Hard Rock

889. ‘Rollin”, by Limp Bizkit

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Alright, partners. Do we know what time it is…?

Rollin’, by Limp Bizkit (their 1st and only #1)

2 weeks, from 21st January – 4th February 2001

Time for the UK’s first and only nu-metal number one, that’s what time it is. And on one level, any sort of metal chart-topper is to be celebrated. There haven’t been many… Iron Maiden, for sure. Stiltskin? The head-banging bit from ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’? The Kinks inventing the genre with ‘You Really Got Me’?? So, yeah, any number one this heavy is worth a moment of appreciation.

And yet, most fans of heavy metal would want nothing to do with this song. Many metal heads want nothing whatsoever to do with nu-metal as a genre, and even if they did, grudgingly, then they might accept Linkin Park, or Slipknot. Korn, maybe. But not Limp Bizkit. Not Fred Durst, with his backwards Yankees gap and his douchey goatee.

Not these processed guitars, which you could easily believe were completely computer generated. And not the rapped lyrics, which reach spectacularly moronic levels. In the space of three chart-toppers we’ve gone from ‘Stan’s Shakespearian tragedy, to: So where the fuck you at, punk? Shut the fuck up! And back the fuck up, while we fuck this track up… (And if you think that’s bad, then don’t google the etymology of the album this single appeared on: ‘Chocolate Starfish and the Hot-Dog Flavoured Water’. Or, for that matter, where the band’s name itself allegedly comes from…)

So, yes, on one level this is a God-awful number one. An offensive new nadir for the new millennium. And yet… and I’m sure you know what I’m about to say… I love this song. I love how dumb it is. I love how processed and fake it is – the rock music equivalent of a Big Mac – and I love the fact that it somehow made number one. Not only that, but ‘Rollin’ was on top of the charts for my fifteenth birthday, which I’m sure you’ll agree is the prime age for appreciating garbage like this.

But also, it feels musically relevant that at least one nu-metal song appears on this countdown. It was one of the touchstones of the millennial teenage experience. Between 1999 and 2002, my high school playground was a sea of black Limp Bizkit, Linkin Park, Slipknot and Korn hoodies. Like it or not, grandad, this was the sound of a generation.

The rock version of ‘Rollin’ is technically the ‘Air Raid Vehicle’ remix, the original ‘Urban Assault Vehicle’ mix being a purely hip-hop version featuring rappers DMX, Redman and Method Man. And we have to mention the video, which is a time capsule of early 2000’s nonsense, featuring Ben Stiller and some faux boy-band dance moves. Plus, it also has one of the very last pop culture appearances of the World Trade Centre in New York, on top of which Fred and his gang filmed just a few months before 9/11. (I tried out a couple of edgy closing sentences, but I think they all went too far. Please insert your own tasteless jokes here.)

(Or if you’d prefer it swears intact…)

813. ‘Pretty Fly (For a White Guy)’, by The Offspring

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Comedy-rock is an underrepresented genre on the UK singles chart, if indeed it is a genre at all. Most of the comic songs we’ve met so far have been thoroughly pop-leaning, and most of them have been thoroughly awful…

Pretty Fly (For a White Guy), by The Offspring (their 1st and only #1)

1 week, from 24th – 31st January 1999

Luckily this next record rocks, and isn’t awful. ‘Pretty Fly (For a White Guy)’ would be a hard-rocking #1 in any era, but in the extreme pop landscape of the late nineties it really stands out. And if any sub-genre of rock lends itself towards comedy, it would be this sort of gonzo nu-punk. From the faux-German intro (borrowed from Def Leppard), past the uno dos tres…, to the Give it to me baby, Aww-aww-aww-aww… this song is packed with several extremely dumb but catchy hooks.

