61. Cliff performs at the Sydney Opera House
1973Following up his initial tour in 1961, Cliff returned to Australia for the opening of one the world's greatest music venues: the Sydney Opera House.
Cliff performed a series of concerts at the prestigious venue shortly after its opening, and became one of the first performers to be able to claim they'd sung at the Sydney Opera House
62. First-hand experience of the third world
1973
Following a stint at the Sydney Opera House where he was feted with champagne and fine food, Cliff flew straight to one of the neediest nations on earth; Bangladesh.
What he saw shocked him, and he wandered around horribly aware that he did not want to touch the children before him when suddenly someone
accidentally stepped on the fingers of a child in front of him. The child's cry of pain made Cliff instinctively reach out at hold the child, forgetting about the dirt and sores, teaching him what he has always taken with him as a lesson in Christian compassion.
The experience made him feel utterly useless and ashamed of his privileged position. At the end of the one day during a meeting in the nurses' quarters he expressed this by saying, 'What I've seen today makes me feel like giving up my life in England and staying here to help.' A nurse on the tour responded to him with the following question: 'Can you give an injection or put someone on a drip?' , to which he responded, 'No, I couldn't. I'd be horrified.' 'Well you'd be little use here,' she smiled, 'Go back home and raise money for us to do it. That's what you do and this is what we do. Without you and other Christians at home we couldn't be here. We need each other.'
These simple words helped to make Cliff more aware of his role as a Christian, and helped him to re-focus his career to help those Christians in the field.
63.Cliff's last film is released
26 December, 1974The film that brought an end to Cliff's movie career was
Take Me High; an attempt to prove musicals could be made without dancing.
Cliff played the character of Tim Matthews who ends up reviving a restaurant's flagging trade by inventing the 'Brumberger', and Debbie Watling played the love interest Sarah.
Take Me High was something of a hangover from another era and failed to ignite much interest at the box office. It became Cliff's first film not to make its money back.
64. Honky Tonk Angel withdrawn from circulation
September, 1975
Perhaps the most controversial single of Cliff's career was his cover of Honky Tonk
Angel. After discovering at a Christian conference that this song was about a prostitute he withdrew in from circulation, even requesting DJs return all copies.
It became his lowest selling single ever with little more than 10,000 sales, and 1975 was Cliff's first year without a hit single.
65. I'm Nearly Famous re-launches Cliff's career
May 1976
Since his conversion to Christianity, Cliff hadn't been particularly interested in his recording career. As a result of this, his sales were seriously beginning to slide and he looked to be teetering on the brink of becoming a 'greatest hits' artist.
Producer Dave Mackay was brought in to help arrest the slide, and although his first few efforts didn't show much in the way of results, on
31st of February Street he helped to bring Cliff into the seventies musically, with Cliff even writing almost half the songs. While the album wasn't a hit, Cliff later said, 'That album was, to me, the turning point of my career.'
It was an old member of the Shadows, however, who would go on to give Cliff the hits - and credibility - that he'd been lacking with his next album,
I'm Nearly Famous.
For this album his journey to America and unearthed a track hidden away on a cassette given to him by the Lionel Conway, head of Island Music, called
Miss You Nights which Conway hadn't thought to mention, but would become the first top-twenty single from Cliff's new album and his most requested song on radio. He also found a song by one of Cliff's band members, Terry Britain, which he'd co-written with a singer a children's television show host Christine Holmes , called
Devil Woman.
The first single to be released was Miss You Nights which sold solidly and gave Cliff his first top twenty hit in two years. The next single,
Devil Woman, however, was the one to turn his career around. The first time any of them heard it played on the radio was when Terry Britten heard a DJ play the first few bars and then ask listeners to ring up and guess who was about to sing. No-one guessed it was Cliff, and there seemed to be genuine excitement that he had produced a track like this.
When the album itself was released it was greeted with the same enthusiasm with Melody Maker writing, 'Cliff Richard has at last made the sort of album he could, and should, have been making for years. It is with some incredulity that I have to say that for the past ten days I've been playing two albums constantly. One is Marvin Gaye's
I Want You. The other is I'm Nearly Famous. The renaissance of Richard, for that is what I believe this album heralds, is long overdue...It is the best album of new songs ever.'
Record companies around the world churned out I'm Nearly Famous badges and t-shirts, and even Elizabeth Tayler, Pete Townshend and Elton John were spotted wearing
I'm Nearly Famous badges after Rocket released the album in the US.
I'm Nearly Famous ended up becoming Cliff's highest selling album worldwide since
The Young Ones and signalled to the world that he was, once again, a force to be reckoned with.
66. Cliff becomes the first western rock artist to tour Russia
August 1976
After discovering that his records were now sold officially in Russia, Cliff received an invitation from the
Official State Entertainment Department to perform a series of concerts in the then-communist country.
Cliff's reception in Russia was extremely warm, with every one of the 91,000 tickets to his twenty concerts sold out. On the first night in
Leningrad the orchestra pit even had to be opened up to prevent enthusiastic fans from jumping onto the stage!
67. Devil Woman becomes Cliff's first UK top-ten
August 1976
America had always seemed elusive for Cliff, but I'm Nearly Famous seemed to be a strong enough album to finally helping him to make an impact in the
birthplace of rock'n'roll, and, sure enough, Cliff was soon signed to Elton John's Rocket label which was to promote the album across the Atlantic.
Cliff undertook his first ever publicity tour of the States, which lasted for four weeks, and by the end of June the first single,
Devil Woman, entered the Billboard charts at No.88 and began to steadily climb through July and August.
When the news broke that Devil Woman had become Cliff's first top ten in the US he was on tour in Russia. It went on to reach No.5 and become a US million-seller.
68. Forty Golden Greats tops the UK charts
October, 1977
While riding high on the wave of his new found success, Cliff released his most comprehensive 'greatest hits' collection to date.
The album, Forty Golden Greats, is significant not just due to the fact it was his first comprehensive compilation album, but also because it was his first No.1 album since the soundtrack to
Summer Holiday reached the summit fourteen years earlier.
69. Cliff releases his highest selling single of all time
July, 1979
While Cliff was recording his Rock'n'Roll Juvenile album with Terry Britten, Bruce Welch came across a track Alan Tarney had written for his next album with Trevor Spencer under the banner Tarney-Spencer. Bruce immediately felt that the song would be perfect for Cliff and pleaded with Alan to let him take the song to him, and he eventually gave in.
We Don't Talk Anymore ended up giving his first UK chart-topper since Congratulations in 1968, and became his highest selling single of all time. It also became his second US top ten hit, reaching No.8.
70. Norrie Paramor dies
September 1979
Cliff's first producer and mentor, Norrie Paramor died in September 1979.
Norrie quit work at EMI in 1968, but continued to produce Cliff until 1973. In that same year he moved to Birmingham to conduct the Midlands Light Orchestra.
