Ballads

1010. ‘Lonely’, by Akon

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In which we meet one of the 21st century’s annoying contributions to popular music: the sped-up sample…

Lonely, by Akon (his 1st of three #1s)

2 weeks, from 8th – 22nd May 2005

Also known as chipmunk soul, it usually involves a sample of an older song sped or pitched way up. Kanye West is seen by most as the inventor of this genre, on his debut album in 2004, most famously in his use of Chaka Khan on ‘Through the Wire’. In Akon’s case it was Bobby Vinton’s 1962 hit ‘Mr. Lonely’. Unless we count Eminem’s use of ‘Toy Soldiers’, which is debatable as the sample is nowhere as squeaky and distorted as it is here, this is the first chart-topping single to employ the technique, and one of the worst.

It’s funny, because not for the first time in recent posts, I am reconciling the feelings I had about a 2005 #1 at the time with the feelings I have now. And I’m sure I remember liking ‘Lonely’ at the time… Liking the novelty of it. Liking the retro vibes of it. But listening now, it’s garbage.

Not only is the sample irritating, but the lyrics are pedestrian and whiny. Plus, Akon’s voice sounds flat for much of the song. He’s cheated on his girl, she’s got tired of his bullshit, and she’s left him. Been all around the world, Ain’t never met a girl that could take the things that you’ve been through, Never thought the day would come when you would get up and run… No admission of guilt, no reflecting on his actions. He just doesn’t like being lonely. It’s Shaggy’s ‘It Wasn’t Me’ without the silliness, or Eamon’s ‘Fuck It (I Don’t Want You Back)’ without the swearing. 

In fact, the spectre of ho-wop lingers heavily over this record. Maybe if this song had come first it would be more palatable, but Eamon really had ruined the doo-wop/hip-hop crossover movement for all involved. Yet… I do think, in the long run, songs like this made it more acceptable for modern pop songs to borrow pre-Beatles melodies and sounds. Without this, maybe there’s no Meghan Trainor, or Doja Cat Vs Paul Anka, or Connie Francis going viral with ‘Pretty Little Baby’.

Akon is a Senegalese-American singer and producer, who would go on to be one of the biggest pop stars of the ‘00s (‘Lonely’ was his second hit), with two further chart-toppers to come before the decade is out. My favourite fact about Akon is that despite claiming he’d done three years in jail, despite his debut single being called ‘Locked Up’, despite starting at least half his records by shouting ‘Kon-vict’ and adding a ‘jail door slamming shut’ sound effect, he has never actually served a prison sentence. Once you learn that about Akon, him releasing a record this slickly insincere makes much more sense.

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1008. ‘All About You’ / ‘You’ve Got a Friend’, by McFly

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And so we arrive at the ultimate love song. The song I will have played at my wedding…

All About You / You’ve Got a Friend, by McFly (their 3rd of seven #1s)

1 week, from 13th – 20th March 2005

Two slight caveats here: you must always allow me room for hyperbole when it comes to McFly, and I have little-to-no plans to ever get married. But still, I do think that ‘All About You’ is a lovely song.

First we have to skip the cheesy harps and strings intro, and imagine they’re being delivered with a knowing wink. Skip straight to the harmonies in the first chorus, and the pretty verses, with their timeless melodies. It is hard to write timeless, hard to write a song that sounds like it might always have existed.

The acoustic guitar solo is more of its time – though that ‘time’ would be a soft-rock song from the eighties – and the second bridge and chorus, when the band finally come in, is pure power-pop. Okay the lyrics are trite – Dancing on the kitchen tiles, Yes you made my life worthwhile, So I told you with a smile… – but eighteen year olds can get away with trite.

McFly songs provide a real chicken vs egg scenario for me. Do I blindly argue their brilliance because I think McFly are a truly underrated band; or are songs like ‘All About You’ truly great and deserve to have me arguing for them? I’ve been a McFly fan for so long now that I can’t judge this clearly.

