Vengaboys

TOTP 1999 – the epilogue

As with seemingly every year, 1999 brought us the usual bad news stories – war and conflict, earthquakes, political turmoil etc but let’s not dwell on all that – the state of the world is shocking enough in 2026 without reminding ourselves that it was ever thus. In popular culture, the Pokémon phenomenon took over the world whilst in TV, The Sopranos, Family Guy and SpongeBob SquarePants premiered. Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace was predictably the biggest grossing film of the year though one of the most talked about movies was the genre bending The Blair Witch Project.

In technology, the way we consumed music was about to change forever. File sharing network Napster was launched ushering in a musical digital revolution. As the year and indeed the century ended, technology was at the forefront of all our minds as the fear of the millennium bug loomed. In the end, those fears came to nought but in terms of 1999’s music (in the charts at least) they were realised.

As for TOTP itself, we were still in the Chris Cowey era and after he’d introduced a new theme tune, logo and title sequence the year before, 1999 saw the executive producer focus on the show’s running order and, let’s be fair, he made a right mess of it. The historical mantra that a song must be No 1, a new entry or going up the charts to be featured was totally ransacked with records descending the Top 40 regularly showcased. The constant rotation of No 1s meant that we often had the spectacle of ending a show and starting the next with the same hit as last week’s chart topper was shown again immediately despite having been knocked of its perch. If it was frustrating to watch back then, reviewing the BBC4 repeats in 2026 was torturous.

The show’s main presenters were Jamie Theakston, Jayne Middlemiss and Scott Mills though we also saw the introduction of Gail Porter as a replacement for Kate Thornton. There was also the curious footnote of TOTP history that was Emma Ledden’s solitary appearance.

OK, well, let’s stick to tradition and look at the year’s Top 50 singles:

Best-selling singles

No.	Title	Artist	Peak position
1	“…Baby One More Time“	Britney Spears	1
2	“Blue (Da Ba Dee)“	Eiffel 65	1
3	“The Millennium Prayer“	Cliff Richard	1
4	“Mambo No. 5 (A Little Bit of…)“	Lou Bega	1
5	“9 PM (Till I Come)“	ATB	1
6	“Livin’ La Vida Loca“	Ricky Martin	1
7	“That Don’t Impress Me Much“	Shania Twain	3
8	“Sweet Like Chocolate“	Shanks and Bigfoot	1
9	“Flat Beat“	Mr Oizo	1
10	“When the Going Gets Tough“	Boyzone	1
11	“Bring It All Back“	S Club 7	1
12	“Better Off Alone“	DJ Jurgen presents Alice Deejay	2
13	“Genie in a Bottle“	Christina Aguilera	1
14	“Perfect Moment“	Martine McCutcheon	1
15	“Boom, Boom, Boom, Boom!!“	Vengaboys	1
16	“No Scrubs“	TLC	3
17	“If I Could Turn Back the Hands of Time“	R. Kelly	2
18	“When You Say Nothing at All“	Ronan Keating	1
19	“Heartbeat“/”Tragedy“	Steps	1
20	“I Try“	Macy Gray	6
21	“2 Times“	Ann Lee	2
22	“My Love Is Your Love“	Whitney Houston	2
23	“Beautiful Stranger“	Madonna	2
24	“Turn Around“	Phats & Small	2
25	“It’s Not Right but It’s Okay“	Whitney Houston	3
26	“I Have a Dream“/”Seasons in the Sun“	Westlife	1
27	“Witch Doctor“	Cartoons	2
28	“King of My Castle“	Wamdue Project	1
29	“We Like to Party! (The Vengabus)“	Vengaboys	3
30	“Pretty Fly (For a White Guy)“	The Offspring	1
31	“Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)“	Baz Luhrmann	1
32	“Wild Wild West“	Will Smith	2
33	“Maria“	Blondie	1
34	“Sometimes“	Britney Spears	3
35	“I Want It That Way“	Backstreet Boys	1
36	“Keep On Movin’“	Five	1
37	“Re-Rewind (The Crowd Say Bo Selecta)“	The Artful Dodger featuring Craig David	2
38	“We’re Going to Ibiza!“	Vengaboys	1
39	“Tender“	Blur	2
40	“You Get What You Give“	New Radicals	5
41	“My Name Is“	Eminem	2
42	“Mi Chico Latino“	Geri Halliwell	1
43	“The Launch“	DJ Jean	2
44	“You Don’t Know Me“	Armand van Helden featuring Duane Harden	1
45	“(Mucho Mambo) Sway“	Shaft	2
46	“Swear It Again“	Westlife	1
47	“Man! I Feel Like a Woman!“	Shania Twain	3
48	“She’s the One“/”It’s Only Us“	Robbie Williams	1
49	“You Needed Me“	Boyzone	1
50	“Fly Away“	Lenny Kravitz	1

The first thing to say is how many No 1s there were! Twenty-nine of the Top 50 were chart toppers. In total there were thirty-six singles that made it to the top which I’m pretty sure was a record. This was no doubt down to heavy first week discounting by the record companies which the public very soon got on board with and wise to. Three weeks at the top was the maximum time any of those records managed with the first nine weeks of the year seeing nine different songs at the summit. Only two of the Top 50 were singles that peaked outside of the Top 3. As for the Top 10 best sellers, I’d break them down like this:

Six were dance hits of one hue or another
One was by an established boy band
One was by a country artist crossing over into the mainstream with a hybrid sound
One was by a new teenage singing sensation
One was by Cliff Richard!

Clearly dance music still dominated the charts but what was interesting (possibly) was the different genres represented. Eurodance, Latino, garage, electro house, trance…it was exhausting. Further down the list we found returning superstars such as Madonna, Whitney Houston, Lenny Kravitz and most surprising of all Blondie. We still hadn’t had enough of novelty singles with South Park‘s Chef, Bad Luhrmann, Cartoons and, arguably, Mr Oizo all having huge hits.

Boybands may not have been having it all their own way anymore but Boyzone, Five, Backstreetboys and the depressing emergence of Westlife ensured they were still very much able to pull in sales from a devoted fanbase. Girl groups though were on the wane it seemed with the Spice Girls releasing no new material but laucnching solo careers instead whilst B* Witched looked on decidedly dodgy ground come the year end. However, girl/boy combos were finding success easier to come by with S Club 7 and Steps both featuring. How many of the Top 50 did I buy? One. Any guesses which? OK, I’ll put you out of your misery…it was New Radicals.

Best-selling albums

So let’s move on to the best selling albums…

No.	Title	Artist	Peak position
1	Come On Over	Shania Twain	1
2	By Request	Boyzone	1
3	The Man Who	Travis	1
4	Gold: Greatest Hits	ABBA	1
5	Performance and Cocktails	Stereophonics	1
6	I’ve Been Expecting You	Robbie Williams	1
7	Steptacular	Steps	1
8	Talk on Corners	The Corrs	1
9	Westlife	Westlife	2
10	On How Life Is	Macy Gray	3
11	The Hush	Texas	1
12	All the Way… A Decade of Song	Celine Dion	1
13	You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby	Fatboy Slim	1
14	…Baby One More Time	Britney Spears	4
15	My Love Is Your Love	Whitney Houston	4
16	Step One	Steps	3
17	The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill	Lauryn Hill	2
18	Songs from the Last Century	George Michael	2
19	Forgiven, Not Forgotten	The Corrs	2
20	The Party Album!	Vengaboys	6
21	S Club	S Club 7	2
22	Ladies & Gentlemen: The Best of George Michael	George Michael	1
23	Reload	Tom Jones	1
24	Synkronized	Jamiroquai	1
25	You Me & Us	Martine McCutcheon	2
26	Greatest Hits III	Queen	5
27	Invincible	Five	4
28	FanMail	TLC	7
29	Ray of Light	Madonna	7
30	The Greatest Hits	Cher	7
31	Unplugged	The Corrs	9
32	This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours	Manic Street Preachers	4
33	Life thru a Lens	Robbie Williams	8
34	Surrender	The Chemical Brothers	1
35	Ricky Martin	Ricky Martin	2
36	Charlotte Church	Charlotte Church	8
37	Millennium	Backstreet Boys	2
38	Gran Turismo	The Cardigans	8
39	Schizophonic	Geri Halliwell	4
40	Turn It On Again: The Hits	Genesis	4
41	Willennium	Will Smith	10
42	The Very Best of Dean Martin: The Capitol & Reprise Years	Dean Martin	5
43	13	Blur	1
44	The Best of Me	Bryan Adams	12
45	Sogno	Andrea Bocelli	4
46	Where We Belong	Boyzone	3
47	Equally Cursed and Blessed	Catatonia	1
48	Believe	Cher	7
49	Twenty Four Seven	Tina Turner	9
50	Americana	The Offspring	10

Yet again, my overall impression is how mainstream most of the artists were. The Corrs, Celine Dion, Westlife, Texas, Cher, Bryan Adams are just a few of the names that stand out on first glance. Then there’s legacy acts like ABBA, Queen and Dean Martin…where were the new artists? OK, Britney Spears and Macy Gray. Who else? Martine McCutcheon? Please! Even breakthrough names like Travis had already been around for a while before hitting it big in 1999.

If new artists were hard to find, now about non-mainstream acts? I’ll offer you The Offspring, The Chemical Brothers, TLC, Fatboy Slim, Stereophonics, Catatonia and The Cardigans. It’s not many is it? Best Ofs and Greatest Hits were still doing decent business accounting for nearly a fifth of the Top 50 whilst Cher, George Michael, Robbie Williams, The Corrs, Boyzone and Steps all had two albums on the list making up nearly a quarter of the chart. As for the year’s best seller, give me strength! What on earth was happening?! And me personally, How many did I own? Maybe three? Four or five if you add in my wife’s contributions. A vintage year it was not.

Hits We Missed

We missed five shows that BBC4 did not broadcast in this run of 1999 TOTP repeats due to the Scott Mills sacking controversy and the Gouryella cultural appropriation issue. Two of those are addressed below whilst there are a further two that weren’t deemed big enough hits to warrant a place in the running order.

Duran Duran – “Electric Barbarella”

Released: Jan ‘99

Chart peak: No 23

Duran Duran were having hits in 1999?! Yes, they were but this one will take a bit of explaining as it has quite the back story. Six years on from their Indian Summer moment that was “Ordinary World” and their seventh studio and second eponymous album aka “The Wedding Album”, the band’s fortunes had taken a bit of a nose dive. The disastrous decision to record a cover versions album – 1995’s “Thank You” – as its follow up (which Q magazine declared the worst of all time in 2006) had derailed the good will and credibility they’d acquired with that comeback to the point that their ninth studio album “Medazzaland” was only released by record label Capitol in the territories of North America, Latin America and Japan. It wasn’t officially released in the UK on various digital platforms until 2021 and finally a physical release the year after.

“Electric Barbarella” was one of two singles released from it but only initially in America where it made little impression. That could have been the end of its story but come 1998, the relationship between the band and their record company reached breaking point after the commercial failure of the whole “Medazzaland” project and they parted company with EMI. And guess what EMI did next? They tried to maximise the commercial returns of their previous charges by raiding their back catalogue for a Best Of collection. Of course they did.

Rather unsurprisingly, it turned out that although the UK didn’t have much of an appetite for new Duran Duran material, when it came to revisiting their past glories, then there was definitely a whole to be filled. The “Greatest” album would eventually go three times platinum, updating as it did, 1989’s “Decade” collection. I say ‘updating’ but, in truth, there were only four songs on it from the 90s one of which (and crucial to our story) was “Electric Barbarella”. Off the back of the success of “Greatest”, it was finally given a UK release in its own right. OK but one week spent at No 23 isn’t much of a story you might well comment. However, here’s the kicker which places the track at the heart of the biggest change in music consumption ever. “Electric Barbarella” is widely considered to be the first ever single by a major label artist available for digital purchase/download on the internet. No really.

The alt-rock and pop history website Diffuser has a great piece about the song’s significance and it’s so interesting to read about some of the concerns and attitudes such a milestone release caused back then. Whilst their label was initially reticent about the whole concept, they eventually relented and the track was to be made available as a digital download two weeks before the physical single hit record shop racks. The retail sector had a wobble about supporting a format that seemed to be given exclusivity and Capitol caved by synchronising release dates. Some of the prevailing attitudes of the time have not aged well though. Look at this quote from Scott Burnett, the VP of Marketing at Liquid Audio, the company Duran Duran partnered with to deliver the electronic version:

“This is about creating additional revenue—not about taking away established revenue streams.”

20 Years Ago: Duran Duran Make Music History by Selling ‘Electric Barbarella’ as a Digital Single; Annie Zaleski, diffuser.fm; 2017

Didn’t really work out like that did it Scott? Then there was Robin Bechtel, senior director of new media (U.S.):

“Most people who find out about music on the Internet do go down to their local retailer to make a purchase. This will help to generate more sales at retail.”

