Mel B

TOTP 25 JUN 1999

Posted on by 80stastic

It’s Glastonbury time again in these TOTP repeats with the host of this show – Gail Porter – making reference to it in her opening intro. In fact, the festival began on the very same day that this TOTP aired with REM being the headliners on the Friday night followed by Manic Street Preachers on the Saturday and Skunk Anansie closing the whole shebang on the Sunday night. Unlike in previous years, the weather was glorious with a sun drenched three days making the £150,000 spent on downpour precautions redundant. As this is the Glastonbury TOTP Rewind post, it’s that time again when I see if any of the acts on this particular episode ever got to play the festival…

We start with last week’s No 1 “Bring It All Back” by S Club 7 which has dropped to No 2. It was the first of four chart toppers for the group though checking their discography, I’m surprised at the gaps between the first one and the other three. I would have presumed all their first few singles went to No 1 but not so. Their second single to achieve that feat came 18 months later in December 2000 with “Never Had A Dream Come True” which was followed by two more successive No 1s in “Don’t Stop Movin’” in May 2001 and “Have You Ever” in December of the same year. That means that those hits you immediately associate with S Club 7 like “S Club Party” and “Reach” didn’t actually make it to the top which I’m quite shocked by. I mean, I say ‘shocked’ but I probably should say ‘mildly surprised’. The word ‘shocked’ shows a level of engagement in the group which I just don’t have. And yet, their story of success, decline, tragedy and redemption really would make a good film or a decent biopic at least.

Did they ever play Glastonbury? No, they never had that particular dream come true despite expressing a desire to do so following their 25th anniversary reunion announcement in 2023.

Some A grade bullshit from executive producer Chris Cowey next as he recycles a performance by Jamiroquai from three weeks ago for their hit “Canned Heat” which is currently languishing at No 21 in this week’s Top 40 having consistently fallen down the chart from its No 4 debut peak. How has he the brass neck to do this? Easy, just repackage the appearance as being shown to mark the band being at No 1 in the album chart with “Synkronized” (check out the caption graphic) even though there was no regular album chart feature at this point. I get that there were no records going up the charts at all that week but there were seven new entries into the Top 40 that could have been shown instead that weren’t (albeit in the lower reaches of the chart). This stinks of fudging the issue with some disdain for the show’s audience thrown in for good measure.

Did they ever play Glastonbury? Yes. In 1993 on the NME stage and the Pyramid stage in 1995.

There were many things to dislike about the fag end of the 90s charts but one which irked me and confused me in equal measure was the UK’s adoption of US boybands. Didn’t we have enough of our own to contend with?! Did we really need the likes of the Backstreet Boys and this lot – NSYNC – clogging up our Top 40 as well?! I’m sorry, I know all the stats and figures will tell me about how big they were sales wise but they were both terrible. Awful songs, whiny vocals and they weren’t even good looking (Justin Timberlake definitely had problem hair) so how do you explain their popularity then? On top of all that, they were almost interchangeable. Take this hit for example. “Tearin’ Up My Heart” could easily have been a Backstreet Boys song. In fact, if you look at the latter’s discography, they released numerous singles about the ‘heart’.

  • “I’ll Never Break Your Heart” 
  • “Quit Playing Games (with My Heart)”
  • “Shape Of My Heart”
  • “Straight Through My Heart”
  • “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart”

Come on! It was money for old rope territory. Just to put the final QED touches to my point, “Tearin’ Up My Heart” was originally pitched to the Backstreet Boys to record but NSYNC ended up doing it. Presumably they were with the same record company but I don’t care enough to check. Be gone with you both!

Did they ever play Glastonbury? No, obviously.

Talking of record companies, clearly Britney Spears’ couldn’t wait any longer to release her follow up to “…Baby One More Time” despite the fact that the monster hit was still at No 31 in the UK Top 40 as “Sometimes” rocketed into the charts at No 3. However, what a disappointment it was compared to its predecessor. A mid-tempo ballad was perhaps the obvious choice but it was also predictable (even down to its key change) and when the song was as weak as “Sometimes” then it couldn’t hope to climb as high as her debut. It didn’t help that Britney couldn’t quite reach the notes to sing it but a hit is a hit and it did a job of consolidation especially over here though it would stall at No 21 in America. A return to the “…Baby One More Time” formula would be sought out for subsequent releases on tracks like “(You Drive Me) Crazy” and “Oops!…I Did It Again”. All of those tracks were written and produced by Swede Max Martin who also supplied songs for the aforementioned Backstreet Boys and NSYNC but, perhaps tellingly, “Sometimes” wasn’t*. Martin would go on to write and produce material for Taylor Swift drawing a nice line between female singer superstars from different eras.