Actually that’s a lie. The other side of this double-‘A’ will give me a chance to appraise McFly impartially. Since this was the official Red Nose Day single for 2005, the suits presumably needed a song with more of a message (and a music video in which the band could run around with lots of Ugandan orphans…) So they chose Carole King’s classic ‘You’ve Got a Friend’.

It is on the one hand completely unnecessary. It does not improve in any way on King’s original, or on James Taylor’s definitive cover. And I really don’t like all the woodwind. (See, I can write something bad about McFly.) But Tom’s voice sounds nice on the first verse. Plus, I sang this in my primary school choir, and it really does have one of the most heart-string tugging choruses in all of pop history.

The flutes, and the full-blown orchestra in the background of ‘All About You’, bring up one of the reasons why McFly’s second album, ‘Wonderland’, is my least favourite. They threw the kitchen sink at it, production-wise, with string sections and three-part rock operas about teen suicide. I think it was an attempt to prove themselves, to show that they weren’t just a boyband; but it led to bloat, and some boringly worthy music. By their third album, they seemed to have shaken that monkey off their back, and returned to making great pop-rock.

As this was the official Red Nose Day single, it opened with McFly’s highest ever weekly sale. It also meant this record didn’t have the massive second week collapse that they would become synonymous with. And yet, ‘All About You’ was still eclipsed by the unofficial Red Nose Day single, which brought about one of the biggest, and unlikeliest, hits of the entire decade, and which is up next.

Just the audio…

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1006. ‘Over and Over’, by Nelly ft. Tim McGraw

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In this post-Lil Nas X world, mixing country and rap together is nothing new. But I recall this next number one feeling like a bit of a novelty at the time…

Over and Over, by Nelly (his 3rd of four #1s) ft. Tim McGraw (his 1st and only #1)

1 week, from 27th February – 6th March 2005

Not that ‘Over and Over’ is particularly ‘country’. It’s a gentle pop song, with a lilting guitar. The most country thing about is Tim McGraw’s raspy drawl, and the Stetson he wears in the video. At the same time, this isn’t particularly a rap track either. Nelly even sings. Sort of. So, having called this ‘country rap’, in the end we’re left with more of a smooth R&B record.

That novelty feeling is about the only thing I recall about this song, as it is relatively unmemorable. It starts off lowkey, with both men singing like they’re babysitting and are just getting the kid off to sleep, but never really picks up. It’s fine. It’s a nice enough slow jam. I’m just not sure why this had the legs to make it to #1. Was it the lack of competition, and low sales? Was it Nelly’s star power? Was it said novelty factor? Whatever it was, Nelly becomes the third act in a row to enjoy a chart-topping spring follow-up to an autumnal lead single #1.

Looking into it a little more, country rap (also known, quite wonderfully, as ‘hick-hop’) had originated back in the late ‘90s. So perhaps we can view a record like this as being a breakthrough moment for the genre, with it making #1 in the UK and Australia, and #3 in the US. It is interesting that it made the top in Britain, and not America, but – like reggae – C&W has been an intermittently popular genre in the UK since the charts began.

Not only did this blending of genres lead to some of the huge country-rap hits of recent years, it also led to ‘bro-country’, in which male country stars started incorporate rapping and syncopated beats into songs about trucks, guns, beer and the like. Tim McGraw himself could be seen as a forefather of that genre. Bro-country (thankfully) hasn’t made much of an impact in the UK charts, while this is by far the biggest of Tim McGraw’s British hits, and the only one to ever make the Top 40.

This was also the tail-end of a career high for Nelly who, although he would return to the Top 10, and to #1 one final time, wouldn’t manage hit singles quite as consistently with his subsequent albums. He was always an interesting rapper, one who seemed a bit removed from the bigger, more posturing personalities of say 50 Cent or Jay-Z, and one who seemed happier to embrace a pop sound on his records. Which is probably why he has several more #1s than those more illustrious hip-hop stars.

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1004. ‘Sometimes You Can’t Make It on Your Own’, by U2

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U2 end a seventeen-year chart-topping career with an understated, and perhaps forgotten, little gem.

