Menswear

TOTP 21 MAR 1996

Posted on by 80stastic

In the last post I mentioned that Ricky Gervais had been the music advisor on the BBC2 show This Life and that much of its soundtrack featured artists that could have been categorised as Britpop. Well, it looks like Ricky could have been advising on the tunes for this TOTP with nearly half of the acts of that genre. Also very much riding that zeitgeist are tonight’s hosts, the then achingly right on Steve Lamacq and Jo Whiley.

We start with one of those Britpop acts Shed Seven who are at the top of their arc popularity wise with their biggest ever hit “Going For Gold”. To mark the occasion, lead singer Rick Witter has channeled his inner Martin Fry from ABC and turned up in a gold lamé outfit (see what he did there?). A few weeks later, as part of the BBC’s Euro 96 coverage, the band would find two of their songs (this one and “Getting Better”) being used to soundtrack trailers for England games. Just as “Going For Gold” was reaching a much wider audience than ever before due to its adoption by BBC Sport, conversely Going For Gold their daytime quiz show hosted by Henry Kelly came to the end of its nine year run just days after the end of the football tournament.

We stick with Britpop as Oasis get another outing despite the fact that “Don’t Look Back In Anger” is no longer at No 1. As with Technohead the other week however, staying in the same position for two weeks as you descend the charts is seen as reason enough to bag a spot on the show. As such, in spite of falling from No 1 to No 2 to No 3 in consecutive weeks, staying at No 3 sees Noel, Liam, Bonehead et al back on our screens. I like the way that Jo Whiley refers to them as “Our friends in the North” thereby giving a nod to the fact that this song was used in the closing scene of the BBCs drama series of the same name that had aired a couple of weeks previously. I seem to be warming to Jo a bit retrospectively having not had too high an opinion of her in the past. This would be the last time we saw Oasis on TOTP for nigh on 18 months when they returned with the “D’You Know What I Mean?” single.

Apart from “Lucky Star” in April 1984, Madonna had an unbroken run of Top 10 hits in the UK stretching all the way until December 1994 and then she had three in 15 months or three out of her last six single releases if you prefer. Starting with “Take A Bow” which only made it to No 16, there then followed “Oh Father” that matched it and finally there was “One More Chance” that peaked at No 11. Another track from her “Something To Remember” ballads collection, this was actually one of three new songs recorded for the project. It’s all very stripped back with only three instruments used on it – acoustic guitar, cello and keyboard. The composite effect is Madge does “More Than Words” by Extreme.

As she was filming for the Evita film when the single was released, there wasn’t time for Madonna to promote the song nor even to shoot a video so we just get a promo of clips from her previous videos slung together, hence Jo Whitley’s comment “A brief history of Madonna, hairdo by hairdo”. I find the whole thing a tad underwhelming if I’m honest. Now, if she’d covered this instead, then I would have taken a lot more notice…

There were perhaps none more Britpop than Menswear and like Shed Seven earlier, this was the peak of their success. After three medium sized hits the previous year, “Being Brave” would give the band their only Top 10 hit. It took a big ballad to do it, dripping with strings and a big ‘bah, ba ba, bah’ chorus but they manage to pull it off. I remember thinking at the time that they were somehow selling themselves and their fans short by releasing a ballad as if they were playing along with the record industry game and not sticking to their principles but on reflection, why shouldn’t they record such a song? They’re the artist, the creative ones, not me – I was just selling their wares working in a record shop.

Johnny Dean looks like he’s been inspired by Bowie’s ‘Thin White Duke’ era image here but, as with the song he’s singing, it all just about works. Menswear would only have one more hit single later in 1996 before they embarked on the disastrous country rock – tinged second album “Hay Tiempo!” which only got released in Japan at the time though it is available on Spotify now. They split in 1998 with a brief relaunch in 2013 but with only Dean as the original member of the new line up. He would subsequently disown that period of the band and having started a new group, it seems that Menswear are officially closed until further notice though a career spanning four CD box set – “The Menswear Collection” – was released in 2020.

There now follows a pair of very middle of the road ballads performed by two very mainstream artists. For all his success both as part of The Commodores and as a solo artist, Lionel Richie hadn’t released a studio album for a whole ten years by 1996. The only material made available under his name in the intervening years had been his incredibly successful Best Of album called “Back To Front” in 1992 and accompanying hit single “My Destiny” but other than that, nowt. In fairness to Lionel, he’d spent much of that time dealing with a highly publicised divorce plus the loss of his father and a close friend. By 1996, he was ready to resume his career and joined forces with those go to soul / R&B producers Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis. The result was the album “Louder Than Words” and its lead single “Don’t Wanna Lose You”. However, Lionel did lose me (if he ever had me in the first place) as this was a sluggish, ambling, slow walk to extinction song whose only possible hope of redemption was that it had a whiff of “No Woman No Cry” about parts of its melody. The album sold moderately at best (ten times less the amount than “Dancing On The Ceiling” did in the UK) prompting his next release to be yet another Best Of in the form of “Truly: The Love Songs” in an attempt to reverse Lionel’s commercial fortunes which it did until his subsequent studio album in 1998 which absolutely bombed. I guess people are just stuck on you(r) old songs Lionel.

The second of those two ballads is “Falling Into You” from Celine Dion. In his intro, Steve Lamacq refers to her as “the skinniest woman in the world”, a comment I don’t think he would get away with today. It was probably ill-advised back then given the rumours of eating disorders that had followed Celine around most of her life. In any case, Steve Lamacq was hardly on the portly side or a picture of glowing health himself back then was he? In 2022, Celine revealed that she had been diagnosed with stiff-person syndrome, a neurological condition affecting her muscles. An Amazon Prime documentary chronicling her illness has just been released.

Were Garbage Britpop? On the one hand you’d have to say absolutely not given that 75% of their line up were American. On the other, their lead singer and focal point of the band was Scottish. Whether they were or not, what is sure is that they were the third band on the show tonight experiencing their biggest ever hit after Shed Seven and Menswear. “Stupid Girl” was the third single to be released from their eponymous debut album and would peak at No 4. It’s also surely their best known song. Built around a drum loop from “Train In Vain” by The Clash, it’s an hypnotic four minute tale of wasted potential with Shirley Manson’s strident, powerful vocal frogmarching rather than leading us through it.

Given that their previous two Top 40 hits had peaked at Nos 29 and 13, “Stupid Girl” going straight in at No 4 must have been a shock to both band and record label especially as the album had been out for a good six months by this point. It would set something of a standard with four of their next five singles going Top 10. Shirley looks great here with her pink dress reviving images of their debut TOTP appearance and that pink feather boa wrapped around her mike stand. So, returning to that original question, to be or not to be Britpop? I don’t know but great pop? Definitely. No maybe about it.

Boxing and pop music are not natural bedfellows. Sure, there’s “Eye Of The Tiger” by Survivor from Rocky III which will be forever synonymous with the fight game and that song “In Zaire” by Johnny Wakelin which was about ‘The Rumble In The Jungle’ match up between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman but generally I would argue, no good can come of them sparring with each other. I’m not talking about the walk on music that boxers enter the ring to as they’re proper tracks that have been co-opted for a different use. Nor do I mean the various boxing playlists to be found on streaming platforms for the same reason. No, I’m talking about when the two worlds properly collide like here…Kaliphz featuring Prince Naseem and “Walk Like A Champion”. This was a hip-hop outfit from Rochdale teaming up with the holder of the WBO Featherweight title, the flamboyant (some may say arrogant) Prince Naseem Hamed. Presumably both thought that they could benefit from such a symbiotic relationship – Kaliphz bagging themselves a bona fide chart hit and furthering their career and Prince Naseem…well…making a few quid I suppose.

The resulting track is, of course, appalling. Naseem was so high on confidence by this point that he even believes a vocal contribution from himself was not just valid but valuable. It wasn’t. Who bought this rubbish? I’m guessing there must have been some hard selling into record shops by the promotion team behind it to get it to No 23. Kaliphz did gain some traction from its success though. At the prompting of DJ and FFRR Records label owner Pete Tong, a move to Jive Records brought a pairing with Pete Waterman. Under his guidance and a name change to Kaleef, they secured a second chart hit when their version of “Golden Brown” by The Stranglers peaked at No 22 later in 1996. Prince Naseem would continue boxing for a further six years winning 36 of his 37 professional bouts.

