2002 #1s

933. ‘Round Round’, by Sugababes

/ UK #1s blog / 5 Comments

In which Sugababes cement their sudden rise to becoming Britain’s biggest girl group, with another cool chart-topper.

Round Round, by Sugababes (their 2nd of six #1s)

1 week, from 18th – 25th August 2002

The energetic Spice Girls were a big exception to this rule, but generally the best girl groups are the ones that make it seem effortless. Like they don’t have to try, and can just conjure classic pop songs out of thin air. Watch great sixties groups like the Supremes and the Ronettes performing live: no wild dance routines, just sparkly dresses and a knowing smile. By the ‘90s the US rap-pop girl groups like TLC and En Vogue had the same haughty spirit, while All Saints turned looking like they couldn’t be arsed into an art form.

Sugababes were firmly in this camp. Listen to the way Mutya almost whispers her opening verse. Calling it husky, or sultry, can’t quite tell the whole story. She sounds like she’s just gotten out of bed, three hours late to the studio. It drips in attitude. I think the kids today might call it cunty. Whatever, it works.

I like that the beat scythes like a huge blade – one of those big wind pylons – swooping ‘round round’ every couple of seconds. The entire song spins as the title suggests it must. It’s the perfect follow-up to the great ‘Freak Like Me’, enough of a similar vibe – same tempo, same attitude – but sufficiently different to suggest they weren’t turning into one-trick ponies. There’s no sample, no cover version, here. Or at least, not an overt one. The backing beat is based on a track called ‘Tango Forte’, which in turn is based on ‘Whatever Lola Wants’, a song from the 1955 musical ‘Damn Yankees’.

Which is another great argument for sampling not just being lazy snatching of someone else’s ideas. For who could listen to that mid-fifties showtune and hear a pop song from forty years in the future? But for all this bigging up, I have to admit: I don’t think it’s as good as ‘Freak Like Me’. It’s good, very good even, but just not as ear-grabbing as its predecessor. Apart from, that is, the middle eight. In which a completely different song, a piano ballad, is transplanted in right into the heart of this record. It jars, but it works, and the way it slowly morphs back into that ‘Tango Forte’ beat is great.

This chart-topper confirmed that Sugababes Mk II were off and away. Three years of solid hit making were in store, until Mutya left the group in late 2005. Two of them we’ll cover as #1s in the not too distant future. But I should also point you back in time, to Sugababes Mk I, and the singles from their ‘flop’ first album: ‘New Year’, ‘Soul Sound’, and one of the best from any stage of their careers: ‘Overload’.

932. ‘Colourblind’, by Darius

/ UK #1s blog / 3 Comments

We’ve had the ‘Pop Idol’ winner, and the runner-up. Why not have the bronze medallist…?

Colourblind, by Darius (his 1st and only #1)

2 weeks, from 4th – 18th August 2002

Darius Danesh had never really been in the running to win the contest against the big two, but he made it to the penultimate round. Then he did the unimaginable, turning down an offer from Simon Cowell and striking out alone. Which means we have the first self-penned reality TV chart-topper.

Under the guise of authenticity, we’re often encouraged to approve more of music that is written by the people singing it. When I was a teen it was a big indicator of an artist or groups’ talent. “Yes, but do they write their own songs…?” Yet, every song is written by someone. There is no such thing as a song tree. And nobody criticises actors for reading somebody else’s lines. Why does it matter if you sing someone else’s song? It worked for Dusty Springfield, the greatest singer Britain has ever produced. It worked for Elvis, who wrote about three songs in his lifetime.

