We’ve nearly got to that point in the 90s when one the decade’s most historic events took place – the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. Two days after this TOTP aired, reports started to emerge that she had been involved in a car crash in Paris before her death, aged just 36, was confirmed. It really is one of those seismic incidents which anchors you in time. I’m guessing we can all remember where we were when the story broke. I myself was in my flat in Manchester doing not very much at all (well it was a Sunday) but from the moment news came in of what had happened, the coverage was wall-to-wall. Normal life seemed to be put on hold. Now, I should say straight out that I’m not a fan of the monarchy and don’t believe in the institution but I could appreciate that this was a tragedy especially for her two young children. What I couldn’t understand though was the reaction of the general public which seemed to be frenzied hysteria – vast swathes of the population seemed to lose all sense of proportion. There were stories of people missing funerals of family and friends to go to London to watch the funeral procession on its way to Westminster Abbey. Coverage of the funeral showed people wailing uncontrollably and hurling bunches of flowers at the coffin. I just didn’t understand nor agree with, what seemed to me, to be these disproportionate displays.

The day of the funeral on 6th September saw everything close in the morning as a mark of respect and so that the nation could watch the funeral. The Our Price store where I worked dutifully complied. We opened in the afternoon and the very first bloke who came in walked straight up to the counter and said “Have you got that song that Elton John sang at the funeral?”. In today’s digital world, that wouldn’t have seemed like an unreasonable request but back in 1997, it was a ludicrous question. I was flabbergasted. How did he think we would have copies of a single in stock of a song that had just been performed for the first time ever about an hour before. At this point, it hadn’t even been decided that it would be made available to the general public via a single release. I should be clear that the guy was asking for that version of the song specifically performed at the funeral and not just the original “Candle In The Wind” recording. Even if he’d have been happy with the original, we might have had it on a Greatest Hits but that would have been it. In 2025, a song from an event of such public interest could be made available on a streaming platform instantly but in 1997, the world just didn’t work like that. Ultimately, the song was released as a single about a week later but that’s a discussion for a future post. Right now, let’s sit back and watch TOTP as if in a more innocent time before Diana’s death.

Jayne Middlemiss is our host again and executive producer Chris Cowey is still wedded to the idea of incorporating a model of the figure 1 into the show’s opening to enforce the idea that it is still the No 1 music show on TV. This week, a glammed up Jayne in full evening dress walks on as the model No 1 drops to the floor behind her. No, you’re right it doesn’t really work does it? The opening artist is Jon Bon Jovi who continues the royal theme to this post with his single “Queen Of New Orleans”. The second track released from his “Destination Anywhere” album, like its predecessor “Midnight In Chelsea”, it was co-written with Dave Stewart of Eurythmics. A solo album by the man behind Bon Jovi was never going to be a huge departure from the sound that made him and his band global stars but “Queen Of New Orleans” is no “Livin’ On A Prayer”. It’s got a laid back feel to it with Jon growling his way through the lyrics whilst some rock guitars squall and squeal away in the background. Ah yes, those lyrics. It’s hard to believe that two men with the amount of hits to their names as Bon Jovi and Stewart could have come up with such useless words. For example:

“Me and Leigh met Summer of ‘95, in a burgundy dress looking finer than a French wine“

Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: David Allan Stewart / Jon Bon Jovi
Queen Of New Orleans lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group

Really? Burgundy and French wine in a line together? Talk about cheesy (thank God they didn’t!). Then there’s this:

“That night I made a move, man I felt hard, when I put my hands in her cookie jar”

Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: David Allan Stewart / Jon Bon Jovi
Queen Of New Orleans lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group

Oh please! Viz’s Finbarr Saunders would have baulked at that. And finally, in a blinding piece of self knowledge, we have this:

“She said baby our love’s just like your songs, the beat ain’t bad but the words are all wrong”

Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: David Allan Stewart / Jon Bon Jovi
Queen Of New Orleans lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group

Ha! Apart from appearing on a few charity singles, Jon Bon Jovi has yet to return to his solo career.