Prince Naseem wasn’t the first boxer to release a record though. Discounting Billy Joel who was a boxer before moving onto making music, Nigel Benn aka ‘The Dark Destroyer’ released “Stand And Fight” in 1990 with an outfit called The Pack. It wasn’t a hit but I would wager it was a better record than the Kaliphz/Prince Naseem effort. I could be biased though as I have my own personal memory of this track. Back then, I’d just started as a Christmas temp at the Our Price store in Market Street, Manchester. Just a few weeks into my time there, we had a personal appearance from Nigel Benn himself to promote the record. He signed a load of publicity shots (I got one for my brother who was a fan) and we played his song continuously on the shop stereo not that it sold much. There was a photo of him with the shop staff (including a 22 year old me) that appeared in the WH Smith staff magazine which I kept for years but I’ve no idea where it is now.

Of course, there is one example of boxing snd pop music dovetailing beautifully and it comes courtesy of Everything But The Girl whose song…erm…”Boxing And Pop Music” from their 1991 album “Worldwide” is rather beautiful.

It’s a third and final week at the top for Take That with “How Deep Is Your Love”. As this blog will come to an end with the 1999 TOTP repeats, it’s also the last time I’ll be reviewing them. So farewell Gary, Mark, Jason, Howard and Robbie. I couldn’t stand you when you first appeared on the scene even before you were having hits. Working in Manchester at that time, everyone knew about the group’s failed attempts at stardom to the point that when Gary Barlow came into the Our Price store I was working in, a colleague followed him round mouthing “Nobody buys your records” behind his back. How we all laughed. Then, when the joke was on us as they started notching up the hits, I really detested them, dismissing them as manufactured teeny weeny idols only getting success by resorting to 70s cover versions. When “A Million Love Songs” came out, I begrudgingly admitted it wasn’t the worst thing I’d ever heard and had to acknowledge that Barlow had written it himself at least. Following that, their Barry Manilow cover of “Could It Be Magic” was actually pretty good – what was happening? Having got into their stride, the flood of No 1s arrived. Most of them I could do without to be honest though they at least tried for a more mature round on “Sure”. Then came their finest moment for me with “Back For Good” – a truly great pop song with follow up “Never Forget” also…well…memorable. Their reunion ten years later brought more well crafted pop songs and they deservedly reaped success a second time around. I even saw them live at the Old Trafford cricket ground with my sister, standing in for a friend who’d let her down and it was a very enjoyable show. Even losing another member in Jason Orange hasn’t killed them off. Fair play to them I say.

One last thing, we never got to see the frankly bizarre video for “How Deep Is Your Love” on these TOTP repeats so a quick word about it. We may have thought that we’d get a commemorative promo for their ‘last’ single, maybe a montage of their hits or a farewell-themed plot reassuring their broken hearted fans that everything would be OK in the end. How wrong we were.

What we actually got was a tale of kidnapping, the implication of torture and ultimately murder. The band play their parts well as the kidnapped performing the song under duress (especially Barlow) but the video is stolen by the blonde kidnapper played by Paula Hamilton. With disturbing heavy Whatever Happened To Baby Jane eye make up, she makes for a convincing deranged, obsessed fan. Paula has had her own demons in her real personal life. You can read up about her yourself if you want but besides the Take That promo, she is also best known for this memorable advert from 1987:

Order of appearanceArtistTitleDid I buy it?
1Shed SevenGoing For GoldThought I might have but singles box says no
2OasisDon’t Look Back In AngerYES!
3MadonnaOne More ChanceNah
4MenswearBeing BraveNope
5Lionel RichieDon’t Wanna Lose YouAs if
6Celine DionFalling Into YouNever
7GarbageStupid GirlCould have but didn’t
8Kaliphz featuring Prince Naseem Walk Like A ChampionHell no!
9Take ThatHow Deep Is Your LoveNo but my wife had their Greatest Hits CD

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/m001zyvh/top-of-the-pops-21031996?seriesId=unsliced

TOTP 28 SEP 1995

Posted on by 80stastic

The last couple of shows have been very poor quality-wise for me – too many anonymous or fly-by-night dance acts and, in the case of one particular standards drop (on many levels) a loathsome novelty record. Well, tonight’s episode sees a definite upturn in the calibre of tunes but…there’s also a tendency for very established acts and mainly those of a rock persuasion. Bon Jovi, Def Leppard and Meatloaf are all on the show tonight as are Wet Wet Wet and Simply Red. Was this what the kids wanted from the UK’s most watched music programme? Or did they want to see and hear more from the Britpop scene that was dominating the musical landscape? Well, it would seem that the TOTP producers were aware of the need to strike a balance. The show had always been structured around the Top 40 singles chart so that needed to be reflected and so, in the case of Simply Red for example, they were always going to be featured as this week’s No 1 record. However, there are also what could be considered Britpop artists on tonight so you can’t say that the genre wasn’t represented.

In a further effort to promote TOTP as being on trend, the chosen presenters this week are Steve Lamacq and Jo Whiley. The pair presented The Evening Session on Radio 1 together from 1993 to 1997 with its emphasis on indie and non mainstream music. Indeed, Lamacq seemed to me like the natural successor in waiting to John Peel whilst Whiley…hmm…well, I never really warmed to Jo Whiley. I didn’t think she had much credibility somehow. She seemed to me like she’d just found herself in the right place at the right time and got to where she was rather fortuitously. That’s probably completely unfair of me and I find myself on very dangerous ground by highlighting my misgivings about the female member of the presenting duo but I can assure you I have no such agenda. I just didn’t buy into Jo’s “I love all of this music” persona. In later years, she moved to Radio 2 and seemed as comfortable introducing the likes of Billy Joel as Billy Joe Armstrong (of Green Day fame). I’ve never found her convincing when she’s hosted at the Glastonbury Festival either. However, her work highlighting the struggles of her sister Frances, who has learning difficulties and diabetes, during the COVID pandemic and the need for her and anybody of a similar status to be a priority to be vaccinated led to the shaping of government policy. I had to reassess my opinion on Jo and I find myself being much more disposed to her these days.

Anyway, we start with one of those Britpoppers in Cast. I quite liked this lot, having seen John Power’s original band The La’s live twice, I guess I was always going to. I dutifully bought their debut single “Finetime” and I’m surprised I didn’t buy the follow up “Alright” which was just as good. Jangly, 60s influenced pop with a 90s twist – yep, sign me up. Although it only reached No 13 in the charts, it was enough of a hit to maintain the band’s momentum and ushered in a run of six successive Top 10 singles. As with Supergrass before them, clearly being a Britpop band and having a hit called “Alright” was a more than ‘alright’ strategy for continuing success.

I love the energy and style of drummer Keith O’Neill in this performance which I don’t think we’d seen the like of in the TOTP studio since Talk Talk’s Lee Harriss powered his way through “Life’s What You Make It” a decade earlier. One final thing, I’m pretty sure the lads in Cast didn’t pronounce their band name as ‘Carst’ Jo Whiley!

A marked strand of the whole Britpop movement was the concept of a band that was fronted by a distinctive female singer. I’m thinking Sleeper, Elastica and Echobelly. Add to that list Garbage. The TOTP caption said that the singer was from Edinburgh with the rest of the band from Madison, US. Whilst that is factually correct, to me it illustrated a laziness on the part of the researchers. That singer was Shirley Manson who had started her musical career as backing vocalist and keyboard player in the marvellous but mostly ignored Scottish rockers Goodbye Mr Mackenzie. The band’s label decided that Shirley had star quality and wanted to launch her as a solo artist. A side project under the name of Angelfish fronted by Manson was put into action and one of their videos came to the attention of the three members of Garbage (one of whom was Butch Vig who had produced Nirvana’s iconic “Nevermind” album). An invitation was sent by Garbage to audition for their band and despite initial reactions not being especially positive, Shirley got the gig. Debut single “Vow” received airplay from the aforementioned John Peel and tonight’s co-host Steve Lamacq (which explains why he introduced them as “the excellent Garbage”). The limited release of “Vow” meant that it wasn’t a big commercial hit but by the time of third single “Only Happy When It Rains”, the momentum of and buzz about the band was enough to propel it into the UK Top 40.