All that is a roundabout way of saying “well done Darius” on writing a number one single; but also of saying that the song is no better than Will Young’s version of ‘Light My Fire’, and is not as good as Gareth Gates’ ‘Anyone of Us’. It has a big pop chorus – You’re the light when I close my eyes, I’m colourblind… – and a modern, very pop-rock feel. This is the future of rock music, really. For guitars to appear at the top of the charts later in the 21st century, they’ve had to soften their edges and exist in songs like this, or by One Republic, or (shudder) The Script…

But it’s let down by the fact that it sounds written-to-order for a rom-com (a 54% on Rotten Tomatoes sort of rom-com), and by the gauche lyrics, in which Darius lists all the colours he feels when he sees the girl he fancies. Feeling black, When I think of all the things that I feel I lack…

Darius was born in Glasgow (in Bearsden, the posh bit) to a Scottish-Iranian family. Post-singing career I remember him always popping up on Scottish TV, as we do love a local kid done good (see also: Michelle McManus). Following ‘Colourblind’ he managed two albums, and four more Top 10 singles, before moving into both said TV career, and a successful stint in musical theatre. The fact he had any sort of career at all is testament to his perseverance, after his legendarily bad performance of ‘…Baby One More Time’ while auditioning for Popstars in 2000. He died very young, aged just forty-one, in 2022, from a suspected accidental overdose.

931. ‘Anyone of Us (Stupid Mistake)’, by Gareth Gates

/ UK #1s blog / 3 Comments

Well, here’s a surprise. ‘Pop Idol’ runner-up, and one of the clearest cases of pop puppetry ever unleashed on the world, Gareth Gates’ second single is… pretty good?

Anyone of Us (Stupid Mistake), by Gareth Gates (his 2nd of four #1s)

3 weeks, from 14th July – 4th August 2002

It starts off unpromisingly. A piano riff that brings to mind Westlife at their most maudlin leads us in. But soon Westlife are discarded for an intro that sounds more like peak Backstreet Boys (it flirts very heavily with ‘I Want It That Way’). Then bang: a chorus that could have competed with anything on Britney Spears’ first couple of albums.

Of course, these references were three years old by 2002, which perhaps gives away the fact that this is an already somewhat dated pop song. But that’s all forgiven as the chorus washes over us: It could happen to anyone of us, Anyone you think of… I think this is a fine song, one that would be better remembered if it had been recorded by somebody else.

It loses its way a bit in a meandering middle eight, but it gathers itself for a mid-line key change, and soaring finish. My only other complaint would be that it sounds perfect for a festive-ballad release, not for the height of summer. Not that it was hurt by its release date, with three weeks on top and 600,000 copies sold; but imagine this with added sleigh bells and tell me if it doesn’t scream Christmas number one.

With singing contest winners/runners up it was all about the second single. The debut single was guaranteed to be a huge hit; and also guaranteed to be crap. But once that obligation was fulfilled, it was always interesting to see what direction they would go in. I’d rate this ahead of Will Young’s cover of ‘Light My Fire’. But sadly Gareth Gates wasn’t given many more singles of this quality, as his upcoming #1s will attest.

I also have a soft spot for love-songs-that-aren’t-really-love-songs, and this is a classic of the genre, with Gareth rather smarmily admitting to an affair. The situation got out of hand, I hope you understand… Whether or not this song came before, during, or after Gates’ famous, virginity-robbing romp with Katie Price, I do not know. But I like to imagine him singing it to his pre-fame girlfriend, presumably a homely Bradford lass. Though I’m not sure if “it could happen to anyone of us” is ever the best way to open an apology…

I’m going to crown this as the best of the reality TV number ones so far (this is the seventh), narrowly ahead of Liberty X. And I’m going to try and keep ranking them for as long as possible. Which will be difficult, as there’s so bloody many of them. Including our very next chart-topper…

930. ‘A Little Less Conversation’, by Elvis Vs JXL

/ UK #1s blog / 9 Comments

No song conjures up the year 2002 more than this tune, that year’s song of the summer.

