TOTP Rewind – the 90s | My memories of 90s chart music

TOTP 18 OCT 1996

Posted on November 20, 2024 by 80stastic

You don’t hear much about him these days but for a while there as the 80s turned into the 90s, Nigel Kennedy was quite the big deal. Tearing up the classical music manual with his appearance, style and attitude, he challenged the predominant perception of what that art form was and who it was for and found himself catapulted into the mainstream by the success of his “Vivaldi: The Four Seasons” album which topped the classical music chart for over a year selling three million copies in the process. What with Kennedy and the extraordinary popularity of The Three Tenors off the back of Italia ‘90, classical music was suddenly accessible to the masses. Our Nige wasn’t to everyone’s taste though. In 1991, he was denounced by the then Controller of BBC Radio 3 John Drummond as being “a Liberace for the nineties”* who went on to criticise his “ludicrous”* clothes and mocked his accent as being “self invented”*. Kennedy responded calling Drummond “pompous”* and of “encouraging exclusivity”* within classical music.

*All quotes taken from Paul Kelso article: Kennedy hits back at arts elitism, The Guardian, Wed 30 August 2000

Whichever side of the argument you find yourself on, none of it explains what Kennedy was doing on our screens in 1996 presenting TOTP does it? Was his profile still so high a good five years on from his “Four Seasons” heyday? His Wikipedia page says that in 1992, he’d announced that he was leaving classical music and he made an album with the marvellous Stephen Duffy called “Music In Colours” which was interesting though I found Nigel’s bits fairly unlistenable. However, by the middle of the decade he’d returned to the work of international classical concerts and just a few months after this TOTP appearance, he received an award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music at the BRITS so maybe he was in the ascendancy again? Anyway, let’s see how he does in the role of presenter…

Straight off the bat, Kennedy (who just introduces himself as ‘Nigel’) weirds us all out with his hair. What. The. F**k.? He has an enormous, towering Mohican fin protruding from the top of his head! Is it real?! If it is, how much product did it take to get it to stand on end like that?! Back in my youth in the 80s, I had ‘big’ hair (didn’t we all?) and would get through cans of Cossack hairspray in the pursuit of trying to get my bonce to look like Morten Harket’s coiffured locks but this was next level stuff. Pure madness and that’s also a phrase that could describe what was happening with the opening act The Boo Radleys at this time. Having broken through to the mainstream with hit single “Wake Up Boo!” and No 1 album “Wake Up!”, the band allegedly decided that all this pop star stuff wasn’t really for them and so made a follow up album that would alienate all those Johnny-come-lately fans (of whom I was one) in the form of “C’mon Kids”. At least, that’s how the story goes but it’s been denied by lead singer Sice that the band deliberately recorded new material designed to kill their previous pop vibe.

I’d bought and been a big fan of the “Wake Up” album but somehow my interest in The Boo Radleys had waned by the time “C’mon Kids” came out and the only songs from it I know are the singles “What’s In The Box (See Whatcha Got)” and the title track. Those who had listened to it included the music press and they were mainly lukewarm in their reaction, with the main takeaway being that the band had committed commercial suicide. Certainly it didn’t sell any where near as much as its predecessor peaking at No 20 but I quite like the singles from it so maybe I should give it a chance nearly 30 years on from its release. After all, it does have some fans within the music industry – Nicky Wire of the Manic Street Preachers said he listened to little else for a year whilst Tom White of The Electric Soft Parade names it as his favourite album ever. Perhaps its greatest accolade though is that supposedly Radiohead went back to the drawing board after hearing it during the “OK Computer” sessions.

“C’mon Kids” the song is nothing like their most well known tune being much more of a harder sound with fuzzy, squalling guitars and an almost shouted vocal from Sice. Jangly, bouncing pop it wasn’t but then why should the band have been expected to come up with “Wale Up Boo! (Part II)”?! They would stay together for another album before the 90s were up before disbanding though some of the members reformed in 2020 and have released two albums of new material since.

I’ve got to comment on a Montell Jordan song that isn’t “This Is How We Do It”? Who knew he even had any other hits? Well, he did and this one is called “I Like” and was the third of five he had in the UK. Watching this back, I’m struck by how lacking in substance it is. There’s hardly anything to it at all which is not helping me in my struggle to find something to say about it. I guess I could mention the lyrics that are so hackneyed that Montell might as well have just called the song ‘Black Cab’ and be done with it. Hackneyed? Hackney? Hackney carriage? Oh please yourselves! Anyway, the lyrics are terrible – ‘lips’ are rhymed with ‘hips’ , ‘walk’ with ‘talk’ and Montell even says “You’re so sexy” at one point. Couldn’t he have just been happy with having the one hit that sustained? After all, “This Is How We Do It” has endured to the point that it’s currently being used to soundtrack a Deliveroo advert.

Kennedy fluffs his lines a bit next as he plugs TOTP2 by saying “By the way, you’ve got to check out this amazing unforeseen…unseen footage of the Stones on Top of the Pops 2”. Probably hard to check out something unforeseen but I’m being harsh on poor Nige, he was just nervous no doubt. And so he should have been, so we all should have been for Mark Morrison has returned with his third hit of the year “Trippin’” and if The Mack is back then that means only one thing – he’ll have his handcuffs with him! I could never understand the appeal of this guy – neither his music nor his image and judging by all his run ins with the law, he was hardly a stand up guy. In the lyrics to “Trippin’”, he starts referring to himself in the third person and there is no bigger indicator of being a massive prick than that! He would crank out another hit before the end of the calendar year called “Horny” and follow it up in 1997 with one called “Moan & Groan”. Delightful.

There follows a really strange segue where immediately after Mark Morrison finishes we just get the voice of Nigel Kennedy (he’s not seen at all) saying “And here is Celine…*big pause*…Dion” before the screen fades and the video for “It’s All Coming Back To Me Now” starts playing. Why wasn’t he in shot and why the large pause? Maybe the camera couldn’t accommodate his huge Mohican hairstyle. Anyway, it is Celine Dion and unlike the other week when we got six minutes worth of the promo, mercifully we only get half that amount this time around. In an interview with the director Nigel Dick, he effused about what a hard worker Celine is and mentioned that he made her run across gravel barefoot for a scene five times until he was happy with the shot. Celine didn’t complain but came to the shoot the next day with her feet in bandages. Fair play to her though I would do the same just to never have to watch this video again.

Nigel is back with us visually now and asking the question why we’ve never seen the next artist on TV before despite them having sold 20 million records. Who is he talking about? It’s Bally Sagoo who I must admit to not being aware of despite this hit “Dil Cheez (My Heart…)” and despite working in a record shop at the time it was in the charts. Having read up on him, my embarrassment of not knowing who he is has multiplied as he really is a big deal. In his early days he was a DJ in Birmingham but he wasn’t spinning the latest chart sounds. No, he was creating his own mixtapes fusing together elements of Western music and hip hop with Indian music. He signed with local record label Oriental Star Agencies as an in house producer collaborating with the likes of Qawwali superstar Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan before signing to Sony Records in his own right. His reworking of an Asha Bhosle song would be played on Radio 1 making him the first Indian artist to achieve national mainstream radio airplay. He then released the album “Rising From The East” which would spend a week in the UK album chart and furnish two Top 40 singles including “Dil Cheez (My Heart)”. Having broken through the glass ceiling, he went stratospheric in terms of exposure by supporting Michael Jackson on the HIStory World Tour. From there he launched his own record label showcasing both his material and other new artists and in 2003 was honoured at the UK Asian Awards with the inaugural trophy for outstanding achievement (presented to him by the Spice Girls no less). His music can be found in films like Bend It Like Beckham and Monsoon Wedding and he has diversified into areas such as film production, artist promotion and management, fashion and technology. Like I said, he’s quite the mover and shaker.

Back to Nigel’s original question about why we’d never seen Bally Sagoo on TV before, I guess it was because there had traditionally been so few UK hit singles that had an Asian influence and sound to them and if they weren’t chart hits the they wouldn’t have been on TOTP. There’s a few exceptions like “Ever So Lonely” by Monsoon in 1982 and are we counting “Im Nin’alu” by Israeli singer Ofra Haza from 1988? By the 90s things were starting to change with the likes of Apache Indian bringing Bhangramuffin to the Top 40 and in 1998, Cornershop took “Brimful Of Asha” to No 1. In these TOTP repeats, we’re not far off from Kula Shaker having a hit with a song sung entirely in Sanskrit in “Govinda”. More recently, there has been the rise of K-pop (which I know barely anything about) and of course the global phenomenon that was “Gangnam Style” by Psy. From the world of film, “Jai Ho” won an Oscar for Best Original Song after soundtracking that memorable dance sequence in Slumdog Millionaire. Finally, in 2023, Diljit Dosanjh became the first Punjabi artist to perform at the Coachella music festival. And I haven’t even mentioned Bollywood…

Nigel’s Mohican is starting to wilt under those studio lights and has flopped on one side. Also suffering a malfunction is the show’s running order as we don’t get to see the advertised ‘Flashback’ feature which was John Travolta and Olivia Newton John doing “Summer Nights” from Grease. Presumably it was cut for reasons of timing to fit in with BBC4’s Friday night schedule. So do I have to review this or not? Look, we all know this song and the film it comes from. I don’t need to make anymore comment on it do I? No I don’t.

Next up is a song that I definitely know but I may have struggled to name the artist behind it. Without looking it up or watching this TOTP repeat, I might have come up with Another Level but I think I would have been confusing “Freak Me” with this song which is “No Diggity” by Blackstreet. Oh, hang on. The album it was taken from was called “Another Level”? Ah well, then my mistake is perhaps forgivable. Perhaps not though as this track was an American No 1 and was the single that knocked “Macarena” off the top of the charts after it had been there for nine weeks. It’s yet another R&B number on this particular show following Montell Jordan and Mark Morrison earlier and also features Dr.Dre (nearly forgot about him) and Queen Pen. It’s come to be recognised as perhaps the definitive New Jack Swing song thanks to the creative input of Blackstreet founder member and lead vocalist Teddy Riley, the man credited with creating the genre. Did I like it? Not really though its title and hook have remained with me all these years. Apparently ‘no diggity’ means ‘no doubt’ but sadly for Nigel Kennedy, he fluffs his lines again and repeats the word ‘diggity’ for no reason and is left with ‘no dignity’.

After the huge success of “Three Lions” with Baddiel and Skinner over the Summer of football, it was back to the day job for Ian Broudie and the Lightning Seeds with another knockabout bit of pop fluff to promote. It may have seemed like an age ago but their last non-football related single had been “Ready Or Not” which had been released way back in February. It was the lead track from the “Dizzy Heights” album but that would not appear until the November after the recording of it was delayed to allow Broudie to concentrate on the “Three Lions” project so effectively “What If” became the lead single.

I have to say it’s not one of their strongest songs (despite being co-written by the wonderful and much missed Terry Hall) and the performance of it here demonstrates that Broudie is not the owner of the most powerful voice in pop. It actually reminds me of something else which I think is this by Sean Maguire and that’s not a good thing by the way…

By strange pop coincidence, there was actually a Lightning Seeds song in the Top 40 in this very week which went under the radar. The cover of “All I Want” from their first album by Susanna Hoffs is actually rather lovely and was at No 32 in the UK Top 40 at the time of this Lightning Seeds performance.

Having not heard it in ages, I’d forgotten what a good song “6 Underground” by Sneaker Pimps is. Pigeonholed in the music press as a cross between Portishead and Garbage, they looked to have the world at their feet but they never seems to be able to go beyond that first flush of success with their debut album “Becoming X”. Maybe it was all the remixes that the band had done of “6 Underground” that seemed to keep them anchored in those initial recordings (there was even an official remix album released called “Becoming Remixed” as a companion piece to their debut). Or maybe it was that the track “6 Underground” wouldn’t go away. After its 1996 chart run, it was rereleased the following year off the back of being included on the soundtrack to The Saint film and peaked at No 9, six places higher then its first foray into the Top 40. That second strata of success and that of follow up “Spin Spin Sugar” was enough evidence for a rerelease of the album which included new artwork and the inclusion of what many saw as the definitive version of “6 Underground” by Nellee Hooper. Then there was the two years of touring in support of the album when they opened for Blur and Neneh Cherry and played with Tricky and Lamb securing the perception of them as a trip hop band. All of this delayed the release of second album “Splinter” until 1999 when musical tastes had moved on and momentum was lost.

However, the biggest event that determined the band’s path was surely when lead singer Kelli Ali was told by fellow band members Chris Corner and Liam Howe that her vocals would not suit their new direction and she was fired from the line up before the recording of “Splinter”. This led to them being dropped by their label Virgin and they would never recapture the level of those early glories. They would go on a decade long hiatus before rebooting the band in 2016 and last released an album in 2021.

After the demise of Take That earlier in the year, the positioning of Boyzone as the UK’s next premier boyband was a foregone conclusion. They’d already spent two years coming up on the rails with a collection of hits that had peaked at Nos 2, 3 and 4 but their first chart topper had proved elusive. With those cheeky Manc scamps out of the way, there was no stopping them. Add to that the fact that they’d returned to the trusted strategy of releasing a cover version and the deal was not so much as sealed as cemented shut. “Words” by the Bee Gees was the song to do it for them and I recall it selling and selling and then selling some more in the Our Price store where I worked. We may have even come perilously close to selling out of it (an unspeakable crime for a record shop). When they released the follow up “A Different Beat”, I was determined not to be in that situation again so ordered in a load of the single. Despite also going to No 1, it failed to sell in anywhere near the quantities of “Words” and we were left with massive overstock. The fickle gods of pop music had farted in my face once again.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	The Boo Radleys	C’Mon Kids	Negative
2	Montell Jordan	I Like	I disliked
3	Mark Morrison	Trippin’	Nah
4	Celine Dion	It’s All Coming Back To Me Now	As if
5	Bally Sagoo	Dil Cheez (My Heart…)	Nope
6	John Travolta and Olivia Newton John	Summer Nights	No
7	Blackstreet	No Diggity	I did not
8	Lightning Seeds	What If	Nah
9	Sneaker Pimps	6 Underground	Liked it, didn’t buy it
10	Boyzone	Words	Never

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/m0024s0d/top-of-the-pops-18101996?seriesId=unsliced

TOTP 11 OCT 1996

Posted on November 15, 2024 by 80stastic

Writing two of these blog posts a week can be quite a drain on the well of creativity. Consequently, I have returned to my 1996 diary for inspiration and it’s certainly thrown a memory up though not one that I’m very proud of. Two days after this TOTP aired, I was out in Manchester with my wife and a coupe of friends. The plan was to have a few drinks and then go to Chinatown first and then for a meal. And we did do all of that so what was the problem? Well, unfortunately I imbibed a few too many alcoholic beverages along the way and by the time I sat down to eat in the Yang Sing restaurant I was completely plastered, off my face, hammered. That would have been bad enough but here’s the real kicker and this was unbelievable. The table next to us had noticed my inebriated state and had engaged in conversation with us along the lines of “dearie me, is he alright?”. In an attempt to prove that I was indeed OK and more than that, not drunk at all, I proceeded to tell them that I had to be at work early the next day as I worked in the Our Price in Stockport and we were having our Christmas merchandising, signage and decorations installed. Back in those days, the company employed outside contractors to come in and do all that sort of stuff. By the end of my time at Our Price, I’m pretty sure the staff were expected to do all that sort of thing. Now we get to the really weird bit. One of the women on the next table the informs me that she works for the company putting up the merchandising and is doing the Stockport store tomorrow. Excellent! So literally in a few hours time when no doubt I will feel as rough as a badger’s arse, I’ll be opening the shop doors to the woman next to me who has witnessed me completely destroyed by drink. So, not embarrassing at all then. My diary doesn’t record what happened at work on the Monday other than it was a quiet day presumably meaning I was hung over and hiding in the stockroom away from the counter and other human beings. I wonder if this TOTP has anyone on it to match my level of humiliation?

Nothing embarrassing about opening act Manic Street Preachers who are in the studio to perform their new single “Kevin Carter”. The third track lifted from their “Everything Must Go” album, it was also their third Top 10 hit on the spin. To give this achievement some context, their previous 13 singles had given them just one. This really was phoenix from the flames stuff given that the band had suffered the loss of main lyricist Richey Edwards. Having said that, “Kevin Carter” was one of the songs demoed for Edwards before his disappearance and which he wrote the lyrics for about the titular Pulitzer Prize winning photojournalist who took his own life in 1994 haunted by the images of famine and death that he had taken in Sudan.

