So here it is…no, not Merry Christmas – though we are nearly there in these 1999 repeats – but my final review of a TOTP show. Yes, after nine and a half years of writing this blog, I’ve finally arrived at my last episode. Not my last post mind – I’ll still have a couple more to write tying up a few ends about 1999 specifically and the 90s in general but for actual TOTP shows, this is it as I don’t review the Christmas Day shows. However, any thoughts of going out with a bang were immediately removed when I checked the running order. It’s pretty wretched including leathery old Tom Jones with a Christmas song, some anonymous dance act, a well known dance act but it’s the Vengaboys and an awful No 1. So much for going out on a high!

Mercifully, those songs don’t feature much in my own memories of Christmas 1999 which was a positive but the down side was that it was because I was far too busy at work to have noticed most of them. The ultimate irony is, of course, that my work, at the time, was being the Assistant Manager of the Our Price store in Altrincham so I was literally surrounded by those same records. It’s not the best endorsement of their impact nor longevity. That particular Christmas was my 10th working for the chain and aged 31, they were becoming harder and harder to get through. OK, 31 doesn’t sound that old (especially to me now aged 58) but maybe it was for working in a record shop?

What was true was that I’d found the first Christmas I’d ever worked for the chain back in 1990 a bit of a buzz, exciting even. Subsequent festive trading periods would see stores being asked to navigate them on a smaller payroll budget year after year but expected to beat last year’s takings. On top of that, we were working more hours as both Sunday trading had come in as well as being open on Boxing Day. As such, I think I didn’t have a day off for nearly 10 days at one point in 1999. Certainly, in the frenzy of the final few days and up to New Year’s Eve, the only time I wasn’t at work was Christmas Day itself. I don’t mind admitting that I was nearly in tears when I woke up one morning and realised I had to go into work yet again. I’m not sure I had another one in me and so it proved as it would be my final ever retail Christmas. Within three months, I was gone not just from Our Price but from Manchester too. Both had been ‘home’ for the last decade. The times they really were a-changin’.

You’re not here for my personal life memories though – well, not exclusively – so let’s get to the music and we start with the aforementioned Tom Jones who is joined for a duet by Catatonia’s Cerys Matthews on the first even vaguely Christmas themed song we’ve heard in these 1999 TOTP repeats. And ‘vaguely’ is the word as “Baby It’s Cold Outside” doesn’t actually mention the Yuletide season in its lyrics at all. Ah, those lyrics. OK, before we get into those, a bit of context. This was a track from Tom’s “Reload” album which saw the Welsh powerhouse collaborate with 17 different artists to record (mostly) cover versions, an idea which paid off big time when the album went to No 1 and four times platinum. “Baby It’s Cold Outside” was the second single taken from it after Jones had collaborated with The Cardigans on a version of “Burning Down The House” by Talking Heads.

So, back to those lyrics. The song was written in 1944 by Frank Loesser who was a Broadway musical composer and has been recorded by many a huge star including Doris Day and Bob Hope, Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Jordan and Dinah Shore and Buddy Clark. The song’s two protagonists are a host and a guest with the former trying to convince the latter to stay for a romantic evening as the temperature outside falls. However, since 2009, its lyrics have come under scrutiny for allegedly implying coercive behaviour and sexual harassment on behalf of the host towards the guest. The line “What’s in this drink?” even led to accusations of date rape. Loesser’s daughter Susan has dismissed such allegations and suggested that the dark undertones being attributed to the song are a result of TV shows Saturday Night Live and South Park depicting it being performed by disgraced comedian and actor Bill Cosby who has served time for a sexual assault conviction. Despite this defence, the song has, in the past, been removed from radio playlists and streaming services.

No such concerns are apparent in this performance by Tom and Cerys though as the studio audience cheer their interaction enthusiastically throughout. Rather than anything sexual, there was some intertextuality in the pairing of Tim and Cerys with the latter having already duetted with Space on 1998 No 4 hit “The Ballad Of Tom Jones”. I’m not quite sure why Tom has been given the stage prop of a throne here as that seems to play into the scenario of masculine power being asserted over the female guest whilst Cerys’ dress with one sleeve being attached to the hem doesn’t seem very practical at all.