A Little Less Conversation, by Elvis (his 18th of twenty-one #1s) Vs. JXL

4 weeks, from 16th June – 14th July 2002

It sounds curious, and potentially disastrous: a little known Dutch DJ remixing a little known Elvis track from one of his long-forgotten late sixties movies. But, through some strange alchemy, the original’s brassy swagger mixes nicely with JXL’s big, accessible beats, and creates a great pop song.

What remains is Elvis-enough for people who were around when he was alive, and modern enough for those who weren’t. It helps that few people probably knew the original, but also that it was recorded in 1968, around the time of the comeback special, when what is now Elvis’s most familiar pop culture persona was born. Elvis sounds like Elvis, deep voiced and lip curled, and the added echo makes it sound like he’s coming live from the other side. All that’s missing is a thank you very much to finish.

JXL (officially Junkie XL, though that was presumably shortened to keep things family-friendly) was Tom Holkenberg, a DJ active since the late-eighties. He had worked as a producer with several punk and metal bands, as well as becoming big on the rave scene and touring with the Prodigy. None of which sounds like the guy who came up with this super-mild, catchy, chart-friendly hit. As much as I like the record, I’d sooner call it cheesy than cool, and do wonder if Norman Cook considered lining up any plagiarism suits against all the Fatboy Slim style drum-breaks and goofy fills.

The original ‘A Little Less Conversation’ had featured on the ‘Ocean’s Eleven’ soundtrack in 2001, presumably bringing it to the attention of Nike. They then commissioned JXL to remix the song for an advert to tie in with the 2002 World Cup, in which the world’s best footballers competed in a first-goal-wins tournament in a cage. Maybe I’m of the perfect age to get swept up in the nostalgia of it, but watching that advert again, much like hearing this song, feels so ‘2002’ that it hurts.

The single followed a few months after the advert, and was sitting at #1 as Brazil won a record fifth world title. Equally record-breaking was the fact that, after a twenty-five year tie, Elvis moved ahead of the Beatles and onto eighteen UK #1 singles. It kicked off a bit of a renaissance for the King, and a collection of his number one hits (including this remix) became a huge seller that autumn. I’d credit this single, and the album, for getting me into Elvis, and enjoying his music to this day. In 2003 another Elvis remix, this time of ‘Rubberneckin’’ by Paul Oakenfold, made #5.

JXL meanwhile, while not quite a one-hit wonder, never made it higher than #56 without Elvis’s help. Still, he was the first person to be allowed by Elvis’s estate to remix one of his songs, which is an honour of sorts. And he is responsible for introducing many youngsters (me included) to The King, and to one of the greatest ever rhyming couplets in chart-topping history. A little less conversation, A little more action please, All this aggravation ain’t satisfactioning me… Thank you very much, indeed.

929. ‘Light My Fire’, by Will Young

/ UK #1s blog / 7 Comments

‘Pop Idol’ champion Will Young returns with something a little more original than his bland winner’s single…

Light My Fire, by Will Young (his 2nd of four #1s)

2 weeks, from 2nd – 16th June 2002

Okay, original might be a stretch. It is another cover, this time of the Doors’ ‘Light My Fire’. But the treatment he gives this sixties classic is light and breezy. Presumably knowing that he couldn’t give it the full-blooded Jim Morrison treatment, Young goes for a slinky, still very sixties-coded, approach. There’s a sexy bossa nova beat, and a pretty cool guitar solo. It owes much more to José Feliciano’s version (a bigger hit in the UK) than the original.

It’s actually… okay. You may detect a hint of surprise there, and you’d be right. Back in 2002, when I was sixteen, it was very much the done thing to write this single off without actually listening to it, and to make sure everyone knew that you knew this was a cover. ‘Oh my God, I can’t believe he’s done that to the Doors’, we could be heard saying, probably without very many of us having actually ever heard the original, or even knowing about the existence Feliciano’s version.

This was the first sign that Will Young might have had something about him, a hint at a career beyond the Simon Cowell sludge factory. That wouldn’t become fully apparent until his second album, but the signs were here. Compare this with Gareth Gates’ – still very successful – second single (coming up on top of the charts soon, don’t you worry!)

