bob the builder

908. ‘Mambo No. 5’, by Bob the Builder

/ UK #1s blog / 4 Comments

Bob the Builder manages what all the other Christmas novelties never could. Benny Hill, Little Jimmy Osmond, Renée and Renato, Mr. Blobby… Few of them managed another hit, let along another chart-topper!

Mambo No. 5, by Bob the Builder (his 2nd and final #1)

1 week, from 9th – 16th September 2001

Gone is Lou Bega’s list of women that he’s shagged, replaced with more child-friendly construction items and a lengthy to do list. A little bit of timber and a saw, A little bit of fixing that’s for sure… A little bit of tiling on the roof, A little bit of making waterproof… Bob’s a little bit of a taskmaster, that’s for sure, but his gang seem to be up to the job.

It’s largely more of the same as ‘Can We Fix It?’, just to a different tune. It sounds so much like Bega’s version that I wonder if they aren’t singing over the same backing track. But like the first hit, there’s an enjoyable amount of energy and love put into it. It’s a novelty, but it doesn’t overly grate, and the lyrics are genuinely tight and cleverly put together.

We’ve just had two versions of ‘Lady Marmalade’ at number one with just three years in between, and here are two versions of ‘Mambo No. 5’ in top spot exactly two years apart. Not counting the 1950s habit of releasing different versions of a song at the same time (as with ‘Answer Me’, ‘Singing the Blues’ and ‘Cherry Pink & Apple Blossom White’) this must be a record for shortest time between two chart-topping versions of the same song. Though is it the same song? Same title and tune, yes, but completely different lyrics. After ‘3 Lions ‘98’ this is only the second song to make #1 twice with (significantly) different words.

Bob the Builder and his gang would have one further hit, with rave anthem ‘Big Fish Little Fish’, from their brilliantly titled second album ‘Never Mind the Breeze Blocks’, making #81 in 2008. Leaving seven years between albums was clearly a gamble that backfired… Bob the Builder remained on TV until 2008, before being relaunched in 2010. I can’t be alone in finding the CGI animation of the reboot slightly sinister compared to the original stop-motion version. The CGI Bob has never attempted a singing career, and it’s probably for the best. Good to go out on a high.

886. ‘Can We Fix It?’, by Bob the Builder

/ UK #1s blog / 24 Comments

Ah, the classic British Christmas. Pigs in blankets, a half-pissed Granny, more rain than snow outside, and some novelty tripe at number one in the charts…

Can We Fix It?, by Bob the Builder (his 1st of two #1s)

3 weeks, from 17th December 2000 – 7th January 2001

Bob the Builder joins Mr Blobby, Benny Hill, the kids of St. Winifred’s, Little Jimmy Osmond, and several more, in the festive hall of shame. But I will say that, while ‘Can We Fix It?’ is not a song I’m desperate to ever revisit after this; it’s far from the most heinous example of festive excess.

It’s an expansion on the theme to the popular kids’ TV show, with lots of fun musical references. It opens with a version of the escalating ‘Twist and Shout’ intro, also heard in more respectable chart-toppers from David Bowie and the Manic Street Preachers (which means that the year 2000’s first and last #1s are connected in the most unlikely way). Elsewhere there’s a pretty current 2-step garage beat, and lots of record scratches. For a song based on a children’s TV show theme it actually sounds like it could, in a not too distant parallel universe, be a real pop song.

In the video, by which novelties like this often live and die, Bob the Builder puts on various pop star guises, the most memorable of which is Liam Gallagher, complete with a parka and a sneering microphone stance. It also helps that Neil Morrissey, AKA Bob, has a Jarvis Cocker-esque drawl to his voice, sounding almost like a real rock star, but also like he’s very much not taking this seriously at all.

So, like I said, far worse musical crimes have been committed in the name of a Christmas number one. (And that’s before we mention the many God-awful, non-festive novelty chart-toppers…) But quite how this managed to become 2000’s best-selling single – in a year not short of generational classics – and the entire decade’s 10th best seller (!), I’m not quite sure. But hey, at least it kept Westlife’s ‘What Makes a Man’ off top spot, denying them a second Christmas #1 in a row.

Interestingly too, it was the only one of the year 2000’s forty-two chart-toppers that climbed to the top, entering at #2 behind ‘Stan’ the week before. It then peaked in sales in its third week, taking the coveted Christmas prize.

We finally, then, reach the end of 2000: the longest year we’ll ever cover. I published the first number one of this year on 23rd January, real-time, and we’re now well into June. I’m not sure I can sum up a year with so many different number one singles, but I’ve enjoyed more of them than I expected to (while it’s also been a self-indulgent trawl through my fifteenth year on this planet). Back then I was frustrated at the high turnover, feeling that it devalued the charts (which it does), but I’m coming round to the feeling that variety is indeed the spice of life. Meanwhile, at the time of writing in 2025, the current UK #1 has just entered its twelfth week on top…