Admittedly I turned thirteen on this song’s final day at #1, so was the perfect age for something this loud and obnoxious. But I will argue that it has held up pretty well, and in fact its poseur-bashing message is perhaps even more relevant in the social media age. Okay, some of the references are dated (Ricki Lake, mistaking Vanilla Ice for Ice Cube) but He may not have a clue, And he may not have style, But everything he lacks well he makes up in denial… is a line for all seasons. Fake it ‘til you make it, baby…

Frontman Dexter Holland made it clear that the song wasn’t a comment on Black/hip-hop culture, but a satire on middle-class white kids trying to ape it. My favourite line is when the hero of the song is cruising in his Pinto, waving at homies as they pass… But if he looks twice they’re gonna kick his lily ass… To this day, though, I don’t get the reference to him wanting a ‘13’ tattoo but getting a ‘31’. I’d appreciate it if one of my more fly readers could enlighten this particular white guy…

The Offspring, from southern California, had been around since 1984 under the name Manic Subsidal. They were proper punks back in the day, which inevitably led to some older fans seeing the poppier sound (not to mention the chart success) of this track as a sell-out. They presumably had conniption fits when they heard the ‘Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da’ aping follow-up ‘Why Don’t You Get a Job?’, which made #2 a few months later.

This smash hit set the Offspring up for a good few years of belated chart success, with tunes like ‘The Kids Aren’t Alright’, ‘Original Prankster’, and ‘Hit That’ to name a few of my favourites. They probably never quite hit the commercial heights of other ‘90s pop-punk acts like Green Day or Blink-182, but they have something that neither of those bands managed: a number one single.

751. ‘Breathe’, by The Prodigy

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Post-recap, we delve into the next thirty. And it’s a very strong start to the next bunch: more headbanging nastiness from The Prodigy.

Breathe, by The Prodigy (their 2nd and final #1)

2 weeks, from 17th November – 1st December 1996

Is ‘Breathe’ better than ‘Firestarter’? Or is it just more of the same thing? Not that more of the same thing, when the thing in question is ‘Firestarter’, is a bad thing, but still… It’s definitely built around the same foundations: a Drum and Bass beat, a heavy riff, a distinctive sample (that sounds to me like someone throwing nunchuks around), and some pretty aggressive lyrics.

Come play my game… growls Keith Flint, like the villain in a particularly twisted fairy-tale. Inhale, Inhale, You’re the victim! responds rapper Maxim, who also gets the song’s best line: Psychosomatic! Addict! Insane! As with ‘Firestarter’, the lyrics are kept to a minimum, but it seems to be a panic attack set to some Big Beats. The video, featuring lots of creepy-crawlies, darkened rooms, and crazed gurning through holes in walls, certainly emphasises this.

I’d say that if it does pale in comparison with the Prodigy’s previous single, it’s because it lacks the shock factor. Would ‘Breathe’ have been the one that got the tabloids in a tizz, and be better remembered today, if it had come first? Or is it a shadow number-one, that wouldn’t have made it without the controversial predecessor? It’s certainly even heavier than ‘Firestarter’, and less commercial sounding, meaning that it really stands out as one of the angriest, most brutal chart-toppers the UK has ever had.

Again, the song was built around a couple of eclectic samples: a drum fill from Thin Lizzy, and ‘whiplash swords’ (AKA the nunchuks) from the Wu-Tang Clan. It was the 2nd single from the massive ‘Fat of the Land’ album, but it gets overshadowed by the songs released either side of it. Following this came the still-controversial ‘Smack My Bitch Up’, which some say glorified drug use and domestic violence.

But if ‘Breathe’ is overshadowed, then it’s to the song’s benefit. It remains fairly fresh, and still packs a big old punch through your headphones. And whether or not it is better or worse than ‘Firestarter’ is beside the point, really. I’m just glad the Prodigy have been around to add some nasty, punk energy to the top of the charts for 1996.

After this the band took a break for several years, before releasing their fourth album in 2004. They have been putting out new music fairly regularly ever since, though the only consistent member has been founder Keith Howlett, and they scored their most recent Top 10 hit in 2009. Keith Flint, who had struggled with depression and addiction over the years, was tragically found to have hanged himself in 2019.

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.

733. ‘Spaceman’, by Babylon Zoo

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The second number one of 1996, and one of the year’s most interesting hits, is yet another Levi’s assisted chart-topper.

