Author: UK #1s blog

Recap: #721 – #750

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Let’s recap, then. And it’s a landmark: our the 25th, the Silver Recap!

The past thirty #1s have taken us across a regulation year and a half of chart-topping history, from spring 1995 to late autumn 1996. This spell has run pretty much concurrent with the very height of Britpop but, as I discussed in a special post, very little of it actually made the top. We’ve had one each from Oasis and Blur – the latter of whom won the ridiculously hyped ‘Battle of Britpop’ – and not much else.

Away from the Big Two, you could argue that the Lightning Seeds were a Britpop band, and that almost thirty years on their Euro ’96 anthem ‘Three Lions’ is the genre’s most enduring hit. You could also argue that the Prodigy and the Chemical Brothers, while primarily dance acts, had strong Britpop elements in their two #1s (especially ‘Setting Sun’, with Noel Gallagher on vocals). We could even really stretch things and claim Babylon Zoo’s ‘Spaceman’ for Britpop, as there were elements of it mixed in amongst the techno and the grunge. I won’t go so far as to claim Texas-based Deep Blue Something for Britpop; but they did give us our one other rock-based chart-topper, ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’.

Britpop aside, one of the other big recent stories was Take That – the decade’s biggest boyband – bowing out after eight number ones in less than three years. They did so with the overblown ‘Never Forget’ and a fairly phoned-in cover of ‘How Deep Is Your Love’, before frontman Gary Barlow launched a solo career with the instantly forgettable ‘Forever Love’. Don’t worry, Take That will be back – just not for a few recaps yet.

1995-6 can also be pinpointed as the moment when rap went mainstream. It’s a genre that has been cropping up in the top spot, every now and then, since the mid-eighties. Often, though, hip-hop has been treated as a novelty: think Vanilla Ice, or Partners in Kryme, or the jarring rap from ‘Rhythm Is a Dancer’. Coolio’s ‘Gangsta’s Paradise’ was uncompromisingly real, though, and had an important message; while The Fugees’ take on Roberta Flack’s ‘Killing Me Softly’ showed how to incorporate rap into a pop song without taking away its edge. This pair remain two of the highest-selling hip-hop records of all time, and paved the way for the likes of ‘Ready or Not’, the Fugees’ much less commercial-sounding follow-up.

Elsewhere, Michael Jackson had his most successful chart period, many years after his true artistic peak, scoring two #1s in four months with the sappy ‘You Are Not Alone’ and the messianic ‘Earth Song’. Another pop superstar, George Michael, bowed out from chart-topping duty with the touching (if a little dull) ‘Jesus to a Child’, and a much more uplifting ode to casual sex in ‘Fastlove’. Shaggy gave us our now mandatory shot of ‘90s reggae, Livin’ Joy provided the dance-banger (though our dance-banger ratio is much down on recent recaps), and Gina G brought us the latest camp Eurovision classic.

One other thing I should mention before we get to the awards is that in the second half of 1996 a pretty big shift occurred. Pop music started to sound very modern. Ground Zero is the Spice Girls’ ‘Wannabe’, which introduced us to a genuine pop phenomenon, and to a breezy, streetwise nineties-bubblegum sound that will set the standard for pop as we barrel towards the new millennium. But it wasn’t just the Spice Girls. Mark Morrison, Peter Andre, and Boyzone, all made the top with songs that sound like pop music will, for better or for worse, from now until the mid-00s. The fact that I was almost eleven at the time of this recap, and for the first time fully aware of what was in the charts, perhaps makes this moment seem bigger than it does for somebody older or younger than me. But I think there’s something in my take on mid-1996 marking a shift into ‘modern’ pop.

Anyway, to the awards. Starting as is now traditional with The ‘Meh’ Award, we peruse the songs that stirred us very little. I have a shortlist that includes MJ’s ‘You Are Not Alone’, George Michael’s ‘Jesus to a Child’, and Boyzone’s simpering cover of ‘Words’. But for the winner I’m choosing Gary Barlow’s utterly underwhelming ‘Forever Love’, which was so dull it basically killed his solo career before it had even begun.

The WTAF Award for being interesting if nothing else has a few decent choices this time around. There’s another MJ contender, the overblown ‘Earth Song’. There’s the latest Levi’s Jeans chart-topper: Babylon Zoo’s zany, genre-hopping ‘Spaceman’. There’s the intense ‘Firestarter’, which had Middle England clutching their pearls. There’s even ‘Wannabe’, a phenomenon, yes; but also a truly bizarre pop song when you actually sit down and listen to it. Of the four, ‘Wannabe’ is a stretch, ‘Earth Song’ is a little too well-intentioned, and ‘Firestarter’ a little too good, for this award. Which leaves Babylon Zoo’s nihilistic anthem for the win!

