Wilson Phillips

TOTP 16 MAY 1991

Posted on August 4, 2021 by 80stastic

It’s mid May 1991 and I have been working in the Our Price store in Market Street, Manchester for about 8 months and life is OK. Except there’s one thing wrong. I haven’t yet had a Saturday off. Obviously as a Xmas temp (as I was when I started) I didn’t expect any whilst the Xmas rush was on but having secured permanent employment with the company, I have worked every Saturday since. Saturday 18 May would change all that though. How do I remember this date? Because I’d booked the Saturday off to watch the FA Cup final. Now as I have mentioned just a few times over the course of this blog, I have always been a Chelsea supporter (46 years and counting now) but I had never missed watching the Cup final regardless who was playing and 1991 wasn’t going to be any different. That year the finalists were Spurs and Nottingham Forest and I had invited some mates from out of town around to watch it. It was an eventful game but it would always be remembered as the Gazza final for all the wrong reasons…

Gazza, of course, had been a pop star less than 6 months earlier off the back of his tears at Italia ’90. His performance in the FA Cup final was more wretched even than either of his two hit singles though. Spurs and hit singles wasn’t a new phenomena restricted to just Gazza mind. The football club had released FA Cup final songs for the previous three occasions they had made the final back in the 80s, all of them with cockney rhyming slangers Chas ‘n’ Dave with the most memorable being the 1981 song “Ossie’s Dream” – ‘in the cup for Totting-ham’ and all that. 1991 was no different as “When the Year Ends in One” was released. Unlike its predecessors, it failed to make the Top 40…because it was shit. Anyway, I finally got my Saturday off to watch the game but before that was the small matter of Thursday night and TOTP. I wonder of host Bruno Brookes will mention the footy*?…

*SPOILER ALERT: He doesn’t.

What on earth is he wearing?! That clobber he’s got on makes him look like a member of a Formula 1 track side race team, ready to speed change a tyre when the driver pulls in for a pit stop. Just ludicrous! Stood next to him is a kid with floppy ‘Madchester’ hair wearing a Revenge T-shirt , Revenge being New Order’s Peter Hook’s side project band in the early 90s. The contrast is startling. Not sure that the kid’s enthusiastic clapping for acts on tonights’s show that include Danni Minogue, Jason Donovan and Cher is that sincere given his choice of T-shirt. I suspect opening act New Kids On The Block wouldn’t have been one of his faves either. Now don’t be fooled by any the studio audience whoops and hollering, by this point in their career, the band’s popularity was not at the heights it had scaled previously. In short, the wheels were coming off and they were heading down the dumper. To arrest this slide, Donnie Wahlberg convinced them to pursue a new musical direction that was more urban. “Call It What You Want” was the first offering of their new style and came from something called “No More Games: The Remix Album” which did what it said on the tin and featured hip-hop-upped versions of their previous hits. In the history of very bad ideas, this was surely in the Top 10. I get they were trying to grow and change with their pre-teen audience as they themselves grew older but surely those kids wanted grunge not dirge. The album sold moderately but didn’t really halt the band’s decline.

Apparently this was their one and only TOTP studio appearance. As such, they’ve decided to try and make it a bit special by performing the vocals live. Big mistake. Wahlberg raps adequately but Jordan Knight’s vocals, never that convincing, sound exposed and flat. Give them their due though, they could dance in sync very well.

“Call It What You Want” peaked at No 12.

One of the best known songs of the 80s making a comeback in the 90s now as we see “Tainted Love ’91” by Soft Cell re-released and back in the charts. Why? Well, there was a Best Of album released by record label Mercury called “Memorabilia – The Singles” and “Tainted Love” was back out to promote it. It was actually a re-recorded version of the song as were all but two of the eleven tracks on the album. There had already been a Soft Cell Best Of album released in 1986 simply entitled “The Singles” but it had got swallowed up in the Xmas rush and scraped to a lowly No 58 in the charts. Fast forward five years and it was deemed the right time for another compilation to boldly go where its predecessor hadn’t. Advertised as a Soft Cell / Marc Almond album, it only actually included two Almond solo originals plus his 1989 No 1 with Gene Pitney “Something’s Gotten Hold of My Heart” and his collaboration with Bronski Beat on 1985’s “I Feel Love (Medley)”. You can imagine a conversation at Mercury about the crucial need to include “Something’s Gotten Hold of My Heart” in the track listing but that would mean marketing it as a Soft Cell/ Marc Almond combined project. It worked though as the album went Top 10 and the single Top 5.

For many years, I couldn’t listen to “Tainted Love” due to the amount of times I had already heard it played on radio. It got hammered at the time and is regularly given a spin whenever anything vaguely to do with the 80s is broadcast. I had reached saturation point (see also “Bohemian Rhapsody” by Queen). I think I might just be coming out of that phase now though. I can’t hear that much difference between the original recording and this 1991 version – maybe a slight difference in the emphasis Marc puts on some of his phrasing and a slightly less lush production? Right until this very minute I had always believed that “Tainted Love” was the best selling single of 1981 but Wikipedia tells me that the Official Charts Company recalculated the data in 2021 giving the title to “Don’t You Want Me” by The Human League. What?! Why did they feel the need to do that 40 years on? One of the great chart swizzes ever surely?

The other week Simon Mayo was telling us how Cathy Dennis was going to be No 1 in the US with “Touch Me (All Night Long)” and now here’s Bruno Brookes saying that she is No1 in the US. Slightly disingenuous as she was actually No 2 in the Billboard Hot 100 chart (their equivalent of our Top 40) but she was No 1 in the US Dance Club Songs chart. I’m being pedantic of course. Suffice to say she was doing very well commercially.

Now, is that a catsuit she’s wearing in this performance? I do believe it is. I’ve told my woman in a catsuit story before haven’t I? OK, here it is again. In my early days at Our Price, there was a woman in our shop called Natalie who also did some modelling on the side I think. Anyway, one day she turned up for work in a catsuit and asked me if I thought it was a bit too much. Suffice to say I didn’t know where to look. One day Mick Hucknall rang the shop asking to speak to Natalie (I think she met him on a night out and he was quite enamoured). I answered the phone and when I asked who it was asking for Natalie he replied ‘Mick’. I knew it was Hucknall as Natalie had told us all that he was interested in her but she wasn’t sure what to do about it. As a claim to fame, it’s pretty poor I admit.

“Touch Me (All Night Long)” peaked at No 5 in the UK.

When I saw in the running order that Dannii Minogue was on this show, I assumed it was to perform her “Love And Kisses” single but it seems I’ve written so many of these reviews that I’ve lost tracks of the weeks. “Love And Kisses” has been and gone and we are now on to Dannii’s follow up single called “Success”. Wikipedia tells me it was also known as “$ucce$$” which was a really naff idea if true.

Like its predecessor, this was lifted from her debut album and was about the trappings of celebrity (probably). It’s got a bit more of a heavier beat to it than the much lighter “Love And Kisses” but it’s still pretty anonymous. Dannii clearly tries to deliver the song’s harder edge with a sassier performance as she takes off her jacket early doors to reveal a tattoo on her right arm which appears to be an elephant (?) and a dress with the straps dangling so perilously low as to run the risk of dropping altogether potentially causing a Janet Jackson style wardrobe malfunction. Even Bruno declared that he had been concerned (well it was pre-watershed I suppose). Also, whoever styled Dannii’s hair, what was the deal with the long straggly bit covering the left side of her face? It didn’t look practical at all. The whole thing looks like she’d just dashed out fo the back of a taxi at the last second before taking to the stage.

Talking of taxis, apparently when recording her album in Brooklyn, there has been some shootings near the studio meaning taxicab drivers were reluctant to take Dannii’s fare for the journey there. She supposedly found the recording experience in New York City both “awesome” and “terrifying”. Also potentially terrifying was the prospect of Dannii repeating that TOTP performance, droopy shoulder straps and all, before the Queen at the The Royal Variety Show that year. Thankfully, I can report that although there was a fair amount of flesh on display (especially from her backing dancers), Dannii kept her modesty intact at all times (unlike when she did those nude calendars back in the mid 90s).

“Success” did a good job of consolidating the success of “Love And Kisses” by peaking at No 11 where it stayed for three weeks.

More breakneck speed Breakers again this week as we get four songs crammed into in 1 min and 20 seconds. I’m sure the TOTP producers were beginning to worry about the competition from ITV’s The Chart Show with its video only show format and were trying to redress the balance. We start with “Shiny Happy People” by REM who Bruno reckons have got a ‘massive cult following’ in the UK. I think they may have surpassed that particular status by this point with the release of the “Out Of Time” album but the arrival of this single certainly left any remnants of being a cult way behind them. Very much the band’s marmite moment, it surely can’t be denied that “Shiny Happy People” brought them to the attention of people that had never heard of them before. We sold copy after copy after copy of the album in the Our Price store I worked in off the back of this song.