Whilst I liked and appreciated those other indie bands that had women lead singers, Garbage’s sound was much more rock and somehow bigger than their contemporaries to me. I guess that was always going to be the case bearing in mind that Nirvana connection. This track was a great example of the band’s style which would bring them huge success and a long career. Their debut eponymous album would sell 4 million copies worldwide and go double platinum here in the UK propelled by subsequent hit singles “Queer”, “Stupid Girl” and “Milk”. The pink, feather boa adorned Mike stand in this performance is presumably a nod to the album’s cover artwork. The band are still going strong with their most recent album released in 2021 whilst they also announced their first tour for five years with dates confirmed for later this year.

The most interesting thing about this next song by Wet Wet Wet is what Jo Whiley points out in her intro – that its video shows us that Marti Pellow has had his hair radically recut. Gone are the luscious long locks that he’s been sporting since about 1992 and that were certainly still in place for previous single “Don’t Want To Forgive Me Now”, replaced by a much shorter (some might say sensible) style. And once you’ve taken that on board, you can effectively switch off watching the rest of the video as the song is soporific. “Somewhere Somehow” sounds to me like a slowed down version of their 1988 hit “Temptation” with a country tinge added to it. Pellow adds a “Love Is All Around” -esque ‘Hey!’ shout into it during the middle eight to try and liven it up but nothing could shake awake this snore fest. Not sure what the woman wandering around with Angel wings attached to her was all about but it probably wasn’t the best idea for her to be walking near a cliff edge – what if a gust of wind had got under those wings!

Was this a new section on the show? The ‘Acoustic Exclusive’ slot or had it just been made up for The Pretenders? After the success of their last studio album “Last Of The Independents” which had given the band their first UK Top 10 single for eight years in “Stand By You”, their record company Warners clearly wanted to keep the band’s profile raised. Rather than waiting for the next studio album to be delivered (which wouldn’t be for another five years), a live, televised performance showcasing the band in acoustic mode formed their next release. Recorded at the Jacob Street Studios in London and accompanied by the Duke Quartet, “The Isle Of View” album was clearly based on the MTV Unplugged concept which was popular in the 90s and featured artists such as Eric Clapton and Nirvana. Its title was a pun on the words ‘I Love You’, a practice no doubt inspired by the film This Is Spinal Tap. You know that bit where the band claim they once played a jazz/blues festival on the Isle Of Lucy? No such place existed and it was a play on words of the title of the US 1950s sitcom I Love Lucy starring Lucille Ball. Apparently, fans of the film didn’t initially pick up on the joke and I didn’t pick up on the reference when my mate Robin bought me a T-shirt with ‘Isle Of Lucy’ emblazoned on it and I love that film! Bah!

Chrissie Hynde performs “Kid” for this TOTP which would end up being released as a single retitled as “Kid ‘95 live” though it would only make No 73 in the charts. The acoustic version is a revelation which lays bare how amazing Chrissie’s voice is (as if it needed pointing out any further). The verse almost sounds like “Unchained Melody” done in this way. Not sure what her red evening gloves were all about though.

It wasn’t the first time that “Kid” had been performed in a stripped back style though. Check out this from Everything But The Girl from 1985…

The pursuit of ever more unusual locations for Bon Jovi to perform on TOTP continues. After Niagara Falls for “Always” and an American Football stadium for “Someday I’ll Be Saturday Night”, we get a runway at an airport in Dallas for “Something For The Pain”. I’m not sure I’m buying Jo Whiley’s explanation as to how this came about – they were just about to get on a plane when the phone call came in from TOTP – as this looks very staged to me – they’ve even got TOTP logos handy for display.

However, watching this back, it wasn’t the location that struck me as odd as much as the very un -Bon Jovi looking bass player they had performing with them. Who the heck was that guy?! Well, I think his name is Hugh McDonald and he was the replacement for Alec John Such who left the band in 1994 after not taking too kindly to his bass playing being criticised by Jon Bon Jovi supposedly. McDonald would tour and record with the band for 21 years before finally being made an official member in 2016. That’s quite the probationary period! Such sadly died in 2022 from a heart attack aged 70. As for the song, it was a pretty standard Jovi composition – a jaunty, little rock number that they probably could have knocked out waiting for that plane to take off.

Is this another new slot? An ‘exclusive performance’? Not just an ‘exclusive’ and certainly not a ‘satellite performance’ but an ‘exclusive performance’. What gives? Well, it appears to be something created bespoke for the next artist who are TLC. According to Jo Whiley, the TOTP family had been waiting for a long time to get the trio on the show (was this their first time in the studio then?) and fortunately they must have been in the country. Unfortunately, they didn’t have a hit single that was rising in the charts to justify an appearance according to TOTP law, so the show producers shoehorned them in anyway, I’m guessing. To give TLC something to perform, a “Hits Medley” was dreamed up comprising “Creep” / “Waterfalls” / “Diggin’ On You” the last of which hadn’t actually been released and wouldn’t be until October. This makes me wonder why they didn’t just perform the final track as an ‘exclusive’ preview of said single? Why the need for a medley? It all seems a bit odd. Nothing wrong with the tracks or performance of course, just that the thinking behind them didn’t seem in alignment with the show’s traditional concept of reflecting what was popular in the UK singles charts. I guess though that the show had changed over the years (and we’d seen plenty in the 90s what with the ‘year zero’ reset and the replacement of Stanley Appel with Ric Blaxill as the show’s executive producer). Maybe this was just another one.

In the whole cannon of Britpop bands, there was perhaps none more Britpop than Menswear. For those who denigrated the movement, they were such an easy target. “They’re not a real band are they?” or “They’re a music press construct” or ultimately “Who do they think they are?”. I get all that and yet I still liked them and this single – “Stardust” – is a banger!

In some ways, they were like the Britpop equivalent of Spandau Ballet. A band who emerged out of a short lived, uniquely British music movement and who were the pin up boys and face of said movement. Gary Kemp is on record as saying that the New Romantics needed a group to rally around that were theirs rather than clinging to Bowie and Roxy Music and Spandau were in the right place at the right time. Menswear kind of performed a similar role – where Spandau were talked about because of their cultish wardrobe in their early days (all kilts, highland sashes and deer stalker hats) so Menswear took inspiration from their name and went for an image influenced by the classic mod look. Melody Maker ran a cover story that labelled them as “the best-dressed new band in Britain”. Indeed, check out Jo Whiley’s sartorial comments in her intro.

Then there’s the bidding war parallels. Spandau became hugely sought after by record labels after a highly publicised early gig aboard the cruiser HMS Belfast. Fifteen years later, Menswear played their debut gig at a club called Smashing on Regent Street which kick started a ruck amongst labels desperate to sign the next big thing. They eventually signed with London Records on an unheard of contract offering the band 18.5% gross revenues. They then signed a publishing deal worth £500,000 despite only having a repertoire of seven songs at the time. However, where the two bands diverge is that Spandau managed to adapt and outgrow the New Romantic scene once it had run out of steam to become bona fide, mainstream pop stars whereas Menswear couldn’t escape the Britpop tag after that movement petered out and they imploded with band infighting and a second album that was only released in Japan. They literally just came to a full stop.

Back in 1995 though, they were where it was at for all the groovy, young Britpoppers. I wasn’t particularly young at the time (I was 27) and had never been groovy but I could still appreciate “Stardust” for the tune it was. It fair gallops along driven by Matt Everett’s on point drumming with Johnny Dean’s affected vocals being punctuated by lots of “ba, ba baaas’ backing vocals. Yes, the piano outro could be accused of plagiarism from “Gimme Shelter” by the Rolling Stones but I didn’t care. The aforementioned Dean trod a thin line between swagger and being a dick in this performance with his dramatic, angular posing but I think he just gets away with it. Even The Who-like set destroying nonsense at the end didn’t put me off nor Dean’s silly styling out of having to omit the word ‘fucker’ from the lyrics – at least it gave Jo Whiley a nice line in her intro describing them as “groovy little muckers”. I’m definitely warming to her you know.

From groovy muckers to legends of rock (Steve Lamacq’s words not mine). Def Leppard seemed to be following in the career footsteps of Bon Jovi who were on earlier. The New Jersey outfit had come to a crossroads and decided a new direction was needed. Drawing a line under what had gone before, (including sacking their bass player) they released a Best Of album in 1994 called “Crossroads” (geddit?) before releasing an album that was supposedly darker in its themes than what had gone before but which was critically acclaimed in “These Days”.