You may have noticed that I haven’t yet mentioned the one act that have dominated the past year and a half of chart action… That’s because I was saving them for The Very Worst Chart-Topper award. I am talking, of course, about Robson & Jerome, the first (though sadly not the last) of Simon Cowell’s crimes against music. Three #1s, thirteen weeks at the top, seven cover versions spread across their various discs… They are the only contender here, it’s just a question of which record to choose. It makes sense to go for the first one, ‘Unchained Melody’ / ‘White Cliffs of Dover’, because it was A) terrible, B) number one for the longest stretch, and C) it is currently the best-selling single of the entire decade…

Finally, then, the latest Very Best Chart-Topper. Four contenders spring to mind, all from 1996. (It has been a much better year for #1s than 1995, which could probably go down as one of the very worst…) In chronological order we have: Oasis’s soaring ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger’, the Prodigy’s incendiary (gettit?) ‘Firestarter’, the Chemical Brothers’ Beatles-based banger ‘Setting Sun’, and ‘Say You’ll Be There’, AKA The Spice Girls best song.

I’m torn. This is probably my only chance of giving the award to my two favourite childhood groups, Oasis and the Spice Girls. But I think the Spice’s would be a stretch – as fun as SYBT is – and ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger’ has simply been done by this point. ‘Firestarter’ and ‘Setting Sun’ are cut from the same cloth, and going by my write ups I enjoyed the latter more. ‘Firestarter’ was a huge cultural moment, but I think ‘Setting Sun’ is the better record. Plus, with Noel G on vocals it means Oasis still get a look in (and that the Beatles do kind of claim their second ‘Very Best’ award…) The Chemical Brothers it is!

To recap the recaps:

The ‘Meh’ Award for Forgettability

  1. ‘Hold My Hand’, by Don Cornell.
  2. ‘It’s Almost Tomorrow’, by The Dream Weavers.
  3. ‘On the Street Where You Live’, by Vic Damone.
  4. ‘Why’, by Anthony Newley.
  5. ‘The Next Time’ / ‘Bachelor Boy’, by Cliff Richard & The Shadows.
  6. ‘Juliet’, by The Four Pennies.
  7. ‘The Carnival Is Over’, by The Seekers.
  8. ‘Silence Is Golden’, by The Tremeloes.
  9. ‘I Pretend’, by Des O’Connor.
  10. ‘Woodstock’, by Matthews’ Southern Comfort.
  11. ‘How Can I Be Sure’, by David Cassidy.
  12. ‘Annie’s Song’, by John Denver.
  13. ‘I Only Have Eyes For You’, by Art Garfunkel.
  14. ‘I Don’t Want to Talk About It’ / ‘The First Cut Is the Deepest’, by Rod Stewart.
  15. ‘Three Times a Lady’, by The Commodores.
  16. ‘What’s Another Year’, by Johnny Logan.
  17. ‘A Little Peace’, by Nicole.
  18. ‘Every Breath You Take’, by The Police.
  19. ‘I Got You Babe’, by UB40 with Chrissie Hynde.
  20. ‘Who’s That Girl’, by Madonna.
  21. ‘A Groovy Kind of Love’, by Phil Collins.
  22. ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’, by Band Aid II.
  23. ‘Please Don’t Go’ / ‘Game Boy’, by KWS.
  24. ‘Dreams’, by Gabrielle.
  25. ‘Forever Love’, by Gary Barlow.

The WTAF Award for being interesting if nothing else

  1. ‘I See the Moon’, by The Stargazers.
  2. ‘Lay Down Your Arms’, by Anne Shelton.
  3. ‘Hoots Mon’, by Lord Rockingham’s XI.
  4. ‘You’re Driving Me Crazy’, by The Temperance Seven.
  5. ‘Nut Rocker’, by B. Bumble & The Stingers.
  6. ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’, by Gerry & The Pacemakers.
  7. ‘Little Red Rooster’, by The Rolling Stones.
  8. ‘Puppet on a String’, by Sandie Shaw.
  9. ‘Fire’, by The Crazy World of Arthur Brown.
  10. ‘In the Year 2525 (Exordium and Terminus)’, by Zager & Evans.
  11. ‘Amazing Grace’, The Pipes & Drums & Military Band of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guard.
  12. ‘Kung Fu Fighting’, by Carl Douglas.
  13. ‘If’, by Telly Savalas.
  14. ‘Wuthering Heights’, by Kate Bush.
  15. ‘Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick’, by Ian Dury & The Blockheads.
  16. ‘Shaddap You Face’, by Joe Dolce Music Theatre.
  17. ‘It’s My Party’, by Dave Stewart & Barbara Gaskin.
  18. ‘Save Your Love’ by Renée & Renato.
  19. ‘Rock Me Amadeus’, by Falco.
  20. ‘Pump Up the Volume’ / ‘Anitina (The First Time I See She Dance)’, by M/A/R/R/S.
  21. ‘Doctorin’ the Tardis’, by The Timelords.
  22. ‘Sadeness Part 1’, by Enigma.
  23. ‘Ebeneezer Goode’, by The Shamen.
  24. ‘I Would Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)’, by Meat Loaf.
  25. ‘Spaceman’, by Babylon Zoo.

