Was (Not Was)

TOTP 23 JUL 1992

Posted on March 14, 2022 by 80stastic

We’re in mid Summer ‘92 at TOTP Rewind. The Euros have been and gone (and with them Graham Taylor’s credibility as the England manager) and the Olympics in Barcelona are just about to start and we all know what that means…yes that bloody song by Freddie Mercury and Montserrat Caballe will be everywhere including the top end of the charts very soon. For now though, we have a TOTP which is, yet again, a right mix bag of music and artists. We’re back to a presenting duo rather than the solo host we have seen recently with Tony Dortie being paired with Claudia Simon. The producers are sticking with the small changes to the format they made recently meaning we get to see Claudia and Tony do an intro even before the titles roll and then do the Top 10 countdown before we see/hear any artists. I’m not convinced about any of it.

When we do get to the actual music, the first intro is very odd. As the camera alights on Claudia and Tony, the latter says “This record is massive on the dance floor” but the camera keeps moving down towards the stage. Claudia says out of shot “Making their debut on Top of the Pops…” and then…nothing. Surely Claudia was teeing up actually saying who the first act was?! What happened? Did her mike fail? Did she forget who she was introducing? Or did the producers say “Just forget it. Too late now anyway. They’ve started and the artist graphic is on screen already”?

That artist graphic told us that the band were Sunscreem with “Love U More”. So who were these lot? I remember the name but the only other thing I recall about them was that they were a Sony artist (the curse of opening all those deliveries while working for Our Price in the 90s strikes again!). Turns out that they weren’t just another anonymous dance act put together to front a hit single. They were a house band from Essex- no I don’t mean they were the resident band for the whole of the county but that they played ‘house’ music – and actually performed live concerts.

Having been tipped as the next big name in dance music during ‘91, they finally broke into the UK Top 40 with “Love U More”. Listening to it now, it does ring a few bells one of which reminded me of “Sunshine On A Rainy Day” by Zoë. If that bell was ringing though then there was an air horn going off in my head about their performance which is giving me heavy D:Ream vibes. It’s not just their sound, the lead singer even has a tartan suit on!

That singer is Lucia Holm who recorded a fine version of one of my favourite ever songs “Heaven” by The Psychedelic Furs in 2005.

Not only that, check out this fact from @TOTPFacts about her involvement in another of my favourite tunes:

Sunscreem singer Lucia Holm also played cello on "Life In A Northern Town" by The Dream Academy – from which her playing was later sampled by Dario G for his dance track "Sunchyme". https://t.co/s2CrslZ6jO #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) March 11, 2022

I had no idea! I was also in the dark that Steps covered “Love U More” on their debut album. Look!

Nice to see some actual, proper musical instruments on display in a dance outfit performance though I’m not sure about the two dancers throwing some shapes. Sunscreem would go on to have eight UK Top 40 hits though none would get any higher than No 13. “Love U More” itself would make No 23.

Snap! are up to No 2 with “Rhythm Is A Dancer” and it’s obvious now that it’s going to be a chart topper. I’m not sure I would have predicted it spending six weeks as the nation’s best seller though but then what did I know eh? Oh yeah, I was working in a record shop at the time so maybe I should have had my finger in the pulse a bit more.

The track routinely features in the ‘Best No 1s /dance anthems of the 90s’ polls but I bet nobody involved in the record could have foreseen its influence extend to this extent…

Thought Shakespear’s Sister only had one hit? You are sorely mistaken for they had six UK Top 40 hits in total though I’m guessing this one would have a decent chance at being a very low scorer on Pointless. “Goodbye Cruel World” was actually the lead single from their “Hormonally Yours” album and not the all conquering “Stay” but nobody noticed it when it was initially released in late September ‘91 and it struggled to a high of No 59. Maybe that would have been the end of the band had they not had that Dave Stewart penned No 1 song up their sleeves but up their sleeves it was and the rest is (you’re) history.

Essentially a straightforward rock/pop song, it had enough quirkiness about it to make it stand out from the crowd. However, it never made it above its chart position here of No 32 in spite of this TOTP exposure. To be fair, the whirling dervish routine of Siobhan Fahey was starting to irritate and they did seem to shoehorn in a platform for Marcella Detroit’s to display her operatic range every song. Siobahn seems to think it’s Xmas time judging by the white fur trim in her outfit but it’s their bass player that my eyes are more drawn to. She looks ever so familiar and judging by the #TOTP tweets for this show, a fair few people thought the same and wanted to identify her. General consensus was that its Claire Kenny who has worked with the likes of Orange Juice, Sinéad O’Connor and Brian Eno though I think it’s Amazulu that I recognise her from which probably says quite a lot about me.

The Breakers are in a much more sensible place in the show this week and we start with the poster boys of grunge Nirvana. To say how influential they were, their career was pretty short and their back catalogue fairly small. Three studio albums and six UK Top 40 hits in a seven year existence. Yes, you could argue that The Beatles only existed for a decade and look at their legacy but they released thirteen albums in that period. You could also make the case that Nirvana’s potential for longevity was truncated by Kurt Cobain’s death but I think that the band were never likely to pull a U2 and carve out a 40 year career. Cobain’s heroin addiction was always an issue and the group almost broke up after disagreements surrounding Kurt’s attempts to reorganise their royalties structure so that he got more to reflect his songwriting input. There’s also that theory that those who shine the brightest burn out the quickest and that the band were always destined to fulfil that particular narrative but is that just a lazy take on their story?

Anyway, one of those six hit singles was “Lithium” which was the third track to be released from “Nevermind”. It’s a good song and all that but it doesn’t stray far from the “Smells Like Teen Spirit” template in that the verses are subdued lulling us into a false sense of security before the violent eruption of the go apeshit chorus.

The video is a collage of gig footage. Cobain had originally had an idea for an animation to tell the story of a girl called Preggo who lives in a forest and takes some eggs she found in her closet to a king in a castle. This was shelved when it became apparent that it the video would take four months to make. They couldn’t think of anything else to do than just cobble some concert clips together?

“Lithium” peaked at No 11 in the UK singles chart.

Still bleeding the “Stars” album dry are Simply Red or more accurately their record label EastWest. I’m wondering about the wisdom of releasing a fifth single (“Your Mirror”) from an album that had been out for 10 months by this point and which had sold so many copies in the first three of those months that it became the biggest selling album of the whole year.

Were EastWest hoping that there were still some punters out there who hadn’t yet been persuaded into buying “Stars” by the first four singles off it but who might be convinced by the fifth? Surely not. Was it designed to appeal to completist super fans who couldn’t resist the lure of Simply Red product? Did such people exist? Were there exclusive extra tracks on the single? Or was it as I first thought just a case of milking the label’s elite cash cow as much as they could?

“Stars” was the band’s fourth album – would that have bought them to the end of their current record deal? Were EastWest concerned they might lose their lucrative charges? As it turned out they didn’t but it would be four years before the next Simply Red album. Had they thought that might be the case and so wanted to maximise sales of the current one by going all Michael Jackson on its singles release schedule? Were the band on tour and so the single was to promote that?