Young had performed ‘Light My Fire’ during his auditions for ‘Pop Idol’, so he presumably liked the song – not something that he would say about ‘Evergreen’. He also performed it at the Eurovision-esque ‘World Idol’, in which the winners from various ‘Pop Idol’ franchises around the world competed against one another. He finished fifth.

With all this talk of ‘Light My Fire’s different versions, we need to mention Amii Stewart’s disco version, twice a UK Top 10 hit, and Shirley Bassey’s fabulously dramatic version from 1970. However, and possibly quite boringly, I’m going to stick my neck out for the seven-minute acidic psychedelia of the Doors. Sometimes the original is simply the best. And as much as Young’s version is tolerable, it’s still unfortunate that it gave the song a higher chart-placing than any of these classics.

928. ‘Without Me’, by Eminem

/ UK #1s blog / 10 Comments

Guess who’s back? Back again? Shady’s back with his third album, and his third British number one single.

Without Me, by Eminem (his 3rd of eleven #1s)

1 week, from 26th May – 2nd June 2002

My usual moral quandaries over his lyrical themes aside, this is my favourite Eminem #1. I even used to know all the words. It’s an elevated version of ‘The Real Slim Shady’, in which Eminem contrasted his vulgarity with his popularity, and took swipes at various famous figures. Here he plays up to his pantomime villain image again, seemingly more at peace with it than on his angrier, earlier chart-topper, and the fact that everyone wants the character of Slim over the real-life Marshall Mathers: I created a monster, ‘Cos nobody wants to see Marshall no more, They want Shady, I’m chopped liver…

In the video, and in the short Batman-theme interpolation, he positions himself as an inept superhero, Rap Boy, who snatches his own CDs from children’s hands, lest they hear his inappropriate rapping. Elsewhere the rhymes are airtight, the delivery precise, and all the right/wrong buttons pressed (choose depending on your tolerance for Eminem). Two people who might have been disapproving were Liz Cheney and her husband, and Vice-President, Dick, whom Eminem kills with a defibrillator in the video. Shots are also fired at NSYNC, Limp Bizkit, Moby, Prince, and his mum: Fuck you Debbie!

The second verse is a highlight, with one of Eminem’s best lyrics: Little hellions, Kids feelin’ rebellious, Embarrassed their parents still listen to Elvis, They start feelin’ like prisoners helpless, Until someone comes along on a mission and yells ‘Bitch!’ In ten seconds it goes from making an interesting comparison between the controversies around himself, and Elvis forty-five years earlier, to him yelling a rude word. Eminem in a nutshell.

Elvis reappears later, in another astute line: I not the first king of controversy, I am the worst thing since Elvis Presley, To do black music so selfishly, And use it to get myself wealthy… Much was, and still is, made of the fact that the biggest selling hip-hop artist of all time is white. But again, just as the casual listener is starting to think Marshall Mathers might be more intelligent than he looks, the same lines are delivered in the video while a mini-Eminem balances on a giant turd that the King has just delivered into his famous toilet bowl.

In some ways, this record is typical Eminem. It wasn’t going to win him any news fans, unlike ‘Stan’, but he’s also at the peak of his powers. Many times over the years he has tried to release a ‘Without Me’ style caustically-comic single, and while many have been commercially successful, none have managed to come close to this. It’s also musically quite fun, with a grinding disco beat, and it may be the one Eminem song that you can actually dance to.

Because I can’t help myself, I have to do the now traditional Eminem Homophobic Lyrics Watch, and there’s just one example here, in which he calls Moby a bald headed fag. But then he asks that he blows him, so who knows. Perhaps the lady doth protest too much? Sixteen-year-old me noticed that lyric, though, never fear. It’s also still noticeable how much more explicit Eminem’s three number ones have been compared to almost everything else that’s made number one. He liked to revel cartoonishly in his status as a corruptor of youth, but he had a point. Few other stars could release chart-topping singles so explicit.

