412 Goodbye Ken Dodd - Hold My Hand

Chart  entered : 26   December  1981

Chart  peak : 44

We  close  our  1981  account  with  a  farewell  to  some  very  Old  Pop. Ken's  chart  career  had  peaked  at  the  height  of  Beatlemania  with  "Tears"  in  1965  becoming  the  third  best  selling  record  of  the  sixties. Two  more  Top  5  hits  followed  in  its  wake. Thereafter  he  was  somewhat  eclipsed  by  the  rather  sexier  Engelbert  Humperdinck  and  the  hits  became  smaller  and  more  sporadic.  His  TV  and  stage  career  as  a  comedian  showed  no  signs  of  slackening  off  and  after  1976  his  visits  to  the  recording  studio  became  less  frequent. I  guess  the  fact  that  royalties  weren't  paid  in  cash  also  made  the  music  business  less  appealing.

This  was  Ken's  first  hit  since  1975  and  was  accompanied  by  a  little  controversy. Since  the  expansion  of  the  charts  to  a  Top 75 , appearances  on  Top  of  the  Pops  had  been  governed  by  a  set  of   production  rules  which  were  transparent, fair  and  protected  the  show  from  the  attentions  of  record  pluggers. Top  of  the  Pops  concentrated  on  the  Top  30  but  where  there  were  spare  slots  they  were  allocated  to new  entries  or  climbers  in  the  31-75  range  in  strict  order, the  only  proviso  being  that  the  acts  must  come  into  the  studio  to  perform.

That  rule  was  clearly  broken  when  Ken  was  given  the  opportunity  to  perform  "Hold My  Hand"  on  the  edition  of  10th  December  1981  because  he  was  nowhere  near  the  chart  at  the  time. By  my  reckoning  Spandau  Ballet  were  the  losers  by  this, missing  the  opportunity  to  perform  Paint  Me  Down  on  the  show.   It' s  easy  to  see  why  it  happened ; Top  of  the  Pops  producer  Michael  Hurll  also   produced  many  of  the  Beeb's  light  entertainment  programmes  and  probably  felt  he  had  to  keep  a  top  talent  like  Doddy  on  side . Nevertheless  it  left  a  nasty  aftertaste  ; just  a  month  later  the  rules  were  rigidly  applied  when  cabaret  electropop  duo  the  Techno  Twins  were  about  to  perform  their  version  of  Can't  Help  Falling  In  Love   but  were  gazumped  by  the  last  minute  arrival  of   Elkie  Brooks   by  helicopter  to  do  Fool  If  You  Think  It's  Over.  It  led  on  to  subsequent  rule-breaking  features  like  Jonathan  King's  US  chart  rundown  until  they  were  eventually  tossed  out  altogether.

"Hold  My  Hand "  was  written  by  Mick  Coleman  who  was  the  Michael  in  Brian  and  Michael  of  Matchstalk  Men  and  Matchstalk  Cats  And  Dogs  fame  and  also  wrote  such  horrors  as  The  Sparrow  and  There's  No  One  Quite Like  Grandma. I  got  to  speak  to  him  briefly  in  the  nineties  when  a  colleague  in  the  part  time  Irish  band  he  was  playing  bass  in  , worked  in  our  office  as  an  IT  guy  and  I  took  a  phone  call  from  him.

It's  well  down  there  with  those  other  hits ,with  a  lyric  about  racial  unity  that  makes  Ebony  and  Ivory  seem  like  Gil  Scott-Heron  and  a  nursery  rhyme  melody  that's  hard  to  shake  out  of  your  head. Ken's  backed  by  another  primary  school  choir  and  they're  needed  as  his  54-year  old  baritone  sounds  decidedly  rusty . Brevity  is  its  only  virtue . Sentimental  Christmas  sales  got  it  to  the  brink  of  the  Top  40   but  no  further.

There  isn't  much  more  of  Ken's  recording  career , just  three  more  singles  "Now  and  Forever", "Little  Words"  ( both  1984 )  and  "When  A  Child  Is  Born" ( 1987 ), none  of  which  I've  heard.

 At  the  end  of  the  decade  Ken  was  arrested  for  tax  evasion. The  evidence  was  overwhelming  with  him  making  frequent trips  to  the  Isle  of  Man  with  suitcases  full  of  cash  earnings, some  of  which  were  found, ready  to  go,  in  his  attic. The  defence  was  basically  "He's  a  great  guy, you  don't  really  want  to  send  him  to  prison  do  you ? "  and  astonishingly  it  worked. In  one  of  the  great  miscarriages  of  justice  he  was  found  not  guilty  though  the  verdict  didn't  save  him  from  a  hefty  tax  bill.

Ken  returned  to  the  boards  and  continued  doing  what  he  does  best  right  up  to  the  present  day  with  occasional  celebratory  appearances  on  TV.