I just saw a comedy sketch on 'TV to go' (BBC1) which featured B7. I thought it was quite a good sketch, and that B7 was used in a pretty intelligent way.

Four friends are sitting in a pub, reminiscing about the seventies and you think it is just a simple piss-take of people my age ('cola flavoured spangles were the best' etc.)

But then one of the friends just takes it too far, going on and on about music, clothes, the school disco 'Dancing to Hot Chocolate'. the others look embarrassed. 'It was me and Susie, me and Susie all the way.' Then the mood darkens 'But she married you, didn't she Charles, and now she's dead'

Oops. you realise why they are letting him go on and on about the seventies, without interrupting him.

In the next bit of the sketch they are discussing blakes 7, and everyone is joining in enthusiastically.

'Blake' 'And Vila' 'Gan, he was that big strong man' 'And Avon, what was that all about?' 'There was some kind of ambiguous, good/baddy thing going on.' 'And that whole love/hate relationship with Servalan.' 'Blakes 7 was great wasn't it?'

So the writer remembers B7 well, and he's using it to dramatise the tensions in the group. Are they being so enthusiastic because they like the show? Or are they pandering to their friend because of his grief? And how appropriate B7 is to that kind of use.

And then at the end, the sad seventies man starts talking about Rubik's cubes, and all his friends get up, and leave him sitting alone in the pub, talking to himself.

A real rib-tickler, then

Alison