Def Leppard were similarly assessing their options. Without an album of new material since “Adrenalize” in 1992, they found themselves in a dark place. Divorce, ill health, arrests for spousal abuse and assault and the death of guitarist Steve Clark meant the band were intent on writing some songs that were more from personal experience and mature than their standard “Let’s Get Rocked” rubbish. Also like The Jovi, they had a line up change following Clark’s passing with the addition of new guitarist Vivian Campbell. Perhaps more significantly though, sixth studio album “Slang” would be the first since 1980 without the involvement of producer Robert John ‘Mutt’ Lange.

Before that though, they put down their own marker to delineate their career in Greatest Hits collection “Vault”. To promote it was a new song, a rock ballad called “When Love And Hate Collide”. Possibly not renowned for their slow songs, they had a hit with at least one to my knowledge – “Love Bites” in 1988. However, this new track seemed more epic. It sounds like it was written to order for a blockbuster movie. In fact, it sounds like a template for Aerosmith’s “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing” which was written for the sci-if disaster film Armageddon.

I always quite liked the name of that Best Of – “Vault” sort of implied that there were sacred treasures inside though whether that meaning should apply to Def Leppard’s back catalogue rather depends on your opinion of the band I guess. My mate Steve who’s from Bolton swears that they were huge there in the 80s. Hmm. There’s a show on Sky Arts called Guy Garvey: From The Vaults which is a veritable treasure trove of fabulous musical clips taken from the archives of shows like The Tube, Razzmatazz, So It Goes and Tiswas. Based around a specific year and curated by Garvey, it’s a little gem of a programme and if the word ‘vault’ is good enough for Guy Garvey, it’s good enough for me.

Simply Red are this week’s new No 1 with “Fairground” which knocks Shaggy off the top spot after just one week. It remains the band’s only chart topping single to date. My first impressions on hearing it went along the lines of “Hang on, he’s just nicked that beat from “Give It Up” by The Goodmen. What a swizz!” OK, I maybe didn’t say ‘swizz’ but my point remains. It seemed to me like Hucknall was just jumping on the dance bandwagon in an attempt to remain relevant. After all, it had been four years since the last album, the all conquering “Stars”. However, lots of people didn’t seem to mind the sample and bought it in enough quantities for it to spend four weeks at the chart summit. At least we don’t get that clip with him wearing his PVC outfit like we got last week. Whoever advised him to don that costume really weren’t ’good men’ and should have told him to ‘give it up’.

The play out video is “I’d Lie For You (And That’s The Truth)” by Meatloaf. After the gargantuan success of the “Bat Out Of Hell II: Back Into Hell” album and “I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That)” single, delivering a follow up was always going to be an almost impossible task. “Welcome To The Neighbourhood” was no flop but it couldn’t hope to match the sales of its predecessor. Like Def Leppard before him, the Meat also had a change of producer and some may argue that was the reason for not being able to replicate the success of “Bat Out Of Hell II”. Meatloaf without Jim Steinman was like Ant without Dec (or the other way round as happened in 2018) – it just wasn’t right.

Having said all that, “I’d Lie For You (And That’s The Truth)” sounded right out of the Steinman playbook. Epic sounding rock ballad, huge production, paradoxical title – all the ingredients associated with the legendary writer and producer were there. And yet, it didn’t perform as well commercially. I mean, a UK No 2 was damn good going for a guy who had been nowhere near the top of the charts for years pre- “I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That)” but in America it only got to No 13. A sizeable hit sure but nowhere near being a No 1 record. It was a similar story with the album. Big sales but dwarfed by those of its predecessor.

In an unlikely turn of events I’m going to reference Spandau Ballet again in a post about pop music in 1995. Having made a connection between them and Menswear earlier, I’m jumping the shark now and relating them to Meatloaf. Gary Kemp said in a 2000 BBC documentary about the band that nobody else could play their songs and that you could get a new guitarist or singer even but really people just wanted to see the five original members performing on stage. Maybe it was a similar theme with Meatloaf and Steinman? That the former’s audience mostly wanted him and Steinman together?

Order of appearanceArtistTitleDid I buy it?
1CastAlrightNo but easily could have
2GarbageOnly Happy When It RainsSee 1 above
3Wet Wet WetSomewhere SomehowNo
4The PretendersKid ‘95 liveNope
5Bon JoviSomething For The PainI did not
6TLCHits MedleyN/A
7MenswearStardustCall the police! Where’s my copy of this?!
8Def LeppardWhen Love And Hate CollideNah
9Simply RedFairgroundNever
10MeatloafI’d Lie For You (And That’s The Truth)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/m001wkgl/top-of-the-pops-28091995?seriesId=unsliced

TOTP 29 JUN 1995

Posted on by 80stastic

We arrived at an unusual episode of TOTP whereby the executive producer Ric Blaxill incorporated what might now be called a ‘heritage’ slot into the show but which I’m sure wouldn’t have been labelled as such at the time. Host Mark Goodier refers to it only using the generic, catch all term of ‘exclusive’ which is the description that was used for just about any non standard performance on the show around this time. The band featured in this slot are pretty special though and retain a huge legacy – it’s only the bloody Ramones!

All in good time though and we start with the antithesis of the legendary punk rockers with one of the worst examples of naff dance music that the 90s spewed forth. Clock (even their name was terrible) followed the classic Eurodance blueprint of a female singer and male rapper even though they were actually from Manchester as opposed to Holland or Germany like many of the acts of that genre. Where they did divert from the template was in their decision to pursue chart hits via that well trodden route of the cover version. After a couple of minor hits with their own compositions in 1994, they went Top 10 with a cover of Harold Faltermeyer’s “Axel F” and that success convinced them to carry on in that direction. Next up was their version of Tag Team’s 1994 No 34 hit “Whoomph! (There It Is)”. Now this track has quite the backstory which I’ve already discussed in the post covering the TOTP featuring Tag Team so I don’t propose to go over all that again. What I will say is that when Clock first started releasing singles and I wasn’t aware of who they were despite working in a record shop, when I was asked about them by a customer I presumed they were asking about Clock DVA, the experimental industrial pioneers from Sheffield who formed in 1978 and were contemporaries of Cabaret Voltaire. I might as well have been talking a different language trying to explain Clock DVA to the young punter who just wanted to buy his favourite Eurodance tune.

Depressingly, we’ll be seeing lots more of Clock in these TOTP repeats as they went on to (ahem) clock up a further nine UK Top 40 hits throughout the 90s including covers of “December, 1963 (Oh, What A Night)”* by the Four Seasons, “You Sexy Thing”* by Hot Chocolate and “Blame It On The Boogie” by The Jacksons. You lucky people!

*They truncated the titles to differentiate them from the originals though.

I think my patience with Jamiroquai wasn’t so much wearing thin by this point as had completely perished to reveal an embarrassing hole in its pants. To my ears, everything single they’d released by this point sounded the same as the one before. “Stillness In Time” was a case in point. It meanders along with the promise of breaking into this really cool groove but never actually goes anywhere. Do you think Jay Kay, when laying down these tracks, would say to himself “Yes! We really nailed it there!”? And yet, this single entered the chart at the highest position (No 9) the band had ever achieved so maybe it was me that was out of step with public opinion? The performance here is sooo muso – there’s even a man wearing an oversized poncho for Chrissakes! Nah, not for me thanks.

And now…a single that has gone down in the annals of time as one of the very worst ever laid down in a recording studio from an album that Q Magazine decreed as the worst of all time in a 2006 poll. It is now received knowledge that Duran Duran made the biggest career misstep ever by releasing their covers album “Thank You” as the follow up to 1993’s career reviving “The Wedding Album” but is that a fair take on the reviled collection of songs? I mean, Lou Reed said that their version of “Perfect Day” was the best cover ever of one of his songs. Indeed, “Thank You” wasn’t even the commercial catastrophe we might have expected from the worst album ever – it made No 12 in the UK album charts and sold half a million copies in the US. So what’s the deal with it?

I think the answer lies in the track listing and the songs the band chose to cover. Some of them were seen as sacrosanct and untouchable and certainly by some faded 80s pin up pop stars. How dare Duran Duran take on the back catalogues of Led Zeppelin, The Doors, Elvis Costello etc! The ultimate act of heresy though appears to be their decision to cover Public Enemy’s “911 Is A Joke” and Grandmaster Flash and Melle Mel’s “White Lines (Don’t Don’t Do It)”. The latter was released as the second single from the album and like Clock earlier, they changed the title slightly to “White Lines (Don’t Do It)”.

