It’s mid May 1998 and my beloved Chelsea FC have just won another cup! Having won a major trophy for the first time in 26 years the previous season when they lifted the FA Cup, they followed it up with two more in 1998. The League Cup was secured in March and now a European trophy as the Cup Winners’ Cup came back to Stamford Bridge after we beat Stuttgart in the final 1-0 two days before this TOTP aired. I couldn’t believe it! Three trophies in two seasons! My whole youth had had seen us in just one semi-final (which we lost) and then, as I was approaching 30, we were suddenly good! I wonder if any of the artists in this show were experiencing a renaissance period after a significant amount of time being shit?

Tonight’s host is Jo Whiley whom I thought for years was a bit shit but I’ve begrudgingly come round to in later years. The opening act are All Saints who I don’t think went through a crap phase, not commercially anyway, at least in their first incarnation. After two performances of “Under The Bridge”, their third consecutive appearance on the show sees them get to grips with the other A-side of their hit – Labelle’s “Lady Marmalade”. Now, if you judge this by just the chorus, and let’s face it that’s how we judge most songs, it’s a pretty faithful interpretation. However, the lyrics in the verses have been completely rewritten with Shaznay Lewis performing them as a rap. It works OK I’d say – better than their cover of “Under The Bridge” anyway. The girls are still wedded to their cargo pants look which has served them well to be fair in terms of their band image. I will comment though that executive producer Chris Cowey clearly had a great affection for them – All Saints I mean not their cargo pants. After their multiple appearances on the show for the seemingly never ending chart run of “Never Ever”, here they were top and tailing two shows having been the final artist on last week’s show as the No 1 and the first on this week’s despite having dropped a place. And there’s more…next week they return to the top spot and perform both tracks of the single on TOTP!

As Jo Whiley says, we have two songs from the 70s starting the show off as, after “Lady Marmalade” (a UK No 17 hit in 1975), we have Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams”. One of the many standout tracks from the legendary “Rumours” album, it made No 24 in 1977. However, that one statistic doesn’t tell the whole tale of its chart history as it has been more successful in the digital age via streaming platforms generating weeks and weeks back in the UK charts. Indeed, it is at No 52 in this week’s chart as I write this post in September 2025! It wasn’t the Fleetwood Mac version that saw it in the charts of 1998 though – we have arrived at the era of The Corrs. Now just as Chelsea weren’t pulling up any trees in the early 80s trundling along in the old Division 2, this family band from Dundalk, Ireland also struggled to make an impression early on in their career, in the UK charts at least.

Beginning their career playing in their Auntie’s bar, they quickly gained recognition via their cameo appearances in The Commitments movie and then via performances on a global stage at the 1994 World Cup, 1996 Summer Olympics and a support slot on the Celine Dion tour. Their debut album “Forgiven, Not Forgotten” sold well in their native Ireland plus Canada, Australia and Japan. However, success in the US and UK remained slight. Follow up album “Talk On Corners” would change all that and then some but not until it was rereleased with the track “Dreams” added to it which the group had recorded for a Fleetwood Mac tribute album and performed live at the Royal Albert Hall alongside Mick Fleetwood. The reaction to that performance convinced the band and their label to release it as a single but with a Tin Tin Out remix to make it more palatable for the dance market. “Dreams” easily became their biggest hit to that point when it peaked at No 6 – none of their previous seven singles had got any higher than No 43. The “Talk On Corners” album would go nine times platinum in the UK alone and become the best selling album of 1998 aided by the release of a ‘special edition’ that included five extra tracks.

Much was made of the group’s image with special attention being given to lead singer Andrea. Now a band’s front person receiving the most press was not unheard of – indeed it was an inevitable occurrence, almost natural especially when you looked like Andrea Corr. However, with her two sisters Sharon and Caroline hardly looking like “a bag of spanners” (as Terry Wogan ironically used to refer to them), it meant that brother Jim would somehow be seen as the weak link, letting the side down as it were which was patently ridiculous but took such a hold in the nation’s collective mind that it led to sketches like the one below. We’ll be seeing lots more of The Corrs in future TOTP repeats. Beautiful!

Ah now, if you ask my mate Robin whether there have been times when Simply Red suffered from, let’s say… ‘not being at the top of their game’, he would probably reply “Yes, of course. Everything they’ve ever released is absolute shit” and many would agree with him. From a purely commercial perspective though, come the end of the 90s, though they were hardly battling relegation to Division 3 as Chelsea did in 1983, they weren’t the title favourites that they used to be either. Gone were the 12 times platinum days of “Stars”. Their 1998 album “Blue” only sold 600,000 copies compared to even previous album “Life”’s 1.5 million and by the time of decade closer “Love And The Russian Winter”, sales were halved again. Now when I used the word ‘only’, it’s relative. Those are still big numbers but Hucknall clearly couldn’t command the sales that he used to. When it comes to singles, Simply Red were never been a big hitter. Out of 26 singles released up to this point, only six had made the Top 10 (although that did include one No 1). Seven didn’t even make the Top 40 at all. Set against those figures, “Say You Love Me” making No 7 was akin to Chelsea having a cup run in the bad old days of my teenage years. Their lead single from the aforementioned “Blue” album, it was hardly anything groundbreaking but it was a perfect daytime playlist track that Hucknall could sell in his sleep. However, he would follow it up with a horrible cover of the old Hollies hit “The Air That I Breathe” and for that alone he should never be forgiven regardless of all his other musical misdemeanours that Robin could list.