*”Sometimes” was written by another Swede in Jörgen Elofsson who would also work with Westlife. Oh God, it was like a Scandinavian version of Stock, Aitken and Waterman!

Did they ever play Glastonbury? No although there were heavy rumours that she would make a surprise appearance during Elton John’s headline set in 2023 following their collaboration on “Hold Me Closer”. The rumours proved to be false.

Think of American pop-punk bands and who comes to mind? Sum 41? Blink-182? Fountains Of Wayne? Third Eye Blind? Weezer? Yep, all good examples but how about Lit? I’d certainly forgotten them (if I even knew them in the first place) but here they are on TOTP with their biggest hit “Own Worst Enemy”. It does sound kind of familiar or maybe I’m just confusing it with all those other bands mentioned above. My fuzzy recall of it though seems to be out of step with the rest of the world though as, according to Wikipedia, it is a huge karaoke favourite and is described in American Songwriter magazine as being:

“among the most broadcasted, karaoked, and covered songs in music history.”

Crone, Madeline (June 1, 2020). “Behind the song: Lit “My Own Worse Enemy”American Songwriter

Wow! Really?! Well it beats “Angels” by Robbie Williams I guess. Lit are still together based around the nucleus of the Popoff brothers Jeremy and A. Jay with their last album being released in 2022.

Did they ever play Glastonbury? That would be a no.

Following ex-EastEnders star Martine McCutcheon into the charts this year was, as host Gail Porter points out, someone from the ‘other side’ meaning from ITV’s Coronation Street. Adam Rickitt had become a pin up before his attempt at pop stardom with his youthful good looks and ripped abdomen building him a fanbase among the nation’s female teenage population via his portrayal of Nick Tilsley. With that following in place, the move into music was a no-brainer and lo, a Top 5 hit was secured with his debut single “I Breathe Again”. Unlike Martine’s No 1 song “Perfect Moment” to which the general public’s reaction was along the lines of “it’s not bad is it?”, Adam’s effort was as anonymous as it was obvious. A Hi-NRG dance track with a deliberately engineered breathy singing style that required very little in the way of vocal chops from Rickitt, it would possibly have sunk without trace without his six pack and that video via which to display them. Featuring a naked Adam in a booth in a lab, it was literally a very steamy promo. We don’t get to see that here though as it was possibly too risqué for the BBC censors. Instead, we get this so obviously mimed performance in which Rickitt actually does very little apart from some upper torso posturing. Seriously, his feet hardly move. There’s a lot of smoke and mirrors going on with his backing dancers doing their best to make him look like he’s even vaguely co-ordinated. On top of everything, he can’t even mine convincingly.

Adam would have two further UK Top 40 hits though surely only his Mum and his superfans (bordering on stalkers) can remember them. He released just the one album called “Good Times” which failed to chart in any meaningful way but here’s the thing – he was signed to a six album deal. WHY?! I may be looking at this all wrong and that this was/is an industry standard practice but who in their right mind thought that Adam Rickitt would last long enough as a pop star to be able to sell SIX albums?! However, Adam did make a comeback 15 years later as part of the ITV manufactured pop group 5th Story who were put together to promote the second series of The Big Reunion. Who were his band mates? Only some of the biggest names in pop! No, of course they weren’t. It was a collection of desperate, famous for 15 minutes chancers including someone from Blazin’ Squad, Kavana and Dane Bowers from Another Level who would light his own farts live on stage if he thought it would keep him in the limelight. Amazingly, according to Wikipedia, 5th Story did play a live gig at the Hammersmith Apollo (presumably as part of The Big Reunion TV show). I can’t believe that the ticket touts were busy for that one.

Did they ever play Glastonbury? I asked AI if Adam Rickitt had ever played the festival and it replied yes in 2023 on the Avalon stage. Flabbergasted, I double checked and it seems it had confused Adam with Will Young. And we’re all worried about AI taking our jobs off us!

If I asked you to name a cover version of Cameo’s “Word Up”, would you immediately turn to Gun’s rock workout of the track or would choose this…well, whatever this is by Mel B, sorry Mel G*? After rather unexpectedly (in my humble opinion) topping the charts with her first single outside of the Spice Girls – her collaboration with Missy Elliott on “I Want You Back” – Mel’s second attempt was recorded as part of the soundtrack to the film Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. However, unlike Madonna’s “Beautiful Stranger” also from that soundtrack which just missed the top spot, “Word Up” would peak at a presumably disappointing for all concerned No 13. That’s probably more than it deserved (again, in my humble opinion) with Mel’s rendition not retaining any of the original’s spark and bite and instead delivering a lacklustre version that even has the audacity to include that horrible ‘I’ve got a little something for you’ sample that was everywhere around the mid point of the 90s. Gun’s take on it was infinitely better to my ears.