‘Without Me’ is the middle single of a triptych, between ‘Stan’ and his next (more serious) chart-topper, in which Eminem was untouchable. Although he has gone on to have an almost thirty-year career, nothing he’s released since 2004 has come close to these three. Not just three of the best hip-hop singles, but three of the best and most controversial #1s of all time.

927. ‘Just a Little’, by Liberty X

/ UK #1s blog / 8 Comments

Our 5th singing contest chart-topper in just over a year. The X Factor Age is well underway…

Just a Little, by Liberty X (their 1st and only #1)

1 week, from 19th – 26th May 2002

And of the five, this is definitely the best so far. I might go so far as to say that it remains one of the best. It’s upbeat, modern, and fun – a world away from Will Young and Gareth Gates’s syrupy attempts, and Hear’Say’s dated efforts. Its opening line – Sexy, Everything about you so sexy… really seemed to enter the public consciousness (or at least my school playground consciousness), while the chanted chorus enters the brain and remains there for some time.

Musically it’s nothing too out the box – in claiming it’s the ‘best’ reality TV #1 so far we have to remember how low the bar is – with lots of early-noughties pop touches, but keeping a great pop sensibility in the chorus and the middle-eight. It’s a bridge between S Club’s bubblegum and the Britney Spears’ classics of the era. And is it too much to suggest that Britney’s songwriters were listening when they came up with something that sounded quite similar, lyrically and melodically, to gimme just a little bit more… a few years later?

Liberty X were made up of contestants who had been rejected during the auditions for Popstars winners Hear’Say. It is perhaps this distance, and the fact that they were picked up by a record label not under the whip of Simon Cowell, which gave them the freedom to release something not beholden to reality TV schmaltz. Their first two singles, including their #5 debut ‘Thinking it Over’, had been released under the name Liberty, but after a legal challenge from a ‘90s R&B band of the same name they were forced to add the ‘X’. It did them no harm, as their first release as Liberty X brought them this huge smash, the 8th biggest seller of the year.

There’s an argument to be made for not winning TV singing contests if you want to have lasting musical success. Plenty of non-winners have gone on to massive popularity, One Direction being the ones that spring to mind first. Liberty X never managed 1D levels of success, but they were regulars in the British charts between 2001 and 2005, with eight Top 10 hits in that time, stats that Hear’Say could only dream of.

They split in 2006, after their third album bombed. They reformed a few times, and now exist with only the three female members. One of the two original male members, Kevin Simms, has been the lead vocalist for Wet Wet Wet since 2018. Imagine telling someone in 2002 that one of the token blokes in Liberty X would go on to become the new Marti Pellow…

926. ‘If Tomorrow Never Comes’, by Ronan Keating

/ UK #1s blog / 9 Comments

Instead of writing a proper intro for this next number one, I’d like you to instead picture me letting out a long, world-weary sigh…

If Tomorrow Never Comes, by Ronan Keating (his 3rd and final solo #1)

1 week, from 12th – 19th May 2002

For we have to, once again, grapple with the cultural contributions of Ronan Keating. With Groanin’ Ronan’s admittedly admirable dedication to releasing dull music. Not bad music. Not offensive. Not ugly. Just… dull. But at least his reign of blandness comes to an end here.

‘If Tomorrow Never Comes’ is a nice enough, country-tinged ballad. It had originally been a hit for King of Country Garth Brooks in 1989, whose version I prefer. I do wish Keating’s producers hadn’t dialled back the yee-haw. They presumably thought that a British audience couldn’t cope with too much Nashville-style production. And they were probably right, though it leads to a very characterless record.