It’s a very spiky track with a rhythm that judders and skitters about and not the strongest chorus but then there’s the middle eight trumpet solo by drummer Sean Moore which is actually quite exquisite. I guess it would have been difficult logistically to have him play the solo and be on the drums simultaneously in this performance. Such a striking piece of music was it that it was used as the theme music to the ITV Wales current affairs show Wales This Week. No, really. See…

Ooh now, here’s something that’s truly mortifying! What in the world was this all about?! Well, it’s the obligatory dance tune on tonight’s show and it arrives courtesy of Jeremy Healy & Amos. Jeremy, of course, started his music career as a member of Haysi Fantayzee but went on to carve out a diverse career as a superstar DJ and musical director for fashion house Victoria’s Secret and labels launched by the likes of Jennifer Lopez and Gwen Stefani. Amos was that bloke from Emmerdale who ran the Woolpack pub. No, of course he wasn’t but he might have well have been for all the information I can find out about Healy’s partner in crime and let’s have it right, “Stamp!” was a crime of music. This track is all over the place. There’s some record decks scratching, funk style bass lines, some de rigueur dream trance keyboards flourishes and some repeated spoken word Spanish all in the mix. And then there’s the performance which is absolutely bonkers. I guess it’s trying to reflect the mishmash of styles on display with flamenco dancers, a ludicrously moustachioed man on bongos and in the centre of it all is Jeremy Healy gurning away and generally making a total prat of himself. There’s very little online about this hit – Healy’s Wikipedia page doesn’t mention it at all – and quite right too as we should all try and expunge it from our memories. A total embarrassment.

With their repertoire of sardonic, social commentary yet beautifully crafted songs, I don’t think The Beautiful South could be accused of being a national embarrassment. Indeed, Paul Heaton is more of a national treasure. He even offered to nationalise his songs so that every time they are played on radio the state would receive the royalties revenue and could use it to improve living standards. Predictably, the Conservative government of the time refused his generous offer of a gift to the British public.

One of those songs that would have been included in his proposal was “Rotterdam (Or Anywhere)” the lead single from fifth studio album “Blue Is The Colour”. Perhaps one of their most well known songs and one of their biggest hits (it peaked at No 5), it was inspired by the lack of a welcome Paul Heaton received in a snooty bar in Rotterdam which he perceived didn’t want ‘his type’ as part of their clientele. Paul has refuted the idea that it’s a criticism of Rotterdam itself but more of the type of people who consider themselves the beautiful elite whom you see everywhere. Heaton’s experience of this just happened to be in a bar in Rotterdam. There’s something about its barbed lyrics with its references to Liverpool, Rome and pickled people that appealed to the nation. Interesting to note that Heaton is happy to completely take a back seat in this performance and hand all the vocals to Jacqui Abbott. As of a 2020 interview in The Guardian, neither the band nor the duo of Jacqui and Heaton have ever played “Rotterdam” live in that city nor Rome but it always goes down well in Liverpool and anywhere in Ireland for the line “gargoyles dipped long in Irish stout”. It has also taken on a life of its own as a football chant with the chorus being adopted by home fans to taunt their away counterparts with “insert name of opposition get battered everywhere they go”. I must tell my football obsessed son where that chant comes from.

Next up are a band whose name I remember but as for their hits, I couldn’t name you a one. Apparently Damage were marketed as being the British 3T despite the fact that there were five of them (the clue was in the name guys – bit embarrassing) and despite my inability to name any of them, they would rack up nine UK Top 40 hits including four Top Tenners. This really was a boom time for British R&B/pop artists what with the likes of Eternal, Gabrielle and Michelle Gayle representing the women of the genre and MN8, Mark Morrison and Ultimate Kaos showing up for the men (well, boys in the case of Ultimate Kaos). It makes me wonder how there was room for another such act in Damage but their run of hits proves that there was. “Love II Love” was their breakthrough hit and its title has left me wondering if it was inspired by another UK R&B artist, that of Soul II Soul. Anyway, it doesn’t do much for me although the video is at least diverting with the band as puppets being controlled by a mean alien lady. The only other thing to delay us here is to mention that lead singer Jade Jones has been in a relationship with Emma Bunton since 1998 finally marrying her in 2021. The Spice Girls are on later but this can’t be where they met as it was Damage’s promo video that we saw on the show and not the real thing in the studio.

Now I wouldn’t call this next hit embarrassing, not at all. However, despite it being the artist’s biggest ever hit, it’s also one of their weakest to my ears. “Flying” by Cast was a standalone single presumably recorded and released to plug the gap between their debut and sophomore album that wasn’t released until April of 1997. It’s not that it’s an awful song (and I don’t recall having this opinion of it at the time) but there really isn’t much to it. It’s very repetitive – the chorus is also its intro with its lyric sung four times over – and said lyrics are so basic and uninspiring that they sound like they took about the same amount of time to come up with as the Liz Truss/Kwasi Kwarteng infamous and disastrous mini budget (now that was something that was truly shameful). Look at these:

It’s like flying through the air, you can make it if you dare

You live your life without a care, you know that love is everywhere

Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: John T. Williams
Flying lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Universal Music Publishing Group

I mean, come on. Was that the best John Power could do? I don’t think so. To be fair to him, I saw Cast live this year as part of a three band open air show along with Embrace and Ocean Colour Scene. We arrived late halfway through the set and only caught a bit of “Flying” which they were playing as we entered the venue but I have to admit it sounded better live.

This week’s ’flashback’ section features Madonna and “True Blue” which was No 1 in the corresponding week ten years previously. Here’s the post from my 80s blog in which I discussed it:

TOTP 09 OCT 1986

Next up is the most misunderstood song since Bruce Springsteen’s “Born In The USA”. Babybird was basically a vehicle for songwriter Stephen Jones who had been churning out hundreds of lo-fi demos in his Nottingham flat without being signed to a major label until Echo Records (a division of the Chrysalis Group) offered him a deal. His first single release for them “Goodnight” was a No 28 hit spending just two weeks in the charts but it was second single “You’re Gorgeous” that would become the song that he would forever be remembered for. On first hearing, it may have seemed like a full blown, lush ballad but first impressions can be deceiving. I can’t recall the specific realisation that I (and so many others) must have had that not everything was as it seemed here but clearly the lyrics of the verses were at odds with that joyful chorus. The tale of a sleazy photographer manipulating his model with promises of magazine covers, it was a brilliant example of subverting the established love song narrative. And yet so many people didn’t get it. Even today, if you check out the comments on YouTube against its promo video you’ll find people saying that their Mums used to sing it to them when they were little or that the song makes the commentator’s spirit feel lighter or that the song has such fun, happy vibes. Should those people be embarrassed or is it a case of ignorance is bliss? Who am I to tell people how to consume or enjoy a song?

And for the third time in the TOTP studio we have Donna Lewis performing “I Love You Always Forever”. Seriously? What is there left for me to say about this one? Or should I be the one who’s embarrassed with my lack of creativity? OK, I’m just going to fling some stuff out there and see if any of it sticks or resonates…

The song was inspired by the H.W.Bates 1962 novel Love For Lydia with the lyric of the chorus being lifted directly from the book.
It was originally entitled “Lydia” but Lewis was talked into renaming it by her record label due to there being no reference to a ‘Lydia’ lyrics. Could it also have been to do with the fact that there was already a song out there called “Lydia” by Dean Friedman?
It spent nine weeks at No 2 sat behind Los Del Rio’s “Macarena”. Surely the Ultravox/ Joe Dolce moment of the 90s?
Despite not toppling Los Del Rio’s hit, “I Love You Always Forever” completely trounced it in the airplay chart being heard by 100 million radio listeners in one week compared to 19 million for “Macarena”.

That do ya?

Was this the moment that we all knew that the Spice Girls were here to stay? After the runaway success of almost novelty hit “Wannabe”, the decision on how to follow it up was always going to be crucial. Would they carry on into the extremes of bubblegum pop or go in an altogether different direction? I guess there two ways of reacting to “Say You’ll Be There”:

It was a super smooth and slick pop/dance number with a dash of R&B that was so prevalent and popular around this time. Therefore it showed a maturity to the group that was not apparent in “Wannabe” and was a wise career move aimed at longevity.
It was a safe and boring decision to jump on that pop/dance bandwagon and shows that the surprise of their debut hit had been sacrificed for guaranteed further success.

I’m not embarrassed to say that I was of opinion No 1. It was super radio friendly and the way that they divided up the vocal parts between the five of them promoted that gang mentality and also allowed for fans to pick out a favourite Spice Girl.

It’s another single that’s straight in at No 1 now as The Chemical Brothers top the charts in week one with “Setting Sun”. Working in a record shop, I was aware of Manchester duo Ed Simons and Tom Rowlands via my much hipper than me work colleagues – they had especially liked their debut album “Exit Planet Dust” which was a shop stereo favourite. However, perhaps like many, I didn’t really take that much notice of them until this single the publicity surrounding which was substantially heightened by the presence of the record of one Noel Gallagher. How much the Oasis man’s association affected sales we may never know but regardless, his input helped forge a spectacular dance tune that even I could get on board with. By all measurable criteria, I should have hated this. After all, “Higher State Of Consciousness” by Josh Wink hadn’t so much set my teeth on edge as trigger a full blown nervous breakdown in me every time I heard it and “Setting Sun” wasn’t a million miles away from that with its sprawling, squealing cacophony of sounds that metaphorically slammed you to the wall and kept you pinned there for the duration when it came on. Whether it was the presence of Noel I’m not sure but this track seemed to have more…what?…structure to it? Those sniffy elements of the music press would laud it as the best thing Gallagher ever did which makes for a good line but is a bit embarrassing on their behalf.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Manic Street Preachers	Kevin Carter	No but I had the album
2	Jeremy Healy & Amos	Stamp!	As if
3	The Beautiful South	Rotterdam (Or Anywhere)	No but I must have had it on something
4	Damage	Love II Love	Definitely not
5	Cast	Flying	Nah
6	Madonna	True Blue	Nope
7	Babybird	You’re Gorgeous	Negative
8	Donna Lewis	I Love You Always Forever	I did not
9	Spice Girls	Say You’ll Be There	I can’t because I wasn’t – no
10	The Chemical Brothers	Setting Sun	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/m0024s0b/top-of-the-pops-11101996?seriesId=unsliced

TOTP 04 OCT 1996

Posted on November 13, 2024 by 80stastic

We are well into the Autumn of 1996 here at TOTP Rewind as we enter the month of October and big changes are afoot. No, I don’t mean the show’s new opening titles but rather the fact that Manchester City have just appointed a new manager – Steve Coppell replaced Alan Ball two days after this TOTP aired. This was big news where I worked in the Our Price store in Stockport where many of my colleagues were City fans. Coppell had done wonders over two separate stints at Crystal Palace and big things were expected of him but his reign would last just 33 days and 6 matches after which he quit stating that the pressure of the job was to big for him. What I remember most of this time was that in those 33 days, the Man City calendar for 1997 came out and had a team photo on the cover with Coppell front and centre. The calendar company and the club must have been so pissed off. What were the chances? With Stockport not being far from Manchester, we stocked the calendar and decided we would try and hide the recently resigned Coppell’s face with the price sticker to try and make it seem like it wasn’t an already out of date product which, let’s be fair, is not a good look for a calendar. Anyway, I wonder if there are any artists on this show that had a similarly short career in pop music?

Our host is ‘Tony from Terrorvision’ (that’s was his official name around this time) who looked like he might have a potential career in the media if the whole rock star thing didn’t work out. To be fair to him, his appearance on Never Mind The Buzzcocks was very good and indicated that a projected media career wasn’t so fanciful. He starts his shift by introducing Sleeper and their latest hit “Statuesque”. The fourth and final single released from “The It Girl” album, it also drew a line under their most successful period. By the time that third album “Pleased To Meet You” came out in the Autumn of 1997, Britpop was in its last vestiges and with no zeitgeist to ride, reaction to it was cool with neither of the singles taken from it making the Top 20. For now though, it was success as usual. “Statuesque” was very much in the same style as its predecessors from the album and secured a No 17 chart peak and a third hit for the band in this calendar year. However, the winning formula of the music wasn’t translating into a ring of confidence when it came to Louise Wener’s stage presence. I’ve said it before but she does look a bit uncomfortable up there in terms of knowing what to do with herself when not singing into the mike. She just sort of shuffles about, swinging her arms and flicking her hair. They could have at least given her a guitar to strum.

Rivalling ‘Tony from Terrorvision’s’ profile at this time, Louise would appear on the Vic Reeves/Bob Mortimer TV game show Shooting Stars in December of this year. Actually, the pair would mirror each other’s extra curricular TV appearances with Wener also appearing on Never Mind The Buzzcocks in 1997 having already presented TOTP six months prior to Tony’s slot here. All of this must have only highlighted the gulf of recognition between Louise and the rest of her band mates whose anonymity was seized upon by the music press who referred to them as “Sleeperblokes”. They took it in good spirits though even having T-shirts produced for them to wear with the phrase on the front.

Steve Coppell-ometer: Burnt brightly but briefly in their heyday but were saved from a higher score by reforming in 2017

We’re still in the ‘techno bollocks’ stage of Everything But The Girl’s career and I still can’t get in board with it. “Single” was the third single taken from the “Walking Wounded” album that had seen them take a more electronica direction following the huge success of the Todd Terry remix of “Missing”. This track, like its predecessors from this era, just sounds a bit ‘meh’ to me (for want of a better word). If I’d been out at a club on an all nighter and I’d made it back home in the early hours and wanted some comedown music to chill out to as the sun came up, then maybe “Single” would be a good choice in that scenario but as I can count on the fingers of one hand how many times I’ve been in that situation…

I had wondered if “Single” was a clever marketing ploy as per the one used by Public Image Ltd back in 1986 when they released an album called “Album” (the CD version of it was called “Compact Disc” and the cassette format “Cassette”). Its lead single was a song called “Rise” but was packaged as being called “Single”. Sadly, Everything But The Girl’s song was just about being single, as in not in a relationship. Miserabilists.

Steve Coppell-ometer: A very low score for Ben and Tracey who recorded under the Everything But The Girl banner between 1982 and 2000 before resurrecting it in 2021 and releasing the “Fuse” album in 2023. They have also been in a relationship with each other for decades finally marrying in 2009. So they didn’t really know anything about being single did they?

It’s another female lead vocal now. Having gone from a band to a duo we now get a solo artist. Gabrielle’s career might have gone another way after her debut single “Dreams” went to No 1 in 1993. She could have been a classic one hit wonder but a series of follow up hits ranging in size from minor to middling to mighty meant that her time as a pop star would carry on until the present day. “If You Really Cared” was one of those middling sized hits I would suggest, peaking at No 15. It strikes me as typical Gabrielle fare, smooth R&B pop, very radio friendly (some of the guitar parts put me in mind of “You’re The Best Thing” by The Style Council) though not likely to last long in the memory. There’s only really the aforementioned “Dreams” plus “Rise” and “Out Of Reach” from her back catalogue that I could tell you how they went.

There is something else to say about this song though and it’s this: why did Gabrielle put out a single so close to the scheduled release of her duet with East 17? Everyone clearly knew it was in the pipeline as ‘Tony from Terrorvision’ describes her as the drinking partner of the boys from Walthamstow and the TOTP caption says ‘Soon releasing duet with East 17’. “If You Really Cared” was made available in the shops on 23 September whilst “If You Ever” came out on 21 October. Was that really an advisable strategy and whilst we’re at it, having the titles of both singles start with the word “If” – would they not have been slightly confusing for punters and indeed record shop staff?

Steve Coppell-ometer: Hardly a blip on its radar which is understandable given she’s been a recording artist for over 30 years

Things I know about LL Cool J:

He’s a rapper non
He had a hit in the 80s called “I Need Love”
He’s also an actor (though I couldn’t name any of the films he’s been in)
The name LL Cool J stands for Ladies Love Cool James
Erm…that’s it

Clearly that list doesn’t include this hit “Loungin’” so this must have passed me by despite going to No 7 in our charts. So back in the day, did the word loungin’ mean something other than relaxing (probably) on a sofa? Was it a forerunner of Netflix and chill? Well, the online urban dictionary gives a definition of:

“The act of a girl lying across a guy’s chest with her head on his shoulder. Usually undertaken while on a sofa watching a film.”

