Right, that’s Christmas and New Year celebrations well and truly over with for another year and a return to normality beckons. However, that isn’t on the cards for these BBC4 TOTP repeats. As far as I can tell, we won’t be returning to these 1995 shows until late January at the earliest as the 60th anniversary commemorations of the show via a series of retro programmes focusing on performances from the 60s, 70s and 80s continue. So, after being behind with my reviews for weeks, I now have ample opportunity to catch up. Hurray!

Tonight’s episode is hosted by Craig McLachlan, probably still best known at this time as Henry from Neighbours though he had carved out a brief career for himself as a pop star at the turn of the decade with his No 2 UK hit “Mona”. Quite why he was perceived to be a big enough name to host TOTP in July 1995 though is a question that’s not immediately obvious to answer to me. He’d left Ramsey Street long ago and his last chart hit in this country – a version of “You’re The One That I Want” with Debbie Gibson as part of the cast of Grease – had been two years prior. However, he had just finished starring in the BBC crime drama series Bugs so that could be the reason behind his appearance here. I never watched that show so maybe that’s why I didn’t quite understand the height of his profile. Whatever the reason for his ‘golden mic’ slot, he turns in a pretty lacklustre performance. Giving a pretence of what you perceive to be cool and actually being cool are two very different things though why he thought he could pull off an all-in-one leather singlet outfit with shades accessories, only he will know. Maybe he was trying on a future look for size as there’s something a bit Frank-N-Furter about it, a role that McLachlan would play more than once in productions of The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Looking remarkably ordinary in comparison (thank goodness) are opening act The Boo Radleys who have clocked up a third consecutive Top 40 hit. After the ubiquitous airplay hit that was “Wake Up Boo!” at the start of the year, the band had followed it up with what I believed was an infinitely better tune in “Find The Answer Within” but once again I was in the lower percentile of the record buying public when it peaked at No 37. Undeterred, a third single from the “Wake Up!” album was released and “It’s Lulu” would fall between two stools, peaking a whole 12 places higher than its immediate predecessor but nowhere near the Top 10 position of the (almost) title track.

As much as I liked it, I believed there were better tracks on the album (which I’d bought) and had hoped “Twinside” or the beautiful ballad “Wilder” would have been chosen as the third and final single from it. Sadly it was not to be and the perfectly decent but rather obvious “It’s Lulu” was given the shout (ahem). I’m guessing it wasn’t actually about the diminutive Scottish singer as the lyrics seem to tell the story of a teenage girl who feels the angst of her age group admitting that she can’t buy any clothes that fit, gets her facts from Smash Hits and is only understood by the posters on her walls. OK, they’re a bit clunky but they beat the pants off Lulu shouting endlessly about not very much.

Now it’s never occurred to me before but is there something in the verses to “It’s Lulu” that’s reminiscent of a certain cult classic advert from the early 80s?…

OK, this was just getting silly now; silly and confusing. “Stuck On U” was the sixth consecutive Top 40 hit for those cheeky scamps PJ & Duncan including one inside the Top 10 and four registering respectable chart peaks of either No 15 or No 12. Quite how they were mining these hits from a very narrow vein of pop/rap material…well…I can only assume that the people buying their records were actually buying into their likeable personalities as the music was formulaic at best. But was it their personalities or their characters because – and this was where the confusion came in – the lines between the real duo (as in Ant & Dec) and their Byker Grove constructs were really blurred around this time. You see despite still continuing to release records as PJ & Duncan (a trend that would carry on until 1996), they were doing a side hustle as TV presenters (having left Byker Grove well behind them) under their own names. Indeed, just three months before this TOTP aired, the first episode of their own show entitled The Ant & Dec Show (!) was broadcast on CBBC. Identity crisis at all?

To add to the confusion, “Stuck On U” was the lead track from their second album “Top Katz” (an awful, dreadful title) which Wikipedia informs me only made it to No 46 in the charts despite containing four hit singles and yet it went gold selling 100,000 copies. No 46 but it sold 100,000 copies? That can’t be right can it? This is a case of advanced orders from record shops masquerading as actual customers sales isn’t it?

Next, what would be called a collaboration these days but back in 1995 it was probably…what? A duet? Maybe not. Anyway, whatever it was, it featured…oh that was probably it wasn’t it? One of the artists featuring the other.

*checks cover of single*

Yes! Officially, it was Method Man featuring Mary J. Blige. Method Man was one of those rap artists that definitely required a temporary insert in place of the actual CD sleeve when on display in any of the Our Price stores I worked in along with Notorious B.I.G., Wu-Tang Clan, 2 Pac, NWA etc. This single “I’ll BeThere For You / You’re All I Need To Get By”, released on the legendary Def Jam label, was supposedly one of the first examples of the ‘Thug-Love’ genre which I wasn’t aware of at the time but which I understand now to be the combination of a rapper doing the verses and an R&B soul singer doing the chorus (I think). Said chorus plunders heavily the melody from Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell’s hit 1968 hit “You’re All I Need To Get By” which is the only bit which appeals to me I have to say. The track did appeal in its entirety to a lot of people though going to No 3 in the US and Top 10 in the UK. Was it from a film as that might have had an influence on its success?