Apparently written ironically with the title and chorus being based on a Chinese propaganda poster, Michael Stipe however disputes this theory. Here’s @TOTPFacts:

"Shiny Happy People" is "not meant to be ironic at all", Michael Stipe says. "We wrote it because we were challenging ourselves. I grew up a child of the '60s listening to The Monkees and the Archies and The Banana Splits…" #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) July 30, 2021

"… The guys threw me the stupidest song that sounded so buoyant and weird and I was like, 'Okay, I accept the challenge.' So it was bubblegum music made for kids." #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) July 30, 2021

Of course, you can’t mention “Shiny Happy People” without referring to Kate Pierson from the B-52s whose vocals on this really did add something to it. Kate’s band were enjoying a commercial renaissance themselves after the success of 1990’s “Cosmic Thing” album so that, allied with the fact that both band’s were from Athens, Georgia made the fit between them kind of inevitable.

Not convinced that this was the song that made mainstream superstars of REM? How about this evidence then. “Shiny Happy People” was used as the theme song to the unaired pilot for the sitcom Friends, known at that time as Friends Like Us.

Still not having it? Well how about this then? REM singing a version of it called “Happy Furry Monsters” on Sesame Street. Come on. Is there a safer TV show in the history of television?

“Shiny Happy People” peaked at No 6 in the UK, easily their biggest hit at the time and still their joint third highest charting UK single to this day.

“A new name to us all” next (according to Bruno Brookes) as Flowered Up breach the Top 40 for the first time. So were they a new name? Well, they had formed two years earlier and had released two singles in 1990 which made Nos 54 and 75 so not totally unknown I would wager Bruno. In fairness to Brookes, had I heard of them before “Take It” was a hit? I really can’t remember but I do recall talk of them being ‘the next Happy Mondays’ at the time. That may have been less due to their sound and more to do with them having a Bez like dancer figure in their ranks, the brilliantly named Barry Mooncult who actually looked more like Peter Gabriel (in his Genesis days) on stage with his flower petal costume.

Their chart breakthrough coincided with a move from indie label Heavenly Records to major London Records so that may explain why it happened (major label promotion budget etc). Debut (and only) album “A Life With Brian” was released later in the year and the band had already appeared on the front covers of both Melody Maker and NME before then. I think they were quite well known in the end then Bruno. Flowered Up will perhaps forever be mostly associated with their biggest hit “Weekender”, the massively epic 12 minute long single that made the Top 20 in 1992 and which the band steadfastly refused to edit for airplay reasons. Hopefully we’ll get to see that in future TOTP repeats. In the meantime, “Take It” peaked at No 34.

Giving Dannii Minogue a run for her money in the strappy top stakes is Carol Decker of T’Pau who are back in the charts with “Whenever You Need Me“. No, really. Going against all known logic, 80s popsters T’Pau were somehow still having hits into the 90s. It really did rally against the status quo as when they returned two years after their last Top 40 hit, they sounded exactly the same. Now I’d had a soft spot for this lot back in their 80s heyday but even I couldn’t have cared less about them come 1991.

“Whenever You Need Me” was the lead single from their third album “The Promise”. I remember we had lots of it in stock in our store and hardly sold a copy. Somehow it made No 10 in the charts whilst the single made No 16 (although it was their last ever trip to the Top 40). Thinking back now, I wonder if there was some chart manipulation going on from the record label with lots of FOC stock being given to chart return stores in return for a few beeps of the album barcode on the Gallup scanner. That might well be a scandalous claim, it’s just that we really didn’t sell many at all. Whatever was going on, it didn’t really work as the band called it a day after “The Promise” (two further singles released from it did nothing at all chart-wise) although there have been reunions and sporadic gigging since then. I saw Carol Decker on the bottom of the bill on one of hose Here And Now tours about 20 tears ago and she still turns up on the music TV channels every now and again presenting things like Carol Deckers 40 Ultimate Rock Chicks or something.

After getting a little too overexcited about Dannii Minogue’s dress straps, Bruno Brookes now starts getting himself in bother over a “threesome of girls”. A threesome Bruno?! You couldn’t have just said ‘trio’?! Anyway, It’s Wilson Phillips that he’s referring to and the rest of his intro makes little sense either as he says they have had No 1 success in America and are now making it big in the UK. Whilst all of that is true – “You’re in Love” was their third single taken from their debut album to top the US charts – Bruno makes it sound as if they are only just starting to make waves in the UK. Actually, they had a Top 10 hit over here the previous year with “Hold On”. Had he forgotten that already? The UK had kind of lost interest in Wilson Phillips already though. “You’re in Love” peaked at No 29 this side of the pond and they would score just a further two hit singles on our shores, neither of which was especially big.

The highest new entry next and it’s a big one. A single going straight in at No 3 wasn’t something that happened every week back in the early 90s (especially by a new, unknown act) so there must have been a big buzz around Crystal Waters and her song “Gypsy Woman (La Da Dee)”. So unusual was it that, at the time, it meant that she was the highest debuting female artist ever*.

*She was subsequently relieved of that title by Gabrielle in 1993 when “Dreams” debuted at No 2 who was in turn usurped by Whigfield a year later when “Saturday Night” went straight in at No 1. Crystal Waters didn’t quite top the charts as Bruno suggested she might, peaking instead at No 2.

The song is actually about homelessness (it was released as “Gypsy Woman (She’s Homeless)” in some territories) but for me, it almost bordered on novelty status with that incessant and extremely annoying ‘La-da-dee/la-dee-da’ hook. Apparently though, it was very much seen as a house music classic and, more than that, it was a trailblazer of the genre in that it combined social conscience with beats. It routinely appears in music polls as one of the greatest dance tunes of the 90s! I had no idea! Maybe I should have guessed at its house music reputation judging by the dance moves Crystal gives in this performance – she performs the song as if she’s busting some moves in a club rather than in front of an audience of millions on the UK’s premier pop music show. The track is of course nothing to do with the country singer Don Williams’ song “I Recall a Gypsy Woman” which my Dad does a pretty good version of.

Talking of novelties, here was something you didn’t see that often – a contemporary Christian music (CCM) artist breaking through to have a monster hit in the mainstream charts. Amy Grant is known as ‘The Queen of Christian Pop’ but here she was back in 1991 with yet another song that had been a US No 1. How many has that been just on this TOTP? Three? If you include Cathy Dennis’s dance chart topper? “Baby Baby” was one of those radio friendly, feel-good pop songs that you found yourself humming along to even though you didn’t particularly like it. Now my wife really did like this one to be fair and even today she can sometimes be heard humming it absent-mindedly.

The heart-warmingly sweet / nausea inducing (delete as appropriate) video received a nomination for Best Female Video at the 1991 MTV Video Music Awards. Totally lacking in special effects but just portraying Amy and her on screen love interest doing luv’d up things seemed to appeal to a simpler sense of what life should all be about. Love, friendship, fun…and rolling oranges back and forth to each other apparently. I’m trying to think of any other Christian Music artists that I know of. Stryper? Were they a CCM artist?

*checks Wikipedia*

Yes! They are Christian Rock band! Two things here. How did I dredge that up from my memory banks and what the Hell is Christian Rock?!

“Baby Baby” peaked at No 2 in the UK.

When I think of Jason Donovan and 1991, only one thing comes immediately to mind – Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and his No 1 record “Any Dream Will Do”. Despite Bruno advising us that the show starring Donovan is opening in June, Jase isn’t here with that song. No, it’s a little ditty called “RSVP”, a single that’s so forgettable, nobody ever did reply to him. Apparently it was a ‘not released before’ track from his forthcoming Greatest Hits album but top points to anyone who remembered this bilge. In line with his recent chart track record, it wasn’t a major hit peaking at No 17. Not even Jason’s guitar playing and some leather trousers could save this one.

Cher is still at the top of the pile with “The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s in His Kiss)”. Now as its the third week of its reign at the top and I have nothing else to say about it, I dug about for some tenuous links between Cher and other artists on this TOTP and I found one! “Baby Baby” wasn’t Amy Grant’s first US No 1. That came in 1986 when her duet with Peter Cetera “The Next Time I Fall” hit the top. And who has had a massive hit duetting with the ex-Chicago man? Yes, Cher of course whose “After All” went Top 10 in the US in 1989. Small world and all that.