Frodrick Frankenstein February 4, 2009

Hmm. Kind of a Netflix and chill vibe then. “Loungin’” would the first of a run of five UK Top 10 hits for LL Cool J including a No 1 with his version of “Ain’t Nobody” for the Beavis and Butt–Head Do America soundtrack. Well, there’s something to look forward to then. Ahem.

Steve Coppell-ometer: Cool James hardly registers a flicker with a career stretching into five decades

This week’s ’flashback’ section features a very famous TOTP performance – it’s Rod Stewart doing “Maggie May”. Yeah, that one with a very hirsute John Peel miming the mandolin. Apparently Rod was told he couldn’t have a non musician up there with him but he insisted on Peel being part of the performance with the latter having to guarantee the Musicians’ Union that he hadn’t received payment for the privilege. The TOTP cameramen were instructed not to focus on Peel but Rod got wind of this and so indulged in some horseplay in and around the DJ so that he would be caught in shot on camera. The performance as a whole is a riot of ill discipline with The Two Ronnies Laine and Wood disappearing off stage mid song meaning that they missed their miming cues whilst scrambling back to their original positions. Sadly in this clip, we don’t get to see the infamous scenes of Rod, Wood and Laine kicking a football about on stage as the song finishes.

“Maggie May” was Stewart’s first solo No 1 and has become perhaps his most enduring song though my first awareness of him would be via his 1975 No 1 “Sailing” which my Mum and Dad liked. They weren’t the only ones. Apparently ex-footballer turned pundit Alan Shearer replied “Sailing by Rod Stewart” when asked by then Blackburn Rovers team mate Graeme Le Saux to name his favourite song ever. Shearer would have been in his early to mid 20s at that point! Le Saux, who is two years older than Shearer and was all about the likes of Jamiroquai at the time, was (perhaps rightly) flabbergasted.

Steve Coppell-ometer: Are you mad?! Rod’s 80 in January and still going strong

There are only nine songs on this TOTP as opposed to what has become the standard ten and I can only assume that was to allow the show to feature the six minutes long video of Celine Dion performing “It’s All Coming Back To Me Now”. As ‘Tony from Terrorvision’ says, “it goes on and on and on…”. The way that the decks were cleared to accommodate it is similar to the special treatment reserved for a Michael Jackson video exclusive – I know she was shifting some units but really?! You don’t have to listen to the song for long to realise it’s a Jim Steinman composition – legend has it that his on/off pal Meatloaf wanted to record it but Steinman told him to hang fire and he could have it for “Bat Out Of Hell 3” but then gave it to Celine to record. Also unimpressed by that decision was one Elaine Caswell, singer with all female group Pandora’s Box who Steinman put together in the 80s and who first recorded “It’s All Coming Back To Me Now”. Apparently, the original recording just had her vocals removed and Dion’s added over the top. Elaine was so upset that she couldn’t bear to be in the room if Celine’s version came on the radio. Supposedly Caswell collapsed five times whilst laying down the track in the studio. It is not known whether it was due to physical exhaustion from all that overwrought singing or that the rancid stench of the song overpowered her senses causing her to faint.

As for the video that TOTP executive producer Ric Blaxill seems to have made such a fuss over, it’s all very derivative with a “Total Eclipse Of The Heart” promo vibe detectable and substantial nods to the movie Ghost and even to The Rocky Horror Picture Show* present. Celine emotes all over the place and the whole thing feels like it wasn’t really worth all that bother. “It’s All Coming Back To Me Now” would take Celine to No 3 in the UK and No 2 in the US. All of this and we haven’t even got anywhere near that Titanic song yet…

*That bit where the ghost of her dead lover drives his motorbike in the house reminds me of Eddie riding his round and round the stairs before he is ultimately despatched by Dr. Frank-N-Furter with an ice pick. Eddie was, of course, played by Meatloaf.

Steve Coppell-meter: Nothing doing here. Despite health issues, Celine still has the desire to record and perform live. She completed an eight year residency in Las Vegas in 2019.

On and on and on…do you think ‘Tony from Terrorvision’ knew that as well as poking fun at Celine Dion that he was also referencing a song by the next artist. Longpigs would rack up four chart hits in 1996 – “On And On” was the second of them peaking at No 16. This one though – “Lost Myself” – was the fourth and final single to make the Top 40 for them in that calendar year. I thought I didn’t know this one but I did remember it when I watched this performance back – the hook of lead singer Crispin Hunt pausing momentarily between the words ‘live’ and ‘by’ in the lyric “to live by myself I’m far too weak” was very arresting and immediately rang a bell. It did strike me as unusual that there were two bands in the charts at this time with lead singers with very similar and… well…let’s have it right, quite posh sounding names in Crispin Hunt from Longpigs and Crispian Mills from Kula Shaker. Still, what’s in a name. I mean, I couldn’t tell you if that’s a Barbie or a Sindy doll strapped to Hunt’s microphone. Actually, what was that about?

Steve Coppell-ometer: Finally an artist who shows up on it. Longpigs were only in existence for seven years and bar one minor chart entry in 1999, all their hits came in this year.

As in the previous two years, Boyzone (now elevated to being the UK’s premier boy band after the demise of Take That earlier in 1996) looked to that old chestnut of a cover version to secure themselves a massive hit. Having taken both “Love Me For A Reason” by The Osmonds and “Father And Son” by Cat Stevens to a chart peak of No 2, the band’s decision to record a version of “Words” by the Bee Gees would reward them with their first UK chart topper. Sound logic but was it all becoming just a little bit cynical? Off the top of my head, I can think of at least another two covers that they released as singles in Tracy Chapman’s “Baby Can I Hold You” and Billy Ocean’s “When The Going Gets Tough” (the second one was for Comic Relief at least) so it’s a concept they weren’t done with yet.

“Words” was originally a No 8 in 1968 for the Bee Gees and you can see why Boyzone (or their management) chose it. A wistful, weary ballad that suited Ronan Keating’s wistful, weary voice perfectly and of course, it had that Gibb Brothers stardust that so many other artists had found themselves sprinkled with when covering a Bee Gees song. The lads seem a bit overdressed here in all that stuffy clobber of large coats, scarves and ties – they must have been sweltering under those studio lights. What do they care for what I’m writing about them though? It’s only words.

Steve Coppell-ometer: Nothing registering here. The lads would carry on until 2000 and then again from 2007 to 2019.

And so to the No 1 and it’s “Breakfast At Tiffany’s” by Deep Blue Something and what a divisive chart topper it was. Literally the worst song ever for some online commenters, it was also undoubtedly popular at least briefly. Where do I stand on it? Well, I certainly wouldn’t describe it as the worst song ever but is it a great track? Probably not. However, look it up on YouTube and there are so many videos of people having a go at playing the song – it seems to be quite the busker’s favourite and if the mark of a song is how many times it’s been played then, at least that’s one thing it’s got.

Steve Coppell-ometer: Finally a massive score on this. They came, they saw, they conquered… and then they disappeared having spent as many weeks inside the Top 10 as Coppell had games in charge of Manchester City – six.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Sleeper	Statuesque	Decent song but no
2	Everything But The Girl	Single	Not happening
3	Gabrielle	If You Really Cared	Nope
4	LL Cool J	Loungin’	Negative
5	Rod Stewart	Maggie May	No but my parents liked it
6	Celine Dion	It’s All Coming Back To Me Now	Never
7	Longpigs	Lost Myself	I did not
8	Boyzone	Words	Nah
9	Deep Blue Something	Breakfast At Tiffany’s	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/m0024hpb/top-of-the-pops-04101996?seriesId=unsliced

Cannot

TOTP 27 SEP 1996

Posted on November 8, 2024 by 80stastic

If last week’s TOTP was all about the mainstream, this time the focus seems to be on repeat appearances. 60% of the songs in this show we have already seen/heard before, some as recently as the previous week. Some of this is down to those pesky ‘exclusive’ performances for singles that weren’t actually available to buy in the shops yet. Once released, they would then debut in the charts thus earning themselves another TOTP airing. Maybe that was fine back in the day but it doesn’t help this blogger 28 years later who has to find something else to write about a song that he’s only just reviewed!

One thing that is new is the host. Comedian Harry Hill is still very much a name in 2024 and part of the country’s psyche and comedy fabric but how well known was he back in 1996? Well, he’d won the Perrier Award for Best Newcomer at the Edinburgh Festival in 1992 but that’s not always a guarantee of a long career. He did have a Radio 4 show called Harry Hill’s Fruit Corner that ran for four series but in terms of being on TV, he was hardly omnipresent. A six episode conversion of his radio show to BBC2 ran from October to December in 1994 and he also appeared on the rebooted Friday Night Live (retitled Saturday Night Live) show in 1996 but as part of an ensemble of comedians. He didn’t get his own show until the following year so I’m guessing that, at the time of this TOTP, he was on his way up but had yet to fully arrive.

His first job is to introduce opening act Skunk Anansie with “All I Want” which is one of those ‘repeat’ performances I mentioned. Harry’s voice sounds a bit croaky after a toot on his bugle to start the show and it seems to be catching as Skin’s live vocal sounds a bit rough as well. She does get it together for most of the song though her yelping in the chorus does sound slightly demonic at times. At one point, she jumps into the studio audience but it all falls a bit flat as clearly a spot of crowd surfing would have breached BBC health and safety rules so she just jumps up and down instead next to a bloke in a cap who it seems now thinks that he is Skin’s best friend. I said the first time I reviewed this that it sounds like the band had just rewritten “Weak” but I’m actually quite liking getting reacquainted with “All I Want”.

I have to say that the 1996 version of Harry Hill doesn’t look any younger than he does today. Perhaps it might be more polite to say he doesn’t look any older than he did 18 years ago. Anyway, I like his segue into the next act which is “But now, I am Donna Lewis and here is the news…”. Excellent word play there that even Huey himself would have approved of (in fact, he’d have probably appreciated the publicity back in 1996).

As for Donna, “I Love You Always Forever” is up to No 9 on its way to a high of No 5 for two weeks before a protracted climb down the charts. As the 25 years anniversary of her hit approached, plans to celebrate it were put on hold when Donna was diagnosed with breast cancer and took time out for treatment and surgery. Having come out the other side, Donna’s most recent album “Rooms With A View” includes songs that tell the tale of her experience and she is now an ambassador for the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer charity. Sadly, the aforementioned Huey Lewis has also had his own health issues in later life announcing in 2018 that he has hearing loss as a result of Ménière’s disease.

It’s a hat-trick of songs that have been on before as The Bluetones are in the studio for the second consecutive week to perform “Marblehead Johnson”. My research tells me that there is a Britpop tribute band called Marblehead – the original and ultimate Britpop experience who are named after the Bluetones tune. Playing a repertoire of songs by the likes of Pulp, Blur, Oasis, Supergrass and, of course, The Bluetones, they have been the support act for Space, Icicle Works and indeed Bluetones singer Mark Morriss. Is it just me or does that sound ever so slightly like a case of overkill? Imagine this scenario. You’re going to see Morriss live who was keeping his career going by playing solo gigs and who no doubt will have performed some Bluetones songs as part of the set but before you get to him, you’ve already watched a band called Marblehead play some Britpop songs presumably including some by The Bluetones. I’ve used the word ‘Bluetones’ seven times alone in this paragraph which suggests a certain level of excess don’t you think?

Time now for the obligatory dance tune on the show and this week it’s from B.B.E. This lot were from France and were exponents of the short-lived dream trance boom that rose to prominence in the mid 90s off the back of its poster boy Robert Miles and his massive hit “Children”. I say short lived but it might be still a going concern for all I know but I’m guessing it isn’t. “7 Days And One Week” was their biggest hit of five but to me, and I’ve said this before, it just sounds like speeded up Jean Michel Jarre. I know I don’t know my Goa from my Balearics so I’m probably missing all sorts of nuances but my limited dance knowledge leaves me with only primitive ways of expressing my thoughts about it. Maybe that’s OK though as Wikipedia informs me that dance trance is considered to be the first and most primitive derivative of the progressive house movement. Presumably dance trance isn’t a thing anymore then. Oh well.

After the obligatory dance tune comes the obligatory satellite performance and this one, by coincidence, is from Barcelona. Why by coincidence? Well, in a recent post, I wrote about how I’d been to Barcelona back in early September 1996 and had really enjoyed it despite a case of Montezuma’s revenge making my flight back home uncomfortable. In his intro to Metallica, Harry Hill tells us how he went to Barcelona once but was chased around his room by a gibbon. It shouldn’t be a funny line but somehow it is mainly because the word ‘gibbon’ is inherently an amusing word – just the sound of it. Hill’s genius is that he knows this and so what should just be a completely random and nonsensical statement is loaded with humour. He follows that up by juxtaposing an old sit com phrase (“Mr Humphreys? Are you free?” – “I’m free!”) with the most unlikely and unconnected subject – in this case a hard rock band – to subvert their image and generate a laugh. Well, I thought it was funny anyway, even 28 years later and accepting the accusations of an outdated depiction of a gay man.

Enough of Harry though, what about the music? Well, Metallica aren’t exactly my first choice to ask Alexa to play but I actually quite enjoyed listening to “Hero Of The Day”. It was much more melodic than I was expecting but in a grandstanding, epic sort of way. So that’s two Metallica songs I could ask Alexa to play talking into account “Enter Sandman” as well.

The ‘flashback’ feature rewinds 10 years where we find The Communards at No 1 in the corresponding week in 1986 with “Don’t Leave Me This Way”. It was the best selling single of that year in the UK and spent four weeks at No 1.

As such, I spent a lot of time reviewing it in my 1980s blog so I don’t propose to go through it all again. If you want to read what I said about it, here’s a link to my first post to include it below:

TOTP 04 SEP 1986

I’ve said it many times before (possibly every time she’s featured in these reviews) but Dina Carroll had a peculiar pop star career. An early spark with Quartz and that Carol King cover followed by a slow burner of a solo career that suddenly burst into flames with her massive hits “Don’t Be A Stranger” and “The Perfect Year” before burning out over the next three years as ill health and record label problems delayed her releasing any new material. In 1996, the flame was relit in dramatic fashion as comeback single “Escaping” went to No 3. Only Tom Hanks rubbing two sticks together in Castaway is a bigger firestarter shock. And then, just as quickly as the fire was ablaze, a big bucket of water was thrown over it and it was out again never to be resuscitated. She remains one of pop’s biggest enigmas.

From 1996 to 1997, Ocean Colour Scene were riding their own personal crest of a wave. Seven hit singles (of which six went Top 10) and two platinum selling albums were achieved during those two years – the tide was definitely in for the Brummie lads who formed in 1989 from the flotsam and jetsam of two earlier bands The Boys and Fanatics breaking up. “The Circle” was the fourth and final hit to be taken from their “Moseley Shoals” album and would peak at No 6.

The single included a live cover version of “Day Tripper” by The Beatles as one of the extra tracks on the second CD single which was especially notable for it featuring Liam and Noel Gallagher who joined the band on stage at the time of recording. Could this have helped the single’s sales by convincing Oasis fans to purchase it for that extra track? I guess you could make the argument that Oasis fans might have bought it anyway given that Ocean Colour Scene were very much seen as part of the whole Britpop explosion anyway. The fact that Liam and Noel had been having numerous bust-ups at the time prompting Oasis split rumours maybe added to the clamour for anything that could be purchased that featured them.

I saw Ocean Colour Scene back in August this year and they played “Daytripper” as part of their set. I had either forgotten or didn’t know about it being on “The Circle” single and just thought “oh, they’re doing a Beatles cover” but a quick check of the setlist.fm website shows that they’ve been playing it live for years.

Wait…what?! There was a reunion of The Power Station?! When did this happen? Well, 1996 obviously but my point is that this must have totally passed me by back then despite my working in a record shop at the time as I have zero recall of any of it. Perhaps a more pertinent question would be “why did this happen?”. Over a decade since the band’s first album, why stage a comeback then? Apparently, it was a reconvening of the original line up of Robert Palmer, Tony Thompson, John Taylor and Andy Taylor although John had to withdraw from the project due to personal issues before any material was actually recorded and he was replaced by Chic’s Bernard Edwards.