*checks Wikipedia*

It doesn’t seem so but it was the biggest hit for either artist at the time. Mary J. Blige is one of those names which I know and who have been extraordinarily successful even earning the moniker of the ‘Queen of R&B’ but whom I’m not sure I could name even three of her songs. The same without doubt applies to Method Man. That clearly says more about my musical tastes than either’s profile.

We’re only three songs in and already Craig McLachlan is becoming insufferable in his role as host. In his link to the next act he says “Yo! Top of the Poppers!” Oh dear. I tried out that greeting affectation once when I was a student at Sunderland Poly. My wife (then girlfriend) was with me at the time and nearly dumped me on the spot. I’ve never used it since. McLachlan then goes on to say that people are always asking him what his favourite type of music is. There’s a couple of things about both this revelation and his answer that don’t ring true to me. Firstly, that anyone would be that interested in his musical preferences in the first place and secondly that he would reply with The Lightning Seeds. Yes, I know it was just a lame line, a construct to segue between artists but couldn’t the scriptwriters have done better here?

Anyway, this was the point where Lightning Seeds really got into gear as a chart hit making machine with “Perfect” being their third Top 40 single of 1995, all of them from their “Jollification” album which would achieve platinum sales by the end of the year. Unlike its high speed predecessors “Change” and “Marvellous”, “Perfect” was a much slower, reflective tune, some may even say melancholy. In fact, listening back to it now, it strikes me that perhaps this was actually Ian Broudie’s attempt at writing his own version of Lou Reed’s “Perfect Day”. Now I’m not suggesting that his song is on a par with the classic track from the iconic “Transformer” album – of course not – but it does have a feel of it, possibly.

As for the performance here, the TOTP producers obviously felt that, despite ex-Icicle Works drummer Chris Sharrock doing his best Keith Moon impression, Ian Broudie sat at a keyboard wasn’t the most interesting spectacle. As such, they came up with a special effect that saw his head, detached and blown up in size dangling over the stage like some pop music version of the Wizard Of Oz (before we got to see the real Oz behind the curtain).

A rerelease of “Lucky You” would see Lightning Seeds clock up four hit singles in 1995 before returning in 1996 with the enduring football anthem “Three Lions” the following year and there was nothing cowardly about that song.

Craig McLachlan does some awful Guinness referencing intro for the next act who are, of course, Irish boyband Boyzone. Unlike the Lightning Seeds who followed up two uptempo hits with a slower song, the pretenders to Take That’s crown did the reverse, releasing a pop tune that bounces along after two consecutive ballads. I made the point previously that the group’s second hit “Key To My Life” was surely a forgotten Boyzone hit. Well, if that one is forgotten then “So Good” must be consigned to oblivion. It’s basically just a chorus with some other bits thrown in as an afterthought. Now, I can’t help noticing the dancing on display here (because the music is hardly captivating is it?) and it occurred to me that though there is definite progress from this…

…most of their moves involve wiggling a leg around Riverdance style and generally just jumping on the spot. Yes, at least they do it in time and their matching outfits lend the whole thing a sense of synchronicity but it’s not that slick is it? Still, maybe it was better that they weren’t super tight. I always admired Bananarama for their amateurish dance steps (earlier in their career at least) and couldn’t stand the synchronised swimming precision of some of the boy bands that emerged later in the decade.

After two hits that they’d had a hand in writing themselves, Boyzone would return with a cover in Cat Stevens’ “Father And Son” that would give them another enormous festive hit just as their version of “Love Me For A Reason” by The Osmonds had done the previous Christmas.

Now I could have sworn that I didn’t know this song by REM but having watched the video for “Tongue”, it does ring a fair few bells and so it should as it has a very distinctive sound. The fifth and final single from the “Monster” album, Michael Stipe sings the whole song in falsetto and it seems to my ears that there’s very little instrumentation to the track save for the sustaining sound of a dominant organ. It’s quite striking so how it seems to have escaped my accessible memory banks is bemusing.

Something else that seemed to have slipped my mind (if I ever knew it in the first place) was the song’s subject matter. Michael Stipe is on record as saying that it is about cunnilingus. Off the top of my head, I can only think of “Turning Japanese” by The Vapours as a pop song that is inspired by a particular sexual act though I’m sure there will be more. I wonder if host Craig McLachlan knew the story behind the song. It would certainly have made his intro take on a complete different tone. Replace every mention of Rapid Eye Movement here with the word ‘cunnilingus’ and see what difference it makes:

“Let me talk to you about Rapid Eye Movement . Do you know what that is? Rapid Eye Movement – have you experienced it? You’re about to…R…E..M!”.

