Take That

TOTP 17 AUG 1995

Let battle commence! Yes, the historic Battle of Britpop is in full swing with both the Blur and Oasis singles having been released three days before this TOTP was broadcast. The battlefields of record shops up and down the land were swarming with punters pledging loyalty to one side or the other (though in all likelihood many had a foot in both camps). The covers of the singles were their flags of allegiance and they flew boldly in displays at the front of many a store. As I’ve said before, working in a record shop at this time was exciting and as fortune would have it, I found myself covering for the singles buyer this week of all weeks at the Our Price in Stockport. As such, I was constantly checking the sales figures for both titles and if memory serves, across the chain Blur were always just ahead of Oasis all week.

So why did Blur win the battle? Well, I always thought that Oasis were at a disadvantage for the simple reason that their rivals released two CD singles, the standard one but also a second featuring four live tracks (including “Country House”). Oasis never went in for that two versions business – all their singles were released as a solitary CD format. Maybe it was a working class thing of not wanting to fleece the fans? Anyway, surely Blur having two options for people to buy must have increased their chances? Recently changed chart rules only allowed for three formats to count towards official sales of a single so whilst Blur’s were spread across two CDs (the dominant format of the time) and a cassette, Oasis’s were aggregated over one CD, the cassette and a 7” (and who was buying those in 1995?). Both bands did release a fourth format (Blur a 7” and Oasis a 12”) but those pesky chart regulations meant that the sales for those had to be allocated a chart position independent of the main release. A curious footnote to the whole story and not one that I’m convinced made much sense but there you go. There was also a rumour that the barcodes of the Oasis single weren’t reading properly on the initial copies but I can’t recall if that was actually the case.

Both singles are featured on tonight’s show (the second time for Blur though it is only the video in the play out slot) but looking at the rest of the show’s running order, I’m struck by how many of the artists are dance acts and completely at odds with the Blur/Oasis contest. It’s interesting to revisit these moments in time because just focusing on the Battle of Britpop rather skews the view of the wider musical landscape.

Having said all of that we start the show with a rock band. I’d forgotten all about – if I ever knew about them in the first place – Moist (terrible, terrible name). This lot were Canadians from the same place as Bryan Adams though I can’t imagine ‘The Groover from Vancouver’ recording a song like “Push”. Listening to it now it’s better than I would have imagined; something about the guitar sound puts me in mind of Suede albeit a grungier version of them. There’s a decent tune in there I think which may explain why it was a hit twice – No 35 in 1994 and No 20 when rereleased here. However, they would prove to be Moist’s only UK chart entries. The band took a decade long hiatus as the millennium began but have reformed since and released an album as recently as 2022.

Lead singer David Usher also has a solo career and is the founder of an artificial intelligence creative studio. On one of his solo albums he did a version of Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car” which was in the news recently when Tracy performed it at The Grammy Awards alongside country star Luke Combs. Public reaction to this catapulted the 1988 original to the top of the iTunes chart. Given all this attention to “Fast Car”, do you want to hear David’s version? Course you do…

The first of the dance tracks is up next and guess what? Yep, it had already been a minor hit before being rereleased and becoming a massive one. This trend for reissued tracks mainly seemed to afflict dance acts but as we saw with Moist earlier, it was not exclusive to that genre. Anyway, “I Luv You Baby” by The Original was originally a No 31 hit at the start of 1995 but its continued plays in clubs the breadth of the country warranted a second spin and this time it hit the jackpot going all the way to No 2.

I didn’t really get its success at all. It was relentlessly repetitive with the song’s title being sung on a loop over a heard-it-all-before piano house backing. Listening to it now, it puts me in mind of “Love Can’t Turn Around” by Farley Jackmaster Funk, another track I couldn’t stand. Maybe it’s just that they share identical syllable count in their choruses?

The singer here is one Everett Bradley who doesn’t really strike me as one of the most natural of pop stars. Maybe it’s his suit and shirt combo or his glasses. Or maybe it’s his dance moves. In the instrumental break he goes a bit David Brent…

It’s another dance artist now but this one’s story involves real life tragedy. Yet again my memory has failed me when it comes to recalling Shiva but they were a band that were signed to the ultra successful FFRR dance label and they had already had a minor hit with “Work It Out” earlier in the year. With powerful voiced singer Louise Dean also having a very marketable image, they seemed destined for bigger things. All their ambitions were swept away on 18th June 1995 when Dean was killed in a hit and run incident near her home in Huddersfield. With new single “Freedom” due out, FFRR pulled it from the release schedules as a mark of respect but Dean’s family asked for that decision to reversed as a tribute to her. The track duly became a No 18 hit.

In the last post, I suggested that Mary Kiani’s “When I Call Your Name” could pass for an M People song and I return to that opinion again for Shiva. Louise Dean’s voice bears more than a passing resemblance to Heather Small’s and you can easily imagine the latter belting out “Freedom”. I guess these comparisons just go to show how popular and ubiquitous the M People sound was back in the 90s. I’m assuming that Shiva split after Dean’s death as there seems to be little information about them post “Freedom”. Another tragic case of what might have been.

This next one is disconcerting bordering on bizarre and yet somehow intriguing…and those are three descriptors I never thought I’d use when discussing Deuce. This lot were the stuff of throwaway, candy floss dance- pop weren’t they? A two boy, two girl quartet whose quality level was literally that of sub-Eurovision (their second single “I Need You” was entered into A Song For Europe but came third). And yet this song – “On The Bible” – has taken me by surprise rather. For a start they’ve got a seven strong gospel choir backing them in this performance and on the chorus which gives the whole thing a sliver of credibility. Said chorus is not only catchy but also solemn somehow. However, undermining all that is the group themselves who it’s impossible to take seriously. Why are the two women dressed in some sort of naughty bride outfits? The blonde one’s heavy eye make up makes her look a bit crazed – a hint of Bette Davis in Whatever Happened To Baby Jane? even. What the deuce was going on here?! As I said, disconcerting, bizarre yet intriguing.

“On The Bible” peaked at No 13 and was the band’s penultimate hit. They split in 1997 and if you’re wondering whatever happened to Deuce, Lisa Armstrong married (and divorced Ant of Ant & Dec) before becoming a make up artist for shows such as X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent. Craig Robert Young became a successful actor performing in such plays as Noël Coward’s The Vortex and as Charlie Chaplin in the Oscar winning film Mank alongside Gary Oldman.

Right, who’s up next? Guru featuring Chaka Khan? Nope, yet again I have zero recall of this one. How is it possible that so many of these tunes have escaped my long term memory banks given that I was working in a record shop at the time? I must have sodding sold many of them to the public. Maybe the answer lies in the fact that the shop stereo, contrary to popular opinion and certainly that of many of my colleagues, was meant to be a promotional tool to highlight chart and new release singles and albums which we had lots of and not to play whatever whoever was on the counter felt like playing regardless of how obscure or not it was. Our Price even had specially put together instore CDs narrated by Mark Goodier that highlighted new releases but it was hard work getting the staff to play them. Saturday afternoon? Busiest time of the week in the shop? A perfect time for some experimental ambient music courtesy of Autechre! Maybe this was the explanation – I just never heard some of these songs because we never played them in the store.

Talking of experimental music, Guru was a bit of a pioneer himself. Having been one half of hip hop duo Gang Starr, his solo work centred around the “Jazzmatazz” project which sought to create a new genre by combining jazz musicians, hip-hop productions and rap. The first volume had been a sleeper hit selling enough copies to convince Guru and his record label that there should be further instalments. “Jazzmatazz, Volume II (The New Reality)” duly followed and “Watch What You Say” was its lead single. As with the previous album, Guru asked various singers to add their vocal talents to the songs including Mica Paris, Shara Nelson, Jay Kay and Chaka Khan on this particular track. Ch-Ch-Chaka (you have to make at least one reference to “I Feel For You” when discussing Chaka Khan, it’s the law) hadn’t been anywhere near the UK Top 40 since 1989 so her TOTP appearance here probably wasn’t the seismic event it might have been back in the 80s. Did the kids even know who she was? As I said, I didn’t remember “Watch What You Say” at all and listening to it now, it’s OK but not really my cup of tea. It peaked at No 28. Guru sadly died in 2010 aged 48 from cardiac arrest after surgery.

At the top of the show we had a rare double message to camera; one from Björk who is in New York and will perform live by satellite from her gig there and one from Take That who will do a similar thing from Manchester. Björk’s song is “Isobel” which was the second single to be lifted from her “Post” album. As stated before, I used to dismiss Björk as not being able to sing but came to the conclusion that she can sing but that I don’t like her voice…most of the time. Some songs featured in these TOTP repeats I’ve surprised myself by appreciating – “Isobel” isn’t one of them. It’s all too ethereal and otherworldly for me. Maybe my tastes are just too mainstream as, like many others, I really liked her next release – her cover of Betty Hutton’s 1951 hit “It’s Oh So Quiet”. That single was so much more commercial than its predecessor.

Here’s something about “Isobel” that I find interesting though courtesy of @TOTPFacts:

The strings on “Isobel” were arranged by Eumir Deodato de Almeida (aka Deodato), perhaps best known for his jazz funk version of "Also Sprach Zarathustra”, a number seven hit in 1973. #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) February 2, 2024

Why am I intrigued by this? Well, the name Deodato appears in the lyrics to “Up On The Catwalk” by Simple Minds which was the third and final single taken from their “Sparkle In The Rain” album. Said album has just passed the 40th anniversary of its release and that makes me feel very old as I bought it back in 1984 (on white vinyl no less!). However, having looked Deodato up, there appears to be multiple individuals of that name deemed worthy of a Wikipedia entry so I’m not sure which one the band were referring to. In addition to Eumir Deodato there’s Ruggero Deodato the Italian film director, Deodato Orlandi a 13th century Italian artist, Deodato Guinaccia an Italian Renaissance painter, Claudio Deodato a Brazilian footballer…phew! That’s a lot of Deodatos. Bizarrely, Eumir’s granddaughter is married to Justin Bieber! No, really.

And another dance track! I remember the song title and name of the artist but I couldn’t have told you how it went. I probably should have better recall of it though as it was a hit twice within 16 months. Yes, “Son Of A Gun” by JX was another of those singles like “I Luv You Baby” by The Original earlier that had already been a hit but would be rereleased a short time later going on to be an even bigger chart success the second time around.

Having listened to it back at a distance of nearly 30 years though, the hook of the line “A man just on the run, you dirty son of a gun” does ring a few bells. Not surprising really as apart from the words ‘oh’ and ‘yeah’ and a couple of derivatives from them, they are the only lyrics in the whole track.

“Son Of A Gun” would make No 6 in the charts in 1995 having peaked at No 13 in 1994. Later in the decade, we would see the emergence of superstar rapper Jay-Z. As far as I’m aware, we are yet to witness a JY or indeed Jay-Y having a hit record.

Finally the show addresses the elephant in the room – Blur vs Oasis, the Battle of Britpop. Before we get to the performance of “Roll With It” by Oasis, there’s an interloper in the studio. For some reason, Robbie Williams pops up next to host Wendy Lloyd to do the intro for the Manc lads describing them as “the band of the people”. Why was he there? Well, I guess he was trying to reinvent himself as a rock ‘n’ roll star as opposed to an ex-boyband member. Infamously, he’d started this process by hanging out with Oasis at Glastonbury that year sporting a peroxide blonde barnet and appearing to be under the influence of either drugs, booze or both. It all seemed very deliberate and calculated.

Anyway, back to Liam, Noel, Bonehead, Guigsy and Whitey. Yes, this was the first time we’d seen new drummer Alan White in situ after he’d usurped the sacked Tony McCarroll earlier in the year. He would stay with the band for nine years before being replaced by Ringo Starr’s lad Zak. This is the performance when Liam and Noel swapped places with the former donning a guitar and the latter taking centre stage on vocals. Obviously they were miming which I’m guessing is the reason for the switch, to highlight / send up the practice. Whilst Liam does his best Bonehead impression, Noel hams it up by poking his tongue out at one point and wearing shades throughout.

And so to the song. You don’t need me to tell you that “Roll With It” wasn’t Oasis’s best song by a country mile. In fact, it’s possibly one of their worst. Pedestrian and lumpen, it was so lacking in energy and creativity that it would prompt cries of “”Oasis Quo” from the Blur camp, referencing the famous three chord specialists. Either of the original extra tracks on the CD single (“It’s Better People” and “Rockin’ Chair”) would have made better choices as the lead track. They made a similar misstep with previous single “Some Might Say” – “Acquiesce” was an infinitely superior song. None of these opinions stopped me from buying it though. I was becoming rather committed to the cause by this point.

Unsurprisingly, there’s no sign of Robbie Williams when it comes to introducing his ex-band mates from Take That who are No 1 for a third and final week with “Never Forget”. This time, as previewed at the top of the show, we get a live performance of the track from the Manchester Arena date of their Nobody Else tour. Having checked their set list, “Never Forget” was the final number to end the show. The travelators prop is a nice touch, allowing the other three to literally take a step backwards to allow Howard Donald to take centre stage for the track on which he is lead vocalist. He does a decent job I think, even coming up with a falsetto at one point.

“Never Forget” would be the band’s penultimate hit in its first incarnation. We won’t see them again until 1996 when they released their cover of “How Deep Is Your Love” to promote a valedictory greatest hits album. However, that won’t be the last we see of Gary Barlow, Mark Owen and, yes, that man Robbie Williams in these BBC4 TOTP repeats as they all went on to solo careers (of varying degrees of success) post Take That. Talking of Williams, maybe we do get to see him in this performance after all. Towards the finale, the camera picks out one of the backing entourage and it’s a bloke with a peroxide blonde, spiky hairdo. It couldn’t be could it?

In the spirit of equity, the play out video is “Country House” by Blur. Of course, it is. Even host Wendy Lloyd acknowledges the inevitability of the situation in her intro of “We better play out with these guys I guess”. The promo is pretty memorable but maybe not for all the right reasons. The premise of the band transported into the board game they are playing is intriguing but the presence of all the glamour models and the Benny Hill style sequence of Matt Lucas chasing them was probably more palatable 30 years ago during the era of lads mags. Then there’s the treatment of that poor pig!

One of the aforementioned models is Jo Guest who was quite the star in the mid 90s appearing in The Sun as a Page 3 girl and various ‘top shelf’ publications. If you’re wondering what happened to her, it’s a sad story I’m afraid. Her health deteriorated and she was eventually diagnosed with fibromyalgia, a rheumatic and neurological condition. It devastated her life leaving her depressed, permanently exhausted and suicidal. Happily, after reaching out to the Samaritans, her health has improved and she is still with us.

Also taking a starring role in the video as the “city dweller, successful fella” of the lyrics is actor and presenter Keith Allen, five years on from featuring in the video for New Order’s “World In Motion” and three years away from the whole Fat Les project. An interesting character to say the least, if you ever get the chance, his autobiography is an entertaining read.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Moist	Push	We start with a no
2	The Original	I Luv U Baby	But I don’t love you - no
3	Shiva	Freedom	I did not
4	Deuce	On The Bible	A curiosity but of course not
5	Guru featuring Chaka Khan	Watch What You Say	It’s another no
6	Björk	Isobel	Nah
7	JX	Son Of A Gun	Nope
8	Oasis	Roll With It	YES!
9	Take That	Never Forget	No
10	Blur	Country House	No but I had the Great Escape album with it on

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/m001vvzf/top-of-the-pops-17081995

TOTP 10 AUG 1995

Posted on February 4 by 80stastic

The BBC4 commemorative shows celebrating the 60th anniversary of TOTP are finally over meaning a return to the schedule of the 1995 repeats. If you recall, we’d just entered August of that year with the Blur v Oasis Battle of Britpop rapidly coming into view. However you feel about that time now with nearly 30 years perspective, it was a heady experience for me personally, feeling right at the centre of it working in a record shop in Greater Manchester. However, neither band are on this TOTP with both their singles being released the Monday after it aired. Blur performed “Country House” in an exclusive slot the week before – “Roll With It” will get one in next week’s show.