The Very Worst Chart-Toppers

  1. ‘Cara Mia’, by David Whitfield with Mantovani & His Orchestra.
  2. ‘The Man From Laramie’, by Jimmy Young.
  3. ‘Roulette’, by Russ Conway.
  4. ‘Wooden Heart’, by Elvis Presley.
  5. ‘Lovesick Blues’, by Frank Ifield.
  6. ‘Diane’, by The Bachelors.
  7. ‘The Minute You’re Gone’, by Cliff Richard.
  8. ‘Release Me’, by Engelbert Humperdinck.
  9. ‘Lily the Pink’, by The Scaffold.
  10. ‘All Kinds of Everything’, by Dana.
  11. ‘The Twelfth of Never’, by Donny Osmond.
  12. ‘The Streak’, by Ray Stevens.
  13. ‘No Charge’, by J. J. Barrie
  14. ‘Don’t Give Up On Us’, by David Soul
  15. ‘One Day at a Time’, by Lena Martell.
  16. ‘There’s No One Quite Like Grandma’, by St. Winifred’s School Choir.
  17. ‘I’ve Never Been to Me’, by Charlene.
  18. ‘Hello’, by Lionel Richie.
  19. ‘I Want to Know What Love Is’, by Foreigner.
  20. ‘Star Trekkin’’, by The Firm.
  21. ‘Nothing’s Gonna Change My Love for You’, by Glenn Medeiros.
  22. ‘Let’s Party’, by Jive Bunny & The Mastermixers.
  23. ‘(Everything I Do) I Do It for You’, by Bryan Adams.
  24. ‘Don’t Stop (Wiggle Wiggle)’, by The Outhere Brothers.
  25. ‘Unchained Melody’ / ‘White Cliffs of Dover’, by Robson & Jerome.

The Very Best Chart-Toppers

  1. ‘Such a Night’, by Johnnie Ray.
  2. ‘Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White’, by Perez ‘Prez’ Prado & His Orchestra.
  3. ‘Great Balls of Fire’, by Jerry Lee Lewis.
  4. ‘Cathy’s Clown’, by The Everly Brothers.
  5. ‘Telstar’, by The Tornadoes.
  6. ‘She Loves You’ by The Beatles.
  7. ‘(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction’, by The Rolling Stones.
  8. ‘A Whiter Shade of Pale’, by Procol Harum.
  9. ‘I Heard It Through the Grapevine’, by Marvin Gaye.
  10. ‘Baby Jump’, by Mungo Jerry.
  11. ‘Metal Guru’, by T. Rex.
  12. ‘Tiger Feet’, by Mud.
  13. ‘Space Oddity’, by David Bowie.
  14. ‘I Feel Love’, by Donna Summer.
  15. ‘Heart of Glass’, by Blondie.
  16. ‘The Winner Takes It All’, by ABBA.
  17. ‘My Camera Never Lies’, by Bucks Fizz.
  18. ‘Relax’ by Frankie Goes to Hollywood.
  19. ‘You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)’, by Dead or Alive
  20. ‘Stand by Me’, by Ben E. King (Honorary Award)
  21. ‘It’s a Sin’, by Pet Shop Boys.
  22. ‘Theme from S-Express’, by S’Express.
  23. ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’, by Sinéad O’Connor.
  24. ‘Would I Lie to You?’, by Charles & Eddie.
  25. ‘Stay Another Day’, by East 17.
  26. ‘Setting Sun’, by The Chemical Brothers.

Up next, we’ll briefly pause the regular countdown. I’m going to launch a new series, and take us back to the 1970s…

750. ‘What Becomes of the Broken Hearted’ / ‘Saturday Night at the Movies’ / ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’, by Robson & Jerome

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Robson & Jerome return for their third and final number one, and bow out with a 100% chart-topping record. Which is something that can’t be sniffed at. Unlike their records, which can. Because they stink.

What Becomes of the Broken Hearted / Saturday Night at the Movies / You’ll Never Walk Alone, by Robson & Jerome (their 3rd and final #1)

2 weeks, from 3rd – 17th November 1996

It’s more of the same: more granny-baiting covers of sixties classics, more cheap and tacky production, more dodgy vocals… Much more, in fact, because they end things with the first and only triple ‘A’-side to make #1. Three songs, give me strength… (How does a triple ‘A’ even work? It’s simple geometry: discs don’t have three sides! Was this released as a triangle?)