Lyrically it’s a twist on the idea of a dead loved one. The singer is not singing about a fear of their lover dying; but is questioning how their lover would feel if they were the one to suddenly perish. Which is an interesting, if slightly self-centred, take on the theme. In the staggeringly bad video, Keating falls, in cringey slo-mo, in front of a car. At the same time, his still-sleeping girlfriend grips her bedsheets in terror (thought to me this could easily be confused with orgasmic pleasure). See Ronan, you assume she’ll be racked with grief, but maybe she’ll quickly move on to someone who hasn’t made it his life’s mission to inflict on mankind the most boring songs imaginable.

Having said that, I did give his first two solo number ones a decent write-up. ‘When You Say Nothing at All’ is a cover of a much better late-eighties country ballad than this, while ‘Life Is a Rollercoaster’ is a minor millennial classic. But of the nine chart-toppers he enjoyed, both solo and as a part of Boyzone, between 1996 and 2002, the majority have been boring. Plus, he helped Louis Walsh create Westlife, so he technically has fourteen more #1s of dubious quality to answer for.

Ronan may be leaving top spot alone, but he still enjoyed several more years of UK hits, including covers of ‘We’ve Got Tonight’ (with Lulu), ‘Father and Son’ (with Cat Stevens himself), and Goo Goo Dolls’ ‘Iris’. Again, I let out a long old sigh. Groanin’ Ronan Keating covering ‘Iris’ feels as grimly inevitable as societal collapse brought on by the climate crisis. I don’t want to come over all Carrie Bradshaw, yet I can’t help but wonder… Did he really ever enjoy his recording career? Did he actually arrive at the studio every day, ready to lay down vocals for yet another plodding cover, and think ‘this is the life’…?

925. ‘Kiss Kiss’, by Holly Valance

/ UK #1s blog / 11 Comments

Two raunchy pop records trade places at the top of the charts. At first glance they’re pretty similar tunes, sung by women, all about getting jiggy… But therein lies the mystery of music. What makes the Sugababes sound, to my ears, sublime, but this next #1 ridiculous?

Kiss Kiss, by Holly Valance (her 1st and only #1)

1 week, from 5th – 12th May 2002

I mean ridiculous in the best possible way, though: trashy, catchy, OTT. It also has a distinctly Middle Eastern feel, with Arabian strings and flourishes not usually found in Western pop. It had originally been released, under the title ‘Şimarık’ by Turkish star Tarkan, in 1997, before being turned into ‘Kiss Kiss’ by Greek-American singer Stella Soleil in 2001. This extended journey to becoming a British hit had left Holly Valance with pretty distinctive debut hit on her hands.

Given how love and lust has inspired so much of the pop canon, it’s mildly surprising that this is the first number one single to use the classic kissing sound as a hook. The song title doesn’t feature in the lyrics, instead it’s represented, over and over, by either a mwah or a kissing-your-granny-on-the-cheek kind of sound. It’s very camp. But as good as the Arabian strings and the kissing are, my favourite part is the break, where the strings and the kisses are chopped up and topped off with a heavily vocoded aw yeah. My biggest complaint though, is that the ending is all set up to end on a big smacker… yet doesn’t.

Holly Valance had been familiar to Brits for a few of years as Flick Scully in ‘Neighbours’. (As an avid Ramsey Street aficionado through the late-nineties and most of the noughties, it’s my personal favourite ‘Neighbours’ era.) And in the tradition of Kylie, Jason, Natalie Imbruglia and Stefan Dennis, the pop career was never far away. This record actually puts ‘Neighbours’ clear of ‘Eastenders’ as the most successful soap on the singles chart, by three (Kylie, Jason, Holly Valance) to two (Nick Berry, Martine McCutcheon). However, we could also accept Wendy Richards, who featured at #1 in 1962, albeit many years before she started playing Pauline Fowler in Albert Square, to make it a tie.

