The Hit List: I smugly sat back and was very proud of myself that I remembered Spaceman by Babylon Zoo and Boys by Sabrina

Billy Weir

Marvin and Rochelle Humes host The Hit List

BBC / Tuesday's Child / Naomi Va

Marvin and Rochelle Humes host The Hit List

July 28 2022 04:30 PM

The Hit List is not a programme where members of the public queue up to meet celebrities who you would never tire of slapping.

I would have quite a long list and have sent the idea for the show to Channel 5 but in the meantime, we will have to settle for BBC One’s Saturday evening pop quiz.

This first came to my attention when two people I didn’t know popped up in the middle of the women’s football suggesting that if you loved shouting at the telly then this was the show for you.

I wasn’t sure, but it would make a change from shouting at Gabby Logan, Alex Scott and Ian Wright at the Euros, and as a man who loves a good gulder at the gogglebox it seemed too good an opportunity to miss.

The show follows two well-trodden paths — a quiz based on music and a husband and wife presenting team who I vaguely recognised but wasn’t sure why.

Further enquiries (Google) revealed that Marvin Humes was a member of JLS while Rochelle was in The Saturdays and they also presented This Morning when the real presenters are away on holiday.

I suppose we were to be thankful that Richard and Judy had been overlooked for The Hit List, although Richard could well be a key contender for my Channel 5 spin-off show.

Unlike Pop Quiz, the Mike Read show of the Eighties, where the vast bulk of my pop knowledge remains, the competitors are not pop stars, but members of the public battling it out for a chance to win up to £10,000.

“All you have to do is name the song and the artist,” Marvin helpfully explained, before introducing the three teams with silver-haired Joe from Scotland offering a glimmer of hope it would be more Rose-Marie than Anne-Marie.

When he said he loved a bit of Blur, said in a growly Glaswegian way with about 13 Rs in it, I was immediately on his and son, Harry’s, side.

First up was ‘Five of Five from Five’ and I was struggling as I only really know Keep on Movin’ and the abomination that was their version of We Will Rock You.

Thankfully it just the number five with five seconds of a song from each of the five decades from the 2010s and going all the way back to the Seventies, leaving those of us who were released in that decade to feel very old.

And thus began the shouting at the telly, as I smugly sat back and was very proud of myself that I remembered Spaceman by Babylon Zoo (90s) and Boys by Sabrina (80s) but was put to shame by contestants Mark and Preethi who knew everything.

“No doubt It’s My Life,” buzzed in a very confident Preethi, or rather she said, ‘No Doubt — It’s My Life’ as I shouted at the Humes that this was a cover of Talk Talk’s No.46 smash of 1984.

They didn’t listen, but so good were they that they raced through to the final where you have to name 10 songs and artists and ‘the longer you take, the less you make’, something builders should maybe take on board.

The category was ‘repeat words’ and before they even started you were shouting ‘Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!’ at the telly and sure enough it was the first one and, in the end, the Humes handed over £6,775.

This is about £6,775 more than I have even seen handed out on Tenable, where a team of five (not them again) have to find the top 10 of whatever Warwick Davis tells them.

This isn’t easy for him. Most of his time is spent making truly awful jokes and he had plenty of targets as a team of police colleagues called Cop A Load of Us was introduced.

Each member gets a Tenable board, the ones on offer were car brands, richest football teams, Alfred Hitchcock films and members of the Pussycat Dolls and Little Mix. They should really have brought in Preethi to help with their enquiries.

Captain Steve was up last, the senior member of the squad, asked to name ceremonial counties between Lancashire and Shropshire in the alphabet.

“West Yorkshire,” came the answer and more shouting at the TV and you just hoped that Steve wasn’t a detective as like any fleeing fugitive, his hopes vanished into thin air.

They got to the final, where they were playing for £5,500, each taking turns to name US Presidents between Hoover and Pierce in the alphabet, with quality answers such as ‘Mayflower’, ‘Maryland’ and ‘Trump’ being offered but by this stage I was being led off to a cell in West Yorkshire singing It’s My Life, roaring that it wasn’t No Doubt or Dr Alban or Bon Jovi either. Remember it’s good to Talk Talk.