Then there’s Mel’s performance here which she conducts whilst sat down on some sort of throne with just two backing dancers for company. What was that about? Did she have a Dave Grohl style injury that restricted her movements? And why was she made up to look like an extra from a Mad Max movie? Was she channeling her inner Tina Turner? At least she didn’t try to recreate the black and white animated promo video for this performance which was very creepy and dark with sexually suggestive material in it. So ‘scary’ (ahem) was it seemed to be that they had to make another video for the track with Mel wearing a sci-fi style metallic costume with what appeared to be bits of Meccano attached to it.

*”Word Up” would be the only single released under the Mel G moniker after Brown’s marriage to dancer Jimmy Gulzar proved to be short lived. Her insistence on changing it in the first place must have caused a few headaches at her record label.

Did they ever play Glastonbury? Despite persistent rumours, Mel B has never played Glastonbury either as a solo artist or as part of the Spice Girls. Mel C, however, played a DJ set there in 2022 and with her own band in 2023.

Though it was never really in doubt, it’s now officially confirmed – chart music in 1999 was utter shite. How can you arrive at any other conclusion when you have tripe like “Boom Boom Boom Boom” by Vengaboys at No 1?! I mean, it’s barely music. It’s more like a demented nursery rhyme. Who was buying this? Pre-school kids? No, it must have been adults as I would no doubt have sold lots of the single as I was working for Our Price at the time and I don’t remember a bunch of five year olds forming an orderly queue to purchase the single. As for their performance here, they look and sound like a hybrid of 2 Unlimited and The Village People. What on earth was happening?

Did they ever play Glastonbury? Hell no!

Order of appearanceArtistTitleDid I buy it?
1S Club 7Bring It All BackNope
2JamiroquaiCanned HeatNegative
3NSYNCTearin’ Up My HeartOf course not
4Britney SpearsSometimesNah
5LitOwn Worst EnemyI did not
6Adam RickittI Breathe AgainI’d rather hold my breath forever
7Mel B/GWord UpNo
8VengaboysBoom Boom Boom BoomNEVER EVER!

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/m002t693/top-of-the-pops-25061999

TOTP 25 SEP 1998

Posted on by 80stastic

I’ve long talked about the number of hits featured in these TOTP repeats that I can’t recall despite working in a record shop at the time. However, I sometimes think that the proliferation of new entries ushered in by first week of release price discounting worked against the show and my poor, overworked memory. Six of the eight hits on this TOTP are new entries (including an obligatory new No 1) and I don’t think any of them featured on the show again. This rapid turnover of songs is not conducive to prolonged residence in the brain.

Anyway, Jayne Middlemiss is our host and we start with one of the two non-new entries this week – “Crush” by Jennifer Paige. Now, I should probably give some thanks at this point to Jennifer as she didn’t give the world a load of minor hits as a follow up to her one big smash that I would have no doubt not been able to remember either. No, with her it was one huge song and then nothing. A classic one hit wonder. That hit though has proved to be remarkably hardy and must provide Jennifer with not insubstantial royalties. Aside from any airplay it continues to receive (of which there must be plenty), it has also featured in many a TV show and film soundtrack including Sabrina The Teenage Witch, Beverly Hills 90210, Resident Evil: Welcome To Raccoon City (that’s what it says here!) and The Crush (natch). It’s also been covered in long running Fox comedy-drama series Glee but then hasn’t just about every song ever recorded? You might even say it was caught up in the crush. Ahem.

Now, if you looked at Lutricia McNeal’s UK chart stats (and I have), then you would understandably get the impression that she pretty much disappeared from public view after the end of the 90s. The latter part of that decade had given her four hits (including three Top 10s of which “Someone Loves You Honey” – which obviously I don’t remember – was the last) but then nothing. Correction, not nothing – nothing in the UK. In other territories, Lutricia continued to have success especially Sweden, Germany and Japan. Although she hasn’t recorded an album since 2004, she has released a number of non-album singles and continues to perform live at festivals across Europe. All of which proves that, even today, someone (still) loves her honey. As minimal as it is, that’s all I’ve got for this one. Sometimes, ain’t that just the way.