So many questions to which I’m not sure I actually care what the answers are. This is Simply Red and Mick Hucknall we’re talking about here after all! Suffice to say “Your Mirror” did nothing for me but it reached a respectable No 17 on the charts which presumably meant something to EastWest.

Talking of Jacko…after the first three singles from Michael Jackson’s “Dangerous” album had been given the ‘exclusive’ treatment by TOTP, the video for his latest single only warrants a slot in the Breakers! Possibly to prevent litigation from The King of Pop’s lawyers, it gets a full outing on the following week’s show.

The single in question is “Who Is It” and the critical reception it received at the time suggested that it was “Billie Jean” 2.0. I can certainly hear that in the bridge into the chorus but is there a bit of “Dirty Diana” in there as well?

It managed to get to No 10 in the UK despite it being the fourth single off the album but curiously wasn’t released simultaneously in the US where they went with “Jam” as the fourth single release. I didn’t really care for it at all. Oh, and never mind ‘who is it’, the question I wanted to ask was why doesn’t the song title have a question mark at the end of it? Answer me that.

So who did get the ‘Exclusive’ slot this week instead of Jackson? It’s gone to Enya? Really?! Are you sure?! Yes, for she was in the studio to promote her single “Book Of Days” from the album “Shepherd Moons”. As Tony Dortie says, it also featured in the Tom Cruise/Nicole Kidman film Far And Away. I think I went to the pictures to see that one. It was OK but far too long and the ending is one of the worst in cinematic history.

As for the performance here, there’s a few things to unpack. Firstly, is she singing live as per TOTP policy? She could be but with all those vocal effects on the record it’s hard to tell. Secondly, what was the deal with the platinum blonde wigs on the cello players? Was it a tribute to Gerry Anderson’s UFO and the purple wigs worn by the female staff at moon base? Finally, the flowers on the piano and studio floor – was that an influence on the cover to the Oasis single “Don’t Look Back In Anger”?

“Book Of Days” peaked at No 10.

https://youtu.be/5hTo-3TF0Nw

Obviously “Sexy MF” by Prince was never going to get any airplay if the true word behind the acronym hadn’t been blanked but it’s not like the rest of the lyrics were squeaky clean. Some of them were filthy:

You seem perplexed I haven’t taken you yet

Can’t you see I’m harder than a man can get

I got wet dreams comin’ out of my ears

I get hard if the wind blows your cologne near me

Sheesh! Where was the censor? Presumably on the dance floor.

“Sexy MF” peaked at No 4.

Action from the US chart next as we get a first look at an artist who’s about to bring his success over here. I say first look but if we’d have been watching Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine carefully we’d have seen his guy before. I have to admit that as a teenager I was probably more interested in directing my gaze at Gloria rather than her band! Anyway, enough of that! The guy in question is Jon Secada and “Just Another Day” would be first and biggest hit.

I could never see the appeal of this song and found it quite laborious and dull. I seemed to be in the minority though as it went to No 5 both in the UK and the US. Now I’m not saying the guy can’t sing but, as someone commented on Twitter, he doesn’t half make a meal of this performance which is a flurry of gurning expressions, mike stand wielding and fist clenching. He makes Spandau’s Tony Hadley look like a wallflower. No doubt we’ll be seeing more of Mr Secada in future repeats.

You wait ages for one ‘Exclusive’ (that never comes if you’re Michael Jackson) and then two come along. The second one after Enya earlier is from Elton John and Eric Clapton who have collaborated on a little ditty called “Runaway Train”. The second single released from Elton’s “The One” album, I have to say that this is utter garbage. A right dirge and money for old rope for the pair of them. This did nothing for either protagonist’s reputation. Even the video effects are horrible and only serve to increase the strength of the headache listening to the song will give you.

Unfortunately Claudia Simon stumbles over her words in the intro to this one saying that the video was “shot at the Wembley during Elton’s worldwise tour’. Sadly, there was nothing wise about this train wreck of a release and it peaked at a lowly No 31.

Jimmy Nail is No 1 again with “Ain’t No Doubt” and he’s in the studio again doing his weird, shambling performance that he’s done every week so far in that same dark suit and T-shirt ensemble. He almost motionless and it’s left to his brass section to provide all the movement on stage. The dinner jackets, black bow ties and shades they’re all wearing remind me of the backing singers Nick Heyward had for his single “Warning Sign” back in 1984:

Jimmy was riding high on the back of the success of his Spender TV series which was huge back in the day and regularly pulled in audiences of 14 million. I’m pretty sure I was one of them though I can’t recall any of the episodes or stories now. In keeping with my own memory, it’s almost as though that it’s entirely forgotten now. Never repeated on TV and never even released on DVD or video and yet his first big hit series Auf Wiedersehen Pet is never off the likes of ITV 4 or the Drama channel.

We play out with “Shake Your Head” by Was (Not Was). Some of the things that the lyrics say you can’t do are palpably untrue. ‘You can’t win money at the horses” for example. I’ll wager some of the thousands attending this week’s Cheltenham festival would disagree. The biggest whopper though is “And you can’t influence the masses”. Vote Leave campaign anyone?

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Sunscreem	Love U More	Nah
2	Snap!	Rhythm Is A Dancer	Nope
3	Shakespear’s Sister	Goodbye Cruel World	I did not
4	Nirvana	Lithium	No
5	Simply Red	Your Mirror	Certainly not
6	Michael Jackson	Who Is It	Negative
7	Enya	Book Of Days	It’s a no from me
8	Prince	Sexy MF	Not the single but I have it on a Best Of CD I’m sure
9	Jon Secada	Just Another Day	Never happening
10	Elton John and Eric Clapton	Runaway Train	I’d have rather bought Runaway Train by Soul Asylum and that’s shit as well
11	Jimmy Nail	Ain’t No Doubt	And no
12	Was (Not Was)	Shake Your Head	Not the single but I bought their Best Of album Hello Dad…I’m In Jail with it on

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/m00156d0/top-of-the-pops-23071992

TOTP 16 JUL 1992

Posted on March 11, 2022 by 80stastic

Right – before I get into this can I just say that the BBC4 schedule for these TOTP repeats has been relentless of late. It’s been two shows every Friday for weeks now meaning lots of content needing to be created by this blogger. Can’t the BBC slip in an impromptu Proms or something to give me a blow?! Having checked the forthcoming schedule I can see there is no abatement pending at least until the end of the month. Thanks very much BBC4.

In keeping with last week, there is only one presenter again this week; the fresh faced Mark Franklin. Unlike last week there’s been a tweak to the format which sees Franklin appear on our screens straight away rather than being a disembodied voice announcing the first act and he then proceeds to go straight into a rundown of the Top 10! It seems to be a nod back to how the show used to begin in the 70s and early 80s with a chart countdown soundtracked by “Whole Lotta Love” before we saw any of the acts.

After that we’re into the music and we start with Wet Wet Wet who, like many an artist this year, seem to be having an unexpected revival of fortunes. “Lip Service” is their third Top 40 hit in succession after chart topper “Goodnight Girl” and follow up “More Than Love”. It’s also the fifth and final track to be released as a single from their “High On The Happy Side” album. I always quite liked this – it sort of frothed and bubbled away until the hook of the chorus brought it to the boil. Marti Pellow has turned up for this performance dressed as a poker playing gunfighter from the Wild West (minus a ten gallon hat) or is it as a member of Showaddywaddy?