Back in 1985, The Power Station had been a side project during a break in Duran Duran’s schedule that turned into a full blown band complete with a hit album and singles both sides of the pond. There was even a cameo for the band in an episode of Miami Vice but Palmer left before a tour of America that saw him replaced by Michael Des Barres who was the guy on vocals when The Power Station played Live Aid.

Despite Palmer’s departure leaving a sour taste in the mouth and led to accusations of unprofessionalism, it didn’t stop him returning for this second coming that produced a sophomore album called “Living In Fear” and this single “She Can Rock It”. However, the band’s second era was not successful with the album stiffing and the single peaking at No 63 in the UK. Perhaps it was always doomed without the support of Duran mania which was still in full flow back in 1985. Or maybe the album just wasn’t very good? I can only judge “She Can Rock It” as I’ve never heard the album but that track seems to be a very retro rock sound (even back then) with stolen guitar riffs and dumb ass lyrics like “What good’s a rock without a roll, it’s a sorry lookin’ donut if it doesn’t have a hole”. It’s all a bit sad really as I love Robert Palmer’s voice but this doesn’t do anything for his legacy which brings me to a second reason why the whole project is a bit sad although really the correct word is ‘melancholic’…the number of people attached to The Power Station who are no longer with us. Palmer and Tony Thompson died within weeks of each other in 2003 whilst Bernard Edwards left us in April of 1996 before this TOTP appearance. Talking of TOTP appearances, I wonder when Andy Taylor was last on the show before this?

P.S. Just as with Ocean Colour Scene, The Power Station story featured a Beatles cover as “Taxman” was the final track on “Living In Fear”.

Harry Hill is back with us to introduce the Top 10 countdown or as he calls it, “Who’s got the biggest feet?”. I do love Harry. The Fugees are still No 1 with “Ready Or Not” and this week we get a live performance of the track from Detroit. I have to say, it sounds a bit all over the place and, for me, doesn’t translate well to the stage. They’ll be back later in 1996 with their cover of Bob Marley’s “No Woman, No Cry”.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Skunk Anansie	All I Want	It’s a no from me
2	Donna Lewis	I Love You Always Forever	Didn’t happen
3	The Bluetones	Marblehead Johnson	No
4	B.B.E.	7 Days And One Week	Never
5	Metallica	Hero Of The Day	Nah
6	The Communards	Don’t Leave Me This Way	Don’t think I did
7	Dina Carroll	Escaping	Negative
8	Ocean Colour Scene	The Circle	Nope
9	The Power Station	She Can Rock It	I did not
10	Fugees	Ready Or Not	No but my wife had the album

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/m0024hp8/top-of-the-pops-27091996?seriesId=unsliced

TOTP 20 SEP 1996

Posted on November 6, 2024 by 80stastic

We’re nearly three quarters of the way through these BBC4 TOTP repeats from 1996 and I have to say this is one of the most mainstream episodes yet. When I say ‘mainstream’, I am of course, referring to the music. Despite its pre-watershed time slot, the show hadn’t shied away from showcasing some of the more niche hits of the day even when the staging of said hits (take your pick from the many dance sub-genres of the day) was problematic. Hell, they’d even had the Sex Pistols on the other week, the very scourge of the mainstream back in the day. However, whether by fault or design, this week saw a more conventional roster of acts on the show. I’ll leave it to you to decide if this week’s host – Tony Mortimer of East 17 – was mainstream or not.

We kick off with Belinda Carlisle – a mainstream stalwart if ever there was. The success of “Heaven Is A Place On Earth” that catapulted her to solo stardom was already eight years in the past by this point and the hits had long since dried up for her in the US. Over here though, she retained a loyal following and had continued to maintain a chart presence throughout those years even if her numbers weren’t always as high as in those early days. Indeed, before 1996, she hadn’t had a Top 10 hit in this country since 1990 when “(We Want) The Same Thing” made No 6. Since then, it had generally been a case of diminishing returns for both her singles and albums. Only 1992’s Best Of collection had really produced massive sales.

However, the release of the “A Woman & A Man” album had generated two consecutive Top 10 hits for her. Following “In Too Deep” in July of this year came “Always Breaking My Heart” which peaked at No 8. The album didn’t sell significantly more copies than any of her other 90s studio albums so maybe the success of its singles was just down to a change in the way singles were being released and promoted by record companies by this point in the decade. I’m pretty sure first week of release discounting was a standard practice by now which would account for why singles were debuting in the charts at their peak position before sliding away. This was true of many a hit, not just Belinda’s. The fact that “Always Breaking My Heart” was a bit of a duffer only adds substance to this theory. Despite being written by Per Gessle of Roxette (was there a more mainstream band ever?) who certainly knew his way around a catchy pop hit, it’s a pretty weak effort. Is it just me or does Belinda’s outfit here make her look like a high powered business person rather than a pop/rock star?

Mainstream or Indie Theme? Definitely the former

Next is surely one of the most mainstream songs of this or any year and as is the way with many a mainstream hit, loads of people bought it at the time but its legacy is one of disownment. “Breakfast At Tiffany’s” by Deep Blue Something will be at No 1 soon enough but try finding someone who admits to having bought it. Talking of disowning, there seems to be a concerted belief by some people online that the song was originally recorded by US indie rockers Gin Blossoms and that the Deep Blue Something version is, in fact, a cover. Quite where or why this rumour started I don’t know but there doesn’t seem to be any truth in it whatsoever. So widespread is its reach though that the band put on their Myspace page back in the day for readers not to request “Breakfast At Tiffany’s” as it’s not their song.

The film of the same title was, of course, based on a book by Truman Capote who once featured on the cover of a single by The Smiths – “The Boy With A Thorn In His Side” – which, incidentally, could be how Deep Blue Something feel about their hit. If I were a conspiracy theorist, I might be allowing myself to believe that they were behind the rumour trying to rid themselves of the albatross around their necks such is the bad rap their hit gets.

Mainstream or Indie Theme? Despite the Gin Blossoms fake connection, it’s undeniably mainstream

If I thought the first two artists on this show were mainstream, I might need to create a whole new category for the Lighthouse Family – ‘super mainstream’ or ‘mainstream extreme’ maybe? “Goodbye Heartbreak” was the duo’s third consecutive hit after the reactivated tracks “Lifted” and “Ocean Drive” finally did the business for them and it was very much in the same mould as its predecessors. Some might even say “exactly the same as…”. I’ve not given this lot much grief in previous posts for fear of accusations of musical snobbery but was their whole album like this? I’ve never heard it in its entirety – I might as well have asked my Our Price colleagues of the day to play the audiobook of Hitler’s Mein Kampf as the Lighthouse Family on the shop stereo – so I’m not really qualified to judge. However, if it is, I’m not sure I would have made it through to the end. Change the record! No, literally change the record.

Mainstream or Indie Theme? Mainstream extreme

Unlike Belinda Carlisle earlier, the next artist looks every inch the pop/rock star in this satellite performance. Sheryl Crow’s future career as such though was by no means guaranteed at this point. Sure, she’d had a massive hit in 1994 on both sides of the ocean with “All I Wanna Do” and her debut album “Tuesday Night Music Club” had won three Grammys in 1995 but it had been written with a collective of other musicians (the titular Tuesday Music Club) prompting accusations that Crow was just the attractive face of the group, the image but not the talent. As such, she was desperate to prove her musical credentials with her follow up, eponymous album. Lead single “If It Makes You Happy” was a huge step in that direction straight off the bat. I’ve said before that the mark of a good song is if it can be performed in a variety of different styles and still sound convincing in each of them. Well, apparently Sheryl tried a number of different genres for this track including country, punk, funk and even as a David Lynch style soundtrack piece. However, it worked best as the growling, prowling, rasping rock track it turned out to be. It would go Top 10 in both the US and the UK but interestingly, the only country it topped the charts was Canada which may explain why this performance came from Vancouver. Perhaps, Sheryl was on promotional duties over there at the time? Its chart success was Crow’s biggest since the aforementioned “All I Wanna Do” and would provide the platform for her career to carry on its upward trajectory, paving the way for her sophomore album to go three times platinum in the UK alone.

Mainstream or Indie Theme? Hmm. Difficult one this. If huge sales make you mainstream then Sheryl Crow undoubtedly was. However, she always seemed a little more gritty than that to me

A quick word on Tony Mortimer before we proceed – he seems more lacking in energy and charm than I would have imagined. Quite dull actually. Liven up a bit Tony! Maybe the only straight up dance tune on the show tonight will get him going? Ah, not this one though. Apparently, “Oh What A Night” by Clock attracted a fair amount of derision even back in 1996 presumably for being an atrocious take on The Four Seasons mid 70s classic. Singer Lorna Saunders is now a legal secretary and was once on Never Mind The Buzzcocks as part of the identity parade feature. I don’t know if either team managed to spot her but she was once mistaken by Jamiroquai’s Jay Kay for 2 Unlimited’s Anita Doth! Doh!

Mainstream or Indie Theme? The most horrible and tacky form of mainstream

The ‘flashback’ feature is still with us and this week we are treated to “Prince Charming” by Adam And The Ants. I’m not sure that Adam is given the credit and respect that he deserves sometimes. He managed to combine originality (yes, I know there was a definite Malcolm McLaren influence at some point but still) with massive sales and a memorable image – that’s quite some plate spinning going on there. I think even his most commercial numbers like this one still stand up. The second and final No 1 for Adam And The Ants before the main man went solo, it retains the power to take me right back to the early 80s over 40 years hence every time I hear it. The natural successor to the dandy highwayman of “Stand And Deliver”, it’s actually quite basic in its nature with a few lyrics repeated over and over but the style and panache of the visuals of the video make it into something quite outlandishly striking. Ah yes, that video with the cameo of Diana Dors as the fairy godmother is a once seen never forgotten experience.

In the last blog post, I asked the question of whether you could actually dance to ABBA’s “Dancing Queen”. In the case of “Prince Charming”, Adam’s right hand man Marco Pirroni actually admits that it was a track that was difficult to dance to and so the arm-crossing choreography featured in the video was devised in order that it would be able to be played in clubs and discos. The whole package remains quite stunning. Adam And The Ants were almost untouchable for two years at the start of the decade but it couldn’t last and despite a No 1 straight out of the traps as a solo artist with “Goody Two Shoes”, by the end of 1982, Adam was already starting to show signs of decline when his third solo single “Desperate But Not Serious” stalled at No 33. “Puss ‘n Boots” saw a brief rally the following year but his time as the country’s No 1 pop star was almost at an end. Despite turning 70 literally the other day, Adam is still touring though he had to cancel his Autumn 2024 dates due to ill health.

Mainstream or Indie Theme? Huge popularity aside, Adam was always outside of the mainstream for me from his punk roots to his unique and enduring style

After a very subdued intro from Tony Mortimer we get The Bluetones and “Marblehead Johnson”. This was their third hit of 1996 and was a standalone single that presumably was intended to keep the band’s momentum going following the success of their No 1 album “Expecting To Fly” and No 2 single “Slight Return”. I’ve got to be honest, it’s not as good as I remembered it. In fact, it’s a bit dull. It sounds like it’s always on the cusp of kicking into life and then just meanders off somewhere for a bit of noodling.

Its title reminds me of the Warren Zevon song “Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner” which I once played by mistake in the Our Price I was working in as it came on after “Werewolves Of London” which was the track I’d originally chosen. It was quickly taken off by the manager as its subject matter of a Norwegian mercenary fighting in the Nigerian Civil War and having his head blown off was deemed inappropriate. Mine’s not a great story I admit but then listening to “Marblehead Johnson” is hardly a scintillating experience.

Mainstream or Indie Theme? My initial reaction is the latter but then in 1996, had Britpop become the mainstream?

And so we arrive at the ultimate in mainstream music, the arch purveyor of prosaic pop, patron saint of the unremarkable, Mr Middle of the Road himself…it’s Phil Collins.

Poor old Phil. We really have had it in for him for quite some time. Does he deserve it? Depends which side of the fence you stand I guess. Some people must like his music given the amount of records he’s sold and yet he’s become a byword for naff. It’s not just his music that can offend though, it’s also…well…him. Accusations of smugness, ubiquity, tax avoidance and of ending his marriage by fax (the last one has always been strenuously denied by Collins and it is generally accepted to not be true) abounded. Maybe it all affected him as his 90s output was nowhere near as commercially successful as that of his 80s heyday. That’s not to say they didn’t sell at all – 1993’s “Both Sides” went double platinum but that didn’t match any of his 80s albums sales and indeed was nowhere near the twelve times platinum status of 1989’s “…But Seriously”. By 1996, the malaise seemed to have set in permanently. “Dance Into The Light” the album would only sell 100,000 copies (gold status) in the UK with its title track lead single peaking at No 9. Let’s be honest, even if you were a mega Phil fan, this comeback track must have been a disappointment. Some cod-reggae groove, Caribbean horn section and some truly shonky lyrics about South Africa coming out of apartheid (?). It’s a bit of a stinker and surely one of his least remembered hits.

Phil embarked on a phase of writing for Disney soundtracks after the “Dance Into The Light” project before returning in 2002 with seventh studio album “Testify” which only reached No 15 in the charts. The last album to do anywhere near the numbers of his glory years was, of course, a Best Of collection in 1998, – the first official one of his career – called “…Hits” which topped the charts and went six times platinum in the UK alone.

Mainstream or Indie Theme? Do you really have to ask?

The Fugees are the UK No 1 with “Ready Or Not”, their second song to top our charts in 1996 following “Killing Me Softly”. I don’t think you could really label the trio as mainstream despite those huge sales figures evidencing their commercial crossover, not when you consider their legacy which lasted much longer than their career. Sure, there are many accolades that talk about them bringing hip-hop into the mainstream but that didn’t make them mainstream artists – I don’t think that’s what they wanted to be either. They were innovators whose creativity struck a commercial seam of gold. Sometimes the right people get lucky I guess.

Mainstream or Indie Theme? Indie definitely

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Belinda Carlisle	Always Breaking My Heart	Nah
2	Deep Blue Something	Breakfast At Tiffany’s	Nope
3	Lighthouse Family	Goodbye Heartbreak	Negative
4	Sheryl Crow	If It Make You Happy	No but I had her Best Of with it on
5	Clock	Oh What A Night	Never
6	Adam And The Ants	Prince Charming	No but I think my younger sister had the album
7	The Bluetones	Marblehead Johnson	I did not
8	Phil Collins	Dance Into The Light	What do you think?
9	Fugees	Ready Or Not	Not

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/m002497z/top-of-the-pops-20091996?seriesId=unsliced

TOTP 13 SEP 1996

Posted on November 1, 2024 by 80stastic

I’ve been waiting for this one to come up. Anyone for Pennis? Yes, it’s the episode hosted by fictional character Dennis Pennis aka comedian and actor Paul Kaye. You must remember this guy. He came to prominence on BBC2’s The Sunday Show* in which his Pennis creation had a regular slot posing as a reporter and attending celebrity events such as film premieres and asking them baffling questions.

*Bizarrely, the show was also a launch pad for another comedian with a very similar name – Peter Kay. What were the chances?!

Armed with an image meant to make him stand out from the crowd – red hair, loud clothes, thick glasses and an American accent – he was a comedy anarchist, a construct presumably informed by Kaye’s own punk background. As the popularity of his character grew, he was afforded his own two part special called Very Important Pennis filmed on location at film festivals in Cannes, Hollywood and Venice which had aired only a month or so before this TOTP. Consequently, his profile was very high and presumably why he was booked for the gig of hosting the BBC’s flagship music show. I really liked him though he riled the other authentic showbiz reporters who were trying to do their job but it couldn’t last as he became too well known and his intended ‘victims’ too aware of him. The character was killed off in 1997 in a video only release called Dennis Pennis RIP: Too Rude To Live though Kaye did resurrect him to introduce The Prodigy on stage at Glastonbury the same year. I’m hoping for a lot from him in this TOTP. Let’s hope he doesn’t disappoint…

We start with a band and a song that I only finished writing about yesterday in my last post – it’s Rocket From The Crypt with rocket “On A Rope”. The first thing I’m noticing is that they’ve stuck with those horrible glittery shirts again for this second performance. Was it their trademark like ABC and gold lamé suits back in 1982? Not many can pull off such an item of clothing and pull them off they should have though I’m not sure I would have been prepared for what was underneath especially in the case of the sideburns wearing lead singer. Was their version of ‘Bez’ with them last time? His main purpose seems to be to jump about the stage like he’s sat on an ants nest. Get in the shower mate for some quick relief – don’t forget your soap…on a rope. Ahem.

