Sinéad O’Connor | TOTP Rewind – the 90s

TOTP 08 FEB 1990

Posted on October 30, 2020 by 80stastic

After a raft of new acts and songs in the last couple of TOTP shows, the charts of early 1990 seem to have slowed down a bit with only three of the performances tonight not having featured before. Also, there’s only ten artists in total as opposed to the thirteen that have been crammed into the last couple of broadcasts which means less writing for your truly. Thank f**k for that!

Tonight’s presenter is Gary ‘safe pair of hands’ Davies and opening the show are Yell! with their version of “Instant Replay”. Now these two were definitely not a couple of talentless bimbos. Says who? Erm…those two talentless bimbos up there on stage. Yes in a rather tetchy Smash Hits interview, Yell! rejected all accusations of a dearth of perceivable musical ability in their camp:

“We’re not a couple of talentless bimbos”

Well, that clears that up then. Anything else you want to say for the record:

“People tend to think if you’re doing something like this you don’t have any brains…’cause we lift our arms and go ‘Instant Replay!!!’…’cause we click our fingers at the same time…’cause we’re doing a cover…We’re saying ‘this is for now!’, let’s have a good time and get serious later…”

Hmm… bit of protesting too much going on there I think. So did Yell! ‘get serious later’? Well, they released another cover version of a dance tune (Average White Band’s “Let’s Go Round Again”) and erm…this. *Does this count as getting serious?

*No, no it really doesn’t.

Right, what’s with the guys in hard hats in the studio audience crowding around Gary Davies? I don’t get it. Bob the Builder wouldn’t become a chart sensation for a further ten years so it can’t be anything to do with that. Just weird.

On with the music though and here’s Janet Jackson with a song I don’t recall at all in “Come Back To Me”. Taken from her “Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation 1814” album, it sounds very much like one of her earlier singles “Let’s Wait A While” to me. Like brother Michael, Janet wasn’t adverse to releasing multiple tracks of her albums as singles. There were seven off this album alone none of which got any higher than No 15 over here. Contrast that to their performance in the US where she clocked up four No1s, two No 2’s (including “Come Back To Me”) and a No 4. Cross-Atlantic differences and all that.

A huge record up now and indeed a future No 1 from the latest incarnation of a post Housemartins Norman Cook. Having already released two singles under his own name the previous year in “Blame It on the Bassline” and “For Spacious Lies” (albeit aided by MC Wildski and Lester respectively), he decided to formalise his collaborations under the banner of Beats International (which on reflection is a pretty crappy name). More of a collective than a stable band including singers, musicians, rappers and dancers, their first single “Dub Be Good to Me” was a huge hit straight off the bat. Mashing up The Clash’s “Guns Of Brixton” and SOS Band’s “Just Be Good To Me” proved to be a genius idea which was then expanded by lacing it with other samples from Ennio Morricone and Johnny Dynell (the “Tank fly boss walk jam nitty gritty, you’re listening to the boy from the big bad city, this is jam hot” rap at the start of the track). Featuring the lead vocals of an unknown Lindy Layton, there was just something about this almighty groove that captured the public’s attention and affection and it was soon a chart topper.

Parent album “Let Them Eat Bingo” however was only a moderate seller and generally perceived by the critics as a bit of a curate’s egg (my wife bought it though and second album “Excursion On The Version”). Cook called time on the project after that, moving onto form Freak Power and then assume the FatBoy Slim alter ego before the decade was out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaeCn_8aCkk

It’s those deadly serious looking Scottish lads Del Amitri next with their folk pop dirge of tune “Nothing Ever Happens”. Folk pop dirge? Look, they’re not my words but only those of lead singer Justin Currie himself who tweeted along to this performance as the BBC4 TOTP repeat went out. See…

Not very good clappers in the crowd this week. Probably traumatised by having to stand through our folk pop dirge.
— justin currie (@thejustincurrie) October 16, 2020

I loved the fact that Currie is very self deprecating in his tweets with this one being my favourite:

Oooh, angry look to camera 1 in last verse. Very effective. You tit.
— justin currie (@thejustincurrie) October 16, 2020

Despite this being the second time the band appeared on TOTP, the producers just reused their original performance clip for this show (there’s an abrupt cut away from Gary Davies to the band with no long, lead in shot) so this was their debut. In keeping with the acoustic nature of the song, it’s a very downbeat performance, almost as if they’re busking. It must have been a strange experience for the rest of the band. Finally, after years of trying they have a genuine chart hit and have made it onto the legendary show that was TOTP where careers are made or broken. The next three and a half minutes were vital to their career and what are they doing as the camera turns to them and they beam direct into the watching nation’s sitting rooms? They’re sat down with their arms draped over their guitars, not knowing where to look. After what must have seemed like an age whilst Justin Currie sings the unaccompanied intro, the rest of the song kicks in and they can mime along. Meanwhile, the normally excitable studio audience just sort of stand there, no clapping, no cheering and certainly no dancing.

They did go onto sell six million albums worldwide after this (and got to meet Sinéad O’Connor in the BBC bar afterwards!) so it all turned out alright in the end. Nothing ever happens indeed!

The last of the ‘new’ tunes next as Lisa Stansfield attempts to follow up her huge No 1 hit “All Around The World” with her new single “Live Together”. I was never much of a fan of the former and much preferred this one. The orchestral strings in the mix gave it a fuller, more lush sound that that of its predecessor. However, when you get such a big seller that early in your career, trying to emulate its success is never going to be easy and although achieving a very respectable No 10 peak, “Live Together” never looked likely to bring Lisa the same returns.

Lisa’s image in the video reminded me of the Hanna-Barbera cartoon character Dick Dastardly but instead of his twirly moustache, she’s got twirly kiss curls. Despite working in the Our Price store in Rochdale (Lisa’s hometown) for a year in the early 90s, I never saw her in the shop once. The one time she finally did come in, I was on my day off! Drat and double drat!

After appearing in last week’s Breakers section, The Beloved have moved up sufficient places in the Top 40 to warrant a studio appearance this time around to perform their single “Hello”. I loved this quirky dance / pop crossover tune and despite being on the dole, purchased the cassette single from my local record emporium.

I really like Jon Marsh’s dancing in this with his finger pointing hand guns and swishing poncho. Sadly, the song gets cut short before we get to the Jeffrey Archer name drop. I would have liked to see if Jon would have incorporated his ‘wanker’ gesture from the promo video into the studio performance. As fate would have it, I write this post on the day after one of the celebrities that we do get to hear name checked in the lyrics, comedian Bobby Ball, died. RIP Bobby and Rock On.