The band would not release another studio album for three years so they filled the gap with their first Best Of compilation (“End Of Part One: Their Greatest Hits”) and a live set (“Live At The Royal Albert Hall”). Then came that single in the Summer of ‘94 but that’s a while off yet.

“Lip Service” peaked at No 15.

Our first glimpse of Madonna in 1992 came via her single “This Used To Be My Playground” which was from the film she was currently starring in A League Of Their Own. I say ‘starring’ in but hers was actually quite a secondary role in this account of the US women’s baseball league that was founded in 1943 to keep the sport in the public eye during WWII. I really am rather fond of this film with some great performances from Tom Hanks, Geena Davis and Lori Petty as the three major protagonists. One of those guilty pleasure films that I’ll watch if I stumble across while channel flipping. Madonna’s name was all over the promotion campaign for the film but as I say, her character isn’t one of the principal leads.

As for the song itself, it’s a bit of an outlier coming as it did in between* the provocative “Justify My Love” and the outright society baiting “Erotica” project. Very much a stand-alone single – contractual issues meant it couldn’t even be included on the film’s soundtrack – it’s an accomplished ballad but one which I have to admit I always found to be quite dull.

*I’m not counting the “Immaculate Collection” inspired re-releases of “Holiday” and “Crazy For You” in ‘91.

The video concept of a man flicking through a photo album, the pages of which have Madonna singing in various different settings, was not as original as it was made out to be. Boy George’s video for his “To Be Reborn” single of five years earlier had a very similar look. Indeed, in his autobiography George said he was furious when he first saw Madonna’s promo and renamed it “This Used To Be My Video”. He had a point – Madonna’s video is a direct rip off…

‘Furious’ may not have been the exact word George used to express his anger at the steal. Here’s TOTP presenter Tony Dortie:

#totp Bumped into Boy George not long after that Playground @Madonna song came out he had some very choice words about it consisting (insert multiple 4 letter words of your own choice)
— Tony Dortie (@TonyDortie) March 4, 2022

“This Used To Be My Playground” peaked at No 3.

Next up are The Wedding Present though you’d be forgiven for thinking it was Altern-8 given the hazmat suits and masks that the band are wearing. What was all that about? Well, apparently the outfits were from the promo video for the single “Flying Saucer” but while watching it back, I discovered something else that interested me far more. There’s a bit where there a close up of David Gedge that just shows his eyes and nose and I swear that could be me back then. Hell, it could be me now! Well, maybe.

Anyway, this was the latest in their year long odyssey to release a new single every month in ‘92. “Flying Saucer” was the seventh of such singles and would peak at No 22, the fourth lowest performing of the twelve released. I quite liked this one. Some crunchy indie guitar licks and Gedge’s usual idiosyncratic vocals made for a winning combination. I’m not sure that the band achieved whatever it was they were trying to with this performance though unless it was actually meant to be a send up of Altern-8.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNrzXyVl8DA

Fresh from his appearance on the last ever Wogan the other week, Jason Donovan was back in the Top 40 however implausible that may have seemed in the middle of 1992. A few things had changed since his last hit though. Firstly, he had successfully sued The Face magazine for libel after he argued that the publication had implied he was a hypocrite for lying about his sexuality after suggesting he may be gay. Secondly, he had left the Stock, Aitken and Waterman family and switched labels from PWL to Polydor.

His first album for his new masters was “All Around The World” (incidentally it shared its name with a single by one of Polydor’s most famous acts The Jam) with its lead single being “Mission Of Love”. This is a truly dreadful song. It would struggle not to come last at The Eurovision Song Contest. Actually, it would struggle not to come last in A Song For Europe. I’m amazed it got to even No 26 in our charts. Polydor we’re clearly not impressed and getting cold feet about the album. In an amazing lack of faith in their charge, they licensed some of his previous hits and shoved them on the album to beef up its sales potential. In total they added six old tracks, four from his previous albums and two from the Joseph and the Technicolour Dreamcoat cast recording. Donovan was less than impressed and when the album stiffed, he and Polydor inevitably parted ways. The era of Jason Donovan the pop star was just about over.

Ah shit! It’s time for another wretched track. Why is it that the offensiveness of a song seems to work in direct correlation to how popular it is? “Achy Breaky Heart” by Billy Ray Cyrus became the first ever single to achieve triple platinum sales in Australia and spent five weeks at the top of the US Country charts before crossing over into the mainstream and peaking at No 4 in the Billboard Hot 100. It was a hit all across the world and yet was also voted No 2 in a VH1 poll of the 50 Most Awesomely Bad Songs. The same TV network voted it in at No 87 in their 100 Greatest Songs of the 90s poll. Has there ever been a more schizophrenic hit? There are people who despise it for popularising line dancing whilst there is also a faction who credit it with breathing life into a genre of music that was dying on its arse amongst younger audiences. It’s a basket case of song. Whatever you make of it though (and it’s almost a novelty song for me), it certainly made an impression on 1992.

Cyrus is of course the father of Miley Cyrus who rose to fame as Disney character Hannah Montana and then as a pop star under her own name. Her bio on Wikipedia is absolutely massive. I was literally scrolling for about thirty seconds just to get to the bottom and I didn’t read a word of it.

“Achy Breaky Heart” was a No 3 hit in the UK which probably means we haven’t seen the last of it yet.

If Jason Donovan’s time as a pop star was coming to an end then the next act were just getting into gear as a mainstream chart stars. The Shamen had turned tragedy into triumph when they managed to carry on despite the death of band member Will Sinnott and rack up a huge hit with a Beatmasters remix of “Pro>gen” as “Move Any Mountain” in the Summer of ‘91. Fast forward a year and they were ready to take it to the next level with an album full of hit singles. That album was “Boss Drum” and the first hit from it was “LSI Love Sex Intelligence”.

With rapper Mr. C now a full time member and the face of the band, an all out charge at the charts was ready to go. All they had to do now was get their tunes out there and they began with this No 6 hit. Another crucial addition was vocalist Jhelisa Anderson who’s contribution helped make the new sound of The Shamen.

The performance here is interesting in that that the staging of it is surely what The Wedding Present should have done instead of those hazmat suits. It’s got a goddam flying saucer prop! WTF? Did Gedge and co not see this in rehearsal and think ‘oh yeah, that’s what we should have done’. It’s sort of like the Madonna/Boy George thing but in reverse. Oh I give up trying to make sense of it all!

Just two Breakers again this week starting with that old rascal Morrissey. Surely one of his more memorable song titles, “You’re The One For Me, Fatty” was the second single from his “Your Arsenal” album although it hadn’t actually been released at this point. When it did arrive at the end of July, I was still working at the Our Price store in Market Street, Manchester and I asked our Assistant Manager Pete if he’d heard “Your Arsenal” yet to which he replied that he had no interest in listening to Morrissey’s arse! To be fair to Pete, Mozza was not his cup of tea at all. As for me, I quite liked it with its robust, glam inspired guitar (well it was produced by David Bowie’s mate Mick Ronson). “You’re The One For Me, Fatty” peaked at No 19.