20 Years Ago: Duran Duran Make Music History by Selling ‘Electric Barbarella’ as a Digital Single; Annie Zaleski, diffuser.fm; 2017

Ha! Anyway, as for the song itself, it was a very electro track, with a repetitive, driving rhythm and simple but hooky chorus but its most interesting parts were the sonic effects in the mix that gave it a claustrophobic, under duress feel. The rather inevitable film reference in its title that gave the band their name reminded me of that time that The Rolling Stones finally recorded Bob Dylan’s “Like A Rolling Stone” for their live album “Stripped”. The robot sex doll video for “Electric Barbarella” will surely only be remembered for all the wrong reasons though. And if you think I’m done with artists who made their names in the 80s in a review of 1999, then think again…

Groove Armada – “At The River”

Released: Jul ‘99

Chart peak: No 19

Another hit now that wasn’t huge in terms of its chart position but it was in terms of its reach. Groove Armada are the electronic music duo of Andy Cato and Tom Findlay who had visited the Top 40 earlier in the year with the single “If Everybody Looked the Same” but it was “At The River” that really announced them, certainly to me at least. What a curious thing this was. Ostensibly a dance track, this was no high bpm dance floor filler though. No, this was an early morning, come down tune that would become a staple in the running order of all those ‘Chilled Ibiza’ compilation albums.

Those solitary two lines of lyrics – “If you’re fond of sand dunes and salty air, Quaint little villages here and there” – are sampled from the 1957 song “Old Cape Cod” which was recorded by American country and pop music singer Patti Page whom I’ve never heard of before and certainly didn’t know about back in 1999. Indeed, Cato and Findlay only became aware of the track whilst holidaying in the Lake District when they bought a 1950s compilation album from a bargain bin in a shop in Ambleside for 50p. Added to that, the mesmerising trombone solo was only included because Andy Cato had brought his instrument with him on holiday to practice for a forthcoming jazz concert. On such random incidents can huge moments in popular culture be made.

“At The River”‘s ubiquity and lazy beats didn’t help though when it came to staging the performance of it on TOTP. A hazy sheen visual effect and a small monitor showing the talking head part of the official video seemed to be the only idea the programme makers could come up with to enliven what was on our screens. That and a fair bit of attention on the very blonde woman on the keyboards. The track would have a second life in 2006 when it was used to soundtrack adverts for Marks & Spencer Food and you don’t get bigger moments in popular culture than that (ahem).

Travis – “Why Does It Always Rain On Me?”

Released: Aug ‘99

Chart peak: No 10

I’ve included this one as Travis really were the breakout stars of 1999 and although they would go on to have bigger hits, this single seemed to me to be the one that made a statement of intent – they were on their way and there would be no turning back. Ironically, it’s opening lyrics – “I can’t sleep tonight, Everybody’s saying everything is alright” – refers to a late night conversation between songwriter Fran Healy and their manager who was trying to reassure the former that the band’s career was taking off whilst Healy himself wasn’t convinced. In many ways, it mirrored the rise of Oasis who after two middling-sized hits, unleashed “Live Forever” and we knew that they meant business. Lending weight to that comparison is the fact that both “Why Does It Always Rain On Me?” and “Live Forever” peaked at No 10.

Sonically, I don’t think there’s that much similarity between them (any musicians reading this will no doubt correct me) although Healy has admitted to pinching the chords from “Wonderwall” for the Travis hit “Writing To Reach You” even referencing the Oasis song in its lyrics. “Why Does It Always Rain On Me?” is almost jaunty in its chorus (despite its oppositional lyric) whereas “Live Forever” has a heavier, almost defiant tone to it. Anyway, I’m pretty sure that WDIAROM also picked up extensive radio play which helped establish Travis in the minds of the public who had not yet caught up with the band.

In a Guardian article in 2020, Fran Healy stated that the moment they started playing the song in their set at Glastonbury 1999, the heavens opened and that everything turned around for them and superstardom beckoned. I guess a song called “Why Doesn’t It Always Rain On Me?” wouldn’t have translated as well.

The Divine Comedy – “Gin Soaked Boy”

Released: Nov ‘99

Chart peak: No 38

Not only did we miss “The Pop Singer’s Fear Of The Pollen Count” on the show due to the Scott Mills controversy, but we also missed this little gem from The Divine Comedy because it wasn’t considered a big enough hit I guess. Both tracks came from the compilation album “A Secret History…” and both deserved to be bigger hits (TPSFOTPC peaked at No 17) but the ignoring of “Gin Soaked Boy” by the record buying public bordered on criminal.

Sometimes the lyrics to a song pass you by (even if you enjoy its sound ) but in this case, the track is all about the lyrics. Now, whether you hear them as random nonsense or cleverly constructed rhyming couplets that play on oppositional meanings, that’s up to you. Personally, I find it intriguing even on repeated hearings with my favourite line being the penultimate and ridiculous “I’m Jeff Goldblum in The Fly“. Glorious stuff. If you still weren’t convinced by it, then the CD single included the Father Ted theme “Songs Of Love” and the marvellous Eurovision entry “My Lovely Horse” from the episode ‘A Song for Europe’. What more could you ask for?

As for the song’s title, it must have been borrowed from the song of the same name from the Tom Waits 1983 album “Swordfishtrombones” which also includes the wonderful “In The Neighbourhood”. Neil Hannon himself says that the gin reference is about ‘spirit’ using the word’s alcoholic definition as a metaphor for resilience within the human condition. Or something. Whether my liking for the song has any bearing on my liking of the drink I’m not sure. If I’m not the gin soaked boy, though, well, who am I?

Hits That Never Were

Slim pickings in this section again, so much so that I had to resort to seeking out two fallen 80s idols.

Toploader – “Let The People Know”

Released: Aug ‘99

Chart peak: No 52

The ubiquity of their hit “Dancing In The Moonlight” (and, let’s be honest, its tweeness) is generally perceived to have taken a sledgehammer to Toploader’s credibility, a blow from which they have never recovered. Now, I’m not saying that I disagree with that but they didn’t start out as everybody’s go to bland band to hate on (or was that the aforementioned Travis?). This single which preceded that mega hit was a precision-tooled, driving, darting arrowhead of disco-influenced soul-pop that was as startling as it was slick.

I first heard it not on initial release but as part of a free gift CD attached to the cover of Q Magazine about a year or so later and, on first listen, it almost blew me away. It was unconscionable that they were the same band which released that King Harvest cover. Even the Rocky inspired video felt like it fitted. Maybe they should have rereleased it as the follow up to “Dancing In The Moonlight” instead of “Achilles Heel” although, to be fair, that was a decent tune as well.

I guess I didn’t subscribe to that theory that they were the ultimate creators of generic, safe, uninspired and inoffensive rock/pop music. In fact, I’m sure I didn’t as I saw them live once (gulp!). No, wait! Come back! It was when I was living in York having left Manchester and you didn’t get many names on the circuit come to York at the time so I went. They were OK as I recall.

There is, of course, a link from them to TOTP 1999 even though they didn’t appear on the show during that year which is that their guitarist Dan Hipgrave was dating the aforementioned presenter Gail Porter (and was presumably the envy of many a teenage lad back then). They married in 2001 but separated three years later before divorcing. He would subsequently marry sports presenter Lynsey Horn.

Howard Jones – “Let The People Have Their Say”

Released: Feb ‘99

Chart peak: No 99

I guess once you have “Let The People Know” then the logical progression is to “Let The People Have Their Say”. The paucity of decent entries for this section has led me to find out what a pop hero of the mid 80s was up to in 1999. Sadly, Howard Jones had long since faded from the minds of the general UK record buying public. His last Top 40 hit had been 1986’s “All I Want” which itself had only just secured that status by clambering to No 35. After that it had all been downhill over here though he had remained a significant live draw in the US.

After his ten year record deal with Warners had expired in 1993, he’d resorted to releasing albums on his own Dtox label via his website and at live gigs. One such release was “People” from which the single “Let The People Have Their Say” was taken. A jaunty, bounce-a-long pop tune with a calypso feel, it was never likely to become a huge hit up against the boybands and dance anthems that were occupying the charts at the time. It’s a nice enough tune though and until 2005 when he featured on Mohito’s No 82 hit, was the last time he ever broke the Top 100 barrier. One final thing though Howard. If you let the people have their say, they invariably get it wrong.

Nik Kershaw – “Somebody Loves You”

Released: Feb ‘99

Chart peak: No 70

Now, it was always the case that Howard Jones and Nik Kershaw came as a pair so…in truth though, it is odd how their careers have almost run in parallel. They both hit within a few months of each other, both had huge selling debut albums with the word ‘Human’ in the title and their chart careers both fell away at almost exactly the same time with the release of their third albums. By 1999, they were still in sync in terms of a lack of commercial success albeit that Kershaw had written a No 1 hit for Chesney Hawkes eight years earlier. However, in terms of racking up the sales under their own names…well, there was virtually nothing.

In the case of Nik though, he hadn’t actually released any music as a solo artist since 1989’s “The Works” as he’d been writing and collaborating with other artists for most of the decade including Genesis’s Tony Banks, Elton John, Les Rythmes Digitales and…erm…Let Loose. However, for his fifth album “15 Minutes”, Kershaw decided that nobody but him could record those songs and so he returned to the studio in his own right.

The lead single from it was “Somebody Loves You”, a very melodic, very mature, very well constructed pop/rock song so, obviously, the crap-obsessed record buying public of 1999 weren’t having it at all. It surely deserved better than its No 70 chart placing. The video with Nik as a living museum exhibit foreshadowed the House Of Annie Lennox exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum which on occasion saw her working within a perspex box by 13 years. Kershaw has continued to record and tour extensively in the past 25 plus years and has even written a book detailing the stories behind his big hits as well as every track spanning his 40 years career.

Shack – “Comedy”

Released: Jun ‘99

Chart peak: No 44

Keeping the 80s theme going in 1999 were Shack who emerged from the ashes of the criminally ignored band The Pale Fountains. They released some wonderful tracks between 1982 and 1985 such as “Thank You”, “Palm Of My Hand” and “…From Across the Kitchen Table” all of which fell by the chart wayside. Singer Mick Head licked his wounds and formed Shack with his brother John in 1987 releasing two albums before finally finding not just critical acclaim but crucially commercial success as well with third album “H.M.S. Fable”. From personal memory, this was a steady, consistent seller rather than a runaway sensation, a recollection which its peak chart position of No 25 supports. The music press loved it though declaring it the second best album of 1999 in the NME and Uncut magazine.

Two singles were taken from it of which “Comedy” was the first. In an unexpected turn, I find myself potentially using similar words to describe it which I used whilst writing about Nik Kershaw above. Sacrilege? Maybe but also undeniable. The album received plaudits that talked about ‘lyrical craftsmanship’, ‘effortless melody’ and ‘classic pop harmonies’. There were also the inevitable Oasis comparisons but with the caveat that Shack were an upgrade (in today’s parlance) or that they were the band that Oasis always wanted to be. You can understand such reviews when listening to songs such as “Comedy” which, without wanting to repeat myself, was all those things and more. Why oh why wasn’t it a hit?

Shack would release two further albums (the final one ironically on Noel Gallagher’s Sour Mash label) whilst Michael Head now plys his trade as Michael Head & the Red Elastic Band who, in 2022, finally gave him the commercial respect he deserved when the album “Dear Scott” made No 6 in the charts.

Their Season In The Sun

Martine McCutcheon

Seemingly taking the well trodden route of soap star to pop star, Martine actually went from pop star to soap star to pop star. Sort of. She was originally in an all-girl group called Milan as a teenager who released three singles and toured as a support act for East 17 before joining the cast of EastEnders. They never achieved fame and fortune though.

By 1998, McCutcheon had decided that it was time for another go at this pop star lark and so, with her Albert Square character Tiffany killed off in the New Year’s Eve episode, there was nothing to distract her from devoting her full attention to music. Her start couldn’t have gone any better with a No 1 straight off the bat with classy, big ballad “Perfect Moment”. Her album “You, Me & Us” made No 2 and generated two more hit singles. The noughties brought two more albums which sold but not in the same numbers and her recording contract was eventually cancelled. She would return to the charts briefly with a fourth and so far final album in 2017. Since then though, her only musical foray has been as Swan in 2021 on The Masked Singer.

The Offspring

This one probably needs some context adding as I’m sure if you’re a fan of The Offspring, you’ll be coming at me with all sorts of stats and data that belie my perceived suggestion that they had one magnificent year and that was it. That certainly was not the case. For a start these American rockers have been going for over 40 years and have released 11 studio albums. In terms of sales, as of 2015, The Offspring had sold over 40 million albums worldwide.