Has any UK pop group risen so high and then fallen so quickly as B*Witched? Kajagoogoo? Maybe but then they had just a solitary No 1 to their name not four. In just 18 months, Edele, Keavy, Lindsay and Sinéad had gone from that record breaking run of their first four singles debuting at the pinnacle of the charts and a Top 3, double platinum selling album to also rans. The writing had been on the wall when previous single “Jesse Hold On” had spent just one week at No 4 before sliding down the charts and that track, remember, had been the lead taster of their second album “Awake And Breathe”. To highlight their drop off in popularity, their eponymous debut album had spent nearly eight months inside the Top 40. It’s follow up clocked in at barely three.

Clearly something had to be done and that something was to release a ballad for Christmas. Perfect for the festive sales period and a shot in the arm for its parent album. To make the song – “I Shall Be There” – stand out in the Christmas rush, they roped in African male voice choir Ladysmith Black Mambazo to beef up the sound. After all, hadn’t Boyzone* had African chants on their No 1 single “A Different Beat” in 1996. If it worked for them…

*And who was the elder brother of Edele and Keavy Lynch? Yes? Boyzone’s Shane. Hmm.

Sadly for B*Witched, lightning would not strike twice. “I Shall Be There” struggled to a peak of No 13, a far cry from consecutive No 1s and an undeniable truth that their time as A-list pop stars was nearly at an end. A third single from the album would appear in 2000 and would do even worse signalling the initial break up of the group (though they would subsequently reform in 2012). So why didn’t “I Shall Be There” return B*Witched to former glories? Personally, I don’t think it’s that strong a song and the whole Lion King vibe had already been done to death. Also, judging by this performance, Ladysmith Black Mambazo don’t seem to add much sonically, being more involved in some curious, high kick dance moves than anything else. The girls themselves don’t seem to have their hearts in it either – especially Keavy, Lindsay and Sinéad who don’t have much to do apart from essentially act as Edele’s backing singers/dancers. Maybe they’d grown tired of just being there.

A classic summer time hit next which somehow only managed to find its way into the UK’s chart a week before Christmas! I’m not sure what the reason for that is and I can’t be bothered to research it but the truth was that we were late to the party with “Steal My Sunshine” by Len which had entered the American Billboard Hot 100 in the August of 1999. This Canadian group was mainly a vehicle for brother and sister duo of Marc and Sharon Constanzo who finally had that one big hit after eight years in existence. Though not a one hit wonder statistically, surely that’s what they are in the minds of most onlookers. In that regard, they’re up there with the likes of Barenaked Ladies (also Canadian), Sugar Ray, OMC and Smash Mouth. Listing those bands, it strikes me that their paucity of hits isn’t the only thing that connects them – is there an argument that musically they aren’t a million miles away from each other? I mean, I’m sure if you did a forensic investigation that generalisation not might not hold up to scrutiny but then, hey…it’s a generalisation and it isn’t supposed to withstand detailed exploration! Maybe it’s just me drawing musical ley lines between them – sometimes the synapses fire and connections are made that you just can’t shake.

Anyway, none of this psychobabble really matters. The facts are that Len took the Andrea True Connection sampling “Steal My Sunshine” to No 8 over here with its combination of pop, hip-hop, disco and rap proving as irresistible to UK audiences as it had to our American counterparts. Supposedly, Marc Constanzo had wanted to write something akin to “Don’t You Want Me” by the Human League and you can just about hear that reflected in their biggest hit. Just about. Following it up proved the harder task though and Len never really did in any meaningful way. However, after a six year hiatus in the 2000s, they reconvened and last released an album in 2012.

Around this time, I was working with a guy called Scott who, like most people in record shops (except me), had tried to get a band off the ground at one point or another. His was called Fairclough after the old Coronation Street character. I’m guessing that was because Len had already been taken then.