Now, this one I do remember but then, wouldn’t most people be able to recall a song with the word ‘sex’ (or derivative of) in the title? Through pop music history, any hit that dared to go there was almost guaranteed some form of notoriety and more often than not success. Look at this list of such songs:

  • “I Want Your Sex” – George Michael (No 2)
  • “Let’s Talk About Sex” – Salt-N-Peppa (No 2)
  • “I Wanna Sex You Up” – Color Me Badd (No 1)
  • “Sexual Healing” – Marvin Gaye (No 2)
  • “Sex On Fire” – Kings Of Leon (No 1)
  • “I’m Too Sexy” – Right Said Fred (No 2)
  • “You Sexy Thing” – Hot Chocolate (No 2)
  • “Do You Think I’m Sexy?”. – Rod Stewart (No 1)
  • “Sex On The Beach” – T-Spoon (No 2)

Add to that list “Generation Sex” by The Divine Comedy. The lead single from sixth studio album “Fin De Siècle”, it features a spoken word intro by TV presenter and newspaper columnist Katie Puckrik (who seemed to be everywhere in the 90s) before Neil Hannon’s distinctively theatrical vocals annunciate some typically satirical lyrics about millennial attitudes to sex, promiscuity and the hypocrisy of the media. Lines like “telephoto lenses that chase Mercedes-Benzes” and “a mourning nation weeps and wails” seem to reference the death of Princess Diana just over a year before. Then there’s “Generation Sex injects the sperm of worms into the eggs of field mice so you can look real nice for the boys” which must be one of the most out there lyrics of the decade and yet you understood the intended meaning. It’s all delivered with Hannon’s trademark impish, tongue-in-cheek style and deservedly returned a Top 20 hit. In early 1999, perhaps the band’s most famous tune “National Express” with perhaps Hannon’s most famous line (“It’s hard to get by when your arse is the size of a small country”) would give them their biggest ever hit. The Divine Comedy were on a roll.

It’s time for the second non-new entry on the show and it’s “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing” by Aerosmith. Again. It’s a third week on the trot for this one and you could be forgiven for thinking someone at TOTP (*cough* Chris Cowey) was determined to make this a big hit by giving it repeated exposure even when its chart status didn’t warrant it. The band even get their own, specially recorded intro for it this time though, ironically, given the name of their hit, it’s so blink-and-you-miss-it that it really wasn’t worth the effort. I said in a recent post that I hadn’t ever seen the film the song was taken from – Armageddon – all the way through but there was another rival film released in 1998 that had a very similar plot that I’ve never seen a second of. Deep Impact told the tale of humanity’s attempts to abort a comet on a collision course with Earth that could cause mass extinction. Although Deep Impact would be the sixth highest grossing film of the year, it ultimately lost out to Armageddon which topped that list. Crucially perhaps, although it had a soundtrack composed by James Horner, it didn’t have a huge hit single associated with it as its rival did so yes, Armageddon didn’t miss a thing whilst Deep Impact did miss a trick.

No, I’ve got nothing for this one either. Deetah and her song “Relax” anyone? Nothing to do with Frankie Goes To Hollywood, this rap hit was all based around a sample from the unlikely source of the Dire Straits track “Why Worry” from their blockbusting “Brothers In Arms” album. Eh? Dire Straits and rapping? I know. I did say it was unlikely. Or was it? Hadn’t we already seen a rap track in the charts in this year from Sweetbox that was based on “Air On The G String” by Johann Sebastian Bach? Well, yes we had (that was meant to be a rhetorical question) so if a German Baroque period composer who had been dead for nearly 250 years could be used for a contemporary rap hit, why not Dire Straits? What’s that? Because their sound was more dead than Bach? Ouch! For the record though, having listened to Deetah’s track, I don’t mind it. No idea what she’s going on about mind.

If asked, how many Eels songs could you name? I could do one without cheating I think which would be their first hit “Novocaine For The Soul”. There have been others though – follow up “Susan’s House” also went Top 10 whilst 2000’s “Mr. E’s Beautiful Blues” missed three-peating that feat by just one place. Then there’s this one – “Last Stop: This Town”. The lead single from what would prove to be a difficult second album in “Electro-Shock Blues”, it would spend just this solitary week in the Top 40 when it debuted at No 23. And yet it warranted a TOTP appearance and therein perhaps was the issue; it felt a bit like TOTP was chasing its tail rather, a perception that was magnified by the emergence of cd:uk and its more up to date chart format. With the case of an artist like Eels, despite having had two big-ish hits 18 months previously, there must have been doubts that such a streak would continue and the fact that their first new material since entered the chart much lower was maybe a good indicator of their trajectory. I guess what I’m saying is…actually, I’m not sure what I’m saying. I spend enough time slagging off Chris Cowey for platforming the same old hits week after week and here I am slagging him off for showcasing new entries!