And yet…in 1999, the UK fully discovered and embraced the band as they released perhaps their most commercial album to date – “Americana” – that furnished them with a No 1 and a No 2 hit single. “Pretty Fly (For a White Guy)” came out of nowhere to debut at the top of the UK charts at the start of the year, spending over a month inside the Top 10. To put that into perspective, their biggest hit over here up to that point had been “All I Want” which made No 31 in 1997. They followed it up with the “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” apeing “Why Don’t You Get A Job?” which just missed the top spot. However, when the album’s third single “The Kids Aren’t Alright” failed to make the Top 10, signs that the fever dream was coming to an end appeared. They didn’t disappear from our charts completely but the high flying days of 1999 would never return. However, they still record and play live to this day including the quaintly titled Shit Is Fucked Up tour in 2009.

Shanks & Bigfoot

Not quite the classic one hit wonder (a solitary No 1 and then nothing) but not far off it. Hailing from that hot bed of late 90s dance artists that was Brighton, Steven Meade and Danny Langsman (aka Shanks & Bigfoot) scored a chart topper in “Sweet Like Chocolate” in the Summer of 1999 and for a while they were the bomb. Accolades and awards followed (nominations and one win at the MOBO/ Ivor Novello/ BRITs) and the likes of Britney Spears and Destiny’s Child asking the duo to write for them.

Somehow though, it all fell away, possibly not helped by the year’s delay between “Sweet Like Chocolate” and their debut and only album “Swings And Roundabouts” being released. Momentum lost and all that. When it finally arrived, it failed to dent the Top 75. Their only other chart entry came from No 12 single “Sing-A-Long” in 2000. What are they up to today? The trail is a little cold though “Sweet Like Chocolate” was sampled by Stormzy during his headline set at the 2019 Glastonbury Festival.

They came (on a bus), they saw (an opportunity) and they conquered (the charts). The success of this…this…project (I refuse to dignify this insult to music by calling them a group) was both baffling and irritating in equal measure. How on earth did the masses fall for their idiotic, nursery rhyme-like ditties (I refuse to call them songs)?! Yes, they had hits before 1999 and after but it was this year that they racked up two consecutive No 1s in “Boom, Boom, Boom, Boom!!” and “We’re Going To Ibiza!”. This was peak Vengaboys and boy did they cause a fit of pique in me.

Come the new millennium, they would replace an original member with a dolphin trainer which is pretty apt as I think I’d rather listen to the chirping squeaks and clicks of a dolphin than a Vengaboys record – in fact, what’s the difference? Unbelievably, a version of the ~~group~~ project still exists and as recently as 2025 opened for Scissor Sisters and Kesha at Madison Square Garden on The Tits Out tour (insert your own joke here…).

Last Words

1999, you were pretty crap I have to say. I’m not sure what I was expecting from these TOTP repeats but what I got was underwhelming, no not underwhelming…poor…no, not that either…shite…yes, that’s the right word…SHITE! You can an ‘utter’ before it too for maximum accuracy.

Personally, it was my final year of working in record retail for Our Price and I lasted just 10 weeks with the company into the new millennium before leaving after having been an employee for nearly 10 years. Not only did I change jobs but also cities, swapping the ever hip Manchester for the not quite as cool York. Sorry York but it’s true. The change from record shop to the civil service proved too big a change and I struggled from day one to come to terms with office life. Somehow I managed seven years before uprooting again to my current home of Hull.

What would have happened if I hadn’t have left when I did? I’d have probably stumbled along for a bit feeling ever less connected to the music I was selling as I settled into my 30s. The writing was on the wall for the traditional record shop though as the digital revolution lurked around the corner yet in plain sight. If I’d have stayed at Our Price, ultimately I would have had to find a new job as the chain folded in 2004. It was a wrench to leave though after all that time and I did feel emotional on the final day. The first thing I ever sold was an Elton John Greatest Hits cassette so my colleagues managed to find an old Elton cassette single that we had in the shop and one of them bought it so Elton on cassette was also my last sale. Bless ‘em.

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.

TOTP 17 DEC 1999

Posted on June 16 by 80stastic

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Tom Jones and Cerys Matthews	Baby It’s Cold Outside	Nope
2	B*Witched featuring Ladysmith Black Mambazo	I Shall Be There	But I won’t – no
3	Len	Steal My Sunshine	Nah
4	Progress Presents The Boy Wunda	Everybody	Never
5	Vengaboys	Kiss (When The Sun Don’t Shine)	As if
6	Artful Dodger Featuring Craig David	Re-Rewind (The Crowd Say Bo Selecta)	No
7	Cliff Richard	The Millennium Prayer	Heavens above 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/m002xks0/top-of-the-pops-17121999

TOTP 24 SEP 1999

Posted on May 6 by 80stastic

On the date this TOTP was broadcast, 45 years earlier, the Italian footballer Marco Tardelli was born. Yes, the guy behind one of the most iconic goal celebrations of all time that happened in the aftermath of him scoring Italy’s second goal in the 1982 World Cup final which became known as the ‘Tardelli Scream’. That guy. I wonder if any of the acts in this show could elicit such a reaction of pure emotion?

Our host is Jamie Theakston and this week the show comes live from the L2 nightclub in Liverpool as part of the Top Of The Pops On Tour project. We start with last week’s No 1 which has dropped to No 4 this week (the weekly changing of the guard at the top of the charts was in full effect by this point). However, the Vengaboys were at the peak of their commercial powers in 1999 with two consecutive No 1 singles of which “We’re Going To Ibiza” was the second.

Although it is a terrible, terrible song, it does have an interesting spin off story which occurred in 2019. The ‘Ibiza Affair’ or ‘Ibiza-gate’ was a political scandal involving Heinz-Christian Strache, the former vice-chancellor of Austria and leader of The Freedom Party and Johann Gudenus, a former deputy leader of the same political party. A sting operation commissioned by Iranian lawyer Ramin Mirfakhra saw Strache and Gudenus discussing their party’s underhanded practices and intentions in a secretly recorded meeting in Ibiza. It led to the collapse of the Austrian government with demonstrators in Vienna co-opting “We’re Going To Ibiza” as a song of protest against the government causing the track to re-chart and the Vengaboys themselves to perform it at the ‘Thursday demonstrations’ protests in front of the Chancellery in Vienna. Well, it’s a step up from this I guess…

Scream connection: In interviews, Vengaboys members have mentioned that they encourage a back-and-forth energy with the crowd, often saying, “If we all scream loud enough, nobody hears the mistakes”. Yeah, there’s no scream with enough decibels to disguise what a mistake “We’re Going To Ibiza” was.

What to say about Sting’s solo career? On the one hand, the case could be made that it’s been both lengthy and stellar. Fourteen studio albums released over a 40 year period including two No 1s with the latest release coming in 2021. On the other, none of his albums have made the Top 10 since 2003’s “Sacred Love” and he has only had one Top 10 single ever if you discount his 1994 collaboration with Rod Stewart and Bryan Adams “All For Love”. I think I could probably name a fair few of his hits but then I spent a decade working in record shops. How many of his solo songs have genuinely cut through to the wider general public? I would say maybe two – “If You Love Somebody Set Them Free” because of its title based on a saying already in parlance and the reference in Jimmy Nail’s No 1 “Ain’t No Doubt” and “Fields Of Gold” and that’s only because of the life it took on when it was covered by Eva Cassidy and the Terry Wogan effect. “Brand New Day” was never going to make that list of two which is a shame as it’s not a bad song. The lead single and title track from Sting’s sixth solo studio album, it has a certain charm with its lolloping rhythms and Stevie Wonder vibe (Wonder actually plays harmonica on the track). I like Sting’s phrasing of the lyrics and even the jazzy trombone interjections which I would ordinarily object to don’t trouble me.

The album would sell well, making the Top 5 and going platinum matching the performance of its predecessor “Mercury Rising”. Tellingly though, neither sold anywhere near as many copies as 1997’s “The Very Best of Sting & The Police” which, although a bizarre concept and perhaps not a true barometer of his solo popularity, did indicate that there was maybe more interest in Sting’s past glories than an appetite for new material.

Scream connection: well, there’s the legendary screaming matches between Sting and The Police drummer Stewart Copeland as a result of their toxic working relationship.

The musical transformation of Everything But The Girl from jazz-pop stylists to electronica dance merchants had, for the most part, left me cold. I’d appreciated the milestone making “Missing” (who hadn’t?) but the continuation of that direction via the “Walking Wounded” album had not maintained that regard. I was with the gig-goer who caught the band around this time and who was overhead by the band’s Ben Watt to say, “Well, that was a load of techno bollocks”.

Rather than being a one-off experiment though, Ben and Tracey Thorn doubled down on the dance vibe for follow up album “Temperamental”. Those in the know (i.e. the music press – ahem) divined a slight readjustment of dance sensibilities with the drum ‘n’ bass beats toned down in favour of a more old school house sound but it all sounded the same to my dance deaf ears. Here’s a typical review:

“EBTG’s early bossa-nova folk has been fully transformed into a contemporary sonic physicality that washes the album’s desperation with sweaty, regenerative joy”

Walters, Barry (October 1999). “This New House”, Spin; Vol. 15, no. 10. pp. 151–152.

“Sonic physicality”? Sweaty, regenerative joy”? I think I’ll pass and I did. Having said all of that, listening to “Five Fathoms” which acted as the lead single from the album (although technically that was “The Future of the Future (Stay Gold)” which they released with Deep Dish a year prior), I actually didn’t mind it. There was more of a proper song structure in there than I was expecting and I liked some of the lyrics like:

“Did I grow up just to stay home?
I’m not immune, I love this tune”

Songwriters: Ben Watt, Five Fathoms lyrics © Sm Publishing Uk Limited

Plus, of course, Tracey’s vocals are always on point. However, “Temperamental” would prove commercially inferior to “Walking Wounded” by some distance and would be the last Everything But The Girl album of new material for nearly a quarter of a century.

Scream connection: Their song “Tender Blue” from the “Eden” album contains the lyric “The baby’s screaming down the hall”.

Before the next act, there’s a bizarre little interlude where Jamie Theakston interviews Holly Johnson. Had this been 1989 instead of 1999, it might have made some sense with Holly riding high in the charts back then with his first solo hits like “Love Train” and “Americanos” but a decade on, he hadn’t been near the Top 40 since. The album he mentions as his next release – “Soulstream” – was studiously ignored in every territory despite including a version of Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s “The Power Of Love”. It’s all a bit pointless and inexplicable and does nobody any favours with the only retrievable piece of utility being that Holly can introduce the next artist who also shares the surname Johnson.

Paul Johnson was a Chicago house DJ and record producer who started the label Dust Traxx and was known for his big personality. He was also a wheelchair user from the age of 16 following an incident where a stray bullet left him paralysed from the waist down. His wheelchair is clearly visible in this performance making him the first person to appear in one on TOTP since…Robert Wyatt in 1974 and his version of “I’m A Believer”? Did he perform “Shipbuilding” on the show in 1983?

Anyway, his hit was “Get Get Down” which was the penultimate Billboard Dance Club No 1 of the 20th century and a Top 5 hit in the UK. A house anthem that was as likely to fill daytime radio playlists as dance floors up and down the country, it was a curiously sparse track consisting of just a looped bass riff, a driving descending beat in what passed for the chorus and the word “down” repeated over and over. I would have liked it better if it had sampled “Wham Rap” – “I said a-get, get, get on down, I said a-get, get, get on down”.

One of those to play “Get Get Down” on the radio were Marc and Lard who, in a pretence of displeasure at such a negative sounding record, would chant “Up, up, up, up” over the top of it. I still miss those guys. Paul Johnson would have one leg amputated in 2003 whilst the other was also removed after a car accident in 2010. He died in 2021 after contracting COVID-19.

Scream connection: In a 1964 New Statesman essay titled “The Menace Of Beatlism”, a British journalist and historian called Paul Johnson attacked the phenomenon of screaming fans.

Anyone remember NetAid? No, me neither. Band Aid and Live Aid? Yes, of course. Sport Aid? Yep. I even vaguely recall Hear ‘n Aid but NetAid? Zip, nothing, nada. For the record, it was an anti-poverty initiative started by the United Nations Development Programme and American multinational technology conglomerate corporation Cisco Systems. It was launched by a concert event on 9 October 1999 to utilise a fledgling internet to raise money and awareness for the Jubilee 2000 campaign to cancel third world debt. Three concerts in Wembley, New Jersey and Geneva took place with a host of international stars on the respective bills. So, a sort of Live Aid for the 90s then.

To help spearhead the campaign, a single was released. Just as the aforementioned Live Aid had its own such promotional track in Mick Jagger and David Bowie’s desecration of “Dancing In The Streets”, NetAid had the duo of Wyclef Jean and U2’s Bono with an insufferable song called “New Day”. I thought I had zero chance of remembering this but there was something about Wyclef Jean banging on about “nuff respect” that stirred a neurone in my memory into action. I wish it had stayed dormant. This was a hateful mash up of musical styles that just didn’t work. There’s a cringeworthy bit where Wyclef exhorts Bono with the line “Now Bono won’t you sing the hook?”. Oh. Dear. In short, it was a complete and utter mess. Unlike Jagger and Bowie’s equally miserable effort, it didn’t even fulfil its brief of raising lots of cash for its charity, staggering to one week at No 23 n the UK charts. Look, it was for charity and all that but let’s not talk about this ever again OK?