The second Breaker hadn’t had a UK Top 40 hit for a couple of years and indeed only had four all told. Was (Not Was) really should have had more. If Jason Donovan could have sixteen chart hits than surely to goodness these Detroit musical boundary pushers deserved a bigger haul.

I’d first come across Was (Not Was) in 1983 when “Out Come The Freaks” narrowly missed the UK Top 40 but nearly 10 years later, despite some excellent tunes, they were still mostly known for 1987 hit “Walk The Dinosaur”. They were still deemed worthy of a Best Of chart compilation by record company Polygram and “Hello Dad…I’m In Jail” was released this year. To promote it, two tracks were released as singles. A cover of INXS’s “Listen Like Thieves” seemed like an overtly commercial decision not in keeping with the band’s previous back catalogue and it was ultimately proven to be misjudged as the single stalled at No 58.

The second single released to promote the album was a different case altogether. Now I never knew this until now but “Shake Your Head” was actually an early Was (Not Was) song from 1982 that had quite an interesting back story. It always featured the vocals of Ozzy Osbourne (who re-recorded them for the ‘92 remix by Steve ‘Silk’ Hurley) but a pre-fame Madonna had also laid down some vocals for the track that were ultimately not used by the band. As possibly the most famous woman on the planet ten years on, the band approached Madonna for permission to use her original contribution but she refused (surely she didn’t hold a grudge, not Madge) so they asked actress Kim Basinger to sing on it instead. They didn’t miss Madonna at all as “Shake Your Head” provided the band with the biggest UK hit of their career when it peaked at No 4.

Meanwhile back in the studio we find Sophie B. Hawkins though you wouldn’t know it as there is no introduction for her at all. We go straight from the end of the Breakers to a camera shot of her and her rather large backing band on stage. Not even a voiceover segue from Mark Franklin. Bit odd. “Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover” is up to No 16 by this point and Sophie gives a pretty good performance of it here. If she watched it back afterwards though, she may have been alarmed at her achingly stylish ripped jeans. As well as the tears around the knee area, she also seemed to have a big, gaping crotch hole which the TOTP cameraman managed to find in a rather salacious camera angle late on. I hope Bob Geldof wasn’t in the studio that night after his ‘I’m just going to look at you’ comment the other week!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5vlNjvfBds

Jimmy Nail has hit the proverbial on the head and is at No 1 within 2 weeks of “Ain’t No Doubt” being released. How did this happen? Since his days in Auf Wiedersehen Pet, Jimmy’s lost a lot of weight and grown his hair longer but he still isn’t what you would describe as your standard looking pop star.

Nail has crafted a career out of being a professional Geordie to the point where he was used as a tool in Anglo American relations. What am I talking about? Well, my friend Robin (the one who hates every Elton John song ever) is partial to golfing holidays in America. He usually goes with some mates who are proud Geordies and keen to promote the cultural significance of The Toon. When in a bar one holiday, the woman serving them was struggling with their accents and was curious as to where they were from in the UK. When their answer of Newcastle brought a shrug of non recognition, Robin’s mates tried to explain their home by mentioning famous people associated with the city. I think the list went like this:

Ant & Dec
Spender
Alan Shearer

When the Premier League’s all time top goal scorer failed to make her understand, it prompted howls of disbelief:

“Yer dinna nar Sheara? Clive man! She dinna nar Sheara!”

“DINNA NAR SHEARA?!” etc etc…

In the end it was Cheryl Cole who was the celebrity that the woman behind the bar knew, presumably from her stint on the US version of The X Factor. Quite why they thought throwing the name of Jimmy Nail’s TV series Spender in the mix would do the trick I do not know.

In another tweak to the show’s format, the closing song video has been reintroduced. Up until this point, the ‘year zero’ revamp shows had finished on the No 1 single. They’ve gone for a big name to relaunch this in Prince (and the New Power Generation) who are back with new single “Sexy MF”. I say back but a Prince was so prolific it seemed like he’d never been away as he always had new material out. “Sexy MF” was the first single from the album “Love Symbol” or to give it its true title ‘unpronounceable symbol’ as depicted on the cover art of the album.

Now we all know what the ‘MF’ in the title referred to (no Mark Franklin not your name) so the single had to be heavily edited to allow radio airplay. So concerned were record company Warners that they released it in the UK as a double A-side with the more palatable track “Strollin’” but nobody played that. Interestingly, though a big No 4 hit over here, it only made No 66 in the US. Maybe it was that airplay issue.

Of course, any mention of “Sexy MF” has to prompt another viewing of this:

Order of appearance	Artist	Title	Did I buy it?
1	Wet Wet Wet	Lip Service	No but my wife had the album
2	Madonna	This Used To Be My Playground	Nah
3	The Wedding Present	Flying Saucer	No
4	Jason Donovan	Mission Of Love	Hell no!
5	Billy Ray Cyrus	Achy Breaky Heart	Double Hell no!
6	The Shamen	LSI Love Sex Intelligence	Nope
7	Morrissey	You’re The One For Me Fatty	Negative
8	Was (Not Was)	Shake Your Head	Not the single but I bought that Best Of album it wads promoting
9	Sophie B. Hawkins	Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover	It’s a no
10	Jimmy Nail	Ain’t No Doubt	That’s another no
11	Prince and the New Power Generation	Sexy MF	I did not

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/m0014zvq/top-of-the-pops-16071992

TOTP 07 JUN 1990

Posted on January 14, 2021 by 80stastic

Hello and welcome back to TOTP Rewind. BBC4 took a break from their TOTP repeat broadcasts over Xmas and the New Year but are back on schedule now. We re-start back in June 1990 and I’ve just had my 22nd birthday! 22! It’s literally a lifetime ago – how did I get to be so old? I suppose the intervening 30 years had something to do with it! To recap, I’ve just moved up to Hull from Worcester having finally secured some work after five months on the dole and am living with my girlfriend and her parents. My job is at Kingston Communications* doing some very basic VDU input on a temporary contract. As I remember, it was putting in employee time sheets into a database and there was a massive back log of them so quite a few weeks work.

*One of the many things that makes Hull unique is the fact that it is the only place in the UK not served by BT but by its own telecoms services run by KCOM (formerly Kingston Communications).

The day after this TOTP was broadcast, the 1990 World Cup kicked off with England expectations pretty low after a disastrous Euro ’88 showing. Italia ’90 would turn out to be a watershed moment for our national game. Enough of all that though, what about the music? Well, there are seven ‘new’ songs on the show that we haven’t seen before and the presenter is the ever so clean looking Mark Goodier who promises us a “special surprise” at the top of the show. Ooh! Wonder what that could be?