Spaceman, by Babylon Zoo (their 1st and only #1)

5 weeks, from 21st January – 24th February 1996

I had no idea before starting this blog the extent of the jeans brand’s grip on the British charts. I make this, I think, the seventh Levi’s-assisted #1 in under ten years, but I admit I’ve lost count. (If we treated Levi’s as an act in themselves, they’d be up there with the Stones and ABBA in the overall list.) And almost all of them have been good #1s – re-released oldies from the Clash and the Steve Miller Band, as well as quirky, newer hits from Stiltskin and Shaggy. And let’s remember that, kicking off this whole era of Levi’s domination, they helped ‘Stand By Me’ to a belated but very deserving number one position

‘Spaceman’ is not at that level, but it is a remarkable chart-topper. People harshly suggested that it made #1 solely because the advert featured just the opening fifteen seconds, which make the song sound like a high-speed techno number. Space man, I always wanted you to go, Into space, Man… trills a high-pitched alien vocal, as we prepare our glowsticks.

Except, most of the song is a much heavier, rockier beast. It lurches from Britpop verses to industrial grunge in the chorus, before ending on a trip-hop, dance beat once again. It’s ear-catching, attention grabbing… And I’m going to stick my neck out and say it’s good. Lyrically it also treads novel ground. The singer, to summarise, is sick of life on earth. The sickening taste, Homophobic jokes, Images of fascist votes, Beam me up because I can’t breathe… are not your average #1 single’s lyrics. I can’t get off the carousel, I can’t get off this world…

Of course, that bit didn’t feature in the commercial. But it’s unfair to suggest that people were duped into buying this record. And the fact that it remained on top for five weeks, with plenty of airplay one presumes, clearly shows the song’s popularity. It became the fastest-selling debut single ever, going on to sell well over a million copies. It may be OTT and hyperactive, lurching from one sound to another, but I like its gothic silliness. There’s also a case for it being the first glam rock number one in quite a few years…

It was also my 10th birthday number one, so I feel a personal connection to it too. Babylon Zoo were a band from Wolverhampton, who had never charted before ‘Spaceman’ went, well, intergalactic. They’re cast as one-hit wonders, even though two further songs from their debut went Top 40. They struggled to sell albums, though, and suffered some terrible reviews for their live shows. They disbanded in 1999.

707. ‘Inside’, by Stiltskin

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In my previous post, I wrote that Tony Di Bart’s ‘The Real Thing’ must have been the most recent #1 that I’d never previously heard. Well, the very next chart-topper is probably just as forgotten…

Inside, by Stiltskin (their 1st and only #1)

1 week, from 8th – 15th May 1994

Luckily, though, my dad once owned a ‘Best Rock Album Ever…’ sort of compilation released sometime around 1994. In amongst all the Free, the Boston, and the Blue Oyster Cult, the compilers had clearly felt the need for something more contemporary. What better track to include, then, than that year’s big rock hit: Stiltskin’s ‘Inside’. Which means that this lumpy, grungy, one-hit wonder takes me right back to my childhood.

This should be a pretty cool moment for chart watchers. Grunge was the sound of the early-nineties, though it had never troubled the top of the charts until now. (By May ’94, the genre was on its last legs, Kurt Cobain having died just a month earlier…) Anyway, this is a very heavy, very sweaty, very hairy number one single, the hardest rocking since Iron Maiden brought our daughters to the slaughter. Listening to it now, for the first time in two decades, the chorus is a classic of the genre.

But it also feels a little like Grunge-by-AI. Listen and you can hear rip-offs of ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ in the quiet-loud chorus, and ‘Black Hole Sun’ in the two chiming notes during the verses. I swear to God there’s something by Pearl Jam buried in there, too, though I can’t quite root it out. People online have compared it to ‘Today’ by Smashing Pumpkins, but I don’t personally hear it. Basically, the songwriters have taken elements of the best grunge bands, smushed them up, and made a pretty decent song.