Scream connection: Billedkunst Opphavsrett i Norge or BONO for short is a Norwegian copyright organization that manages rights for artists including Edvard Munch who painted the seminal Expressionist work The Scream.

We continue the internet theme with the return of a music legend. The 80s are often referred to as to as a fallow decade for David Bowie in terms of the quality of his back catalogue but the 90s were hardly a golden period I would argue either. After the albums “Outside” and “Earthling” saw him trying to keep up with ever changing musical movements, his final album before the new Millennium- “Hours” – found him trying to be at the forefront of a technological revolution. It was one of the first albums by a major artist available to download via the internet and specifically via Bowie’s website BowieNet. The ability to do such a thing is completely taken for granted by Generation Z but back in 1999, it would have been a totally alien concept for most of us. Not everyone was an early adopter like Bowie and even if we had an internet connection, it probably wasn’t up to downloading multiple files. However, “Hours” was released digitally before it was physically so it must have been a frustrating experience for many of Bowie’s devoted fanbase.

Bowie predicts the internet in 1999

For those people who did manage to access the album via their computer, would they have been pleased or disappointed by the fruits of their labours? Well, “Hours” received generally mixed reviews and regularly appears towards the bottom of lists ranking Bowie’s albums. Critics seemed to like individual tracks but believed that the album lacked cohesion. Lead single “Thursday’s Child” was one of its more well received songs but it’s hardly classic Bowie though some tried to relate it to his seminal “Hunky Dory” album. An airy ballad of sorts, its title was inspired by Eartha Kitt’s autobiography though surely the traditional nursery rhyme “Monday’s Child” had a bearing as well. If so, Bowie wasn’t the first to incorporate it into a song with the likes of Matt Monro and Spandau Ballet using the motif before him. Am I saying Bowie copied the Spandau boys? No, I wouldn’t dare obviously. “Thursday’s Child” peaked at No 16 despite Bowie’s in person performance here though clearly he wasn’t in the L2 nightclub in Liverpool – that would have been a major coup.

Scream connection: Bowie immersed himself in early 20th century German Expressionism during his Berlin period in the late 70s. Edvard Munch who painted The Scream was a pioneer of Expressionism.

The audience in Liverpool might have missed out on Bowie but they did get another big name in Tom Jones plus the added bonus of The Cardigans to boot. Together. How so? Well, Tom hadn’t released an album for five years and so to relaunch himself, he put together a covers album. Hardly an original concept but Tom added an extra layer of interest by recording each individual song as a collaboration with a different artist including the likes of Stereophonics, Robbie Williams and Natalie Imbruglia. The lead single taken from it was a cover of the Talking Heads track “Burning Down The House” with the aforementioned Swedish rockers The Cardigans.

It appeared a bold choice on initial inspection. For a start, how well known was the song? Sure, it had been Talking Heads’ only Top 10 hit in the US but in the UK it had failed to chart on its release in 1983. So, we were talking about a 16 year old song that had never been a hit. That take is disingenuous though as “Burning Down The House” was hardly unknown. Its parent album “Speaking In Tongues” had charted in the UK and moreover, it was an integral part of perhaps the greatest live album of all time – “Stop Making Sense”. All that said though, there were perhaps more obvious choices for the lead single from Tom’s covers album “Reload” – INXS’s “Never Tear Us Apart” or “Sunny Afternoon” by The Kinks maybe? Obvious isn’t always right though and Tom and The Cardigans’ version of “Burning Down The House” lit the charts up returning Jones to the Top 10 for the first time since 1988 which was, coincidentally, also a cover – Prince’s “Kiss” with the Art Of Noise. I was one of those who bought “Burning Down The House” though mainly for Tom’s version of EMF’s “Unbelievable” which was an extra track on the CD single after seeing him perform it live with EMF on his 1992 TV series Tom Jones: The Right Time which is just a great clip.

Scream connection: Jones is well known for eliciting screams from his audiences at live gigs where the throwing of underwear on stage has also been a regular occurrence.

One of the most memorable/annoying No 1s of the year now as Eiffel 65 top the chart with “Blue (Da Ba Dee)”. This was yet another dance track that had caused a splash over the summer in Ibiza and, like ATB and Lou Bega before it, the record had charted in a minor way just in sales of import copies alone before shooting straight to the summit over here once it had an official UK release. Despite their French sounding name, this lot were actually Italian and they came up with their most well known track after the initial looped keyboard hook was fleshed out with some nonsense lyrics about a blue man living in a blue world (or something). However, the track’s USP was the “da ba dee” line in the chorus which had an almost hypnotic effect on the listener. It also created one of the most infamous misheard lyrics of all time as many people (including myself) heard “Aberdeen I will die”. Surely only Kate Bush’s backing vocals line “Jeux sans frontières” in Peter Gabriel’s “Games Without Frontiers” which was misheard as “She’s so popular” rivals it. “Blue (Da Ba Dee)” was No 1 all around Europe and beyond and would stay at the top of the UK charts for three weeks (one of only three singles to do so in 1999) becoming the second biggest selling single of the year. Yabba-da-ba-dee!

Scream connection: Well, here’s a thing. Aside from the “Aberdeen I will die” mishear, the internet tells me that “Da Ba dee” was also mistaken for either “If I bleed, I would die” or “I will scream” and that some have concluded that they were inspired by a ritualistic, screaming, dancing event. Bloody conspiracy theories.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Vengaboys	We’re Going To Ibiza	As if
2	Sting	Brand New Day	I did not
3	Everything But The Girl	Five Fathoms	Nope
4	Paul Johnson	Get Get Down	Not for me
5	Wyclef Jean / Bono	New Day	Never
6	David Bowie	Thursday’s Child	Nah
7	Tom Jones / The Cardigans	Burning Down The House	YES!
8	Eiffel 65	Blue (Da Ba Dee)	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/m002vr8s/top-of-the-pops-24091999

TOTP 17 SEP 1999

Posted on May 1 by 80stastic

Four days before this TOTP was broadcast was a very significant date if you were a fan of science fiction and of one show in particular. You see, 13 September 1999 is the date that a thermonuclear explosion caused the moon to blast out of Earth’s orbit and into deep space. Well, it did in Gerry Anderson’s Space:1999 anyway. I loved this show when I was a kid though I probably didn’t understand a lot of the heavy, complex plots in Series One that dealt with metaphysical themes. Series (Year) Two was much more action-orientated, awash with monsters with each episode pretty much ending in a bug hunt which was probably more alluring for the eight years old me. 50 years on, I can appreciate that the first series was infinitely superior. I haven’t done a theme post for a while so let’s see if I can make some very tenuous connections between the artists on this TOTP and Space:1999…

Before we get to all that though, who’s this not-seen-before host for this show? Emma Ledden? It’s a new name on me. Well, she’s an Irish author, presenter, model and writer who at the time of this broadcast was about to take over the reins of presenting Saturday morning children’s TV show Live & Kicking after Zoe Ball and Jamie Theakston had left so I guess this was a bit of cross promotion by the BBC. That certainly seems to be the case as this was the only TOTP she ever presented. She now runs a communications company and is a published children’s author. Oh and by the way, we’re still in TOTP On Tour mode with this show coming from Club Wow in Sheffield. We start with the only song this week that has featured on a previous show – “Moving” by Supergrass. As such, I’ve already reviewed this one. Here’s what I had to say about it:

TOTP 26 AUG 1999

Can I just leave it at that? No? OK, well checking it out online I found a comment that said that the intro to “Moving” is just like that of the track “Dogs” by Pink Floyd. Now, never having caught the boat going to Floyd island, I’m not in a position to make any comparison without listening first so…

…Wow! It’s just like it! Was that deliberate on the part of Supergrass or subconscious?

Space:1999 connection: The video for “Pumping On Your Stereo” features Supergrass as animatronic puppets with human heads, a visual style that pays homage to the “Supermarionation” technique pioneered by Gerry Anderson, the creator of Space 1999.

After their ubiquitous Summer hit “Kiss Me” had finally dropped out of the charts, Sixpence None The Richer made a bold, unexpected decision for the follow up single. For many, “There She Goes” by The La’s was seen as untouchable when it came to covering it and yet that’s just what the Christian alternative rock band did. Why would it have been seen as musical blasphemy? I think perhaps it’s because of the almost myth-like status that has been built up around The La’s over time. In an alternate universe, they would not have split after just one album and would have given us a wealth of material over a long career and it’s that missed opportunity on which their legend has been built. The story that never got to be told. The paucity of La’s recordings* means that the ones that exist are upheld as almost religious artefacts so to dare to cover their most well known and perhaps treasured song…well, it was…daring. That might all sound a bit over the top and yes, I could be open to accusations of hyperbole but I think I prefer to call it artistic licence.

*They reformed briefly in the mid-1990s, 2005 and 2011 but no new recordings were released.

Anyway, was the Sixpence None The Richer version of “There She Goes” any good? Actually, after all that ~~hyperbole~~ artistic licence above about The La’s original, it’s a pretty respectful take on it. Sort of reminds me of the Cowboy Junkies but poppier. Its peak of No 14, though nowhere near as high as that of “Kiss Me”, suggests that the record buying public didn’t reject it out of hand as sacrilegious. Of course, it’s possible that the pop kids of 1999 weren’t aware of the 1990 incarnation and took it on its own merits and liked it enough and I guess that’s where I’ll leave this one. It was an adequate cover – good enough.

Space:1999 connection: Sixpence None The Richer’s name was inspired by a passage from C.S.Lewis’s book Mere Christianity. Lewis also wrote a Space Trilogy including the title Out of the Silent Planet which explored the idea of Earth as a ‘Silent Planet’ quarantined from the rest of the cosmos whereas Space: 1999 depicts humanity forced out of that quarantine due to a disaster. Put that in your rocket and ignite it!

It’s Hepburn’s nemesis next – the blink-and-you’ll-miss-‘em Thunderbugs. Yes, the other big player in the ‘all girl groups playing their own instruments’ mini movement at the end of the 90s make their TOTP bow with their debut single “Friends Forever”. Unlike Hepburn though who all hailed from England, Thunderbugs had an international flavour to them with members from France and Germany in their line up. So, who came first or should that be who copied who? Perhaps neither question holds water as both groups appear to have met organically rather than being recruited for a specific project akin to the Spice Girls. Admittedly, Hepburn got their product to market first but only by a few weeks. Should the question then be were there any differences between the two? On the surface the answer is no as both consisted of four members who all played their own instruments and both were pedalling a rock/pop sound. Digging a little deeper, I would say that Thunderbugs were actually more pure pop in that “Friends Forever” sounds like something from High School Musical but I might be splitting hairs. What is true is that both bands couldn’t sustain. Thunderbugs released a follow up that flopped, failing to make the Top 40 in a packed Christmas market and their album wasn’t even released in the UK (though it is now available on Spotify). So much for Emma Ledden’s comment about this being the first of many TOTP appearances for them – this was their one and only. Hepburn, meanwhile, managed three mid-sized hits (including one called “Bugs” bizarrely) and a Top 30 album before being dropped in the Summer of 2000.

Space:1999 connection: Emma Ledden did my job for me in her intro “Thunderbugs are go” obviously referring to Gerry Anderson’s puppet series masterpiece Thunderbirds.

Well, this is fortunate. A new entry into the charts that is steeped in Sheffield music history whilst the show is being broadcast this week from a club in, yep, Sheffield. I wonder if that was in the thinking behind showcasing a hit at No 28 whilst ignoring a smash at No 7 by Leftfield/Afrika Bambatta. Anyway, it’s The All Seeing I featuring Phil Oakey who we get making a South Yorkshire double whammy for their single “1st Man In Space”. Written by yet another Sheffielder in Jarvis Cocker (supposedly a collaboration sparked by Pulp being on the same TOTP show as The All Seeing I in 1998), its lyrics inevitably drew comparisons with David Bowie’s “Space Oddity” and “Rocket Man” by Elton John. However, it sounds more like early B-52s to me, maybe with a lick of New Order in the mix. That’s a good thing by the way with Oakey’s low register vocals a perfect compliment to that sound. It was probably a little too left field (no, not them) to be as big as their previous two hits “Walk Like A Panther” (made with another South Yorkshire man Tony Christie) and “Beat Goes On” and indeed, that aforementioned chart position of No 28 was its peak. Still, in a year of awful music, it provided a nice little pushback against the tide of tat. It was also The All Seeing I’s final UK hit.

Space:1999 connection: Space:1999? “1st Man In Space”? This shizzle writes itself.

