Top of the Pops
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50 free Top of the Pops trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
For more than four decades, Top of the Pops was where Britain found out what was number one. A slot on the weekly chart show could turn a new single into a hit overnight, and a few minutes of television gave pop some of its most replayed moments. This quiz covers the whole run: how the programme began and how it bowed out, the presenters and dance troupes who became household names, the changing theme tunes, and the performers who bent the rules on miming. There are also questions on missing episodes, spin-offs, overseas versions and the stories behind well-known appearances. It is written for anyone who grew up watching the countdown, for quiz setters after a music round, and for younger fans curious about where so many pop legends were made. Every answer comes with a short explanation.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Top of the Pops magazine coined the famous individual nicknames of which pop group in a 1996 feature?
Spice Girls
Spice Girls members became Baby, Ginger, Posh, Scary and Sporty after editor Peter Loraine's team invented the labels following a lunch with the group.
Q 02The only Beatles footage from Top of the Pops long thought to survive was a clip reused in which BBC series?
Doctor Who
Doctor Who borrowed a short clip of the band playing 'Ticket to Ride' for the 1965 serial The Chase, and that excerpt outlived the BBC's own copy of the performance.
Q 03An instrumental cover of which rock band's song was the Top of the Pops theme tune for most of the 1970s?
Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin's 'Whole Lotta Love' became the theme in a version by the band CCS, a UK chart hit in 1970, and a remix of it returned to open the show from 1998 to 2003.
Q 04Dexys Midnight Runners sang 'Jackie Wilson Said' on Top of the Pops beneath a photo of a namesake from which sport?
Darts
Darts star Jocky Wilson's face filled the screen behind the band in 1982, and frontman Kevin Rowland later said the swap was his own idea, not a BBC mistake.
Q 05Which Radio 1 DJ pretended to play the mandolin behind Rod Stewart's 'Maggie May' on Top of the Pops in 1971?
John Peel
John Peel joined Stewart and the Faces on stage, and near the end of the song the band began kicking a football around while the record played on.
Q 06Which American band protested Top of the Pops' miming rule in 1991 when its singer performed in a deep, deadpan voice?
Nirvana
Nirvana were told to sing 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' over a backing track, so Kurt Cobain dropped his voice while Krist Novoselic swung his bass over his head.
Q 07Which regular Top of the Pops host missed the 2006 finale because she was filming Love Island in Fiji?
Fearne Cotton
Fearne Cotton still opened the farewell with a short introduction recorded on location, while Edith Bowman co-presented the hour-long show in the studio.
Q 08Which singer performed the very first song on Top of the Pops on New Year's Day 1964?
Dusty Springfield
Dusty Springfield opened with 'I Only Want to Be with You' on a show the BBC had planned to run for only a few programmes; it lasted more than 42 years.
Q 09A 1996 move to Friday nights put Top of the Pops in direct competition with which ITV favourite?
Coronation Street
Coronation Street went out at the same time once the chart show settled at 7.30 pm, forcing fans to choose and starting a major decline in Top of the Pops' audience.
Q 10Which rock band appeared on Top of the Pops more often than any other group, from 1968 to 2005?
Status Quo
Status Quo made 106 appearances, the first with 'Pictures of Matchstick Men' and the last with 'The Party Ain't Over Yet'.
Q 11Which band was the first group ever to perform on Top of the Pops, playing 'I Wanna Be Your Man'?
The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones followed the opening solo singer on the first edition, and 42 years later their song 'The Last Time' opened the farewell episode.
Q 12Which band was the last act to play live on a weekly Top of the Pops, performing 'Chasing Cars' in 2006?
Snow Patrol
Snow Patrol played in the penultimate edition, because the farewell a week later was built from archive clips and tributes with no live acts in the studio.
Q 13Which singer held the number one spot on the final weekly Top of the Pops with a hit featuring Wyclef Jean?
Shakira
Q 21Marc Bolan's glittery 1971 performance of 'Hot Love' on Top of the Pops is often seen as the start of which genre?
Glam rock
Glam rock took off after the T. Rex frontman appeared in shiny satin and glittery make-up, the latter suggested by his stylist Chelita Secunda.