Anyway, tonight’s host is Lisa I’Anson and we start with…who? Mary Kiani? Well, I should show a little humility after bigging up my record shop credentials earlier as Mary clocked up four solo UK Top 40 hits in the 90s plus three (including a Top Tenner) as the vocalist for dance project The Time Frequency. That’s not a bad career. In comparison, how many chart hits have I ever had? None obviously though my rendition of Nick Cave and Kylie’s “Where The Roses Grow” in guitar class back in the day was pretty special. Back to Mary though and her journey to the UK Top 40 wasn’t via your usual route. As a session singer, she toured with the credibility sapping Donny Osmond. Mary clearly didn’t care about any of that though. Post chart success, she would contribute her vocals to “The Simpsons’ Yellow Album”.

Yet in 1995, she was riding the dance tidal wave. This single – “When I Call Your Name” – went to No 1 in the UK Dance charts. I don’t remember it at all but listening to it now, it’s a pleasant enough ditty which wouldn’t sound out of place on an M People album. That’s either a compliment or an insult depending on your opinion of M People I guess. I’m not sure about the ‘white out’ special effects in this performance though – all a bit too Dr Who in the 70s.

Kiani has continued to release material sporadically over the years but remains a big draw on the gay club circuit and in Australia where she now lives.

Yes! This is what the kids want! Music played by a bunch of teenagers for teenagers! Ash were indeed teenagers having started the band back in 1992 when lead singer Tim Wheeler was only 15 years old. This performance of their first Top 40 hit “Girl From Mars” came just four weeks after the band had sat their final ‘A’ Level exams! Imagine that! I’d love to think that the band sat around saying “What shall we do in the Summer while we’re waiting for our exam results?” and one of them pipes up “Well, we could take a single to No 11 in the charts and appear on TOTP. Anyone fancy that? Or we could get a job fruit picking or even just bum around doing nothing. I’m easy”. Of course, Ash were much more involved in the music industry than that scenario suggests by this point. They’d already released a mini album called “Trailer” on indie label Infectious Records and three singles from it. In March 1995, they put out “Kung Fu”, the lead single from their full debut album “1977” which just missed the Top 40. Momentum was building and with the championing of them by Radio 1’s Steve Lamacq and the station giving major airplay to “Girl From Mars”, the inevitable big hit ensued. And quite right too. It’s a great tune, one of many the band would record. “1977” would go to No 1 but in many ways they are the perfect singles band. Indeed, in 2009/2010, they took The Wedding Present idea of releasing a single every month but upped the ante by making the cycle every two weeks. Over those two years, they released 27 singles.

I caught them live in 2011 in Manchester on the anniversary tour for their “Free All Angels” album (also a No 1) and they were great. However, my abiding association with “Girl From Mars” belongs to someone I was working with at the time. Cara was/is one of the nicest people you could meet but she had a reputation for being…erm…in a world of her own at times I think is the best way to put it. This state of being caused her to be known on the lunch rota as ‘Cara – on loan from Mars’. The description stuck rather and when she left after getting a job with Head Office, we bought her the single as a leaving present. I am always reminded of Cara whenever I hear “Girl From Mars” to this day.

It’s a second outing for the award winning video for “Waterfalls” by TLC next. The song was nominated in two categories at the 38th Annual Grammy Awards in 1996. As I type this, we’ve just had this year’s – the 66th – and there are a couple of parallels between the 1996 and 2024 shows. Both featured performances by Annie Lennox (and both songs she sang were cover versions) and both had Celine Dion presenting an award. Whatever you think of her music (and it all sounds hateful to me), it was a good news story to see her in public after all the reporting of her recent health problems.

Although “Waterfalls” didn’t win the gong for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals, they did walk away that year with the award for Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals (blimey what a mouthful!) for “Creep”.

It’s a second song that has been on the show before next and perhaps rather surprisingly it’s another studio outing for Julian Cope with his single “Try Try Try”. Surprisingly? Well, the single only spent three weeks on the chart and only one of those (this week when it debuted at No 24) inside the Top 40. So how did it come to be on the show twice? Well, Julian was afforded an ‘exclusive’ slot a couple of weeks before the single was released. Although that explains the maths of it, a second studio appearance did seem a bit like overkill – Julian was hardly a mainstream pop star in 1995. Indeed, was he ever a mainstream anything? Apart from a brief spell in 1986/87 when Island Records tried to promote him as a more traditional rock star for the “Saint Julian” / “World Shut Your Mouth” era, Cope has always chosen a path less travelled. Conversely, maybe that was why the TOTP producers wanted him back on their show; as an antidote to the more generic, manufactured pop acts of the time. I mean just look at him here! Utterly bonkers with his Gandalf style hat and oversized hi-vis jacket with leopard print lining. Maybe it was just a case of counting though. A chart entry of No 24 was probably a big enough number to justify another go on the show.

A bigger mystery than the appearance of Julian himself on the show though is the person in the studio audience with the giant paper mache head that looks like the Mekon from the 2000 AD and Eagle comics. What was that all about?! Fortunately, @TOTPFacts is here with the answer:

That's Julian Cope's seven-foot alter-ego Sqwubbsy. #TOTP (thanks to @wadeywade for the memory prompt) https://t.co/RXq3TR0xaW
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) February 2, 2024

Breaking free from the chains of being a potential one hit wonder comes Tina Arena who clocks up a second Top 40 entry with “Heaven Help My Heart”. Whereas her debut hit was intense and brooding, this one was a paint-by-numbers country ballad that, unlike Julian Cope, went straight down the middle of the road. Indeed, so bland was it that when Radio 1 DJ Chris Evans played it, he took it off air after a minute or so declaring it too easy listening for his zeitgeist riding, lad culture fawning, Britpop following show and despatched a (presumably all too willing) lackey to hand deliver it to Terry Wogan over at Radio 2. What a prick! Evans that is, not Terry. Ironically, within a couple of years, ballads like “Heaven Help My Heart” would become big chart hits in the UK from the likes of Shania Twain and LeeAnn Rimes as the last vestiges of Britpop played out.

Tina’s next single also featured the word ‘heaven’ in the title as she released a cover of Maria McKee’s “Show Me Heaven”. Gulp! Heaven help us all.

There have been some terrible cover versions to besmirch the charts over the years. More specifically, there have been some terrible Beatles covers. I’m thinking “Strawberry Fields Forever” by Candy Flip, Tiffany’s approximation “I Saw Him Standing There” and, of course, Bananarama and Lananeeneenoonoo’s take on “Help!” (no I don’t care that it was for charity, it’s shit). Despite the dreadful stink caused by all of these, this version of “I’m Only Sleeping” by Suggs also reeks to high heaven. Taken from his first solo album “The Lone Ranger”, it somehow went Top 10. As shown in the examples above, covering The Beatles isn’t for everyone and to my ears, Suggs makes a porcine one of it here. Did he really think he could just add his usual layer of ska pop over the original and get away with it. He doubles down on the error in the performance by doing his Suggs shtick of juddery movements (even doing a staged fall at one point) just to make sure we all knew that we were residents of Suggsworld for three minutes.

Incredibly, he managed to out-shite himself with another cover taken from the album the following year when he took on “Cecilia” by Simon & Garfunkel which led to the infamous Chris Eubank intro but that’s for a future post.

Another year and another controversial Madonna video. After the press backlash she received following the release of her “Erotica” album and coffee-table book Sex, in 1992 when she was deemed by some to have gone too far with her sexual explicit material, Madge seems initially to have decided to tone things down a bit. “I’ll Remember” was an unthreatening big ballad from the film With Honors with a more classic looking and dare I say it tasteful video. Her next studio album “Bedtime Stories” addressed subjects that were more about love than sex but then came the fourth and final single to be released from it. “Human Nature” was a direct response to the criticism she had received for “Erotica” and Sex – an answer song, a musical middle finger. Look at some of these lyrics:

“Oops, I didn’t know I couldn’t talk about sex…You punished me for telling you my fantasies…I’m not your bitch, don’t hang your shit on me”

Songwriters: Dave Hall / Madonna Ciccone / Kevin Harold Mc Kenzie / Shawn Mc Kenzie / Michael Deering
Human Nature lyrics © Wb Music Corp., Emi April Music Inc., Webo Girl Publishing Inc., Stone Jam Music, Wize Men Music Publishing, Webo Girl Publishing, In

Blimey! Then there’s the aforementioned video with Madonna and her dancers decked out in S&M gear (hell, even her pet chihuahua is dressed in leather!) and cavorting in small boxes which on reflection looks like a kinky version of Celebrity Squares! Clearly it’s about Madonna retaking control of the narrative but hadn’t we seen all this before and in a more provocative way? Remember the X-rated promo for “Justify My Love”? Talking of that track, the intro of “Human Nature” seems to mirror it with its hypnotic trip-hop beat opening with Madonna repeating the line “Express yourself, don’t repress yourself” over and over. All in all, I found the whole thing rather tiresome but what did I know? The single still made No 8 in the UK though it was notably not a big hit in America.

A week before the Battle of Britpop, we had another contest of the charts though not with the same levels of rivalry nor media attention. The Battle of the Boybands (which nobody called it at the time) saw the pretenders to the throne Boyzone on the same show as current kings Take That though I don’t think the latter were in the studio together as the clip is just a previous appearance re-shown. First up though are those nice Irish lads with their third hit single “So Good” which is up to No 3. Whilst Take That’s “Never Forget” lived up to its name as being one of the group’s most memorable songs even being performed at the Coronation Concert for King Charles III, “So Good” really didn’t fulfil the claim of its title being one of the band’s least remembered hits – in short, it’s so bad.

And so to the boyband winners. Take That are at No 1 for a second week with “Never Forget”. Although Boyzone would eventually amass a comparable amount of chart topping singles themselves, to my mind they always came up short when in a straight competition with Gary, Mark, Howard, Jason (and never forgetting Robbie of course!) for the title as the nation’s favourite 90s boyband. Maybe not the gulf in popularity that we saw in the 80s between Bros and Brother Beyond but a clear distance nonetheless. Just my personal view of course. Other opinions are available. What’s that? What about those other Irish lads Westlife? Oh feck off!

The play out track is “Don’t You Want Me” by Felix and if it sounds familiar then that’s probably because it was a hit three times in the UK during the 90s. This was its second incarnation making No 10. The original release was a No 6 hit in 1992 and in 1996 it returned to the charts peaking at No 17. Obviously, each release had a different mix but this practice of recycling dance tracks that had already been a chart success before was really prevalent around this time. “Don’t You Want Me” was on the Deconstruction Records label but given its release history, Reconstruction Records might have been a more apt name (chortle).

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Mary Kiani	When I Call Your Name	Nope
2	Ash	Girl From Mars	No but I have theirBest Of album Intergalactic Sonic 7″s with it on
3	TLC	Waterfalls	I did not
4	Julian Cope	Try Try Try	No No No
5	Tina Arena	Heaven Help My Heart	Nah
6	Suggs	I’m Only Sleeping	Dear me no
7	Madonna	Human Nature	Negative
8	Boyzone	So Good	So bad – no
9	Take That	Never Forget	It’s a no
10	Felix	Don’t You Want Me	No I don’t

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/m001vvzc/top-of-the-pops-10081995

TOTP 03 AUG 1995

Posted on January 9 by 80stastic

Back in August 1995, our lives were about to change. Well, for those of us who were partial to a pint or two. You see, the Sunday after this TOTP aired, public houses in the UK were permitted to remain open throughout Sunday afternoons for the first time ever. Wa-hey! Get the beers in! I have to say it’s hard to recall the effect that this may have had on the nation given our current all day licensing laws but I assume it was quite the seismic cultural shift. I wonder if I can get some alcohol references into all of the artists on this TOTP? Anyone fancy a pint?

We start with my nemesis Therapy? Now, it’s not that I can’t stand them but rather that they kind of passed me by at the time and I never really know what to say about them when they appear on these TOTP repeats which feels like it’s all the time. It makes sense chart-wise –“Loose” was the band’s ninth UK Top 40 hit in under three years but even given how prolific they were at releasing hit singles, I kind of get the impression executive show producer Ric Blaxill must have been a fan for them to have been invited on the show so regularly. Anyway, here they are but they don’t sound like I was expecting. “Loose” – to my ears at least – seems almost…well, like a Busted tune. OK, I’m exaggerating – call it artistic licence – but it’s certainly more Green Day than Nirvana but then Therapy?, according to my online research, forged a career of longevity out of adapting their sound to challenge their fanbase and indeed themselves so maybe nobody should have been surprised.

Perhaps what did take people by surprise though was lead singer Andy Cairn’s appearance. Quite the change from his previous trip to the TOTP studios – he’s gone full on rocker complete with greased back barnet, facial hair and sideburns. It’s a look that is used as the cover art of their album “Infernal Love” so a change in image that was presumably part of a bigger promotional rebrand. I’m probably reading far too much into it – he probably just got bored of his old look. We’ve all experimented with different styles haven’t we? I tried growing a goatee beard myself around this time. When I tired of it, I booked myself an appointment with a hairdresser to shave it off. When I got to the salon, I was greeted by hoots of derision by the guy who was going to do it. He pointed at my face and exclaimed “That’s not a beard!”. I never felt so emasculated!

Alcohol association: Well’ ‘loose’ can be slang for being inebriated can’t it?

It seems to me that Italian Eurodance project Corona managed to amass more UK chart hits than they had any right to. “The Rhythm Of The Night” was a decent example of the genre but did we really need subsequent watered down facsimiles of it that got weaker with each release? No, no we didn’t and yet the hits kept coming. “Baby Baby” made No 5 whilst this one – “Try Me Out” – would peak at No 6.

“The Rhythm Of The Night”, of course, shared its title (save for a definite article) with a famous hit from the 80s. DeBarge took their song to No 4 in the UK but unlike Corona, had the decency to be one hit wonders (over here at least). As well as a link to the 80s, the group also share a connection with the 00s. Do you remember the ITV show Popstars that gave us Hear’Say? Yes? OK, do you recall the five hopefuls that fell at the final hurdle but decided to form their own group anyway (or more likely at the prompting of a rival record label) called Liberty? Still with me? Good. So Liberty had to change their name to Liberty X as there was already a band called Liberty who objected. So what has any of this to do with Corona? Well, they amended their moniker in 2001 to…yep, Corona X. It’s not a great anecdote I admit but then Corona weren’t a great act so it’s all they deserve in my book.

Alcoholic association: Has to be the Mexican beer called Corona.

Next, the first of two tracks on the show that were originally recorded in the 80s. The life and times of “Blue Monday” by New Order is quite the tale. We all know the track but here’s some facts and stats behind it:

Originally released March 1983 on 12” only peaking at No 12
Returned to the chart in August 1983 surpassing its previous chart high by making No 9
Remixed by Arthur Baker in 1988 and released in UK in 7” format for first time. Peaks at No 3
Remixed by Hardfloor and released in 1995. Peaks at No 17
Spent 89 weeks on Top 100 chart over three releases spanning 12 years selling 1.16 million copies
Best selling 12” record of all time

This 1995 release was, rather unimaginatively, officially titled “Blue Monday–95” and was released as a single to promote “The Rest Of New Order” compilation. The band themselves were on a hiatus following the difficult recording of the 1993 album “Republic” and were showing no signs of wishing to work together again anytime soon. Their new record label London clearly wouldn’t have been too jazzed about the lack of any new material from their artist so turned to the back catalogue that they brought with them. We’d already had “The Best Of New Order” album in 1994 which had been a big seller so London wasted no time in trying to repeat the trick with an album of remixes. Having used “True Faith” and “1963” to promote the first compilation, it made sense that they would look to their best known track to advertise the follow up. What a horrible incarnation of an iconic song this remix was though. Maybe that sound was where it was at in 1995 but for me, this version strips away all the power and intrigue of the original replacing it with fuzzy bleeps and beats and turns Bernard Sumner’s vocal into a disembodied, distant ghost of itself. As I write this, we’ve just had the other ‘Blue Monday’, the third Monday in January which has come to be known as the most miserable day of the year but even that day has nothing on the misery of the 1995 remix of New Order’s classic song.