And so to another cover version reactivating a hit years after it was originally in the charts but I’m guessing that this one would not have raised the same eyebrows that “There She Goes” did. Perhaps the defining anthem of bubblegum pop, “Mickey” started out life as “Kitty” on “Some Girls” hitmakers Racey’s debut album but was remodelled by Toni Basil with a name and gender change which propelled her to the top of the US charts and to No 2 in the UK in 1982. Basil’s pop career was basically just that one song and she returned to her more successful career as a choreographer working with some of the biggest names in music and showbiz. “Mickey” though would prove to be a remarkably hardy song, regularly topping ‘one hit wonder’ polls and becoming a staple of wedding disco playlists. I guess it was inevitable that somebody would cover it eventually and so it was that Lolly took it back into the charts in 1999. Who you may well ask? Born Anna Shantha Kumble, in Sutton Coldfield (and I’d always assumed she was American), Lolly had already had one hit with her debut single “Viva La Radio” which we missed in these TOTP repeats because of the Gouryella issue but she was back with her version of “Mickey” which would become her biggest hit of five when it peaked at No 4. Given Lolly’s image, it was an almost perfect choice of track and she gives a pretty faithful rendition of it (albeit with some clunky synths to the fore) even down to recreating the cheerleader motif. Her squeaky voice is almost unspeakable though.

Now there was some controversy surrounding these lyrics:

“So come on and give it to me any way you can
Any way you wanna do it, I’ll take it like a man”

Writer/s: Michael Donald Chapman, Nicholas Barry Chinn
Publisher: Downtown Music Publishing

Why? Well, a music critic called Robert Christgau suggested that the lines referred to anal sex (!) but Toni Basil adamantly denied that and indeed, neither Lolly nor her management felt the need not to include the lyrics in her version despite her teeny bop appeal. After her short lived music career was over (she had a couple more hits with cover versions of Michael Jackson and Cyndi Lauper tracks), Lolly diversified into TV presenting, stage roles (she’s a veteran of pantomimes) and even returned to music in 2018 with a single called “Stay Young And Beautiful” though I’m not sure anyone really noticed.

Space:1999 connection: Yasuko Nagazumi played Yasko in Space:1999 and her daughter was the lead singer of shoegaze band Lush – Miki Berenyi

WHOOOO?! LFO? They were an electronic dance duo from Leeds (Low Frequency Oscillations for all you pedants) who specialised in the bleep techno sound weren’t they? Well, yes they were but they were also an American pop-rap group who had a handful of hits around the turn of the century. LFO (or Lyte Funky Ones to give them their full title) have quite the tragic element to their story despite my not knowing who they were/are. Although clearly a trio here, their timeline of members consists of four people – three of them are now dead including two of those featured in this performance. That’s quite a death percentage. Their early releases included a cover of “Step By Step” by New Kids On The Block (more of them later) before going into the stratosphere with “Summer Girls” which made No 3 in the US and No 16 over here. Listening to it in 2026, I have to say its success seems inexplicable. It’s truly awful with some random lyrics supposedly inspired by memories of previous summers like these that put me in mind of “The Chicken Song” by Spitting Image:

“New Kids On The Block had a bunch of hits
Chinese food makes me sick…When you take a sip, you buzz like a hornet
Billy Shakespeare wrote a whole bunch of sonnets…”

Songwriters: Bradley Young / Dow Brain / Rich Cronin; Summer Girls lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group

Well, there’s the New Kids On The Block reference but even worse is Billy Shakespeare. BIILY SHAKESPEARE?! REALLY?! The whole thing sounds dreadful, like they’d been given just 20 minutes to come up with a rap and this was the best that they could do. Maybe it’s just their name but they’re giving me EYC (Express Yourself Clearly) vibes when they should have been more EMF (Epsom Mad Funkers). Despite now numbering just one, their name is being kept alive by surviving member Brad Fischetti who has toured with reality TV boyband O-Town.

Space:1999 connection: Space:1999 was put into development after Gerry Anderson’s first live action sci-fi series UFO wasn’t commissioned for a second series. LFO…UFO? Ah, it’s close enough.

Ooh! Here’s a nice little link from Lolly whom we saw earlier to the next act courtesy of the ever reliable @TOTPFacts:

The only other top 40 hit to contain the name "Mickey" in its title was "Metal Mickey" by Suede (number 17, September 1992). #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) April 17, 2026

Excellent! Now, there was a third single from Suede’s “Head Music”? There was a third and fourth actually but “Everything Will Flow” was the third and it has the band on a very laid back vibe, with an almost cosmic sound. Suede go all hippy? Maybe that’s a stretch but it’s certainly less urgent than some of their back catalogue and I’m afraid to say that’s not necessarily a good thing. It’s all a bit meandering and, dare I say it, dreary. Its high of No 24 was their worst chart position since their debut single “The Drowners” failed to make the Top 40. These were difficult times for the band with Brett Anderson’s addiction problems to the fore and their commercial fortunes on the wane. Everything was flowing and the band were drowning.

Space:1999 connection: Suede released a B-sides compilation album in 1997 called “Sci-Fi Lullabies”.

Just when I think that 1999 can’t have any more musical nadirs left to negotiate, up pops another abyss devoid of taste and creativity. How the hell did the UK put “We’re Going To Ibiza” by Vengaboys at No 1? Look, I get that the hordes of Brits holidaying on the Spanish island in the Summer meant that some of the tunes that they heard out there in the clubs would create a demand for them back in the UK but this wasn’t an Ibiza anthem was it? It was almost a novelty song based on the 1975 No 1 “Barbados” by Typically Tropical. It was crud, pure, irredeemable crud and yet the record buying public found it irresistible. Was it the way that they pronounced “Ibiza” as “I-bitz-a” (a common pronunciation in their home country of Holland) that people fell for? Is that all it took?! Never mind going to Ibiza, we were all going to Hell in a handcart.

Space:1999 connection: In 2021, Vengaboys released a single called “1999 (I Wanna Go Back)”.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Supergrass	Moving	No but I had the album
2	Sixpence None The Rich	There She Goes	Nah
3	Thunderbugs	Friends Forever	Nope
4	The All Seeing Eye / Phil Oakey	1st Man In Space	Decent but no
5	Lolly	Mickey	No thanks
6	Lyte Funky Ones	Summer Girls	Of course not
7	Suede	Everything Will Flow	No
8	Vengaboys	We’re Going To Ibiza	Hell 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/m002v4qp/top-of-the-pops-17091999

TOTP 02 JUL 1999

Posted on April 7 by 80stastic

We’re halfway through these BBC4 1999 TOTP repeats which means I’m officially in the home straight with this blog which will end with the 90s and there will be no TOTP Rewind the 2000s. Also coming to an end back in 1999 was my time working for Our Price. Having started with the company in October 1990, I now had less than a year left before I would leave. I recently posted a photo of myself taken outside the store in Altrincham around this time and with me in that photo was my manager Pete whom I’ve not referred to before. Pete came in to replace Scott who had been so important in my rehabilitation back into work after a significant amount of time out when I was struggling with my mental health. I’d not worked with Pete before so I was probably a bit concerned when Scott was moved on to the Piccadilly shop in Manchester. I shouldn’t have worried as Pete was great albeit in very different ways to Scott. He was an absolute dynamo, always busy doing something, probably because he was a sugar junkie – Pete would think nothing of having a packet of Tunnocks Teacakes for his lunch. He was also not the best observer of Health and Safety regulations. I recall doing an induction for a Xmas Temp and had literally just told them about never standing on a swivel chair to reach for anything high up and Pete came into the stockroom and reached for something high up on a swivel chair! I once locked him in the shop by mistake after taking both his and my keys home. This was before we all had mobile phones and so I got all the way home to Manchester where I found my answer machine full of messages from a stranded Pete asking me to come back and let him out. He took it in good humour though and we went to the pub afterwards to watch the footy. Pete would be my 14th and final manager before I left both Our Price and Manchester for a job in the Civil Service at York.

You’re not here for recollections about my work life though so let’s get to the music. There are only seven artists on tonight as opposed to the usual eight but having checked, that appears to be the original figure when first broadcast and not due to any revised editing decision. Gail Porter is in the host hot seat and we start with last week’s No 1. This practice of having the previous week’s chart topper raise the curtain on the following week’s show despite having been toppled from their throne was becoming a regular feature. Previously, we had S Club 7, this time it’s the Vengaboys with “Boom Boom Boom Boom”. I get that it was a method of combatting the extreme fluctuations of the very top of the charts otherwise these big selling hits would only get one TOTP appearance but it made for an odd spectacle for those of us who grew up in the 70s and 80s watching the show. We just get a repeat of the performance from seven days prior in this one and as such, I have nothing more to say about this absolute pile of crud.

Instead, I think I’ll comment on the profuse usage of the word ‘boom’ in pop and rock music because the Vengaboys sure weren’t the first to coin it. Going back to 1962 there was “Boom Boom” by legendary US blues artist John Lee Hooker whilst the 70s brought us The Boomtown Rats. Into the 80s, the word seemed to be attached to bands and songs that didn’t achieve the same level of success. “Iko Iko” hitmaker Natasha released “The Boom Boom Room” as the follow up but it failed to crack the Top 40 whilst the band Boom Boom Room never hit any higher than No 74 with “Here Comes The Man” despite releasing it twice. The 90s was…ahem…boom time for songs featuring “boom” in their titles. There’s “Boom Boom Boom” by The Outhere Brothers and “Boom! Shake The Room” by DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince both of which were No 1 records. Meanwhile, Apache Indian would score a Top 5 hit with “Boom Shack-A-Lak” in 1993. I’m sure there are more but I think I’ve proved my point. In fact, I think I’ve earned the right to one of these…

Almost two months (TWO MONTHS!) after we first saw Whitney Houston perform “My Love Is Your Love” on the show, we got to see her do it again this week or rather we were just shown a repeat of that initial appearance. Yes, that’s what the once monumentally important TOTP had become by 1999 – a show that would feed us repeats of performances we’d already seen weeks before. OK, that assessment doesn’t really tell the whole story. Presumably when Whitney and her team agreed to record an in person performance for the show, it came with certain conditions. It wasn’t worth her time to do just one song so two tracks were performed – her current single “It’s Not Right But It’s OK” and the follow up “My Love Is Your Love”. I’m pretty sure that was the case anyway. It makes sense. I recently posited a similar theory regarding Cher who I believe did two performances of her hit “All Or Nothing” in the same recording but with two different outfits on! I guess satisfying diva demands was deemed a fair price to pay to get the biggest names in music on the show.

Anyway, the long game strategy played by Whitney’s people paid off for both parties – they had a ready made performance for promotional purposes in the can for the release of “My Love Is Your Love” and TOTP had the exclusive of a studio appearance that they could show. However, why then was said appearance shown on the 14th May show weeks before it was available to buy in the shops? It must have been to plug the album which had been released the previous November surely? Or perhaps the release date of the single got put back? My guess is your guess.

Ah 1999, you really were a pile of shite weren’t you? Pointless, needless, inexplicable hit after hit cluttering up the charts. Hers another example. For some reason, The Three Amigos and their cover version of “Louie Louie” puts me in mind of The Wiseguys* whom we recently saw coming on like a turn of the millennium Blues Brothers with their single “Ooh La La”. Just like those berks, these jerks put the least amount of original thought that they could get away with into their hit. I mean like literally – they chose possibly the world’s most recorded song (2000 different versions at last estimate) and added a rap to it. That’s it pretty much. Such a poor idea was it that some weird visuals were required to sell it so we get the monochrome, 60s style backing dancers (a nod to the popularity of Austin Powers perhaps) and some sort of sci-fi costumes and and a bloke with a beard who I can’t tell if he’s covered in cobwebs or looks like he’s just come out of a cryogenic freezing facility (Austin Powers again). What utter charlatans (just like the characters from the 1986 comedy movie they were presumably named after).

*It turns out that The Wiseguys remixed one of the tracks on the “Louie Louie” single for The Three Amigos. My Spidey senses working well there.

Suede’s commercial peak was starting to decline by the end of the 90s. Although fourth album “Head Music” had followed “Coming Up” (and before that their eponymous debut album) to the top of the charts, it had only sold a third of its predecessor’s copies. Following suit were the singles released from “Head Music”. “She’s In Fashion” would end a run of six releases charting inside the Top 10 when it peaked at No 13. Subsequent singles taken from the album would not even make the Top 20. And yet “She’s In Fashion” is generally regarded as one of the band’s most accessible songs receiving more airplay than any of their previous singles had. It was championed by Radio 1’s Zoe Ball though possibly she saw it as tool for self promotion due to its opening lines:

“She’s the face on the radio, she’s the body on the morning show.”