It’s LeAnn Rimes next…again. I think this the third time she’s been on the show already with “How Do I Live?”. What else can I say about this one? Well, have I already talked about the fact that two different versions of the song were released on the same day – one by Rimes and another by Trisha Yearwood and that both versions were nominated for Best Female Country Vocal Performance at the Grammy Awards which was the first time such an occurrence had ever happened? Only one version could be performed at the event and LeAnn was chosen. She belted out the song in a career best turn apparently. As soon as she left the stage though, the award in her category was made and they gave it to Trisha Yearwood! Talk about awkward! It’s the football equivalent of Bayern Munich completely outplaying Chelsea in the 2012 Champions League final played at the German team’s own ground and being beaten on penalties. Get In!

P.S. What extremely tenuous connection is there between “How Do I Live?” to this week’s No 1? All will be revealed later.

The links are writing themselves for Jo Whiley tonight. Firstly, she can highlight the connection between two 70s songs opening the show in “Lady Marmalade” and “Dreams” and now she can segue from one teenage singer in LeAnn Rimes to a whole group of them in Cleopatra. Having made No 4 with their debut hit “Cleopatra’s Theme”, they repeated the trick with follow up “Life Ain’t Easy”. It’s a bit smoother on the ear than its predecessor, less jarring somehow though the vocals do have a tendency to grate and why does one of them have a rucksack on their back 3T style? To highlight that they were still school age? Was that good idea? Surely not. Jo Whiley’s comment about “Madonna’s Mancunian mavericks” was a reference to the fact that the group were signed to her label Maverick in America. Just two singles into their career and they had Madonna as a mentor? Maybe life was easy after all…

Next a song I always confuse with “C U When U Get There” by Coolio for no other reason than that they’re both by rappers and the song titles suggest journeys conducted over a period of time. I’m easily confused is my only excuse. “Gone Till November” was the third and joint biggest solo hit by ex-Fugee Wyclef Jean. It starts off all calm and melodic but then when the rapping starts, chaos ensues and it becomes almost unlistenable especially in this performance in which Wyclef’s vocals aren’t the strongest. Maybe the recorded version is better though this single edit is the ‘pop’ version so presumably more mainstream than the album track? Like “The Show” by Doug E. Fresh and the Get Fresh Crew over a decade earlier, it features an awful interpolation of “Michelle” by The Beatles. Compared to his Fugees output, I would say his solo stuff is the equivalent of Chelsea’s 1978/79 team which finished bottom of the league with just five wins out of 42 games. I really suffered for my team in my childhood!

I still haven’t provided the answer to my previous teaser (it’s really not worth waiting for either) but here’s another one. What links Wyclef Jean with the next act on the show who is Adam Garcia? The Bee Gees of course. Wyclef’s debut solo single was “We Trying To Stay Alive” which sampled the disco classic “Stayin’ Alive” whilst Adam Garcia is on the show to perform “Night Fever” from the soundtrack of the jukebox musical Saturday Night Fever based on the 1977 film of the same name. Garcia was starring as Tony Manero, the character played by John Travolta in the movie during the musical’s run at the London Palladium. He’s clearly got those iconic dance moves down pat judging by this performance but as ever with these jukebox musicals, the question remains of why would you want the soundtrack to the show when you could just have the original tracks in their full glory? That’s especially true with Saturday Night Fever with the show following the film’s plot (albeit with the darker elements removed) as opposed to a completely new story that features the songs of a particular artist.

Ooh, here’s another connections teaser – what’s the link between Adam Garcia and LeAnn Rimes? The 2000 film Coyote Ugly which starred Garcia and the soundtrack of which featured four songs by Rimes including the UK No 1 “Can’t Fight The Moonlight”. I love it when a post comes together!

We have yet another new No 1 and I’m not saying anything perceptive nor insightful by stating that nobody saw this song coming from this artist. Yes, Aqua are back at the head of the pack with their third consecutive chart topper “Turn Back Time”. Now, achieving that feat might well have been seen as completely beyond the Danish group based on the cartoon pop of their first (and admittedly) mega hit “Barbie Girl”. Even when copycat follow up “Dr Jones” replicated that position, many must have believed that a third No 1 was surely beyond them? Well, had they stuck to the formula of those first two hits, maybe the UK record buying public wouldn’t have fallen for it a third time but the truth is that Aqua released a song I certainly didn’t know they were capable of. “Turn Back Time” was nothing like its predecessors. A proper ballad with proper singing from vocalist Lene Nystrøm rather than those squeaky noises we’d come to expect. True, there is a weird, incongruous breakdown near the end but I think we can overlook that. Also (thankfully) overlooked was that bald bloke who’d supplied the unsettling “Come on Barbie, let’s go party” line in “Barbie Girl”. Is he even on stage in this performance? Oh, is that him sat on a stool holding a tambourine with a hoodie and glasses disguising his striking look? Might be. A fourth No 1 was a step too far and Aqua would only return to the Top 10 twice more after this and one of those was a remake of “Barbie Girl” in light of the success of the 2023 Barbie film. Still, “Turn Back Time” allowed Aqua to always be able to say that there was more to them than just that song.

Oh, the link between LeAnn Rimes and Aqua? “How Do I Live?” was written by songwriting legend Dianne Warren who also penned “If I Could Turn Back Time” for Cher and if I really could turn back time, I wouldn’t have tried to make such a tenuous link in the first place.

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.