The lyrics are apparently based on Plato’s ‘allegory of the cave’, making this potentially the first UK #1 to reference the ancient Greek philosopher. To my ears, though, it sounds like the worst sort of Year 9 poetry: Strong words in a Ganges sky, I have to lie, Shadows move in pairs… culminating in the motivational slogan: If you believe it, Don’t keep it all inside… (To be fair, I was a fan of the fat man starts to fall line as a kid…)

‘Inside’ also loses a few more street-cred points from the fact that the song was written to order for a Levi’s jeans commercial (making this the fourth number one to come from a Levi’s ad, though the first that isn’t a re-release of an older track). A man called Peter Lawler wrote the song, and plays all the instruments on this recording. He needed a vocalist, and after some auditions found Ray Wilson, a Scottish singer/guitarist. This first incarnation of the band released only one album, and two more low-charting singles, but they reformed and have carried on to this day, in an ever-changing line-up with Wilson as the only constant. (He also spent four years as lead-singer for Genesis, replacing Phil Collins.)

‘Inside’ was probably fortunate to find itself on a compilation called ‘Best Rock Album Ever’ – right place, right time – and is similarly fortunate to hold the title of the UK’s sole grunge chart-topper. But variety is the spice of life, and I’m glad it sneaked its week at number one. Sadly, the fate that confirms once and for all if a record has been lost to the mists of time has indeed befallen ‘Inside’… It’s not on Spotify.

697. ‘I Would Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)’, by Meat Loaf

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On the one hand, we have to ask how this became a number one single. How did this outrageous, eight-minute long, barnstorming rock-opera push past the dance and all the Take That to become the biggest seller of the year?

I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That), by Meat Loaf (his 1st and only #1)

7 weeks, from 17th October – 5th December 1993

On the other, we have to ask ‘how could it not?’ What would be the point of a song this huge getting stuck at #23? You put this much time, and money, this many power chords, that many prosthetics on Meat Loaf’s face, then you have to aim for the top. Then there is the fact that it was the lead single from ‘Bat Out of Hell II’, Meat Loaf’s first album in almost a decade, and follow-up to one of the best-selling albums of all time. Maybe the demand and the interest was there…? Or, if we had an imaginary third hand, do we decide not to care why, and just give thanks that it did? The dramatic build-up, the soaring chorus, the sledgehammer duet, the fun innuendo in the title…

It tells the story of a frustrated lover, who would do anything for love, you know it’s true and that’s a fact. Except, for one thing. One thing that turns out to be vital. ‘That’. Many suggestions have been offered as to what ‘that’ is: some philosophical, some slightly more sexual… There’s even a Wikipedia entry on the ‘perceived ambiguity of ‘that’’. The video, directed by Michael Bay with a budget that would be the envy of many a feature film, pads the story out a bit more. Meat Loaf plays a monster, Dana Patrick plays a sexy siren, miming along to lines originally sung by Lorraine Crosby. It’s part ‘Beauty and the Beast’, part Channel 5 soft porn. At the end, the pair escape an approaching police squad on a motorbike. It’s every bit as fun, and as confusing, as the song itself, and I’d suggest a large factor in its success.

Speaking of the female vocalist, she has to wait a while before coming in, but when she does she makes the most of it. Will you cater to every fantasy I’ve got, Will you hose me down with holy water, If I get too hot? Hot! has to be one of the greatest lines ever in a number one single. It’s reminiscent of Meat Loaf’s other epic duets: with Cher on ‘Dead Ringer for Love’ and with Ellen Foley on ‘Paradise by the Dashboard Light’. Sadly, Crosby – like many of Loaf’s female partners – didn’t get a credit, or any royalties, for her part in the song.

Do we list this as the ‘90s version of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’? It’s every bit as epic, though not as genre-hopping. Or is it just a power ballad – possibly the ultimate power ballad? – the likes of which have been popping up at the top of the charts for a decade. The fun had started to fade, with bloated and boring turns by Bryan Adams and Whitney Houston, so Meat Loaf arrives just in time to inject some much needed OTT silliness to the genre. It was, of course, a creation of Jim Steinman, who also had a hand in another contender for best power-ballad ever: ‘Total Eclipse of the Heart’.