Writer(s): Brett Lewis Anderson, Neil John Codling

That must be why my immediate association with the song is the broadcaster and presenter. Didn’t she try and make out that it was written about her? I can’t remember now. It’s too long ago. Enough of all that though, was it any good and why did it receive so much airplay? Well, yes it was, certainly compared to the rest of the junk in the charts. I’m guessing its airplay was down to its lighter, breezier sound that almost had a summery feel. Almost. It’s also quite repetitive for a Suede track which probably helped to lodge it in people’s brains and make it possibly one of their best known songs despite not being one of their biggest hits. Apparently the track was written and recorded at a time when Brett Anderson’s drug habit was at its worst but looking at him here, either he’d turned his life around by this point or the make up artist had done an amazing job on him.

Even in the dying light of the 90s, still the disease that blighted the musical landscape of that decade would not yield – yes, we still had time for yet another boyband. This lot were so lightweight that they’d have floated to the surface if chucked in the nearest canal wearing concrete shoes which is possibly a fate they deserved for the bilge they served up. Too harsh? Maybe but having to write about A1 is really trying my patience. A1 – even their name was awful, only beaten in the manky moniker stakes by Blue.

OK, so what was the story behind this shower? It was all down to someone called Tim Byrne who was one of the people involved in setting up Steps apparently. Paul Marrazzi had just missed out on being in that group but Byrne must have seen something in the pop hopeful and so decided to form another band with him in it. Auditions were held and a four piece put together. Presumably Byrne’s track record with Steps helped get A1 a record deal and hey presto!…their debut single “Be The First To Believe” was suddenly in the Top 10 despite sounding like a piss weak version of Steps if such a thing were possible. Surely this lot were destined for just the 15 minutes of fame but no; they would rack up 11 hit singles including (and this is truly mind boggling) two No 1s! One was a cover version of A-ha’s “Take On Me” which I can only describe as depressing.

They would split in 2002 with the obligatory solo careers pursued but would reunite in 2009 for a series of live shows and a persistent dalliance with Norway and the Eurovision Song Contest (member Christian Ingebrigtsen is Norwegian). In 2014 they appeared in that last scraping of the fame barrel known as The Big Reunion alongside the aforementioned Blue, Five, 911, Adam Rickitt etc. When their 20 years anniversary came around in 2019, Marrazzi rejoined for some live shows and the band released some non album singles. They are still together to this day which see seems incredible to me for a band that had so little to offer.

P.S. When I was at secondary school, we had a grading system that was a combination of letters and numbers with the former referring to your level of achievement in a particular subject and the latter the amount of effort you put in. A1 was therefore the highest you could be awarded and you were generally considered a swot if you received that mark. The coolest grade was A5 – you were naturally clever but couldn’t give a toss about applying yourself. In that system, A1 the band should surely have been an E1 – desperate to do well but intrinsically hopeless. And the recipient of the A5 grade in boyband world? I don’t know, East 17 maybe?

Here’s a question – was I already aware of Jennifer Lopez as an actress before she turned her hand to singing or was her debut single “If You Had My Love” my first introduction to her? Let’s have a look. Which films had she been in up to this point?

*checks her filmography*

Nothing I’d seen then nor indeed since I don’t think. Out Of Sight alongside George Clooney seemed to have been her highest box office hit by this point. The truth is that it’s hard to recall our first awarenesses of huge public figures isn’t it? It’s difficult to pinpoint our consciousness in these matters as our memory shifts and re-edits what we knew and when. I think the answer is probably that I knew of her as an actress but hadn’t engaged with her work on any meaningful level until I had to as I was selling her CDs as part of my job at Our Price. Despite this, I’d be hard pushed to name any of her songs (save maybe “Jenny From The Block”) and there’s plenty to choose from – she’s released nine studio albums and 67 singles! I had no idea! As mentioned earlier, “If You Had My Love” was the first of those 67 and it hit immediately going to No 1 in America and No 4 over here. As a Latin-infused, R&B number, it was never going to do much for me but even my ‘pop’ ear (Popeye’s brother) could identify that it was a very serviceable track competently delivered. Parent album “On The 6” would sell 300,000 copies in the UK and 10 times that amount in the US. A superstar was born and she would go by the name of J-Lo. Well, it was snappier than Jenny From The Block I guess.

It’s yet another different No 1 this time from ATB who was German DJ André Tanneberger. Now, if you look at the chart for 6th to the 12th June 1999, you’ll find two separate entries for “9PM (Till I Come)” – one at No 97 and one at No 78. How could this be and how did the track get to No 1 from these lowly positions? Well, it was all down to imports. The release at No 96 was the Australian import and No 78 position was occupied by the German import. Both singles were released on different labels and therefore circumvented chart rules that didn’t allow the same track to occupy separate chart positions. Neither would get higher than No 47 in the charts. Now that might sound like I’m being sniffy but actually a peak of No 47 for an imported single was very respectable and showed a true demand for the track that had initially been released by Ministry of Sound three months earlier when it had peaked at No 68. Confusing isn’t it? Presumably that Ministry of Sound release didn’t have much promotion behind it or it was a limited pressing as the track remained popular in clubland thereby necessitating those import copies being brought into the country to satisfy demand. In the face of this, Ministry of Sound gave it another go, this time aligned with Summer and the Ibiza season and a No 1 was assured. As I wasn’t frequenting the nightclubs of Ibiza in 1999 (nor anywhere actually being in my 30s at this point), this trance track based around a synthesised slide guitar riff, to paraphrase Midge Ure, meant nothing to me.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Vengaboys	Bom Boom Boom Boom	Of course not
2	Whitney Houston	My Love Is Your Love	Nope
3	The Three Amigos	Louie Louie	Never
4	Suede	She’s In Fashion	Decent tune but no
5	A1	Be The First To Believe	No, it was last
6	Jennifer Lopez	If You Had My Love	Nah
7	ATB	9PM (Till I Come)	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/m002t695/top-of-the-pops-02071999

TOTP 25 JUN 1999

Posted on April 3 by 80stastic

It’s Glastonbury time again in these TOTP repeats with the host of this show – Gail Porter – making reference to it in her opening intro. In fact, the festival began on the very same day that this TOTP aired with REM being the headliners on the Friday night followed by Manic Street Preachers on the Saturday and Skunk Anansie closing the whole shebang on the Sunday night. Unlike in previous years, the weather was glorious with a sun drenched three days making the £150,000 spent on downpour precautions redundant. As this is the Glastonbury TOTP Rewind post, it’s that time again when I see if any of the acts on this particular episode ever got to play the festival…

We start with last week’s No 1 “Bring It All Back” by S Club 7 which has dropped to No 2. It was the first of four chart toppers for the group though checking their discography, I’m surprised at the gaps between the first one and the other three. I would have presumed all their first few singles went to No 1 but not so. Their second single to achieve that feat came 18 months later in December 2000 with “Never Had A Dream Come True” which was followed by two more successive No 1s in “Don’t Stop Movin’” in May 2001 and “Have You Ever” in December of the same year. That means that those hits you immediately associate with S Club 7 like “S Club Party” and “Reach” didn’t actually make it to the top which I’m quite shocked by. I mean, I say ‘shocked’ but I probably should say ‘mildly surprised’. The word ‘shocked’ shows a level of engagement in the group which I just don’t have. And yet, their story of success, decline, tragedy and redemption really would make a good film or a decent biopic at least.

Did they ever play Glastonbury? No, they never had that particular dream come true despite expressing a desire to do so following their 25th anniversary reunion announcement in 2023.

Some A grade bullshit from executive producer Chris Cowey next as he recycles a performance by Jamiroquai from three weeks ago for their hit “Canned Heat” which is currently languishing at No 21 in this week’s Top 40 having consistently fallen down the chart from its No 4 debut peak. How has he the brass neck to do this? Easy, just repackage the appearance as being shown to mark the band being at No 1 in the album chart with “Synkronized” (check out the caption graphic) even though there was no regular album chart feature at this point. I get that there were no records going up the charts at all that week but there were seven new entries into the Top 40 that could have been shown instead that weren’t (albeit in the lower reaches of the chart). This stinks of fudging the issue with some disdain for the show’s audience thrown in for good measure.

Did they ever play Glastonbury? Yes. In 1993 on the NME stage and the Pyramid stage in 1995.

There were many things to dislike about the fag end of the 90s charts but one which irked me and confused me in equal measure was the UK’s adoption of US boybands. Didn’t we have enough of our own to contend with?! Did we really need the likes of the Backstreet Boys and this lot – NSYNC – clogging up our Top 40 as well?! I’m sorry, I know all the stats and figures will tell me about how big they were sales wise but they were both terrible. Awful songs, whiny vocals and they weren’t even good looking (Justin Timberlake definitely had problem hair) so how do you explain their popularity then? On top of all that, they were almost interchangeable. Take this hit for example. “Tearin’ Up My Heart” could easily have been a Backstreet Boys song. In fact, if you look at the latter’s discography, they released numerous singles about the ‘heart’.

“I’ll Never Break Your Heart”
“Quit Playing Games (with My Heart)”
“Shape Of My Heart”
“Straight Through My Heart”
“Don’t Go Breaking My Heart”

Come on! It was money for old rope territory. Just to put the final QED touches to my point, “Tearin’ Up My Heart” was originally pitched to the Backstreet Boys to record but NSYNC ended up doing it. Presumably they were with the same record company but I don’t care enough to check. Be gone with you both!

Did they ever play Glastonbury? No, obviously.

Talking of record companies, clearly Britney Spears’ couldn’t wait any longer to release her follow up to “…Baby One More Time” despite the fact that the monster hit was still at No 31 in the UK Top 40 as “Sometimes” rocketed into the charts at No 3. However, what a disappointment it was compared to its predecessor. A mid-tempo ballad was perhaps the obvious choice but it was also predictable (even down to its key change) and when the song was as weak as “Sometimes” then it couldn’t hope to climb as high as her debut. It didn’t help that Britney couldn’t quite reach the notes to sing it but a hit is a hit and it did a job of consolidation especially over here though it would stall at No 21 in America. A return to the “…Baby One More Time” formula would be sought out for subsequent releases on tracks like “(You Drive Me) Crazy” and “Oops!…I Did It Again”. All of those tracks were written and produced by Swede Max Martin who also supplied songs for the aforementioned Backstreet Boys and NSYNC but, perhaps tellingly, “Sometimes” wasn’t*. Martin would go on to write and produce material for Taylor Swift drawing a nice line between female singer superstars from different eras.

*”Sometimes” was written by another Swede in Jörgen Elofsson who would also work with Westlife. Oh God, it was like a Scandinavian version of Stock, Aitken and Waterman!

Did they ever play Glastonbury? No although there were heavy rumours that she would make a surprise appearance during Elton John’s headline set in 2023 following their collaboration on “Hold Me Closer”. The rumours proved to be false.

Think of American pop-punk bands and who comes to mind? Sum 41? Blink-182? Fountains Of Wayne? Third Eye Blind? Weezer? Yep, all good examples but how about Lit? I’d certainly forgotten them (if I even knew them in the first place) but here they are on TOTP with their biggest hit “Own Worst Enemy”. It does sound kind of familiar or maybe I’m just confusing it with all those other bands mentioned above. My fuzzy recall of it though seems to be out of step with the rest of the world though as, according to Wikipedia, it is a huge karaoke favourite and is described in American Songwriter magazine as being:

“among the most broadcasted, karaoked, and covered songs in music history.”

Crone, Madeline (June 1, 2020). “Behind the song: Lit “My Own Worse Enemy”American Songwriter

Wow! Really?! Well it beats “Angels” by Robbie Williams I guess. Lit are still together based around the nucleus of the Popoff brothers Jeremy and A. Jay with their last album being released in 2022.

Did they ever play Glastonbury? That would be a no.

Following ex-EastEnders star Martine McCutcheon into the charts this year was, as host Gail Porter points out, someone from the ‘other side’ meaning from ITV’s Coronation Street. Adam Rickitt had become a pin up before his attempt at pop stardom with his youthful good looks and ripped abdomen building him a fanbase among the nation’s female teenage population via his portrayal of Nick Tilsley. With that following in place, the move into music was a no-brainer and lo, a Top 5 hit was secured with his debut single “I Breathe Again”. Unlike Martine’s No 1 song “Perfect Moment” to which the general public’s reaction was along the lines of “it’s not bad is it?”, Adam’s effort was as anonymous as it was obvious. A Hi-NRG dance track with a deliberately engineered breathy singing style that required very little in the way of vocal chops from Rickitt, it would possibly have sunk without trace without his six pack and that video via which to display them. Featuring a naked Adam in a booth in a lab, it was literally a very steamy promo. We don’t get to see that here though as it was possibly too risqué for the BBC censors. Instead, we get this so obviously mimed performance in which Rickitt actually does very little apart from some upper torso posturing. Seriously, his feet hardly move. There’s a lot of smoke and mirrors going on with his backing dancers doing their best to make him look like he’s even vaguely co-ordinated. On top of everything, he can’t even mine convincingly.

