Magic Roundabout

(Especially for Steve and Bill)

I was at Ian's Birthday party on Saturday night and as the wee hours of the morning drifted by I found myself in an impromptu "pop-quiz" with Steve, Bill & Hans. I say pop-quiz loosely because the word "quiz" implies some sort of a competition - it was more like a slaughter although Bill was determined to "get warmed up" (I hasten to mention that it was 2am in the morning at this point).

Scores on the doors: -

Steve - 0
Hans - 0
Bill - 3
Simon 601

One of Bill's questions which he delivered with an air of arrogance & confidence that belied the sorry state of his score vs mine was - "What country was Freddie Mercury born is?"

Naturally my answer was instant, delivered before the question was finished and most importantly right - "Zanzibar".

Bill was crushed - job done.

So what has this got to do with the Magic Roundabout? Well one of my questions was "Who had a hit with the song Funky Moped?" - I gave many clues such as "He is from Birmingham", "The song was so famous because it actually was a hit not in it's own right but because of the 'B'-side", "He had a hugely funny TV show which included a character 'Dave the Cardboard Box'". The hints were endless but the response still blank.

The answer was Jasper Carrot and the 'B'-Side to the hit was "Magic Roundabout".

Now to all you Brits born in the 50's, 60's and early 70's you'll remember the Magic Roundabout, it was on for just five minutes at the end of kids TV just before the evening news. Check out the start and the theme tune - (ahhh that brings back memories)



It was actually a French animated cartoon that the BBC discarded the original story lines and came up with their own. A real classic icon of a programme. Check out the episode "Dylan - Sculpture"

Jasper Carrot on the other hand thought it was a good idea to do a bit of a risque spoof of it - he was right - and here it is.