Pennis Putdown: “This band came straight in this week at 12. Unfortunately the building didn’t open until 5 so they’ve been hanging around the car park for hours” – Not bad 6/10

If it’s the mid 90s, then you can’t get through an episode of TOTP without having to endure yet another dance tune by some faceless DJ types fronted by a female singer in a PVC outfit. This week was no exception so here comes Stretch & Vern present “Maddog” with “I’m Alive”. Wikipedia tells me that this lot were Stretch Silvester and Jules Vern (real names Stuart Collins and Julian Peake) who were on the FFRR label whose A&R was run by one Pete Tong. Quite who “Maddog” was I haven’t been able to ascertain. The sample their tune was based around didn’t need any research to identify though with it being instantly recognisable as “Boogie Wonderland” by Earth, Wind & Fire. It’s all very frenetic with the speeded up vocal adding to the intensity and that proved to be attractive to UK record buyers as it topped the dance chart and made No 6 in the national Top 40. It sounds very early 90s to me listening back to it now but then what do I know about dance music. Apparently, one of the PVC clad women is actress Jaime Murray who is best known for starring in BBC crime drama Hustle. I didn’t know that before either.

Pennis Putdown: “Coming up on the show we’ve got exclusives from Skunk Anansie and Deep Blue Something plus a brand new No 1 from Peter Andrex with a song that goes on and on and on” – Clever enough pun though clearly couldn’t come up with anything for Stretch & Vern Present “Maddog” 5/10

What is it with this post and people called Kay? After name checking Peter Kay and Paul Kaye we now have Jay Kay of Jamiroquai although Dennis Pennis just refers to him as if his name is Jamiroquai (that was the band of course) in his intro. Despite having already peaked at its debut chart position of No 3 and started descending the charts, they are granted another outing to the show as “Virtual Insanity” is holding for a second week at No 5 so not technically breaking any TOTP appearance rules. This exposure wouldn’t stop it slipping again in the following chart but did afford it one final week in the Top 10.

Pennis Putdown: “Jamiroquai? Love him or hate him, you gotta love him! Or HATE him! He takes environmental issues seriously. He makes music by recycling classic funk records. This song is no exception. Take it away. AWAY!” – Wickedly barbed 7/10

How do you follow up a hit that would prove to be the biggest selling of the year in the UK? Well, if you’re the Fugees then you come up with another No 1 record that was also a million seller* and would forge your reputation as the new creative light of East Coast rap.

*It couldn’t quite replicate the sales of “Killing Me Softly” which sold 1.8 million copies in the UK. “Ready Or Not” would shift 1.2 million units and be our 24th best selling single of 1996.

“Ready Or Not” has come to be regarded as a defining moment in hip-hop for its blending of rap with soulful singing and inspired use of samples (albeit said samples hadn’t been copyright cleared at the time leading to threatened litigation and an out of court settlement). The vision of Lauryn Hill to see how a song by ambient, new age superstar Enya could be used as the basis for a Fugees track was…well…visionary. She wasn’t finished there though using a song by 70s Philly soul group The Delfonics to create that hypnotic chorus. Even that wasn’t the end of the band displaying their influences. They also manage to sneak in a reference to the Nas hit “If I Ruled The World (Imagine That)” which Hill had featured on and which itself borrowed heavily from the Kurtis Blow tune of the same name AND a lyric from Bob Marley’s “Buffalo Soldier”. There’s a lot going on in this song!

And yet, there was even more going on in the video which cost a reputed $1.3 million to produce making it one of the most expensive promos ever filmed at the time with only the likes of those by Guns N’ Roses and Michael Jackson above it. Even 28 years later, it is still the 32nd most expensive video ever made. The reason for its high costs was presumably all the helicopters, explosions, sharks, chase scenes and a submarine that it features. It really was quite epic, especially given the period it was made in.

The purpose of the song was to be a shot across the bows at gangsta rap and its attendant culture helping to make “Ready Or Not” be named by The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as one of the Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll in 2018. Former US President Barack Obama has named it as his favourite song ever. Given all of this, I really thought it must have gone straight in at No 1 here but its inevitable ascent to the top was ludicrously delayed for a week by a jumped up, muscle man from Australia with a washboard stomach peddling some wishy washy R&B crud. Come on Pennis – give him both barrels when the time comes!

Pennis Putdown: “What a video, man. More like a Fugee film really” – Even Pennis couldn’t find fault with the Fugees 0/10

Skunk Anansie are one of those bands who I was aware of during the 90s and had a decent idea of the type of music they played but I can still to this day only name one of their songs – that being “Weak”. One of the reasons for this state of affairs might be that their albums seemed to always come with Parental Advisory stickers on them meaning we couldn’t play them in the Our Price I worked in. That was certainly the case with their second album “Stoosh” and I recall having to tell at least one member of staff to take it off the shop stereo. In retrospect, I probably shouldn’t have worried so much and not been so draconian about it but as Assistant Manager, it was potentially me in the firing line if we got complaints.

The lead single from “Stoosh” was “All I Want” which sounds as if the band just rewrote “Weak” if I’m honest. That’s not a bad thing as I really liked “Weak” but just an observation. Lead singer Skin does her usual intimidating performance, looking threateningly down the camera and leaping about all over the stage including standing erect on the drum kit at one point. She really did have quite the striking image – a bit like Grace Jones in that you’re not sure that she isn’t really an alien descended to Earth in human form. “All I Want” would peak at No 14, the band’s then highest chart position and the third highest of their career in total.

Pennis Putdown: “Now, some bands are very appropriately named. Skunk Anansie are a classic example. They’re black, they’re white and their music really stinks” – Bit obvious but very well executed 7/10

It’s that dastardly ‘flashback’ feature now that has extended the show’s length by four minutes or so which presumably explains why it was now starting at 7.25pm rather than 7.30pm during this particular era of the show’s history. Having had its day and time of broadcast changed and its channel switched from BBC 1 to BBC2, the show was in a state of flux from which it would ultimately never recover. Being reminded of its past glories in the form of this ‘new’ slot maybe wasn’t the wisest idea on reflection. Tonight its spotlight shines on ABBA and perhaps their most famous song “Dancing Queen”. Indeed it is widely considered to be one of the best pop songs by anyone ever thanks to its catchy hooks and feelings of euphoria it promotes.

However, can you actually dance to “Dancing Queen”? I don’t mean the choreographed routine in the Mama Mia! film but rather just if it was played at a wedding disco or such like? Aren’t its bpm not quite right for cutting some rug? Look at Agnetha and Anni-Frid in the video – they’re just sort of swaying about or doing the nerd shuffle. Sacrilege? Possibly. Its accolades include being ranked No 2 in Billboard’s 2023 list of The 500 Best Pop Songs and was the inspiration* for Elvis Costello’s “Oliver’s Army” and Blondie’s “Dreaming” and similar to Barack Obama and “Ready Or Not”, is the favourite song ever of Republican Party party nominee for the 2008 US Presidential Election where he was beaten by…yep…Barack Obama.

*”SOS” was the inspiration behind “Pretty Vacant” by the Sex Pistols but that’s another story altogether.

Pennis Putdown: “Like most good Swedish video footage I’ve seen, the men have beards and the women are clean shaven” – Lowers the tone a bit but what did I expect from Dennis Pennis? 6/10

Way Out West – both a Laurel and Hardy film and a 90s purveyor of dance music – I know which one I prefer and it’s not option two. This lot were Jody Wisternoff and Nick Warren who met in a Bristol record shop and teamed up to do remixes for other people before signing to Deconstruction Records as an artist in their own right. “The Gift” was by far their biggest hit peaking at No 15 on the national chart and No 2 on the specialist dance chart. It featured the vocals of Joanna Law who’d had a minor hit in 1990 with a version of Roberta Flack’s most well known hit “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face”. Said version was sampled for “The Gift” though I don’t personally think it’s that obvious. As with Stretch & Vern earlier, it all sounds a bit early 90s and fairly dull with the same lyric repeated over and over. It probably made more sense on a dance floor if you were under the influence of something rather than on TOTP. Probably.

Pennis Putdown: “Now Way Out West featuring Joanna Law – classic yuppie hangover music. It’s called “The Gift” – appropriate cos no-one’s likely to buy it” – First line is better than the second so 6/10

After her last appearance on the show, Donna Lewis seemed to divide opinion among those watching the BBC4 repeat. I wrote in my post reviewing that show that her hit “I Love You Always Forever” had a timeless quality and was light and joyful and seemed to bring hope to a world that so often seemed dark. On reflection that seems slightly over the top – I should maybe have gone with something along the lines of it being a fluffy, soothing punctuation mark in the long narrative of the day. However, other people went online to say how much they hated it and that it was a whole lot of nothing. It’s a game of opinions as they say and anyway, we’re all just pissing in the wind – as Frank Zappa once said, writing about music is like dancing about architecture.

Pennis Putdown: “They say Donna Lewis is gonna be a one hit wonder. Sounds optimistic to me.” – Cutting and personal; a solid insult 7/10

Here’s another song that split opinion but I think it may have been a case of musical snobbery causing the division as the music press hated it but the UK record buying public loved it enough to send it to No 1. Deep Blue Something were a bunch of good ol’ boys from Texas (well, they were pretty young actually) whose members included brothers Todd and Toby Pipes who sound like they should be a firm of plumbers in Trumpton. Their song “Breakfast At Tiffany’s” clearly stole its title from the Audrey Hepburn film of the same name though apparently the inspiration for it came from another of her films – Roman Holiday. It was the tale of a couple on the verge of breaking up due to no longer having anything in common only to realise that they both sort of liked the film Breakfast At Tiffany’s and so maybe they should stay together. As the foundation for a full blown romantic relationship, it’s pretty unstable you’d have to say. And random. Imagine you’re in the scenario of tying to salvage your relationship and when trying to think of a reason to stay together, you delve into the darkness and come up with the title of a film you both quite liked. Not that you share the same values, have a similar sense of humour, enjoy each other’s company…no, you both have a fondness for a specific Audrey Hepburn film. Never mind it being a flimsy foundation for a relationship, it’s a pretty ludicrous basis for a song.

And yet…and yet it was as catchy as hell with some nifty guitar work and a memorable chorus. It was also very daytime radio friendly which must have helped. Even so, its rise to the top did seem unlikely and I was surprised at its level of success. The band weren’t the prettiest of boys either. I recall a friend said at the time that their six year old daughter liked it but he mistakenly believed it was a new song by Lloyd Cole And The Commotions. I’m not sure that I can hear their sound in “Breakfast At Tiffany’s”. However, it does kind of make me think of “I’ll Be There For You” by The Rembrandts who’d been in the charts recently and I can imagine it being the theme tune for a Friends type show. Deep Blue Something would annoyingly have one further minor hit (“Josey” made No 27) thus spoiling their status as perfect one hit wonders – one chart topper and then nothing.

Pennis Putdown: “When most people think of the title “Breakfast At Tiffany’s”, they think of an Audrey Hepburn film. This song is unlikely to change that unfortunately” – Nice line but it’s his facial expression at the end that is the real kicker. So dismissive 8/10

This a joke right?! How the hell did we give Peter Andre a No 1 record and such a terrible one to boot. Any hopes that he might just disappear after his god awful hit “Mysterious Girl” disintegrated when he returned with “Flava”. This wasn’t so much a follow up as a follow through, a honking stinker of a song. Well, I say song but it was more of an identikit exercise in putting together all the bits of previously successful hits and seeing if you could just recycle them. It’s built around that awful parping riff used by the likes of Montell Jordan, MN8 and the Backstreet Boys and then proceeds to name check artists such as Dr. Dre and Bobby Brown who presumably would have thought Andre was a joke. And he was/is. Just to absolutely hammer home his lack of creativity, he even throws in a lyric about the Mack being back, like we hadn’t heard that line enough in 1996 already.

Despite all the fuss and promotion of Andre’s pecs and six pack, he keeps them hidden most of the time under a huge leather jacket which must have stank under those hot studio lights. The occasional glimpses of his body that he allowed the studio audience are met with predictable screams. Weren’t we better than this?

Pennis Putdown: “Peter Andrex is finding it virtually impossible these days to sell records in Europe due to the ban on British beef but in the UK, the kids are mad for it and its my pleasure to announce that Peter Andrex is top for the poops!” – It was topical (the EU had imposed a worldwide ban on exports of British beef in 1996) but the last line is weak 5/10

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Rocket From The Crypt	On A Rope	Never happened
2	Stretch & Vern present “Maddog”	I’m Alive	No
3	Jamiroquai	Virtual Insanity	It’s a no from me
4	Fugees	Ready Or Not	No but my wife had the album
5	Skunk Anansie	All I Want	Negative
6	ABBA	Dancing Queen	No but we all have a copy of ABBA Gold don’t we?
7	Way Out West	The Gift	I did not
8	Donna Lewis	I Love You Always Forever	Nah
9	Deep Blue Something	Breakfast At Tiffany’s	Nope
10	Peter Andre	Flava	NOOOOOOO!!!!

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/m002497x/top-of-the-pops-13091996?seriesId=unsliced

TOTP 06 SEP 1996

Posted on October 30, 2024 by 80stastic

It’s early September of 1996 and I’m on holiday in Barcelona. I loved it though I did get a case of Montezuma’s revenge the day before we were due to go back which made for a very uncomfortable flight home I can tell you. Sticking with that theme, although I really enjoyed Barcelona, a friend who visited there after me hated it saying that he’d rather go on holiday in his own toilet bowl. What has any of this to do with TOTP? Nothing really though I wonder how many shit songs we might get in this particular show?

Our host for tonight is Julia Carling (remember her?) and we start with a group that my mate Robin once described as a ‘joke band’ so I presume he thought they were a big pile of poo though I think that’s a harsh description. Space were certainly idiosyncratic and they may not have been to your taste but I don’t think they can be dismissed out of hand as complete shite. After securing themselves a bona fide hit in “Female Of The Species”, the scouse band were back with a follow up in “Me And You Versus The World”. As with its predecessor, it wasn’t your conventional pop song with Tommy Scott’s grainy vocals telling a Bonnie and Clyde type story in which the protagonist admits he’s “just a joke” (maybe Robin was right after all!) before a rather grizzly end is revealed. Scott channels his inner Victoria Wood when he gets the line “a tin of baked beans and a Woman’s Weekly” into the lyrics. The single would debut at No 9 providing the band with their first Top 10 hit. Space were in full launch mode. Who was laughing now?

Hit or Shit? I’m going hit with this one

Now this, this is a complete scandal. How on earth were Clock allowed to do this?! Well, presumably they got copyright clearance from the original artist but it’s still a disgrace. Having decided the only way to score major hits with their yucky brand of Eurodance was to cover previous hit records and polish them into turds, they’d already sprinkled flecks of shit onto “Axel F” and “Whoomph! (There It Is)”. Harold Faltermeyer and Tag Team were one thing but Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons were sacrosanct! How dare they take their 1976 UK and US No 1 “December, 1963 (Oh, What A Night)” and give it the shitty stick treatment! They even had the temerity to rename their version as “Oh What A Night” (unless that was a stipulation of being granted permission to cover it – maybe they couldn’t use the song’s original title?). I mean, you just can’t improve upon the original, you can only make it worse so why try? Were they hoping to appeal to young record buyers who may not know The Four Seasons original? It’s just wrong on every level and yet somehow it was a hit spending four non consecutive weeks at No 13 unluckily for us.

I have to admit to being a bit biased in my denigration of Clock here as I do love Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. I’ve seen Jersey Boys and, in my current job working in a theatre, have seen a couple of tribute acts all of which I’ve enjoyed. As such, this Clock nonsense really offends. They weren’t finished here though going on to cover the likes of Hot Chocolate, KC and the Sunshine Band and The Jacksons.

Hit or Shit? A massive, steaming turd

Next up are Kula Shaker with their No 2 hit “Hey Dude”. I discussed this one in quite some depth in a previous post so I don’t propose to say an awful lot more this time around. However, what I did discover in my research for it is that the band’s keyboard player Jay Darlington was a touring member of Oasis from 2002 until their 2009 break up. So, will he have had the call from Noel and Liam for the 2025 reunion tour and if he has, will he be allowed to go as he is currently back with Kula Shaker? When he was with Oasis, due to his long hair and beard, he was often introduced by Noel as “The Shroud”, “Gandalf” or even “Jesus Christ” leaving to the crowd chanting “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus…”. Never mind Noel and Liam giving him a call, maybe Donald Trump* might reach out to Darlington. What an endorsement that would be!

