In the BBC1's "Life on Mars", actor John Simm finds himself trapped in 1973. How would you manage? There would be no mobile phones, computers or the internet. 1973 was the year of the OPEC oil crisis and the time of power cuts, strikes and the three day week. It was also the year Britain joined European Common Market. But what else was going on?
1973 was the year of Glitter and Glam Rock. The Sweet topped the year's best sellers' list with "Blockbuster", closely followed by Gary Glitter's "I Love You Love Me Love". A touch of culture was bought to the list by the year's third best seller, the Simon Park Orchestra's "Eye Level" (the theme tune from the detective series "Vandervalk"). Slade also featured heavily in the chart of 1973 with their classic hits, including "Cum on Feel the Noize", "Skweeze Me Pleeze Me", "My Frend Stan" and everyone's favourite Christmas tune "Merry Xmas Everybody".
Other Glam Rock hits of 1973 also included "See My Baby Jive" and "Angel Fingers" by Wizzard and further hits by the Sweet - "Ballroom Blitz" and "Hell Raiser". Gary Glitter, who has now sadly fallen from grace, had three other hits - "Do You Want to Touch Me (Oh Yeah), "Hello Hello I'm Back Again" and "I'm the Leader of the Gang (I am)", which reached number one in July 1973.
1973 also saw more hits from the singing Osmond Brothers from Utah, USA. Donny, every young girls' pin-up, had number one hits with "The Twelfth of Never" and "Young Love" and a number four hit with "When I Fall in Love". Not to be outdone, younger sister Marie had a number two hit in November 1973 with "Paper Roses". The Osmond Brothers (Alan, Wayne, Merrill, Jay and Donny) had two hits with "Going Home" and "Let Me In".
Other American pop stars who had hits in 1973 included the star of television's "The Partridge Family", David Cassidy, who had a number one hit in October 1973 with "Daydreamer/The Puppy Song" and a number three hit in March of the same year with "I'm a Clown/Some Kind of Summer". The pop charts of 1973 were also blessed with the wonderful voice of the late Karen Carpenter, who had two hits with her brother, Richard with "Yesterday Once More" and the uplifting song "Top of the World".
One of the greatest pop icons, David Bowie, had four hits in 1973, "Drive In Saturday", "Life on Mars" (from which the BBC programme is named), "Sorrow" and the rather amusing and unusual song "The Laughing Gnome".
Mention should also be made of other best seller records from 1973 which you may have forgotten about!
1973 was certainly a diverse year for pop music!
In "Life on Mars", John Simm's boss, DCI Gene Hunt, played by Phillip Glenister, drives a Cortina 2000GXL - the top of the range Cortina from the that year. The lucky driver had a host of luxury features, including a black vinyl roof and real simulated wood facia and door trim. With the 2.0 litre engine, it could reach 60mph from rest in a shade over 10 seconds and had a top speed of 103mph - not bad for 1973. But for more performance, go for the Sweeney's Regan's choice of the Granada with a 3.0 V6 and just as much fake wood (interior left).
Of course in 1973 you could still go out and buy a chrome bumper MGB, but the ultimate sports car was still the E-Type Jaguar with a 5 litre V12.
John Simm's character missed his mobile on "Life on Mars". In the 70s the latest thing was the pocket calculator like this Sinclair (right) or if you wanted to be really high tech an LED digital watch was de rigueur. In those days, colour TV was still quite new and few people had video recorders. So you had to stay in to watch the Sweeney.
Oh and the nearest you could get to a mobile phone was a Trimphone. The GPO had just about got them to work properly by 1973.