Before any of that though we’re kicking off with Pop Will Eat Itself and only their second ever Top 40 hit “Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina”. I’d first come across this lot when they released a cover of Sigue Sigue Sputnik’s “Love Missile F1-11” in 1987 but I hadn’t quite grasped at the time that they were part of the same ‘grebo’ movement that would launch the likes of The Wonder Stuff, Ned’s Atomic Dustbin and Gaye Bykers On Acid. Indeed The Poppies*, The Stuffies* and The Neds* were all from the same place; Stourbridge in the West Midlands which was my original neck of the woods so I really should have had a better handle on all these bands.

*No amount of dropping their shortened names can cover that up (Credibility ed).

By 1990, they had carved out a career of sample-laden, indie dance rock tunes with singles like “Def. Con. One” and “Can U Dig It”. With one eye on the imminent Italia ’90 World Cup, the single “Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina” was promoted as the ‘unofficial World Cup Theme’ and includes sampled crowd chants and I’m pretty sure snatches of match commentary by the likes of Barry Davies and John Motson. And Cicciolina? This referred to…oh tell you what…here’s @TOTPFacts with that particular back story:

Cicciolina was the stagename of Ilona Staller, a Hungarian-born porn star who was elected to the Italian parliament in 1987, representing the district of Rome until 1991. Notoriously, she offered to have sex with Saddam Hussein in the interests of peace. #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) January 8, 2021

Well, if Boris Johnson felt comfortable saying Donald Trump deserved a Nobel Peace Prize when Foreign Secretary back in 2018, then I hope somebody nominated Cicciolina back in the day for her unorthodox peace process plan.

Apparently the marketing campaign for the “Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina” single included an absurd notion to petition for Cicciolina to be the person who presented the World Cup to the winning team at the conclusion of Italia ’90. I’m guessing the single’s title was inspired by New Order’s 1987 single “Touched By The Hand Of God” – the Mancs are also of course indelibly linked with Italia ’90 due to “World In Motion” which we will be seeing later. I was chatting with my friend Robin at the weekend and he disputed my claim that “World In Motion” is the best football song ever declaring that, indeed, he preferred “Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina”. Never one to follow popular opinion Robin but I do think he means it! Robin’s favourite footy song peaked at No 28.

Historically when TOTP presenters make chart predictions they usually over estimate the potential of a single, rashly forecasting a No 1 record. In the case of Elton John and “Sacrifice” this evening’s host Mark Goodier does the opposite and under estimates its chart peak by saying it “could well end up being a Top 5 record that”. It of course went all the way to No 1 and not just any No 1 but Elton’s first as a solo artist. I say “Sacrifice” but it was actually “Sacrifice / Healing Hands” as it was a double A -side release. Both songs had been previously issued as singles in their own right at the tale end of 1989 with neither breaching the Top 40 but after Radio 1 DJ Steve Wright inexplicably started playing “Sacrifice” on his show in the Summer of 1990, it was re-released after audience reaction. How apt that a man infamously not that bothered about music would have a key role in getting such a bloated, lifeless dirge of a song to the top of the charts. In its defence, as Goodier says, it did raise money for charity (the AIDS Foundation I think) but it seems a travesty that “Sacrifice / Healing Hands” was the single to finally secure him a No 1 in his own right. So many more songs in his back catalogue deserving of that particular accolade. Of the two, I slightly preferred “Healing Hands” but I’m splitting arse hairs to be honest.

My aforementioned friend Robin and I once had a disagreement over a drink in a London pub about Elton’s back catalogue – he dismissed it all (and I mean every song) as awful. When I countered that you couldn’t say all his songs were shit he replied “Of course I can. Music taste is subjective – I thought you knew that”. I had no comeback. Smart arse.

Talking of double A-sides here comes a dance act I have no memory of at all. D-Shake were from Holland apparently and its their track “Yaaah” that gets a spin on the show tonight but it was the flip “Techno Trance (Paradise Is Now)” that all the DJs in the know were playing in the clubs apparently including the likes of Carl Cox. I’ve listened to both (although they actually seem to be different versions of the same track) and can confirm they are both horrible.

The guy behind D-Shake was a guy called Aad de Mooy who sounds like he plays up front for Huddersfield (or maybe Brighton) and according to the Discogs website has 31 different aliases including Cat Scanner, Jackhead and my particular favourite Dr Nunu. By the way, check out Goodier’s arse clenchingly awful intro to this one:

“What’s the secret of a good dance song – it’s definitely a good groove…”

A good groove?! He’s only one step away from saying (in true embarrassing Dad style) “It’s got a good beat and you can dance to it”. Oh Christ! That’s what I sound like when I talk about music to my 11 year old isn’t it?! “Yaaah” / “Techno Trance (Paradise Is Now)” peaked at No 20.

In all of these TOTP reviews I have done stretching way back to 1983, it feels like very few bands have been on as much as The Mission. I mean maybe some of the really big hitters like Erasure, Depeche Mode etc but of those who have not had massive hits I can think of only maybe Siouxsie And The Banshees. And despite all of those appearances, not once did The Mission ever have a Top 10 hit. “Into The Blue” was their eighth consecutive Top 40 hit and was the last single to be taken from their “Carved In Sand” album. Goodier is at it again with a really patronising intro when he says “Coming up a band who really can play their instruments” Eh? Why did he feel the need to day that. Was there some conspiracy theory going around that they were just Milli Vanilli-esque record company stooges who didn’t actually play on their records? He goes onto call the single a “big chart smash”. Was it Mark? This is its chart record:

35 – 32 – 65

Hmm. Hardly a biggie. Three weeks on the chart in total with a high of No 32 then gone! I have to admit this one doesn’t do much for me. I don’t mind their sound but it does all start to sound the same after a while. Damn! I’m sounding like an embarrassing Dad again! By the way, Wayne Hussey and bassist Craig Adams used to be in The Sisters Of Mercy but left to form The Mission. So what I hear you cry. Well, here’s @TOTPFacts again to fill in the gaps:

Joining Pop Will Eat Itself in the #TOTP studio here on vocals… The Sisters Of Mercy’s Patricia Morrison.
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) January 8, 2021

The first of just three songs on the show that we have seen before next as we’re back with the dance tunes when we get another eyeful / earful of Don Pablo’s Animals and their version of “Venus”. As with D-Shake earlier, these lot were a European collective of producers but where D-Shake were from Holland, DPA* were Italian and German consisting of Paolo Bisiach, Christian Hornbostel and Mauro Ferrucci. And just like D-Shake founder Aad de Mooy, all three sound like they could have Premier League connections. I’m going for:

Paolo Bisiach – a Liverpool centre back in the mid 90s
Christian Hornbostel – a Southampton manager
Mauro Ferrucci – a Chelsea left back in the early 2000s

You can tell I’ve run out of things to say about Don Pablo’s Animals can’t you?

*Did anyone call them that? Bit like did anybody really call Tears For Fears ‘TFF’ apart from Peter Powell of course!

Goodier mispronounces the name of the next act who are Wilson Phillips or ‘Wilston Phillips’ as our host calls them (thanks to my wife for spotting that little gaff). Ah yes, Wilson Phillips whom you cannot mention without referencing their rock heritage. So much was made of the fact that Chynna Phillips is the daughter of John Phillips and Michelle Phillips of The Mamas & The Papas, while Carnie Wilson and Wendy Wilson are the daughters of Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys and Marilyn Rovell of The Honeys. They must have got so fed up of answering questions about their famous parents when doing promotional interviews for the record. Whatever promotion they did though must have worked as their debut single “Hold On” went to No 1 in the US and No 6 over here.