To finish off, we have a forthcoming No 1 record by perhaps one of the most useless bands in the whole of the decade (in my humble opinion). Color Me Badd were an R’n’B four piece who briefly threatened global dominance after their “I Wanna Sex You Up” single became a hit all around the world. The group described their style as ‘hip-hop doo-wop’ although I seem to recall a lot of talk of them being part of this new jack swing movement but maybe that was purely because of the song’s inclusion on the soundtrack to the film New Jack City. For the record, I described Color Me Badd as atrocious shit and yet the UK seemed unable to resist their …erm…charms and sent it to No 1. Was it just that it had the word sex in the title and chorus? I can just imagine loads of beered up young men sidling up to women on the dance floor in clubs up and down the country crooning “I Wanna Sex You Up” to them. Ugh!

As for Color Me Badd themselves, I have to say that the word sex wasn’t what came to mind when looking at them. If you were trying to put a hip hop boy band together, I don’t think I’d have included a Kenny G lookalike and someone trying (and failing) to look like “Faith” era George Michael but with a long bob haircut in their ranks.

Order of Appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	New Kids On The Block	Call It What You Want	Ok, I will. It was shit
2	Soft Cell / Marc Almond	Tainted Love ’91	Nope
3	Cathy Dennis	Touch Me (All Night Long)	Nah
4	Danny Minogue	Success	Failure – no
5	REM	Shiny Happy People	I didn’t
6	Flowered Up	Take It	No
7	T’Pau	Whenever You Need Me	Negative
8	Wilson Phillips	You’re In Love	But not with this song – no
9	Crystal Waters	Gypsy Woman (La Da Dee)	I’d have rather listened to Crystal Tips and Alistair sing
10	Amy Grant	Baby Baby	I didn’t. Not sure if my wife did or not
11	Jason Donovan	RSVP	Dear Jason, this is a shit song – no
12	Cher	The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s in His Kiss)	Yes but it was all a genuine mistake
13	Color Me Badd	I Wanna Sex You Up	Hell 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/m000y2fl/top-of-the-pops-16051991

TOTP 23 AUG 1990

Posted on February 25, 2021 by 80stastic

It’s late August in 1990 and the new football season is to kick off two days after this TOTP was broadcast. After a rousing performance by the England team at Italia ’90, the country seems to have fallen back in the love with the national game which is experiencing a surge in popularity as it rises phoenix like from the ashes of its nadir in the mid 80s. The same description could be applied to tonight’s opening act who are The Human League. After massive commercial success at the start of the previous decade with the “Dare” album, Phil, Suzanne, Jo and co struggled to replicate that commercial peak and 1984 follow up “Hysteria” was a big disappointment. Licking their wounds, they decamped to the US and hooked up with legendary R’n’B producers Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis for the 1986 “Human” single which was an American No 1 and retuned the band to the Top 10 in the UK. However, their resurrection proved to be a false dawn and by the end of the 80s, they were in massive decline. The dawn of the 90s saw the band regroup with a new line up and intentions to re-establish themselves in the pop hierarchy. “Heart Like A Wheel” was the lead single from new album “Romantic?” and whilst it did gain them entry back into the Top 40, it was hardly a glorious return to form. The single peaked at No 29 whilst the album struggled to a high of No 24. Its perceived failure led to their long time record label Virgin unceremoniously cancelling their recording contract and the band were out in the wilderness for five years before being picked up by EastWest Records and launching the most unlikely of comebacks just as Britpop was taking hold with the hit single “Tell Me When” and parent album “Octopus”.

Watching this performance back, the band do seem to be in the midst of an identity crisis. Apart from the fact that there were two new band members on view, the core trio of Oakey, Catherall and Sulley appear to be on very different pages image wise. Phil, in the days when he still had hair, has resorted to his early 80s shoulder length cut albeit without the lopsided bit on one side whilst Susan Ann has gone all rock chic with her golden, cascading tresses. Joanne has her hair up but part from that looks pretty much like she always did. Not a lot of cohesion going on there I would argue.

What? Oh the song? Well, to me it doesn’t sound that different to “Tell Me When” which would return them to the Top 10 in 1995. Clearly the 1990 record buying public wasn’t quite ready to embrace The Human League back into their lives at that point in history but give it five years guys. Nowadays of course, the group are stalwarts of the live circuit and indeed, I caught them in concert back in 2019 at an open air gig in Hull where they performed “Heart Like A Wheel” plus just about every other song you could have wished for from their back catalogue. The band were on good form but the crowd were seemingly more interested in getting annihilated on booze and other substances which kind of made for a bad atmosphere. It did strike me though that Joanne and Susan Ann had made a career from basically ‘arm-dancing’ for nearly 40 years – you know, all that rhythmic arm waving they do. It’s a living I suppose.

Move over Whitney Houston – you’ve got competition! Yes, there was a new kid on the block (not not them!) in the huge, pop/soul ballad stakes come 1990 when Mariah Carey appeared seemingly from nowhere with her debut single “Vision Of Love”. Little did we know then that this 20 year old would become one of the biggest selling artists of the whole decade. Not only did this track become her breakthrough commercial moment but it also provided Mariah with her first husband in Tommy Mottola, the then head of Columbia Records who signed her after he had heard the demo of “Vision Of Love” at a record company bash. Has anybody ever punched above their weight in the relationship/looks stakes more than Tommy Mottola?

Anyway, “Vision Of Love” was a huge hit (No 1 in the US and No 9 over here) and introduced us to Mariah’s legendary five-octave vocal range. Ah yes, that voice. The technical terms for her vocal stylings are ‘whistle register’ and ‘melisma’ otherwise known to some of us as screeching. Too harsh?! Ok, how about ‘warbling’? Look you know what I’m referring to – the Mariah Carey effect that influenced a generation of would be singing stars to over emphasise notes and prolong them just that bit too long. I’m not saying she can’t sing – clearly she can – but I always found that element to her vocals to be the wrong side of grating.

Despite the success of “Vision Of Love”, it took Mariah a while to establish herself in the UK. Follow up singles “Love Takes Time” and “Someday” barely made the Top 40 here whilst they were No 1 records in the US. Yes, the album sold well in the UK (300,000 units) but nowhere near what it did in the US where 9 million copies were sold. It wasn’t really until her 1993 album “Music Box” did she really start shifting massive numbers over here when the album went to No 1, went five times platinum and included the No 1 single “Without You”. Incidentally, if there was any fierce rivalry between Mariah and Whitney, there was a show of unity in 1998 when the pair duetted on the single “When You Believe” from the animated feature The Prince of Egypt.

OK, I’ve got nothing in the memory banks for this one. “Look Me In The Heart” by Tina Turner anyone? Apparently this was the fourth single to be released from her “Foreign Affair” album which was pushing it a bit considering the album was initially released just under 12 months previously. Unsurprisingly it didn’t do anywhere near as well as its predecessor singles peaking at No 31. Incredibly, record label Capitol didn’t think even that was enough fleecing of the public for one album and released a fifth single (“Be Tender with Me Baby”) in October.

As for “Look Me In The Heart” itself, apart from being completely banal it also has an embarrassingly awful title. Can you imagine two people being in the midst of an emotional discussion about the state of their relationship and one of them saying ‘Look me in the heart and say that’? I can’t – nobody would come out with that would they? They’d say ‘Look me in the eye…’ surely? Oh well, artistic licence and all that – maybe I’m missing the point. Sadly, Tina was not finished in the cringe stakes for 1990. By the end of the year she was back in the Top 5 duetting with Rod Stewart (!) on a version of “It Takes Two”. Come on Tina. You’re better than that. Look me in the heart* and tell me that wasn’t just money for old rope?

*Oh

My God! I’ve just realised that this particular TOTP includes two of the most heinous crimes against popular music on the same show! Not only do we have a complete git at No 1 (Timmy Mallett /Bombalurina) but incredibly, some 12 months after their first musical misdemeanour, it seemed that the UK record buying public still hadn’t had enough of Jive Bunny & The Mastermixers! You could possibly excuse one novelty record becoming a hit by blaming it on some sort fever that induced a national loss of taste but this was their fifth hit on the trot! What was happening to us? I can only assume that the success of “Can Can You Party” was the result of some illegal chart tactics that involved a massive buying in operation by unscrupulous record company reps.

The monsters behind Jive Bunny didn’t even see the need to tinker with the formula at all. It’s still just a load of hits of yesteryear cut and pasted together and then supported by a video featuring nonsensical and unrelated black and white footage with that f*****g horribly animated rabbit superimposed over the top. And talking of “It Takes Two” as we were before re: Tina Turner and Rod Stewart, if I thought that was bad, Jive Bunny declared ‘hold my beer’ and were involved in a version that featured Radio 1 DJs Liz Kershaw and Bruno Brookes! Thankfully that one didn’t make the charts unlike “Can Can You Party” which peaked at No 8.