My only complaint is that it doesn’t build to a crescendo, rather a more gentle finish as the woman lists the ways he’s going to break her heart and he, to my ears anyway, grudgingly agrees. But that’s a minor quibble about a song that has so many soaring peaks over the course of its epic runtime. The UK single edit comes in at 7mins 48s, making this the longest number one single ever at the time, beating ‘Hey Jude’s twenty-five year record. There’s a more manageable five and a half minute edit, and a frankly ridiculous twelve minute version on the album. Meanwhile, following on from Lulu, Meat Loaf becomes the second consecutive forty-something to top the charts (he was forty-six when this made it to the summit).

‘I Would Do Anything for Love’ is glorious, but I don’t think it quite hits the heights of some of the ‘Bat Out of Hell’ tunes. I was raised on that album as a child, and could quite probably sing all seven songs (plus ‘Dead Ringer’ on the deluxe version) word for word. But it did what none of those songs could do, and gave Meat Loaf a number one single… In twenty-eight countries, no less. It was only his second UK Top 10 hit, but he’d go on to have several more in the years that followed, including a #8 for a re-released ‘Bat Out of Hell’ in the wake of this. I saw him in concert in 2007 and, while it was a lot of fun, it was clear that his best days were behind him by then. He continued recording and performing well into his seventies, despite various health issues, remaining a larger than life presence on stage and in interviews, until his death from Covid-19 complications last year.

656. ‘Bring Your Daughter… To the Slaughter’, by Iron Maiden

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Fists of metal to the ready! For yes, you read correctly: Iron Maiden have a number one single.

Bring Your Daughter… To the Slaughter, by Iron Maiden (their 1st and only #1)

2 weeks, from 30th December 1990 – 13th January 1991

Though whether this is truly heavy metal, or just hard rock, is a valid question. It’s a straight-forward, riff driven song; distinctly Iron Maiden – few lead singers have as recognisable a voice as Bruce Dickinson – but stripped back, lacking the prog touches that many of their songs have. The opening chords are almost punk – short sharp jabs to the side of the face – before we settle into something more, well, silly.

I’ll be far from the first to point out that, for a genre so given to machismo, sweat and greasy hair; heavy metal can be quite camp. And there have been few camper moments in a #1 single than when Dickinson starts to purr: True love and lipstick on your linen, Bite the pillow, Make no sound… Oo-er! Unchain your back door… he then growls, presumably trying very hard not to giggle… Invite me around…

In fact, the entire record sounds like Iron Maiden put themselves under the control of a group of schoolboys for the day. Even the writers of ‘This Is Spinal Tap’ would have turned this down as too silly. But hell, it’s fun. The way Dickinson goes all operatic on the word ‘slaughter’, the middle-eight with demonic monks chanting, the shredding solo, and the sudden ending – I’m comin’ to get ya! – marking the point where the band clearly decided this nonsense had gone on long enough.

Even though ‘Bring Your Daughter…’ gave the genre its first ever chart-topper, it doesn’t have a lot of love in the heavy metal community. (One article I read online named the title line as the laziest rhyme in music history.) On the one hand it’s a bit of a sell-out for band that were capable of truly genre-defining rock. On the other, though, it is a unique moment in UK chart history. The list of hard rock #1s is short, and up for debate: ‘You Really Got Me’, ‘Fire’, ‘Baby Jump’, ‘School’s Out’… and this? Plus, it knocked Cliff and his God-bothering ‘Saviour’s Day’ off number one, a fact that Maiden were well aware of when they promoted the single.

In fact, this may well be the first example of a very 21st century phenomenon: the chart campaign. Most of these will come much later, fuelled by the democracy of the download era, with a little help from social media, in which any song from any band, any genre, any time, can chart if bought in sufficient quantities, often for a cause (charitable, or just to be obnoxious). It’ll give us some interesting moments as we go along on our journey. Back in 1990 though, the internet was a strange, new thing that most people had never actually experienced, and so Maiden had to rely on word of mouth, a ban from the ever-willing BBC, and the publicity of whacking Cliff Richard out the way.