The ‘lead’ single from the three is a cover of Jimmy Ruffin’s ‘What Becomes of the Broken Hearted’. As with last time, and the pair’s take on ‘Up on the Roof’, there is an element of this being a good thing. ‘What Becomes…’ is an all-time classic, and even in this highly diluted version it’s good to see it having a moment on top of the charts. And this isn’t as heinous as some of their other chart-topping moments. The production is quite lush and substantial, and they sensibly rope a gospel choir in to do much of the actual singing.

If only they had left it at that… The Official Charts Company lists just the one song, though maybe they simply don’t have the space to squeeze in three fairly long titles. All other sources have this as a threesome though, and so we’ll have to give the other two a spin. Starting with a case of GBH on The Drifters’ ‘Saturday Night at the Movies’. The synthesisers are set for ‘jaunty’, as Jerome Flynn does his best Johnny Moore high-notes… The less said the better. (I will admit that the video is quite fun…)

We end with a song that’s already been #1 twice and that really didn’t need to return, especially not in a version as lightweight as this. ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ is a technically demanding song and, although the producers try very hard to drown out Robson & Jerome’s reedy vocals with lots of bombast, we can sadly still hear them. You can see why the OCC has been tempted to erase it from history. Elsewhere on their second album, ‘Take Two’, lurk covers of ‘Oh Pretty Woman’, ‘Keep the Customer Satisfied’ and – presumably because Christmas was just around the corner – ‘Silent Night’.

We can perhaps be glad, then, that they decided to end their music careers rather than release any further singles. They had, after all, been reluctant to do it in the first place, and not even the offer of three million pounds from Simon Cowell could persuade them to do a third album. I can forgive them almost everything, music-wise, knowing how much that must have annoyed Cowell. Unfortunately, he discovered an even more lucrative way of unleashing terrible music on the masses. More on that soon…

To be honest, it’s easy to forgive Robson and Jerome most things, as they both seem like decent blokes. Green has been a fixture on British TV ever since, both in acting and in presenting travel and fishing documentaries. Flynn laid-low for a few years, before returning to the spotlight with a scene-stealing turn as Bronn in ‘Game of Thrones’. The pair are, you’ll be very glad to hear, still firm friends.

Up next, a recap. And I have a feeling that this pair may well be up for an award…

749. ‘Say You’ll Be There’, by The Spice Girls

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Forget ‘Wannabe’, and all its gimmicky, chanting, in your face-ness… This is the moment that the Spice Girls announced themselves as a genuine phenomenon.

Say You’ll Be There, by The Spice Girls (their 2nd of nine #1s)

2 weeks, from 20th October – 3rd November 1996

To me anyway, as this was the song that caught my ears and made me a fan at the time; its charms less obvious but running much deeper than its shouty predecessor. Should I go as far as to claim, less than four sentences into this post, that it is the Girls’ one true classic record?

It’s a pop song. Pure pop. Peak-nineties, sugar-filled, bubble-gum. The production dates it almost to the month, with the squelchy synths and the scratchy cuts. But it’s just hook, after hook, after hook. Within the first minute we’ve already gone through three levels of catchiness: Emma Bunton’s verse, Mel B’s pre-bridge, and Victoria on the bridge proper. And then there’s a timeless chorus.

But it doesn’t stop there – any downtime, any moment that could have been dead air is crammed with something ear-catching. Mel B’s little rap, the Yeahhh I want you, the Stevie Wonder harmonica solo… (Not actually by Stevie Wonder, but by Judd Lander, who also contributed the iconic intro on ‘Karma Chameleon’.) The best bit, though, is Mel C’s harmonies on the final chorus, in which she announces herself as The Spice Girl who could genuinely sing…

The lyrics are more female empowerment, with the girls this time setting the rules for a relationship: This time, You gotta take it easy, Throwin’ far too much emotion at me… I’m not sure if they’re making the imagined man swear his undying faithfulness, or just roping him in for a one-night stand, but it’s clear that they’re the bosses. Girl-power, indeed…

I’ve come out with some grand statements already, so here’s another for good measure: ‘Say You’ll Be There’, not ‘Wannabe’, set a pop-song template that will be followed for the next decade, or more. Listen to All Saints, S Club 7, Five, or Atomic Kitten when they come along, and you will hear elements of ‘Say You’ll Be There’s lightly-funky, mildly-soulful, gold-standard pop. Max Martin must have been taking notes too, as US pop sensations like Britney Spears and NSync will also borrow from the Spice’s sound.

I know that I’m prone to over-nostalgia when it comes to the Spice Girls, so I will assure readers that I won’t be so gushing over any of their remaining seven #1s. ‘Say You’ll Be There’ is not their only great record, but it is their best. One more thing to say before I finish – and this really puts me into ‘back in my day’ territory – but the campy, ninja-inspired video, in which the Girls are dressed very sexily (but not all that sluttily), feels a world away from modern pop videos. I won’t wade into whether or not this is a good thing – I’m not sure where I stand, to be honest, and I enjoy many current female stars who writhe around in next to nothing. I just thought it was worth noting…

748. ‘Words’, by Boyzone

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We wake up, post-Chemical Brothers, with a bit of a headache. Bleary-eyed, we reach for the play button on our next #1… And it’s one hell of a comedown.