*For any avoidance of doubt, I despise Trump.

Hit or Shit? Definite tune this one!

What on God’s green earth…? If I thought we’d reached a nadir with Clock, I hadn’t bargained on the sodding Smurfs making a comeback. People of a certain age (i.e. me) will have strong childhood memories of The Smurfs not least because of the ridiculous single “The Smurf Song” spending six consecutive weeks at No 2 in the UK charts during the long, hot Summer of 1978. That bloke with the long flowing beard? No, not Jay Darlington! Yep – Father Abraham (no, not the biblical patriarch but Dutch singer-songwriter Pierre Kartner). He had a bowler hat as well I seem to remember. Anyway, we finally came to our senses as a nation about The Smurfs (though there were two minor follow up hits as well) and left it all behind us after 1978 but across the rest of Europe they never went away and so, in 1996, EMI deemed it was time for their return to our shores (and ears) courtesy of “The Smurfs Go Pop” album which spent 12 consecutive weeks inside the Top 10 of our charts over the Summer and Autumn of that year. Similar to the Clock concept earlier, The Smurfs (or whoever had the licensing rights to them) took modern day hit tracks and smurfed them up with high octane vocals that were enough to give you a migraine. And we thought Pinky and Perky* were bad enough!

*In fairness, I recall there being a Pinky and Perky record in our house when I was a tiny child and presumably the infant version of me loved it.

Brilliantly, they tried to get permission to do covers of some Oasis songs but Noel Gallagher wasn’t having any of it. In the end, the songs covered were fairly awful including “Mr Blobby”, “Cotton Eye Joe”, “Saturday Night” and “No Limit”. However, the single chosen for release was their take on Technohead’s recent gabber hit “I Wanna Be A Hippy”. Clearly, a brand aimed at young children couldn’t feature any references to drugs as the original did so they were all stripped out and replaced with the tale of a small dog and retitled as “I’ve Got A Little Puppy”. A happy hardcore version of The Smurfs sounds appalling and yet the single, as with the album, was a huge hit peaking at No 4. Who the f**k was buying it?! Working in Our Price, I must have sold it to punters many times over but I can’t actually recall doing it. Perfectly for the theme of this post, the lyrics included the refrain “pooper, pooper scooper!”.

Hit or Shit? A huge pile of dog poo

Here’s a curious thing – when an artist’s biggest hit is also one of their least known. I speak of Dina Carroll and her comeback single “Escaping”. I use the word ‘comeback’ as we hadn’t seen her for nigh on three years since her annus mirabilis in 1993 saw her become one of the breakout stars of that year. Four hit singles and a four times platinum selling debut album in “So Close” saw her named Best Female Artist at the following year’s BRIT awards. She was set for superstardom and then just seemed to vanish. Health issues and record label contractual problems caused a lengthy delay to her releasing any new material and so it was not until 1996 that she returned to the charts with “Escaping”. Despite this debuting at No 3 making it her joint highest charting single alongside “Don’t Be A Stranger”, I had real trouble recalling how this one went. That may be a common experience – when was the last time you heard it on the radio? Once I’d re- listened to it, it did sound faintly familiar but I do recall being surprised at how high it had gone into the charts back in 1996 given her low profile for the previous three years. The album it was taken from “Human Nature” also did well going to No 2 and achieving platinum sales status though its predecessor sold four times as many copies.

A mixture of an hereditary bone condition that affected her ears, bad luck (a cover of Dusty Springfield’s “Son Of A Preacher Man” was aborted due to Dusty’s untimely death) and more record label and management wrangling meant that Dina never did release a third album and drifted away from the music industry come the new millennium. She seems an almost forgotten figure somehow which strikes me as unfair I have to say.

Hit or Shit? Hmm. Difficult one this. “Escaping” is pleasant but not exactly memorable but then it was her joint biggest hit. Is this an “all fart, no shit” scenario?

What the heck?! What’s going on here? Why is “Tainted Love” by Soft Cell, a No 1 record in 1981, on TOTP in 1996? Well, this show was the first of ten that had a start time of 7.25pm. So? Here’s @TOTPFacts to take up the story…

For these 10 weeks, producer Ric Blaxill introduced a "Flashback" feature halfway through the show, the idea being that viewers channel-hopping during the commercial break for Coronation Street might stick with #TOTP if they saw a familiar archive performance.
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) October 18, 2024

Hmm. I think Blaxill was hoping against hope with that idea. In reality, it was probably just to further plug the return of TOTP2 that Julia Carling mentions at the song’s end. As my TOTP blog only dates back to the 1983 repeats, I’ve never properly discussed “Tainted Love” before but do I really need to go into the backstory on this one? Actually, there is a little bit of its origin that ties in nicely with this post. After becoming aware of the song due to its Northern Soul profile, Soft Cell decided to insert it into their live set. The song it replaced? “The Night” by the aforementioned Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. For years it was known as the biggest selling single of 1981 in the UK until the Official Charts Company recalculated the data in 2021 and gave that title to “Don’t You Want Me” by The Human League. “And I’ve lost my light” indeed.

Hit or Shit? For years it was one of those unlistenable tracks for me that you can’t hear anymore because it’s been so overplayed. However, it has recently become more acceptable to my ears again and is definitely a hit!

This next one comes charged with emotion for the band performing it. Less than two months before this appearance, Rob Collins, keyboard player for The Charlatans, died in a car crash aged just 33 on his way back to the studios where the band were recording their fifth album “Tellin’ Stories”. Despite the devastating loss, the band decided to carry on and completed the album with Primal Scream’s Martin Duffy drafted in to cover the keyboard parts. “One To Another” was its lead single coming out a good eight months before the album. I remarked in a recent post about how there seemed to be a trend around this time for huge time gaps between lead singles and its parent album being released quoting the examples of Paul Weller and Shed Seven. In the case of The Charlatans though, the loss of Collins more than explains the delay. The band had supported Oasis at their giant Knebworth gigs in the August and just weeks after Collins had died so maybe “One To Another” was released when it was as a tribute to their departed band mate? Perhaps there was also one eye on capitalising on the huge media profile those Oasis dates had generated?

Either way, the single was a banger, a huge, barrelling sound with groovy riffs aplenty. As Julia Carling said in her intro, it was their highest charting single ever when it crashed in at No 3. Interesting to note that there’s not much camera time given to Martin Duffy* on keyboards here. Could that have been at the request of the band who would have wanted to be respectful to Collins’s memory and not make it look like he’d just been effortlessly replaced?

*Tragically Duffy would also die young aged just 55 in 2022.

Hit or Shit? Huge tune this. Definite hit.

From the sublime to the ridiculous – it’s time for Los Del Rio again. Is it time to talk about the dance that went with the “Macarena”? I guess we have to at some point. I don’t propose to give a breakdown of the various moves – go online and find them yourselves if you want a refresher. However, what’s more interesting is the psychology behind why people would want to do it. In 2015, Oxford University published research into collective, synchronised dancing and found that the practice raised tolerance levels, fostered connectedness and friendship and broke down barriers promoting a feeling of togetherness. So there was some benefit to this ludicrous song. It’s still musical excrement though.

Hit or Shit? Definitely shit

And so to Rockets From The Crypt – a one hit wonder but one which I do actually remember. American punk rockers hailing from San Diego, their singular chart entry was “On A Rope” which would peak at No 12 in the UK charts. What stands out most in my memory about this one was that it was released as three different CD singles in cardboard slip covers. As I was working for Our Price, and, as we were not yet displaying stock live on the shop floor, you had to be really careful to get the correct disc from the filing behind the counter. Some of my more rock leaning colleagues were quite into this one but it didn’t do much for me I have to say. It was all a bit repetitive and certainly these days, aged 56, I would say it was too loud. It’s crap getting old isn’t it?

Hit or Shit? Is there a category for the non committed as I really couldn’t give a shit

It’s the last week at the top for the Spice Girls and “Wannabe”. Its success must have exceeded everything that record label Virgin could possibly have imagined for the debut release from a brand new act. It’s interesting to note that although the UK remained enamoured by them for the duration of their career (the first part of it at least) with nine of their first ten singles topping our charts, “Wannabe” was the only one to go to No 1 across the board in every territory globally.

The early copies of the single had a cover which doesn’t actually say Spice Girls on it but rather just ‘Spice’ with images of the individual members depicted within the lettering of the word. I think some of my colleagues were confused by this and actually just wrote ‘Spice’ as the artist name on the master bag for the filing system we used. It’s hard now to imagine a world where we didn’t know the name Spice Girls.

Hit or Shit? Sales phenomenon not withstanding, it was still a bit shit

The play out video is “How Bizarre” by OMC. By my reckoning, this is its fourth appearance on the show and therefore I have nothing left to say about it. Literally nothing. OK, OK…I’ll think of something. How about this? In 2002, “How Bizarre” was ranked at No 71 on the 100 Greatest One Hit Wonders show hosted by William Shatner. That’s William Shatner. Shatner. Shat-ner. The theme of this post? Oh forget it.

Hit or Shit? My wife bought this so I fell duty bound to say ‘hit’

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Space	Me And You Versus The World	No but my wife had their album
2	Clock	Oh What A Night	NO!
3	Kula Shaker	Hey Dude	No but I had a promo copy of their album
4	The Smurfs	I’ve Got A Little Puppy	Are you mad?
5	Dina Carroll	Escaping	Nah
6	Soft Cell	Tainted Love	I did not
7	The Charlatans	One To Another	No but I had it on their Best Of album Melting Pot
8	Los Del Rio	Macarena	Never
9	Rockets From The Crypt	On A Rope	Nope
10	Spice Girls	Wannabe	Negative
11	OMC	How Bizarre	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/m00241bt/top-of-the-pops-06091996?seriesId=unsliced

TOTP 30 AUG 1996

Posted on October 25, 2024 by 80stastic

Oh dear God! I thought we were past this point! This is a real kick in the nuts! A real ball ache! Simon Mayo is back as host for this TOTP. If you’ve taken even a mild interest in this blog previously then you’ll be aware of my complete aversion to the smug git. I have even been advised to seek medical help over my hatred of him. Given this, the idea of having to review an episode that will feature him heavily is anathema to me. So what do I do here? Just blank this episode out and stop the post right here? The completist in me won’t allow that. Review the show without making any further references to Mayo? Nah, if I’m doing this then he’s getting both barrels! Let’s do this!

The first thing to note is that in the time he’s been away from our screens, Mayo has grown his hair into what I’m guessing would have been a popular style of the time. It’s all long and slicked back – all that’s missing is an Alice band. It looks ridiculous and, if I’m honest, a bit dirty. His first ‘gag’ comes immediately when he makes some fatuous remark about the show lasting as long as a royal marriage referencing Charles and Diana who had completed their divorce proceedings two days before this TOTP aired. They were married for 15 years Mayo. Where’s the similarity with a 30 minute pop music programme? Idiot.

The first act on tonight is Shed Seven whose Rick Witter is also having a bad hair day. Quite what look he was trying to achieve I’m not sure – it’s a kind of cross between Edmund from Blackadder I and US stand up comedian Emo Philips. Anyway, Rick and his band mates were on a roll in 1996 clocking up five chart hits including their first and only Top 10 hit. In fact, I would go as far as to say the York indie rockers were never bigger than they were this year. They were good value for their success as well with those hits being some of the strongest of their career by my reckoning. “On Standby” was the fourth of those peaking at No 12 and was the last to be taken from second album “A Maximum High”. In the November, they would release “Chasing Rainbows” as the lead single from third album “Let It Ride” and yet said album would not appear for over 18 months. A similar thing happened with Paul Weller who released “Peacock Suit” as the lead single from his “Heavy Soul” album ten months before said album came out. What was all that about?

For his next lame attempt at humour, Mayo tries to compare the outfits worn by MN8 in this performance to those in children’s TV show Fireman Sam. In truth, I don’t think there’s any sort of valid comparison to be seen here. They’re more like angling waders than firemen’s overalls but Mayo couldn’t make a joke about Mortimer & Whitehouse Gone Fishing as that was over 20 years away from coming to our TV screens. As with all of his links, I always find myself asking the question “Why?”. He was there to do a fairly basic job of introducing acts on a pop music show. We weren’t tuning in to watch him. Why couldn’t he understand that. He treated these appearances as if they were an extension of his Radio 1 show which I guess people were choosing to tune into partly due to him at least. TOTP though was a completely different story.

As for MN8, they were finding out that having an enormous debut hit was one thing but following it up, well that was another different story. After “I’ve Got A Little Something For You” made No 2 in early ‘95, subsequent singles never quite measured up to that standard. Sure, they’d had a couple of further Top 10 hits but could you name them without checking? I couldn’t and I must have reviewed them in this blog. In an act of self knowledge, their latest attempt to scale the chart heights again was called “Tuff Act To Follow” (note obligatory urban spelling of the word ‘tough’) and was basically a rip off of Bobby Brown. Seriously, close your eyes and listen and it could almost be him. The single reached No 15 but it was only prolonging the inevitable. They would have one more minor hit before second album “Freaky” vanished without trace along with MN8. By the way, I’m not sure that the guy who can’t keep his shirt on under his oversized waders is quite achieving the sexy image he thinks he is.

For his next LOL moment, Mayo returns to his go to subject matter of football. Smug Simon was always been keen on flashing his ‘beautiful game’ credentials, banging on about his love for Spurs etc (well this was the time of ‘lads’ culture when following football was suddenly not only allowed but embraced). With this in mind, he gets a reference in to the recent world record transfer of Alan Shearer from Blackburn Rovers to Newcastle United for £15 million comparing it to the £52 million record deal just signed by REM with Warner. I’m not sure what his point was (if indeed he had one) by equating it to three and a half Shearers but he obviously thought he was on the money with that line. Prat.

Anyway, it’s time for another showing of the video for “E-Bow The Letter” as, after last week’s exclusive screening, it’s debuted at No 4 in the UK Top 40. That chart position was the band’s then highest ever as despite their huge international success (especially since the turn of the decade), they weren’t big on huge charting singles. Prior to this, their highest peak had been No 6 with “Shiny Happy People” in 1991, one of only four Top 10 hits up till then. Was it that once they’d crossed over into mainstream success that punters tended to buy their albums and only invested in singles when they were a brand new/lead track from a new one? Maybe. All I know for sure is that of the nine studio albums released since (and including) “Out Of Time”, seven of them went to No 1 in the UK.

Oh Mayo’s very pleased with himself for the next link as he introduces dance act De’Lacy as having split up from De’Cagney. See what he did there? De’Cagney and De’Lacey? Cagney and Lacey? Yes, Simon we all get it- it’s just that it’s not very funny. Nor topical. Cop show Cagney & Lacey stopped being made in 1988. Sure, it may have been repeated during daytime schedules around the early 90s but it wasn’t a current hit show. Would the pop kids of 1996 have even got the reference? If you’re going to persist with these pathetic lines, at least know your audience Mayo!

So who were this De’Lacy anyway? Well, they were the act that had a hit with “Hideaway” in the Autumn of ‘95. Curiously, it took them a year to release a follow up and when it came in the shape of “That Look”, it sounded like a weaker version of its predecessor (to my uncultured ears at least). Lots of beats and lots of screeching vocals is all I can hear but then it’s all about the remixes or so I’m told and “That Look” came with some from Hani and Deep Dish which was a big deal apparently. To prove the point, De’Lacy’s only other hit was a remix of “Hideaway” in 1998. Remixes, it’s all about the remixes.

Mayo is running out of material already and we’re not even halfway through the show yet. In his intro to “Undivided Love” by Louise, he goes on about the royal divorce again insinuating that Charles and Diana clearly couldn’t appreciate the concept of a love that couldn’t be divided. To back up his line, he name checks the Gallagher brothers as another couple that fall into that category. How hilarious Simon! Stand well back, my sides may split! There really was no beginning to this guy’s talents!

As for Louise, this was a fairly unremarkable piece of pop fluff that was a bit of a disappointment after the change of direction both sound and image wise instigated by previous release “Naked” especially for teenage schoolboys I would imagine. Still, I’m sure “Undivided Love” came with a fold out poster of Louise. Did they have laminators back then? Sorry, sorry, SORRY!