The other big talking point about the trio was their vocal harmonies which are all over “Hold On” which is one of the perkiest pop songs you might ever hear despite its lyrics being inspired by Chynna Phillips’s experiences with substance abuse and the AA. I used to work with someone who said this was one of his favourite songs ever although I’m not entirely sure he wasn’t winding me up.

Despite initially breaking up in 1992, the trio have reunited a few times over the years including for this scene at the climax of the film Bridesmaids which is one of those movies I always end up watching if I stumble over it while channel flipping.

If it’s 1990 then it must be Madchester and here’s someone else who was seen as being part of that movement and for once, he was actually from Manchester! MC Tunes was from the infamous Moss Side area of that great city which (certainly when I lived there and not that far from Moss Side itself) had a reputation for high crime rates, regular stabbings, drugs and gangsters. The image of his glaring face and intimidating stare on the cover of his album “The North At Its Heights” would absolutely have you believe that Tunes could handle himself in Moss Side. Indeed, Mark Goodier seems so unnerved by his presence in the TOTP studio that he stumbles over his intro seeming to change his description of Tunes from a ‘man’ to a ‘lad’ halfway through.

“The Only Rhyme That Bites” was his debut single and biggest hit of his career and was made in conjunction with fellow Mancs 808 State. Cleverly based around a sample from the main title theme to the Western The Big Country which pulled you in from the start, it would go Top 10 in the UK. However, after his initial success, his solo career fell away a bit and by 1995 he had left his MC Tunes alter ego behind and formed the achingly trendy Dust Junkys who just about everybody I ever worked with in multiple Our Price shops in the Greater Manchester area seemed to love …except me. I always quite liked “The Only Rhyme That Bites” though. So apparently did Goodier who pulls out a “Wicked, wicked” line to describe it at the end of the performance. Dearie me.

https://youtu.be/YY0Zq-xb_g4?si=bL5mX0kzQZ1mC0NZ

Just when you thought he couldn’t plumb the depths of naffness any deeper, Goodier uses the phrase “1990 stylee” to introduce “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone” by Was (Not Was). How did this man ever achieve such longevity as a broadcaster?!

David and Don Was (not their real names) have done some truly remarkable work I think but this cover of The Temptations’ 1972 hit left me cold. Songs like “Out Come The Freaks”, “I Feel Better Than James Brown” and “How The Heart Behaves” sound brilliant but this? Nah, not for me. I’d even take “Walk The Dinosaur” over this! They retuned to the charts in 1992 in a big way with the No 4 hit “Shake Your Head” featuring the vocals of Ozzy Osbourne and Hollywood movie star Kim Basinger and a Best Of album called “Hello Dad…I’m In Jail” which I bought but again they recorded another uninspiring cover version (INXS’s “Listen Like Thieves”) to promote it. Just stick to your own songs guys!

At least Goodier agrees with me (and therefore disagrees with my friend Robin) that “World In Motion” by New Order is the best football song ever as we get to the new No 1 and its time for that surprise! It’s only a live interview with the England 1990 World Cup squad! Would this have been seen as event TV back in the day? Maybe I guess. What follows though is the lamest of banter (courtesy of Gazza and a fake sleeping Chris Waddle) whilst Goodier attempts to prove to the watching millions that he’s actually a football fan as well. About as convincing as David ‘Is it Aston Villa or West Ham’ Cameron mate.

As for the song, apparently the FA hadn’t been that keen on the involvement of New Order and the band never got any World Cup tickets or freebies. National treasure and star striker Gary Lineker wasn’t keen either describing football songs as “a bit twee” but John Barnes was all for it and of course he would go onto seal his small but perfectly formed place in pop history with that rap. Supposedly the few players that did turn up to the recording session disappeared halfway through to open a Topman store in Middlesbrough! Talking of which, mention must go to the ultimate top man of football songs Keith Allen who helped write the lyrics and of course appears in the video. He would return to that rather niche genre again in 1998 being involved with both “Vindaloo” by Fat Les and “England’s Irie” by Black Grape. I read his autobiography a few years ago which was a fascinating read. He supports Fulham in case you were wondering.

We close with one of the most well known power ballads of all time. “It Must Have Been Love” by Roxette is of course forever associated with the film Pretty Woman in which it featured but it’s also taken on a life of its own soundtracking many a relationship break up and still gets regular radio airplay to this day.

The band were big news in the US after clocking up two Billboard No 1s in 1989 and so were approached to record a song for the film’s soundtrack album. Rather than recording something brand new, they just reworked an existing song called “It Must Have Been Love (Christmas for the Broken Hearted)” which had been a big hit in their native Sweden but had not been released globally so remained unknown to most of the planet’s pop fans. Not for long though as both the soundtrack album and “It Must Have Been Love” took off in a massive way with the latter supplying the duo with their third US No 1. It was also a No 3 in the UK and remains their biggest hit here. I’m guessing that it must also be their most well known song. They would return the following year with the album and single “Joyride” – yet another US No 1 single.

Order of appearance	Artist	Song	Did I Buy it?
1	Pop Will Eat Itself	Touched by The Hand of Cicciolina	I didn’t – sorry Robin
2	Elton John	Sacrifice /Healing Hands	Certainly not!
3	D-Shake	Yaaah	Naaah
4	The Mission	Into The Blue	Nope
5	Don Pablo’s Animals	Venus	No but my wife had it on a Smash Hits Rave album
6	Wilson Phillips	Hold On	No
7	MC Tunes versus 808 State	The Only Rhyme That Bites	I didn’t
8	Was (Not Was)	Papa Was A Rollin’ Stone	No but it’s on my Best Of album of their which I bought
9	New Order	World In Motion	Call the cops! There’s been a robbery. This isn’t in my singles box!
10	Roxette	It Must Have Been Love	Negative

Disclaimer

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

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000qzmj/top-of-the-pops-07061990

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

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

Some bedtime reading?

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

TOTP 24 MAY 1990

Posted on December 24, 2020 by 80stastic

The 24th of May 1990 was not a slow news day as England football manager Bobby Robson chose this day to inform the media that he would not be renewing his contract after the Summer’s World Cup competition in Italy. Sir Bobby had a job lined up with Dutch club PSV Eindhoven which led to accusations from the tabloid press of him being unpatriotic. Hmm. It seems we haven’t progressed much in 30 years.

That year’s World Cup would become inextricably linked with the music world thanks to New Order’s “World In Motion” song but that’s for the next repeat’s post. For now though, we start with The B-52s and their follow up to their No 2 hit single “Love Shack” called “Roam”. I’d loathed “Love Shack” so probably wasn’t expecting that much from “Roam” but it it turned out to be vastly superior to its predecessor to my ears.

