I'm not alone in roundly despising the new version that MS has foisted upon us.  This morning I Googled "MS response to complaints .......".  I read that they've decided to extend support for the previous version (7) beyond Sept 1st "for a while".  After finding some dodgy downloads of the old version, I found one at Bleeping Computer https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/download/skype-classic/
This seems to work.  You need to uninstall Ver 8 first.
Waiting with baited breath to see what (if anything) happens next Saturday.
For what it's worth !!