Alcohol association: In 2016, New Order launched their own brand of beer called Stray Dog after a track on their album “Music Complete”.

Black Grape are back with their second single “In The Name Of The Father”. The follow up to their debut “Reverend Black Grape”, this was very much more of the same which was no bad thing in my book. Some funky grooves and nonsensical lyrics (Neil Armstrong having bigger balls than King Kong indeed!)? Yes please!

Kermit’s crutch (he’d broken his ankle at the T in the Park festival) puts me in mind of the infamous Extreme Noise Terror / The KLF BRIT Awards performance…but without the machine gun fire at the end obviously.

Just as I was writing this whilst listening to Radio 2 (no, you do one! I’m 55!), Shaun Ryder appeared as a guest on the Dermot O’Leary show and they were talking about this incident on TFI Friday from back in the day. God, I miss being young(er).

Alcohol association: Black Grape? Wine? Cabernet Sauvignon? Yeah, that’ll do.

Something out of leftfield now from…well…Leftfield. Despite having a No 3 album in debut “Leftism”, huge single success had eluded the electronic duo of Neil Barnes and Paul Daley. “Afro–Left” couldn’t change that though it was pretty interesting. Featuring gibberish, African sounding spoken vocals and a trippy, hypnotic backbeat, it wasn’t your average chart entry. The supplier of those vocals was listed on the record as Djum Djum. In my first draft of this review – and I swear this is true – I referred to Djum Djum as the African Stanley Unwin, the comic actor who was famous for creating ‘Unwinese’ (essentially a gobbledygook version of English). I deleted the comparison though thinking it might be too niche but on researching Djum Djum further, I came across a piece which suggested that he was, in fact, the son of Stanley Unwin! Other ‘facts’ about him was that he also went by the name of Neil Cole and that he was the originator of Jum Jum which is the sound you make whilst chewing an elastic band! I’m not sure I’m having any of this though. I mean, come on! Jum Jum? I should Coco!

Alcohol association: I thought I might struggle with this one but it turns out that there is not only a Left Field Beer company but also a Leftfield vineyard and a Left-Field whiskey distillery.

Next, the second of those songs that were recorded in the 80s. Originally released as the B-side to their 1986 hit “Suburbia”, I first became aware of this Pet Shop Boys track around 1987 when my girlfriend (now wife) bought me a cassette of their remix album “Disco”. “Paninaro” was the fourth of just six songs on said album but always stood out even against the remixes of all the singles from their debut long player “Please”. Starting off with a drum sound that is reminiscent of the J. Arthur Rank gong, it then takes off with an excoriating synth sound before the almost unique happens – a Pet Shop Boys vocal by Chris Lowe. OK, he’s speaking rather than singing but it works perfectly as the normally motionless one of the duo recites just eight words on a loop that speak of the very essence of the human experience interspersed with name checks for Italian designers like Armani and Versace. How so? It turns out that the ‘paninari’ were a 1980s Italian youth subculture who were into designer clothing, pop music and hanging out in fast food restaurants (‘panino’ is Italian for sandwich). Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe identified with the movement which inspired the song.

All very interesting but why was it put out again in 1995 you might well ask? Well, “Paninaro ‘95” was a bunch of remixes including one by Tin Tin Out that was used to promote the B-sides compilation album “Alternative” that was released the Monday after this TOTP aired. Very much like New Order before them I guess.

The performance here is obviously memorable for the role reversal which sees Neil behind the keyboards and Chris up front and centre. The latter clearly isn’t used to the spotlight and looks like he doesn’t know where to put himself even turning his back on the studio audience at one point. To make up for Chris’s shortcomings as the focal point, there’s some serious overcompensating going on with the two oiled up male dancers behind him. Was that really necessary? They could have done with some more clothes on them and talking of clothes, that “Alternative” album that I mentioned earlier featured the track “In The Night” which was adopted as the theme tune to the old BBC fashion programme The Clothes Show…

Alcohol association: Tricky one this…the only thing I’ve got is that in the book Literally which documents the duo’s first ever tour in 1989, there’s plenty of references to the consumption of alcohol with champagne being a favourite tipple.

Talking of tricky…in 1995, trip-hop was a big deal spearheaded by the holy trinity of Massive Attack, Portishead and, yep, Tricky. Having been an early member of Massive Attack but not fancying the idea of fame and fortune, Tricky (real name Adrian Thaws) branched out on his own and found…fame and fortune. His seminal debut album “Maxinquaye” went gold and made No 3 in the charts. The music press lavished it with praise and it topped many a publication’s album of the year poll. It received a Mercury Music Prize nomination losing out to, you guessed it, Portishead’s “Dummy”. As a consequence of this success, Tricky’s face adorned the covers of magazines like…erm…The Face and Wire but he was never comfortable with his celebrity though he did rather court publicity by dating Björk. He also had a relationship with the vocalist on “Maxinquaye” Marina Topley-Bird.

This song- “Hell Is Around The Corner” – was taken from “The Hell E.P.” which was a collaboration with US hip-hop group Gravediggaz though they didn’t contribute to this particular track. It would prove to be Tricky’s biggest ever hit peaking at No 12. The man himself stated that he didn’t like the term ‘trip-hop’ and shied away from claims that he invented the genre. His stance was reinforced by him releasing a song that sounded very similar to Portishead’s “Glory Box” that was released six months earlier. The fact was though that both artists had sampled the same track – Isaac Hayes’s “Ike’s Rap II” – though who actually recorded their song first (as opposed to releasing it) is disputed.

Alcohol association: There is a dessert cocktail called The Grave Digger which is a coffee liqueur comprising brandy, Grand Marnier and is topped with crushed Oreo biscuits on whipped cream with a tiny shovel accessory to signify a freshly dug grave. Tricky stuff.

And suddenly it is upon us. When people talk about the pop music story of 1995, one event dominates. Not just the biggest story of the year but possibly the whole decade. We have arrived at a defining moment in time – the ‘Battle of Britpop’ is here! Now I don’t intend to rehash this story in detail – so much has been written about it already that it’s all out there and easily accessible from just a basic search of the internet. However, I was working in a record shop at the time (Our Price in Stockport) and during that week in the middle of August that saw the dual release of “Country House” by Blur and “Roll With It” by Oasis, I stood in for the singles buyer who was on leave which brought a certain amount of pressure – to run out of either release would have been unforgivable. I was checking stocks of both on what seemed like an hourly basis.

It was though an unbelievably exciting time to be working in record retail with news crews dispatched to shops (not ours sadly) to film pieces that would make headlines on the national evening news. Such was the intense media speculation that the story transformed from the tale of two singles to a class war with Oasis cast as working class northerners and Blur as arty, southern softies. The narrative constructed was that you were either on the side of one or the other and your choice of which single to buy was akin to casting a vote with record shops remodelled as polling stations. The truth is, of course, that plenty of people bought both though not necessarily in the same purchase. I worked with someone who bought one in the first week of release and the other in the second – she liked both tunes but had a preference for one to be No 1 over the other. I can’t recall which way round it was but I guess this was the record shop equivalent of tactical voting.

Anyway, it’s Blur we’re concerned with in this show who have the ‘exclusive’ performance slot to promote the lead single from their new album “The Great Escape”. Now the TOTP caption says that “Country House” was to be released on 14th August which was also the date that “Roll With It” was due in the shops. As such, the decision by Blur (mainly Damon from what I can ascertain) to go head to head with their rivals had already been taken. Reportedly wrong footed by Creation pushing forward the Oasis release date by weeks and fearing that they would trail in the wake of a second successive No 1 for the Mancs, the battle was set up by “Country House” having its own release date shifted to 14th August as well. I’m guessing I would have been aware of all this what with working in a record shop and all but it’s hard to recall at a distance of nearly twenty-nine years.

So what of the actual song itself? Received opinion is that “Country House” is not actually very good and certainly is not a good representation of the band’s canon. Whilst there is some credence to that conventional wisdom, I think history has shown that there was more to the tune than it being what Liam Gallagher described as ‘chimney sweep music’. Yes, the band themselves seemed to disown the song, refusing to play it live for many years but accusations of it being a throwaway pop song are wide of the mark I feel. There’s a sense of unruliness to it but it also has layers. The knockabout fun coexists with some standout melancholy moments like the “blow, blow me out, I am so sad I don’t know why” line when the song pauses for breath. Whether it can ever escape the connotations of that time or not I don’t know but it’s probably better than it is remembered as. We’ll get the whole denouement of the ‘Battle of Britpop’ soon enough but then we all know who won don’t we?

Alcohol association: Bassist Alex James developed more than a liking for champagne to supplement his cheese obsession and he did call his autobiography “Bit Of A Blur”.

Take That are No 1 this week with “Never Forget”. I went into all the Robbie Williams leaving the group stuff the last time I wrote about this one so I’m not going to go over all that again. Suffice to say, due to a clause in his Take That contract, he wasn’t allowed to release any solo material until six months after the band was officially dissolved meaning that the first Robbie Williams single – a rather weak cover of George Michael’s “Freedom” – didn’t see the light of day until the end of July 1996. That will either be a relief or totally infuriating to viewers of these BBC4 TOTP repeats depending on your inclination. I will say though that I recall catching Williams appearing on a breakfast TV show (possibly The Big Breakfast) not long after he had left the group where he was his usual bullish self (no sign of any regret or self reflection) where he kept going on about how brilliant his little bit of singing was on “Never Forget”. What a class act!

Alcohol association: Gary Barlow launched his own range of organic wine in 2021.

The play out video is “Waterfalls” by TLC. I don’t think I ever quite realised quite how much of a big deal this trio was until I checked their discography. Four American No 1 records! Wow! Their level of success over here was a bit more tempered but they still racked up four Top 10 hits including this one which made No 4. A groundbreaking track in many respects, its lyrics made reference to drugs related violence and HIV/AIDS which was one of the very first mainstream chart songs to do so. It’s hard not to fall for the sonic charms of “Waterfalls”. It’s the very definition of ‘slinky’ with a smooth beat that oozes class aligned with some gorgeous vocal stylings and a killer rap from Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes. Those attributes earned it two Grammy nominations for Record of the Year and Best Vocal Performance and a Soul Train Music Award for Best R&B / Soul single.

If the song itself wasn’t enough to tempt you to dive right into it, then there was the video. A combination of literal retelling of the lyrics visually and special effects, it would win four gongs at the MTV Video Music Awards. If the image of the trio performing whilst seemingly standing on water in an ocean wasn’t striking enough then their liquefied, ‘water sprite’ forms dancing in front of a waterfall couldn’t help but make an impression. This seemed like cutting-edge stuff in 1995.

Lopes would tragically die in a car crash just seven years on from “Waterfalls”. The lyrics of her rap from it were engraved on her casket.

Alcohol association: There is a sobriety support group called The Luckiest Club who use the abbreviation TLC as part of their identity. There’s also a non-alcohol beer company called Tropical Lager Coral’ation.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Therapy?	Loose	No
2	Corona	Try Me Out	As if
3	New Order	Blue Monday – 95	I did not
4	Black Grape	In The Name Of The Father	No but I had the album
5	Leftfield	Afro-Left	It’s a no from me
6	Pet Shop Boys	Paninaro ‘95	Nope
7	Tricky	The Hell E.P.	Nah
8	Blur	Country House	See 4 above
9	Take That	Never Forget	Negative
10	TLC	Waterfalls	Liked it, didn’t buy it

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

TOTP 20 JUL 1995

Posted on December 17 by 80stastic

One of the interesting things about these TOTP repeats is that they’re a great snapshot of cultural tastes of the time, shining a spotlight on sounds, artists and personalities that were popular and prominent at a specific moment. Obviously, some names transverse any particular juncture; U2 first example who are on this show later can’t be put into a time capsule but then there are people like the presenter of this show. Does the name Gayle Tuesday ring any bells? No? How about Brenda Gilhooly? Nothing? OK. Maybe if you saw a clip…

…anything now? Got her? Yep, Gayle Tuesday was nothing to do with a song by The Rolling Stones (Ruby Tuesday) nor the new Doctor Who’s latest companion (Ruby Sunday) but was a character created by comedian Brenda Gilhooly who briefly rose to fame in the mid 90s. A send up of the traditional image of and persona allocated to Page 3 models, the character appeared on programmes such as !Viva Cabaret! and The Jack Dee Show as well as forming a partnership of sorts with Paul O’Grady’s Lily Savage character. A TV show of her own called Gayle’s World arrived in 1996 but both Gilhooly and her creation seemed to disappear after that. A relaunch in 2010 called Gayle Tuesday: The Comeback appeared on the Living channel in 2010 but Brenda makes her living these days as a writer having penned and starred in the 2019 Radio 4 sit com Madam Mayor. In July 1995 though, she was Gayle Tuesday and a ‘golden mic’ slot on TOTP beckoned…

We start with Corona who were infeasibly onto their third hit single with “Try Me Out”. As the UK went dance music crazy in the 90s, the number of different genres and sub genres of that generic term was bewildering. The scariest part of the Our Price store where I was working at the time was always the Dance Collections section. You really had to have someone who knew their stuff when it came to dance music to sort it out and keep it maintained. Anyway, what would Corona’s music be categorised as? I’ve seen it described online as Euro-NRG, Nu-NRG and, of course, the catch-all term Eurodance. Never having been even remotely qualified to have sorted out the Dance Collections section, I couldn’t possibly give any insight into the discussion other than to say it sounded crap to me. This one comes across like it was written to order, or perhaps formulated by AI if it had existed then. All the essentials are there but it just sounds so cynical and calculated. However it gestated, it worked becoming the band’s third consecutive Top 10 hit.

Next a song and artist I don’t believe I’ve thought about since 1995. Dana Dawson was from Queens, New York but she was more popular in Europe than the US. Not an official one hit wonder (she had two minor follow ups) but “3 Is Family” was by far her biggest. A fluffy but enjoyable bit of dance pop, the online reviews of it I’ve found made comparisons with the output of Eternal and Dina Carroll but it reminds me more of “I Love Your Smile” by Shanice. My comparison wasn’t all the two singers shared – they both released their first ever recordings at the age of just 14 – Shanice brought out her debut album “Discovery” in 1987 whilst Dana entered the world of pop with her single “Ready To Follow You” in 1988.

The latter initially found success just in France as her records were only available there so she signed with EMI in 1993 to open up more territories for her including the UK. The plan worked straight off the bat as she struck big with her first EMI single “3 Is Family” peaking at No 9 over here. A tale of the impending arrival of a first born child, its catchy chorus about a couple becoming a family of three employs some basic maths to great effect. A year later, the Spice Girls would bag the Christmas No 1 with a similarly titled song but in reverse with “2 Become 1” reportedly about the act of lovemaking though the line “Be a little wiser baby, put it on, put it on” suggested that, unlike in Dana’s song, the protagonists weren’t planning on starting a family!

Dana Dawson sadly passed away in 2010 aged just 36 from cancer.

There’s time for a quick boobs gag from Gayle before she introduces Paul Weller whom she describes as “gorgeous, funky, fab” before rounding off with a “phwoar!”. The Modfather as a hunk? Really? Look, I know he has a super loyal fanbase who swear by him (my elder brother is one of them) but I always thought it was about his music not his looks, no?

*watches video for “You Do Something To Me”*

Hmm. Well, he certainly looked better than he does these days but who doesn’t? I guess he has a certain beanpole charm to him. In fact, in the shots in the back of the van with those shades on and that loose, shaggy hair, he has a whiff of Liam Gallagher about him. Anyway, we really should talk about the music and this track was the third single to be taken from his “Stanley Road” album and it would peak at No 9. Not his biggest ever hit but perhaps his most well known solo song? To the casual listener at least maybe. It’s a very charismatic, evocative ballad with a lyric about unattainable love though apparently it’s very popular at weddings. Another one of those totally misunderstood songs that gets played inappropriately like stalker anthem “Every Breath You Take” by The Police. As I remember, this was the point where the ‘godfather of Britpop’ tag really started to circulate in conjunction with the rise of the movement that Weller was supposedly the originator of. I’m not sure if he welcomed it or not but he certainly collaborated with some of its purported proponents on “Stanley Road” including Liam’s brother Noel and Steve Craddock of Ocean Colour Scene. It remains easily his best selling solo album.

