These mid 90s TOTPs were all over the place musically. I’m looking for some sort of thread that links the acts on this particular show together and apart from an over arching theme of dance music, I can’t really detect one – it’s all a bit…not exactly eclectic but more…well…haphazard. There’s Britpop, soft rock, cover versions, a novelty record…and Mike And The Mechanics. If the running order is unpredictable one thing that is completely, absolutely unequivocally guaranteed is that host Simon ‘Smug’ Mayo will trot out a string of lame lines that he thinks are shit-your-pants funny. What a plank.

1995 really was in the midst of an identity crisis. Look at the opening act – the prince of Eurodance Haddaway had somehow managed to secure himself four consecutive Top 10 hits between 1993 and early 1994 but the wheels had pretty much come off by this point. His second album “The Drive” did nothing in the UK (I’m not sure we even stocked it in Our Price as I don’t know it’s cover art at all) but somehow its lead single “Fly Away” propelled him into our charts one more time despite everybody knowing (including himself surely) that he was living on borrowed time. Being a resourceful lad, he’s decided the best way to extend his shelf life was to do his best 2 Unlimited impression complete with bringing in a female vocalist to accompany him just to hammer home the Ray and Anita comparison. I guess it worked as “Fly Away” made it to No 20 but this track surely didn’t live long in anyone’s memory.

It’s the aforementioned Mike + The Mechanics next with the title track from their latest album “Beggar On A Beach Of Gold” though curiously they’ve added an ‘A’ to the title of the single. “A Beggar On A Beach Of Gold” was the follow up to “Over My Shoulder” which performed well reaching No 12 in the charts. Its successor couldn’t repeat that though peaking at No 33. Was there a reason for this? Well, this track has Paul Young (not that one) on lead vocals whereas “Over My Shoulder” saw Paul Carrack doing the heaving lifting when it came to the singing. Now, wasn’t their biggest hit “The Living Years” also sung by Carrack so is there a pattern emerging here?

*checks Mike + The Mechanics discography*

Hmm. Not really. Paul Young was the vocalist on “Word Of Mouth”, “Silent Running (On Dangerous Ground)” and “All I Need Is A Miracle” which were all UK Top 40 hits. I’m sure OMD went through a small phase in the mid 80s where their singles sung by Paul Humphreys were hits but those that had Andy McCluskey on the microphone didn’t though. The only other band that comes to mind where the vocals were shared is Tears For Fears but they had big hits with songs sung by both Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal. I seem to be looking at a theory that doesn’t hold water so I’ll move on.

The sadly departed Paul Young (still not that one) was also the singer in Sad Café best known for the hits “My Oh My” (not the Slade song!) and “Everyday Hurts” though I have to say that watching Paul here, I’m not reminded of those hits but taken aback by his resemblance to the actor, screenwriter and novelist Mark Gatiss or rather Mark Gatiss as a League Of Gentlemen character. Perhaps Les McQueen of Crème Brulée?

We’re back to the dance music now with another airing of the video for “(Everybody’s Got To Learn Sometime) I Need Your Loving” by Baby D. A take on The Korgis’ hit of the same name (almost), it was at its chart peak of No 3 this week so not quite equalling the success of their chart topper “Let Me Be Your Fantasy”. Baby D herself was one Dee Fearon and if that surname sounds familiar then it could be due to this guy…

Yes, Dee is married to Phil Fearon of Galaxy fame. You may recall him having a clutch of jaunty pop hits in the mid 80s. A little known fact is that Phil also had a song with the word ‘fantasy’ in it that also got to the top of a chart – sadly for Phil it was the Best of the Rest chart as his single “Fantasy Real” peaked at that most unfortunate of chart positions No 41 in 1983. Yes, Phil’s fantasy of a No 1 record wasn’t real. He should have asked his wife about how to bag a chart topper. “What Do I Do?” indeed.