Those hard hat guys are back again as Gary Davies introduces the next act. There are also two young girls with matching Deirdre Barlow spectacles and frizzy perms in shot! Quite extraordinary! Very much the opposite of extraordinary though is the artist that Gary is introducing as it’s Phil Collins who plods his way through latest single “I Wish It Would Rain Down“. I’m sure I’ve told this story before but as Phil is so boring, I have no other recourse than to wheel it out again…

I once attended a wedding where the music that was played in the registry office as we waited for the bride to arrive appeared to be a Phil Collins Greatest Hits CD. As such, the three songs that were played one after the other before she arrived were:

“I Wish It Would Rain Down” (surely not on your wedding day?)
“Against All Odds” (with its lyric ‘you coming back to me is against all odds’)
“Separate Lives” (perhaps not the best song to celebrate the union of two people in matrimony)

“I Wish It Would Rain Down” peaked at No 7.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yseNilZX3_I

Skid Row‘s video for their “18 And Life” single is the next thing we get to see on the show despite it only being on just last week. Its rise of 11 places to No 12 though was deemed justification enough by the TOTP production team to reshow it. Written about the plight of an 18 year old who received a life sentence for the murder of his friend with a gun he thought was not loaded, the full version of the video incorporates this element of the song with many scenes showing the use of a firearm. Uncomfortable with this, MTV refused to air the video.

Comparing the full video below with the version shown on TOTP, it’s clear that the BBC had similar concerns and all of the images involving a gun have been edited out. They even removed the scene where the protagonist’s father chucks him out of the house threw a plate glass window. Well, it was before the watershed and Mary Whitehouse was still in post as President of the National Viewers and Listeners Association to be fair.

Sinéad O’Connor is still at No 1 with “Nothing Compares 2 U” and this week it’s the video that TOTP uses rather than her in studio performance. The promo won three Moonmen at the 1990 MTV Video Music Awards for Video of the Year (O’Connor became the first female artist to be awarded with it), Best Female Video and Best Post-Modern Video.

With all the accolades though inevitably came the piss takes. This one is courtesy of Gina Riley on Australian comedy show Fast Forward…

The play out song this week is “The King And Queen Of America” by Eurythmics. I’m kind of surprised this video got a second airing considering it peaked at a lowly No 29 and had already been shown last week but it did go up five places in the Top 40 that week which seemed to be the criteria for inclusion on the show at the time (see also Skid Row and The Beloved earlier).

Apparently, the 7″ single was issued in an incorrect sleeve initially and had to be withdrawn on the day it went on sale. Those copies that slipped through the net have become one of the most collectable Eurythmics items and command around £1000 resell price. Sort of their version of the A&M release of The Sex Pistols’ “God Save The Queen” though not quite as desirable – a copy of that collectible sold for £13,000 at auction in 2019.

For posterity’s sake I include the chart rundown below:

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

Order of appearance	Artist	Song	Did I Buy it?
1	Yell!	Instant Replay	NO!
2	Janet Jackson	Come Back To Me	Nah
3	Beats International	Dub Be Good To Me	No but my wife had their album
4	Del Amitri	Nothing Ever Happens	No but it’s on a Q magazine compilation album I bought
5	Lisa Stansfield	Live Together	Nope
6	The Beloved	Hello	Yes! I did buy this one! The cassette single no less!
7	Phil Collins	I Wish It Would Rain Down	As if
8	Skid Row	18 And Life	Haddaway and shite
9	Sinéad’ O’Connor	Nothing Compares 2 U	Don’t think so
10	Eurythmics	The King And Queen Of America	That’s a no

Disclaimer

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

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000nnyn/top-of-the-pops-08021990

I make no claim to the rights of this show and all ownership and contents including logos and graphics belongs totally to the BBC or copyright holder(s).

All opinions on the music and artists featured are my own. Sorry if you don’t agree.

Some bedtime reading?

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

TOTP 02 FEB 1990

Posted on October 27, 2020 by 80stastic

We’ve come through January 1990 here at TOTP Rewind and by general consensus that was one shitty month. When BBC4 were showing the TOTP repeats of the tail end of 1989 back in the Summer, there was a clamour on Twitter for the 80s to be consigned to the dustbin and for the sweet release of the 90s to swoop in and rescue us. Yeah, it hasn’t quite worked out like that yet I would wager. So far we’ve had a truck load full of nasty Italo house tunes, the New Kids On The Block phenomenon go into overdrive and ..erm…Fish! OK, that’s not absolutely everyone we’ve seen so far but you get my drift. Surely February will be better?

Well, early signs are not good as tonight’s presenter is well known Tory supporter Bruno Brookes who welcomes us to another “spondicious” TOTP. Spondicious? Is that a word? Well, according to the online Urban Dictionary it is and means awesome, brilliant, amazing, ace and was used in the Midlands in the 80s. Whoa! Hold on there! I’m from the Midlands and grew up there in the 80s and I have never said that word in my life! Wait, where’s Brookes from?

*checks internet*

…hmm. Well he was born in Stoke and went to school in Newcastle-Under- Lyme in Staffordshire so yes, he is a Midlander but in an online list of 51 words and phrases you only know if you are from Stoke-on-Trent, spondicious is nowhere to be seen. I’m not convinced.

On with the music though and here comes Lonnie Gordon to kick off the show with her S/A/W penned hit “Happenin’ All Over Again”. This was Lonnie’s biggest hit by far peaking at No 4 (she had two further Top 40 entries in ’91 and ’95). There was an album as well called “If I Have to Stand Alone” but it only got a limited release in parts of Europe, Japan and Australia but curiously it was never released in the UK. However, as ever, it’s Cherry Red Records to the rescue as they gave it the special edition reissue treatment in 2009! In the promotional blurb for the album, Cherry Red state:

“If I Have To Stand Alone” is one of three sought-after albums from the Stock Aitken Waterman / PWL Hit Factory to be given a simultaneous Special Edition release on Cherry Pop, along with Mandy Smith – “Mandy” and Princess – “Princess”

WTF?! Mandy Smith’s album? Sought after? Why not go the whole hog and call it ‘spondicious’ while you’re at it?!

Back to Bruno who’s up on the studio bridge with a gaggle of young girls from the audience surrounding him as he prepares to do the next link. Bruno opens with:

“I’d just like to say that all these girls are at least six foot tall“

Jeeze! I thought for one, horrifying spilt second he was going to say ‘All these girls at least sixteen’! Thankfully he was only making a comment about his diminutive size and nothing of a more salacious nature. When he does get around to introducing the next act it’s Wreckx-n-Effect with “Juicy”. So what was their name all about? According to band member Aquil (Aquil?) Davidson it means “Making things happen, gettin’ busy”. Of course, over here in the UK, ‘gettin’ busy’ meant something altogether different…

Back to those New Jack Swingers Wreckx-n-Effect though and the lyrics to their hit single were more gettin’ jiggy than gettin’ busy…

Look a there Juicy is a cutie, she has nice legs and a big booty

Have no fear ’cause Juicy is here, she said you can lick me everywhere

Pure filth! You’d never get that sort of smut with Sooty! Actually, what would you get if you crossed New Jack Swing with the Sooty Show? New Jack Sweep? Sue Jack Swing? I’ll stop now.