The next four songs have all been on the show before so I might just whip through them pretty quickly if that’s alright by you. The first is “Love Enuff” by Soul II Soul. I didn’t have much to say about this one when it was on as the play out track recently and my cupboard is still pretty bare now. I guess I could say that some of the backing singer harmonies remind me a bit of En Vogue or that main vocalist Penny Ford did the singing on Snap!’s early hits. Is that enough? Sorry, enuff?

Gayle gets a gag in about the rude name of the next act before we get another airing of the studio performance from the other week by Shaggy (ooerr!) and Rayvon. As with Soul II Soul, I’m at a loss as to what to say about these two. We all know that “In The Summertime” was originally a No 1 hit for Mungo Jerry in 1970 so that won’t do.

*checks Shaggy’s Wikipedia entry*

Oh, his son is a music artist as well. He’s a rapper and goes by the name of Robb Banks (or sometimes styled as Robb Bank$ inevitably). His influences include Biggie Smalls and…is this right?…Sade?! The list also includes some names I’ve never heard of like SpaceGhostPurrp and Slug. Does his Dad get a mention? Oh yeah, he’s in there (just referred to literally as ‘his Dad’). Now I might regret this but I wonder what Robb Banks sounds like?

*listens to his single “You Kno It”*

Oh God. Why did I bother? What did I think was going to happen? It’s dreadful. I didn’t think I would ever say this but I actually prefer Shaggy!

It’s the video for U2’s “Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me” next back for what I believe is a third outing on the show as it is going back up the charts having seemingly peaked at No 2 a month previously. The reason for its reversal of fortunes is pretty obvious – the film it was taken from – Batman Forever – had been released to UK cinemas six days before this TOTP was broadcast. Its eleven week run in the Top 40 (in itself definitely not a regular occurrence in the mid 90s) would yield the following chart positions:

2 – 2 – 3 – 6 – 10 – 6 – 4 – 7 -13 – 17 – 26

The power of a blockbuster film promoting a single on display right there. That’s not to say it wasn’t a good song of course. I always quite liked it and certainly enjoyed it more than the big hits from the other Batman films up to this point. If you’ve forgotten what they were, there was “Batdance” by Prince (where was the song in this track?) and “Face To Face” by Siouxsie and the Banshees (seriously, who does remember that one?).

Another song in the charts enjoying a helping hand from being on a hit film’s soundtrack is “Shy Guy” by Diana King which was featured in Bad Boys. Now, she may really only be known for this one song in the UK but Diana is quite the trailblazer both musically and culturally in her home country of Jamaica. Whilst her blend of reggae, dancehall and R&B pushed back musical boundaries, in her personal life, Diana came out as a lesbian in 2012 making her one of the first and only LGBTQ+ Jamaican artists in the music industry. So it turned out that as well as not wanting no fly guy, she didn’t want a shy guy either really.

And so to the climax of the show and yes, I’m not counting another week at No 1 for The Outhere Brothers – this was a much more seismic event in the world of pop music. It’s not just an exclusive performance of the new Take That single “Never Forget” but our first look at the group in a post Robbie Williams world! Eek! Yes, just three days before this TOTP went out, Williams had officially announced that he was leaving Take That. The fall out, rumours and accusations surrounding this were huge. Did he resign or was he asked to leave by the rest of the band? Would they continue without him or replace him? Would they split up? Double eek! Whatever the truth, there were some very immediate logistical consequences for the band to deal with. Take That were in the middle of a world tour and just about to begin the UK leg of it. How would they accommodate a Robbie-shaped hole? Well, as I recall they offered a refund to anyone who had bought a ticket for one of their concerts if they felt short-changed that they wouldn’t be seeing Williams. As I recall, maybe one person cashed in on the refund for that reason. My wife went to see them with a friend on that tour and said it was a great show and that she didn’t even notice Robbie wasn’t there.

So, tour troubles resolved but what to do about the new single? “Never Forget” didn’t have Gary Barlow on lead vocals for once but Howard Donald. A surprise it may have been but a problem? No, Howard wasn’t going anywhere. However, the song did feature Robbie singing prominently in the middle eight and the bridge part before the final chorus. Well, they didn’t re-record the single that was released to shops because promo copies featuring Robbie had been made available to radio stations weeks before. However, for the purpose of promoting the song on TV shows, they performed a version with the Williams vocals edited out. Watch this TOTP appearance. I’m pretty sure you can’t hear Robbie on it anywhere.

Talking of different versions of the song, the edit that was released as a single is quite different from the album version. It was remixed by Meatloaf producer Jim Steinman who added a boys choir part to the intro and coda and a steal from Verdi’s Requiem right at the very start of the song. These enhancements made for a very crowded stage for this TOTP performance with the lads sharing it with eight choristers and a gospel choir. Who knew it would take so many people to replace Robbie Williams?! Maybe they wanted to make a statement that they weren’t going anywhere and they didn’t need Robbie to put on a show? If so, it certainly worked – the four of them look highly delighted. Nothing forced about their smiling faces; maybe there was an element of (dare I say it) relief in there? Image-wise, Howard has toned down his attempt to turn into the musical version of Chewbacca by tying his hair back and he’s also pre-dated David Beckham by at least a couple of years by his choice to wear a sarong. Mark and Jason look like 70s pin ups with their grown out hair dos that Black Lace would probably describe as ‘girly-curly hair’ whilst Gary just looks like he’s counting the dance steps in his head like he always does. Those dance moves include, of course, that “Radio Ga Ga” style hands aloft move which is actually pretty effective and inclusive (even the two left footed amongst us can pull that off).

Overall, I think they do a pretty good job of displaying a band united despite the potential for derailment caused by the departure of a popular member of the group. The lyrics and theme of the song also help with Robbie’s leaving somehow imbuing them with more significance. There’s also an element of grounded-ness in there as if they’re saying “Look, we’re just a pop group at the end of the day. You’ll move on as we will”. It puts me in mind of John Lennon saying to the fans that they couldn’t stay those lovable moptops forever when The Beatles decided to concentrate on recording and stop touring. He reminded them that those early records were still there and that if they really couldn’t let go of the band’s previous image and style then there was always The Monkees anyway. “Some day soon this will all be someone else’s dream” indeed. “Never Forget” has become possibly Take That’s biggest song – not in sales maybe (though it will go to No 1 for three weeks) but in terms of its profile to the point that the 2023 version of the band chose to sing it at the Coronation Concert for King Charles III and Queen Camilla.

After quite a lengthy dissection of Take That, I’m going to give short shrift to these two berks. The Outhere Brothers are No1 for a third week with “Boom Boom Boom”. There you go. That’s it. That’s the comment.

And that’s nearly it. There’s just time for Gayle Tuesday to say goodbye and advise the watching female audience to remember to stick their chests out and giggle a lot before the play out track kicks in. I’ve never heard of Tecknicolor nor their track “Take 5 In The Jungle” though, of course, I was aware of “Take 5” by the Dave Brubeck Quartet. I’m not sure that this dance version of the jazz standard made the Top 40 and there’s precious little information about it online that I can find. For what it’s worth, my opinion on it would be that with all the dance music around at the time, did we really need to bring jazz into the equation?

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Corona	Try Me Out	No
2	Dana Dawson	3 Is Family	I did not
3	Paul Weller	You Do Something To Me	Not but I had the Stanley Road album
4	Soul II Soul	Love Enuff	Nah
5	Shaggy and Rayvon	In The Summertime	As if
6	U2	Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me	Liked it, didn’t buy it
7	Diana King	Shy Guy	Nope
8	Take That	Never Forget	It’s a no from me
9	The Outhere Brothers	Bom Boom Boom	Ha! Away with you!
10	Tecknicolor	Take 5 In The Jungle	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/m001t61l/top-of-the-pops-20071995

TOTP 20 APR 1995

Posted on November 2 by 80stastic

Those big BBC changes keep on coming in 1995. The day after this TOTP aired, both Bruno Brookes and Steve Wright presented their final shows on Radio 1. Brookes, of course, had hosted his last TOTP just the other week; Wright hadn’t been near the corporation’s flagship pop music show for years. Dear old Uncle Steve probably felt hard done by having been shunted from his natural habitat of Radio 1 afternoons to the Breakfast Show by new controller Matthew Bannister in the January of the previous year. The new time slot hadn’t worked out and the Monday after Wright’s departure, the era of Chris Evans commenced.

Whatever your opinion of Mr Evans, there’s no denying he created some noise around himself and his show. The first time I became aware of him was in 1992 when he presented a Sunday afternoon show on Radio 1 called Too Much Gravy and he genuinely sounded like a breath of fresh air. He had a feature where he asked listeners to suggest songs that were really long and really short in length as I recall. Later that year he would break into TV with The Big Breakfast and his fame (some may say infamy) was assured. Don’t Forget Your Toothbrush would follow (made by Evans’ own production company) before the call came from Matthew Bannister to renew his relationship with Radio 1. His breakfast show would add 600,000 new listeners possibly due to the controversy it created with innuendo-laden features and the regular questioning of a female member of his team called Holly Samos about her sex life. Over the next couple of years, Evans would become one of the biggest celebrities around aided by the rise of ‘lad culture’ and his Channel 4 show TFI Friday. This post isn’t about blowing smoke up Chris Evans’ arse though so on with the music and we start with Pato Banton and Ranking Roger and their duet “Bubbling Hot”.

Now, if like me you’re wondering why this sounds so familiar even though you weren’t aware that it even existed until it was featured on these TOTP repeats, then here’s @TOTPFacts with the reason why:

“Bubbling Hot” pinches a melody from Dave & Ansel Collins’s classic 1971 track “Double Barrel”: https://t.co/p5kVXVuuC9 #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) October 27, 2023

Roger, of course, is probably best known for his time as a member of The Beat though there is much more to his musical legacy including a band who never had a UK Top 40 hit though they did achieve some success in America. General Public were kind of a punk /ska supergroup comprising a line up of ex-members of The Specials, The Clash, Dexys Midnight Runners and the aforementioned The Beat’s Dave Wakeling and Ranking Roger. Though ignored at home, three of their songs would make it into film soundtracks resulting in hits on the US charts. The John Hughes pictures Weird Science, Sixteen Candles and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off plus the Alicia Silverstone starring Clueless all feature General Public tracks of which this is probably my favourite:

Wakeling and Roger reactivated General Public in 1995 and would score another US hit from another film soundtrack (this time Threesome) with a version of the Staple Singers’ “I’ll Take You There”. Sadly, Ranking Roger died of cancer in 2019 aged just 56.

Next up we have *checks notes* ah yes, some Eurodance. Of course we do. You couldn’t sodding avoid this soulless genre back then. Corona are this week’s exponent of the genre’s paucity of passion with their single “Baby Baby”. There are few if any redeeming features on display here. Even the singer isn’t the actual singer. Echoing Black Box’s vocalist deception, the woman fronting the whole sham here – Olga Maria de Souza – was just that, a front. The voice on the track belongs to someone called Jenny B. In fact, despite being the public face of the act throughout the 90s and beyond, Souza didn’t actually lay down her own vocals on any Corona recording until 2005! We’re talking Boris Johnson levels of building a career based on nothing but smoke and mirrors here. “Baby Baby” would somehow become a No 5 hit. The more I hear, the less I understand.

A genuinely arresting song now that would make you stop in your tracks the first time you heard it. Portishead had firmly been announced by the music press as the movement leaders of trip hop by this point though this wasn’t an image that the band themselves wished to promote. After “Glory Box” had made them bona fide Top 40 stars earlier in the year, a rerelease of their debut single “Sour Times” was deemed sensible and what a sound decision it proved to be.

After making No 57 in August of 1994, it would peak at No 13 second time around. Many a descriptor has been used to identify Portishead’s sound in general but on this track in particular, words like ‘haunting’, ‘melancholy’ and ‘cinematic’ are certainly not wide of the mark. That last one certainly rings true. “Sour Times” features a speeded up sample from a track from film composer Lalo Schifrin’s album “More Mission: Impossible”. Not only that but the video features footage from a short film made by the band themselves! I had no idea such a thing existed! Said film is called To Kill A Dead Man and a still from it formed the cover of their “Dummy” album. The theme from the film was an extra track on the CD single of “Sour Times” and gives off some serious 60s spy film vibes…

Of course, Portishead weren’t the first band to make their own feature film. ABC came out with Mantrap in 1983 and, like To Kill A Dead Man, it was a spy caper and had its own theme tune called “Theme From Mantrap”.

After that rather spine tingling interlude, we’re back to the cruddy, generic dance music. I say generic but there was something that set Real McCoy apart from their peers and that was that for some reason their particular brand of Eurodance crossed over to America. They had two No 3 hits over there with “Another Night” and “Run Away” not though with this one, “Love & Devotion”. Yes, I know the TOTP caption says “3rd UK hit and 2nd US Top 20 hit” but as far as I can tell, this isn’t true. This track wasn’t released as a single in America.

Anyway, so what was it about the Real McCoy version of Eurodance that succeeded over the pond where the genre generally didn’t prove to be popular? I think I may have said in a previous post whilst commenting on another of their hits that there seemed to be more of a classic pop song structure to their output than some of their contemporaries so was that a factor? Bizarrely, in the case of “Love & Devotion”, I could probably understand if that had been a major hit in the US (it wasn’t released there remember) as it has more than a passing resemblance to Ace Of Base whose Euro-infused cod reggae sound provided them with a No 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. I’ll say it again, the more I hear the less I understand.

When it comes to songs from films, Portishead, despite having their own short film to their name, had some way to go to catch the soundtrack master Bryan Adams. The Groover From Vancouver’ first had one of his songs featured in a film in 1983 when “Heaven” appeared in the largely unknown A Night In Heaven and by 2002 he had written a whole soundtrack album by himself for the animated western Spirit: Stallion Of The Cimarron but it was the 90s when he bestrode the genre mammoth like. Starting with that Robin Hood song, he followed it up by being part of a trio with Sting and Rod Stewart on “All For Love” from The Three Musketeers and then came “Have You Ever Really Loved A Woman?” from Don Juan DeMarco. Yet another ballad (all his film songs seemed to be of the love variety), the flamenco guitar gave it a differential to the others but for me it was always a bit of a damp squib. Sorry Bry but I’ve never really loved this song. Not one bit.

It’s the ‘album’ slot now but as is commonwith this feature, what we actually get is a very long preview of the artist’s next single. Wet Wet Wet’s latest album “Picture This” (as the TOTP caption says) was No 1 and had already sold 340,000 copies (it would go on to shift 900,000 units) so I guess it made sense to have the top selling artist on the show. The track they perform here is “Don’t Want To Forgive Me Now” which would end up being their next single when it was released in June. It’s an accomplished, well produced pop song but a little to formulaic and obvious for me. It would peak at No 7 when finally released.

If the track itself didn’t really intrigue me, I was struck by something about the performance of it, namely that bass player Graeme Clark and keyboardist Neil Mitchell have swapped places and instruments. Was that just some sort of band in joke or did they perhaps want to have a laugh by messing with the usual set up? Neither looks convincing in their new role. Neil hardly moves his fingers at all along the bass neck whilst Graeme literally bashes around on the keys like he was Bamm-Bamm from The Flintstones. It got me thinking though about other occasions in the show’s history where a classic band line up has been subverted. Later in the year we would get the classic Oasis performance of “Roll With It” when Noel and Liam exchanged places and didn’t Jimmy Somerville and Sarah Jane Morris mine each other’s vocal parts when performing “Don’t Leave Me This Way”? I think they did. Must be something about songs that begin with the word ‘Don’t’.