There seems to be a lot of discussion online about the true meaning of the song’s lyrics. On there surface an innocent message about freedom, travelling and seeing the world, the online conspiracy theorists would have you believe that it’s all just one big double entendre and is actually about the sexual act with lines like ‘Take it hip to hip, rocket through the wilderness, Around the world the trip begins with a kiss’ clearly being about cunnilingus! What?! Mind. Blown.

Moving on swiftly, for me the performance here and indeed the sound of the song is all about Kate Pierson and Cindy Wilson and their rousing vocals which are just perfectly weighted for the song. So dominant are they visually that Fred Schneider, who had been so high profile in their performances of “Love Shack”, is relegated to shaking his tambourine almost absentmindedly throughout. I wonder if he was OK with that? Reminds me of a story I once heard about the single “Nobody’s Fool” by Haircut 100. When percussionist Mark Fox first heard it, he complained that there weren’t enough parts in it for him and he wasn’t going to just stand their on TOTP with a bloody tambourine thank you very much!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPR0morlE6w

There’s a parody of “Roam” called “Comb” which was a skit on Australian comedy sketch show Fast Forward about Pierson’ and Wilson’s hairstyles. There’s also a COVID-19 parody that I found on YouTube featuring lines like “No more hip to hip, keep your social distances” but now doesn’t seem the time to be dwelling on that.

“Roam” peaked at No 17 in the UK but went all the way to No 3 in the US.

The first video of the night comes from Mantronix featuring Wondress with “Take Your Time”. I have zero left to say about this one so I’ve had to plunge into the internet to come up with something. What I found chilled me to the bone. This single was taken from an album called “This Should Move Ya” the title of which alone should have been enough to set my warning bells ringing but nothing could have prepared me for what I found out about that album. It includes a version of “Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll” by Ian Dury And The Blockheads! Obviously then I had to give it a listen and I’m not yet sure I have recovered. If you are brave, or possibly a masochist, listen to this….

Just horrible. Anybody involved in this heinous crime should hang their heads in shame.

“Take Your Time” peaked at No 10.

En Vogue are up next and actually in the studio for their very first visit to TOTP as presenter Anthea Turner advises. She also tells us that they have style and you have to admit she’s not wrong. They give a mesmerising performance including that a cappella intro which is actually a song within a song as it is a treatment of “Who’s Lovin’ You” by The Miracles.

I was amazed to see a filmography section in the band’s Wikipedia entry but they have actually appeared in three films – Aces: Iron Eagle III, their own Christmas movie and this fleeting cameo in Batman Forever whichI had no idea was them until now…

Four Breakers this week and Anthea Turner perversely announces them in the reverse order to the one that they actually appear. The first one then is actually Movement 98 featuring Carroll Thompson with “Joy And Heartbreak”. I had no recall of this at all before hearing it on this repeat at which point it did sound familiar but that’s probably because it is based on the melody of Erik Satie’s “Les Trois Gymnopedie”. No really. Listen to just a few seconds of Satie below…

and then play the start of the Movement 98 track….

…see? That classical music trick would be repeated later in the year when The Farm scored a huge hit with “All Together Now” which was based on Pachelbel’s Canon but that’s getting ahead of ourselves. Back to Movement 98 though and Wikipedia informs me that this was a Paul Oakenfold project with input from Rob Davis, the earrings and dresses wearing guitarist from Mud who would go onto write such huge hits as “Groovejet (If This Ain’t Love)” for Spiller and “Can’t Get You Out of My Head” for Kylie. As for vocalist Carroll Thompson, she has quite the musical pedigree. An award winning reggae singer, she was also a member of Floy Joy briefly and also sang on Aztec Camera’s “One And One” track from their “Love” album. She has also worked as a session singer with the likes of …deep breath…Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, Natalie Cole, Pet Shop Boys, Robbie Williams, Boy George, Maxi Priest, Sting, Billy Ocean, Chaka Khan, Aswad and M People. Phew!

As well as Satie’s influence, “Joy And Heartbreak” also reminds me of something else which I can’t quite put my finger on. Is it Shanice’s “I Love Your Smile”? A Janet Jackson track maybe? It’ll come back to me …probably in the middle of the night.

“Joy And Heartbreak” peaked at No 27.

Right then, the era of Betty Boo is upon us. Having introduced herself to UK pop fans the previous year as the vocalist on Beatmasters’ single “Hey DJ / I Can’t Dance To That Music You’re Playing”, she was signed to Rhythm King Records on the strength of demos that she presented to them for “Doin’ The Do” and “Where Are You Baby?” with the former becoming her debut solo single. Mixing her hip hop roots with some irresistibly catchy pop hooks, the track was an immediate hit taking Betty (real name Alison Clarkson) to No 7 in the charts. She was a bona fide pop star in her own right.

The video worked well in promoting her cartoony rebellious image as she revisits her old school in a leather jacket and hot pants to take issue with the teachers who said she would amount to nothing. In a 2019 Classic Pop Magazine interview, Clarkson related the origin of the song:

“When I left my A-Levels I did have my tail between my legs,” she reflects, “in that [after the She Rockers split] I did go back to the head of sixth form and say, please may I come back and do my A-Levels again, and she said no. I was so annoyed with them. So I thought it’d be great if I just channelled that. I was sticking two fingers up, basically.”

For a while back there in 1990, Betty Boo was hot news. Her debut album “Boomania” went to No 4 in the charts and contained four hit singles. However, inevitably the hits dried up after taking two years to come up with a second album and she retired from the music world after losing her Mum to cancer. As with the aforementioned Rob Davis though, she would carve out a career as a successful songwriter penning hits for Girls Aloud, Dannii Minogue and the No 1 single “Pure And Simple” for Hear’Say.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sM_9As_2VAg

In a recent TOTP repeat we saw British rock act Thunder on the show and this week we get another of the acts of that early 90s UK rock scene in Little Angels. Having been in existence since 1984 after forming in Scarborough, the band had released four singles up to this point that had all failed to make the Top 40 but they rectified that with the release of “Radical Your Lover” which was their first chart hit peaking at No 34. If you check out the details of the release, it’s actually credited to Little Angels and The Big Bad Horns with the latter being a trio who provided the brass parts to complement their out and out rock sound.

Listening back to this now, it seems almost interchangeable with that of Thunder but then I’m not a die hard fan. Having said that, I did own a copy of their No 1 1992 album “Jam” at one point which was a freebie from Our Price – record companies would often supply the chain and its shops with a promo copy of their artists’ albums ahead of official release date to play in store to ‘create a buzz’ about it. Not sure what happened to my copy though. I also once saw them do a PA at Manchester’s HMV store to promote that “Jam” album. They performed a short set and they sounded pretty good to be fair.

More interesting than any of the above though is the fact that the band’s guitarist was called Bruce Dickinson. Yes! Exactly the same as Iron Maiden’s lead singer! What are the chances?!

Talk Talk in the charts in 1990 with a re-release of a single that flopped when originally issued in 1984? What gives? Well, “It’s My Life” had been reissued by EMI to promote the band’s first ever Best Of Collection called “Natural History: The Very Best of Talk Talk” which the band themselves had disproved of. It performed surprisingly well commercially given that the band only ever achieved three Top 40 singles despite much critical acclaim. So well that EMI released a remix album the following year called “History Revisited: The Remixes” which angered the band so much that they sued EMI claiming that material had been falsely attributed to them. Talk Talk won the case with EMI agreeing to withdraw and destroy all remaining copies of the album. I would have been working in Our Price at that point but I must admit I can’t remember having to take that album off sale.