Words, by Boyzone (their 1st of six #1s)

1 week, from 13th – 20th October 1996

Not for the first time this year, a boyband reaches for the Bee Gees songbook. ‘Words’ was one of the Gibb Brothers’ first chart hits, their third record to reach the Top 10 back in 1968. The original is a very much a late-sixties ballad, drenched in strings and heavy piano chords, but it doesn’t feel overblown, with Barry Gibb’s voice right out at the front of the mix. Boyzone’s producers decide to up the drama, up the rolling drums and the layered vocal tracks, and drag a full extra minute out of the song.

It’s a bit stodgy, a bit lumpy. On their cover of ‘How Deep Is Your Love’, Take That stripped things back, and I was also a bit sniffy about it, so maybe I’m just picky. Or maybe it’s just very hard to do justice to a Bee Gees original. This take on ‘Words’ isn’t terrible (and Boyzone have some real crimes against pop to come), but that’s because the quality of the source material shines through.

One thing I do find particularly annoying about this is Ronan Keating, Boyzone’s main man, on lead vocals. He just has an annoying voice, like he’s constantly trying to add gravitas to each and every syllable rather than just singing the damn song. Alas, it’s a voice that we’ll have to get used to on top of the charts for the time being.

For all the fuss I made about Take That as the boyband of the ‘90s, for folks of my age group they were just a little too old. No, it was Boyzone that the girls in my Primary 6 class were obsessed with. To this day I remain conditioned to hate them, after getting into trouble for sending a classmate into floods of tears just because I told her how terrible they were…

But honestly, they weren’t a patch on Take That, who had some genuinely good pop songs, many of them originals. Boyzone relied too heavily on bland covers, that cynically targeted both the tweens and their mums. ‘Words’ was the group’s first number one but their sixth Top 5 hit, and they’d already had their wicked way with the Osmonds’ ‘Love Me for a Reason’, and Cat Stevens’ ‘Father and Son’.

Robson & Jerome gave us our introduction to the chart crimes of Simon Cowell, while Boyzone were managed by his henchman in the vanilla-isation of ‘90s and ‘00s pop, Louis Walsh. Not that Boyzone were the only Irish five-piece that Walsh unleashed on the world, but we’ll try not to think about them until we have to….

747. ‘Setting Sun’, by The Chemical Brothers

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There’s no doubt that ‘Firestarter’ was the big, banging dance-rock crossover hit of 1996; but that song’s infamy probably means that it has unfairly overshadowed the year’s other big, banging dance-rock crossover hit…

Setting Sun, by The Chemical Brothers (their 1st of two #1s)

1 week, from 6th – 13th October 1996

Because ‘Setting Sun’ hits even harder than ‘Firestarter’, and it hasn’t been tamed by years of ubiquity. I hadn’t heard it properly for ages, and was genuinely taken aback by how nasty it sounds. Take the relentlessly monotonous, boldly uncommercial, one-minute long intro for a start. These are big beats with a capital ‘B’.

The shrieking klaxons and the gut-dropping bass hold the track together, and are very nineties. But in the droning sitar, and the vocals played in reverse, there’s also more than a nod to the original tape-looping, Eastern-looking, psychedelic game-changer: the Beatles’ ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’. At one point lawyers looked like getting involved, before a musicologist was brought in to prove that the song was merely inspired by, and didn’t sample, The Beatles. The fact that it was used as a template for a dance track thirty years later surely just proves how incredibly ahead of its time ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ was.

And what could be more Beatlesy, back in 1996, than to have Noel Gallagher on vocals? Uncredited, and filtered through layers of feedback, but still recognisable from the off, he even manages to rip-off his own lyrics from ‘Half the World Away’… You said your body was young but your mind was very old… And I have to say that this is probably the best #1 single that he features on, as much as I do enjoy many of Oasis’s chart-toppers.

Other brilliant moments include the intense break half-way through, which sounds like a helicopter landing on your head. (I was going to call it the ‘middle-eight’ but I don’t think traditional terms like that apply to boundary pushers like this.) And then there’s the completely unhinged outro, in which the song disintegrates before our ears. The video I’ve attached below is the radio edit, but it’s worth hearing the full five and a half minute version, to drag out the exquisite nastiness…

Another thing that’s interesting about this record is that, unlike The Prodigy when they unleashed ‘Firestarter’, The Chemical Brothers had only a couple of minor hits to their name before ‘Setting Sun’. According to most sources, airplay was limited too. So it seems to have been a genuine underground, word of mouth smash (with Noel G for added clout) that set the duo up to become one of the biggest dance acts of the late-90s and early-00s.