Q 22Which David Bowie song did he perform on Top of the Pops in July 1972, inspiring a generation of future musicians?
Starman
Starman climbed to number 10 after the broadcast, and Robert Smith of the Cure later said everyone his age remembers the night it was on.
Q 23Which band holds the record for the longest Top of the Pops performance with the nine-minute 'Jesus of Suburbia'?
Green Day
Shakira's 'Hips Don't Lie' had climbed back to the top of the UK chart earlier that same day, just in time to close the final countdown in July 2006.
Q 14Which English city hosted Top of the Pops for its first two years before the show moved to London?
Manchester
Manchester's Dickenson Road Studios in Rusholme staged the first edition, but the capital was thought easier for bands to reach and the programme left in 1966.
Q 15On which evening of the week did BBC One show Top of the Pops for most of its 42-year run?
Thursday
Thursday became the regular slot in September 1964, after the earliest editions had gone out on Wednesdays, and it remained the show's traditional night until the mid-1990s.
Q 16Which all-female dance troupe became a regular fixture on Top of the Pops between 1968 and 1976?
Pan's People
Pan's People danced to hits whose performers could not appear in the studio, and each member was paid the minimum Equity rate of £56 a week.
Q 17Which six-woman dance troupe replaced the mixed-sex Ruby Flipper on Top of the Pops in late 1976?
Legs & Co.
Legs & Co. got their name from a viewers' competition, after spending their first weeks on screen listed as a row of question marks in the end credits.
Q 18Which Britpop band's singer and guitarist swapped roles while miming 'Roll with It' on Top of the Pops in 1995?
Oasis
Oasis sent Liam Gallagher out pretending to play guitar while Noel mouthed the vocal and held his brother's tambourine, mocking the order to mime.
Q 19Which band's singer waved gladioli instead of a microphone while miming 'This Charming Man' on Top of the Pops?
The Smiths
The Smiths' frontman Morrissey objected to having to lip-sync, so he carried a bunch of the flowers on stage where a microphone would normally be.
Q 20Brian May says which Queen single got its 1975 video so the band could avoid miming on Top of the Pops?
Bohemian Rhapsody
Bohemian Rhapsody was thought too complex to mime convincingly, and the film made in its place first aired on the show in November 1975.
Green Day's 2005 performance of the full nine-minute song ran about three times the limit the show had placed on studio acts through most of the 1990s.
Q 24Which heavy metal band refused to mime 'Running Free' in 1980 and played live on Top of the Pops instead?
Iron Maiden
Iron Maiden were promoting their debut single at the time, yet the newcomers got their way and played it for real.
Q 25Which guitarist was left stranded on Top of the Pops in 1967 when an Alan Price Set record played instead of his?
Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix was ready to perform 'Burning of the Midnight Lamp' when the wrong record rolled, and he reportedly quipped that he did not know the words.
Q 26What happened to the tapes of most Top of the Pops episodes made before 1976, leaving them lost today?
Wiped by the BBC
Wiped by the BBC under what was then standard practice for videotape, the early archive is so thin that only about 20 of the first 500 episodes survive complete.
Q 27'Top Gear of the Pops', Jeremy Clarkson's 2007 take on Top of the Pops, was made to raise money for which charity?
Comic Relief
Comic Relief got the special after a celebrity quiz planned for the night was withdrawn, and the three hosts ended it by performing as a band with Justin Hawkins.
Q 28Which talent-show judge said in 2008 that he would be willing to buy Top of the Pops from the BBC?
Simon Cowell
Simon Cowell's idea went nowhere: the BBC replied that it had not been formally approached and that the format was not up for sale anyway.
Q 29In 2005 Top of the Pops lost its prime-time Friday slot and moved to Sunday evenings on which channel?
BBC Two
BBC Two took the show after ratings fell below three million; the stated aim was to air it straight after Radio 1 revealed the new chart each Sunday.
Q 30Which leading British punk band was known for refusing to appear on Top of the Pops at all?
The Clash
The Clash's refusal fed a sense that the programme had become uncool, one of the reasons behind its radical 1991 revamp, nicknamed 'Year Zero'.