Oh come on! What is this nonsense? A horrible trance track based around the intro to Madonna’s “Papa Don’t Preach” with some decidedly dodgy staging involving dancing nurses?! Well, this was Progress Presents The Boy Wunda and their hit “Everybody” and as I’m on a countdown to my final few words of reviewing artists on TOTP, I’m going to allow myself to keep this one brief. This was some nasty shit topped off by a performance that stank the studio out. I’m assuming Boy Wunda is the guy is the straight jacket whilst the nurses are there as a continuation of the mental heath facility based official video and due to the fact that “Everybody” actually contains some lines of dialogue from One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest. It looked like crap, it sounded like crap and it was crap. Progress Presents The Boy Wunda? More like an abscess that makes you chunder.

Oh brilliant! It’s the Vengaboys! That’s how you turn the quality control up! Dear Lord! What a final review show running order this is turning out to be. The only saving grace here is that “Kiss (When The Sun Don’t Shine)” didn’t go to No 1 like their previous two singles had despite sticking to the same bubble gum pop/dance formula of those hits. Watching this bank from a distance of 27 years, it seems totally implausible that such a sound and group image could have been so successful. Why did so many people (literally) buy into it? Was it something to do with the impending millennium and expectations of parties to end all parties? Was that passing of time milestone somehow messing with the nation’s collective mind, casting a spell or incantation over the UK record buying public that had them believing that the Vengaboys were the answer to everything including the Y2K bug? Yes, it sounds like the theory of a madman but then how do you explain Trump?

OK, let’s get back to reality and deal with the facts and one which I would like to clarify is, after Len earlier, when was the last time there were two hits on the same show that had a reference to sunshine in their titles? Answers on a postcard please for the chance to win nothing at all.

I feel like I’m losing the plot here which is not the way I wanted to go out with these TOTP reviews but just like that old football adage that you can only play the opposition in front of you, I can only comment on the acts in front of my eyes and in my ears. Sadly for me and both of my sensory organs, the next act is Artful Dodger Featuring Craig David and their garage hit “Re-Rewind (The Crowd Say Bo Selecta)”. It’s holding at No 2, fighting off the challenge of all the other chart entries that we’ve seen earlier in the show though it can’t quite eclipse the record at the top.

It’s hard to talk about this hit without mentioning Leigh Francis and his Bo‘ Selecta! TV show. I commented in the last post that Craig David’s own view of it has not always been consistent with claims that it ruined his career and was racist to admissions that he had made peace with Francis and, of course, he did actually appear on the show in person as tribute act Craig Davis.

Whatever the real truth, what we do know is that Channel 4, in agreement with the comedian and writer, took the show down from its All 4 streaming platform in 2020 following complaints of its frequent use of blackface. I have to say that, at the time, I did find it funny especially the Michael Jackson character but on reflection, it would be hard to make claims that it was any different to the offensive sketches seen in the likes of Little Britain and Fantasy Football League. In my defence, the Jacko take off was so grotesque that he almost became a non-person and that somehow made the Bo’ Selecta! characterisation more acceptable. It couldn’t be wrong to laugh at someone who wasn’t even real could it? I feel like I’m tying myself up in knots here so I should probably perform an act of escapology by saying I abhor racism in all its forms and leave it at that.

I have arrived at my final review destination and I could hardly have picked a worse place to alight. For the third consecutive week, Cliff Richard is No 1 with “The Millennium Prayer” and Lord only knows how we got here. In fact, looking at the final four songs I’ve had to review, I’m not sure I could have picked a worse quartet in my deepest nightmares. I’m literally out of words to say anymore about this one but before I go, there’s a little bit of admin to take care of. You see, Cliff wasn’t actually the Christmas No 1. No, that honour went to Westlife and their double A-side single “Seasons In The Sun / I Have A Dream” which was officially announced as the festive chart topper two days after this TOTP aired having timed the release of their Christmas offering to perfection. The next show was the Christmas jamboree on the 25th when they performed “I Have A Dream” alongside some of the year’s other big hits. The first TOTP of 2000 would see them perform “Seasons In The Sun”. Thankfully I won’t be reviewing either of them. And there we have it. I’m done…well, nearly. There will be a ‘TOTP 1999: the epilogue’ post and also one for the whole of the decade but then that will finally be it. The end is very near now…

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/m002xks0/top-of-the-pops-17121999