So Mayo has found himself some new material which was topical at the time but which makes no sense that I can ascertain. Introducing “Spinning The Wheel”, he says that it was released so early that George Michael is thinking of changing his name to George Michael Howard. After some research on the internet, I finally found the news story that Mayo was referring to. In this year, then Home Secretary Michael Howard ordered the release of two career criminals from prison with royal pardons after just ten months of their eighteen years prison sentences for heroin smuggling after they provided information leading to the seizure of firearms. So what has that got to do with George Michael? It can’t just be that there’s a ‘Michael’ in both their names can it? Does the title of the single have any relevance? “Spinning The Wheel”? Gambling? I can’t really see a connection. So what about it being released early? Well, it was the third single taken from the album “Older” which had already been available in the shops for over three months by this point. Nothing there then. It really does seem like he squeezed that line into his segue just because of the name ‘Michael’! I hate the way he then leaves his ‘joke’ lingering while he deadpans the camera before the song starts as if he’s giving the watching audience at home the chance to catch up with his amazing wit. Prick. Offering some karma here is the fact that those two career criminals were re-arrested in 2008 and subsequently convicted of having set up the weapons finds themselves to earn their early release thus proving that Michael Howard’s decision making was as flawed as Mayo’s ‘humour’. As for “Spinning The Wheel”, this is the third time it’s been on the show and I still can’t remember how it goes.

Mayo has a job to do in his next link which is to inform us that TOTP will be on at 7.25 rather than 7.00 from next week. This messing around (it had already been shifted from its traditional Thursday night slot to Friday) would contribute to the beginning of the end for the show as it lost its identity struggling to remain relevant in an ever changing musical landscape. Mayo even messes this up though instructing us to write the new start time on our fridges. Quite how do you write on a fridge Simon? Surely you meant put a post-it note on the fridge no?

Anyway, it’s time now for another one of those straight out of left field appearances next that TOTP executive producer Ric Blaxill was fond of just to shake things up a bit. After Bis before them come another band without a hit to their name at the time in Fluffy. Remember this lot? No, nor me. Hardly surprising as they featured more in the pages of the music press than the Top 40. A punk rock band from London, they were signed to Virgin and supported many big names on tour including Marilyn Manson, Foo Fighters and punk legends the Sex Pistols before releasing their only album “Black Eye” in mid September. Despite some decent reviews and a promotional campaign that included the release of an EP of songs recorded live at New York’s legendary CBGB club, it didn’t sell.

The album’s opening track was “Nothing”, performed here to promote its release as a single. A TOTP appearance didn’t help as it peaked at No 52. Why didn’t Fluffy convince the record buying public? Was it that they were not offering anything new? Was their sound too raw compared to the slicker production of Britpop? Who knows? What I do know is that the band’s bassist Bridgette Jones went on to become the inspiration for Helen Fielding’s novel and subsequent film Bridget Jones’s Diary. OK, I made that last bit up. Well, if Mayo can do his lame lines…

Mayo shows his age (he was already just a few weeks off 38 years old at this point – 38 and pretending he was still down with the kids!) by referencing former Radio 1 DJ Alan “Fluff” Freeman in his next link. Fluff? Fluffy? Get it pop pickers? Oh do piss off mate. The penultimate act before the No 1 is Jamiroquai who were about to release their third studio album “Travelling Without Moving” and it would be this collection of songs that really propelled the band (or more specifically Jay Kay) into global superstardom. The previous two albums “Emergency On Planet Earth” and “Return Of The Space Cowboy” had both sold well each shifting over a million units worldwide but the traditionally ‘difficult third album’ was nothing of the sort selling four times the amount of both its predecessors combined.

Although not strictly the lead single due to his collaboration earlier in ‘96 with M-Beat that was tacked onto the end of the album as an extra track, “Virtual Insanity” certainly felt like it. Not really a change in direction – some might say it was the same as all their other hits – but it was silky smooth and very radio friendly with an infectious groove (man!). It would become one of the band’s best known tracks debuting at No 3 backed by its memorable, award winning sleight of hand video. The album would spawn five hits in total including three Top Tenners thereby making Jamiroquai not only a successful albums artist but singles act as well. Clearly the title “Virtual Insanity” was a play on the phrase ‘virtual reality’ which must have been a thing even 28 years ago. Although it could be viewed as a slightly lazy construct, it’s still infinitely better than Peter Andre’s similar wordplay when he combined the words ‘insane’ and ‘mania’ to come up with “Insania”.*

*Apparently the word actually has its origins in Ancient Greek but I’m not about to let that get in the way of a convenient way to finish a paragraph!

Mayo is struggling now we’re deep into the show and segues into the No 1 by asking us to remember the new time for TOTP (labouring on the word ‘new’) before introducing the “Old Spice Girls”. Old Spice? Geddit? Yeah, it’s shit isn’t it? It was a sixth week of seven at the top for Spice Girls with “Wannabe” though and through the prism of its success, it’s hard to recall now that it was actually a very odd song. A mash up of sugary pop, rap, and at just 2:40 in length, was it almost a novelty record? The super smooth follow up “Say You’ll Be There” made it even more of an outlier. There’s just one more week of it to come at the top of the charts and that’s probably for the best.

The play out track is another single that wasn’t a Top 40 hit in the UK – that’s two on the same show after Fluffy earlier. I’m no Nostradamus myself but it would seem that Ric Blaxill wasn’t that great at spotting hit potential. Apparently Big Soul were a funk-rock band from California whose single “Hippy Hippy Shake” was nothing to do with the hit that The Swinging Blue Jeans had in 1964 but it had been reasonably successful in France. In the UK however, they quickly found that one funk-rock band from California* was all we needed and promptly disappeared never to be heard of again,

*Waves at Red Hot Chili Peppers

Mayo can’t resist one last lame attempt at humour when saying that next week’s presenter Julia Carling was the only Carling recently not to be dropped – presumably something to do with Will Carling and rugby? He signs off by saying “See you soon” but guess what? We won’t be! This was the last of 56 TOTP shows that he presented! Hallelujah! The gods of pop music blogging smile on me at last! Bye bye Mayo – you won’t be missed!

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Shed Seven	On Standby	Not this one
2	MN8	Tuff Act To Follow	Never
3	REM	E-Bow The Letter	It’s a no from me
4	De’Lacy	That Look	Negative
5	Louise	Undivided Love	Not even for a fold out poster
6	George Michael	Spinning The Wheel	Nope
7	Fluffy	Nothing	No – very few did
8	Jamiroquai	Virtual Insanity	Nah
9	Spice Girls	Wannabe	I did not
10	Big Soul	Hippy Hippy Shake	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/m00241br/top-of-the-pops-30081996?seriesId=unsliced

TOTP 23 AUG 1996

Posted on October 23, 2024 by 80stastic

According to my 1996 diary, around this time I received a reward cheque for £50. What for? Well, back in the day, if a retail worker took a customer’s credit card out of circulation at the request of the card issuer, they would send you a cheque for that amount as a thank you. The way it would work is that the customer with the overspent card would try and buy something on it and when it was put through the PDQ machine, the display would show the message ‘contacting card issuer’ and you’d have to pick up the phone that was part of the machine and talk to the customer’s bank. They’d ask a couple of questions about the transaction and possibly ask to speak to them in person as well. The chances were that ultimately you would get asked to retain the card and cut it up in front of them before sending it back to the bank. The experience was both exciting (at the thought of the £50 reward) and unnerving (as to how the customer would react) at the same time. Mostly they would be sheepish and let you do what you had to do but not always. One in particular I remember went ballistic whilst talking to the bank shouting at the top of his voice “Don’t you know who I am?! I’m a knight of the f*****g realm!”. I don’t know what the person on the other end of the line said but it must have been withering as the customer gave me the phone back, said sorry and sloped off. Anyway, eventually the company I was working for (Our Price) changed their policy so that the reward cheques didn’t go to the individual but the shop (supposedly into a fund for a Xmas do or some such) but this reward must have predated that as it came directly to me. So, in honour of that and in view of the recent furore over concert ticket prices, I thought I’d play a game of £50 quid or gig with the artists on this episode of TOTP. Would I rather have pocketed the money or paid to see the artist live?*

*For the purposes of the game, I’m assuming gig prices from 1996 not nowadays.

We start with an easy one – there is no way on earth I would have preferred to see Ant & Dec doing their thing (whatever it was) live over 50 quid in my pocket. Did they even do proper gigs on an official tour? They might have supported Take That back in the day or maybe that was just a plot line in an episode of Derry Girls? This was their first single to be released under the moniker we all now know (i.e. their real names) as opposed to that of the fictional characters from Byker Grove PJ & Duncan. Quite why they persisted with calling themselves that long after they had ceased to appear in the show I’m not sure. It seems a like an oversight. The track itself – “Better Watch Out” – is an absolute stinker! Some cobblers about Ant (who gets to sing the verses) being beaten up by the brothers of a girl he’s trying it on with. The lyrics suggest he might be deserving of said punishment as he then pursues the girl’s sister before indicating he might set his sights on their mother. What a cad! It’s a nasty sentiment matched by a terrible song – I can imagine it being used to soundtrack some chase scene in 70s children’s show Here Come The Double Deckers!

£50 or gig? Cash every time

Ah, now this one is tricky because I have actually seen the artist live previously. Don’t take the piss! I know we’re talking about Bryan Adams here but this was years ago, years before this TOTP performance even. Back in 1987, whilst a student at Sunderland Poly, myself and a friend who was also a housemate, took ourselves off to the big smoke of Newcastle and caught Bryan live at the City Hall where he was supported by T’Pau (I mean it! Stop sniggering!). It was a top gig, it really was! He was promoting his “Into The Fire” album that had failed to shift many units in the UK but which I’d liked anyway. This was years before that Robin Hood song and his slow decline into a world of ever more dreary ballads and he rocked the joint. Fast forward nine years and guess what? He’s just released a dreary ballad! “Let’s Make A Night To Remember” was the second single from his “18 Til I Die” album and was a massive disappointment after its lead single, the fun-filled “The Only Thing That Looks Good On Me Is You” which I had enjoyed. It’s so one paced and trudges along with Bry singing some lines that sound like he’d pinched them directly from the Ladybird Book of Hackneyed Lyrics. In short it was a duffer though somehow got him all the way to No 10 in our charts.

£50 or gig? If the gig was that one from 1987, I’d definitely go back in time to relive it. A 2024 concert? I’ll take the Benjamins thanks.

Another difficult one as I have seen Pet Shop Boys live and not that long ago; as recently as May 2022 in fact. It was a COVID delayed concert that should have taken place in 2020 and it was bloody marvellous! A date on the Dreamworld – The Greatest Hits Live tour, it did exactly what it said on the tin meaning that yes, they did play this track “Se a vida é (That’s The Way Life Is)”. The setlist.fm website tells me it was the ninth song of the night as part of a mini medley with “Single Bilingual”.

The second single released from the “Bilingual” album, it’s a joyously upbeat track which was well received by the music press and given a lot of radio support – it’s Summer release date (presumably planned to exploit its seasonal sound) certainly aided its playlist potential. The promo video being shot at a water theme park in Florida almost certainly had one eye on that Summer vibe as well though I can’t help thinking it would have been better if it was in colour and the single itself should possibly have been released earlier in the season.

Linguistically, the title isn’t quite correct. The English translation from the Portuguese of “Se a vida é” is “If life is…” and not “That’s the way life is…” which would be “A vida é assim”. Ah, you say tom-ay-to, I say tom-a-to. The single peaked at No 8 (it perhaps should have been higher) – they would never have a higher placing single throughout the 90s up until this day.

£50 or gig? I’m going gig every time on this one. It’s a sin not to.

This one’s going to be an easy decision as well. After the breakthrough of their first UK hit single earlier in 1996 with “Get Down (You’re The One For Me)”, the Backstreet Boys staked their claim as the next big teen sensation with follow up “We’ve Got It Goin’ On” which would debut at No 3. What a load of old toss this was. Recycling that horrible ‘ner ner ner na ner ner ner ner ner’ hook used previously by the likes of Montell Jordan and MN8 (and which Peter Andre would also adopt in a TOTP repeat coming very soon), this also made no sense grammatically. “We’ve got it goin’ on for years” the band sing but surely that should be “we’ve had it goin’ on for years”. Even if they’d got the grammar spot on it still wouldn’t have made sense as their first release came in 1995 so one year before this. That’s ‘year’ – singular. Maybe they were projecting into the future and meant “We’ll have it goin’ on for years” which would have been statistically accurate as, sadly, they continued to have hits for the rest of the 90s and into the new millennium. Clearly temporal clauses were not what they had going on.

This lot really were just New Kids On The Block revisited. An all male American group with five members making music for the female teenage market. They even had the same type of characters in the band. There’s the cute, young looking one, the taller, older one with facial hair, the street wise one etc etc. In the case of the last type, Backstreet Boy Brian Littrell literally looks like his NKOTB counterpart Donnie Wahlberg. He’s also responsible for some horrible wailing when he goes all Mariah Carey early on in the song where he over annunciates the word “go” as “go-ooh-aoow”. Deeply unnecessary and unpleasant. Horribly, we’ll be seeing lots more of these berks in future repeats.

£50 or gig? Show me the money!

After Bryan Adams earlier, we now have another dreary ballad although this one is also nonsensical. I criticised the lyrics to “Why?” by 3T and Michael Jackson the other week as being hopeless for lines like this:

Why does Monday come before Tuesday? Why do Summers start in June?

“Why Lyrics.” Lyrics.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 23 Oct. 2024.

A reader of the blog got in touch to point out that not only were the song words abysmal but also inaccurate as only half the planet has its summers start in June – the Southern Hemisphere has its summers start in December. Thank you to Essor for pointing that out.

Watching the video for this one (another one all in black and white just like the Pet Shop Boys earlier – it must have been a thing back then), I noticed that the guy from 3T with his rucksack has bought it back for the promo and he walks along a corridor with it dangling by his side. What was the point of this accessory? Did he gave a product placement deal with a rucksack manufacturer in place? Or was it just his trademark gimmick like Shades and his sunglasses in the film That Thing You Do! ?

£50 or gig? Despite a Michael Jackson concert being quite the event, I’d still take the cash especially if the support were 3T.

This is the third time in the show for OMC and “How Bizarre” and they’ll manage another brief appearance as the play out song before they’re done. It’s not surprising given how long the record spent on our charts (fourteen weeks on the Top 40 of which six were inside the Top 10). This week it was at its peak of No 5 but would spend a further three consecutive weeks holding at No 8.

As host Beerjte Van Beers says, OMC stood for Otara Millionaires Club however if you google OMC the top result is not the “How Bizarre” hitmakers but a fishing tackle and outdoor products manufacturer called One More Cast. They have a range called Terminal Tackle which includes such items as ‘Tweakers Touch Me Up’, ‘Revibed Blood Worm Tippers’ and ‘Vitabitz Ring Swivels Size 11’ which all sound like double entendres to my uneducated angling brain. As for seeing them live, surely it would descend into the sketch from The Big Train below:

£50 or gig? Cash please!

My interest in REM had started to wane by the mid 90s to the point that I had very little anticipation for the new single from their tenth studio album “New Adventures In Hi-Fi” called “E-Bow The Letter” (with Patti Smith no less on backing vocals). In fact, it just about passed me by but then that was possibly a lot of people’s experience as their first new song for a couple of years was not radio friendly. In fact, it was almost anti-playlist. That doesn’t make it a poor song though of course but by the band’s own admission, it wasn’t an obvious nor easy choice of lead single which their record company struggled with just as they had with “Drive” being the first track released from “Automatic For The People”. In fact, “E-Bow The Letter” actually sounds quite similar to “Drive” so there’s sonic as well as thematic similarities. On first listen, it does seem to be a bit all over the place and, whisper it, miserable. However, there’s beauty in misery and the overall effect is…well…quite affecting. The ‘E-Bow’ of the title is a device to induce sustained vibration in an electric guitar string whilst the ‘letter’ refers to a communication never sent by Stipe to his friend River Phoenix who had died of a drug overdose at the Viper Club in Los Angeles three years earlier whilst the band inside played a song called “Michael Stipe”. The track would become the band’s then highest charting single when it debuted at No 4 and its parent album would get to No 1 but a decline in sales for the band was clearly happening as the latter sold significantly less than either “Monster” or “Automatic For The People”.

