outhere brothers

723. ‘Boom Boom Boom’, by The Outhere Brothers

/ UK #1s blog / 3 Comments

In my last post, I asked who were the worse duo: the Outhere Brothers, or Robson & Jerome? Well here they stand, in direct comparison…

Boom Boom Boom, by The Outhere Brothers (their 2nd and final #1)

4 weeks, from 2nd – 30th July 1995

It’s more obnoxious rap-cum-dance from the Outheres, though I have to admit that this is significantly better than ‘Don’t Stop (Wiggle Wiggle)’. It has a less irritating beat, and something resembling a verse-chorus structure. It hangs together like an actual song, rather than a bunch of samples around which filthy lyrics are shouted.

That’s not to say the lyrics aren’t dirty here; they just don’t reach the same levels of obnoxious vulgarity as their earlier #1. There’s an excellent use of the term ‘nani’, (as in put your nani on my tongue…), as well as various mentions of the brothers’ pet obsession: the booty. And I will confess I smiled at the line: Slip my Peter, Into your folder… I’m no prude, and if rudeness can be both silly and inventive, then I’m all for it.

The vast majority of the song though, is a sledgehammer Eurodance beat, and the call-and-response hook of Boom, boom, boom, Now let me hear you say Way-Oh! That’s what I remember from the school playgrounds of the time, and presumably the reason why this was such a hit. There’s nary a millennial alive who can’t complete the second half of the title line, though back in 1995 innocent little me had no idea that there was an explicit original.

Like ‘Don’t Stop’, it looks like ‘Boom Boom Boom’ had a wide variety of mixes and edits: some radio-friendly, some not. I don’t know if these were a factor in making this record a hit, or whether the British public were just mad for the Outhere Brothers in the summer of ’95. It still does feel very incongruous that slap bang in the middle of the year of Britpop, we had a month of this after seven weeks of Robson & Jerome’s golden-oldies.

This, thankfully, is the last we’ll hear from The Outhere Brothers. They would manage a couple of further Top 10 hits, before fading away. I call this the ‘significantly better’ of their two chart-toppers, but that still doesn’t mean it’s particularly good. The Brothers’ charms remain difficult to place. At least they didn’t outstay their welcome – a quick-fire double and now we can forget they ever existed. Unlike the year’s other duo…

718. ‘Don’t Stop (Wiggle Wiggle)’, by The Outhere Brothers

/ UK #1s blog / 10 Comments

Is 1995 the year with the biggest disparity between what it is remembered for, and what actually made #1? 1977 might have a case, the year punk exploded yet in which David Soul was the breakthrough star. 1995, though…?

Don’t Stop (Wiggle Wiggle), by The Outhere Brothers (their 1st of two #1s)

1 week, from 26th March – 2nd April 1995

I mention this because this next number one has left me in a state of shock. Shock at how I don’t really remember it. Shock at some of the lyrics. And shock at just how bloody awful it is… Biiiyyaaatch!

I thought that Rednex had my upcoming ‘Worst #1 Award’ in the bag. But as horrible as ‘Cotton Eye Joe’ is, at least it is identifiable as a ‘song’. This is an absolute racket. The pitch of the singer’s voice as he repeats the title line: Don’t stop movin’ baby oh that booty drive me crazy…, the one-note beat and the bubble-popping sound effect, the way that that one line is chopped up over and over again, ad nauseum… Some mixes are better than others – and the video attached at the foot of this post is the most palatable version, with a Hi-NRG beat – but most are dire.

I’m torn between wrapping this post up as soon as possible, trying to forget that this record ever existed, and delving a bit deeper. The radio edit of ‘Don’t Stop (Wiggle Wiggle)’ is repetitively, mind-numbingly, boring. But that wasn’t the reason this made number one. For the other, non-edited mixes reveal this to be the filthiest number one single we’ve heard so far on this countdown.

No, make that one of the filthiest number ones, ever. Period. Even in this post-‘WAP’ world, the lyrics here still raise an eyebrow. There’s that opening Biiiyyaaatch! for a start. Then there’s: Put your ass on my face… I love the way your… No I can’t type the rest. Girl you’ve got to suck my… Nope, still can’t. I’m not a prude, but this isn’t something I’ve never had to consider in my seven hundred and seventeen previous posts. The worst word we’ve encountered so far has been, I think, ‘bullshit’. And that’s a word I heard on Radio 4 the other day… I knew the 1990s would see morals and standards loosen (God, I sound like Mary Whitehouse), but I though it would be gradual. A ‘bitch’ here and a ‘fuck’ there. But no, it all arrived at once, right here: a smorgasbord of vulgarity. Which means that ‘Don’t Stop (Wiggle Wiggle)’ is actually a hugely important chart-topper…

But nah, I don’t want to give it that sort of weight. It happened. Swearing in #1 singles is fine now. Let’s move on. (And anyway, luckily for all of us, The Outhere Brothers have an even bigger hit coming up very soon…) They were a duo from Chicago – yet another pair of fake chart-topping siblings – and this was their breakthrough hit, after previous releases such as ‘Pass the Toilet Paper’ had failed to chart. Thirteen-year-old boys around the world then kept the pair in hits for the next couple of years, though their subsequent album ‘1 Polish, 2 Biscuits and a Fish Sandwich’ wasn’t as successful (and you can look up the meaning of that title, if you dare…)

Back to what I mentioned in the intro, about 1995 being a strange year, in which most of the acts and songs we remember the year for didn’t make the top of the charts. It’s a theme I’ll return to, especially when a different gruesome twosome dominate later in the year. Up next, though, I’m sort of instantly proven wrong, for it’s the decade’s biggest boyband, with one of the nation’s best-loved songs…

(The ‘best’ version of the song…)

(The explicit version, if you must…)