Sometimes You Can’t Make It on Your Own, by U2 (their 7th and final #1)

1 week, from 13th – 20th February 2005

Understatement is all relevant, of course, and for many acts this would count as a bombastic power-ballad. By U2’s standards though, it is gentle and stripped-back. It had been written around five years earlier, about Bono’s father, who died from cancer in 2001. (The line: It’s you when I look in the mirror, And it’s you when I don’t pick up the phone…taps so sharply into many father-son relationships.) According to the band, the song went through a lot of workshopping, away from a traditional Irish sound to something more contemporary. And I’m glad they spent the time to bring it to fruition.

It still has a folksy feel, especially in the intro, which reminds me of Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Man of the World’. Bono’s vocals are impressive – possibly his best performance on any of their chart-toppers – especially in the middle-eight, in which the song switches to something more predictably soaring. The Edge’s guitar chimes in trademark fashion, and we get briefly swamped in over-production, before ending on a sparser note.

I suppose it would be a lot to expect the biggest band in the world™ not to give in to that glossy sheen, when they have unfettered access to the best equipment and producers, but I would be interested to hear an even more restrained version of this ballad. Not that this gets spoiled by the production, not at all, but it’s a tempting thought. We have the low sales climate of early 2005 to thank for U2 enjoying two #1s from the same album for the first time, and their first chart-topper that isn’t a lead single. Not for the first time in the last couple of years a grim situation for the record industry has led to some interesting chart hits. This is also one of the longest-titled number one singles, from one of the shortest-titled chart-topping acts.

Actually, despite often being down on U2, and Bono in particular, I have enjoyed almost all of their six number ones, with one notable exception. Not counting their feature on ‘Take Me to the Clouds Above’, I would rank them thusly, in ascending order. ‘Beautiful Day’ >>>>>>>>>>>> ‘The Fly’ > ‘Discotheque’ > ‘Sometimes You Can’t Make It on Your Own’ > ‘Desire’ > ‘Vertigo’. Because, at the end of the day, rock bands are at their best when they rock.

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1002. ‘It’s Now or Never’, by Elvis Presley

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At the end of my last post, I claimed that ‘It’s Now or Never’ wasn’t particularly good. Which was a bit harsh, I suppose…

It’s Now or Never, by Elvis Presley (his 21st and final #1)

1 week, from 30th January – 6th February 2005

The problem I have with ‘It’s Now or Never’, both in its original eight-week 1960 run at number one and now, is that there are better Elvis songs which deserve to have been his biggest selling hit. ‘It’s Now or Never’ is catchy, eminently singable, and Elvis belts it out like no other; but it is essentially a novelty. It is an old Italian melody, ‘O Sole Mio’, tarted up as a pop song. It is better remembered nowadays as a Cornetto advert.

It also marked the launch of Elvis Mk II: the operatic, corny movie Elvis, who was being rinsed for every cent by Colonel Parker. Which in hindsight isn’t something to be celebrate. However, it also launched probably the most successful chart-topping run of any artist in British chart history. In just over two years (November 1960 to December 1962), Elvis scored nine chart-toppers, and racked up forty-one weeks in pole position. I’m sure I contended with all that in my original post on the song, published back in 2018. 

I’m also a bit down on ‘It’s Now or Never’ because this rerelease ensured that it was my nineteenth birthday #1. Which means it stands out like a sore thumb in my ‘Birthday #1s’ playlist… It’s far from being my worst birthday #1 – and maybe one day I’ll do a post on them – but I’d rather have had ‘Jailhouse Rock’ or ‘One Night’. Or even better, ‘Goodies’: an actual contemporary piece of music from January 2005.

‘Goodies’ withstanding, Elvis came very close to replacing himself at number one three times, with four consecutive number ones. Which it goes without saying would have been a record. In any case he became only the third artist to replace themselves at #1, after the Beatles and a posthumous John Lennon. But as winter turned into spring, and singles sales slowly picked up, none of his subsequent thirteen re-releases troubled top spot.

