And Here's Why ... >>
The 7 Ages of Parky >>
Dediddly-der-d-da >>
Pissing All Over Parky >>
The Nation Vs Parky >>

Even if you weren't particularly well disposed towards Parky's sycophantic panderings, it was still possible to get something out of his show; namely the theme music, the flat-out Hammond-heavy stoner jazz majesty of The Harry Stoneham Five's 'Michael's Theme'.

A close relative of the theme from its fellow Saturday night scheduling staple DAVE ALLEN AT LARGE, 'Michael's Theme' is the missing link between the smokey jazz-club mumblings of late 1960s arts shows and the big band sound that will always signify primetime variety shows, and the full version (as heard on the unexpectedly superb Top BBC TV Themes Vol.3 alongside such equally striking fare as THE BODY IN QUESTION, the demented THE ENIGMA FILES and, erm, Tony Hatch's ill-advised late 1970s-styled refit for MAN ALIVE) is festooned with fiddly free-form guitar and organ diversions, not to mention one of those sorry-I-thought-you'd-finished calamatious jazz endings that always sat well over the producer's credit and the copyright date.

On top of the generous opening and closing extracts that made it just about worth sitting through the show itself, there were also the tantalising bursts that were inevitably used on "Saturday Night on BBC1!" trailers, and of course the indelible memory of Rik Mayall singing a frighteningly forceful rendition of it whilst smashing up Nicholas Parson's flat.

But even that simple pleasure has been denied to us now.

The original arrangement has long since been abandoned in favour of a bland, bland, bland brass-led effort which is not only dull and uninspiring and decidedly unSaturdayish in approach, but also commits the unforgiveable offence of 'improving' on the stacatto joy of the frantic Hammond melody. Notes that once whizzed by are now held for an absolute age (cf "de-diddly-daada-daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa, de-diddly-daada-daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa" rather than the traditional "dediddly-der-d-da, ded iddly-der-d-da"), which is just plain wrong, frankly. And also, weirdly, the polar opposite of the way that Brucie contracted the legendary "la-iy-y-ffffe, is the naaaame of the gaaaaame" to "lif- isthe nameofthegame" as time went by, perhaps hinting at some weird symbolic theme tune-related representation of his and Parky's wildly varying degrees of enduring entertainment value.

Still, small wonder that Parky chooses to give endless airings to Jamie Cullum's dreary reach-for-the-skip-button reworkings of old standards instead of his more interesting self-penned efforts when he can't even get his own theme music right.