More dodginess from Brooke’s next as he allows a female member of the studio audience to fondle his frankly vile looking tie! “You should be watching the band not studying my tie” he protests too much.

The next band’s TOTP performance was the source of a full three page feature in Smash Hits magazine. In said article, And Why Not? (for it is they) state that for the record, they think that Stock, Aitken and Waterman are crap. Must have been a bit awkward being on the same show as Lonnie Gordon and her S/A/W produced song then. Apparently they were in dressing room No 24 whilst Lonnie was just down the corridor in No 31. Anyway, despite going through the usual experience of TOTP debutants – admitting that everything is so much smaller than it looks on TV and being bored waiting around for hours before they get their three and a half minutes slot – the boys look like they enjoyed their moment, jumping around and grinning like good ‘uns. Their tune “The Face” isn’t bad either with its jerky bass line and choppy guitar licks – they could have dropped the Bros style grunting in places though. There would be one more very minor Top 40 hit and one flop from And Why Not? before they left the pop music world to it.

The case of US singer Sybil is a curious one. She managed to rack up five Top 40 hits in the UK including three Top Tenners and yet three of those songs were cover versions. Not only that, two of them were written by the same song writing team and then made famous by the same singer! Yes, after she scored a No 19 hit in late ’89 with the Bacharach and David tune “Don’t Make Me Over” originally recorded by Dionne Warwick, she then repeated the trick for her next single when she released a cover of the duo’s “Walk On By” again, a song best known for being sung by Dionne Warwick. There have, of course, been numerous cover versions of the song down the years by artists as disparate as Gloria Gaynor to The Stranglers and indeed, it would be continued to be covered throughout the 90s and into the new millennium by Gabrielle, Cyndi Lauper and Seal. For me, Sybil’s take on it is one of the weakest. It’s not that she couldn’t sing the thing, more a case of a clunky production that lost all the soul of the original and didn’t age well to my ears.

Sybil would return in 1993 with yet another cover and the biggest hit of her career, this time of the old Harold Melvin & The Bluenotes song “The Love I Lost”, which she took to No 3 in the charts. Meanwhile, back in 1990, her treatment of “Walk On By” would peak at No 6.

Three Breakers next starting with Birdland who I had completely forgotten about until now. These Brummie indie kids were given that poisoned chalice of the title of being ‘the next big thing’ by the music press but all that expectation quickly dissolved when they were hamstrung by delays to the release of their debut album. Initially their fiery brand of high octane, post punk noise and chaotic live gigs had the press drooling. Assisted by their strident Andy Warhol homage image, they came over like a peroxide blonde Ramones meets The Jesus And Mary Chain. Despite their first four single releases topping the indie charts between ’89 and ’90 (including this mainstream breakthrough track “Sleep With Me”), a delay that meant the album was not released until ’91 saw all momentum lost and it struggled to a peak of No 44. Their plight is nicely summed up by band members and brothers Ron and Lee Vincent in a recent Von Pip Musical Exptress (VPME) website interview in which they were asked:

What five words would best sum up Birdland’s career in the late 80’s early 90’s?

Their replies were:

ROB : Speed/chaos/pop/blonde/noise

LEE: Well ‘short’ has to be one of them!!

A great track next which shows that quirky pop doesn’t have to mean novelty song. Having finally scored a Top 40 hit the previous year with dance cross over “The Sun Rising”, The Beloved followed it up with “Hello”, a song just about as far removed from its Lionel Richie namesake as it’s possible to be. Essentially a list song, like Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start The Fire”, comprising an eclectic mixture of names of both real and fictitious people, it hooked me in immediately. Even now, I like the idea that the names chosen weren’t all mega famous identities and indeed many of them would requite lengthy explanation to today’s youth as to who they actually were/are. Billy Corkhill? Vince Hilaire? I’m guessing your average 18 year old today wouldn’t have a clue. There was also something about the order in which Jon Marsh sang the names that intrigued. I think it was probably just the alliteration and rhyming in retrospect:

“Little Richard, Little Nell, Willy Wonka, William Tell”

“Billy Corkhill, Vince Hilaire, Freddy Flintstone, Fred Astaire“

If you watch the video closely, when Marsh name checks Jeffrey Archer, he sneaks in a ‘wanker’ gesture into his dance moves such was the band’s revulsion at Archer as, in their own words, “the epitome of slimeball Tory liar”. Well played Jon. “Hello” seemed to have much more of a conventional pop song structure to me than “The Sun Rising” which was probably another reason why I was drawn in and ultimately bought it – I was always more of a pop kid than a dance head. “Hello” peaked at No 19 making it the band’s joint second biggest hit ever.

By the start of the new decade, Eurythmics had been around for ten whole years and had released eight albums in that time but they were nearing the end of their time together, at least the first phase of it. This single, “The King and Queen of America”, was the third to be taken from their No 1 album “We Too Are One” but there would be only one more single release (the glorious “Angel”) this year before the duo took just about the rest of the decade off. The constant recording and touring schedule had created tensions between and Annie and Dave and although there was no official split, they went on hiatus until reforming in late 1999 for the “Peace” album.

I hesitate to say this but possibly the video to this one is more interesting than the actual song with Annie and Dave playing multiple characters such as cheerleaders, Mickey and Minnie Mouse, game show hosts and TV evangelists to visualise the song’s message of taking a swipe at the concept of the American Dream. Unsurprisingly, it was never released in the US as a single.

Despite “We Too Are One” being the second No 1 album of their career, the singles from it all under performed:

Title	Peak chart position
Revival	26
Don’t Ask Me Why	25
The King and Queen of America	29
Angel	23

Maybe, the timing of that career hiatus was right after all.

Meanwhile, back in the studio, we find another indie guitar band (that’s two on the same show following Birdland in the Breakers before – have that house music!) in House Of Love. I knew of these guys from having bought the incredibly pretentious “The Hit List” compilation album fronted by Mark Goodier with its ‘for the discerning music lover‘ tagline. It included one of the band’s previous singles “I Don’t Know Why I Love You” in its track listing which had peaked at No 41 in ’89 (one of two successive singles to do so that year for the band – how’s your luck?). “Shine On” would break that particular hoodoo when it crashed into the charts on its way to a peak of No 20. It was actually a new version of their original debut from ’87 having been signed to major label Fontana who didn’t seem to ‘get’ their latest addition to their stable and desperately wanted a hit which was at odds with the creative aspirations of the band.

Lead singer Guy Chadwick, who always seemed to be trying morph into Mark E Smith to me, would come to regard signing with Fontana as the worst mistake in the band’s career. Unbelievably, Chadwick is now 64 meaning he was already 34 at the time of this performance. House Of Love limped on for another couple of years before splitting in ’93 and ultimately reforming in ’03.

Back to the videos now and we find Mantronix with “Got To Have Your Love”. Mr Mantronix’s real name is Kurtis Khaleel but he changed it to Kurtis Mantronik which then became the inspiration for his dance act’s name when he replaced the ‘k’ with an ‘x’. Why? Well, according to Kurtis himself (in a Smash Hits interview) it was because:

“Mantronix just sounds cooler. Man…and er, tronix“.