In fact, I remember at the time it was quite an interesting way to judge the overall health of the singles market. Assuming the Elvis rereleases always sold just over the 20k mark, the more singles that finished above him meant a more robust chart. From memory, I think the lowest he charted that spring was #5.

Here then ends the ultimate chart-topping career. Twenty-one of the buggers. Yes, some will complain that he has been helped by remixes and releases, and that without them he’d have remained tied with the Beatles on seventeen. But we have to treat these releases as ‘new’ #1s, with new packaging and new catalogue numbers. As we did when ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ and ‘My Sweet Lord’ returned to the top. It’s been an interesting interlude, this Elvisenaissance, that’s for sure. But as much as I do love a bit of Elvis, I’m glad we’ll be returning to more contemporary #1s after this. 

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998. ‘Against All Odds’, by Steve Brookstein

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2005 begins with what should have been the final chart-topper of 2004, and that year’s Christmas #1…

Against All Odds, by Steve Brookstein (his 1st and only #1)

1 week, from 2nd – 9th January 2005

On the one hand you can feel a teensy bit sorry for Steve Brookstein, because a couple of years later winning X Factor would be a sure-fire way to have a genuinely massive million-seller, a Christmas number one, and at least one or two follow-up hits. But since he was the winner of the first series, before it was pulling in huge viewing figures, and because he came up against a juggernaut of a single in Band Aid 20’s ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’ reboot, none of this came true. Instead he belatedly limped to #1 for a week, when nobody was watching, on a technicality.

At the same time, any sympathy for him evaporates when you hear this dull and predictable winner’s single. Did we really need another cover of ‘Against All Odds’? Mariah Carey and Westlife had taken their version to the top barely four years earlier. Phil Collins’ original was only two decades old. (Worryingly, Brookstein’s cover is now closer to 1984 than the present day…)

Of course, Brookstein isn’t a bad vocalist. But he is a glorified pub singer. Judge Sharon Osbourne didn’t like him, and I don’t think the X Factor producers were thrilled to have a thirty-six year old with a pretty limited appeal as their inaugural winner. The subsequent champions were all young, and pretty, with potential for real pop stardom. Some even came close to managing it.

The one person who did argue for Steve Brookstein was, inevitably, Simon Cowell. Cowell looks at a granny-baiting, middle-aged crooner as hungry kids look at chocolate ice cream. He lapped him up. For a while, at least. Following a debut, chart-topping album, Cowell and Brookstein feuded. Eight months after winning X Factor, he was dropped by BMG Records. According to Brookstein it was because he refused to record another LP of safe covers.

And so he faded into obscurity, popping up every now and then to rant about Cowell. He did a bit of musical theatre, a bit of TV, and a lot of provincial touring. Looking at his Wiki, has there been a more depressing sentence in a pop star’s bio than: “In June 2007, Brookstein appeared on the P&O Portsmouth to Bilbao car ferry, alongside X Factor alumni Chico Slimani and Journey South”? (More on Chico soon, btw.)

This would be the last X Factor winner’s single not to make Christmas #1 for five years, as the series dominated British pop culture in the latter half of the decade. So that’s something to look forward to covering… This also came dangerously close to being Britain’s 1000th number one single. Which feels like a close escape, but maybe it would have been fitting. Maybe it is the ultimate #1 single? Cheap, disposable, forgotten…

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996. ‘I’ll Stand By You’, by Girls Aloud

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Girls Aloud – the pop group of the noughties – finally score a second chart-topper, slaying the curse of the reality TV show winner…

I’ll Stand By You, by Girls Aloud (their 2nd of four #1s)

2 weeks, from 21st November – 5th December 2004

Of course, the fact that bangers like ‘The Show’, ‘Love Machine’, and ‘No Good Advice’ had all stalled at #2 in between their debut and this #1 was a travesty. It is a perfectly serviceable cover of the Pretenders’ 1994 #10 hit, recorded for the BBC’s annual ‘Children in Need’ telethon – which has already brought us number ones from S Club 7, and the all-star collective with ‘Perfect Day’ – but it is the dictionary definition of “nothing special”.