Ah, it’s Björk. Always a difficult review for me. I used to think I didn’t like Björk because she can’t sing. Then I came to the realisation that she can sing but I just don’t like her voice. Then I surprised myself when rewatching these BBC4 TOTP repeats by actually appreciating and even liking some of her material like “Venus As A Boy” and “Big Time Sensuality”. So how do I approach and revisit “Army Of Me”, the lead single of her second album “Post”? Well, I’m afraid this one doesn’t work for me. Too menacing, brooding and industrial sounding for my delicate pop sensibilities. However, even I couldn’t resist the charms of her version of “It’s Oh So Quiet” when she scored a massive hit with it over the Xmas period.

Björk is back on the show in a future repeat alongside Skunk Anansie to perform a remix of “Army Of Me”. Maybe I’ll like that version better. By the way, this was yet another song that featured on a film soundtrack – the big screen adaptation of the comic book character Tank Girl. The collection of songs was assembled by Courtney Love and included tracks by her own band Hole (of course) and the aforementioned Portishead. This is fast turning into a film soundtrack special!

Or is it a Eurovision special? With the song contest just three weeks away, the BBC was ramping up its promotion of the annual event. The UK’s official entry Love City Groove will be along shortly but right now it’s an act that came third to them in the selection competition A Song For Europe. Deuce had already had a No 11 hit with “Call It Love” earlier in the year but their Eurovision attempt “I Need You” would go one better giving them their biggest ever hit. Having listened back to this rather nasty slice of Eurodance, I can understand why it didn’t win. Deuce were like a second rate Steps prototype and nobody needed that in their lives.

Despite being well beaten at A Song For Europe by Love City Groove, Deuce did pip their victors in one chart battle – they made it to the Top 10 first. Whilst the rappers were at No 17 this week, Deuce went straight in at No 10. LCG would eventually supersede that feat by peaking at No 7 after Eurovision had aired.

Take That remain at No 1 for a third week with “Back For Good”. The black and white video of the band mooching about in the rain in slow motion in front of some classic American cars became almost iconic, perhaps because it was the last to feature Robbie Williams in the band’s first incarnation. A still from it would form the cover for their 2005 Best Of “Never Forget – The Ultimate Collection”.

And so to Love City Groove. Tacked onto the end of the show as an additional tenth track (most shows of this period had featured nine), this looked like a clear case of hype building for Eurovision by the BBC. I guess in this week in particular they could make the case that its inclusion was merited as it was the highest climber on the chart leaping from No 26 to No 17. My guess is that this won’t be the last TOTP appearance for “Love City Groove”.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Pato Banton and Ranking Roger	Bubbling Hot	Nah
2	Corona	Baby Baby	NO!
3	Portishead	Sour Times	No but my wife had the album
4	Real McCoy	Love & Devotion	Negative
5	Bryan Adams	Have You Ever Really Loved A Woman?	Nope
6	Wet Wet Wet	Don’t Want To Forgive Me Now	I did not
7	Björk	Army Of Me	It’s a no
8	Deuce	I Need You	But I don’t need you or your record
9	Take That	Back For Good	No but my wife did
10	Love City Groove	Love City Groove	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/m001rrzj/top-of-the-pops-20041995

TOTP 13 APR 1995

Posted on October 28 by 80stastic

After Bruno Brookes’ valedictory TOTP appearance last week, we’re back to the ‘golden mic’ slot and this time it’s given to Phill Jupitus. Now quite how big a name Phill was at the time I’m not sure. Wikipedia tells me that he didn’t start his stint as a team captain on Never Mind The Buzzcocks until 1996 but that he had his own radio show on BBC GLR. In the pre-digital world, I’m not sure that the latter post would have cut through that much but I’m wondering if I would have been aware of him thanks to my Weller super fan elder brother and the fact that Phill had been involved with the Red Wedge movement of the mid 80s. Possibly. Anyway, Phill would go onto have a very successful career as a stand up, actor, radio host, performance poet and podcaster. However, Wikipedia informs me that Phill has now retired and is studying art at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design in Dundee.

Back to 1995 though and Phill is doing his best to look excited at the thought of introducing this year’s Eurovision entry which, though the artist didn’t do the business on the night of the contest finishing 10th, is one of the more memorable acts to have represented the UK. Now it may not seem like a big deal to our sophisticated 2023 ears with the hindsight of twenty-nine contests informing our perspective but having a rap / hip-hop group as the Eurovision entry was almost revolutionary. Love City Groove were that group and, as I remember, much was expected of them if not to actually win it then to at least shake the whole competition up a bit. Their 10th place finish wasn’t very glorious but was in line with recent UK form in the competition. Frances Ruffelle had also finished 10th the previous year as had Samantha Janus in 1991. Sure, only Coco in 1978 and Rikki in 1987 had secured a poorer position in the years since the competition’s inception, but given the horrors that were to come for the UK, 10th place would certainly come to be seen as not bad at all. However, Eurovision stalwart Terry Wogan wasn’t that impressed. As the voting played out on the big night and it became apparent that the losing streak that we’d been on since Bucks Fizz were the last UK winners in 1981 was going to continue, Terry grimly stated that “the experiment has failed”.

They may not have brought the bacon home for the UK but “Love City Groove” the single was more successful in winning over the UK record buying public. Its peak of No 7 meant that it was the highest charting UK Eurovision song since Bardo made No 2 in 1982. Indeed, no Eurovision song (UK or otherwise) had made our Top 10 since Johnny Logan’s “Hold Me Now” in 1987.

Watching their performance here, it all looks rather unconvincing like it’s actually a present day parody, sending up mid 90s sounds and styles; even their name sounds like a spoof. I guess that opinion can only exist with 28 years of hindsight though. I’m predicting this won’t be the last time we see Love City Groove on TOTP as Eurovision night was still a month away at this point.

Next an artist who is pretty much known as a one hit wonder over here (although that’s not statistically correct) but is a huge deal in her own country. Tina Arena (not quite her real name but close enough – Filippina Arena isn’t quite as snappy I guess) is an Australian singer-songwriter, musical theatre actress and producer who has sold 10 million records worldwide but how many people in the UK know her just for “Chains”?

A slow building, brooding power ballad with a memorable chorus performed by a strong vocalist with a soprano range, it was always going to do well commercially. And so it did. Going double platinum in Australia, it also crossed over in the UK selling 200,000 copies but then, we’d always been suckers for power ballads. Meatloaf had the biggest selling single of 1993 with “I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That)” and more recently Celine Dion’s “Think Twice” had been our No 1 single for seven weeks. “Chains” didn’t quite match the feats of those two records but a No 6 hit was highly respectable.

Tina did have four more UK chart entries but none made the Top 20. Her final hit was called “Whistle Down The Wind” from the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical of the same name based on the Hayley Mills film. I thought at the time she must have covered the greatest living Englishman Nick Heyward’s debut solo hit but thankfully she hadn’t. A quick thought on the staging of the performance here. What was the deal with having the backing singers positioned on a separate stage away from Tina? There was plenty of space behind her which Phill Jupitus occupies when he walks on behind her to do the next intro. Odd.

I saw a post on Twitter (I refuse to call it X) on a #TOTP thread the other day saying that everyone had lost interest in REM by 1995. I’m not sure that’s true as most of their post ‘95 albums went to No 1 both here and in the US but I have to admit personally to not following their output as closely from “Monster” onwards. I think a case could be made that those four albums “Green”, “Out Of Time”, “Automatic For The People” and the aforementioned “Monster” represented their imperial phase. “Strange Currencies” was the third single to be lifted from that album but it could easily have been called “Everybody Hurts 2.0” so close is its sound to that previous 1993 hit. It doesn’t mean it isn’t a good song (it is) but I guess maybe I expected more from a band like REM than song recycling.

The video features Norman Reedus who would go on to play Daryl Dixon in The Walking Dead franchise but it’s another US TV show that has a more current link to “Strange Currencies”. If you haven’t caught FX’s The Bear (you can watch it on Disney Plus in the UK), you’ve missed out. A comedy drama about an award winning chef who returns to his hometown of Chicago to run his dead brother’s sandwich shop…yeah, I know that description isn’t really selling it but trust me, it’s great. Anyway, the show has a fine soundtrack featuring the likes of Wilco, Radiohead, The Breeders, Van Morrison and “Strange Currencies”. Such was the show’s impact that a second video for the song was released in June of this year featuring footage of REM’s documentary Road Movie and clips from The Bear.

It’s another outing for the latest incarnation of Snap! now with their hit “The First The Last Eternity (Till The End)”. I haven’t got much else on this one seeing as this is its second studio appearance recently other than to say the staging of it looks very simplistic with just vocalist Summer and two backing dancers for company. I know there was always an issue with presenting dance acts on the show effectively but this does seem overly sparse.

Also looking on the scant side were the band’s album sales. Generating big numbers from a dance act’s albums as opposed to their singles was always a difficult trick to pull off but Snap! had been one of the more successful proponents of the art. Debut album “World Power” went Top 10 and achieved gold status as did the 1992 follow up “The Madman’s Return” but their third effort “Welcome To Tomorrow” bombed out at No 69. To be fair, it didn’t feature a No 1 single like its predecessors did (“The Power” and “Rhythm Is A Dancer” respectively). That kind of makes sense but then how do you explain how 1996’s Greatest Hits collection “Snap! Attack: The Best Of Snap!” could only make a high of No 47? Ah, the vagaries of public approval.

Next, it’s another of those previous ‘exclusive’ performances being wheeled out again once said single has entered the charts. This time it’s for “Doll Parts” by Hole. Did I tell my Hole / Nirvana T-shirt story last time? I think I did meaning I’m struggling for content yet again. Erm…well there’s the influence that Courtney Love has had on inspiring subsequent female performers to embark on a career in rock music but there’s plenty been written about that much better than I could do in my irreverent blog. Instead, here’s an insight to that TOTP appearance from the other week courtesy of @TOTPFacts when Ant & Dec were the hosts:

This Hole appearance is a repeat of their performance from two weeks earlier. Apparently during rehearsals either Ant or Dec introduced Hole as "featuring Kurt Cobain's widow", but Courtney Love objected and insisted on a retake. #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) October 20, 2023

Wait. What? Another Bruce Springsteen track from his “Greatest Hits” album?! We had “Murder Incorporated” the other week and now we get the second of four new tracks on the collection “Secret Garden”. His label Columbia must have been hitting the phones hard to get him exposure like this. Or maybe The Boss was such a big name that he told TOTP when he would be on the show.

“Murder Incorporated” was never released as a single in the UK but “Secret Garden” was. However, despite the strength of the track, it only made No 44 originally. What do I mean by originally? Well, it was reactivated two years later by its inclusion on the soundtrack to Jerry Maguire which is possibly why it sounds so familiar to me. Either that or the fact that it could be mistaken for “The Big Ones Get Away” by Buffy Sainte-Marie. The 1997 release of “Secret Garden” would make No 17 whilst the “Greatest Hits” album topped the charts just about everywhere on the planet.

And another dance tune that’s back for another TOTP appearance that I’m not sure I have the stamina to comment on. Strike are up to No 4 with “U Sure Do” which is where they will peak. Will that do? No? OK, how about the contrast in performance between them and Snap! earlier? A vocalist and two backing singers on a bare looking stage was all Snap! had but Strike have two keyboard players, two twirling dancers and two backing singers on their own podiums. I get that there’s a difference in tempo between the respective tracks which may have influenced the set ups but it hardly seems fair does it?

The exclusive performance this week features two controversial and irrepressible characters and a song that has a back story that has a connection to one of tonight’s artists that was on earlier. Shane MacGowan (and the Popes) and Sinéad O’Connor were an unlikely duet or were they? In terms of their voices maybe. Sinéad with her pure, angelic vocal and Shane with his drunken growl but in terms of their background and profiles, perhaps their collaboration was inevitable. The track they chose to record together was an old Pogues song called “Haunted” that had originally been on the soundtrack to the Sid Vicious biopic Sid And Nancy which is where the connection with another act on tonight’s show comes in. Courtney Love had a bit part in that film as a friend of Nancy Spungen. “Haunted” failed to make the Top 40 on its original release in 1986 but its re-recording in 1995 and inclusion on the soundtrack to another film (Two If By Sea / Stolen Hearts) propelled it to a high of No 30.

I quite like it I have to say even if the contrast in Shane and Sinéad’s voices is a bit jarring to say the least. The latter, of course, died in July this year at the tragically young age of 56. Back in 1995, I don’t think any of us would have predicted that MacGowan would live longer out of the two of them.

Take That are still secure in top spot with “Back For Good” for a second week. It would eventually sell over a million copies and is the biggest selling single by a boyband ever in the UK.

Such is its influence that it has been used in The Office as the love theme between Tim and Dawn but I think even that is eclipsed by its use in Channel 4 sit com Spaced which also managed to reference the rather wonderful John Cusack film Say Anything.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Love City Groove	Love City Groove	Not likely
2	Tina Arena	Chains	Not for me
3	REM	Strange Currencies	Neative
4	Snap!	The First The Last Eternity (Till The End)	I did not
5	Hiole	Doll Parts	No thanks
6	Bruce Springsteen	Secret Garden	Nah
7	Strike	U Sure Do	Nope
8	Shane MacGowan and the Popes / Sinéad O’Connor	Haunted	No
9	Take That	Back For Good	No but my wife did

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/m001rk7c/top-of-the-pops-13041995

06 APR 1995

Posted on October 25 by 80stastic

We’ve arrived in April of 1995 here at TOTP Rewind and back then, the day before this TOTP was broadcast, came some seismic music news. The NME published a statement announcing that Stone Roses drummer Reni had left the band. Now maybe a drummer leaving any band wouldn’t normally be such a big deal but I guess the Roses weren’t just any band and Reni wasn’t just any drummer. He cut a legendary figure as part of the four musketeers of the classic line up with his wicked talent and trademark bucket hat. His departure was the removal of the foundation stone that would see the band disintegrate by 1996. It would be another seventeen years before he played with them again.

By a strange quirk of fate, Reni wouldn’t be the only drummer to leave a huge Manchester band this month. On the last day of April, Tony McCarroll was sacked from Oasis thereby definitely making him the Pete Best of the 90s. Maybe. This TOTP doesn’t feature The Stone Roses, Oasis nor The Beatles though amazingly we only missed all three by a whisker. The Stone Roses had been in the Top 40 in March with “Ten Storey Love Song”, Oasis were a month away from their first No 1 “Some Might Say” and The Beatles were actually in the charts again with the track “Baby It’s You” from the “Live At The BBC” album. So if they’re some of the artists not on the show, who were the acts that were?

We start with a dance outfit (of course we do) but who was Grace? Well, she wasn’t the woman front and centre doing the vocals for “Not Over Yet” in this performance. Her name is Patti Low. Neither was it the singer who replaced her after this single – she’s Dominique Atkins. In fact, Grace wasn’t a woman at all. Grace was a group formed by superstar DJs Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne and originally named State Of Grace until they realised that an American band had nabbed the name first. Oakenfold had already been in the charts this year with a different vehicle for his material in the form of Perfecto Allstarz but presumably that moniker wasn’t deemed suitable to promote “Not Over Yet”. A different type of dance track required a different artist name right? Anyway, Grace would go onto have a total of six Top 40 hits but none were bigger than “Not Over Yet” which peaked at No 6.

I thought I didn’t know this one but as soon as that chorus kicked in, it all came flooding back. How could I have forgotten that driving hook that persistently hammers at your brain until it’s stuck in there. As dance tunes go, and you know I’m not a big fan, I’d have to say it’s one of the best examples of trance/disco out there. Indeed, so good was it that it was a hit all over again when re-released four years later under yet another pseudonym- this time Planet Perfecto – when it made No 16. That made it three releases in total for the track if you include its original 1993 outing when it failed to chart and four if you count the 2007 cover version by Klaxons. Who knows, it may even get a future release. It still might be not over yet for this particular tune. Ahem.