Some Breakers now and we start with the Steve Miller Band. The only thing I knew about Mr Miller (and indeed his band) at the time was that song “Abracadabra” from 1982 which I hadn’t even liked that much. So what was this “The Joker” song and why was it in our charts? Well, it had been a No 1 record for the band in the US in 1974 but had never been a hit over here. Cue its strategically well placed use in a Levis advert and…I don’t ned to write anything else do I?

Much was made of the song’s lyrics and in particular the phrase ‘the pompatus of love’. What was that when it was home? Here’s @TOTPFacts with the answer…

What the hell is "the pompatus of love"? Miller heard this nonsense word in "The Letter" by doo-wop band The Medallions, which includes the lyric, "Let me whisper sweet words of dismortality and discuss the pompatus of love". https://t.co/FfdpU92eoX #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) February 19, 2021

Oh, OK – thanks. Anyway, some of the other lyrics, referenced songs including Miller’s own “Space Cowboy” (nothing to do with Jamiroquai then) and The Clovers’ 1954 song “Lovey Dovey” whilst I’m guessing we all knew what he meant by being a ‘midnight toker’.

“The Joker” would go onto become involved in one of the most controversial chart battles ever when it went up against Deee-Lite (more of whom later) and their “Groove Is In The Heart” single for the No 1 spot. Supposedly sales for each single were so tight that a dead heat was called and using a rule that had never been instigated previously, “The Joker” was instilled a the No 1 song that week on account of its sales having increased most from the previous week. This ruling was disputed by Deee-Lite’s record company WEA and it was subsequently scrapped. Chart compilers Gallup later released data that showed that the Steve Miller Band had sold a mere 8 (EIGHT) copies more than Deee-Lite and so were the rightfully crowned chart toppers. All seemed a bit of a rum do to me. Jive Bunny probably had something to do with it as well!

Right, after all that controversy, we need something relaxing to calm us down and here’s a track that fits that particular bill well. “Release Me” by Wilson Phillips was their follow up to smash hit “Hold On” and it sounded like it. It was almost exactly the same song! OK, its got a slightly slower bpm to it and they all seem to sing the whole song in harmony unlike its predecessor which I think had separate vocal parts but its pretty damn similar. For once the record buying public were too aware than to fall for the ‘buying the same song twice’ trick again and it only made No 36 on the UK Top 40. Our American counterparts however had no such discernment and sent it to No 1 for the second consecutive chart topper after “Hold On”.

Look out! It’s “The End of the World”! Not literally of course but this version of the old Skeeter Davis song by Sonia did signify the end of something – this was her last ever single with Stock, Aitken and Waterman. It was also the last single released from her “Everybody Knows” album and after four high tempo, poppy hits before this point, a slowie was well overdue. Sonia had dipped her toe in the ballad market recently with her collaboration with Big Fun on the Childline charity single “You’ve Got a Friend” but this was her first time in that territory on her own. It’s a decent choice of song but Sonia’s version is hardly dripping with the emotion of the original and sounds more mechanical than melancholic in comparison.

I could have sworn that Cilla Black did a version of this (which would have made even more sense of the decision to get scouser Sonia to record it) but she didn’t. I think I was getting confused with “You’re My World”. My abiding memory of Sonia’s version is hearing it piped over the instore sound system in Debenhams in Hull some weeks later. I was back working there as a Xmas temp (after my legendary stint as stand in Father Christmas the year before!) but I knew I had a job at Our Price waiting for me to start in October so I wasn’t there long this time. And no I didn’t let on to Debenhams that I would be leaving as I needed a few weeks work before I could start at my record shop ‘career’ and deliberately misled them. If, by any remote chance, any management from Debenhams in Hull from circa 1990 are reading this, I am so sorry but let’s face it, it wasn’t the end of the world.

That time worn pop tradition of a singer leaving a band to court solo fame was still in evidence as the 90s began. After Nick Heyward leaving Haircut 100, Limahl departing Kajagoogoo and George Michael leaving Wham! behind in the 80s, here comes Lindy Layton ditching Beats International to pursue independence. To be fair, she wasn’t kicked out of the band like Heyward and Limahl were – it was much more amicable by all accounts (Norman Cook even helped produce her debut solo album “Pressure”) but jump ship she did after Cook et al had given her an initial pop platform. It seemed to be the right move when she scored an immediate hit with a cover of Janet Kay’s “Silly Games” teaming up with …erm…Janet Kay to do so. However, subsequent single releases from “Pressure” all failed to dent the Top 40 and by 1993 she did what many others previously had done to revive a career – came calling at Stock, Aitken and Waterman’s door (well, they did have a Sonia sized vacancy on their artists’ roster to fill). Two SAW singles failed to do much business chart-wise and Lindy had all but disappeared from the pop world by the mid 90s.

You can tell from this TOTP performance that this was meant to be a new start for Lindy – she’s got a new short hairstyle and changed her wardrobe dramatically from her Beats International appearance. Her version of “Silly Games” was pretty slick as well. She looked a good bet for a prolonged solo career at this point. Ah, the fickle nature of pop – silly old game innit?

In 1990, Cliff Richard was celebrating the 30th anniversary of his recording career and to commemorate this milestone, he released a live album called “From A Distance: The Event” which was recorded in June 1989 at his The Event concert, held at Wembley Stadium over two nights. Cliff’s version of “Silhouettes“, a No 3 hit for Herman’s Hermits in 1965, was plucked from said album to promote it. It reached No 10 in the UK Top 40. It is also, undeniably, horrible. Not content with inflicting this upon us, the album also contained his next Xmas No 1 in “Saviour’s Day”. Have you ever seen such cruelty?!

I’m guessing that the next tune was intended by the band’s record company as a stop gap release between albums to maintain their profile. It ended up becoming their biggest ever hit. Deacon Blue‘s only release this calendar year so far had been their New Year anthem “Queen Of The New Year” back in …erm…January as the fifth and final single from their “When The World Knows Your Name” album. With the rich seams of tunes having been exhausted from that album and the new one not to be released until June 1991, something was needed to ensure fickle pop fans didn’t forget about them in the meantime. The answer of course was a cover version (the answer is always a cover version) but Deacon Blue took things further by releasing an EP of four Burt Bacharach and Hal David songs called… well….the “Four Bacharach & David Songs” EP.

The track that got all the airplay though was “I’ll Never Fall in Love Again”. There was something about the crystal clean production and the vocals of Ricky Ross and Lorraine McIntosh that bewitched UK pop fans to purchase it in enough quantities to send it all the way to No 2. I was one of them. This EP of cover versions idea obviously resonated with Everything But The Girl who released their own EP in 1992 featuring “Love Is Strange”, Bruce Springsteen’s “Tougher Than The Rest”, Cyndi Lauper’s “Time After Time” and Elvis Costello’s “Alison”. I bought that as well.

As for Deacon Blue, although it would be harsh to say this was the pinnacle of their popularity, they would only have one more Top 10 single in their career although they continue to tour and record new material to this very day with their last album “Riding On The Tide Of Love” being released *performs some basic maths calculation* 20 days ago!

If Jive Bunny was the bread in this show’s shit sandwich, here comes the filling and it really reeks! Timmy Mallett / Bombalurina have leapt to No 1 with “Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polkadot Bikini” and consequently he’s been invited back on the show for another studio performance. What makes it all the worse is that Mallett seems to take it seriously in that he mimes the lines correctly and has learnt his little dance moves. If he’s done it all a bit more free form and tongue-in-cheek ,would it have been less odious? Nah, you’re right. Nothing could save this turd from stinking the place out.

The play out video is a huge tune. Sorry, that should be HUUUUGE TUUUUNE! Appearing fully formed from out of nowhere came Deee-Lite with the barnstorming dance floor legend that was and remains “Groove Is In The Heart”. I know this will make me sound like a knacker but the groove on this tune is immense! These self proclaimed ‘groovniks’ hailed from New York City and were composed of Lady Miss Kier, Supa DJ Dmitry and Jungle DJ Towa Tei and had an image as wild as their hit song. Dayglo colours, psychedelic patterns and huge 70s style platform shoes somehow seemed totally appropriate despite being at least two decades out of fashion.

That track though! Listed in in Gary Mulholland’s marvellous book This Is Uncool: The 500 Greatest Singles Since Punk And Disco as one of the tracks of the year, I think I’ll let Gary do the talking for me:

“If I was ever asked to play some crazy DJ version of Russian roulette, where you had one chance and one chance only to make a roomful of disparate people dance or you die – I would play ‘Groove Is In The Heart’ and book my cab home”.