For a girl group, Girls Aloud were thankfully not very ballad-heavy. But this was proof that they could indeed handle some balladry, and that they could properly sing. That’s probably the best thing you can say about this record, though, as it goes down the bells and tinkles, over-produced route that so many songs of this ilk do. I prefer the opening verse, which is nicely stripped-back. After that it drowns in schmaltz. (Some might also call the original schmaltzy – and Chrissie Hynde certainly isn’t the song’s biggest fan, claiming that it sounded too desperate to be a hit – but it still has far more edge than this cover.)

Making this sound even worse is the knowledge that Girls Aloud’s chart-topping fortunes wouldn’t improve after this second #1 either. Further classics like ‘Biology’, ‘Something Kinda Ooh’ and ‘Long Hot Summer’ would stumble before their next chart-topper – another charity effort – over two years away…

But charity records always buck trends and do well, especially in the run-up to Christmas. For confirmation of this, just take a look at what’s up next…

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985. ‘Dry Your Eyes’, by The Streets

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It’s still July, but can we already declare 2004 as the year of the break-up song?

Dry Your Eyes, by The Streets (their 1st and only #1)

1 week, 25th July – 1st August 2004

We’ve had spiky break-up #1s from Busted, and the dreaded Eamon and Frankee, as well as maudlin break-up songs from Mario Winans and Usher. What’s interesting about ‘Dry Your Eyes’ is that it manages to straddle the two moods.

In fact, Mike Skinner seems to be going through the seven stages of grief during this three or four minute (depending which mix you listen to) track. There’s sadness, denial, pleading, and anger. We go from Everything’s just gone, I’ve got nothing, Absolutely nothing… to I’m not gonna fucking just fucking leave it all now… and various stop-offs in between. It also goes into a lot of strangely specific detail about where and how he and his girlfriend are placing their hands.

I remember this song getting a lot of critical attention at the time. It is a unique track, half-rap/half-spoken word, from an influential act in British hip-hop, grime, garage… you name it. Yet it doesn’t make me care. It doesn’t move me. And I know I complained about the nastiness in Busted and Eamon’s break-up songs, but at the same time I’m not convinced that just because a confirmed lad like Mike Skinner wrote an apparently touching and vulnerable track about being dumped that it’s any better. (This was the follow-up to the far more degenerate – and better, in my eyes – ‘Fit But You Know It’.)

(…getting personal for a second, I don’t think my aversion to break-up songs stems from any personal trauma. Nor does it stem from a lack of experience. When a relationship of ten and a half years ended, I did turn to music. I turned to Dusty Springfield. ‘All I See Is You’ is the ultimate break-up song. It renders a tune like ‘Dry Your Eyes’ completely and utterly insignificant…)

Another downside to ‘Dry Your Eyes’ is that I remember my mum liking it. Which means it must have been getting played on Radio 2. Which means that The Streets had officially lost their street-cred. Not that I am snobby against my mum’s taste in music – we have lots of favourite acts in common – but when middle-class, middle-aged mums are citing your song to show they are still ‘with it’, then I’d be tempted to utter the words ‘sell-out’. For context, the one other 21st century artist my mum has claimed to like is Ed Sheeran…

The Streets, a musical project of up to seven members and led by the already mentioned Mike Skinner, had been around since the early nineties. They released their first music in the early ‘00s, and their first two albums (‘Dry Your Eyes’ was from the second) were hugely popular, influential, and critically acclaimed. And yes, this is an interesting, innovative – even unique – number one. It just doesn’t do much for me.