They also had the sense to release it on the quietest week of the year – the one after the Christmas rush – and so it entered at #1 with fairly low sales. In fact, one source names ‘Bring Your Daughter…’ as the lowest-selling #1 of all time, with total sales of around 100,000. It’s an old article, though, and that figure was probably beaten in the mid-00s sales slump. (It’s definitely been beaten by now, if you don’t count streams as ‘proper’ sales.) Iron Maiden, though, were no strangers to the top end of the singles chart by late 1990: this was their sixth consecutive Top 10 hit, and one of seventeen in total.

Anyway, who cares if it barely sold, if the BBC didn’t play it, and if it’s a bit crap? It’s heavy metal, at number one. The anonymous dance tracks, movie soundtrack monster hits and boy-band preeners will be back soon enough. Until then, raise those fists once more, and pray for mercy from the Gods of rock.

580. ‘The Final Countdown’, by Europe

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I take back what I said about our last #1, Berlin’s ‘Take My Breath Away’, having the ultimate ‘80s riff. For I had forgotten about this baby…

The Final Countdown, by Europe (their 1st and only #1)

2 weeks, from 30th November – 14th December 1986

Da-da-daadaa… A handful of synth notes that have entered our collective consciousness, in a way that few songs manage. I’d say there aren’t very many people who wouldn’t Dada-da-da-da… back at you if you abruptly Da-da-dada’d in their face (there’s a sentence I never imagined writing…)

Is this as close as we’ll come to that most eighties of genres – hair metal – having its moment at #1? I had previously suggested Doctor & The Medics, or Survivor, but this trumps them hands down. It isn’t particularly metal, save for the shredding guitar solo, but boy do they have hair to spare. In the video, lead singer Joey Tempest (pause to relish the name…) bounds onto the stage in a leather jacket and trousers, doing things to his mic stand that make you hope he bought it dinner first. His hair is glorious, though the amount of hairspray used was probably a major factor in our current climate crisis, while his face is prettier than most boyband idols.

I love rock music – proper rock music, by men with beards – and songs like ‘The Final Countdown’, by preening, prancing, clean-shaven hair metal bands like Europe, really get the rock snobs’ goats up. But I have a secret love for ‘80s hair metal that I file under ‘guilty pleasures’, because in some ways it is the purest form of rock and roll. It exists solely for pleasure: no introspection, no shoe-gazing, very little thought at all; just rocking out in ridiculous clothes, and getting laid.

Speaking of getting laid… Is ‘The Final Countdown’ about going to space, with lyrics inspired by David Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’, as the band claim…? Or is it a five-minute extended metaphor for sex? Since release, it’s moved into the sporting arena, and is regularly used as a hype song before matches. It also gets an airing every New Year’s Eve, around the globe, and charted again in 1999 ahead of the millennium celebrations. The band weren’t very impressed by that remix (their drummer claimed he ‘wouldn’t have pissed on it if it were on fire’…) In fact, certain band members weren’t impressed with the original, thinking it a poppy betrayal of their metal roots.

There haven’t been too many light-hearted chart-toppers as we’ve plodded through the mid-eighties, so I will welcome Europe with open arms. They didn’t hang around long – this was their only Top 10 hit – but they reformed in the 2000s and are touring and recording to this day, remaining very successful across, well, Europe – especially in their native Sweden. Adding to the ‘peak-eighties’ feel of this record is the fact that we’ve now had two successive number ones by acts named after geographical locations. Berlin, Europe… Not to mention Japan, and Asia. Write an iconic synth riff, do a line of coke, and name your band after a continent. The 1980s in all its glory…

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416. ‘Mull of Kintyre’ / ‘Girls’ School’, by Wings

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It is amazing to think that, almost eight years on from their split, this is only the second time an ex-Beatle has appeared at the top of the charts. You’d have got long odds on it taking this length of time. George Harrison got in there quickly, and then there was a big old wait… Until our latest Christmas #1.