Shola Ama had nine UK Top 40 hits in total but apart from her cover of Randy Crawford’s “You Might Need Somebody”, I couldn’t have told you the names of any of them without checking her discography first. It turns out that this one – “You’re The One I Love” – would be her highest charting when it peaked at No 3. This was actually a rerelease of her debut single which stalled at No 85 in 1996. Her album “Much Love” came out on the Monday after this TOTP and would go to No 6 eventually selling 100,000 copies. Shola was big news and never bigger than when she won a BRIT award for Beat British Female and two MOBOs for Best Newcomer and Best R&B act. And then…well, it all went a bit flat. A follow up album appeared in 1999 but it was a commercial failure peaking at No 92. Shola would remain within the music business even featuring on a Top 10 hit in 2004 for The Pirates. However, it maybe wasn’t the career she might have imagined she would have after her success filled start.

As for “You’re The One I Love”, it’s a very serviceable R&B/soul hit the type of which was very prominent at this time but does it linger long in the memory? Not mine I’m afraid. Apparently, Shola’s son is a big name music producer called Mekhi or prollymac or something – he’s one of those ‘Nepo Babies’ which is what the kids are saying these days but I wouldn’t know about that or Mekhi/prollymac. In fact, I struggled to find anything to say about his Mum.

Who’s this? Conner Reeves? Do I know this guy? Let me think….Reeves…Reeves….I know Hollywood actor Keanu Reeves obviously and Country legend Jim Reeves. Hell, I even remember 80s footballer Kevin Reeves but Conner (with an ‘e’ not an ‘o’) Reeves? Nope, I’ve got nothing. What’s his hit called? “My Father’s Son”? That kind of sounds familiar but am I getting confused with that song by Mike + The Mechanics about a son’s regret over an unresolved conflict with their now deceased father – “The Living Years”. Actually, didn’t the bloke who had a hit with that song called “Jessie” do one called “My Father’s Son”?

*checks internet and cross references*

That’s him. Joshua Kadison and yes he did but that’s not this song. It’s all very confusing.

Anyway, Conner Reeves’ song was his debut hit of five (five!) in total and apparently big things were predicted for him but I’m not sure why on the strength of “My Father’s Son” as it’s a bit of a plodder. How would I describe his sound? Well, Wikipedia categorises it as blue-eyed soul which is as good a description as any I guess. As for his image, he’s giving me serious Gilbert O’Sullivan vibes with that cap. Did he always wear it? Was it his USP? He looks like a bit of a knacker to be honest. In short, I’m not sold. In fact, I’d go as far as to say I’d rather have “Son Of My Father” than “My Father’s Son”…

Hmm. The running order for this particular show isn’t turning out to be the best. Now we’ve got UB40 but it’s not the UB40 of their classic early 80s hits. No, the 1997 version of the band had certainly seen better days and was probably past its sell by date. They hadn’t released a new studio album for four years and had filled that gap with a Best Of Volume 2. “Tell Me Is It True” was their first release of any nature for two years and was initially from the soundtrack to the movie Speed 2: Cruise Control though it would later turn up on their album “Guns In The Ghetto”. As Jayne Middlemiss hints at in her intro, the band actually had a cameo appearance in the film but I didn’t know that until now as I’ve never seen it. I loved the original Speed starring the aforementioned Keanu Reeves (I love it when a post comes together) but he wasn’t in the sequel and it got bad reviews so I gave it a miss. There were a few supposed blockbuster movies out that Summer that didn’t really land – Event Horizon and The Fifth Element were two others. I actually fell asleep in the latter though I was talking to someone at work the other day who loves it.

