Turning A “We Will Rock You” Singalong Into A Colorful Event

This happened back in the late 1970s. My family had a TV in the living room. This was back when TVs were analog, with lots of mechanical switches and dials to control the channel, volume, and, most importantly for this story, the picture.

This particular TV had “Hue” and “Color” sliders. The mechanism in one of them was either dirty or faulty and the color would randomly go out. We found out pretty quickly that tapping the TV on the top would vibrate the slider enough that the color would come back. And soon after that, we found that stomping our feet on the floor had the same effect, but we didn’t need to leave the comfort of our seats.

One evening, a friend of my brother’s stopped by to pick him up. As he was standing in the living room making small talk with me, my mom, my dad, and my sister, the color on the TV went out. Cue a few seconds of furious stomping of feet by everyone before the conversation returned to normal.

The friend later asked my brother why his family suddenly started stomping their feet during the small talk. After my brother stopped laughing, he explained that it wasn’t personal; that’s just how we fix the TV.