It seems that the band were never on that good terms with their record company. As far back as the single’s original release six years previous, EMI had interfered with the band’s creativity when, disliking Tim Pope’s original video showing Mark Hollis with lips sealed and covered by animated lines (a statement against lip synching), they insisted on another video which was basically the band performing against a back drop of said original promo. The band’s exaggerated movements suggest that they weren’t totally on board with EMI’s idea!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ooj-y3LLuE

As for me, back in 1984, I’d liked “It’s My Life” on its original release and also subsequent singles “Such A Shame” and “Dum Dum Girl”. I’m pretty sure I had plans to purchase the parent album also called “It’s My Life” but somehow that purchase never materialised. The 1990 re-release peaked at No 13.

Two songs we’ve already seen on the show before are up next starting with “Won’t Talk About It” by Beats International. Featuring Lindy Layton on vocals, I’m pretty sure this would have been the band’s last ever TOTP appearance as they never made the Top 40 again after this single.

Although Lindy attended stage school in the 1980s and appeared as an actor in TV shows such as Casualty and Press Gang alongside numerous adverts, she did not, contrary to rumours, appear in Grange Hill. Apparently the press reported at the time that she had been in the long running school drama but they had confused her with the actress Lindy Brill who played Cathy Hargreaves. Maybe the reason for the confusion was that Brill did seem to have some musical chops. Witness her here in a story line about her school band who were rehearsing for a scout hall dance gig in the school’s music room at lunchtime….

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUFX2LFCYac

The scout hall dance gig was small fry though compared to actually being on TOTP itself, a feat which Brill achieved as part of the St Winifred’s School Choir backing singers on Brian and Michael’s No 1 hit “Matchstalk Men And Matchstalk Cats And Dogs” some 12 years before Lindy Layton fronted Beats International on the show. Lindy Brill – only the woman Lindy Layton could have been.

“Won’t Talk About It” peaked at No 9.

Oh come on now! Seriously?! Michael Bolton on again?! How many times is this? Three? Four? It’s just the same old clip of that original performance of “How Can We Be Lovers” recycled again and again to boot. OK – let’s look on the bright side. Despite a haul of 17 chart hits in the UK, we won’t see Bolton on the show again for at least another year as his next three single releases didn’t make the Top 40 and he would only make the Top 10 twice more; once with a cover of Percy Sledge’s “When A Man Loves A Woman” in 1991 and secondly with the creepily titled 1995 No 6 hit “Can I Touch You…There?”. Bolton also had a hit with a song called “Said I Loved You But I Lied” – I’m starting to think Michael might not be all that nice a guy.

A song next which seemed to be the go to track if you wanted to cover it for a hit. Like most people, I knew “Venus” from the Bananarama version of it in 1986 rather than the Shocking Blue 1969 original. However, it’s also been covered by the likes of Tom Jones through to Weird Al Yankovic via Sacha Distel. Weird is certainly the word. In 1990, it was revitalised once more by Italian / German dance project Don Pablo’s Animals who took it all the way to No 4 in our charts. It’s a horrible instrumental version though with that omnipresent ‘whoo, yeah’ sample all over it. Just nasty.

And that name? What was that all about? Here’s @TOTPFacts with a decent guess:

Why the name "Don Pablo's Animals"? Here's my (unconfirmed) theory: it's a reference to "Don" Pablo Escobar, the Colombian drugs baron, who notoriously built a zoo on his estate, stocking it with antelope, elephants, giraffes and hippos. #TOTP
— Top Of The Pops Facts (@TOTPFacts) December 18, 2020

Oh OK. So Don Pablo was basically a prototype Joe Exotic of Tiger King notoriety. Joe, of course, liked a sing-song (before was sentenced to 22 years in prison for hiring someone to murder his nemesis Carole Baskin) . Here he is with “I Saw A Tiger”…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WB6wYVCEY3w

Wikipedia advises me that it wasn’t really him doing the singing though. Say it ain’t so Joe.

Back to Don Pablo’s Animals, I think my wife had this on a “Smash Hits Rave” compilation album which, after a quick google search, shows me that it also included Betty Boo’s “Doin’ The Do” from earlier in the show. I have never played said album in my life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKVM8MVp9sI

In a very static Top 5, Adamski (featuring Seal) comes out on top for a third straight week with “Killer”. It’s the video this week rather than a studio performance. It’s pretty basic looking stuff by today’s standards with Seal’s body less, spinning head enhanced by some flashing graphics. Adamski himself also features as some sort of Dr Frankenstein figure with Seal portrayed as his creation.

The song has been covered numerous times most famously by George Michael and by Seal himself but there are other versions too. Witness Sugababes who recorded it as a B-side to their 2003 single “Shape”:

Four years before that, there was this vile version from German trance act ATB in 1999 which I must have voided from my memory banks and for good reason:

The play out video is “Papa Was A Rolling Stone” by Was (Not Was). I would have had no clue as to when this was a bit. I’d have maybe gone for later in the decade to be honest but this cover of The Temptations classic by David and Don Was (not their real names) was the lead single from their fourth studio album “Are You Okay?”. It didn’t do much for me I have to say but I did like the other two singles lifted from the album which were “How the Heart Behaves” and “I Feel Better Than James Brown” neither of which made the Top 40.

In a neat bit of symmetry, Don Was produced four tracks on The B-52s album “Cosmic Thing” from which opening song on tonight’s show “Roam” was taken (although not that track itself but he did produce “Love Shack”).

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

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_v2dEufstZ8

Order of appearance	Artist	Song	Did I Buy it?
1	The B-52s	Roam	I didn’t
2	Mantronix featuring Wondress	Take Your Time	I could take all day but I won’t change my mind about this – no
3	En Vogue	Hold On	Nah
4	Movement 98 featuring Carroll Thompson	Joy And Heartbreak	Nope
5	Betty Boo	Doin’ The Do	No but my wife had it on that Smash Hits Rave album
6	Little Angels	Radical Your Lover	No
7	Talk Talk	It’s My Life	No but I have it on a compilation CD of theirs (not Natural History though)
8	Beats International	Won’t Talk About It	No but my wife has their album with a version of it on
9	Michael Bolton	How Can We Be Lovers	NO!
10	Don Pablo’s Animals	Venus	See 5 above
11	Adamski	Killer	No but I had the Seal album with his version of it on
12	Was (Not Was)	Papa Was A Rolling Stone	No but I have it on their Best Of compilation Hello Dad…I’m In Jail

Disclaimer

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000qcx2/top-of-the-pops-24051990

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

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

Some bedtime reading?

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

TOTP Rewind – the 90s

My memories of 90s chart music

TOTP 23 JUL 1992

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TOTP 16 JUL 1992

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TOTP 07 JUN 1990

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Some bedtime reading?

TOTP 24 MAY 1990

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Some bedtime reading?