Hmm. Not sure that we’re dealing with an intellectual heavyweight here. What else did we find out about him in the interview? Well, he had just two hobbies which were:

“Music, music, music. And Girls“

Again I say hmm. Asked if he was a sophisticated type he replied:

“In some ways. Hehe. Ummm, um like when it comes to when you’re in a one-to-one situation with the the opposite sex“

I see…and his ideal woman?

“Someone that understands me, all my moods because I’m a very moody person. Um, she’d be basically independent. If I said ‘naff off she’d leave and come back the next day or whatever because she’d know that I don’t really mean it. Like I said before – music, music and girls…so she’d have to accept that.”

Does he have a girlfriend?

“No”

No further questions m’lud. “Got To Have Your Love” peaked at No 4.

Back to Bruno Brookes now who reveals that the next song is about one of his heroes. Really? Who could that be then? Nelson Mandela perhaps? Martin Luther King maybe? Who is it Bruno? Well it is of course…. Jesse James? Jesse James?! The notorious outlaw and murderer? The Jesse James who took part in a train robbery in a Ku Klux Clan mask? That Jesse James? He’s your hero Brookes? OK, there is a train of thought that depicts James as a hero, an American Robin Hood, standing up against corporations in defence of the small farmer, robbing from the rich and giving to the poor. Wikipedia, however, advises though that there is no evidence that he shared the loot of his robberies with anyone other than his gang members. Think your hero worship of Jesse James is shot down in flames Bruno. Oh well, at least he didn’t say Margaret Thatcher.

Anyway, the source of all this Jesse James discussion is of course Cher and her single “Just Like Jesse James”. The second track lifted from her “Heart Of Stone” album, it was very much a reflection of the soft rock direction that Cher had gone in. It was written by AOR songwriters in chief Desmond Child and Diane Warren who had provided huge hits for the likes of Bon Jovi, Aerosmith and Starship so you could see why Cher would want to record one of their compositions. After admitting that I had bought Cher’s previous single “If I Could Turn Back Time” in my 80s blog, I am pleased and relieved to announce that I kept my money firmly in my pocket when it came to this one. “Just Like Jesse James” peaked at No 11.

From Mantronix earlier to Technotronic now and their single “Get Up! (Before the Night Is Over)“. The brain child of producer Jo Bogaert, what was the origin behind this band name? Here’s @TOTPFacts with the answer:

Jo Bogaert says the name Technotronic was inspired by Frippertronics, a tape-loop system used by King Crimson guitarist Robert Fripp. "That sounded cool. I applied the suffix of the genre I was doing, techno, to tronic." #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) October 23, 2020

Oh, it’s another ‘it sounded cool’ moment as per Mantronix. Look, I’ve never been in a band so have never been through the whole band name saga but I’m guessing the idea is to come up with a cool sounding moniker for your group? What’s that Mr McAloon? Prefab Sprout? Ok – right you are. As I say, I’ve never been through it.

Back to Technotronic and I should point out that this single featured Ya Kid K who wrote the lyrics and sang vocals on their previous mega hit “Pump Up The Jam” although they drafted in some model with ultra-blue lipstick to do the visuals for the video and promotion. This, I believe, is yer actual Ya Kid K in this performance though. Her real name is Manuela Barbara Kamosi Moaso Djogi with the ‘Kamosi’ (meaning ‘the only one’) part informing the ‘K’ bit of her stage name. She is not to be confused with Leila K of Rob’n’Raz featuring Leila K fame. What is it with all the ‘K’s? Someone should have pointed the trend out to Kurtis Mantronik – he really should have stuck with the ‘k’ rather than dropping it for an ‘x’. That trademark Technotronic sound would eat up the charts in 1990 with this single reaching No 2 and a further three singles becoming chart hits including two Top 10s.

The third different No 1 in three weeks now as Sinéad O’Connor makes it to the top with “Nothing Compares 2 U”. Is it fair to say that, despite her clear musical talent, the first thing that comes to mind when you think of Sinéad isn’t actually her music? How many of her songs could you name apart from “Nothing Compares 2 U”? I’ve got “The Emperor’s New Clothes” (which was the follow up), that song she did with Jah Wobble (“Visions of You”) and I think she did a cover of “Don’t Cry for Me Argentina”. Apart from that….Sadly I think her back catalogue is over shadowed by the controversies that seem to have followed her around for her whole career from tearing up photos of The Pope on Saturday Night Live to Tweets about non-Muslims. It’s certainly been a life lived.

Whilst commenting on Megadeth in a recent post, I stated that I was never not dumbfounded by the amount of useless heavy metal acts that seemed to get so much chart action in these TOTP repeats. I also name checked Anthrax, W.A.S.P and Mötley Crüe. Well add another to the list for here come Skid Row with “18 And Life”. This lot of New Jersey rockers were fronted by Sebastian Bach whose real name was Sebastian Bierk – oh make your own jokes up….

Order of appearance	Artist	Song	Did I Buy it?
1	Lonnie Gordon	Happenin’ All Over Again	Nah
2	Wreckx-n-Effect	Juicy	Nope
3	And Why Not?	The Face	No but my wife had their album
4	Sybil	Walk On By	No
5	Birdland	Sleep With Me	I did not
6	The Beloved	Hello	Yes! I did buy this one! The cassette single no less!
7	Eurythmics	The King And Queen Of America	That’s a no
8	House Of Love	Shine On	No but I had their previous single on that Hit List album
9	Mantronix	Got To Have Your Love	Definitely not
10	Cher	Just Like Jesse James	No – phew!
11	Technotronic featuring Ya Kid K	Get Up! (Before The Night Is Over)	Obviously not
12	Sinéad’ O’Connor	Nothing Compares 2 U	Don’t think so
13	Skid Row	18 And Life	Hadaway and shite

Disclaimer

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000nnyl/top-of-the-pops-02021990

I make no claim to the rights of this show and all ownership and contents including logos and graphics belongs totally to the BBC or copyright holder(s).

All opinions on the music and artists featured are my own. Sorry if you don’t agree.

Some bedtime reading?

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

TOTP 26 JAN 1990

Posted on October 22, 2020 by 80stastic

OK, a few things about this particular TOTP show. Firstly, it was broadcast on a Friday rather than its usual Thursday slot due to the BBC’s coverage of the Commonwealth Games. I have zero recall of this festival of sporting endeavours but Wikipedia tells me that the opening ceremony had been on the Wednesday of this week but I’m not sure which specific event was deemed unmissable TV viewing on the Thursday and required that TOTP be shunted across the broadcast schedule.

Drum ‘n’ bass legend
Goldie wanted to get a kiwi bird as a pet
but couldn’t find one in the ‘jungle’. Soz!