Anyway, that’s all besides the point. What is the point? The music of course so was “Tell Me Is It True” any good? Well, having listened back to it, it was actually better than I expected. The verses echoed back to those glory days of their prime although the chorus was a bit of a letdown. Also a letdown was the reaction to the “Guns In The Ghetto” album so the band returned to that reliable sales generator the “Labour Of Love” project with Volume III released in 1998. The new millennium would see the band splinter acrimoniously but that’s a whole other story/film/documentary…

And yet another artist who I don’t know at all despite having been in full time employment in a record shop at the time of her biggest hit. The name Tina Moore does resonate with me but only because that’s the name of the wife of the 1966 World Cup winning England captain Bobby Moore. Tina Moore the singer? My memory bank is as empty as a MAGA supporter’s head. For the record, she had two UK chart hits with “Never Gonna Let You Go” the first and biggest of them. Now if it sounds a bit like Rosie Gaines that’s possibly because it was on the flip side of white label copies of “Closer Than Close” but it wasn’t picked up for an official release like its partner. When it finally was, it was this ‘Bump-N-Go’ remix by Kelly G (an associate of Chicago house legend Steve ‘Silk’ Hurley no less) that did the trick sending the track to No 7. I assume the “chicka-boom” comment by Middlemiss in her intro was a reference to the noise of the track’s two-step backing track was it? Look, I don’t know what I’m talking about do I? I’m clearly winging it here!

And so to a band whose name I do recall but I would struggle to tell you any of their songs let alone how they sounded. Symposium were ‘the best live band in Britain’ according to the Melody Maker’s front page in late March 1997. I obviously never saw them live but judging by this TOTP appearance, I’ve got a fair idea of what one of their gigs would have been like. “They’re noisy, they’re wild, they’re anarchic” Jayne Middlemiss tells us in her intro which I’m sure fitted perfectly with how the band’s label would have wanted them to be described but were they? Certainly their song “Fairweather Friend” had lots of pop punk energy but was it anything we hadn’t heard before? Green Day springs to mind. Maybe if I’d have been the same age as the band (18 or so) I’d have found them as entertaining as the even younger studio audience clearly did. Once again, I have to question the lack of security here – there’s a semi-mosh pit going on down the front and then, breaking a longstanding taboo, one of the band stage dives into the audience! Naturally, after such antics, there’s then a stage invasion just as we’ve seen recently with Oasis and to a lesser extent Stereophonics recently. What was going on here?!

“Fairweather Friend” would be Symposium’s biggest hit of three peaking at No 25. By 2000, the perennial problem of ‘musical differences’ would do for the band though they reformed for occasional gigs in 2022. By the way, they surely have two of the most tongue-twister type named members in their line up since Big Country drummer Mark ‘Unpronounceable Name’ Brzezicki – try saying Wojtek Godzisz and Hagop Tchaparian three times in a row.

What was executive producer Chris Cowey thinking of with this running order? After stage-diving and stage invasions with Symposium, the next act in the studio is Chumbawamba! All those youngsters in the studio audience needed calming down not given another track to get their adrenaline pumping! “Tubthumping” was definitely the latter! Thankfully, the first couple of rows of the audience seem to have settled into a rather nerdy ‘dance’ of bending over when singer Dunstan Bruce sings “I get knocked down” and raising their arms when he sings “but I get up again” before shaking their fist rather limply to “You’re never gonna keep me down”. Ah to be young again – actually, they’ll all be in their mid-40s now! Oh, and talking of unusual band member names, Chumbawamba had Danbert Nobacon and Alice Nutter in their ranks but obviously they were made up.

It’s a third week at the top for “Men In Black” and once again we have a superimposed Will Smith introducing the video. I think it worked OK once but I fear overexposure had caused the magic dust to disperse too far by this point. The same couldn’t be said for the single itself which continued to see off all opposition to remain at No 1 for this chart and the following week’s. However, we would all be saturated by the news of a car crash in Paris in the days to come after this TOTP was broadcast.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Jon Bon Jovi	Queen Of New Orleans	No
2	Shola Ama	You’re The One I Love	Negative
3	Conner Reeves	My Father’s Son	I did not
4	UB40	Tell Me Is It True	No and that’s the truth
5	Tina Moore	Never Gonna Let You Go	Nope
6	Symposium	Fairweather Friend	Nah
7	Chumbawamba	Tubthumping	YES!
8	Will Smith	Men In Black	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/m00293qd/top-of-the-pops-29081997?seriesId=unsliced