Well said Gary.

Order of appearance	Artist	Song	Did I Buy it?
1	The Human League	Heart Like A Wheel	Nah
2	Mariah Carey	Vision Of Love	Nope
3	Tina Turner	Look Me In The Heart	As if
4	Jive Bunny & The Mastermixers	Can Can You Party	Can can you piss off please?
5	Steve Miller Band	The Joker	It’s a no
6	Wilson Phillips	Release Me	After “Hold On” you now want releasing? Make your mind up! No
7	Sonia	End Of The World	No
8	Lindy Layton and Janet Kay	Silly Games	Negative
9	Cliff Richard	Silhouettes	Silhouettes? It was enough to give me Tourettes! No
10	Deacon Blue	Four Bacharach And David Songs	Yes, yes I did
11	Bombalurina	Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polkadot Bikini	How does f**k off sound as an answer?
12	Deee-Lite	Groove Is In The Heart	Where’s my copy of this?! I must have bought this surely?!

Disclaimer

OK – here’s the thing – the TOTP episodes are only available on iPlayer for a limited amount of time so the link to the programme below only works for about another month so you’ll have to work fast if you want to catch the whole show.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000scfy/top-of-the-pops-23081990

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.

Some bedtime reading?

https://michaelmouse1967.wixsite.com/smashhits-remembered/1990-issues

TOTP 22 JUN 1990

Posted on January 20, 2021 by 80stastic

If a week can be a long time in politics then that is also true of football (and quite possibly music). When last week’s TOTP was aired, the England national team had made a sluggish start to Italia ’90 and were being widely criticised in the media. Fast forward eight days and they have turned things around and qualified for the knockout stages after defeating the might of Egypt in the last group game. Hang on, eight days you say? Yes, this particular TOTP went out on the Friday rather than in its regular Thursday night slot so as to clear the schedules for that England v Egypt game the day before. Suddenly hopes were revived and the nation looked forward (albeit with some trepidation) to the next game versus Belgium.

Those eight days have also proved to be a long time in the pop music world as tonight’s show has nine (!) ‘new’ songs on it and only four that we have seen before in no small part due to the return of the Breakers section. Tonight’s host is Jakki Brambles whose previous recent appearances on the show have been dominated by her wearing of big Winter coats even under TV studio lights. With it being the height of Summer though she peeled all her layers off and gone for a white t-shirt and ripped jeans look topped off with an embroidered baseball cap. The T-shirt proclaims the legend that is The Royal Findhorn Yacht Club (I have no idea) and Jakki seems to be in a rush to get off (possibly to do some tacking on a schooner or something – as I said I have no idea) judging by the speed with which she is talking.

We start tonight with Brummie rockers Magnum who were last seen in the Top 40 back in ’88 with a trio of medium-sized hits from their “Wings Of Heaven” album which was the peak of their commercial success. I have no recollection of them still having chart hits into the 90s but here they are with a little ditty called “Rockin’ Chair”. Taken from an album called “Goodnight L.A.”, it sounds pretty unexceptional, rock fodder to me but supposedly the album was meant to be an attempt to break the band in the US and was seen by critics as taking the band in an ‘Americanised’ and more commercial direction. If anything, to my ears, it sounds less commercial than their previous hits like “Start Talking Love” and “Days Of No Trust”. Anyway, what do I know? So did Magnum manage to break America? No, no they didn’t and you know why they didn’t? The album was never released in the United States! Right, scratch that comment about what do I know because I may not be a record company executive but I do know that if you want to break America, it’s a good idea to release your album there so that people can, you know, actually buy it!

The album did OK in the UK (where it was released) peaking at No 9 and presumably it did well in Germany judging by Jakki’s comments about the band entertaining 50,000 East Berliners recently.

“Rockin’ Chair” peaked at No 27 but their last single previous to that was a No 33 hit called “It Must Have Been Love” talking of which…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUdS4Zy0OMk

…here come Roxette enjoying the biggest hit of their career with “It Must Have Been Love”. Often dismissed as insubstantial and not deserving of any credibility claims, it’s fair to say that the duo rarely get referenced as being the musical influence of…well…anybody really. Having said that, they racked up a smorgasbord of hit singles throughout their career which, incidentally, spanned 33 (!) years. I always got the impression that they were not that bothered by the criticism that dogged them, steeled by the knowledge that they were good at what they did – writing, recording and performing well crafted pop tunes. Indeed, so comfortable were they with their image that they even called one of their compilation albums “Don’t Bore Us – Get To The Chorus!”. If that doesn’t display a healthy degree of self knowledge then I don’t know what does!

“It Must Have Been Love” peaked at No 3 in the UK and was a Top 10 hit in just about every country around the world going to No 1 in the US, Australia, Denmark and Spain to name but a few.

Well here’s a treat – two acts for the price of one! Never has the acronym BOGOF been more apt though as said acts are Sonia and Big Fun! What?! Why?! What possible justification could there be for this unholy pairing?! What? It was for charity? Which charity? Childline? Oh..well…I can’t really…oh OK, it seems there was some credible justification but it doesn’t mean I have to like the song does it? And I don’t. It’s not even a cover of the James Taylor classic “You’ve Got a Friend” but another Stock, Aitken and Waterman composition.

Watching this performance back, it looks just wrong for them all to be sat down for the duration of the song Westlife-esque when we were used to seeing Big Fun jumping around the TOTP stage wiggling their arses for all their worth and little Sonia doing her rolling shoulders nerdy dance moves. It’s not that easy to transform yourself from pop puppets to serious artists surely? Just by the addition of some stools? *Insert your own jokes*

In a Smash Hits interview around this time to promote the single, when Big Fun’s Jason John was asked if they dreaded ‘the dumper’ and what would they do if they fell into it, he replied:

“I don’t think about the dumper because we’re really only just beginning our careers…”

Hmm. After “You’ve Got a Friend” peaked at No 14, Big Fun never had another Top 40 single. After disbanding, one of them became a painter and decorator whilst Jason ‘we’ve only just begun’ John decamped to the US to run a nightclub in New York.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWeBLpxtsPI

It’s those famous musical offspring Wilson Phillips next who are bounding up the charts with their single “Hold On”. The group En Vogue also had a hit with a song called “Hold On” in this year – they were on the show only the other week – and it got me thinking whether “Hold On” was a popular song title of choice for recording artists. I found a website that listed 45 cover versions and distinct songs that happen to share the title “Hold On”. They included artists as diverse as Tom Waits through to Donny Osmond via Santana and KT Tunstall. And whose song called “Hold On” was the most commercially successful? Why, Wilson Phillips of course (En Vogue came in second).

Some Breakers now starting with Red Hot Chili Peppers and “Taste The Pain”. Despite being around since 1984, I have to admit that they hadn’t been on my radar at all in that time and I can’t say I remember this track either. I wouldn’t really become aware of them until the following year and the release of their “Blood Sugar Sex Magik” album and attendant singles “Give It Away” and the anthemic “Under The Bridge” which I bought. “Taste The Pain” was from their previous studio album “Mother’s Milk” and became the band’s first UK hit single peaking at No 29. I hadn’t realised before but they actually had a track on the multi platinum Pretty Woman soundtrack album called “Show Me Your Soul”. Given the film and soundtrack’s popularity and seeing what it was doing for the career of Roxette whom we saw earlier, I can’t help wondering if they wouldn’t have been better off releasing that as a single?

I can’t move on though without a mention for Celtic ‘bagrock’ outfit Red Hot Chilli Pipers whose lineup features three highland bagpipers and traditional marching snare backed by a more traditional rock band. Their live show even features highland dancing! I’ve yet to catch them live myself yet but a friend who has say they are quite the experience.

Bruce Dickinson covering “All The Young Dudes”? Even if this was for charity* as per Sonia and Big Fun (which it wasn’t) it would still be inexcusable. This David Bowie penned tune that was turned into a massive hit by Mott The Hoople really didn’t need the Dickinson treatment. I couldn’t see that it added anything to the original being a pretty straight cover. I suppose it was a canny marketing move by Bruce’s label to release a well known song to help promote his “Tattooed Millionaire” album but still.

*Two years later, Dickinson did record a song for charity when he combined with Rowan Atkinson in his Mr. Bean alter ego to record Alice Cooper’s “(I Want To Be) Elected” for Comic Relief which went to No 9 which was 14 places higher than “All The Young Dudes”.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qu4uzJsqIxE

And talking of Alice Cooper, completing a trio of rock-related Breakers, are Dogs D’Amour who once toured with Alice around the start of the new millennium. Back in 1990 though, they were in the Top 40 again for the second and final time. Having finally breached the chart ramparts in ’89 with ‘Satellite Kid”, “Victims Of Success” was the lead single from their album “Straight??!!” and I have to say the title didn’t ring any bells with me. Having given it a listen, it sounds like a rather unremarkable blues rock song full of guitar twangs and hackneyed lyrics like these:

“Yesterdays punks on the cover of the rolling stone
Yesterdays punks could buy a Beverly Hills home”

I’m kind of surprised it managed to sneak into the charts to be honest. Maybe they were riding on the coattails of the success their good buddies The Quireboys were enjoying around this time?