Incidentally, the mascot for the games was called Goldie – no, not the DJ and musician of Metalheadz fame but rather a kiwi bird.

Secondly, the show is timed at 33 minutes long and includes 13 acts! Bastards! This is going to take me ages to write up! Thirdly, well here’s @TOTPFacts with the third point of note:

This was the final occasion (excluding Christmas editions) where two hosts were paired up to host a #TOTP until the “Year Zero” revamp of October 1991. Until then this presenting roster of Mayo, Brambles, Campbell, Davies, Brookes, Goodier and Turner would remain stable.
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) October 16, 2020

Well, there are pros and cons to this I feel. No duos might mean no more poorly scripted ‘comedy’ exchanges between presenters which is a good thing. However, there are at least three names on that list who I cannot abide (I’ll let you work out for yourselves who they are) and the thought of them cropping up on a regular basis for almost the whole of the next two years is a harrowing thought.

On with the show then and somewhere in a darkened laboratory, the evil professors of manufactured pop are brewing another concoction to torment the nation with. This particular experiment seemed to have combined the DNA of Big Fun with London Boys and created a two headed monster called Yell! Who on earth were these two berks?! Well, they were called Daniel James (not the Man Utd footballer clearly) and Paul Varney (not Reg’s lad surely?). Or were they? You see, Daniel James also went under the name of Colin Heywood. Oh, he was also an actor – must have been a stage name thing. Anyway, they were signed to Fanfare Records by Simon Cowell (he had to have something to do with this monstrosity didn’t he?) and they had immediate success with their cover of the Dan Hartman hit “Instant Replay”. Quite why we needed another version of this disco stomper in a cold, bleak January I’m not sure. I wonder if including the exclamation mark after their name Wham! style was Cowell’s idea?

Despite all the studio audience…erm…yelling and squealing on display here, the duo never got to be the next teen sensation they clearly hoped to be. A further two single releases (including another cover version, this time of Average White Band’s “Let’s Go Round Again”) both flopped spectacularly and Yell! disappeared into a whisper. James went back to acting whilst Varney wrote the UK’s 1999 Eurovision entry “Say It Again” by Precious which made No 6 in the chart, a whole four places higher than his own hit a decade earlier. It was also considerably more successful than his ex bandmate James’ excursion into Eurovision who came sixth in the 1986 Song For Europe competition.

Well we can slag TOTP off as much as we want (and many of us do on Twitter) but you can’t say the show wasn’t diverse. From Yell! to Public Enemy. It’s quite a leap. The second single taken from the “Fear Of A Black Planet” album, there is so much going on in this extraordinary noise that is “Welcome To The Terrodome” assaulting your senses that it’s hard to break it down. One of the things I did pick out listening back to this was the Mikey Dread sample from “Operator’s Choice” that The Soup Dragons would also use to great effect on their minor hit “Mother Universe” (which I bought) later in the year. There’s also Flavor Flav quoting bits of Al Pacino dialogue from the film Scarface and some shuddering guitar riffs – it’s a heady brew and I felt exhausted by the end if it. And that song title? Nothing to do with Frankie Goes To Hollywood nor Samuel Coleridge – here’s @TOTPFacts again with the origin story…

Chuck D on "Welcome To the Terrordome": "What does it mean? It means the 1990s are coming. If we as a people do the right thing we'll be all right, if we do the wrong thing the black situation is out of here at the end of the decade…" #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) October 16, 2020

…prophetic words indeed.

“Welcome To The Terrodome” peaked at No 18.

Another of those debut performances that Simon Mayo promised us at the top of the show now as Del Amitri make their bow. I have to admit I’d never come across this lot before this point but they had actually been in existence since 1985 and had already released one unsuccessful album. Everything was to change for the band with the release of the almost ironically named single “Nothing Ever Happens” from their second album “Waking Hours” (that’s ‘waking’ not ‘working’ Jakki Brambles). Peaking at No 11 it would be their biggest ever hit which was a surprise to me given that they’ve had 15 Top 40 UK chart singles.

This gentle, folky song seemed very much at odds with the rest of the homogeneous dance tunes – infested charts to me and was probably one of the reasons that I liked it. Lead singer and group founder Justin Currie does a much better explanation of the song than I ever could in this performance of it in the brilliant BBC4 programme Songwriters’ Circle…

I recall hearing Steve Wright play the song on his then Radio 1 show and making some deeply unfunny Only Fools And Horses inspired comment about the band’s name afterwards. It went along the lines of:

“Del Amitri there. E’s alright ain’t he old Del”

According to Wikipedia, the band name is actually:

“a bastardisation of the name of a film producer who appeared in the closing credits of a film Currie saw in 1979 – “probably Dimitri-something, but we couldn’t remember… so eventually through osmosis or maybe Chinese Whispers ‘Dimitri’ became ‘Del Amitri’.”

So now you know Steve Wright. OK?

Three Breakers now starting with Lonnie Gordon and “Happenin’ All Over Again”. Question: When is a Donna Summer song not a Donna Summer song? Answer: When Donna refuses to record it because she has fallen out with its writers Stock, Aitken and Waterman and it’s given to someone else. That someone else was of course Lonnie (God I so keep wanting to type Donegan) Gordon. Listening back to it, you could really hear Donna recording this but Lonnie got the glory (it was Single of the Fortnight in Smash Hits magazine!) and took this Italo House infused S/A/W tune all the way to No 4.

It was covered eight years later by…ahem…Tracie from Coronation Street…

Who? Wreckx-n-Effect? No – rack up another score in the blogger’s- memory-fails-him-again tally. Apparently they were New Jack Swingers from Harlem and they would go onto have a No 2 record in the US with the rather quaintly entitled “Rump Shaker” (only kept off the top spot by the all conquering success of Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You”) but I don’t remember that one either. Anyway, that’s all a couple of years down the road. In the right here, right now (i.e. 1990) they have a middling hit with “Juicy”. I’m assuming I won’t know this either….

*clicks play on the video below*

…well part of it was familiar so I looked it up and it samples “Juicy Fruit” by M’Tume which I do remember from the charts of 1983. No wonder it sounded familiar. Wreckx-n-Effect’s version peaked at No 29 over here, five places higher than M’Tume’s original which somehow seems wrong to me.

The final Breaker this week is “The Face” by And Why Not? (try saying that band name without picturing Barry Norman sat in a chair slyly slagging off some film or other -impossible). This lot’s brand of reggae-tinged pop had them briefly hailed as the next big thing but despite three Top 40 hits (“The Face” was the biggest peaking at No 13) and support slots with UB40 and Transvision Vamp, it never quite happened for the Brummie trio. Supposedly, Wendy James fancied one of them (according to Smash Hits magazine anyway). Not sure that particular endorsement helped their cause.

You never hear them mentioned at all nowadays, not even in these nostalgia-fuelled times of reunion tours and deluxe box set album reissues. Even specialist reissue label Cherry Red hasn’t picked up the rights on their only album “Move Your Skin”. My wife had a copy back in the day – I’ll ask her if she still has it if they want to borrow it!