So it’s cards on the table time – I don’t mind the Duran Duran version. I think it’s alright in the same way that I thought Gun’s rocked up cover of “Word Up” by Cameo was OK. Is it better than or even as good as the original? No, I don’t think so but that doesn’t make it utter shite by default. I even think the black and white video works and adds something to the track. What didn’t work though was the album’s standing both critically and within the band’s own oeuvre of work. In fact it derailed them. A follow up album (“Medazzaland”) wasn’t released in the UK and by the end of the decade, the band had lost both their record label Capitol / EMI and bass player and founding member John Taylor. They would not have another hit album until 2004 when the original line up reformed to record “Astronaut”. And yet…I wonder if it’s time for “Thank You” to be revisited and reappraised. There are surely worse albums out there. Surely?

Who remembers All–4–One? “I Swear” yeah? Sure. Great. Who remembers their other hit though? Not so many hands up now are there? Well, they did have one and it was called “I Can Love You Like That” and remarkably, just like “I Swear” before it, this was a song originally recorded by country singer John Michael Montgomery. I guess if it had worked once, why wouldn’t it work again? And it did, in America at least where it was a No 5 hit. Over here though, we decided that one huge song from All-4-One was quite enough thank you very much and it struggled to a high of No 33 despite this live TOTP performance (which I can’t find a clip of by the way). The group would never return to our charts though they are still together to this day and last released an album in 2016.

Heeeere’s Edwyn! Yes, the rather fabulous Edwyn Collins is back on the show to perform his brilliant but surprising hit “A Girl Like You”. Edwyn, of course, started his musical career as the lead singer of Orange Juice who criminally only had one UK Top 40 hit. However, alongside the likes of The Adventures, Icicle Works and It Bites, they really should have had more. “Flesh Of My Flesh”, “Lean Period” and “What Presence?!” were all great singles that were habitually ignored by the record buying public. Their back catalogue has been revisited retrospectively though including a six CD box set called “Coals To Newcastle” and a compilation called “The Glasgow School” the latter of which featured a cover of “I Don’t Care” by The Ramones. I’m guessing then that Edwyn would have been stoked to be on the same show as the Queens punk rockers. Except he wasn’t. The clip shown here was just a repeat of an earlier performance from a couple of weeks before. Bloody scheduling! Rip it up!

We now turn our attention to Menswear and I don’t mean that awful tank top that host Mark Goodier is wearing. It looks like an off cut of the rug in my dining room. No, I mean the poster boys of Britpop – they even had a Levi’s modelling contract – who are experiencing their first chart hit in “Daydreamer”.

More than perhaps any other artist of this era, Menswear’s is a cautionary tale of running before you can walk, going too far too soon and all those other advisory idioms. Being lauded by the press and courted by record labels whilst only having four songs inevitably led to egos bigger than their talent and it would all end in tales of drug abuse, mental health issues, a sacked drummer and a massively over budget sophomore album that only got a release in a Menswear obsessed Japan. Back in June 1995 though, the band looked like they had the world at their feet. A distinctive, Roxy Music infused single and a frontman in the modish, angular Johnny Dean who had perfected the art of looking right down the camera lens long before ex-Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg did it at the 2010 General Election live TV debates. God, even that is now 13 years ago! Oh to be young and watching Menswear on TOTP again!

Boo! Rubbish! Get off! It’s The Outhere Brothers again whom I referred to as “those two pricks” in a previous post. By way of contrast, Mark Goodier calls them “those naughty boys”. Yeah, I stand indubitably by my comment mate. Their single “Boom Boom Boom” is up to No 2 on its way to the top of the charts where it will stay for four weeks. It came from an album called “1 Polish, 2 Biscuits & A Fish Sandwich” which were not that subtle references to the penis, buttocks and vagina. They went on to release a Best Of album in 2002 called “The Fucking Hits”. It’s not big and it’s not clever is it? Like I said, pricks.

And so to the Ramones. Now I wouldn’t describe myself as a super fan but I certainly can appreciate the influence that the band had despite little in the way of commercial success. Their hi-speed, pop-punk sound would mobilise a generation of bands and shape their futures in a way that they surely couldn’t have predicted. That said, would the pop kids of 1995 have known or cared who the Ramones were? Maybe they did. Or maybe it was just that executive producer Ric Blaxill was a fan and wanted to get them on the show. I don’t know. On the show they were though and they were there to plug their fourteenth and final studio album “Adios Amigos” of which “I Don’t Want To Grow Up” was the lead single. Now, I already knew this Tom Waits song as my wife is a fan and had the “Bone Machine” album it’s taken from. It’s a great track, all raggedy, shuffling and shambolic but also captivating.

This version by the Ramones is pretty good too and the fact that the tempo of it can be ramped up so much shows the quality of the song. You could be forgiven for thinking it was a Ramones original.

Given the trademark brevity of the Ramones’ material, there’s time for another song from them so we get an album track called “Cretin Family” from them. Mark Goodier’s attempt at looking genuinely surprised that there was more doesn’t convince anyone. He must have known – there’s even a caption on screen that says ‘Yes more!’. It’s sobering to think that Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee and Tommy are now all no longer with us.

From the Ramones to Robson & Jerome. That’s quite a leap! The duo are still at No 1 with “Unchained Melody” for a seventh and final week. When the dust finally settled, it would have spent 14 weeks in the Top 40 and 25 inside the Top 100. That’s just under half a year! Just as it finally dropped out of the charts, their follow up “I Believe / Up On The Roof” went straight in at No 1. 1995 – what a time to be alive!

The play out track is “This Is A Call” by Foo Fighters. I have a history of missing out on bands that I really should have been into and Dave Grohl’s post Nirvana vehicle was another to add to the list. I think because I’d never really got Nirvana either (although clearly “Smells Like Teen Spirit” is a monster tune), my musical antenna weren’t pointing in the Foo Fighters direction in the first place. That said, “This Is A Call” is a banger so why it didn’t lead me to investigate more of their stuff at the time I don’t know. Still, it’s much easier these days to explore music unknown to you what with the likes of Spotify and all so I really have no excuse. I’ve got until their next appearance in these TOTP repeats to report back…

Order of appearanceArtistTitleDid I buy it?
1ClockWhoomph! (There It Is)As if
2JamiroquaiStillness In TimeNo
3Duran DuranWhite Lines (Don’t Do It)Didn’t mind it, didn’t buy it
4All-4-OneI Can Love You Like ThatNope
5Edwyn CollinsA Girl Like YouLiked it, didn’t buy it
6MenswearDaydreamerI did not
7The Outhere BrothersBoom Boom BoomHell no!
8RamonesI Don’t Want To Grow Up / Cretin FamilyNegative
9Robson & JeromeUnchained MelodyOf course not
10Foo FightersThis Is A CallNo but I had it on one of those Best Album Ever compilations

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/m001sx1h/top-of-the-pops-29061995

TOTP 22 JUN 1995

Posted on by 80stastic

These mid 90s TOTPs were all over the place musically. I’m looking for some sort of thread that links the acts on this particular show together and apart from an over arching theme of dance music, I can’t really detect one – it’s all a bit…not exactly eclectic but more…well…haphazard. There’s Britpop, soft rock, cover versions, a novelty record…and Mike And The Mechanics. If the running order is unpredictable one thing that is completely, absolutely unequivocally guaranteed is that host Simon ‘Smug’ Mayo will trot out a string of lame lines that he thinks are shit-your-pants funny. What a plank.

1995 really was in the midst of an identity crisis. Look at the opening act – the prince of Eurodance Haddaway had somehow managed to secure himself four consecutive Top 10 hits between 1993 and early 1994 but the wheels had pretty much come off by this point. His second album “The Drive” did nothing in the UK (I’m not sure we even stocked it in Our Price as I don’t know it’s cover art at all) but somehow its lead single “Fly Away” propelled him into our charts one more time despite everybody knowing (including himself surely) that he was living on borrowed time. Being a resourceful lad, he’s decided the best way to extend his shelf life was to do his best 2 Unlimited impression complete with bringing in a female vocalist to accompany him just to hammer home the Ray and Anita comparison. I guess it worked as “Fly Away” made it to No 20 but this track surely didn’t live long in anyone’s memory.

