''Beat-Club'' is a West German music programme that ran from September 1965 to December 1972. It was broadcast from

Bremen Bremen ( Low German also: ''Breem'' or ''Bräm''), officially the City Municipality of Bremen (german: Stadtgemeinde Bremen, ), is the capital of the German state Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (''Freie Hansestadt Bremen''), a two-city-state cons ...

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 ...

on ''Erstes Deutsches Fernsehen'', the national public TV channel of the ARD, and produced by one of its members,

Radio Bremen Radio Bremen (RB), Germany's smallest public radio and television broadcaster, is the legally mandated broadcaster for the city-state Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (which includes Bremerhaven). With its headquarters sited in Bremen, Radio Brem ...

, later co-produced by WDR following the 38th episode.

History

''Beat-Club'' was co-created by Gerhard Augustin and Mike Leckebusch. The show premiered on 25 September 1965 with Augustin and Uschi Nerke hosting. German TV personality Wilhelm Wieben opened the first show with a short speech. After eight episodes, Augustin stepped down from his hosting role and was replaced by DJ

Dave Lee Travis David Patrick Griffin (born 25 May 1945), known professionally as Dave Lee Travis, is an English disc jockey, radio presenter and television presenter. Travis began his broadcasting career on the pirate radio station Radio Caroline in 1965. He ...

The show immediately caused a sensation and achieved cult status throughout West Germany among the youth, while the older generation hated it. The show's earlier episodes featured live performances, and was set in front of a plain brick wall. It underwent a revamp in 1967, when a more professional look was adopted with large cards in the background displaying the names of the performers. Around this time, a troupe of young women billed the "Go-Go-Girls," were introduced to dance to songs when their performers couldn't appear. In early 1969, Travis was replaced by Dave Dee, of

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. On 31 December 1969, ''Beat-Club'' switched to colour and again featured live performances. Dee departed in 1970, leaving Nerke as the lone host. In the later years of its run, the series was known for incorporating psychedelic visual effects during many performances, many concentrating on images of the performers in the background. When the show switched to colour, the effects became much more vivid.

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performed on the show on 21 April 1972, halfway through their European Tour (selections of which would make up the live album '' Europe '72''). The band played a shorter set than usual, but still included crowd favourites such as "

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". The set is believed to be the last professionally filmed appearance of

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, who retired from the band following his final gig at the

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shortly after the end of the tour owing to medical reasons and he later died in March 1973. In 2014, the footage had its first theatrical screening in theatres across the US.

Acts on the show

In its seven-year run before being replaced by ''

Musikladen ''Der Musikladen'' (german: The Music Shop) was a West German music television programme that ran from 13 December 1972 to 29 November 1984. The show continued the 1960s '' Beat-Club'' under a new name, and in turn was replaced by ''Extratour' ...

'' the show featured artists such as the following: *

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* Barry St. John *

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* Can *

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* Cherry Wainer *

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* The Equals *

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and

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* Fanny *

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* Free * Frumpy *

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* Jethro Tull *

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* Manassas *

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* MC5 *

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* Redbone *

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* Santana *

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* Spirit * Steppenwolf * Stone the Crows *

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* T. Rex *

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* Zager and Evans Performances from the show were seen on

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, and reruns air in several European countries. Several DVD collections have also been released.

Relaunch

''Beat Club'' is now broadcast on Sunday afternoons between 1 and 3 pm as a weekly radio programme on Radio Bremen 1 and on a web channel offered by the radio station. The radio show is still hosted, rather nostalgically, by Nerke, reprising her role as presenter for the series. The 2008

Video on demand Video on demand (VOD) is a media distribution system that allows users to access videos without a traditional video playback device and the constraints of a typical static broadcasting schedule. In the 20th century, broadcasting in the form of ...

web portal launched for ''Beat-Club'' and ''Musikladen'' was replaced by a

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

channel in 2010.

References

External links

TV.com: Beat-Club
- complete list with all tracks (in English)
Beat-Club
channel on YouTube * {{ARD Radio Bremen German music television series Pop music television series 1965 German television series debuts 1972 German television series endings German-language television shows Das Erste original programming