“Straight??!!” would be the last studio album to feature the band’s ‘classic’ line up (it says on Wikipedia) before they split. Top Dog Tyla (real name Timothy Taylor) would resurrect the brand in various different formats and line ups over the years as well as collaborating on a project entitled Hot Knives with long-time friend *checks notes* ah yes, Spike… from The Quireboys.

“Victims Of Success” peaked at No 36.

A return to the show for the break out star of ’88 next as we witness the return of Yazz with her new single “Treat Me Good”. Just two short years since her massive No 1 single “The Only Way Is Up”, Yazz was at a crossroads. Her debut album “Wanted” had gone double platinum but the singles released from it had all peaked at a lower chart position than the one before. Her next move was career crucial. “Treat Me Good” was to be the lead single from an album initially entitled “Revolution Of Love” (presumably the album due out “at the end of the Summer” as advised by Jakki Brambles) but it never appeared and was canned when Yazz left her record label Big Life. Were they disappointed by the commercial performance of “Treat Me Good”? Despite a 10 place move up the charts after this TOTP outing, the single would get no further than that No 20 peak and would be in and out of the Top 100 in five weeks. To be fair, it didn’t really sound to me like it had that ‘Wow!’ factor that “The Only Way Is Up” had and was a pretty sub-standard R’n’B pop number.

Re-emerging with Polydor Records, Yazz once again found herself in the position where a proposed second album was shelved when “One True Woman” failed to appear in May ’92. After one final return to the Top 40 in ’93 with Aswad with a cover version of Ace’s “How Long”, her sophomore album finally emerged more than five years after her debut. It bombed completely. Yazz continued to release singles and one further album into the 90s but she then found herself at another crossroads (this time of a more personal nature) when her marriage to her husband (who was also her manager and publisher and father of baby Rio mentioned by Jakki Brambles in her intro) broke down. After finding Christianity, Yazz now spreads the gospel message in prisons and released a record called “This Is Love” which was inspired by her experiences.

And yes Jakki, she did look incredible just eight weeks after giving birth.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJQQXg2CdLk

After the decade that was the 80s had seen fit to allow Aussie soap Neighbours to spawn bona fide chart stars in Kylie, Jason Donovan and (for the love of God!) Stefan Dennis, you would have thought that the 90s would have brought a stop to that but no! There was still another of the cast that felt that the world of pop had space for one more…all hail Craig McLachlan And Check 1-2. As referenced by Jakki Brambles in her intro, Craig had played the role of Henry Ramsey (the brother of Kylie’s character Charlene) in Neighbours for nearly three years but by the time of his foray into music and subsequent hit with “Mona” he had swapped allegiances and transferred to the other Aussie soap Home And Away. I have very distinct memories of Henry Ramsey whilst I was still a student at Sunderland Poly – nasty mullet and dungarees worn without a T -shirt which the women that I was friendly with at the time were quite taken with – but I had no idea that he had pop star pretensions.

Now admittedly it was a very low bar but I didn’t mind “Mona” (compared to Stefan Dennis, he was the height of credibility) and it was a tune that was written by blues rock ‘n’ roll legend Bo Diddley which had been performed previously by the likes of The Rolling Stones, The Troggs and Bruce Springsteen so Stock, Aitken and Waterman this was not. I’m pretty sure I didn’t realise the song’s origins at the time but fourteen years after it was a hit in the UK, I saw a band perform their own version of this in whilst on holiday in San Francisco. I can’t remember the name of the band but the venue was called the Biscuits And Blues Bar and I remember thinking there’s no way this can be a Craig McLachlan original if this authentic blues band are performing it!

After peaking at No 2 in the UK, it seem that Craig might have a shot at usurping his one time co-star Jason Donovan in UK pop fans’ affections given that old Jase seemed to be on a downward commercial trend but after one more single (the No 16 hit “Amanda”) he was pretty much gone. He did follow Donovan’s trick of releasing a song from a stage musical three years later when “You’re the One That I Want” from Grease in which he was starring with Debbie Gibson made No 13 in the UK Top 40 (Donovan had scored a No 1 with “Any Dream Will Do” from Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat) but he would never again return to our charts.

Inevitably, and very much seen as the classical antidote to New Order’s “World In Motion”, here is the BBC’s Italia ’90 theme tune “Nessun Dorma” by Luciano Pavarotti. Now inextricably linked in the psyche of every English football fan with the events of June /July 1990 and the fortunes of the national team, how many of us had ever heard of it (or indeed Pavarotti) before?

The BBC really pulled it out of the bag when it came to soundtracking their coverage of this World Cup. Does anybody recall the ITV opening titles and music? I didn’t and had to look it up. Here’s their opening titles….

…just dreadful. Apparently it was entitled “Tutti Al Mondo”, was written by Rod Argent and Peter Van Hooke and …oh nobody cares do they? ITV’s theme tune was crushed by the BBC and Pavarotti’s weight as easily as Gazza’s tears started to flow after that booking in the semi final. A few words about the opening title graphics before we move on which were awful as well. The crass image of the statue of David nonchalantly nodding some footballs around and the official mascot stick figure player called Ciao added in to ensure the full tacky horror couldn’t be missed. Comparing the two is a bit like on The Apprentice when the two teams do the advert task and one team has understood the brief completely and delivered something concise and on message and the other team has just came up with a slogan that they thought was a clever word play and completely missed the point of what they were trying to sell. Somebody in the ITV creative team should have got fired.

“Nessun Dorma” was a No 2 hit on the UK Top 40 and after the Three Tenors concert in Rome the night before the final was played featuring José Carreras, Plácido Domingo and of course Pavarotti spawned the classic live album, the world went classical music mad. That album became the best-selling classical album of all time and even changed the way the music industry marketed its classical catalogue with a whole new category called ‘strategic classical’ set up to try and reach new audiences via huge marketing campaigns.

My own personal memory of the whole Nessun Dorma / Three Tenors phenomenon was that my future father -in -law was so enthused by the concert that he taped it off the TV (remember when we used to do that?) to keep for posterity but my future mother-in- law taped over it with an episode of Eastenders by mistake. Once the incident had been discovered I was dispatched into Hull town centre to ask around the music shops to see if anyone knew when the official video would be coming out. There was no release date forthcoming so we had to pretend that the precious VHS tape couldn’t be found whenever my father-in-law asked about watching the concert over again for many months until the official release could be bought for him.

MC Tunes in the area! The Moss Side rapper is back on the show with his hit single “The Only Rhyme That Bites” although this week we get the video. @TOTPFacts has unearthed this about the promo:

The video for "The Only Rhyme That Bites" was shot in the then-disused Daily Express building on Ancoats Lane in Manchester. It was directed by Ken Horn (Trevor's brother), also a director on Emmerdale at the time. #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) January 15, 2021

Hmm. Well, it just looks to me like a load of guys skateboarding and not especially impressively. I suppose we all have to start somewhere and Ken Horn did go onto produce a number of successful TV shows including the Jimmy McGovern drama The Street and the fifth series of the superb Line Of Duty. Back in 1990 though, it looked like brother Trevor had the monopoly on the family talent.

By the way, if you’re wondering whatever happened to MC Tunes and wanted to know more about what sort of person he was/is, don’t go looking to Wikipedia for the answer. Under the category Personal Life, it just says:

Tunes still lives in Manchester.

“The Only Rhyme That Bites” peaked at No 10.

And so it came to pass that Elton John‘s first ever solo No 1 would be with the brain stupefying “Sacrifice / Healing Hands”. After his ridiculously flamboyant outfits of yesteryear (Donald Duck anyone?), Elton has completely toned it down and gone for an all black ensemble topped off with a BOY cap. Were they popular at the time? I’m pretty sure Chris Lowe of the Pet Shops Boys used to wear one back in the day but were they still a thing in 1990?

The single was taken from the album “Sleeping With The Past” which in a Smash Hits feature where pop stars named their favourite ever albums, that man from Big Fun Jason John (whom we heard from earlier) was at it again giving us the benefit of his wisdom. Here he is:

“Sonia actually gave me this LP as a present a few weeks ago…It must be one of the best albums he’s ever done…Personally I’ve become a big Elton fan after listening to this album. It’s been a big inspiration to me.”