It’s the aforementioned Mike + The Mechanics next with the title track from their latest album “Beggar On A Beach Of Gold” though curiously they’ve added an ‘A’ to the title of the single. “A Beggar On A Beach Of Gold” was the follow up to “Over My Shoulder” which performed well reaching No 12 in the charts. Its successor couldn’t repeat that though peaking at No 33. Was there a reason for this? Well, this track has Paul Young (not that one) on lead vocals whereas “Over My Shoulder” saw Paul Carrack doing the heaving lifting when it came to the singing. Now, wasn’t their biggest hit “The Living Years” also sung by Carrack so is there a pattern emerging here?

*checks Mike + The Mechanics discography*

Hmm. Not really. Paul Young was the vocalist on “Word Of Mouth”, “Silent Running (On Dangerous Ground)” and “All I Need Is A Miracle” which were all UK Top 40 hits. I’m sure OMD went through a small phase in the mid 80s where their singles sung by Paul Humphreys were hits but those that had Andy McCluskey on the microphone didn’t though. The only other band that comes to mind where the vocals were shared is Tears For Fears but they had big hits with songs sung by both Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal. I seem to be looking at a theory that doesn’t hold water so I’ll move on.

The sadly departed Paul Young (still not that one) was also the singer in Sad Café best known for the hits “My Oh My” (not the Slade song!) and “Everyday Hurts” though I have to say that watching Paul here, I’m not reminded of those hits but taken aback by his resemblance to the actor, screenwriter and novelist Mark Gatiss or rather Mark Gatiss as a League Of Gentlemen character. Perhaps Les McQueen of Crème Brulée?

We’re back to the dance music now with another airing of the video for “(Everybody’s Got To Learn Sometime) I Need Your Loving” by Baby D. A take on The Korgis’ hit of the same name (almost), it was at its chart peak of No 3 this week so not quite equalling the success of their chart topper “Let Me Be Your Fantasy”. Baby D herself was one Dee Fearon and if that surname sounds familiar then it could be due to this guy…

Yes, Dee is married to Phil Fearon of Galaxy fame. You may recall him having a clutch of jaunty pop hits in the mid 80s. A little known fact is that Phil also had a song with the word ‘fantasy’ in it that also got to the top of a chart – sadly for Phil it was the Best of the Rest chart as his single “Fantasy Real” peaked at that most unfortunate of chart positions No 41 in 1983. Yes, Phil’s fantasy of a No 1 record wasn’t real. He should have asked his wife about how to bag a chart topper. “What Do I Do?” indeed.

As predictable as a controversial VAR decision every weekend, here comes Simon Mayo with some inappropriate reference during his link to the next act. Introducing “Shoot Me With Your Love” by D:Ream, he makes some asinine comment about selling bullets to Iran which I’m assuming was his attempt at being topical as the US imposed oil and trade sanctions on Iran over their sponsorship of terrorism, pursuit of nuclear weapons and hostility to the Israeli – Palestinian peace process in this year. Yeah, nice one Mayo. Nothing was off limits to you was it in your pursuit of a cheap gag. What a prick! And look at what he’s wearing to present a music programme reflecting current trends – a shirt and tie! He was only three months away from his 37th birthday at the time of this broadcast – not exactly down with the kids was he?

As for D:Ream, this was the lead single from their second album “World” and the majority of the online reaction to it after this TOTP repeat aired on BBC4 recently went along the lines of “Bloody Hell! Robbie Williams nicked this tune for ‘Let Me Entertain You’!”. I have to say I concur. The chorus hook of both songs is interchangeable. I didn’t I notice this at the time, probably because:

  1. Robbie’s song wasn’t released until nearly three years after D:Ream’s single
  2. “Shoot Me With Your Love” was hardly that memorable a tune in the first place. Come on, D:Ream are remembered for one song and one song only by the vast majority of people!

Anyway, it did reach No 7 which isn’t to be sniffed at (“Let Me Entertain You” peaked at No 3) whilst parent album “World” also did pretty well with a chart high of No 5 though it sold five times less copies than its predecessor “D:Ream On Vol 1”.

More identity crisis stuff now. A big ballad from a dance act? Maybe it’s more of an anthem than a ballad but even so. Despite being one of M People’s best known songs, “Search For The Hero” is not one of the band’s biggest hits. The third single from their “Bizarre Fruit” album, it did stretch their run of consecutive Top 10 hits to eight but I would have thought it peaked much higher than No 9. Not so. Its status might be due to the fact that its profile was raised not once but twice by external factors. Firstly, a year after its release, it was used as the music for a Peugeot 406 car advert and then, on 29 June 1996, M People performed it at a celebratory concert at Old Trafford to mark the final match of the Euro 96 football tournament. Heather Small was so attached to the idea of the song that she basically rewrote it as her first solo single in 2000 and called it “Proud”. Again, it was latched upon for a sporting purpose becoming the official theme for the London 2012 Olympic bid and, of course, was used as a running gag throughout the BBC sit com Miranda.

It wasn’t just Heather Small who liked to recycle though (as she did by taking “Search For The Hero” and turning it into “Proud”). M People’s record label Deconstruction reused the whole “Bizarre Fruit” album by rereleasing it as “Bizarre Fruit II” just a year later with the radio edits of “Search For The Hero” and “Love Rendezvous” replacing the original album versions plus the band’s version of “Itchycoo Park” by Small Faces added to the track listing. Cheeky blighters.

And now, perhaps one of the most pointless cover versions of all time – Amy Grant’s take on Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi”. Why? Just…why? Well, to get a hit obviously but sheesh, this is totally without merit. A sanitised, horribly 90s version of a song when the original is so well known? No thanks. Amy doesn’t even do the infamous high/low vocal followed by the cringy laugh at the end. Maybe she thought that was a step too far? Maybe she thought that would be disrespectful to Joni? Maybe she thought she was being respectful by not doing it?

For whatever reason, enough punters bought this to send it to No 20 in the UK singles chart, Amy’s biggest hit since “Baby Baby” made No 2 in 1991. Surely it isn’t possible that people didn’t know the 1970 original? Or maybe they were reminded of it but in the pre-streaming days of 1995, the closest thing to having access to Joni’s song (unless you shelled out for the “Ladies Of The Canyon” album it was on) was to buy the Amy Grant version? Not everything was simpler back in the day I guess.

It’s the kings of the TOTP exclusive next as, for what seems like the umpteenth time, Bon Jovi are here with, yep, another ‘exclusive performance’. This time it’s to promote their new album “These Days” which was released the week after this show aired and which would knock Michael Jackson’s “HIStory” Best Of off the top of the charts. There’s no Niagara Falls or American Football stadium location tonight though as they are in the TOTP studio in person. The song they perform here is the album’s title track and, for what it’s worth, it’s pretty good I think. Now I have been known in the past to not be immune to the guilty pleasure that is the Jovi – I once refused to leave a nightclub in Sunderland until I’d danced to them despite being legless through drink – so I may be a little biased but still, I think the song holds up. More reflective and mature than some of their earlier, bombastic stadium rock.

Jon seems to have grown out that shorter haircut he was sporting for the “Always” single back in the Autumn of 1994 and there’s also a change in the band line up as original bass player Alex John Such has been replaced by Hugh McDonald. This track would eventually be released as the fourth single from the album in February 1996 so we may see it again when the BBC4 repeats get to that point in time.

Simon Mayo has another one of his ludicrous non sequiturs for us next as he states that Bon Jovi had recently picked up two Kerrang! awards and a Kerplunk award. For God’s sake man, please just stop!

Right, on with the music and what’s going on here then? Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer teaming up with EMF to do a cover of “I’m A Believer”? Well, it seems to me that in the case of Vic and Bob, they had a history both with this song (it was performed by Vic on the first ever TV show of Vic Reeves’ Big Night Out) and with teaming up with indie rock bands to do cover versions (they, of course, collaborated with The Wonderstuff to take Tommy Roe’s “Dizzy” to No 1 in 1991). As for EMF, it looks to me like a desperate attempt to restart their career which had exploded with UK No 3 and US No 1 “Unbelievable” in 1990. The success of that single and parent album “Schubert Dip” hadn’t sustained and their latest album “Cha Cha Cha” (released in March 1995) had peaked at No 30 and yielded just one minor hit single. By comparison, Vic and Bob were flying with a second series of The Smell Of Reeves And Mortimer having just finished airing. It made sense to associate yourself with a successful act when you’re trying to regain your own popularity and if the plan was to bag themselves a massive seller then it was a case of mission accomplished as “I’m A Believer” peaked at No 3. However, this would prove to be a temporary return to glories. One final throw of the dice in the form of the wonderful follow up single “Afro King” failed to make the Top 40. The band split not long after though have reformed at various points down the years and are currently a functioning entity.