As predictable as a controversial VAR decision every weekend, here comes Simon Mayo with some inappropriate reference during his link to the next act. Introducing “Shoot Me With Your Love” by D:Ream, he makes some asinine comment about selling bullets to Iran which I’m assuming was his attempt at being topical as the US imposed oil and trade sanctions on Iran over their sponsorship of terrorism, pursuit of nuclear weapons and hostility to the Israeli – Palestinian peace process in this year. Yeah, nice one Mayo. Nothing was off limits to you was it in your pursuit of a cheap gag. What a prick! And look at what he’s wearing to present a music programme reflecting current trends – a shirt and tie! He was only three months away from his 37th birthday at the time of this broadcast – not exactly down with the kids was he?

As for D:Ream, this was the lead single from their second album “World” and the majority of the online reaction to it after this TOTP repeat aired on BBC4 recently went along the lines of “Bloody Hell! Robbie Williams nicked this tune for ‘Let Me Entertain You’!”. I have to say I concur. The chorus hook of both songs is interchangeable. I didn’t I notice this at the time, probably because:

1. Robbie’s song wasn’t released until nearly three years after D:Ream’s single
2. “Shoot Me With Your Love” was hardly that memorable a tune in the first place. Come on, D:Ream are remembered for one song and one song only by the vast majority of people!

Anyway, it did reach No 7 which isn’t to be sniffed at (“Let Me Entertain You” peaked at No 3) whilst parent album “World” also did pretty well with a chart high of No 5 though it sold five times less copies than its predecessor “D:Ream On Vol 1”.

More identity crisis stuff now. A big ballad from a dance act? Maybe it’s more of an anthem than a ballad but even so. Despite being one of M People’s best known songs, “Search For The Hero” is not one of the band’s biggest hits. The third single from their “Bizarre Fruit” album, it did stretch their run of consecutive Top 10 hits to eight but I would have thought it peaked much higher than No 9. Not so. Its status might be due to the fact that its profile was raised not once but twice by external factors. Firstly, a year after its release, it was used as the music for a Peugeot 406 car advert and then, on 29 June 1996, M People performed it at a celebratory concert at Old Trafford to mark the final match of the Euro 96 football tournament. Heather Small was so attached to the idea of the song that she basically rewrote it as her first solo single in 2000 and called it “Proud”. Again, it was latched upon for a sporting purpose becoming the official theme for the London 2012 Olympic bid and, of course, was used as a running gag throughout the BBC sit com Miranda.

It wasn’t just Heather Small who liked to recycle though (as she did by taking “Search For The Hero” and turning it into “Proud”). M People’s record label Deconstruction reused the whole “Bizarre Fruit” album by rereleasing it as “Bizarre Fruit II” just a year later with the radio edits of “Search For The Hero” and “Love Rendezvous” replacing the original album versions plus the band’s version of “Itchycoo Park” by Small Faces added to the track listing. Cheeky blighters.

And now, perhaps one of the most pointless cover versions of all time – Amy Grant’s take on Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi”. Why? Just…why? Well, to get a hit obviously but sheesh, this is totally without merit. A sanitised, horribly 90s version of a song when the original is so well known? No thanks. Amy doesn’t even do the infamous high/low vocal followed by the cringy laugh at the end. Maybe she thought that was a step too far? Maybe she thought that would be disrespectful to Joni? Maybe she thought she was being respectful by not doing it?

For whatever reason, enough punters bought this to send it to No 20 in the UK singles chart, Amy’s biggest hit since “Baby Baby” made No 2 in 1991. Surely it isn’t possible that people didn’t know the 1970 original? Or maybe they were reminded of it but in the pre-streaming days of 1995, the closest thing to having access to Joni’s song (unless you shelled out for the “Ladies Of The Canyon” album it was on) was to buy the Amy Grant version? Not everything was simpler back in the day I guess.

It’s the kings of the TOTP exclusive next as, for what seems like the umpteenth time, Bon Jovi are here with, yep, another ‘exclusive performance’. This time it’s to promote their new album “These Days” which was released the week after this show aired and which would knock Michael Jackson’s “HIStory” Best Of off the top of the charts. There’s no Niagara Falls or American Football stadium location tonight though as they are in the TOTP studio in person. The song they perform here is the album’s title track and, for what it’s worth, it’s pretty good I think. Now I have been known in the past to not be immune to the guilty pleasure that is the Jovi – I once refused to leave a nightclub in Sunderland until I’d danced to them despite being legless through drink – so I may be a little biased but still, I think the song holds up. More reflective and mature than some of their earlier, bombastic stadium rock.