All of this week’s Breakers will be be back as the first three acts of next week’s TOTP.

Oh god! Double cringe moment incoming. As the camera cuts back to Jakki Brambles it catches her dancing to And Why Not? which seems to involve some sort of half-hearted, squawking chicken move. She compounds this by introducing the next act F.P.I. Project by referencing the fact that their single “Goin’ Back To My Roots” was originally a hit for Odyssey in 1981. “Here it is 1990 stylee…” she advises. Stylee?! Stylee Jakki?! God, did we really use that expression back then? Surely nobody still trots that one out today do they?

This being the third time F.P.I. Project have been on the show, I’ve run out of things to say about them. OK, look nine years on from this, they released “Goin’ Back To My Roots” again. How did it fare compared to the No 9 peak of its 1990 counterpart? It spent one week on the UK charts at No 96. I know there were a lot of ‘nines’ in those last two sentences but will that do? Who said ‘Nein’?

The F.P.I. Project performance was clearly just footage from a previous show slotted into the current one (i.e. they weren’t actually there in the studio that week) . The cut from that clip back to Simon Mayo clearly takes him by surprise and he tries to style (or is that stylee?) it out by making some snidey remark about TOTP cameramen before introducing yet another track that must have passed me by at the time. “I’ll Be Good to You” by Quincy Jones and featuring the vocal talents of Chaka Khan and Ray Charles is the track in question.

Taken from Quincy’s platinum selling and multiple grammy winning “Back On The Block” album, it was originally a hit in 1976 by R’n’B duo The Brothers Johnson with Jones on production duties. Thirteen years later, he returned to it and got Ray Charles and Chaka Khan to do the vocals. Look, I know everyone involved in this song are /were musical legends but having listened to it today, I just can’t warm to it. Completely passes me by. This fact didn’t pass me by though. Ray Charles fathered 12 children by 10 different women in his lifetime – and we thought Boris Johnson had form in this area!

Here now to hammer home the feeling of having the January blues is Phil Collins. Some might say that Phil’s presence alone would be enough to bring you down but just to make sure there’s no escape from the melancholy he’s singing a song called “I Wish It Would Rain Down”. The second single to be lifted from his ridiculously successful “…But Seriously” album, it would return Collins to the Top 10 in the UK but was even more successful across the pond where it went Top 3 in the US and was the best selling single of the year in Canada!

Phil looks as sweaty as ever under the studio lights in this performance but I’m more interested in his backing band. Jakki Brambles tells us that Eric Clapton performs guitar on the track in her intro but is that actually ‘God’ up there on stage behind Phil? After much squinting at the screen, I don’t believe it is but it seems that they deliberately got a lookalike in to fool us! Also, check out Maharishi Mahesh Yogi on bass!

I thought “I Wish It Would Rain Down” was marginally better than previous single “Another Day In Paradise” but that’s not saying much – they’re both shite.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yseNilZX3_I

Who came first then? Adamski? Normski? Chelski?! Well, I think it was Normski who fronted BBC’s DEF II programming from 1988 to 1994 closely followed by Adamski with this his first hit single, “N-R-G”. The Chelski term didn’t come into existence until 2003 when my beloved Chelsea FC were taken over by Russian billionaire businessman Roman Abramovich. I still can’t stand the term to this day.

Anyway, here’s Adamski making his TOTP debut as Simon Mayo advises and according to The Story Of 1990 TOTP documentary, the girl dancers on stage with him were completely the producers idea and Adamski hated it. The rasta guy though was his flat mate (one Daddy Chester) but his dancing alone was judged to be inadequate. This highlights the problem that TOTP had with the flood of dance tunes making the charts back then. Just what did you do when it came to a studio performance of the track? The programme really struggled to showcase this new genre.

On her way to pop’s summit is Sinéad O’Connor with her Prince cover “Nothing Compares 2 U”. Despite having had a shaved head as early as 1988 when she even appeared on TOTP to perform “Mandinka” with that hairstyle, I recall there being quite a bit of press about it again in 1990. Maybe she was just more mainstream this time, reaching elements of the nation that she hadn’t previously with this huge hit thereby promoting this fascination with her looks. According to Wikipedia, her shaved head was initially an assertion against traditional views of women but having decided to grow it back years later, she lopped it all off again after being mistaken for Enya!

T’KNOB have gone! Yes, the new pretenders to pop’s throne have been deposed by Princess Kylie whose cover of “Tears On My Pillow” has risen to the top after just two weeks. It won’t last long though as she’ll be dethroned next week by Sinéad O’Connor (not sure of her status in pop’s royal family). Of the three Kylie Minogue singles released in 1990, “Tears On My Pillow” was easily the weakest but then the other two, “Better The Devil You Know” and “Step Back In Time”, are for me possibly her two greatest tunes.

“Tears On My Pillow” was included on the soundtrack to The Delinquents in which Kylie starred and which was the most successful Australian film of 1990 in Australia. Reading that statement back, was that much of an achievement? By comparison, it was the 17th highest grossing film of the year in the UK. Draw your own conclusions.

Finally we get to the thirteenth and final song of the night and guess what? It’s another dance track I can’t recall at all. Gino Latino anyone? Not an Italian TV chef but a DJ (real name Lorenzo Cherubini), “Welcome” was his only UK Top 40 hit (as far as I can tell) and it peaked at No 17. Check this out though. He also went under the pseudonym of Jovanotti and look at this tweet I found on a @TOTPFacts thread:

Cherubini also worked in TV as Jovanotti and was a presenter on the Janet Street-Porter masterminded DEF II strand on BBC2 (New Order composed the closing music for DEF II magazine show Reportage – which they later used for ‘World In Motion’)
— Angus Teee (@AngusTeee) October 16, 2020

I promise you I had no idea about any of this when I started going on about Normski earlier!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7w9CaYcjnJ4

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

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBrgIoMg0Z4

Order of appearance	Artist	Song	Did I Buy it?
1	Yell!	Instant Replay	NO!
2	Public Enemy	Welcome To The Terrordome	I did not
3	Del Amitri	Nothing Ever Happens	Not the single but it’s on my Greatest Hits CD of theirs
4	Lonnie Gordon	Happenin’ All Over Again	Nah
5	Wreckx-n-Effect	Juicy	Nope
6	And Why Not?	The Face	No but my wife had their album
7	The FPI Project	Going Back To My Roots	No
8	Quincy Jones featuring Chaka Khan and Ray Charles	I’ll Be Good To You	Buy it? I didn’t even remember it
9	Phil Collins	I Wish It Would Rain Down	As if
10	Adamski	N-R-G	N-O-P-E
11	Sinéad’ O’Connor	Nothing Compares 2 U	Don’t think so
12	Kylie Minogue	Tears On My Pillow	No
13	Gina Latino	Welcome	Goodbye more like – no

Disclaimer

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000ng7c/top-of-the-pops-26011990

I make no claim to the rights of this show and all ownership and contents including logos and graphics belongs totally to the BBC or copyright holder(s).