I should say that the host tonight is Bruno Brookes in his last ever appearance on the show. He’d had a good run though stretching all the way back to 1984. Obviously there was a three year break during the ‘year zero’ revamp but even so. After getting permanently annoyed by him as the years rolled by, I actually thought he did a decent job when he returned in 1994 but for some reason he’s started the last show in bizarre fashion. Dressed in clergyman garb and calling himself Reverend Rock ‘n’ Roll, it all seems to be just so he can get in a cheap quip about ‘saying grace’ as he introduces opening act…yep…Grace. Not exactly dis-grace-ful but certainly lame.

And talking of lame…here come Ultimate Kaos with a really wimpy ballad called “Show A Little Love”. I could never understand the appeal of this lot or indeed quite what the deal was with them at all. A bunch of barely teenage boys and a lead singer who was only nine when they started out eliciting screams from the young girls in the studio audience? I know I wasn’t the target demographic even back then but the whole thing was decidedly icky. I suppose Michael Jackson wasn’t much older when The Jackson 5 started having hits and although that’s an obvious comparison to make, surely that’s the template that Simon Cowell was following when he put Ultimate Kaos together. “Show A Little Love” was also of an identikit nature being a sickly, bubblegum-pop-by-numbers ballad aimed directly at the hearts of teenage girls. At least it wasn’t as inappropriate as their previous hit “Hoochie Booty” but its No 23 peak meant it wouldn’t last long in the memory and rightly so.

We’re back in the world of dance with the next hit which is “The Bomb! (These Sounds Fall Into My Mind)” by Bucketheads. It’s the video for this one again which was directed by Guy Ritchie and Alex De Rakoff, both at the very start of their careers. The former would go on to direct The Calcium Kid whilst the latter would find fame with Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels and by marrying Madonna.

There’s a scene in the video where the male protagonist walks into a record shop, picks a 12” from the racks (by Bucketheads obviously) and proceeds to nip behind the counter, put the record on the shop turntable and start dancing around with the guy working there. I can honestly say that scene never happened to me once and I worked in record shops for the whole of the 90s pretty much. The only punters who made it behind the counter were those who had been caught on the rob by the security guard and were waiting in the staff kitchen for the police to arrive. Their defence? “These sounds fell into my bag by accident. Honest.”

You’d think spending eight hours a day, five days a week working in a record shop that you’d hear just about every new album that was released wouldn’t you? Wrong! There’s loads of albums that I recognise the cover of but have no idea what it sounded like. Terence Trent D’Arby’s fourth album is a prime example. The cover was striking with TTD sporting a peroxide blonde short haircut and a pair of wings – quite the angelic image. Now I thought it was called “Vibrator” but according to Wikipedia its full title is “Terence Trent D’Arby’s Vibrator* (*Batteries Included)”. Ooerr.

The lead single from it was “Holding Onto You” and I have to say that I was expecting more from it. It’s a bluesy/soul number that sort of meanders along but never really convinces. I keep waiting for the song to get started but it never does. TTD’s distinctive voice is to the fore and seems to have got deeper over the years but even that can’t save it. I’m surprised it got as high as No 20. This would prove to be the last ever UK Top 40 hit for the man who now signs his name as Sananda Maitreya and wasn’t exactly going out on a high. A far cry from the dizzy heights and expectations that met his arrival on the music scene eight years before. Shame really.

What the chuff am I supposed to write about this one seeing as “Baby Baby” by Corona sounds exactly like their previous hit “Rhythm Of The Night”? I know this was common practice around this time but why didn’t the punters see through it and not buy it?! Was it all just about the bpm on the dance floors?

Vocalist Olga Maria de Souza has gone all Bladerunner for this performance with her sartorial choices; specifically the transparent mac that the replicant Zhora is wearing as she flees from Deckard. Thankfully she hasn’t got a snake like Zhora had too. There would have been letters sent to Points Of View, I’m telling you.

Just as the ‘exclusive’ performance from Prince and NPG was recycled the other week, so is this recent appearance by Simple Minds which was also labelled as ‘exclusive’. It’s all very well repeating these clips but where does that leave me eh? I’ve already written about this one in a previous post and they’re just in the studio not at a world famous landmark like the Eiffel Tower as they were when promoting previous single “She’s A River” on the show. Follow up single “Hypnotise” wasn’t anywhere near as strong to my ears so they probably should have reversed the songs and their settings. “Hypnotise” would have benefited from the distraction of the Eiffel Tower whereas “She’s A River” was probably muscular enough to stand up to a session in the TOTP studio as it were.

“Hypnotise” would end up being the band’s penultimate UK Top 40 hit. A lack of chart success didn’t deter them though and they are now in their 47th year of existence (albeit with only Jim Kerr and Charlie Burchill remaining from the original lineup) and have released 21 studio albums with the most recent being 2022’s “Direction Of The Heart”.

Nope, no memory of this one at all. Pato Banton did a single with Ranking Roger of The Beat? Pato only had that one (albeit massive) hit didn’t he? His execrable version of “Baby Come Back”. Well no, actually. He had four (or five if you count his guest rap on Sting’s “This Cowboy Song” for which he received a credit) but none of his other hits got anywhere near the success of his chart topper. This one – “Bubbling Hot” -only managed a peak of No 15. He liked a collaboration though did old Pato. As well as Ranking Roger and Sting (with whom he also had a minor hit with a cover of The Police’s “Spirits In The Material World”), “Baby Come Back” also featured Ali and Robin Campbell of UB40. In fact, that means every one of his hits was with in conjunction with other artists.

“Bubbling Hot” kind of sounds like a reggae version of Arrow’s soca classic “Hot Hot Hot” to my untutored ears which is not necessarily a bad thing but overall there doesn’t seem to be much to the track really. Still, it’s nice to see the sadly departed Ranking Roger who died of cancer in 2019 again.

If it’s the 90s and Bryan Adams then it must be a big ballad and his latest release is…kind of. “Have You Ever Really Loved A Woman?” certainly was a ballad but it was not quite of the same flavour of some of his other love songs of the decade. Tracks like “Please Forgive Me”, “All For Love” (with Rod Stewart and that king of collaborations Sting), “Do I Have To Say The Words” and of course “(Everything I Do) I Do It For You” were very much soft rock ballads but this one was slightly different. How? It had a flamenco guitar in it courtesy of Paco de Lucia as name checked by Bruno Brookes in his intro.

I have to admit to dismissing this song completely at the time, very possibly due to its inclusion of said guitar. Written for the soundtrack to the film Don Juan DeMarco, it peaked at No 4 showing the power that Bryan still wielded when it came to mainstream balladeering. The fact that (yet again) the song was part of a film soundtrack probably helped its success though I don’t think Don Juan De Marco cut through quite as much as something like Robin Hood: Prince Of Thieves. I for one didn’t catch it at the time and have never watched it ever. One person who did was my friend Susan. Whilst waiting in the queue to buy her ticket, she heard the guy in front of her ask for his by putting an extraordinary emphasis on the word ‘Juan’. It went something like this: “Two for Don WHOOAHN De Marco please”. For the record, Susan didn’t believe that the guy was Spanish either.

Rejoice for The Outhere Brothers are Top of the Pops no more. They probably were still selling enough records to have stayed at No 1 for a few weeks yet but they were no match for the unit shifting phenomenon that took their place. We have arrived at the commercial and creative peak of Take That. In some ways it was, if not unexpected, then not guaranteed given that their last two singles hadn’t quite performed as expected. “Love Ain’t Here Anymore” had broken a run of four consecutive chart toppers by only making it to No 3 whilst “Sure”, though making it to No 1, only stayed there for one week despite Gary Barlow’s belief that it was the best thing the band had ever done. I (and millions of others) would beg to disagree Gary. It’s hard to see past “Back For Good” when it comes to that accolade. The song had been unveiled in a performance at the BRIT Awards in February creating a demand for it that saw it made available to the media six weeks before you could buy it in the shops and resulting in the single’s official release being brought forward. It would sell close on 400,000 copies in its first week meaning it had sold more in seven days than any single since Band Aid in 1984. It wasn’t hard to understand why. “Back For Good” was a shimmering pop masterpiece. It’s full of melody and nicely crafted lyrics about lipstick marks and coffee cups – this one though is excellent:

In the twist of separation, you excelled at being free
Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Gary Barlow
Back for Good lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC

I think though it’s the harmonies of the backing vocals that seeks the deal. Such was the song’s quality that it even gave them a hit in America which had been impervious to their success at home before.

Not everything was rosy in the Take That garden though. Within three months Robbie Williams would be gone, asked to leave by at least two of his bandmates over his attitude and commitment. Are there signs of him feeling the stress here with his shaved hair which has been died a hue of red/purple? “Back For Good” will be No 1 for four weeks so the boys (including Robbie) will be back soon enough. Sadly for Bruno Brookes, well, he was gone for good.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Grace	Not Over Yet	No
2	Ultimate Kaos	Show A Little Love	Never
3	Bucketheads	The Bomb! (These Sounds Fall Into My Mind)	Negative
4	Terence Trent D’Arby	Holding Onto You	Nah
5	Corona	Baby Baby	I did not
6	Simple Minds	Hypnotise	Its a no from me
7	Pato Banton and Ranking Roger	Bubbling Hot	Not I
8	Bryan Adams	Have You Ever Really Loved A Woman?	Nope
9	Take That	Back For Good	No but my wife did – on 7″ no less

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/m001rk79/top-of-the-pops-06041995

TOTP 20 OCT 1994

Posted on June 9 by 80stastic

Ah, now this one should write itself. The ‘golden mic’ host this week is the idiosyncratic Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker. He’ll give me plenty of material to comment on surely? Thinking back now though, just how big a name was Jarvis in the Autumn of 1994 and therefore how big a coup was it for TOTP to have lured him on to present the show? Well, I would suggest this was before Jarvis and his band went into the stratosphere off the back of the “Different Class” album and the “Common People” single which both appeared the following year and indeed it was 14 months before his bum wafting protest in the direction of Michael Jackson at the 1996 BRIT Awards but Pulp were certainly more famous than they had ever been in their career which was already into its 16th year by then. They’d finally gotten themselves two Top 40 hits and their 1994 album “His ‘n’ Hers” had gone Top 10 and been nominated for the Mercury Music Prize. So maybe not a household name but certainly well known enough to music fans and seeing as TOTP was the BBC’s flagship music show then it was an understandable if a bit of a leftfield choice.

P.S. After all of my musings above about how Jarvis came to be tonight’s host, here’s the ever reliable @TOTPFacts with the true story that I’ve just found. Why do I bother?!

This was the first of two #TOTP editions presented by Jarvis Cocker – his other being the "big Britpop battle" showdown between Blur and Oasis on 24 Aug 1995. Producer Ric Blaxill had been impressed by Jarvis' performance on Pop Quiz, broadcast on 2 July. https://t.co/41IsqnCBL4
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) June 2, 2023

Jarvis does seem ever so slightly nervous as he introduces himself (for the uninitiated) describing himself as lead singer of The Pulp. The Pulp Jarvis? You may have finally proved yourself to be the real deal but you didn’t need a definite article to do so. He also seems to be a little scared of timings and leaving any dead air lingering as he introduces the first act tonight Michelle Gayle and slips in an unnecessary “Here we go” at the last second. Nerves I guess. Anyway, Michelle’s record “Sweetness” is inside the Top 10 on its way to a peak of No 4 and she’s selling it well in this energetic performance. Michelle was married to footballer Mark Bright for 12 years making her one of a long line of pop stars who had relationships with players of the beautiful game. Going back as far as the 1950s you had England captain Billy Wright who was married to Joy Beverley of The Beverley Sisters pop group. Fast forward to the 90s and we saw Louise marry Liverpool midfielder Jamie Redknapp though their love proved not to be eternal with the couple divorcing in 2017. Perhaps though there is no bigger pop/football fusion than the ultimate 90s power couple David and Victoria Beckham. A Manchester United pin up and a Spice Girl? The papers and the magazines couldn’t get enough of them and despite rumours of an affair by Becks, they are still together four children and over 20 years later. Into the new millennium there was Shakira and Gerard Piqué, Ashley and Cheryl Cole and Perrie Edwards and Alex Oxlade- Chamberlain. Sadly only one of those couples are still together. Less sweetness, more sweet…well…less then.

Jarvis gets himself into a bit of a muddle with his next intro for Let Loose and their single “Seventeen”. The follow up to the surprisingly enduring “Crazy For You”, it didn’t have the same pop credentials of its predecessor and, on reflection, is quite an unremarkable pop song despite being written by Nik Kershaw who knew his way around a decent tune. Never mind all that though, what was Jarvis banging on about? Firstly, he introduces the watching audience to the show – wouldn’t he have been better doing that at the very top of the show rather than one song in? Then he tries to illicit some humour from the fact that Let Loose have gone straight into the charts at No 15 despite their song being called “Seventeen” before feigning confusion and then saying “Who’s Let Loose? Them!”. Sorry, where was the punchline in all that or have I missed something? For the record, “Seventeen” peaked at No 11 and was a rerelease having originally peaked at No 44 when first out earlier in the year.

Reacting to the title of the next song in the show, Jarvis starts on a “Don’t do drugs kids” warning with his tongue firmly inserted in his cheek. Within a year Pulp would release the single “Sorted For E’s & Wizz” which would cause all sorts of undeserved outrage in the tabloids. For now though, it was all about the booze and fags. “Cigarettes And Alcohol” was the fourth hit of 1994 for Oasis and their biggest so far peaking at No 7.

I once watched this interview below with Liam and Noel where the latter talked about how he’d not been sure initially about releasing a fourth single from debut album “Definitely Maybe” but when it placed higher in the charts than any of the others, he knew that the band were on to something big. It’s worth a watch. Noel talks about the accusations thrown at him about pinching the song’s guitar riff from “Get It On” by T-Rex (he didn’t give a shit unsurprisingly) and there’s also a nice insight into the way the band interacted with each other behind the scenes with Noel’s ‘Bonehead was a tutter’ tale. There was a time when I could have listened to Noel talk for ages but he seems to have turned into a reactionary, right-wing leaning arse of late. Who’d have thought it would be Liam that would turn out to be the more likeable one? By the way, Liam’s “Where’s the monkey?” comment was a reference to Michael Jackson’s chimp Bubbles. The talk of a fourth single off the album sounded too much to them like Jacko territory and his nine singles off “Thriller” or whatever it was and if they were going down that route then maybe they deserved a chimpanzee as a pet.

As for my opinion of “Cigarettes And Alcohol” as a song, yeah of course there’s the T-Rex similarity but I couldn’t ignore its power and I was in deep by then anyway. This seemed to be the point when the famous Liam Gallagher pronunciation of lyrics really kicked in with emphasis on words like ‘shine’ as ‘she-iiine’ and ‘aggravation’ as “aggra-vay -sheon’ which would lead to many a parody and impression

By the way, it strikes me that Noel wasn’t the first to borrow that guitar riff anyway (although he did recycle it again for the “Some Might Say” single). Nevertheless, Marc Bolan himself seemed to have been listening to “Little Queenie” by Chuck Berry when he wrote “Get It On”. Then there’s the likes of Thunder with “Dirty Love”, Robbie Williams with “Old Before I Die” and this by ex-Duran Duran guitarist Andy Taylor:

We had a support band on TOTP the other week who found fame (albeit it fleetingly) under their own steam in the shape of 2wo Third3 who had toured with East 17. Well, there’s another one tonight as it’s a case of anything East 17 can do, Take That can do better. Ultimate KAOS (as with 2wo Third3, another awful, awful name) had toured with the Manc boyband superstars and lo and behold found themselves in the charts themselves with their single “Some Girls” riding to No 9. This lot germinated in the mind of the ultimate arbiter on shit music Simon Cowell or rather he saw the seed of an idea that could be grown. You see, Ultimate KAOS started life as Chaos and they released a cover of Michael Jackson’s “Farewell My Summer Love” in 1992. When it flopped they were dropped by their record label but came to the attention of Cowell who picked them up, dusted them down, gave them a horrible new name and shoved them on tour with Take That.