Jon seems to have grown out that shorter haircut he was sporting for the “Always” single back in the Autumn of 1994 and there’s also a change in the band line up as original bass player Alex John Such has been replaced by Hugh McDonald. This track would eventually be released as the fourth single from the album in February 1996 so we may see it again when the BBC4 repeats get to that point in time.

Simon Mayo has another one of his ludicrous non sequiturs for us next as he states that Bon Jovi had recently picked up two Kerrang! awards and a Kerplunk award. For God’s sake man, please just stop!

Right, on with the music and what’s going on here then? Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer teaming up with EMF to do a cover of “I’m A Believer”? Well, it seems to me that in the case of Vic and Bob, they had a history both with this song (it was performed by Vic on the first ever TV show of Vic Reeves’ Big Night Out) and with teaming up with indie rock bands to do cover versions (they, of course, collaborated with The Wonderstuff to take Tommy Roe’s “Dizzy” to No 1 in 1991). As for EMF, it looks to me like a desperate attempt to restart their career which had exploded with UK No 3 and US No 1 “Unbelievable” in 1990. The success of that single and parent album “Schubert Dip” hadn’t sustained and their latest album “Cha Cha Cha” (released in March 1995) had peaked at No 30 and yielded just one minor hit single. By comparison, Vic and Bob were flying with a second series of The Smell Of Reeves And Mortimer having just finished airing. It made sense to associate yourself with a successful act when you’re trying to regain your own popularity and if the plan was to bag themselves a massive seller then it was a case of mission accomplished as “I’m A Believer” peaked at No 3. However, this would prove to be a temporary return to glories. One final throw of the dice in the form of the wonderful follow up single “Afro King” failed to make the Top 40. The band split not long after though have reformed at various points down the years and are currently a functioning entity.

I read Bob Mortimer’s autobiography recently and he comes across as a very humble, vulnerable and warm human being. He was actually very shy as a school kid which looks at odds with his exuberant performance here. One last thing, what was the deal with EMF and songs with the word ‘believe’ in them? “Unbelievable”, “I Believe”, “I’m A Believer”…I would liked to have heard them take on Bucks Fizz’s “Land Of Make Believe” – now that really would make for an interesting cover version!

Six weeks now for Robson & Jerome at No 1 with “Unchained Melody”. SIX WEEKS! I never watched Soldier Soldier, the TV series that spawned this duo so I dug out the infamous clip on YouTube. Here it is…

Hmm. I can’t really see why this scene would have ignited a clamour to be able to buy and own a copy of these two actors doing “Unchained Melody” if I’m honest. If only YouTube had been around back then, maybe all those people who bought the record would have been satiated by being able to watch this clip over and over again instead and we wouldn’t have had to endure Robson & Jerome at all!

The play out track is “Daydreamer” by Menswear but they will be in the studio on the next episode of the show so I’ll keep this short. This was the band’s second single release but their first to be made available extensively after debut “I’ll Manage Somehow” was only printed in very limited quantities meaning that it couldn’t sell enough copies to get in the charts. “Daydreamer” therefore became the band’s first Top 40 hit when it peaked at No 14, also its debut entry position.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Haddaway	Fly Away	Never happening
2	Mike + The Mechanics	A Beggar On A Beach Of Gold	Nope
3	Baby D	(Everybody’s Got To Learn Sometime) I Need Your Loving	No thanks
4	D:Ream	Shoot Me With Your Love	Nah
5	M People	Search For The Hero	No
6	Amy Grant	Big Yellow Taxi	Negative
7	Bon Jovi	These Days	I did not
8	Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer / EMF	I’m A Believer	I wasn’t – no
9	Robson & Jerome	Unchained Melody	As if
10	Menswear	Daydreamer	And no

Disclaimer

I make no claim to the rights of this show and all ownership and contents including logos and graphics belongs totally to the BBC or copyright holder(s).

All opinions on the music and artists featured are my own. Sorry if you don’t agree

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001snq6/top-of-the-pops-22061995