Hmm. Not “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” then? “Too Low For Zero” maybe? “Don’t Shoot Me I’m Only The Piano Player”? No? OK, Jase, you know best.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qy67a8MPs9Y

At the song’s end, there’s a weird interaction between Jakki Brambles and Elton where she strides across the stage, offers her had to Elton to shake and then kisses his! There then follows an excruciating exchange where Jakki asks Elton how he is and which charities the royalties from the single are supporting. Elton is almost monosyllabic in his replies. Now if you really want to see a proper Elton John interview, may I recommend this…

So put off her stride is Jakki that she forgets to introduce the play out song which is one of the biggest and most talked about hits of the year – it’s MC Hammer with “U Can’t Touch This”. This tune was absolutely massive back in the day but more seemed to be made in the press about Hammer’s baggy loon pants (that tapered to the ankle) in the video.

Famously based on “Super Freak” by Rick James, “U Can’t Touch This” made Hammer a huge star briefly. Parent album “Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em” stayed at No 1 in the US album charts for 21 weeks and was the best selling album of 1990 there. Multiple awards followed and his extensive tours raked in the money. It’s 1990 and the living is good for MC Hammer. It wouldn’t last though but that’s all for another post.

“U Can’t Touch This” peaked at No 3 in the UK Top 40.

For posterity’s sake, I include the chart run down below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAn-Dar1jyU

Order of appearance	Artist	Song	Did I Buy it?
1	Magnum	Rockin’ Chair	Nah
2	Roxette	It Must Have Been Love	Negative
3	Sonia and Big Fun	You’ve Got A Friend	But it’s not me!
4	Wilson Phillips	Hold On	No
5	Red Hot Chili Peppers	Taste The Pain	Nope
6	Bruce Dickinson	All The Young Dudes	As if
7	Dogs D’Amour	Victims Of Success	It’s a no from me
8	Yazz	Treat Me Good	It was really weak sounding to me – no
9	Craig McLachlan Check 1-2	Mona	I did not
10	Luciano Pavarotti	Nessun Dorma	For all the memories it always invokes, I didn’t but it
11	MC Tunes versus 808 State	The Only Rhyme That Bites	Liked it, didn’t buy it
12	Elton John	Sacrifice /Healing Hands	Certainly not!
13	MC Hammer	U Can’t Touch This	And I didn’t – no

Disclaimer

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000r6hy/top-of-the-pops-22061990

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.

Some bedtime reading?

https://michaelmouse1967.wixsite.com/smashhits-remembered/1990-issues

TOTP 07 JUN 1990

Posted on January 14, 2021 by 80stastic

Hello and welcome back to TOTP Rewind. BBC4 took a break from their TOTP repeat broadcasts over Xmas and the New Year but are back on schedule now. We re-start back in June 1990 and I’ve just had my 22nd birthday! 22! It’s literally a lifetime ago – how did I get to be so old? I suppose the intervening 30 years had something to do with it! To recap, I’ve just moved up to Hull from Worcester having finally secured some work after five months on the dole and am living with my girlfriend and her parents. My job is at Kingston Communications* doing some very basic VDU input on a temporary contract. As I remember, it was putting in employee time sheets into a database and there was a massive back log of them so quite a few weeks work.

*One of the many things that makes Hull unique is the fact that it is the only place in the UK not served by BT but by its own telecoms services run by KCOM (formerly Kingston Communications).

The day after this TOTP was broadcast, the 1990 World Cup kicked off with England expectations pretty low after a disastrous Euro ’88 showing. Italia ’90 would turn out to be a watershed moment for our national game. Enough of all that though, what about the music? Well, there are seven ‘new’ songs on the show that we haven’t seen before and the presenter is the ever so clean looking Mark Goodier who promises us a “special surprise” at the top of the show. Ooh! Wonder what that could be?

Before any of that though we’re kicking off with Pop Will Eat Itself and only their second ever Top 40 hit “Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina”. I’d first come across this lot when they released a cover of Sigue Sigue Sputnik’s “Love Missile F1-11” in 1987 but I hadn’t quite grasped at the time that they were part of the same ‘grebo’ movement that would launch the likes of The Wonder Stuff, Ned’s Atomic Dustbin and Gaye Bykers On Acid. Indeed The Poppies*, The Stuffies* and The Neds* were all from the same place; Stourbridge in the West Midlands which was my original neck of the woods so I really should have had a better handle on all these bands.

*No amount of dropping their shortened names can cover that up (Credibility ed).

By 1990, they had carved out a career of sample-laden, indie dance rock tunes with singles like “Def. Con. One” and “Can U Dig It”. With one eye on the imminent Italia ’90 World Cup, the single “Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina” was promoted as the ‘unofficial World Cup Theme’ and includes sampled crowd chants and I’m pretty sure snatches of match commentary by the likes of Barry Davies and John Motson. And Cicciolina? This referred to…oh tell you what…here’s @TOTPFacts with that particular back story:

Cicciolina was the stagename of Ilona Staller, a Hungarian-born porn star who was elected to the Italian parliament in 1987, representing the district of Rome until 1991. Notoriously, she offered to have sex with Saddam Hussein in the interests of peace. #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) January 8, 2021

Well, if Boris Johnson felt comfortable saying Donald Trump deserved a Nobel Peace Prize when Foreign Secretary back in 2018, then I hope somebody nominated Cicciolina back in the day for her unorthodox peace process plan.

Apparently the marketing campaign for the “Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina” single included an absurd notion to petition for Cicciolina to be the person who presented the World Cup to the winning team at the conclusion of Italia ’90. I’m guessing the single’s title was inspired by New Order’s 1987 single “Touched By The Hand Of God” – the Mancs are also of course indelibly linked with Italia ’90 due to “World In Motion” which we will be seeing later. I was chatting with my friend Robin at the weekend and he disputed my claim that “World In Motion” is the best football song ever declaring that, indeed, he preferred “Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina”. Never one to follow popular opinion Robin but I do think he means it! Robin’s favourite footy song peaked at No 28.

Historically when TOTP presenters make chart predictions they usually over estimate the potential of a single, rashly forecasting a No 1 record. In the case of Elton John and “Sacrifice” this evening’s host Mark Goodier does the opposite and under estimates its chart peak by saying it “could well end up being a Top 5 record that”. It of course went all the way to No 1 and not just any No 1 but Elton’s first as a solo artist. I say “Sacrifice” but it was actually “Sacrifice / Healing Hands” as it was a double A -side release. Both songs had been previously issued as singles in their own right at the tale end of 1989 with neither breaching the Top 40 but after Radio 1 DJ Steve Wright inexplicably started playing “Sacrifice” on his show in the Summer of 1990, it was re-released after audience reaction. How apt that a man infamously not that bothered about music would have a key role in getting such a bloated, lifeless dirge of a song to the top of the charts. In its defence, as Goodier says, it did raise money for charity (the AIDS Foundation I think) but it seems a travesty that “Sacrifice / Healing Hands” was the single to finally secure him a No 1 in his own right. So many more songs in his back catalogue deserving of that particular accolade. Of the two, I slightly preferred “Healing Hands” but I’m splitting arse hairs to be honest.

My aforementioned friend Robin and I once had a disagreement over a drink in a London pub about Elton’s back catalogue – he dismissed it all (and I mean every song) as awful. When I countered that you couldn’t say all his songs were shit he replied “Of course I can. Music taste is subjective – I thought you knew that”. I had no comeback. Smart arse.

Talking of double A-sides here comes a dance act I have no memory of at all. D-Shake were from Holland apparently and its their track “Yaaah” that gets a spin on the show tonight but it was the flip “Techno Trance (Paradise Is Now)” that all the DJs in the know were playing in the clubs apparently including the likes of Carl Cox. I’ve listened to both (although they actually seem to be different versions of the same track) and can confirm they are both horrible.

The guy behind D-Shake was a guy called Aad de Mooy who sounds like he plays up front for Huddersfield (or maybe Brighton) and according to the Discogs website has 31 different aliases including Cat Scanner, Jackhead and my particular favourite Dr Nunu. By the way, check out Goodier’s arse clenchingly awful intro to this one:

“What’s the secret of a good dance song – it’s definitely a good groove…”

A good groove?! He’s only one step away from saying (in true embarrassing Dad style) “It’s got a good beat and you can dance to it”. Oh Christ! That’s what I sound like when I talk about music to my 11 year old isn’t it?! “Yaaah” / “Techno Trance (Paradise Is Now)” peaked at No 20.