Mull of Kintyre / Girls’ School, by Wings (their 1st and only #1)

9 weeks, from 27th November 1977 – 29th January 1978

And it’s strangely comforting to hear Macca’s voice again, like a long lost friend… Mull of Kintyre, Oh mist rolling in from the sea, My desire, Is always to meet you… It’s just him, and a couple of guitars. Simplicity itself. Until ninety seconds in, when the bagpipes arrive (I always assumed they were saved for the finale. Alas, no.) They enter with that unmistakeable, ominous drone, and by the three minute mark they are the stars of the show. It is amazing to think that, in the 1970s, as many #1 singles featured bagpipes as featured a Beatle.

‘Mull of Kintyre’ is not an old folk song, though it sounds for all the world as if it should be. It is further evidence of McCartney’s ability to conjure timeless pop from a few chords (and a cheeky slice of ‘Auld Lang Syne’). It is not ‘Yesterday’, nor is it ‘Eleanor Rigby’, but it is a huge moment in his legacy. And yet…

As a Scot, part of me bristles at this act of cultural appropriation… (You may roll your eyes, but hear me out.) It’s a nice song, a sweet melody, a love-letter by Paul to his adopted home (he really was living, while he wrote this, on the Mull of Kintyre). But the lines about mist rolling in from the sea and sweeping through the heather like deer in the glen… It’s the aural equivalent of a souvenir shortbread box. It’s Scotland as imagined by American, or Japanese, (or Liverpudlian) tourists. It’s #notmyscotland. You can also imagine John Lennon hearing this for the first time, on the radio one morning, and ruefully shaking his head…

Still, come the drum-roll and the key change, ‘Mull of Kintyre’ has wormed its way into your brain. You can see why this is was a ginormous hit – a song that appeals to five-year-olds, ninety-five-year olds, and anyone who’s had enough whisky. Its nine weeks at the top makes it the joint longest running #1 of the decade, alongside ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ and an upcoming movie soundtrack hit. It became the biggest selling single ever in the UK, usurping ‘She Loves You’, and it remains the biggest selling non-charity single ever released.

I did wonder if, by hitting #1 in late November, this was the earliest an Xmas #1 had made it to the top. But it’s not even close. Al Martino got there two weeks earlier in 1952, as did Clean Bandit in 2016, while Elvis’s ‘It’s Now or Never’ holds the record by holding on from November 3rd. However, this record also stayed top for over a month after Christmas thanks, it seems, to the flip-side…

‘Girls’ School’ is a rocker, all scuzzy slide guitars and heavy drums, as far removed from the faux-folk of ‘Mull of Kintyre’ as can be. SongFacts describes it as ‘semi-pornographic’, and that’s putting it mildly. While your grandma would have enjoyed singing along to ‘Mull…’, she may have choked on her sherry when she heard this one. Sleepy head kid sister, Lying on the floor, Eighteen years and younger boy, Well she knows what she’s waitin’ for…

It seems the nuns have lost control of the convent school… Yuki, the resident mistress and oriental princess, is showing porn in the classroom. The Spanish nurse is running a full-body massage parlour, while the matron is drugging the kids in their beds at night, and then… Well that much is left to the imagination… Ah, what can the sisters do…?

I’m loving-yet-appalled-by this post-‘Mull…’ palate cleanser. It is pure rock ‘n’ roll, both in terms of its sound and its lyrical content (which would come under, shall we say… ‘scrutiny’ were it released in 2021). I think someone was having a good old chuckle to themselves when they stuck this alongside such a shamelessly sentimental ‘A’-side. It does seem, too, that McCartney may have swept it under the carpet in recent years. It’s not on Spotify, for a start.

Although this is his first #1 since The Beatles, it’s not as if Paul had been hiding under a rock since ‘Let It Be’. Wings were a huge chart force throughout the seventies, featuring Paul, his wife Linda, Denny Laine (whom we have heard from before as a member of The Moody Blues) and a rotating cast of supporters. This was their 10th Top 10 hit, but the only one to go all the way. Macca will be back, though, in the 80s, with a couple of chart-toppers to make ‘Mull of Kintyre’ sound like the epitome of cool, cutting edge pop.