Their debut single as Ultimate KAOS was “Some Girls” and it would prove to be their biggest of six UK Top 40 hits. It was clearly meant to sound like a 90s version of The Jackson 5 but it’s really not very good. Their song isn’t the biggest problem I have with them though. It’s the fact that their average age at the time of this TOTP performance was 14 with lead singer Haydon Eshun being just 9 and seeing them being screamed at by the studio audience which made for uncomfortable viewing. It wasn’t helped by Jarvis’s comment about them playing doctors and nurses in his intro. Eeeuuwww. Eshun would go onto appear on the West End in the Michael Jackson musical Thriller–Live and was also in Reborn In The USA as I mentioned in a recent post when discussing the aforementioned Michelle Gayle.

Now apparently the next act’s lead singer was greatly offended by Jarvis Cocker and his intro to his band, so much so that the latter had to reshoot it. In his first take he referred to INXS as ‘Inks’ – cheeky boy – but the version that went out still included him talking to a young lady in the studio audience and saying “Oh, so you prefer older men do you? Well, you might like the singer of this next group we’ve got coming on then…”. Ouch! At the time of the broadcast, Michael Hutchence was 34 whilst Jarvis himself was 31 so the latter’s comment about older men seem a bit barbed and uncalled for. He then compounds it by listing his most recent relationships in public – “he’s snogged Kylie and he’s now going out with the woman from the Brut advert” (Helena Christensen). All a bit intrusive no?

Anyway, it’s a second appearance by the Aussie rockers to perform “The Strangest Party (These Are The Times)”, a track to promote their first Best Of album. So what was the deal with the two people on four stilts that looked like human flies? Very odd especially the tongue action. A strange party indeed.

There’s only eight acts on tonight’s repeat as the BBC have edited out R. Kelly with his “She’s Got That Vibe” single (which would have followed INXS) after his conviction in 2022 for child pornography charges and three counts of enticing a minor. Needless to say, I won’t be discussing him any further than that.

If there was a female equivalent of the Oasis / Blur battle of Britpop, would it have been between Elastica and Sleeper? That’s probably a completely unfair, uninformed and oversimplified comparison (and there was probably no beef between them anyway) that I’ve drawn just because both bands had a high profile female lead singer but it’s out there now so I’m going with it. In my made up battle, I would have been in Sleeper’s corner I think. They appealed more to my pop sensibilities (I even saw them live) and, if I’m completely honest, I fancied Louise Werner more than Justine Frischmann. I know, I know; that doesn’t sound great but there it is. Not that I didn’t like Elastica at all – this song “Connection” (surely their best known is a tune alright) – but they always seemed a bit too…what? Intellectual? Intimidating? Something else beginning with ‘I’? Maybe it was as arbitrary a thing as me not happening to hear their album that much (despite me working in a record shop I should say so that’s a poor excuse really). Who knows? Clearly not me. Maybe I should revise my loyalties as they give a pretty good performance here and aren’t even put off by the fact that you can clearly see the stage set up for tonight’s headline act in one shot – a big blue neon sign spelling out his name seems slightly disrespectful to everyone else.

And so to that headline act. After all the success and fame in the 60s and early 70s, the hits dried up for Tom Jones. Not that he wasn’t busy. He played Las Vegas, had his own TV show This Is Tom Jones and toured extensively but maybe all that diversifying meant he took his eye off the ball when it came to chart success. He tried his luck with country music but the truth is that from 1972 to 1987, he only had three UK Top 40 hits which peaked at Nos 31, 36 and 40. And then from out of nowhere came…ahem…”The Boy From Nowhere”. Recorded for a concept album called “Matador” that would become a musical, it placed at No 2 on the charts and led to a revival of interest in Jones which culminated in a rerelease of “It’s Not Unusual” and a collaboration with the Art Of Noise on a version of Prince’s “Kiss”. Tom was suddenly hip. The spike in his commercial fortunes petered out though as the 80s ended. The first few years of the new decade saw just a couple of charity single cover versions as his only visits to the Top 40. By the end of the 90s though, another resurgence in popularity saw him top the album charts with his “Reload” project, a collection of cover versions recorded in collaboration with contemporary artists including Robbie Williams, The Cardigans and Stereophonics.

But before all that came a rather overlooked period in his career I feel which was “The Lead And How To Swing It” album and its hit single “If I Only Knew”. Although the former failed to shift huge units, the single was quite the banger but I never knew until now that it’s yet another cover. Originally recorded by experimental US rap group Rise Robots Rise, Sir Tom’s version was produced by the legend that is Trevor Horn and includes a melody that Jones came up with himself.

My wife loved Tom’s version and duly bought it and helped send it rather unexpectedly to No 11 though you rarely hear it on the radio these days. Clearly it was a precursor to the aforementioned “Reload” album and a definite indication that Tom wanted to try and remain current and valid rather than be known just for all those 60s hits. For that alone, he should be admired. Jones retains a huge presence and profile to this day. A coach on TV show The Voice UK, he released his last album “Surrounded By Time” in 2021 which topped the charts.

As for Jarvis’s input to Tom’s appearance here, I could have done without the staged handing back of a pair of knickers to a female member of the studio audience if I’m honest.

So who got the loudest screams? Tom Jones or Take That? What a show to have been in the audience for! The latter are there to perform their chart topper “Sure” and they do what is expected of them, whipping the crowd up into a frenzy by prancing and hopping around the stage. For some reason, Jason and Howard seem to be wearing their jackets inside out with the lining exposed whilst Gary is marked out as the leader of the gang with a leather jacket. This was the second of two weeks at No 1 so I’m guessing this will be the last we’ll see of them in these 1994 repeats. Not quite the stellar year for the band that 1993 was. They only released three singles and one of them somehow didn’t get to No 1. Still though, nice work if you could get it.

So how did Jarvis Cocker do on his debut as a presenter? I think I was a little disappointed on balance although I probably thought he was brilliant back in 1994. Yes, I’d rather him than Goodier or Mayo but I was expecting a little bit more. I’m probably very unfairly bringing 30 years perspective to my opinion that didn’t exist back then but if I had to grade him it would be could do better – C+.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Michelle Gayle	Sweetness	Nope
2	Let Loose	Seventeen	I did not
3	Oasis	Cigarettes And Alcohol	Not the single but I had the album. Didn’t we all?
4	Ultimate KAOS	Some Girls	Never happening
5	INXS	The Strangest Party (These Are The Times)	No
6	Elastica	Connection	Nah
7	Tom Jones	If I Only Knew	No but my wife did
8	Take That	Sure	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/m001mffj/top-of-the-pops-20101994

TOTP 13 OCT 1994

Posted on June 6 by 80stastic

Dearie me. The running order for this TOTP looks especially uninspiring. What am I going to say about this lot? Even Simon ‘Smug’ Mayo isn’t the presenter for me to throw the word equivalent of rotten apples at as it’s Mr Nice himself instead, the completely inoffensive Mark Goodier.

*Starts watching the show*

Woah! Stop right there! What am I looking at?! It’s as if Mark Goodier himself had just read my comments about him being incapable of being abused because he’s just too nice and said “Hold my beer!” because he’s had an image change and turned up as a dead ringer for Jazz Club host Louis ‘Nice’ Balfour from The Fast Show. What was he thinking?! This can’t have been deliberate on Goodier’s part to look like John Thomson’s character surely? Or is it just coincidence? Is it possible that Goodier may not have even seen the BBC’s new comedy series? It first aired on 27 September so maybe three episodes had gone out by the time this TOTP aired? Is it feasible that he missed them all and so had never laid eyes on the fictional Mr Balfour? Whatever the truth, there’s no denying the similarities.

Anyway, we start with Ant & Dec when they were still known as PJ & Duncan who I’m sure we’re on the show just the other week with “Let’s Get Ready To Rhumble” but are already back with a follow up called “If I Give You My Number”. This was their third consecutive UK Top 40 hit peaking at No 15. Their run of charting singles would extend to 13 in total if you only count those whilst they were an ongoing, active concern as a pop act (i.e. between 1993 and 1997). It’s 15 though if you count their 2002 World Cup song and a 2013 rerelease of the aforementioned “Let’s Get Ready To Rhumble”. That’s a lot of hits but how many could you name off the top of your head? Just “Rhumble” right? Don’t sweat it. I worked in record shops selling the damn things for the entirety of their pop career and I could only come up with two more than that – “Shout” and a cover of “Stepping Stone” made famous by The Monkees.

So what was “If I Give You My Number” like? Well it was somewhere on the spectrum of poor to shite clearly. It didn’t have the playground chant appeal of “Rhumble” but instead, in places, seemed like a poor attempt to rewrite “Jump” by Kris Kross. Given the what I always thought of as a manufactured confusion about which one was Ant and which one was Dec early in their TV career, were there signs of this being a genuine problem during their PJ & Duncan incarnation? Ant/PJ seemed to be cast as the one in a hat whilst Dec/Duncan was the one with the oh so mid 90s pair of curtains haircut. As Louis Balfour would say, “NICE”.

What better way to follow up two ex-Byker Grove stars rapping than with some bland Eurodance? As well as having a penchant for song titles which included the letter ‘U’ substituting for the word ‘you’ and the number ‘2’ for the word ‘to’ (“U Got 2 Know”, “U Got 2 Let The Music” and “U & Me”), Cappella now seemed to be branching out to corner the market in dance tracks with the word ‘Move’ in their title. “Move It Up” was their second hit of 1994 to follow this trend after “Move On Baby” earlier in the year. Look, I’m sorry but I really have had enough of Eurodance and I’m not sure I’ve got anything to say about Cappella…except…what’s the deal with the rapper guy sitting on a throne in this performance? The optics on it are rather jarring. A man sits in an elevated position on a symbol of power overlooking five women who seem to be cavorting about for his pleasure and entertainment whilst he appears displeased by their efforts. Who thought that was a good idea?

I’m wondering whether, by the mid 90s, Gloria Estefan was running out of ideas artistically speaking. I mean you could argue (if you were being extremely harsh) that she only ever had two anyway – the Latin flavoured, uptempo dance numbers (“Get On Your Feet”, “1-2-3”, “Rhythm Is Gonna Get You”) and the huge, schmaltzy ballads (“Anything For You”, “Don’t Wanna Lose You”, “Coming Out Of The Dark”). As I say, if you were being really harsh. However, by 1994 her last three albums had been a Greatest Hits, a Spanish language collection and a Christmas album. To complete the set, Gloria chose to record an album of cover versions, the ultimate sign that the creative well has run dry.

However, “Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me” would prove to be a wise move by Gloria peaking at No 5 in the UK and selling 300,000 copies over here and 2 million in the US. Featuring covers of songs by the likes of Neil Sedaka, Elton John and Carole King. And Vicki Sue Robinson. Who? Well, she was an American actress and singer who’s biggest hit was the disco staple “Turn The Beat Around”. A Top 10 hit Stateside and on the track listing for many a disco compilation, it was never actually a hit in the UK. Gloria’s version would correct that when it peaked at No 21.

Before the next act, and in anticipation off the new No 1, we get a message from Take That from Belfast where they are on tour. It’s fairly inane stuff only made even noticeable by the fact that Robbie Williams sits with his back to camera for most of it presumably to make him look interesting…oh and to show off the fact that he’s had the figure ‘1’ shaved into the back of his head. How little did we know of the trauma to come for many a young teenage girl in just nine months time when Robbie would leave the band.

Right, this is all very odd. A record by Snap! that I don’t actually mind. “Welcome To Tomorrow (Are You Ready?)” wasn’t an in your face, bass pumping, klaxon blaring dance anthem like “The Power” but a lilting, whimsical tune that was actually melodic and almost charming. How had this happened? Well, yeah, obviously they’d gotten rid of rapper Turbo B. That seemed to be the crucial factor in the transformation. Like Cappella before them, Snap! seemed to be in the midst of a song title fetish that dictated that every single they released had to include some brackets somewhere. The single before this was called “Do You See The Light (Looking For)” and the one after it “The First The Last Eternity (Till The End)”. What was the point of them? Was it the Robbie Williams effect, trying to make them seem more exotic? There have been many an example of this practice down the years but perhaps two of the most irritating are “I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)” by George Michael and Aretha Franklin and “(Don’t You) Forget About Me” by Simple Minds. Just WHY?

Oh come on now! I believe this is the fourth appearance on the show by Lisa Loeb And Nine Stories with “Stay (I Missed You)” – BRACKETS! – which seems a bit over the top for a song that peaked at No 6. I mean it was in the Top 20 for six weeks, the Top 20 for nine and the Top 40 as a whole for thirteen so it had some legs I guess but four times on the show?! One was a live by satellite performance, one was the video and the other two were in the studio of which this one is just a repeat of the first time. Curiously, Goodier introduces it as “still a Top 10 record” which suggests it’s falling down the chart maybe? There’s no caption for it detailing its chart position so just what number was it at?

* Checks chart rundown*

So it was at No 8. Now given that the record stayed at No 8 for three weeks, it could be a non mover. I’ll check. Wait there…

*Checks chart for this week*

Yep. This was its second week of those three so definitely a non-mover. Historically, TOTP had a policy of only featuring records going up the chart plus the No 1. I can’t recall what the rule was about non-movers but clearly they were deemed still valid in 1994 by head producer Ric Blaxill. Surely this must be the last time on the show for this one though. Lisa, Go (I won’t miss you). BRACKETS!

A future No 1 incoming now as we get the video for Pato Banton and his cover of “Baby Come Back”. I should say Pato Banton featuring Ali and Robin Campbell of UB40 of course. As this will be No 1 soon enough, I think I’ll just leave these chart stats here for this post:

Topped UK singles chart for 4 weeks
Finished the year as the fourth best selling single of 1994 in the UK
Spent 10 weeks inside the Top 10
Spent 4 months on the Top 40
Actually started going back up the charts in week 15 of its chart life

Despite working in record shops for virtually the whole of the 90s, I quite often get tripped up in these reviews by songs or acts I’ve either erased from my memory banks or who had completely passed me by at the time. The next artist is an example of the latter circumstance but watching them back now, how on earth did I miss this uneven paving stone?

Apparently, 2wo Third3 (terrible, terrible name) were the brainchild of pop impresario/manager Tom Watkins whose artist roster also includes Pet Shop Boys and Bros in the 80s and East 17 in the 90s. His new creation were an openly gay four piece pop group – sort of like Bronski Beat but without the credibility and with a much cheesier sound. You’ll notice only three members on stage here though as the fourth member was the non-performing songwriter Richard Stannard who was nicknamed Biff and is represented by the cartoon character displayed behind the band. Well, East 17 had that dog logo – it must have been a thing with Watkins. Also a thing with him was style over content. 2wo Third3 was all about image and promotion – London design firm Form were employed to produce the group’s record sleeves and promotional material which included yellow rubber gloves (check the single glove the lead singer is wearing) and Biff plasters being sent out to fans and promoters. To help get their name (terrible as it was) out there, they supported East 17 on their 1994 world tour (of course they did).

All this promotion finally worked when, after their first two singles failed to crack the Top 40, they finally crowbarred their way in with “I Want The World”. I mean, it’s catchy and all and I’m guessing it went down a storm in gay clubs but it was never going to be anything more than a disposable, here today gone tomorrow pop tune. There is something captivating about their TOTP performance though. I’m not sure if it’s the Biff logo or the way the two keyboard players double up as dancers by deserting their instruments and coming to the front of the stage to bust some moves. Or is it the lead singer’s customised stool that allows him to tower above the studio audience? How very Julian Cope of him!

“I Want The World” peaked at No 20 whilst a follow up “I Want To Be Alone” (make your mind up!) made it to No 29 and that was it. An album was recorded but never released. Biff went on to write mega-hits for Spice Girls and 5ive (another terrible name) whilst the lead singer reappeared in 2007 as 4th Child (what was it with numbers in their names!). As for the other two, one went into music publishing and the other went back to being a plumber. Well, pop songs are all very well but who are you going to call when your toilet won’t flush eh?