983. ‘Burn’, by Usher

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2004: the year in which Britain really went wild for a slushy R&B ballad…

Burn, by Usher (his 3rd of four #1s)

2 weeks, 4th – 18th July 2004

Barely two weeks after Mario Winans was mourning his unfaithful lover, and a couple of months on from Eamon’s whining, Usher ponders an age old dilemma. Man I don’t know what I’m gonna do, Without my boo…

Ballads like this had been the sound of the Billboard Hot 100 since the nineties, usually staying at number one for months on end (‘Burn’ itself was the US #1 for eight weeks, and knocked Usher’s earlier single ‘Yeah!’ from top spot). And while they often charted well in Britain, it feels like 2004 was the year that they belatedly broke through and dominated.

Why? I’m not sure. Slumping sales? A lack of British pop talent? More break-ups than usual? Was the insidious internet forcing American slush into the homes of impressionable British kids…? However it happened, it made for some fairly dull number ones. Usher’s vocals are impressive (though his tendency towards a falsetto is grating), yet the production is slow and treacly. While ‘Yeah!’ was certainly dumb; it was at least cutting edge and upbeat.

Another potential symptom of slumping sales seems to be that acts are scoring multiple chart-toppers, closer together. In 2003 only Busted managed multiple #1s, but we’ve now had three repeaters in a row – Britney, McFly and now Usher. A long time ago I described this phenomenon – lesser follow-ups making number one thanks to a huge smash hit – as ‘shadow number ones’. But I don’t think that’s what’s happening here, and it’s going to keep happening over the next few years, until sales start to pick up.

What’s also going to happen over the next few years is more and more syrupy R&B ballads like this making number one in Britain, beyond their natural habitat of the Hot 100. Think Akon, think Ne-Yo. Even normally upbeat females like Beyonce and Rihanna will try their hand at it. And here am I, scanning the horizon for any sign of a guitar…

981. ‘Everytime’, by Britney Spears

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Britney scores back-to-back chart-toppers for the second time in her career, with a track that’s the polar opposite to the throbbing ‘Toxic’.

Everytime, by Britney Spears (her 5th of six #1s)

1 week, 20th – 27th June 2004

Brit was never one for pure ballads. Her slower numbers – ‘Sometimes’, ‘Lucky’ – still had lots of poppy, Max Martin touches. ‘Everytime’ stands alone in her discography for how sparse it is. It’s held together by a music box riff, which is beautiful, and which deconstructs itself towards the end, just as if the box needed to be wound-up again. The song does build, slowly, with ominous strings, but it never feels cluttered.

Stripping the production back like that leaves the slightly scary proposition of Britney’s voice being front and centre. No, she’s not the best singer. And no, her voice is not in its element here (you can hear lines in the chorus where she has been, shall we say, digitally supported.) But I think it adds vulnerability, the fact that she holds back, doesn’t over sing, and is allowed to be imperfect.

It’s also helped now by what we know of Britney’s mental state over the past couple of decades. The inspiration for the song was her break-up with Justin Timberlake, an alleged abortion, and her anger at his #2 hit ‘Cry Me a River’ (which I guess makes ‘Everytime’ another answer song!) Tawdry speculation was rife – proving her point, really – and controversy ensued when the video appeared to show Britney killing herself in a bathtub, being rushed to hospital, and being reborn as a baby in the ward next door.

Let’s be bold, and call this a jewel in Britney’s discographic crown. But let’s also admit that it’s not among my very favourites of hers, because upbeat almost always trumps weepy for me, and because it’s hard to compete with a trio of all-timers like ‘…Baby One More Time’, ‘Oops…! I Did It Again’, and ‘Toxic’.

Let’s keep up the hyperbole though, and claim that Britney’s breathy delivery here invented the modern ‘cursive’ singing trend. Maybe the new-born baby in the video was actually Billie Eilish? And in the slightly odd falsetto parts, can I claim to hear Kate Bush…? Or is that hyperbolism taken too far?

‘Everytime’ was Britney Spears’ tenth UK Top 10 hit, and looked for a while like it might have been her last #1. She has one more to come, in eight years’ time, and a lot will happen to her between 2004 and then. And yet, she will keep churning out the hits – seven more Top 10s before that 2012 postscript, to be exact – and keep being, for better or worse, probably the most famous woman on the planet.