All opinions on the music and artists featured are my own. Sorry if you don’t agree.

Some bedtime reading?

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

TOTP 18 JAN 1990

Posted on October 20, 2020 by 80stastic

We’re three weeks into 1990 and I have the deep January blues. I am unemployed, living back at my family home in Worcester and my girlfriend lives 170 miles away in Hull. I haven’t worked since my temporary retail job at Debenhams finished on Christmas Eve so I have no money and my social life is non existent. In terms of things to look forward to, it’s confined to watching my beloved Chelsea make a rare TV appearance (they weren’t considered one of the big six clubs back then) in a live match* screened on ITV some four days earlier. I have no career plans, I am signing on and having to go to the DSS Job Club to be able to make use of free stamps to make applications for positions I don’t want and won’t get anyway. I am floundering.

* We scraped a 1-1 draw with Sheffield Wednesday. It wasn’t great.

I’m guessing that I must have been relying heavily on music at the time to keep me going and give me a lift. No doubt TOTP would have been part of my weekly musical intake. This particular show have better been good…

…as with last week’s TOTP, the opening act on the show were also the closing turn on the previous episode. I wrote in the last post that I wasn’t sure that had ever happened before and yet here is the same phenomenon the very next week! Said opening act are Halo James who host Nicky Campbell describes as a “potent mix of teen appeal and genuine talent”. As ever with the snarky Campbell, you can’t quite tell if he’s taking the piss royally or on the level.

“Could Have Told You So” was the band’s only hit despite being tipped for greatness at the time and I also commented in the last post that they were no better than the likes of Breathe (of “Hands To Heaven” fame) to my ears with their brand of sophisto -pop. Since writing that, I have discovered that their one and only album (“Witness”) was produced by respected record producer Bob Sargeant – whose credits include Haircut 100, The Beat, The Buzzcocks, Motorhead, Dexys Midnight Runners and….yep….Breathe. QED!

Lead singer Christian James clearly decided to mark his debut TOTP performance here by wearing the most god awful multi coloured jacket that reminds me of one of Irish easy listening crooner Val Doonican’s comfy sweaters. Just vile.

Halo James were destined to be one hit wonders, cursed by being a band out of time (their brand of sophisto -pop had long since bitten the dust) and simultaneously a marketing dilemma. Were they a teen band or a credible artist? Indeed Campbell’s intro seems to hint at this dichotomy. However, if “Could Have Told You So” still floats your boat then, as with seemingly every album ever released these days, there is a special edition of “Witness” available including eight (!) bonus tracks.

Asked to name a hit by Lil’ Louis I would be able to respond confidently with “French Kiss” but prodded for a second….I’d dry up completely. And yet there was a second hit and here it is in “I Called U (But You Weren’t There)” and despite my initial lack of recollection, on hearing this back the titular spoken line, in that weird, strung out drawl was instantly familiar. It’s actually almost a reverse of the old Oran ‘Juice’ Jones song “The Rain” except this time the protagonist is the woman who follows Louis in her blue car to see what the bounder was up to.

For this track Louis (real name Marvin Burns) rebranded himself as Lil Louis & the World and the single reached No 16. In fact, it turns out that there was a third hit for Lil’ (as his mum calls him) when fellow US DJ and producer Josh Wink released a track called “How’s Your Evening So Far?” which heavily sampled “French Kiss” in 2000 and took it to No 23 in the UK charts. On a side note, Josh Wink made one of the few tracks that actually give me the jitters and makes me feel anxious and sweaty every time I hear it in “Higher State of Consciousness”. The times the staff in Our Price Stockport used to put this over the shop stereo back in the mid 90s just to see my reaction. Cruel it was.

Martika is up next with a song I really don’t recall at all called “More Than You Know”. This was the third single released from her debut LP following the success of “Toy Soldiers” and “I Feel The Earth Move” and it’s easily the weakest of the three. Apparently it was actually her first single released in the US where it became a No 18 Billboard Hot 100 hit so it was deemed worthy of a run out over here. Her record label Sony really shouldn’t have bothered. It sounds like something Debbie Gibson might have dashed off sat on the toilet during a particularly lengthy shit. Martika even pinches Debbie’s ‘aah, aah’ sighs from “Only In My Dreams”.

Somehow “More Than You Know” scrambled all the way to No 15 in the UK and Martika would return to our charts some eighteen months later with a much more mature sound following her collaboration with Prince on “Love… Thy Will Be Done”.

Back to Nicky Campbell who furnishes us with the lamest of jokes about house booms before introducing one of the seemingly never ending conveyor belt of Italian house acts on the scene at the time in the 49ers.

We’ve already seen this one on the show before and I have very little else left to say about it…except this. Ever wondered what it is the vocalist is actually singing in the chorus to “Touch Me”? It always sounded like ‘Pick a pear and a planet’ to me but apparently the lyrics are actually ‘People can’t understand it’. If you want to know more about the composition of “Touch Me”, here’s @TOTPFacts but word of warning, the Aretha Franklin video is a bit creepy….

Large parts of the vocals in 49ers' "Touch Me" are sampled from "Rock-A-Lott" by Aretha Franklin https://t.co/XFx2ZwNs2q, while the chorus line is sampled from "Touch Me" by Alisha Warren https://t.co/lzujiTMVtM. #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) October 16, 2020

At the end of the 49ers video, we cut back to Campbell in the studio and there’s what appears to be a very young Martine McCutcheon stood behind him as he links to the next act. She’s got a big frizzy perm but it doesn’t half look like her. It couldn’t be could it?

For the love of God….I’m never not dumbfounded by the amount of useless heavy metal acts that seemed to get so much chart action in these TOTP repeats. From Anthrax all the way through to W.A.S.P via Mötley Crüe, all horrible and here’s another bunch of berks in Megadeth. Somehow these LA thrash metalloids racked up seven hit singles in the UK Top 40 between 1990 and 1994 and “No More Mr Nice Guy” was the first. This one wasn’t even their own song but a cover of the old Alice Cooper track which they recorded for the soundtrack of the Wes Craven slasher flick Shocker.

Looking through the band’s discography, I recognise some of their album titles (and indeed covers) from my years at Our Price but mainly for how dumb they sound. The evidence m’lud…

“Peace Sells… but Who’s Buying?”
“Rust in Peace”
“So Far, So Good… So What!”

All the band members seem to have Spinal Tap names as well like Dave Mustaine, David Ellefson, Dirk Verbeuren and Kiko Loureiro. Incredibly, they do seem be genuine and not stage names. Look, I’m sure all of these types of bands have very loyal fan bases who swear by them but …sod it…it’s my blog so “No More Mr Nice Guy” from me… I say they’re shite.