Adam would have two further UK Top 40 hits though surely only his Mum and his superfans (bordering on stalkers) can remember them. He released just the one album called “Good Times” which failed to chart in any meaningful way but here’s the thing – he was signed to a six album deal. WHY?! I may be looking at this all wrong and that this was/is an industry standard practice but who in their right mind thought that Adam Rickitt would last long enough as a pop star to be able to sell SIX albums?! However, Adam did make a comeback 15 years later as part of the ITV manufactured pop group 5th Story who were put together to promote the second series of The Big Reunion. Who were his band mates? Only some of the biggest names in pop! No, of course they weren’t. It was a collection of desperate, famous for 15 minutes chancers including someone from Blazin’ Squad, Kavana and Dane Bowers from Another Level who would light his own farts live on stage if he thought it would keep him in the limelight. Amazingly, according to Wikipedia, 5th Story did play a live gig at the Hammersmith Apollo (presumably as part of The Big Reunion TV show). I can’t believe that the ticket touts were busy for that one.

Did they ever play Glastonbury? I asked AI if Adam Rickitt had ever played the festival and it replied yes in 2023 on the Avalon stage. Flabbergasted, I double checked and it seems it had confused Adam with Will Young. And we’re all worried about AI taking our jobs off us!

If I asked you to name a cover version of Cameo’s “Word Up”, would you immediately turn to Gun’s rock workout of the track or would choose this…well, whatever this is by Mel B, sorry Mel G*? After rather unexpectedly (in my humble opinion) topping the charts with her first single outside of the Spice Girls – her collaboration with Missy Elliott on “I Want You Back” – Mel’s second attempt was recorded as part of the soundtrack to the film Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. However, unlike Madonna’s “Beautiful Stranger” also from that soundtrack which just missed the top spot, “Word Up” would peak at a presumably disappointing for all concerned No 13. That’s probably more than it deserved (again, in my humble opinion) with Mel’s rendition not retaining any of the original’s spark and bite and instead delivering a lacklustre version that even has the audacity to include that horrible ‘I’ve got a little something for you’ sample that was everywhere around the mid point of the 90s. Gun’s take on it was infinitely better to my ears.

Then there’s Mel’s performance here which she conducts whilst sat down on some sort of throne with just two backing dancers for company. What was that about? Did she have a Dave Grohl style injury that restricted her movements? And why was she made up to look like an extra from a Mad Max movie? Was she channeling her inner Tina Turner? At least she didn’t try to recreate the black and white animated promo video for this performance which was very creepy and dark with sexually suggestive material in it. So ‘scary’ (ahem) was it seemed to be that they had to make another video for the track with Mel wearing a sci-fi style metallic costume with what appeared to be bits of Meccano attached to it.

*”Word Up” would be the only single released under the Mel G moniker after Brown’s marriage to dancer Jimmy Gulzar proved to be short lived. Her insistence on changing it in the first place must have caused a few headaches at her record label.

Did they ever play Glastonbury? Despite persistent rumours, Mel B has never played Glastonbury either as a solo artist or as part of the Spice Girls. Mel C, however, played a DJ set there in 2022 and with her own band in 2023.

Though it was never really in doubt, it’s now officially confirmed – chart music in 1999 was utter shite. How can you arrive at any other conclusion when you have tripe like “Boom Boom Boom Boom” by Vengaboys at No 1?! I mean, it’s barely music. It’s more like a demented nursery rhyme. Who was buying this? Pre-school kids? No, it must have been adults as I would no doubt have sold lots of the single as I was working for Our Price at the time and I don’t remember a bunch of five year olds forming an orderly queue to purchase the single. As for their performance here, they look and sound like a hybrid of 2 Unlimited and The Village People. What on earth was happening?

Did they ever play Glastonbury? Hell no!

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	S Club 7	Bring It All Back	Nope
2	Jamiroquai	Canned Heat	Negative
3	NSYNC	Tearin’ Up My Heart	Of course not
4	Britney Spears	Sometimes	Nah
5	Lit	Own Worst Enemy	I did not
6	Adam Rickitt	I Breathe Again	I’d rather hold my breath forever
7	Mel B/G	Word Up	No
8	Vengaboys	Boom Boom Boom Boom	NEVER EVER!

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/m002t693/top-of-the-pops-25061999

TOTP 12 MAR 1999

Posted on February 6 by 80stastic

At last a presenter who isn’t Jayne Middlemiss nor Jamie Theakston! Yes, we have a new presenter who is Gail Porter, someone who has had quite the life and career full of the highest highs and the lowest lows. Gail’s early CV entries included stints on various children’s TV shows before getting her big break on TOTP. She was also a model for magazines such as FHM and it was that part of her life which would result in one of the most infamous news stories and visual memories of the decade. Although it would raise her profile into the stratosphere, it would ultimately cause Porter far more harm than good. A couple of months after her TOTP debut, Gail would awake one morning in May 1999 to find her names in headlines though it wasn’t her head that the story concerned. A nude 60ft tall photograph of Porter was projected onto the Houses of Parliament organised by FHM magazine as part of a marketing campaign to promote their ‘100 sexiest women in the world’ poll. Gail had no idea what had been planned but received a backlash anyway as the perception that she was in on the stunt as a career move was propagated. The incident would lead to Gail not feeling able to leave the house and contribute to bouts of depression. She suffered from anorexia nervosa and was hospitalised before, in 2005, developing alopecia totalis which led to her losing all of her hair. Choosing to deal with her condition literally head on, she declined to wear hats or wigs and used her profile to become ambassador for the Little Princess Trust, a charity which provides wigs to children with hair loss. As if that wasn’t enough to deal with, her marriage (to Toploader guitarist Dan Hipgrave) broke down and she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and sectioned against her will for 17 days in 2011. In a painfully honest and insightful 2024 documentary called Being Gail Porter, she discussed her two decades of mental health struggles. Knowing all of the above, it’s hard to recall her as this fresh faced, young presenter. Let’s see how she did…

Well, Gail’s first line is about it being her first time and a request to please be gentle with her, a bit of sexual innuendo which feels unnecessary but possibly didn’t raise an eyebrow in the era of ‘lad culture’. We then move straight to our first performance which is…oh this is just getting silly now…a hit that was only just on last week’s show and was now coming down the charts. I know this was nothing new in the Chris Cowey era and that I’ve banged on loads about the practice of repeat showings of songs that were descending the Top 10 but this one has really pissed me off for some reason. Actually, not this one but FOUR songs that were on just seven days ago which are all back on the show. Wait a minute though, am I being unfair here? Having checked out that week’s chart on official charts.com, there’s not one song going up the charts! The whole Top 40 consists of either new entries or songs going down. What was the hell was this?! I guess it was another consequence of first week record company discounting as sales in the second week fell dramatically as the price of a single went up. OK, so were there any new entries that could have featured on the show instead of songs declining in popularity? Well yes, there were three entries inside the Top 10 which were never featured including hits from two of the biggest names in music – Madonna and George Michael! OK, they might not have been available for an in the studio appearance but were there no videos made to promote their singles? Well yes, there were – at least they are easily found on YouTube so was this Cowey’s stupid ‘no promos’ policy at work again?

For the record the first act in this TOTP is Cher with “Strong Enough” which is down from No 5 to No 8 in the charts. I’ve nothing else to say about this one other than that Cher was in the news this week for fluffing her lines at the Grammys when presenting Kendrick Lamar and SZA with an award though in her defence it didn’t seem to be all her own fault…

Gail Porter warns us that this next act’s last single stayed on the charts for three months hinting that the follow up may do the same. Did we heed Gail’s warning? No we did not as Vengaboys spent five weeks inside the Top 10 and two and a half months on the Top 40 with “We Like To Party! (The Vengabus)”. You know, the 90s have provided some awful years of music but I think 1999 might just prove to be the worst and this lot will have been one of the biggest contributing factors as to why. Using those exact same tinny, buzzing and downright annoying backing beats as featured on their first hit “Up & Down”, this was music in its most basic form. No, it wasn’t music, this was anti-music or some sort of tribal chant led opium for the masses causing the general public to lose its collective mind and taste to rush to their local record emporium to buy this colossal shit. “Pushing the boundaries of pop” says Gail by which I don’t think she meant carving out a new art form but shrinking the definition of what could reasonably be described as such. Just horrendous but worse was to come in the shape of two No 1 hits during the year for these absolute dolts. The Vengabus was indeed coming…for us all.

Now in previous posts I’ve stated how I should really explore Skunk Anansie’s back catalogue more based on some of their hits I wasn’t familiar with. However, this next one – “Charlie Big Potato” – has dulled my commitment to that endeavour as it’s far too heavy for my liking. I mean, it sounds like Metallica or someone. And it’s dark as well as heavy. The opening lyrics are “I awake from blood thick dreams” followed a bit later by “I awake, dry the scream, spit the vile breath, till my tongue bleeds”. Bloody hell! Skin’s almost demonic performance here certainly doesn’t add any levity to the whole experience with her seemingly on the verge of kicking out at the studio audience and her weird stage outfit of what seems to be a PVC jacket with dangling, massively oversized pieces of material (I’m not sure they count as sleeves) hanging from her arms. Are they meant to be wings? Is she meant to resemble a bat? The whole thing comes across as far too much for a mainstream pop music show and the aforementioned audience don’t seem to know how to react to what they are witnessing initially before adopting an ‘if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em’ approach and just going mental in the really loud bits. The floor managers seem to have run with the element of danger to the whole performance with police tape barriers skirting the stage. “Charlie Big Potato” was a big hit in Iceland which makes sense as the craziness of it puts me in mind of Björk. It was also used in the soundtrack to the deeply disturbing and unpleasant movie Hollow Man starring Kevin Bacon which again makes sense.

Another song going down the charts from No 3 to No 5 is next – “It’s Not Right But It’s OK” by Whitney Houston. This is the third time in a row this performance has been on the show. Week one was an ‘exclusive’ performance before the single was released, week two reflected its debut at No 3 and week three is it descending the charts albeit still remaining in the Top 5. Are all three appearances justified? I can make a case for the first two but surely the third is overkill? Whatever your own opinion on the matter, the upshot is that I have nothing else to say about this one. As a blogger, it’s not right…but it’s OK.

We arrive at the valedictory performance for a band who had eighteen Top 40 hits including a Christmas No 1 and of which only six failed to make the Top 10. A group who courted controversy and were allocated the role of the perceived rivals to the UK’s premier boy band of the 90s. A group who looked to have lost everything but who shortened their name and made one last (partially) successful grab for chart victory. It is, of course, ~~East 17…~~erm…E-17!

Having achieved a No 2 hit against the odds as a Tony Mortimer-less trio with their past single “Each Time”, Brian, Terry and John (thanks for the name checks Gail!) followed it with “Betcha Can’t Wait” which was more of a deliberate R&B sound which they’d plotted without their former chief songwriter. However, whilst I’d unexpectedly appreciated “Each Time”, this one was pure parody. All the same soul stylings were there but the lyrics were laughable. Witness:

“I’m gonna touch you in the right spot baby….Betcha can’t wait, betcha can’t stop…Can’t stop thinking ’bout my love rock, baby come on”

Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Brian Lee Harvey / Terence Mark Coldwell / John Darren Hendy / Mark Reid / Jonathon Lesley Beckford / Ivor Paul Reid
Betcha Can’t Wait lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Ltd., Strongsongs Ltd.

“Touch you in the right spot”?! “My love rock”?! This performance is almost like a Fast Show sketch but instead of ‘Jazz Club’ or ‘Indie Club’ they’d turned their attention to R&B and given us ‘Bump ‘n’ Grind Club’. And check out the other two’s (forgotten their names already – where’s Gail when you need her?) ridiculous dance moves! Like I said pure parody. Compare this nonsense to such gems as “Deep” and “It’s Alright”. There is no comparison. What a said way to bow out for the lads who were straight outta Walthamstow.

Two more hits now which were also on only last week starting with “Just Looking” by Stereophonics. As with Whitney earlier, I haven’t got much else to say about this one except to note that their bass player was recreating a look first popularised on the show by Sandie Shaw and her barefooted performances. However, if you’re wanting a band to band comparison, check out Duran Duran’s guitarist Andy Taylor in this clip of them playing “Hungry Like The Wolf”. What happened to his shoes? I don’t know but if you watch him closely, he does seem to be rather out of it like he was in another world. Planet earth to Andy…Is there something I should know?