I read Bob Mortimer’s autobiography recently and he comes across as a very humble, vulnerable and warm human being. He was actually very shy as a school kid which looks at odds with his exuberant performance here. One last thing, what was the deal with EMF and songs with the word ‘believe’ in them? “Unbelievable”, “I Believe”, “I’m A Believer”…I would liked to have heard them take on Bucks Fizz’s “Land Of Make Believe” – now that really would make for an interesting cover version!

Six weeks now for Robson & Jerome at No 1 with “Unchained Melody”. SIX WEEKS! I never watched Soldier Soldier, the TV series that spawned this duo so I dug out the infamous clip on YouTube. Here it is…

Hmm. I can’t really see why this scene would have ignited a clamour to be able to buy and own a copy of these two actors doing “Unchained Melody” if I’m honest. If only YouTube had been around back then, maybe all those people who bought the record would have been satiated by being able to watch this clip over and over again instead and we wouldn’t have had to endure Robson & Jerome at all!

The play out track is “Daydreamer” by Menswear but they will be in the studio on the next episode of the show so I’ll keep this short. This was the band’s second single release but their first to be made available extensively after debut “I’ll Manage Somehow” was only printed in very limited quantities meaning that it couldn’t sell enough copies to get in the charts. “Daydreamer” therefore became the band’s first Top 40 hit when it peaked at No 14, also its debut entry position.

Order of appearanceArtistTitleDid I buy it?
1HaddawayFly AwayNever happening
2Mike + The MechanicsA Beggar On A Beach Of GoldNope
3Baby D(Everybody’s Got To Learn Sometime) I Need Your LovingNo thanks
4D:ReamShoot Me With Your LoveNah
5M PeopleSearch For The HeroNo
6Amy GrantBig Yellow TaxiNegative
7Bon JoviThese DaysI did not
8Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer / EMFI’m A BelieverI wasn’t – no
9Robson & JeromeUnchained MelodyAs if
10MenswearDaydreamerAnd 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/m001snq6/top-of-the-pops-22061995

TOTP 30 MAR 1995

Posted on by 80stastic

It’s another golden mic episode of TOTP and this week the slot goes to Ant & Dec or Ant & Declan as they introduce themselves. Or is it PJ & Duncan? Ant says that they are in fact them as well in the intro. They were releasing records as PJ & Duncan at this time (that didn’t change to Ant & Dec until 1996) but maybe they (or their management) were starting to think about a more long term brand. Certainly they’d decided on who should stand where by this point with Ant on the viewer’s left and Dec on the right. They had been positioned the other way round when performing on TOTP as opposed to presenting. I was wondering if this was their first such gig but Wikipedia tells me they’d already co-hosted a children’s programme on ITV called Gimme 5 before getting their own show on BBC. Little did we know at the time that they would come to dominate the TV schedules behemoth like for the next three decades.

Back in 1995 though, they were those fresh-faced lads from Byker Grove who sang that song “Let’s Get Ready To Rhumble” (amongst other hits) introducing Strike as the first act of the night. This is one of those occasional moments in chart history when the hit is much more well remembered than the artist. “U Sure Do” was said hit that actually made the UK Top 40 twice. It made No 31 in early January but was a much bigger hit just a few weeks later in the March and April of 1995 when it peaked at No 4. To be fair, although I used the word ‘occasional’, you could make a case that the vast majority of these 90s Eurodance hits were all about the tracks not the people behind them or indeed in front of them. For example, Strike had four further UK Top 40 hits but I defy anybody to name even one of them.

“U Sure Do” was based around the hook from Donna Allen’s 1987 hit “Serious” though I’m not sure I made that connection at the time. I also didn’t know that Strike’s singer – Victoria Newton – went onto record a dance version of All About Eve’s “Martha’s Harbour”. If that sounds like a hideous concept to you, then I urge you not to click on the video below. Trust your gut feeling. If only Victoria Newton hadn’t heard about the idea of making a dance track of All About Eve’s biggest hit, just like Julianne Regan couldn’t hear the the backing track on that infamous TOTP appearance.

Some R&B balladeering now from a new name in Brownstone. Whilst I do remember this group, I couldn’t have told you the name of any of their hits and certainly don’t recall the info shared by Ant & Dec in their intro about them being signed to Michael Jackson’s label MJJ Music. Indeed, the fact that Jacko even had his own record label can’t have registered with me at all. Apparently, it was in existence from 1993 to 2001 and was owned by Sony and distributed by Epic for whom Jackson recorded but was dissolved over disagreements between Sony and the singer over the promotion of his career. Brownstone were one of the label’s few artists to secure any hits with the other being 3T who famously were a trio made up of Jackson’s nephews. Nepotism much?

Brownstone made a splash when this single “If You Love Me” made the Top 10 in the US and UK but their subsequent releases suffered from a dose of diminishing returns and they split in 1998 before reforming in 2007 and 2019 though only Nichole ‘Nicci’ Gilbert remains from the original line up. As for this performance, the lady on the left surely couldn’t see out from under that lowered peaked cap could she? Had she seen Gabrielle with her eye patch look and said “Hold my beer”?

I’d have to say that Ant & Dec’s links weren’t the best at this stage of their career. Rather obvious and unfunny but they were both very young and not as slick the as they would become. The segue into “Two Can Play That Game” is especially lame unlike the song by Bobby Brown. Like “U Sure Do” earlier and many other hits around this time it seemed, this had already been a minor hit before bestriding the charts giant-like later in its life. Originally a No 38 in the Summer of 1994, it would go Top 3 nine months later.

Now usually it took a remix by a de jour producer to make a track a much bigger hit second time around and indeed “Two Can Play That Game” did have such a sprinkle of magic in the form of mixes by K Klass (the album version didn’t) but here’s the thing; as far as I can tell, these remixes were already present on the 1994 original release as well as the 1995 re-issue. Which begs the question why was it given a second chance? I guess either Bobby or his record company had faith in the track and thought it deserved a second chance. You can hear why I think. Steered by a hand-clapping beat with some strident house piano flourishes, it’s also got an uplifting chorus that I can imagine leant itself to much dancing with abandon on many a dance floor throughout the country. Limbs!

The success of the single prompted the release of a whole remix album of the same name later in the year which did what it said on the tin – featured remixes of some of his biggest songs that led to three more recycled tracks becoming UK Top 40 hits.

Finally! After weeks of wondering where all the Britpop artists were in this year of Britpop, here’s one that were really at the heart of it. Or were they? Well, Menswear were a bit of a conundrum. In some quarters, they were very much seen as manufactured to be part of the burgeoning scene rather than growing out of it organically and therefore not genuine nor credible. There was some truth in that of course. First mentioned in a Select magazine article by founding members Johnny Dean and Chris Gentry before the band even existed, the hype surrounding them was huge. Having put the idea out there, Dean and Gentry decided that they should probably form the band for real and lo, Menswear were born to the world in the epicentre of Britpop, namely Camden. A debut gig had the record labels frothing at the mouth, besides themselves with fear at the thought of missing out on the next big thing. In the end, London Records won the race at the cost of £90,000. A £500,000 publishing deal (they only had seven songs in their repertoire at the point of signing!) and an NME front cover followed before this TOTP appearance. They hadn’t even released anything at the time!

As if the buzz around them wasn’t big enough, they made their first single “I’ll Manage Somehow” a limited edition release with, as Dec says in his intro, just 5,000 copies made available. Ant wasn’t the only one asking the question “Why?”. Around this time, I was doing a further education night course about music of the 70s. One of my fellow course members was a guy called Dominic who had heard about this band called Menswear but was mightily pissed off that he couldn’t find their single anywhere to purchase due to its limited release. Knowing I worked in a record shop, he asked me what it was all about. I said I thought it was a marketing strategy to create a clamour for the product at the counter but Dominic wasn’t having it and thought it was daft. He had a point. In the end, “I’ll Manage Somehow” somehow managed a peak of No 49. Wouldn’t it have been better to mass produce it and give them the chance of a bigger debut hit or was I missing something? The follow up single “Daydreamer” made No 14 so clearly that was made more widely available. It was their third single “Stardust” though that did it for me. Hopefully we’ll get to see that one on a future TOTP repeat.