The Breakers are back! Yes, after being ditched in the first two shows of the new decade and seemingly consigned to the TOTP dustbin, the section is back albeit with only two entries in it. The first is “Inner City Mama” by Neneh Cherry. I’d completely forgotten (if indeed I ever knew at all) that there was a fourth single released from Neneh’s “Raw Like Sushi” album but here it is. Apparently it was only released in Europe and New Zealand with the track “Heart” chosen for the US and Australian territories. Why would you need two different tracks to be released in Australia and New Zealand? Seems a bit odd to me that.

I don’t recall this one at all but it has that Massive Attack back beat to it which is hardly a surprise considering Neneh was involved in the Bristol hip hop scene and helped as an arranger on Massive Attack’s seminal “Blue Lines” album. Indeed, the band’s Robert Del Naja co-wrote “Manchild” with her.

“Inner City Mama” fizzled out at No 31.

The second Breaker hardly needs an introduction at all. Easily one of the most recognised songs of the whole decade let alone the year, it would become a stand out moment in musical history thanks to the unnerving performance and vocals of Sinéad O’Connor. We all know that “Nothing Compares 2 U” is actually a Prince song but for me it’s easily the best treatments of one of his compositions especially (ahem) compared to the likes of “I Feel For You” by Chaka Khan (I could never understand the appeal of that one) or the execrable version of “Kiss” by Tom Jones.

The power of the song was completely entwined with the visuals of the video with its almost constant close up on Sinéad’s face and the reportedly natural tears that she sheds at the song’s end.

“Nothing Compares 2 U” will be at No 1 soon enough and also around the globe including the US, Australia and pretty much everywhere in Europe. It became the third best-selling single of 1990, the 82nd best-selling single of the whole decade and was certified platinum. We’ll be seeing loads more of it in the weeks to come so I’ll leave it there for now.

Meanwhile back in the TOTP studio we find The Quireboys who have returned for a second performance of their hit “Hey You”. I didn’t notice this before but what’s with the bulk load of flowers that are spread around the stage, most prominently on the piano? It immediately put me in mind of the cover to the Oasis single “Don’t Look Back In Anger”. That iconic image couldn’t have been inspired by The Quireboys surely?!

Liam went a bit over the top with the
conciliatory flowers he sent to Noel

Often talked of in the same breath as fellow blues rockers Dogs D’Amour, lead singer Spike would ultimately (and perhaps inevitably) collaborate with two members of the Dogs on two separate projects in the 90s.

The Quireboys are still together to this day playing live and releasing new material (their last album was as recent as 2019) albeit with only two original members but including the aforementioned Spike.

Back to Nicky Campbell now for some more stilted audience interaction – he comes across as the archetypal middle aged uncle who thinks he’s still down with the kids. His Top 10 rundown gets increasingly histrionic until he introduces the video for Kylie Minogue’s new hit “Tears On My Pillow” at which point he resorts to the catty behaviour we have seen from him before. Witness:

“And that means that Kylie Minogue has gone straight in at No 2 with the old Imperials song. It appears in the closing credits of the film The Delinquents if you manage to stay in the cinema that long…“

Turn it in Campbell. You’re just making yourself look like a petty, vindictive goon.

Anyway, as for Kylie this would be her fourth No 1 single (albeit only for one week) and would be her last for a decade. I never knew that it was actually on her ‘Enjoy Yourself” album – I always assumed it had been recorded specifically for the soundtrack of The Delinquents film. I did actually catch the movie at the cinema at the time (must have been cheap ticket Thursday or something) and it was ….underwhelming. So underwhelming that I can’t recall what happens in it other than Kylie’s character bleaches her hair blond and goes to prison at one point I think. I’ve never seen the film shown on terrestrial TV since. Wasn’t the male lead meant to be the new Sean Penn or something? Can’t even recall his name now…

*checks internet*

Charlie Schlatter! That was him. Apparently he stayed in acting and is best known for his role as Dr. Jesse Travis in Diagnosis Murder with Dick Van Dyke according to Wikipedia. Hmmm. Kylie meanwhile…

“Tears On My Pillow” was included in the film Grease of course although it’s hardly remembered as one of the big tunes on that soundtrack.

New Kids On The Block still reign at the top of the charts with “Hangin’ Tough”. As with Halo James earlier, there is a deluxe version of their album of the same name that came out this year for the 30th anniversary. In the customer reviews for the album on Amazon I found this one

“Amazing album for anyone who is a blockhead”

I genuinely thought it was someone talking the piss until I realised that ‘blockhead’ must be the collective term given to fans of the band! And then I dug a bit deeper and found that a fan had set up a Facebook page called Blockheads Unite and designed her own logo for it. Unfortunately she seemed to have come up with a idea that was a direct rip off of the design created by Barney Bubbles who did the logo for Ian Dury and The Blockheads that was used in their advertising and promotion. The NKOTB fan was forced to take it down and issue an apology which included the line:

“I had never heard of Ian Drury and The Blockheads”

No, I’ve never heard of Ian Drury either! Cringe!

Thankfully this is the last week that “Hangin’ Tough” is at the No 1 spot but we’ll be seeing plenty more of them in future repeats. Gulp!

The play out video is “N-R-G” by Adamski. Now I’m no dance head but I had actually heard of Adamski before this as he’d appeared on a free 4-track 7″ vinyl single given away with Record Mirror in 1989. I bought said issue and guess what? It’s still in my singles box! I am sorry to say I have never, ever played it.

It featured his track “I Dream of You” which was included on his album “Live And Direct” which had made the charts when released in December 1989. That album also included a live version of “N-R-G” and the track was edited and given a single release the following month. I have to say it never did anything for me (it’s just a load of blips and bleeps to my ears) but I once worked with a girl called Sarah in Our Price who absolutely loved Adamski.

Mr Ski (real name Adam Tinley) took “N-R-G” to No 12 and will be back soon enough later on in 1990 as a fully fledged pop star alongside Seal for one of the sensations of the year in “Killer”.

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

Order of appearance	Artist	Song	Did I Buy it?
1	Halo James	Could Have Told You So	Could have told you No more like
2	Lil’ Loui & The World	I Called U (But You Weren’t There)	Emphatic no
3	Martika	More Than You Know	More than you NO more like
4	49ers	Touch Me	Nah
5	Megadeth	No More Mr Nice Guy	A thousand times NO!
6	Neneh Cherry	Inner City Mama	No but my wife had the album
7	Sinéad’ O’Connor	Nothing Compares 2 U	Don’t think so
8	The Quireboys	Hey You	No but a Q Album compilation that I bought
9	Kylie Minogue	Tears On My Pillow	No
10	New Kids On The Block	Hangin’ Tough	No but I think my younger sister may have been into them and bough it
11	Adamski	N-R-G	N-O-P-E

Disclaimer

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000ng79/top-of-the-pops-18011990

I make no claim to the rights of this show and all ownership and contents including logos and graphics belongs totally to the BBC or copyright holder(s).

All opinions on the music and artists featured are my own. Sorry if you don’t agree.

Some bedtime reading?

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