Also just like Whitney Houston, this is the third time for Blur on the show with “Tender”. Come on Cowey, what do you think I’ve still got left to say about this one?! OK, how about a shout out to the London Community Gospel Choir who also featured on this track. Founded in 1982, look at this list of artists with whom the have either performed or recorded:

George Michael and Liza Minnelli at The Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert
Madonna at Live 8 in Hyde Park
Eric Clapton in Hyde Park
Kylie Minogue in Hyde Park
Blur (again) at the 2012 BRITS
The 1975 at the 2017 and 2019 BRITS
Pink! at the 2019 BRITS
They recorded a version of the OutKast hit “Hey Ya!” with Razorlight (the B-side to their single “Vice”)
They recorded with Will Young on his debut album “From Now On”
They provided backing vocals on Erasure’s self-titled 1995 album
They featured on Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds 2005 double album “Abattoir Blues/The Lyre Of Orpheus”
They also performed on the songs “Don’t Get Lost in Heaven” and “Demon Days” on the Gorillaz’ “Demon Days” album
They have also recorded with
Paul McCartney, Elton John, Westlife, Elkie Brooks and Tori Amos amongst others

Blimey! Or should I say Hallelujah!

So the halting of the run of one week wonder No 1s didn’t last long did it? Britney Spears has been toppled after just fourteen days at the top of the charts by the 1999 Comic Relief single recorded that year by Boyzone. For the third time in a row we got a pretty straight run through of a song that wasn’t written with the intention of being funny nor that had extra comedic lines thrown into the mix by the performers over a well known hit. To break that down further, ever since its inception in 1986, the established choice was either a cover version played for laughs:

Cliff Richard and The Young Ones – “Living Doll”
Mel & Kim (Mel Smith & Kim Wilde) -“Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree”
Bananarama & Lananeeneenoonoo – “Help!”
Mr. Bean & Smear Campaign feat. Bruce Dickinson – “(I Want to Be) Elected”

Or an original song written to be intentionally funny (I’m not sure the writers always succeeded):

Hale & Pace – “The Stonk”
Right Said Fred – “Stick It Out”
Pet Shop Boys – “Absolutely Fabulous”

Then came “Love Can Build A Bridge” by Cher, Neneh Cherry, Chrissie Hynde and Eric Clapton in 1995 which was a cover of an original song by country music duo The Judds. Two years later, no song was specifically written nor covered for the campaign but the Spice Girls agreed that all royalties for their double A-side single “Mama / “Who Do You Think You Are” would go to the charity. And then there was Boyzone who did a faithful version of Billy Ocean’s 1986 No 1 “When the Going Gets Tough” which I didn’t particularly like first time round so Ronan and the lads take on it was never going to win me over, charity record or not. Watching this back, I’m struck again by how little the guys who weren’t either Keating nor Stephen Gately actually did. In this one, they’re tasked with a bit of finger clicking and some shadow boxing to match the staging theme for the performance and that’s about it. That staging with the boxing backing dancers gives the whole thing a very 80s feel. I’m thinking of this perhaps..

P.S. A few people on line noted an unlikely link between “When the Going Gets Tough” and “We Like To Party! (The Vengabus)” by Vengaboys. Give up? They both have near identical opening lines – “I got something to tell you” in the former and “I’ve got something to tell ya” in the latter. Then in the third line they both share a similar theme – Ronan Keating sings “I’m gonna put this dream in motion” whilst whoever the Vengaboys ‘vocalist’ is gives us the line “Gonna put some wheels in motion”. Note to arresting officer – add plagiarism to the Vengaboys charge sheet for crimes against music.

As for Gail Porter, she did pretty well I think. All power to you Gail, a quite remarkable person. We’ll see plenty more of her (ahem) in future 1999 TOTP repeats.

Order of appearance	Artist	Tilte	Did I buy it?
1	Cher	Stong Enough	Nah
2	Vengaboys	We Like To Party! (The Vengabus)	Never
3	Skunk Anansie	Charlie Big Potato	No
4	Whitney Houston	It’s Not Right But It’s OK	I did not
5	E-17	Betcha Can’t Wait	Nope
6	Stereophonics	Just Looking	No but I had the album
7	Blur	Tender	See 6 above
8	Boyzone	When the Going Gets Tough	Not even for charity

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.

TOTP 27 NOV 1998

Posted on December 19 by 80stastic

After featuring nine songs in the last TOTP, we’re down to seven this time though six of them are new to charts (sort of). Our host is Jayne Middlemiss and we start with that ‘start of’ hit which is from Steps. The reason for it’s unclear categorisation is that whilst “Heartbeat” hasn’t been on the show previously, it wasn’t actually a new chart hit being the other track to their double A-side single alongside their cover of “Tragedy” which we saw on the previous programme. Now, I said in the last post that I didn’t think that I’d ever heard “Heartbeat” before such was the ubiquity of “Tragedy” and I stand by that statement having listened to it today. There’s no bells ringing (even though it’s Christmas time) and I’m rather glad there aren’t as it’s a sickly, saccharine pop ballad that cloys but leaves no cultural nor sonic sustenance whatsoever. It’s literally like a musical form of candy floss. Surely punters weren’t buying the single for this track but purely for “Tragedy”?

“Cor! It’s the Corrs!” or so Jayne Middlemiss in her intro would have us believe that’s what the male population would be saying at this point. Bit sexist that isn’t it Jayne? Well, it was the time of lad culture and Jayne herself had spent time as a glamour model early in her career so maybe all that informed her comments. Or maybe she was just reading the lines written in a script (presumably by a man). Let’s not tie ourselves up in knots about all that. On with the music and “So Young” was the third hit on the trot for The Corrs this year. Written by violinist Sharon about her parents and the notion that no matter how old they got, they seemed to her to be forever young in spirit and outlook. All this talk of ageing and youth got me thinking about who are the eldest and youngest Corrs and the order of the ages in the middle. So how about a festive game of ‘Guess the age of the Corrs’? I’ll start. I’m going:

Jim – eldest
Sharon
Andrea
Caroline – youngest

How did I do?

*checks Wikipedia*

Ooh! Almost! These are their actual ages:

Jim – 61
Sharon – 55
Caroline – 52
Andrea – 51

This, of course, means that even “the beautiful Corrs” (© Ant and Dec) are all now in their 50s.* Time waits for no man…or woman.

*Before you all accuse me of ageism and misogyny, I’m sure they are all still beautiful and absolutely agree that age should have no bearing on perceptions of attractiveness. I was trying to make a point about the passing of youth and how time marches on but I’m regretting saying any of it now. Let’s move on quickly…

…to the Vengaboys! NOOO!!! We can’t have reached that time already. 1998 you really have been a pile of steaming shite and this is the little twist on the turd after it’s been curled out. Too graphic? I care not a jot when it comes to this lot. Which despicable people were responsible for this utter crapola? I’ll tell you who – a couple of Dutch producers who went by the aliases Danski (real name Dennis van den Driesschen) and Delmundo (Wessel Dietrich van Diepen) who threw (according to the official Vengaboys website) impromptu and illegal beach parties from their worn out school bus in the early 90s. Deciding to grow their operation, they recruited some singers and dancers to spice up their DJ sets and then took it a massive step further by deciding to form a record label and produce records. With that concept established, the task of fronting said records would fall to those dancers and singers they had already recruited. After a couple of minor hits in their own country, they went truly international with the release of “Up & Down” which was a Top 10 hit all around Europe and topped the US Dance Club Play chart.

This whole thing has given me some strong 2 Unlimited vibes. The Dutch duo began their run of hits with the track “Get Ready For This”, the single edit of which was essentially an instrumental with the occasional shout out thrown in which many (me included) thought would make them one hit wonders. They made mugs of us though by proceeding to have a run of 14 Top 40 singles including that No 1. Similarly, the Vengaboys, for all the world, looked like being a one-off, almost novelty act with “Up & Down” the lyrics of which consisted of the words ‘up’, ‘and’, ‘down’, and ‘woo!’. Just like 2 Unlimited though, they would follow it with a string of hit singles (including two No 1s) between 1998 and 2001. All of which means we’ve only just scratched the surface of the crust of the Vengaboys planet of which we will all become inhabitants (willing or not) until the end of the 90s.

Ah that explains it! Here’s @TOTPFacts with the reason why there’s only seven songs on this repeat:

Edited out here: the Celine Dion and R Kelly duet “I’m Your Angel”, which was at its number 3 peak. #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) December 12, 2025

Moving on very quickly we find Sash! with yet another hit in “Move Mania”. This was the trio’s* sixth consecutive UK hit but the first not to debut at either No 2 or No 3 when it made its chart entry at No 8.

*Yes, Jayne Middlemiss, Sash was a three man production team not a single person and certainly not an “international man of mystery” as you describe them in your intro.

In their continual conveyer belt of guest vocalists, for this release they have teamed up with Shannon who had a couple of hits in the mid 80s notably with “Let The Music Play” though she also featured on Todd Terry’s 1997 Top 20 hit “It’s Over Love”. Maybe it’s the Shannon effect but “Move Mania” sounds very retro to me by which I mean retro even in 1998. It’s all very frantic, frenetic and furious – dare I say like an 80s Hi-NRG track? Maybe I’m reaching a bit there but it didn’t have the same feel as some of the other Sash! hits to this point. Although the hits certainly didn’t dry up after this slight downturn in chart fortunes for “Move Mania”, they didn’t sustain at that previous high level either with only one of their subsequent six UK entries making it to No 2, the mention of which allows me to trot out this well worn fact about Sash! – they remain the act with the most No 2 hits (five) without ever having a No 1. In the dark times that we currently live in, this bit of pop trivia somehow gives me the slightest slither of hope for the world.

And that slither of hope is extinguished immediately by this next hit. Not another Latin flavoured dance track! How many times have we seen this sort of thing during these late 90s TOTP repeats? Here’s just a few I can think of:

Dario G – “Carnaval De Paris”
Echobeatz – “Mas Que Nada”
Ricky Martin – “(Un Dos Tres) Maria”
Bellini – “Samba De Janeiro”

That’s was surely more than enough of that kind of thing no? No, it wasn’t apparently as here were Ruff Driverz and their flamenco inspired track “Dreaming”. Officially, this was credited as being ‘Ruff Driverz Presents Arrola’ who was the vocalist who has worked with loads of dance acts (sometimes under her real name of Katherine Ellis) including 4-2 The Floor, Eruption and Utah Saints amongst many others. Similar to Sash! and the Vengaboys earlier, the people behind the hit were a DJ/Production team who in this case consisted of Brad Carter and Chris Brown whom for some reason thought that it what the charts needed, as Christmas approached mind, was a flamenco themed hit that surely would have been more suited to a Summer release. As ever though, what did I know as it debuted at No 10 becoming, in the process, the seventh new hit to chart inside the Top 10 that week. What a time to be alive!

After coming up with a true banger with their last single “Everybody Get Up”, Five have resorted to the usual marketing trick of releasing a slushy ballad just in time for Christmas. “Until The Time Is Through” is almost mechanical in its construction, adhering to the accepted boy band blueprint at every turn. Perhaps in an attempt to mix things up a bit, they’ve settled on a rather odd performance for this TOTP appearance. As Jayne Middlemiss says in her intro, the vocals on this one are handled by Richie and Scott presumably because it was their turn with Abz and J having taken the lead on rapping duties on “Everybody Get Up” – poor old Sean never seems to get a go in the spotlight.

Anyway, with those two situated at the front of the stage, the other three are sat right at the back on chairs. I’m sure it sounded like a good idea on paper but the optics of it look a bit odd. They never move once from their seated position which created the impression that they’re rather disinterested in what was happening in front of them. There’s something a bit ‘three wise monkeys’ about them with Abz sat with his chair back to front, J with it the right way around and Sean with his angled to one side. Was that deliberate? You know what would have livened things up? If they’d played a game of musical chairs whilst performing. That would have been a first and created a talking point! As it is, the only talking that happens is right at the very end when J turns to Sean and appears to say something to him. I wonder what he said? “Thank God that’s over”? “I could have sung that better than those two”? “Last one to the BBC bar gets the drinks in”?

It’s a fifth week at the top for Cher and “Believe”. What else is there to say about this one? I’ve covered its chart and sales data, the auto tuned vocals, its awards…what else is there? OK, how about who wrote it? Originally it was a demo worked up by Brian Higgins in 1990 who would gain fame via his Xenomania production team who wrote hits for Sugababes, S Club 7, Girls Aloud and The Saturdays. Higgins couldn’t get any interest in the track (apparently Saint Etienne were one of the artists offered it who turned it down) but he submitted it to Warners chairman Rob Dickins after a chance meeting. Dickins thought it was terrible but had a great chorus and so he employed two more songwriters (Steve Torch and Paul Barry) to work on it. Cher herself added some lyrics but did not get a writing credit though three other names did alongside Higgins, Torch and Barry. Cher admitted in 2023 that she regretted not asking for a songwriter’s credit. With worldwide sales of 11 million, I’m not surprised.

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Steps	Heartbeat / Tragedy	No
2	The Corrs	So Young	Nope
3	Vengaboys	Up & Down	NOOOO!
4	Sash! / Shannon	Move Mania	I did not
5	Ruff Driverz	Dreaming	Nah
6	Five	Until The Time Is Through	Never
7	Cher	Believe	Negative

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/m002nd35/top-of-the-pops-27111998