Having said that, watching this performance back some 28 years later, I’m not sure if the profile the band attained is quite so obviously explained. They made a decent sound to my ears but it was hardly revolutionary and indeed left them open to the same accusations of plagiarism that plagued their Britpop contemporaries Elastica. I’d forgotten Johnny Dean’s military style tunic that he wore here. A few short years later, The Libertines would copy the look in their own brief blaze of hype and glory. So was the Menswear ballyhoo that bad? After all, they were hardly the first to go there. Sigue Sigue Sputnik did it much more outrageously and ridiculously back in 1986 and were vilified extensively and that thing about being the pin up band for a musical movement? Wasn’t that what Spandau Ballet were for the New Romantics? Unlike Spandau though, Menswear weren’t able to extend their life beyond their Britpop origins and when that came to an end, so did they. Drummer Matt Everett would become a writer, presenter and sidekick to ex-Radio 6 DJ Shaun Keaveny whilst lead singer Johnny Dean became an advocate for the National Autistic Society after being diagnosed with Asperger syndrome and briefly restarted Menswear with a new line up in 2013. He ditched the project shortly afterwards though following a change of heart.

When you’ve had a name as big as Prince on your show recently, I guess you’re going to make use of his performance more than once even if you couldn’t actually see his face. Yes, it’s that former ‘exclusive’ appearance by New Power Generation promoting their “Get Wild” single where Prince hides his fizzog throughout it behind a veil in protest at the actions of his record company Warners with whom he was in dispute. With the Purple One using NPG as a means of releasing material whilst hamstrung by Warners and the latter retaliating by issuing a single called “Purple Medley”, it set up a chart battle of sorts though it would hardly rival the Blur v Oasis bout later in the year. Prince would finally disentangle himself from Warners around 1996.

He wasn’t the first pop star to use the gimmick of a mask of course. Here’s David Soul pre his Starsky and Hutch days as The Covered Singer…

He wouldn’t be the last either with the advent of the TV show The Masked Singer being syndicated around the world and featuring actual pop stars…

From one music legend to another. After Prince comes The Boss! The reason behind Bruce Springsteen’s appearance here seems to be to promote his recently released No 1 “Greatest Hits” album from which “Murder Incorporated” was one of four new tracks. I say ‘new’ but it was actually a really old song that was written during the “Born In The USA” album sessions but which didn’t make the cut. In fact, “Murder Incorporated” was going to be the album’s title at one point. It got reactivated for Bruce’s first compilation album and fast became a crowd favourite when played live. It’s a good song I think that doesn’t sound out of place next to some of the other more well known and celebrated tracks on the album. It was never released as a single in the UK (in fact it was only released in Canada) hence the big TOTP caption ‘Album Track’.

The “Greatest Hits” would go multi platinum but Bruce chose to follow it up with an album that would be his first to fail to make the Top 10 in the US for two decades. “The Ghost Of Tom Joad” was his second acoustic collection after “Nebraska” and on the one hand didn’t seem like an obvious direction to go in but on the other it made perfect sense. Draw a line under one phase of your career by reminding everyone how great it was with a Best Of and then deliver something unexpected. That’s how you maintain a career that’s lasted over 50 years I guess.

Snap! were still having hits in 1995? Well, yes they were but both visually and sonically you would be forgiven for believing that this wasn’t the same group that exploded onto the charts in 1990 with “The Power”. Rapper Turbo B had long gone and they were on to their fourth singer in Summer after Jackie Harris, Thea Austin and Niki Haris before her. In this performance with Summer and her two backing vocalists/dancers in crimson ball gowns, they look an era away from those early days which I guess they were. Their sound had also transformed over the years to the point that they were now peddling trance flavoured pop with “The First The Last Eternity (Till The End)” a prime example. With a title that seemed to borrow an awful lot from that old Barry White hit, it consisted of Summer repeating the word ‘eternity’ over and over until it sounded like she was singing ‘eternally’. It does, however, have a deeply hypnotic quality to it that kind of draws you in…and in…and…No! Snap out of it! Ahem.

“The First The Last Eternity (Till The End)” would make a respectable No 15 on the UK charts but the majority of their final hits would be remixes of past glories, mainly “Rhythm Is A Dancer” which provided their last Top 40 entry in 2008. It wasn’t their first hit but it was their last meaning Snap!’s success didn’t last an eternity.

Whilst I can appreciate their place in musical history, I was never a massive Nirvana fan. Consequently, by association, I was never that interested in Hole either. The band started by Courtney Love who was, of course, married to Kurt Cobain always seemed to be inextricably linked to Nirvana because of that relationship. Working in record shops throughout the 90s, obviously I was aware of their releases and the names of their albums but I never had that much interest in hearing them. Plenty of people did though. I don’t think I understood quite how many records they sold. Literally millions of copies of their second and third albums in America achieving platinum status. It wasn’t quite the same story in the UK though those two albums “Live Through This” and “Celebrity Skin” did shift 100,000 units each. In terms of singles, Hole had never had a Top 40 hit in this country until “Doll Parts”. Watching this performance doesn’t make me feel I mistakenly deprived myself of their oeuvre I have to say. It’s all a bit too lo-fi and grunge- high for me and I don’t think I could listen to Courtney Love’s voice on repeat that much.

Despite not being a fan, I do have a Hole story. A month after this TOTP aired, the band played a gig at the Manchester Academy venue. A quick search of the internet tells me it was actually Sunday 30th April. I was living in Manchester at the time and my wife and I had been for a walk somewhere and on the way back home, passed by the Academy. The ticket touts were out in force and they seemed to be particularly interested in trying to flog me one. Approach after approach was made to the point where I was getting annoyed. “No mate, I’m not interested”; my reply was almost becoming a chant. I turned to my wife and, exasperated, said “What’s going on? Why do they keep trying to flog a ticket to me?”. My wife looked me up and down and then pointed to my T-shirt. “Maybe that’s got something to do with it?”. I’d completely forgotten that I was wearing a Nirvana T-shirt. Now you would be forgiven for asking the question “Hang on, I thought you said you weren’t that into Nirvana so what gives with the T-shirt?”. Well, there’d been some sort of Nirvana promotion at the Our Price store where I worked whereby customers got a feee T-shirt if they bought the album or something. Anyway, there were loads left over so they were dished out to the staff and I happened to have mine on the day of the Hole gig completely by chance. For the record, I didn’t buy a ticket for David gig.

Ant & Dec finally start to get into their stride with their links with a nice Morecambe and Wise style routine around the No 1 record “Don’t Stop (Wiggle Wiggle)” by The Outhere Brothers. That intro is the only good thing about this whole footnote in UK musical history when the public lost their minds not just once but twice (there’s another No 1 coming in a few weeks) over these two dolts. The whole appeal of this record it seems to me was its sexually explicit lyrics which, of course, we don’t hear in this performance. You wouldn’t have heard them on the edit version played on the radio either. It kind of makes this TOTP appearance slightly redundant. Still, the studio audience seem to be having a great time whooping it up in call and response fashion.

We should perhaps be thanking our lucky stars for small mercies. If it weren’t for Take That releasing a new single around this time, “Don’t Stop (Wiggle Wiggle)” would surely have stayed at No 1 for longer. In total, it spent six weeks inside the Top 2 with only one of those in the top spot.

Order of appearanceArtistTitleDid I buy it?
1StrikeU Sure DoI sure don’t – no
2BrownstoneIf You Love MeNo
3Bobby BrownTwo Can Play That GameNope
4MenswearI’ll Manage SomehowCouldn’t get a copy despite working in a record shop
5New Power GenerationGet WildNah
6Bruce SpringsteenMurder IncorporatedNot released as a single
7Snap!The First The Last Eternity (Till The End)Negative
8HoleDoll PartsNot my bag really
9The Outhere BrothersDon’t Stop (Wiggle Wiggle)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/m001rb0b/top-of-the-pops-30031995