It’s time for another appearance by Seal as his single “Kiss From A Rose” is up to No 5. Somewhat surprisingly, despite his profile, Seal would only have another two UK Top 40 hits under his own name. In fact, his chart success fell away pretty spectacularly. Despite his first two albums going to No 1, his third, 1998’s “Human Being”, only made it to No 44 selling 10x less than its predecessor. He did have more of a return to form with “Seal IV” making No 4 appropriately in 2003 but he has not had another Top 10 album since. We won’t see him in the UK singles chart again for nearly 18 months when another song from a film – his cover of Steve Miller Band’s “Fly Like An Eagle” from Space Jam returned him to the Top 20.

It’s the album chart slot now which means a chance for Supergrass to plug their debut album “I Should Coco” which has risen to the top of the charts off the back of the success of their No 2 single “Alright”. To celebrate the achievement, the band are live by satellite from Vancouver performing “Caught By The Fuzz” which was their first ever single which failed to make the Top 40 on its release in the autumn of 1994.

Wikipedia tells me that a mugshot of Hugh Grant – who had been caught by the fuzz (and indeed his short and curlys) receiving oral sex from prostitute Divine Brown on Sunset Boulevard exactly a month before this TOTP aired – was intended to be the artwork for the sleeve of the US release of the single. However, Grant’s lawyers complained and the idea was dropped. Not completely it would seem though as bassist Mick Quinn is wearing a T-shirt in this performance with that infamous Grant mugshot emblazoned all over it. I wonder if Hugh’s lawyers were watching?

As for the song itself, I’m slightly surprised that it never got a rerelease off the back of the band’s subsequent success. Maybe they thought they’d plundered the album enough by this point and wanted to avoid over exposure seeing as “Alright” had been all over radio and TV. Good tune though.

Oh dear. Inevitably, Craig McLachlan has got a guitar out and is singing the next intro (and I thought Mike Read was bad back in the day). Quite who the two blokes with him are or why they are dressed as Arabs I’m not sure. Could the disguised duo be any of the artists that were in the studio that day? Well, having inspected the footage, it’s clearly not PJ & Duncan / Ant & Dec nor any of Boyzone – could it be any of the Lightning Seeds or The Boo Radleys? I’d like to think they wouldn’t have lowered themselves.

Anyway, said intro is for Julian Cope who is enjoying his first UK Top 40 hit since the rather lovely “Beautiful Love” from 1991. “Try Try Try” was the lead single from his twelfth solo studio album “20 Mothers” – wait, his twelfth was in 1995?! So how many has he done in total?

*checks his discography*

My God! He’s up to 36 now! Like him or loath him (and I very much like him), you have to admire the prolific frequency of his output. Listening back to “Try Try Try” now, I’m struck by how conventional a sound it is which is at odds with his outlandish appearance (he does look like a knacker in that druid hat). It sort of reminds me of The Who in places, something about the melody perhaps? I’d sort of lost track of Julian by this point having kind of drawn a line under him when buying his 1992 compilation “Floored Genius” though I’m sure I went to an exhibition he curated at the Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester around this time.

There’s an episode of Rock Family Trees about the post-punk scene in Liverpool in the early 70s where Pete Wylie talks about Cope having been in the short lived but near legendary Crucial Three with him alongside Ian McCulloch. His relationship with Julian has been antagonistic over the years and he describes him as being this rather unwanted, weirdo type figure tutting “Here comes Julian” whenever Cope arrived. My wife and I still use this phrase today usually when our cat is pissing us off referring to him as Julian even though his name is Peter Pan.

The Outhere Brothers are still at No 1 with “Boom Boom Boom”. Fear not though as their four week reign at the top will be ended in the next show by *SPOILER ALERT* Take That who also ended the run of their other chart topper “Don’t Stop (Wiggle Wiggle)”. This, in some way, almost makes up for the fact that they couldn’t depose Mr. Blobby as the Christmas No 1 in 1993. Almost.

The play out video is “Violet” by Hole. Apparently the lyrics relate to Courtney Love’s past relationship with Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan and it got me thinking about how many other songs are about relationships that have gone bad. Off the top of my head there’s “A Good Heart” by Feargal Sharkey which was written by Maria McKee about the end of her relationship with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers keyboardist Benmont Tench. Then there’s the follow up single “You Little Thief” which is written by Tench and is supposedly his response to McKee’s song. Perhaps the most famous example though is Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain”. For years there was speculation about who the song was about but Carly has finally admitted that it was about ex-lover Warren Beatty – well, the second verse at least if not the whole song. There must be many more out there though surely?

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/m001tdmj/top-of-the-pops-27071995