The Chemical Brothers (yet again, like the Walkers, the Righteouses and the Outheres, they are not actually brothers!) had met at the University of Manchester in 1989, and had bonded over their love of rave culture. There can be few chart-topping DJs with a degree in late-Medieval history, but the Chem’s Ed Simons is one. They have one further chart-topper to come, but it will have to go some to match the power of this.

746. ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’, by Deep Blue Something

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I’ve made a big deal about British rock (‘indie’, ‘Britpop’, call it what you will) not getting its fair share of airtime at the top of the singles chart in the ‘90s. I even did a special post on it. But here’s an even rarer sighting of the US equivalent…

Breakfast at Tiffany’s, by Deep Blue Something (their 1st and only #1)

1 week, from 29th September – 6th October 1996

When I think of US alternative rock, post-grunge, in the mid-1990s, I think of REM, the Chili Peppers, Hootie & the Blowfish, and… I’m struggling, to be honest. Britain was bursting at the seams with their own alt-rock, and not many American acts broke through. Here then is US indie, alt-, college (again, call it what you will) rock’s one week in the sun. I might even go as far as suggesting that this is the first such #1 since The Highwaymen in 1961, though that might be pushing things slightly.

It’s a catchy record, with jangly verses which contrast against the power chords in the chorus. It’s a very different sound to Oasis, or Blur – there’s an earnestness to US rock that its British equivalent often deliberately avoids – but I’m sure the prevalence of Britpop benefitted this in making it to #1. And, though I was still young at the time, I can remember it being everywhere on the radio…

The most interesting thing about this record is the lyrics. Even the title intrigues… ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’? I make it only the second number one single to share its name with a book, after ‘Wuthering Heights’, but I’ll happily be proven wrong if I’ve forgotten one! It’s about a dying relationship, that the singer tries to save by thinking of one thing the pair have in common. And I said, What about, ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s? She said I, Think I, Remember the film… I think we’re meant to assume that this is enough for them to give it another go. I always thought that the next line was And as I recall, I read the book and I liked it… with the film and the book versions of ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’ being pretty different and a sign of the couple’s ill-suitedness… Except it turns out that the real line is as I recall I think we both kinda liked it… Call me a cynic, but my subconscious didn’t want them to stay together.

I see a lot of hate for this song online, hate that was also around at the time. And I can kind of see it, the fact that it’s cookie-cutter mid-nineties soft rock. The lyrics could also be seen as contrived, though I think they’re endearingly clumsy. It’s certainly not worthy of #6 on the ‘50 Most Awesomely Bad Songs Ever’ list, as VH1 and ‘Blender’ named it!

Deep Blue Something were from Denton, Texas and, despite forming in 1991 this was their first hit. Their only hit in much of the world, apart from in the UK. We felt sorry for them, and allowed their follow-up ‘Josey’ to make #27, sparing them a one-hit wonder tag. They split in 2001, but reformed in 2014. The members juggle being in Deep Blue Something with other day jobs in the music industry. Apart from, that is, guitarist Clay Bergus, who is a manager of Eddie V’s Prime Seafood restaurant in Fort Worth. Which is great.

745. ‘Ready or Not’, by The Fugees

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I first proposed the existence of ‘shadow #1s’ way back at the start of this blog when covering Frankie Laine’s ‘Hey Joe’, which had made top spot shortly after his mega-hit ‘I Believe’ (the song that still holds the record for weeks at number one). ‘Hey Joe’ was a zany, whip-crackin’ country ditty, a world away from the spiritual ‘I Believe’, and I suggested that the reflected glow of the earlier hit had paved the way for the follow-up.

Ready or Not, by The Fugees (their 2nd and final #1)

2 weeks, from 15th – 29th September 1996

It’s a phenomenon we’ve seen repeated a few times. ‘Baby Jump’ by Mungo Jerry springs to mind as one of the most obvious. ‘Shadow #1s’ don’t even have to follow a chart-topper, as both Alvin Stardust and a-Ha achieved their only number ones after their much more famous number twos… All of which is my long-winded way of introducing ‘Ready or Not’, one of the ultimate shadow #1s…

I tried to claim that The Fugees earlier cover of ‘Killing Me Softly’ was hip-hop’s big arrival as a chart force. But actually, this is the moment. This is no funky cover of a seventies classic; this is uncompromising rap. (Though it is built around a very distinctive, very haunting sample from Enya, so I suppose it does have some mum-friendly credentials.) Like Peter Andre’s ‘Flava’, which was a particularly modern sounding pop song, this is modern rap – East Coast rap, apparently, though I’m not qualified to clarify what that actually means – and could have been a credible chart-topper anytime between 1996 and now.