The biggest name of the night makes an appearance now. Despite his huge success as part of The Police and a solo career that had delivered four massive selling albums (including two No 1s), when it came to singles, Sting was an underperformer – less sting, more minor skin irritation. Up to this point he’d never had a single even make the Top 10 let alone top the charts but “When We Dance” would finally provide him with one by peaking at No 9.

This was one of two new songs written to help promote a Greatest Hits album. “Fields Of Gold: The Best Of Sting 1984-1994” collected the singles from those four solo albums into a handy one stop shop and it was a big seller too. Triple platinum over here, double platinum in the US; it was official – Sting could shift albums. Those pesky singles though. Until “When We Dance”, his highest charting song was “Russians” which made No 12 in 1985 (I’m not counting his part in that trio with Bryan Adams and Rod Stewart on “All For Love” which made No 2). Even singles that still get played on the radio today and which you immediately associate with him like “If You Love Somebody Set Them Free” only made No 26.

Anyway, he finally got his Top 10 solo hit with “When We Dance” but I can think of loads of other Sting songs that are more deserving than this soporific, generic ballad. “Fortress Around Your Heart”, “Love Is The Seventh Wave”, “We’ll Be Together”…all more better tracks in my opinion. Mr Sumner had already done a very slow paced song with the word ‘dance’ in the title back in 1988 on his “…Nothing Like The Sun” album called “They Dance Alone”. Seems Sting liked a slow dance number.

Coincidentally, he collaborated the following year with the aforementioned Pato Banton on a cover of “Spirits In The Material World” for the Ace Ventura soundtrack. Inevitably with such a bad idea, it was awful. Sting obviously liked that sort of reggae hook up though as he would infamously make an album with Shaggy in 2018. He got away with it too – it went to No 9 in the charts.

And so to the new No 1 courtesy of Take That and we get an exclusive live performance of “Sure” from what I presume is their concert in Belfast from where they did their live message earlier in the show. Curiously though, it sounds and feels like a dress rehearsal – although we can see an audience there, we can’t hear them much. Maybe they were turned down in the mix by the sound people.

P.S. To say I was worried I wouldn’t have much to write about a fairly uninspiring line up, I seem to have written quite a bit. Go me!

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	PJ & Duncan	If I Give You My Number	Of course not
2	Cappella	Move It up	Never happening
3	Gloria Estefan	Turn The Beat Around	Nope
4	Snap!	Welcome To Tomorrow (Are You Ready?)	Pleasant tune but no
5	Lisa Loeb And Nine Stories	Stay (I Missed You)	I did not
6	Pato Banton	Baby Come Back	Nah
7	2wo Third3	I Want The World	No
8	Sting	When We Dance	Another no
9	Take That	Sure	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/m001m6qq/top-of-the-pops-13101994

TOTP 06 OCT 1994

Posted on June 3 by 80stastic

We’ve got another ‘golden mic’ show as we enter October 1994 with guest presenters Steve Punt and Hugh Dennis. Having been ‘the other two’ in The Mary Whitehouse Experience alongside the first rock stars of comedy David Baddiel and Rob Newman, Punt and Dennis did go on to hugely successful careers in their own rights. Hugh Dennis is a regular on comedy panel shows and starred in long running BBC sitcom Outnumbered. Punt, who as I recall had to fend off multiple questions in interviews as to whether he was actually the son of Eric Idle of Monty Python fame due to their facial similarities, would pursue a career off camera as a script editor and screenwriter. In 1994, the first series of their own sketch show – The Imaginatively Titled Punt & Dennis Show – had just finished being broadcast so their public profile was possibly at its highest point, certainly as a double act anyway. As such, they were probably a good choice as guest hosts and TOTP head producer Ric Blaxill couldn’t have booked Baddiel and Newman instead as they weren’t speaking to each other by then (they wouldn’t be in each other’s company for another 24 years).

Anyway, that’s enough about the presenters, what about the music? Well, I’d talk about it if we had some but I’m not sure that the opening act meets the criteria to be defined as music. By Autumn 1994, the trend for reggaefied versions of old pop hits was so popular that just about every week the chart seemed to have a representative of the genre. In this Top 40 for example there’s Pato Banton and this guy, C.J. Lewis who’d already carved out two hits for himself with ragga covers of songs by The Searchers and Stevie Wonder. However, C.J. was after a third and turned to the 70s smash “Best Of My Love” by The Emotions to complete the hat-trick. Sticking to the formula, this was again a case of C.J. toasting his way through the verses with the chorus performed faithfully by vocalist Samantha Depasois. It really was a load of old tosh but C.J. got his wish and “Best Of My Love” became his third consecutive hit peaking at No 13.

When it came to original material though, the hits reduced in size dramatically before disappearing altogether. Subsequent singles “Dollars” and “R To The A” both peaked at No 34 and C.J. never returned to the Top 40 again. To paraphrase his namesake from the wonderful BBC comedy The Fall And Rise Of Reginald Perrin, C.J. didn’t get where he is today without pinching other people’s songs and then bastardising them.

Is this a third studio appearance for Cyndi Lauper to perform her track “Hey Now (Girls Just Want To Have Fun)”? I think it is. As such, the TOTP producers have tried to shake things up a bit by having Cyndi arrive on stage by cadging a lift from one of the moveable studio cameras – you know, those huge ones that glide around on tracks to get smooth panoramic vistas? Yeah, those. It’s not a bad bit of staging actually. Cyndi then indulges in some hand shaking with the studio audience though I’m sure I detect some slight panic in her a couple of times as she struggles to free herself from an over enthusiastic audience member. They’re an appreciative crowd though who generate some large cheers for both Cyndi’s guitarist’s slide guitar work and for the star herself when she belts out a protracted long note. Talking of long, Cyndi’s career certainly has some length. She’s been at it for over 40 years now and just this year was announced as a nominee for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame though she didn’t make the cut, losing out to Kate Bush, Sheryl Crow and Missy Elliott.

By 1994, Madonna had been having hits for 10 years. So many of them in fact that this one – “Secret” – was her 35th consecutive Top 10 hit. As they’ve all come in the years that I’ve been blogging about TOTP repeats, that means I’ve probably had to write something about all of them. That’s a lot of words about Madonna. Do I have anything else left to say about her? Yeah, probably.

After the outrage and backlash she suffered from her “Erotica” album and Sex book project in 1992, it was time for Madonna to soften her image a bit and that meant a change of image. The Mistress Dita persona of “Erotica” gave way to a more classic ‘blonde bombshell’ look inspired by Hollywood actress Jean Harlow (whom had been one of those name checked on Madge’s “Vogue” single). Then there was her new album of which “Secret” was the lead single. Lyrically, “Bedtime Stories” explored themes of love as opposed to sex and musically it ventured into R&B and hip-hop to generally positive reviews. I must admit though to getting a bit lost (and dare I say it even bored) by Madonna at this point. I get that she wanted to keep evolving creatively as an artist but it all seemed a bit too knowing and contrived. “Secret” is very accomplished and well crafted but it just didn’t cut through with me.

Interesting to note though as a timepiece of the era, Madonna discussed the song on the internet (I had no idea what that even was in 1994) leaving an audio message for her fans and a snippet of the track online. It’s hard to comprehend in these times of 24hr online access to music platforms how exciting this must have been. To hear a song back then, you either had to catch it on the radio or a TV music show or actually go and buy your own copy. I guess you could tape it off the radio but that involved a certain amount of planning and commitment that you kids today wouldn’t understand. My god I’m an old fart.

OK, enough of my old man rants s here comes Michelle Gayle who’s just entered the Top 10 at No 9 on her way to a high of No 4 with “Sweetness”. In total, Michelle would rack up seven UK chart hits of which all bar one would make the Top 20.

However, it seems that Michelle wasn’t bothered about chart positions. During my research for this post (yeah, I do some!) I came across this clip of her during her stint on the 2003 ITV show Reborn In The USA. This was basically a travelling version of the X Factor but for fading pop stars who would compete with each other for audience votes in a different US city each week with the act getting the least being booted off. This video is of the four finalists Peter Cox (Go West), Tony Hadley (Spandau Ballet), Hayden Eshun (Ultimate Kaos) and Michelle discussing whether musical artists have a competitive streak. Tony was a definite ‘yes’ whilst Michelle just didn’t see it that way at all…

Go to 5:40

In direct contrast to Michelle’s view, in the early weeks of the show the competition between two of the participants became so acute that it spilled over into something else all together. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you one of the great TV spats. Give it up for Dollar Vs Sonia!

The live by satellite slot where artists performed against the backdrop of a well known landmark had given us perhaps its most memorable moment just the other week when Bon Jovi played “Always” with the stunning visual of the Niagara Falls behind them. Head producer Ric Blaxill wasn’t going to waste that bit of footage and so it gets another airing on this show.

Now I’ve had a (well documented) weakness for a bit of the Jovi in the past but I have to say that John’s lyrics are sometimes a bit obvious and cliched. In this one he sings about loving his baby forever and a day until the heavens burst but there are a couple of lines that made me think of something else completely. First there’s this…

It’s nothing but some feelings that this old dog kicked up
Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Jon Bon Jovi
Always lyrics © Bon Jovi Publishing

And then this…

I’ve made mistakes, I’m just a man
Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Jon Bon Jovi
Always lyrics © Bon Jovi Publishing

Dogs? Just a man? You know where I’m going don’t you?

Sometimes when writing this blog my synapses are firing and the words come easily. Sometimes they really don’t. This is one of those latter moments. I haven’t really got anything else to say about “Circle Of Life” by Elton John. Think man! Anything will do! Nobody’ll read it anyway let alone care. I’m writing this sat in a Costa Coffee shop listening to Arab Strap and inspiration is not striking.

*Looks at Elton’s discography in forlorn hope of sparking a kernel of an idea*

OK. Got something. How many soundtrack albums do you think Elton has written? Well, according to his discography it’s ten. TEN! How many could you name though? Yes, The Lion King obviously and it’s 2019 remake. How about Rocketman Elton’s biographical musical drama? Wikipedia counted it so that’s good enough for me. Billy Elliot: The Musical is on there of course. How about Gnomeo & Juliet though? Or Sherlock Gnomes? I’m afraid that they’re his as well (Why Elton? Why?). There’s also the musical based on Verdi’s Aida known rather pompously as “Elton John And Tim Rice’s Aida”, The Muse which was a late 90s comedy which I don’t recall at all and a DreamWorks Animation called The Road To El Dorado. Perhaps the most intriguing was his first which came out in 1971 for a film called Friends (nothing to do with the US sit com TV series). I have never heard of this film until now but apparently it received a Golden Globe nomination for Best English Language Foreign Film. Not knowing the film, I obviously wasn’t aware of Elton’s soundtrack album either but then it has never been released as a standalone CD since its initial vinyl release although its tracks are on the “Rare Masters” compilation album that was released in 1992. I’ve gone from nothing to say to far too much Elton John information haven’t I?

However, I’ve not said too much about tonight’s hosts Punt & Dennis since the top of the post so how are they doing? Well, I have to say I’m a bit disappointed but maybe it’s like looking back at the technology of the time; it seems underwhelming by today’s standards but was actually cutting edge at the time. Anyway, they’ve bought out the big guns for this next link as Hugh Dennis gets his own backstage set up to showcase perhaps the duo’s best known comedy character Mr Strange and his catchphrase “Milky milky”. Known for his love of milk (that had usually gone off) and with the manner of a Peeping Tom, he was a weird but memorable creation. Dennis had actually brought him out for the Elton John intro but I wanted to save commenting on that until he got his own little slot when introducing the next act who are Take That. Before he does that though, we get the revelation that Mr Strange doesn’t wash his pants. Of course he doesn’t. Anyway, onto the biggest teen sensation since the last one and Gary Barlow gives us his own little intro telling us how the band are on a 31 date tour before joining the rest of them for a run through of new single “Sure” whilst presumably on a break from rehearsals.

After previous single “Love Ain’t Here Anymore” had broken the group’s run of four consecutive No 1s by peaking at No 3, I’m guessing there was just a tiny bit of pressure on follow up “Sure” to ensure normal service had been resumed, especially as it was a brand new track. As it turned out, this super slick slice of pop-R&B would return the band to the top of the charts (a position they maintained for two weeks) but it seems to me that “Sure” is an almost forgotten No 1. The first taster of their third album “Nobody Else” which was released the following year, it got completely overshadowed by the other two singles released from it – “Back For Good” was so perfect a pop song that many refused to believe Barlow had written it and was actually the work of Bee Gee Barry Gibb whilst “Never Forget” got elevated to another level when it was released just as the news of the departure of Robbie Williams from the band broke.

I’m sure I read at the time that Gary Barlow believed that “Sure” was the best thing that the band had ever released and was disappointed that it only lasted for two weeks at the top of the charts. I think the gist of his gripe was that he thought that the song was good enough to have transcended the teen fan base and cut through to more adult record buyers. The irony is that those two subsequent singles probably did do that on some level. In a 2021 article in The Guardian, writer Alex Petridis ranked the best 20 Take That tracks. “Sure” came in at No 12 whilst “Never Forget” and “Back For Good” were put at No 3 and No 1 respectively. I think that’s probably about right.

As for the performance here, there’s been a couple of image changes since the last time the group were on TOTP. Robbie Williams has had all his hair shaved off and Howard Donald has started his metamorphosis into pop music’s equivalent of Chewbacca. Meanwhile their outfits seem to have been inspired by the Gerry Anderson show UFO and specifically the uniforms worn by the crew of the Skydiver craft. Blimey!

For all their massive profile and popularity, when it came to huge hit singles, INXS were no Take That. They only ever had one UK Top 10 hit despite having 18 Top 40 entries. I guess they were more of an albums band? Despite the lack of mega-selling singles, as was often the case with such bands, if you put all their medium sized hits together on one Best Of album it would sell like hotcakes. I’m thinking the likes of The Beautiful South and Crowded House who both had Greatest Hits albums that sold and sold despite not having a stack of high charting tracks to put on them. So it was with INXS as well whose first compilation album went platinum in the UK.

To help promote it came this new track “The Strangest Party (These Are The Times)” which was actually an old song left over from the “Full Moon, Dirty Hearts” sessions that didn’t make the cut for that album. It’s pretty standard INXS fare which is no bad thing but it’s certainly not one of their best. Whatever the calibre of the song though, any performance that features Michael Hutchence was always going to be billed as an ‘exclusive’ by the TOTP producers such was his star quality. “The Strangest Party (These Are The Times)” peaked at No 15 continuing that run of Top 10 avoiding hits.

Hugh Dennis brings out another character to introduce Whigfield who is in her fourth and final week at No 1. This time it’s Embarrassing Dad who threatens to do the “Saturday Night” dance. As I said before, I was a little underwhelmed by their whole shtick. As for Whiggy, as Dennis referred to her, “Saturday Night” would be the 2nd best selling single in the UK in 1994 only behind Wet Wet Wet. It was replaced at the top by *SPOILER ALERT* Take That’s “Sure” which for purposes of context was the 37th biggest seller of the year. Make of that what you will.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	C.J. Lewis	Best Of My Love	As if
2	Cyndi Lauper	Hey Now (Girls Just Want To Have Fun)	Not this nor the 1984 original
3	Madonna	Secret	Nah
4	Michelle Gayle	Sweetness	Nope
5	Bon Jovi	Always	Negative
6	Elton John	Circle Of Life	No
7	Take That	Sure	Sure didn’t
8	INXS	The Strangest Party (These Are The Times)	I did not
9	Whigfield	Saturday Night	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/m001m6qn/top-of-the-pops-06101994

TOTP Rewind – the 90s

My memories of 90s chart music

TOTP 17 AUG 1995

Disclaimer

TOTP 10 AUG 1995

Disclaimer

TOTP 03 AUG 1995

Disclaimer

TOTP 20 JUL 1995

Disclaimer

TOTP 20 APR 1995

Disclaimer

TOTP 13 APR 1995

Disclaimer

06 APR 1995

Disclaimer

TOTP 20 OCT 1994

Disclaimer

TOTP 13 OCT 1994

Disclaimer

TOTP 06 OCT 1994

Disclaimer