Maybe I should just talk about the music because it’s a pretty good tune. Written by Mark ‘E’ Everett about the suicide of his sister (a subject which informed the content of much of the album), it’s an interesting yet tuneful* bit of alternative rock. Its chord structure reminds me of something else as well…is it “Closing Time” by Semisonic? Or is it (whisper it) “MMMBop” by Hanson? Surely not.

*I’m not too sure how tuneful the bass guitarist’s singing is though

OK, I’m still trying to organise my thoughts about what I’m trying to say about the show seemingly wanting to feature all these new chart entries and I’m still not sure what that is. Whatever it is though is amplified by following Eels with PJ Harvey. Maybe it’s that it appears that Chris Cowey was trying to hard to prove the show’s (and his?) eclectic music credentials? “Look, we’re not all about bands like Boyzone and Five. Here’s some more serious artists” Cowey seemed to be saying and I should be welcoming that but it’s confusing after all those boy band and pop fluff repeat performances. Maybe I’m just a natural moaner.

Anyway, the reasoning behind P J Harvey getting a look in this week according to Jayne Middlemiss is that “when you get a chance to get this turn on, you always say yes”. That clears that up then. Did PJ not like playing pop music shows? Or was it that she rarely had a Top 40 hit? “A Perfect Day Elise” was just Polly Harvey’s fifth in five years and it’s peak of No 25 made it her highest charting ever. What to say about this one? That it’s ’interesting’? I think that’s the kindest thing I can say. Alternatively, I could say it’s relentlessly miserable. I keep thinking I should explore her back catalogue more – she does have an MBE for services to music after all – and then I hear a track like “A Perfect Day Elise” and I think “No, I’m alright thanks”.

Was it inevitable that after Geri Halliwell splintered the Spice Girls by leaving the group earlier in 1998 that it would usher in solo careers for every member? All five would have hits in their own right but if I’d had to say who was the first, I’m not sure I would have gone with Mel B. I’d have maybe plumped for Geri (who has the most No 1s of them all totalling four) but I’d have been wrong. Maybe Mel B was first past the post because she had someone else doing the heavy lifting for her? Supposedly, rap artist Missy ‘Misdemeanor’ Elliott just rang her up while she was on tour with the Spice Girls and said that she had a song all ready for her and would she record it. Within a month it was all done including the memorable green hue video. Simples!

Sadly, the track – “I Want You Back” – wasn’t very memorable. In fact, I would say it was one of the weakest No 1s of the whole year. Elsewhere, it didn’t get anywhere near the top of the charts with No 6 in Holland being its second best chart position. Clearly in the UK we were still under a Spice spell. Either that or it’s that pesky first week discounting again creating an inflated demand for it. It certainly didn’t hang around too long. Just one further week in the Top 5, one inside the Top 20 and then three at the bottom end of the Top 40. Apparently, it was taken from the soundtrack to a film called Why Do Fools Fall In Love which was a biopic of 50s teenage pop sensation Frankie Lyon but I have zero recall of that. Having been first out of the traps as a solo artist, it would take Mel B nine months to release a follow up (her dreadful cover version of Cameo’s “Word Up”) by which point Mel C had released “When You’re Gone” with Bryan Adams and Geri Halliwell had announced herself on the solo stage with No 2 single “Look At Me” and suddenly it wasn’t just all about Mel B. Even a name change to Mel G following her marriage to Spice Girls dancer Jimmy Gulzar (as referenced by Jayne Middlemiss in this TOTP) couldn’t return her to the top of the charts with “Word Up” stalling at No 13. What I will say about her debut solo hit though is that it pulls together nicely a couple of this post’s themes by including the words “deep impact” and “sex” in its lyrics.

Order of appearanceArtistTitleDid I buy it?
1Jennifer PaigeCrushIt’s a no
2Lutricia McNealSomeone Loves You HoneyNegative
3The Divine ComedyGeneration SexNo but I had their Greatest Hits with it on
4AerosmithI Don’t Want To Miss A Thing”Nope
5DeetahRelaxNah
6EelsLast Stop: This TownGood song but no
7PJ HarveyA Perfect Day EliseI did not
8Mel B I Want You BackNo

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/m002lvjt/top-of-the-pops-25091998