£50 or gig? Now supposedly I passed up the chance to see REM live in 1988 on their tour in support of the “Green” album. What my enthralling other option was I could not tell you but I regret it, especially now the band have broken up so I’m going ‘gig’ on this one.

Next a song that was the first ever to achieve over one million airplays in America and yet it hardly ever seems to get played in this country… or so I thought until I heard it all the time on Magic Radio* recently. Donna Lewis is a classic one hit wonder – almost. A huge, enormous hit then nothing ever again. “I Love You Always Forever” would spend nine weeks (!) at No 2 in America behind Los Del Rio’s “Macarena” and go to No 5 here in the UK as part of a five week stay inside the Top 10.

*Yes, I know – Magic Radio – but in this scary world I sometimes need to hear something soothing.

That US success led me to believe that Donna was American but she’s actually Welsh, hailing from Cardiff with the success of her hit bringing her a BRIT award nomination in 1997 for Best British Female Artist. More success seemed inevitable but her album, though selling a million copies in the US, performed averagely everywhere else including over here where it peaked at No 52. She would have one more UK chart entry (denying her that classic one hit wonder status) with follow up single “Without Love” spending a week at No 39. She did perform a duet with Richard Marx for the 20th Century Fox animated film Anastasia in 1997 that was a hit on the Adult Contemporary Billboard chart but that really was it for chart success although Donna still records to this day with her latest album having been released this year.

So what was it about “I Love You Always Forever” that struck a chord with audiences and gold for Donna? Well, it strikes me that it has a timeless quality – it could have been a hit in the 80s as easily as it was in the 90s and Donna’s girlish voice (often compared to Cyndi Lauper) suited the almost nursery rhyme chant of the chorus perfectly. Ultimately though, it was a light, joyful song that almost seemed to bring hope to a world that so often seemed dark. One reviewer described listening to it as “catharsis” and that, presumably, is why I suddenly started hearing it on Magic radio in 2024.

£50 or gig? It’s the same scenario as the OMC gig. Sorry Donna, it’s got to be the money.

It’s a fifth week at the top for the Spice Girls and “Wannabe” so it’s probably time to talk about some of the lyrics of their debut single. First off is the elephant in the room – what the hell was “zigazig ah” all about?! Well, Marie Claire magazine reckoned they had the answer in a 2023 article:

One of Wannabe’s co-writers revealed that it was inspired by a saying on set: ‘Shit and cigars.’ Apparently, the Spice Girls shared a recording studio in Shoreditch with a famous musician and decided to give said celebrity this nickname. Why? Well the anonymous co-writer told The Sun: “There was this one eighties pop dude who hated us for encroaching on what he considered ‘his turf’ which was boy bands and girl bands. This guy had this nasty habit of taking a dump in the shared khazi while smoking a cigar, so we took to referring to him as ‘Shit and Cigars’.”

By Jamie Troy-Pride, published 20 April 2023 in News

Wonder who Mr Shit and Cigars was then? Cigars conjures up images of someone whom I don’t want to reference so let’s move on to the bit in the song where the group all get a name check. Marie Claire has the inside story on that too:

‘We’ve got Em in the place’ is likely a reference to Emma/Baby Spice who, apparently, ‘likes it in your face’. Pretty self explanatory. Then ‘we got G like MC’ (Geri and Mel C) who ‘like it on an e’ – this one really caught us off guard. Who knew that we’ve been unknowingly singing that for over twenty years? ‘Easy V’ actually gets it very easy because she doesn’t come for free – ‘she’s a real lady’, so congrats Posh. And Mel B’s is steeped in mystery as we’ll just have to see what she’s all about.

By Jamie Troy-Pride, published 1 August 2023 in Features

Not sure I needed to know that but it’s too late now. A final word about the people that the girls get up on stage with them for this TOTP performance. Do you think that was planned or spontaneous? The woman on the end in the hot pants next to Mel B looked like a bit of a ‘wannabe’ to me.

£50 or gig? Say you’ll be there? Sorry but I’ll be at home counting my 50 notes.

The play out track is “You’ll Be Mine (Party Time)” by Gloria Estefan. I don’t remember this one and have very little to say about it as a consequence so I’m going to rely on a tale I’ve told before about a friend from Poly who once asked if Emilio was Gloria’s brother having conflated the name Estevez with Estefan. In my friend’s defence, Gloria’s husband is called Emilio.

£50 or gig? Miami Sound Machine or Fifty Pound PDQ Machine? I’ll take the latter thanks.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Ant & Dec	Better Watch Out	I did and I swerved when I saw you coming – NO!
2	Bryan Adams	Let’s Make A Night To Remember	Nah
3	Pet Shop Boys	Se a vida é (That’s The Way Life Is)	No but I had it on their Pop Art compilation
4	Backstreet Boys	We’ve Got It Goin’ On	Never
5	3T / Michael Jackson	Why?	As if
6	OMC	How Bizarre	No but my wife did
7	REM	E-Bow The Letter	Negative
8	Donna Lewis	I Love You Always Forever	Nope
9	Spice Girls	Wannabe	I did not
10	Gloria Estefan	You’ll Be Mine (Party Time)	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/m0023sy0/top-of-the-pops-23081996?seriesId=unsliced

TOTP 16 AUG 1996

Posted on October 18, 2024 by 80stastic

After a couple of weeks of ‘golden mic’ guest presenters, we’re back with the Radio 1 DJ crowd and this week it’s the turn of Steve Lamacq and Jo Whiley. As I write this, I note that tomorrow is Lamacq’s 60th birthday. Imagine that! One of the biggest names in indie music and natural successor to John Peel 60 years old! Is it such a big deal? I mean Peel was 65 when he died and still broadcasting right till the end. My own next birthday milestone will be 60 (though I have a few years to go yet) so am I supposed to just forget about music once I get to it and leave it to the youth?

Talking of which, the opening artist tonight maybe should have considered leaving it up to the kids back in 1996 when she was 50 years old if this was the best she could come up with. The 90s had been a mixed bag for Cher – two No 1 singles (albeit one was a charity record) sat alongside minor hits and complete flops. By 1996, she had resorted to releasing cover versions with three of the four singles taken from her album “It’s A Man’s World” being so. The last was “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore”, the old Frankie Valli song made famous by The Walker Brothers. Now on one hand, I can just about understand the song choice here. Scott Walker had a very deep, resounding voice and Cher also has that low register tone so it does suit her vocally. On the other hand, why would you want any other version of the track than The Walker Brothers? OK you might want to investigate the Frankie Valli original if you’d never heard it but did you really need to listen to Cher have a crack at it, let alone buy her single?

Watching her performance here, there’s some technical jiggery pokery going on as Cher manages to harmonise with herself as the song reaches its climax – she even has her face inset over the top of the regular camera angle as she does so. Wouldn’t that have had to be recorded before hand? If so, does that speak of Cher being ever so slightly diva-ish about her appearance? Although her version of “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore” would peak at a paltry No 26, within two years, she would have worked out what the kids (or at least the record buying public) wanted when she came up with the best selling single for 1998 in the UK with “Believe”.

Next up is “How Bizarre” by OMC. In an uncannily prescient move, Steve Lamacq foretells what the song will become known for by the TikTok generation in his intro with a stylised pronunciation of its title. Yes, a quarter of a century after it was a hit, “How Bizarre” was claimed by TikTok users as an audio meme to soundtrack all their interminably unfunny shorts on the world’s most pointless platform. I really don’t get TikTok. My teenage son shows me stuff on it and my reaction is inevitably this…

You can probably tell that I’m out of my comfort zone talking about stuff like this but then I am 56. I bet Steve Lamacq doesn’t get TikTok either. Don’t let me down Lammo!

Is the “Macarena” an audio meme? Probably. Back in 1996, it was just a dance craze and a song that you could buy. Ina shop. They were simpler times. We get the video for Los Del Rio’s hit this time which despite being basic is still memorable. It’s just ten women dancing set against a completely white background whilst the two old fellas sing into suspended old style microphones in a completely different shot but it kind of works. The promo showcases the “Macarena” dance led by choreographer and lead dancer here Mia Frye who’s also had a minor film career with small roles in movies by the likes of Luc Besson and Brian De Palma. If that video was remade today, I can’t believe all that white space in the backdrop wouldn’t be green screened with all sorts happening behind the promo’s protagonists. Like I said before, they were simpler times.

Have the music press ever turned on a band quicker than in the case of Kula Shaker? Seemingly an overnight success (they weren’t but most bands aren’t are they?), they swooped to No 1 in the charts with their debut album “K” which would go double platinum in the UK. Add to that three big hit singles in 1996 (including this one “Hey Dude”) and they were set to conquer the world with their fusion of traditional rock and Eastern mysticism. But then something happened. The tide turned. They lost the support of the music press. The reason? Well, the main cause seems to be that they were middle class white boys one of whom came from an acting family dynasty and was called Crispian! The horror! Who did they think they were with their songs informed by an idiots guide to Eastern culture?! That was wholly the reserve of The Beatles and you’re certainly not them! One of their songs was even sung wholly in Sanskrit!

However, not only did the band suffer a class backlash but they suffered from a case of inertia. 1997 saw them release just one single – a cover of Deep Purple’s “Hush”. Momentum was being lost. 1998 brought another false start – “Sound Of Drums” was the only song they released in that calendar year. The lead single from second album “Peasants, Pigs & Astronauts”, we had to wait another twelve months for the actual album to appear. By the time it did arrive in record shops, the band found themselves engulfed by another crisis as Mills had to repel accusations of Nazism following ill judged comments he’d made in Melody Maker and the NME praising the imagery of the swastika. Explaining that it had its origins in Indian culture, he accepted that he it was now irreversibly linked with Nazism and apologised for his naivety. The controversy affected the release of “Peasants, Pigs & Astronauts” with it selling only reasonably as opposed to exceptionally – six times less than its predecessor and only just scraped into the Top 10. Shaken, the band split in 1999 only to reform in 2004 since when they have released five further albums not that most people probably noticed. Like another 90s band Jesus Jones who experienced a similar trajectory, they are still active to this day with their most recent album “Natural Magick” having been released in February of this year.

As for me, I quite liked them. I had a free CD sampler of the album that the Our Price I was working in had been sent to plug in store and it sounded pretty good to me. I particularly liked the track “Start All Over”. Also, were they the instigators of the brief fascination with the letter ‘K’ a few years back. Their band name starts with a ‘K’, their debut album was called “K”, their Best Of was called “Kollected”…oh no that was Wayne Rooney wasn’t it? Well, he did call his kids Kai, Klay and Kit.

Excellent! First OMC and now OMD on the same show! How did Steve Lamacq not use this in his intro? It’s an open goal! How bizarre! Anyway, this marvellous event nearly didn’t happen as “Walking On The Milky Way” was the final UK Top 40 hit for OMD meaning this is the last time we’ll see them in these TOTP repeats. It’s a great tune to bow out with – a classic pop melody allied to an anthemic chorus. Apparently Andy McCluskey put his heart and soul into writing it only to find that Radio 1 wouldn’t playlist it due to their perception that it did not meet their target audience’s tastes and that Woolworths subsequently wouldn’t stock it. The single’s failure to get higher than No 17 would lead to McCluskey retiring the OMD name leaving him free to go and write songs for Atomic Kitten. Hmm. After a ten year hiatus, he would reunite with Paul Humphreys to reactivate OMD and they have since released a further four albums though rumour has it that they might be about to call it a day for good soon. If true, they leave behind one hell of a legacy.

It’s a third massive hit on the spin for George Michael as “Spinning The Wheel” will enter the chart and peak at No 2 when released the Monday after this TOTP aired. Sadly for George, those pesky Spice Girls would prevent him from scoring a hat trick of No 1s though after the the first two tracks taken from his third album “Older” (“Jesus To A Child” and “Fastlove”) both topped the charts. Although I could appreciate the appeal of those two singles, “Spinning The Wheel” left me rather cold. Telling the tale of a promiscuous partner at the height of AIDS, it’s seems to be neither ballad nor dance track nor pop song. I understand the CD single included some dance remixes that boosted its popularity with clubbers but the radio edit is (whisper it) a bit dull. One reviewer’s take was that the track:

“…achieves a light jazz feel (on the song) that also makes for good background music”

Gardner, Elysa (25 May 1996). “Music Reviews: “Older””. Lakeland Ledger.

I’m not sure that’s the endorsement the reviewer intended. The words ‘jazz’ and ‘background music’ would send shudders down the spine of many including myself. George would release three further singles from “Older” that would peak at either No 2 or No 3 giving the album six singles with the following chart positions:

1 – 1 – 2 – 3 – 2 – 2

Are there any other albums that can compete with those stats?

This post started with a theme about the passage of time and growing old and looking at the running order for this particular TOTP, there was a definite tendency towards the more mature artist. Look at the ages of these performers at the time the show aired:

Cher – 50
Los Del Rio – 56 and 58
Andy McCluskey (OMD) – 37
George Michael – 33

Add to that list the next artist Paul Weller who was 38 when he did this performance of “Peacock Suit” in the TOTP studio. Where were all the young, hip bands? What? Kula Shaker? Ok, apart from them. I’ve already reviewed this once fairly recently when Weller was on that brief doubleheader feature that saw an artist perform two songs at the end of the show after the No 1 record. As such, I haven’t anything else to say about it so if you want to read what I wrote first time around, here’s the link:

TOTP 14 JUN 1996

After all the talk of oldies, we suddenly get two young girl groups one after the other beginning with Eternal. Three years prior, this lot must have thought they would be the UK’s next big all female act and they were…sort of. However, after ditching Louise (or vice versa depending on which version of the story you believe), they went off in a more pronounced R&B direction and the door was left open for a bunch of wannabes (ahem) to come charging through it to be the new pop darlings and subverting the boy band norm in the process.

Despite being outgunned by the Spice Girls in terms of sales and size of hits, that’s not to say Eternal didn’t continue to have success and then some. They were still a year away from their only No 1 single whilst “Someday” would peak at No 4. I’m not sure about the white, reflective jackets they’re wearing here – they’re almost giving me snow blindness. I din’t think I would have preferred the video either though. The guy who plays a jester looks like Mr Claypole from Rentaghost. Spooky!

So here they are again with a fourth week at No 1. Yes, the Spice Girls were immovable with their debut single “Wannabe”. We are all familiar with the individual nicknames given to the five members but have you ever wondered why they were called the Spice Girls at all? A quick google suggests a number of possibilities from its AI overview summary including:

An allusion to nursery rhymes specifically What are little girls made of? – sugar and spice and all things nice etc
Association with far off places – far East and India where spices originate
Variety is the spice of life – the Spice Girls were individuals as well as a group
Metaphorical reading – names suggest a fiery, uncontrolled Girl Power nature

Yeah, not sure any of that holds water with me, about as much as those individual nicknames which apparently only came about when a lazy journalist coined them as he couldn’t remember their actual names. So, in a parallel universe, they could have been Speedy Spice, Sloaney Spice, Spooky Spice, Sprog Spice and Carrot Top Spice.

The play out video is a bit out of left field for TOTP – “Ratamahatta” by Sepultura. Obviously, the “hardcore metal meisters” (© Steve Lamacq) weren’t my cup of tea at all. However, in the dark recesses of my mind there lingers a faded (and possibly totally inaccurate) memory that the Brazilian band’s fan club used to hold their annual convention in a hotel in Manchester which struck me as a bit odd. I clearly didn’t appreciate the international reach of the band but in my defence, they only ever had two UK hit singles neither getting higher than No 19. In Finland, which is home to loads of rock bands like Lordi and Hanoi Rocks, they had a No 2 hit so wouldn’t that have been a better country to host such an event?

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Cher	The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore	As if
2	OMC	How Bizarre	No but my wife did
3	Los Del Rio	Macarena	Never
4	Kula Shaker	Hey Dude	No but I had that album sampler
5	OMD	Walking On The Milky Way	No but I had it on a Best Of compilation
6	George Michael	Spinning The Wheel	I did not
7	Paul Weller	Peacock Suit	Nope
8	Eternal	Someday	Nah
9	Spice Girls	Wannabe	No
10	Sepultura	Ratamahatta	Of course not

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/m0023sxy/top-of-the-pops-16081996?seriesId=unsliced