Remembering The Roxy

The current run of Top of the Pops repeats have reached the summer of 1987 it was during this time that ITV started their own version The Roxy. Presented at first by David 'Kid' Jensen and Kevin Sharky. Jensen of course had been a presenter of TOTP and Sharky a couple of years ago announced his intention to run for President of the Republic of Ireland. The Roxy struggled in a slot against Eastenders in it's prime. After a short while changes were made, this included a change of studio and presenters. In came Pat Sharp another former TOTP presenter and Paul Nolan had been a contestant on Blind Date. But the changes were not enough and The Roxy came to an end in April 1988 just 9 months after it started. One criticism was the lack of star names willing to come to the Newcastle studio to perform. Though 2 big names who did appear were Robert Plant and Bryan Ferry. It would be a decade later until ITV would do another performance based music show, CD:UK hosted by Ant & Dec and Cat Deeley. The Roxy today is a curio in British Music TV.