Originally published as a FB Note, on 17 July 2008 at 00:06
Inflation, oil price rises and public sector strikes. Turn on the news and you’d be forgiven for wondering if you’d suffered the same fate as Sam Tyler in ‘Life on Mars’ and woken up in the 1970’s. Even the England football team are joining in with the nostalgia, resolutely failing to qualify for a major championships.
So what else are we expected to enjoy or endure again, thirty-odd years on? We’ve already seen the return of ‘Swap Shop’, hosted now by that other icon of the 70’s, Basil Brush. The seminal rock act of the age, Led Zeppelin got back onstage, possibly for one more night only and now Channel five have brought back ‘Superstars’. It all sounds so comfy and reassuringly familiar.
Wait a minute, though. We’re talking about a time commonly known as “The Decade That Taste Forgot” in homage to the fashions of the day. A time that Andrew Marr, in his ‘History of Modern Britain’ saw fit to dedicate the title ‘Paradise Lost’. Power rationing, a government emasculated by the narrowness of its majority, the so-called ‘Winter of Discontent’ and crippling unemployment.
Is this the shape of things to come or a reminder that things may not be as bad as we might think? Unfortunately, 2008 will have entered into history before we’ll know the answer to that one…
Resonation 