It still makes use of Lauryn Hill’s amazing voice, in the chorus, but while she sang angelically on ‘Killing Me Softly’, her voice now drips with deadpan attitude. Ready or not, Here I come, You can’t hide… Around this, each of the three MCs take turns telling us how the Fugees are poised for world domination. I like Hill’s alliterative voodoo line, as well as: While you’re imitating Al Capone, I’ll be Nina Simone, And defecating on your microphone… But perhaps the most important verse is Pras Michel’s, which focuses on the group’s immigrant background: I refugee from Guantanamo Bay, Dance around the border like Cassius Clay… (the band name is, after all, short for ‘Refugees’).

Although uncompromising, this isn’t gangsta rap. Hill’s verse even calls out stereotypical rappers: Frontin’ n*ggas give me heebeejeebees… Enya threatened to sue the trio for sampling ‘Boadicea’ before she realised that the lyrics went deeper than just guns and pimping. (Although, while there’s no swearing, there is the above-mentioned debut appearance of the n-word in a UK #1.) Meanwhile, though it isn’t strictly a sample, the chorus is heavily based around the Delfonic’s ‘Ready or Not Here I Come (Can’t Hide from Love)’, a minor hit in 1969.

In calling this a ‘shadow #1’, I don’t mean to suggest that this doesn’t have musical merit. The verses are impressive both lyrically and in the way they are delivered, while the use of ‘Boadicea’ is one of the all-time great samples (so effective that this won’t be its only appearance in a number one single…) There was also the small matter of a multi-million dollar video featuring submarines, sharks and helicopters to promote it. But no, all that aside, this is an impressive and important song, and I say that as someone with a fairly low tolerance for rap.

The Fugees weren’t together for long after their chart-topping summer of ‘96, with the members moving on to solo projects by the following year. All three will have their own hits, but only Wyclef Jean will feature on another #1. Lauryn Hill has had the most interesting post-Fugees career, involving both charity work and other philanthropic endeavours, jail time for tax fraud, as well as the small matter of eight Grammy awards and the title of ‘Greatest Female Rapper’. The group have reunited twice over the years.

744. ‘Flava’, by Peter Andre

/ UK #1s blog / 8 Comments

Straight after the ‘90s most famous five-piece, the decade’s most famous six-pack arrives on the scene…

Flava, by Peter Andre (his 1st of three #1s)

1 week, from 8th – 15th September 1996

To be fair to this record, we have to try forget what Peter Andre is now – the butt of a million jokes, basically – and cast our minds back over a quarter of a century (gulp!) to when he was hot property. And if we are being fair, this record is a perfectly serviceable slice of mid-nineties dance/pop/R&B. Listening to it, you’d assume that Andre was American, especially when singing lines like Can’t bring myself to sleep, So I get the keys to my Jeep…

Except Mark Morrison recently proved that Brits (or British-Australians in Andre’s case) could do these sort of new-jack swing, R&B jams as well as, if not better than, the Americans. Not that ‘Flava’ is in the same street as ‘Return of the Mack’, but they do share the same postcode. And interestingly, Andre also sings in the chorus that the Mack’s back with the flava of the year… (Since writing my post on Mark Morrison, I’ve learned that ‘Mack’ is US slang for ‘a confident, successful man who has many sexual partners’, according to the OED, possibly stemming from the blaxploitation movie of the same name.)

The weakest link here is Peter Andre himself, and his reedy voice which never quite convinces that he is someone who parties all night, or who gets drunk as hell blazin’ up with the smoke, as the uncredited Cee raps in his verse. But this leads us on to what the legacy of ‘Flava’, an otherwise average, throwaway tune, is… The fact that it is a completely and utterly modern pop song.

There’s that beat that Max Martin would be rinsing the life out of by 1999, there’s a synth riff that I’m pretty sure was used by both the Backstreet Boys and 5ive (if not several others), and there’s a rent-a-rapper brought in for the middle eight. This is how pop music will sound for the next twenty-odd years, and here it first appears on top of the charts. With Peter Andre, musical trailblazer…

Or maybe it’s because I can remember 1996, and so my subconscious is forcing me to hear it as modern. It’s either that, or accept that I’m old… Anyway. I made a big play of Peter Andre’s six-pack in the intro, but in the ‘Flava’ video he keeps it fairly well hidden behind an array of baggy shirts. This was probably a reaction to the ‘Mysterious Girl’ video, which had made #2 earlier in the year and in the video for which he spent most of his time topless, under a waterfall. He clearly wanted to be known for his art, dammit, not his body! I won’t link to ‘Mysterious Girl’ – his one true classic – as that makes #1 eventually, under circumstances that will lead to Peter becoming the boob he is nowadays

743. ‘Wannabe’, by The Spice Girls

/ UK #1s blog / 11 Comments

Ah, now this feels like a significant moment…

Wannabe, by The Spice Girls (their 1st of nine #1s)

7 weeks, from 21st July – 8th September 1996

And not just because it introduces us to a genuine musical phenomenon, who by certain metrics are the most successful chart act ever; but because the Spice Girls were my first modern pop obsession, the first act that I loved in real time.