Flick may have been helped to the top of the charts by the video in which she appeared naked but for some accurately applied strip-lighting. It’s a classic ‘the nice girl you thought you knew is all grown up’ move. And, hey, sex sells. I can confirm it was quite the hot topic in the school playground at the time. In fact, the boy I was in love with, aged sixteen, was obsessed with Holly Valance. It’s taken me until today, listening to this trashy classic of its time, to make my peace with her. I’m less willing to endorse Holly’s post-pop career. Her Wiki page now lists her as singer, model, right-wing activist…

Like I said at the start, Sugababes gave us pop to stand the test of time. Holly Valance gave us pop that stands the test of its three and a half minute run-time. But both are great in their own ways. Valance also struggled to have the longevity of the Sugababes, but scored two further Top 3 hits from her debut album, ‘Kiss Kiss’ being followed by ‘Down Boy’ and ‘Naughty Girl’ (I’m noticing a theme…)

924. ‘Freak Like Me’, by Sugababes

/ UK #1s blog / 8 Comments

Back in my post on All Saints’ ‘Pure Shores’, I crowned the ‘00s as the decade of the girl group. All Saints, as great as they were, were a bit of a false start (and they were technically a ‘90s group, anyway) but we’re finally off and away. Forget Destiny’s Child, forget Atomic Kitten. The two greatest girl groups of the decade (of all time?) score their first #1s in 2002, starting with…

Freak Like Me, by Sugababes (their 1st of six #1s)

1 week, from 28th April – 5th May 2002

No more covers of ‘Eternal Flame’, or songs about well you’re ‘surviving’. The Sugababes grab a sample from Tubeway Army and have their wicked way with it, whipping it into a whirlpool of echo, churn and industrial synths, while singing about how they want it every which way with a bad boy. This is what I want from my girl groups. Filth!

I wanna freak in the morning, freak in the evening… I need a roughneck brother who can satisfy me… The lyrics are nothing revolutionary, even if they are a world away from the kid-friendly Spice Girls. Though the Spiceys are there in spirit, in terms of their Girl Power message. This is girl group pop for the 21st century, in which the women are in charge, and parading their men around like dogs, apparently. Come on and I’ll take you around the hood, On a gangsta lead…

As fresh as All Saints’ hits sounded, I don’t think we’ve heard anything like this on top of the charts before. I’m going to use the word ‘original’, despite the fact that the Gary Numan sample is so front and centre. And despite the fact that the song itself is a cover of a US #2 hit from 1995, by Adina Howard, which itself samples and interpolates snatches from Sly & the Family Stone and Bootsy Collins. DJ Richard X had created a mash-up of Howard’s version and ‘Are “Friends” Electric’, but couldn’t secure Howard’s permission to use her vocals. Instead, he turned to desperate-for-a-hit Sugababes, who had been dropped by their label following an underperforming debut album, and who had lost founding member Siobhán Donaghy a few months earlier. For what it’s worth, Gary Numan claims that this song is better than his original.

So, a girl group. A DJ. A bootleg mash-up. Is this the #1 which officially announces the ‘00s as up and running? I probably claimed the same thing when Hear’Say became the first reality TV winning group, but I much prefer this version of the noughties. This reminds me of university, of the decade’s indie revival where pop and guitars collided, of the hits to come, of the days when I’d go out four nights a week… (nowadays, four nights a year is more likely…)

How much my coming-of-age influences my opinion of this record, and pretty much every #1 between now and 2008, is a good point to raise. But also, it’s a pointless question. Music is memory. The charts are one way of recording the soundtrack to our lives. Had I been born a decade earlier and I might have dismissed this as a gimmicky nothing, but I hope not. I hope the quality of this record can exist beyond my nostalgia.

Like Atomic Kitten with ‘Whole Again’, Sugababes were in danger of being consigned to the dustbin had ‘Freak Like Me’ not been a hit. Thankfully it was, and it set the MK II (and III, and IV) versions of the group up for sixteen further Top 10 hits between now and 2010, five more of which will make #1. And, as good as this record is, I think at least one of their later chart-toppers is better.