Lets look back at the times when the nations former favourite music quiz and dance music collided

 

Yesterday the BBC dropped the bombshell that the music world had long been expecting. Once-relevant televised music quiz, Never Mind the Buzzcocks, would go the way of Top of Pops, Popworld and pretty much every other music show on terrestrial British TV - it was cancelled, basically. In the near future, cultural commentators may describe it as a watershed moment, the time when the damn finally broke, and music-centric television ceased to be a viable format.

In some ways those people would be right. It seems that Buzzcocks may well have been the last defence preventing the twin-powers of Simon Cowell and Jools Holland from conquering the whole kingdom of music television. But in other ways, the show should've been cancelled a long time ago. Certainly any rose-tinted memories we may have of the glory years are tainted by the monotonous snore-fest it later became. I mean, my full time job is writing about music and I reckon the last time I made a point of watching the show must've been in the previous decade.

But as boring as it later became, there were times when Buzzcocks truly felt like one of the most on-point TV shows in the world. It was the show that dragged celebrities and musicians out of the ivory towers and mercilessly mocked them on national TV. And while the show's focus was undoubtedly on pop and rock, it was also responsible for giving a range of producers and DJs some rare airtime on a medium that generally has little time for dance music.

Pete Tong, Annie Mac, The Prodigy, Sister Bliss, Spoony, Artful Dodger, Calvin Harris, DJ Sammy and even the girl from the "Call On Me" video all made appearances over the years. So lets mourn the passing of the show with a look at some Buzzcocks dance music moments that you've probably forgotten about.

 

Steve Aoki Cakes A Fan

This actually occurred on the second-to-last ever episode of Buzzcocks. You can say what you like about Steve (and the fact that he's on here caking people so close to the end of the show's run smacks of "producers clutching at straws") but that is still some hit. Point-blank range, no holding back. If there's one thing the continued existence of You've Been Framed can teach us, it's that the British public love seeing people get hit in the face with almost any object. This is TV gold.

 

Basshunter Gets Spanked

Remember Basshunter? No? Well he had a string of top ten hits around roughly the same time that a man called David Walliams co-wrote and starred in a popular sketch show. At some point in this narrow window of Western culture they both found themselves on an episode of Buzzcocks. Basshunter ended up splayed over David's knee and a spanking was administered on national television. It was simpler times indeed.

 

Sash! On Identity Parade

Sash! were best known for their No.2 hit "Encore Une Fois", but they also had huge success with vocalist Tina Cousins on 1998's "Mysterious Times". That was enough to land her a spot on the dreaded identity parade in a 2006 episode. Luckily for Tina she managed to avoid any particularly scathing comments from professional celeb-slayer, Simon Amstell. And in her defence, she has released five singles since her appearance on the show. That said, none of them managed to chart in the UK, so Simon's probably feeling pretty vindicated.

 

Sophie Ellis Bextor Gets Bullied

A real trip back in time now, as original host Mark Lamarr, former captain Sean Hughes and Canadian comedian Sean Cullen, gang up on poor, fresh-faced, Sophie Ellis-Bextor. I do feel bad for Sophie, but considering the infamous roastings that future guests such as Preston, Huey Morgan and Donny Tourette received, she got off pretty lightly.

 

Moby Is A Tie Breaker

A tie-breaker question in which you have to count the floating bald Moby heads while Michael Snipe, Bruce Willis and Heston Blumenthal try to distract you? This is why we'll all miss Buzzcocks, if only a little bit.