Listening to ‘Wannabe’ now, I can confirm that I still know all the words, and that I can still picture the one-shot video frame by frame. I’m still pretty sure I know what zigazigah means… But can I now admit that this record isn’t… very… good?

Of course I can. Even aged eleven, I didn’t have that much time for ‘Wannabe’. Far greater pop songs were to be found on the Spice Girls’ debut album, including some of their upcoming #1s. The verses are slightly risqué nursery rhymes – If you want my future, Forget my past, If you wanna get with me, Better make it fast… – while the chorus is an aggressively nonsensical chant: I’ll tell what I want what I really, really want… So tell me what you want etc. etc. etc. It’s breakneck, the sudden changes in direction are dizzying, and it leaves you with a bit of a headache.

One thing remains iconic: the ‘rap’, in which all the Spices are introduced to us. Like the chorus it makes little to no sense, but it does include an all-time classic line: Easy V doesn’t come for free, She’s a real laydee… (at which point in the video, the soon to be Mrs Beckham is grinding on a priest’s lap). Otherwise, this song is best viewed as a statement of intent, a big slap around the face with a leopard-print handbag. Or perhaps it’s actually the Spice Girls’ manifesto, with all those lines about putting friendship first, and everything being on a girl’s terms. (This is before they were lumped with the slogan ‘Girl Power’.)

The Spice Girls probably wouldn’t have been as huge if they hadn’t released ‘Wannabe’ as their debut single (and it surely had to be released first, or not at all). It’s a marmite track, something the girls and their management acknowledged at the time, but they went with it and were rewarded for their decision, and then some. Number one in thirty-seven countries, and voted as the most recognisable pop song of the past sixty years…

‘Wannabe’ itself probably wouldn’t have been as big as it was without the chaotic video, in which the girls rampage through a posh soiree at the St. Pancras Hotel in London. Again, it’s the perfect introduction to the group, their friendship, their vibe. And it’s interesting how young the target audience clearly is: you have five youthful, attractive females, and yet there’s nothing very sexual going on, aside from a bit of zigazigah-ing. It feels more like a madcap kids’ TV show.

In fact, the helter-skelter, cut and paste feel of the song, and the zany anarchy of the video, is pushing me to call this… not ‘pop punk’, as that’s already taken… maybe ‘punk pop’? Cheap, cheerful, and far more to do with attitude than any sort of musical quality. It works for now, anyway. We’ll have plenty of time to further assess the Spice Girls over the coming months. I might even bring up my homemade Baby Spice badge, and the saucy graffiti I drew all over the CD sleeve of their album, at some point too…

742. ‘Forever Love’, by Gary Barlow

/ UK #1s blog / 4 Comments

Have I ever heard this song before…? The much-anticipated solo debut from Take That’s leading man? I was about to start my final year of primary school, fairly well up on the pop hits of the day, and yet…

Forever Love, by Gary Barlow (his 1st of three solo #1s)

1 week, from 14th – 21st July 1996

There’s a chance I may never have heard ‘Forever Love’ before; but there’s also a chance I’ve heard it a hundred times and simply forgotten. It is… Dull. Bland. Pedestrian. Lacking any sort of hook, or memorable lines. Love it has, So many beautiful faces, Sharing lives, And sharing days… See what I mean. Meh.

My last two posts have been lengthy, so this one can be short and sweet. Dull love song has week at number one. Hardly the first time, and at least it was just one week. Except, ‘Forever Love’ should be so much bigger, so much more of an event. Gary Barlow was the biggest pop star in the land, striking out alone. The next George Michael, maybe?

I think he was probably trying too hard. This record is clearly well produced, something that took a lot of time and careful thought. But it’s too fussy, too needlessly ornate. The album-version intro is so long, and overwrought, that you’re bored before Gary has even opened his mouth. At the three minute mark you check how long is left, and sigh when you see there are two more to go… I’ve never written a classic pop song, but I bet nobody that’s managed it ever sat down at their piano and said ‘today is the day I write something timeless!’ You feel that Barlow probably set himself that goal, though.

The obvious comparison to make is with his former bandmate, the one who had jumped ship first and was also about to release his debut single, a cover of ‘Freedom’ by George Michael (clearly both men had the same ambition). Initially it was Gary who had the bigger hits, but it was Robbie Williams who understood better what a pop star is about, what the public wants: some catchy tunes and some showmanship. Most of them don’t care about the ‘craft’. (Also, Robbie very sensibly got someone in to help him write said tunes…)

And so Robbie will very soon eclipse his estranged bandmate. Gary has one further solo number one to come – another that, at first glance, I don’t think I’ve heard for the best part of three decades – before a decade in the wilderness beckons.