In all of these TOTP reviews I have done stretching way back to 1983, it feels like very few bands have been on as much as The Mission. I mean maybe some of the really big hitters like Erasure, Depeche Mode etc but of those who have not had massive hits I can think of only maybe Siouxsie And The Banshees. And despite all of those appearances, not once did The Mission ever have a Top 10 hit. “Into The Blue” was their eighth consecutive Top 40 hit and was the last single to be taken from their “Carved In Sand” album. Goodier is at it again with a really patronising intro when he says “Coming up a band who really can play their instruments” Eh? Why did he feel the need to day that. Was there some conspiracy theory going around that they were just Milli Vanilli-esque record company stooges who didn’t actually play on their records? He goes onto call the single a “big chart smash”. Was it Mark? This is its chart record:

35 – 32 – 65

Hmm. Hardly a biggie. Three weeks on the chart in total with a high of No 32 then gone! I have to admit this one doesn’t do much for me. I don’t mind their sound but it does all start to sound the same after a while. Damn! I’m sounding like an embarrassing Dad again! By the way, Wayne Hussey and bassist Craig Adams used to be in The Sisters Of Mercy but left to form The Mission. So what I hear you cry. Well, here’s @TOTPFacts again to fill in the gaps:

Joining Pop Will Eat Itself in the #TOTP studio here on vocals… The Sisters Of Mercy’s Patricia Morrison.
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) January 8, 2021

The first of just three songs on the show that we have seen before next as we’re back with the dance tunes when we get another eyeful / earful of Don Pablo’s Animals and their version of “Venus”. As with D-Shake earlier, these lot were a European collective of producers but where D-Shake were from Holland, DPA* were Italian and German consisting of Paolo Bisiach, Christian Hornbostel and Mauro Ferrucci. And just like D-Shake founder Aad de Mooy, all three sound like they could have Premier League connections. I’m going for:

Paolo Bisiach – a Liverpool centre back in the mid 90s
Christian Hornbostel – a Southampton manager
Mauro Ferrucci – a Chelsea left back in the early 2000s

You can tell I’ve run out of things to say about Don Pablo’s Animals can’t you?

*Did anyone call them that? Bit like did anybody really call Tears For Fears ‘TFF’ apart from Peter Powell of course!

Goodier mispronounces the name of the next act who are Wilson Phillips or ‘Wilston Phillips’ as our host calls them (thanks to my wife for spotting that little gaff). Ah yes, Wilson Phillips whom you cannot mention without referencing their rock heritage. So much was made of the fact that Chynna Phillips is the daughter of John Phillips and Michelle Phillips of The Mamas & The Papas, while Carnie Wilson and Wendy Wilson are the daughters of Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys and Marilyn Rovell of The Honeys. They must have got so fed up of answering questions about their famous parents when doing promotional interviews for the record. Whatever promotion they did though must have worked as their debut single “Hold On” went to No 1 in the US and No 6 over here.

The other big talking point about the trio was their vocal harmonies which are all over “Hold On” which is one of the perkiest pop songs you might ever hear despite its lyrics being inspired by Chynna Phillips’s experiences with substance abuse and the AA. I used to work with someone who said this was one of his favourite songs ever although I’m not entirely sure he wasn’t winding me up.

Despite initially breaking up in 1992, the trio have reunited a few times over the years including for this scene at the climax of the film Bridesmaids which is one of those movies I always end up watching if I stumble over it while channel flipping.

If it’s 1990 then it must be Madchester and here’s someone else who was seen as being part of that movement and for once, he was actually from Manchester! MC Tunes was from the infamous Moss Side area of that great city which (certainly when I lived there and not that far from Moss Side itself) had a reputation for high crime rates, regular stabbings, drugs and gangsters. The image of his glaring face and intimidating stare on the cover of his album “The North At Its Heights” would absolutely have you believe that Tunes could handle himself in Moss Side. Indeed, Mark Goodier seems so unnerved by his presence in the TOTP studio that he stumbles over his intro seeming to change his description of Tunes from a ‘man’ to a ‘lad’ halfway through.

“The Only Rhyme That Bites” was his debut single and biggest hit of his career and was made in conjunction with fellow Mancs 808 State. Cleverly based around a sample from the main title theme to the Western The Big Country which pulled you in from the start, it would go Top 10 in the UK. However, after his initial success, his solo career fell away a bit and by 1995 he had left his MC Tunes alter ego behind and formed the achingly trendy Dust Junkys who just about everybody I ever worked with in multiple Our Price shops in the Greater Manchester area seemed to love …except me. I always quite liked “The Only Rhyme That Bites” though. So apparently did Goodier who pulls out a “Wicked, wicked” line to describe it at the end of the performance. Dearie me.

https://youtu.be/YY0Zq-xb_g4?si=bL5mX0kzQZ1mC0NZ

Just when you thought he couldn’t plumb the depths of naffness any deeper, Goodier uses the phrase “1990 stylee” to introduce “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone” by Was (Not Was). How did this man ever achieve such longevity as a broadcaster?!

David and Don Was (not their real names) have done some truly remarkable work I think but this cover of The Temptations’ 1972 hit left me cold. Songs like “Out Come The Freaks”, “I Feel Better Than James Brown” and “How The Heart Behaves” sound brilliant but this? Nah, not for me. I’d even take “Walk The Dinosaur” over this! They retuned to the charts in 1992 in a big way with the No 4 hit “Shake Your Head” featuring the vocals of Ozzy Osbourne and Hollywood movie star Kim Basinger and a Best Of album called “Hello Dad…I’m In Jail” which I bought but again they recorded another uninspiring cover version (INXS’s “Listen Like Thieves”) to promote it. Just stick to your own songs guys!

At least Goodier agrees with me (and therefore disagrees with my friend Robin) that “World In Motion” by New Order is the best football song ever as we get to the new No 1 and its time for that surprise! It’s only a live interview with the England 1990 World Cup squad! Would this have been seen as event TV back in the day? Maybe I guess. What follows though is the lamest of banter (courtesy of Gazza and a fake sleeping Chris Waddle) whilst Goodier attempts to prove to the watching millions that he’s actually a football fan as well. About as convincing as David ‘Is it Aston Villa or West Ham’ Cameron mate.

As for the song, apparently the FA hadn’t been that keen on the involvement of New Order and the band never got any World Cup tickets or freebies. National treasure and star striker Gary Lineker wasn’t keen either describing football songs as “a bit twee” but John Barnes was all for it and of course he would go onto seal his small but perfectly formed place in pop history with that rap. Supposedly the few players that did turn up to the recording session disappeared halfway through to open a Topman store in Middlesbrough! Talking of which, mention must go to the ultimate top man of football songs Keith Allen who helped write the lyrics and of course appears in the video. He would return to that rather niche genre again in 1998 being involved with both “Vindaloo” by Fat Les and “England’s Irie” by Black Grape. I read his autobiography a few years ago which was a fascinating read. He supports Fulham in case you were wondering.

We close with one of the most well known power ballads of all time. “It Must Have Been Love” by Roxette is of course forever associated with the film Pretty Woman in which it featured but it’s also taken on a life of its own soundtracking many a relationship break up and still gets regular radio airplay to this day.

The band were big news in the US after clocking up two Billboard No 1s in 1989 and so were approached to record a song for the film’s soundtrack album. Rather than recording something brand new, they just reworked an existing song called “It Must Have Been Love (Christmas for the Broken Hearted)” which had been a big hit in their native Sweden but had not been released globally so remained unknown to most of the planet’s pop fans. Not for long though as both the soundtrack album and “It Must Have Been Love” took off in a massive way with the latter supplying the duo with their third US No 1. It was also a No 3 in the UK and remains their biggest hit here. I’m guessing that it must also be their most well known song. They would return the following year with the album and single “Joyride” – yet another US No 1 single.

Order of appearance	Artist	Song	Did I Buy it?
1	Pop Will Eat Itself	Touched by The Hand of Cicciolina	I didn’t – sorry Robin
2	Elton John	Sacrifice /Healing Hands	Certainly not!
3	D-Shake	Yaaah	Naaah
4	The Mission	Into The Blue	Nope
5	Don Pablo’s Animals	Venus	No but my wife had it on a Smash Hits Rave album
6	Wilson Phillips	Hold On	No
7	MC Tunes versus 808 State	The Only Rhyme That Bites	I didn’t
8	Was (Not Was)	Papa Was A Rollin’ Stone	No but it’s on my Best Of album of their which I bought
9	New Order	World In Motion	Call the cops! There’s been a robbery. This isn’t in my singles box!
10	Roxette	It Must Have Been Love	Negative

Disclaimer

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000qzmj/top-of-the-pops-07061990

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.

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https://michaelmouse1967.wixsite.com/smashhits-remembered/1990-issues

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