should have been a number one?

Should Have Been a #1…? ‘They Don’t Know’, by Tracey Ullman

/ UK #1s blog / 11 Comments

Thanks again to our guest writers this week, who have donated fine posts on the Stones, Wizzard, ‘Crimson and Clover’, and the very concept of being ‘number one’... Our final guest post of the week comes from Kevin (AKA freddybobs) with the record he wishes could have taken that final step up to the number one position. And it’s another classic…

As in sport, getting to number one can grant you immortality, but the runners-up are yesterday’s jam in no time at all. So it is that ‘Karma Chameleon’ is still ubiquitous 40-plus years on, but you never hear a song that it kept pegged at number two for two weeks in the autumn of 1983.  I speak of “They Don’t Know” by Tracey Ullman.

They Don’t Know, by Tracey Ullman

#2 for 2 weeks in October 1983, behind ‘Karma Chameleon’

I think it’s one of the great love songs. No, I really do. It’s not a power ballad, because it doesn’t need to be. There’s no desperation or yearning or heartache to tell of; it’s a simple and joyful paean to young love where the only thing that matters is being with that one person, regardless of what others think. Because you know, and they don’t.

Kirsty MacColl was nineteen when she wrote it, and took the original version all the way up to #62 in 1979.  Some prefer her version, but for me Tracey’s cartoon-character voice sounds younger, and contributes to the overall feel of wide-eyed innocence.

The song opens with wedding chimes, lolloping piano and Tracey singing wistfully about her love for her own Prince Charming despite the disapproval of everyone she knows.  The words she uses describe something universal. I get a feeling when I look at you, she sings.  We don’t know what that feeling is, but we definitely recognise it. And her friends? When they look at you, they don’t see what I see... These are not complicated sentiments, they’re very simple; but they say more about the helpless joy of young love than a dozen Celine Dion songs ever could. And ultimately, the denouement: They’ve never heard of love.  No, they don’t understand; they couldn’t possibly. 

The song’s innocent feel is enhanced by its strong ’60s and Phil Spector influences. There’s definitely some Ronettes or Shangri-Las there, particularly in the “do do do” backing vocals in the middle-eight – ironically from Kirsty herself – as is the “Bay-bee” crescendo, a couple of notes that Tracey couldn’t quite reach…

The song was accompanied by a cheap and cheerful video featuring Tracey getting ready for a date at the bowling alley, blotting her lipstick with the Marc Bolan pics on the wall and pointing excitedly at her engagement ring. Then she sees his terrible attempts at bowling and grimaces at his awful shoes, but it doesn’t matter; she loves his faults as well. At the end, she’s wearing slippers at the supermarket; she’s dowdy, with a child in the trolley and another on the way. But “they” weren’t proved right. She fantasises about Paul McCartney and rolls her eyes when her moustachioed hero pinches her ass, but her joyfulness is undiminished.

And that’s one of the two elements that make this song so poignant. The song captures a feeling that everyone has at some stage or other, but yes, it’s bound to fade. No-one wants to live with that intensity forever, but it’s a shame it’s gone. 

The other element, of course, is Kirsty MacColl’s death aged just forty-one in Mexico in 2000. She debuted with her version, and the whole premise of the song – embarking on one of life’s great adventures – mirrors her own tentative steps into the music business.  And tragically, she died while there were still so many adventures ahead of her.

‘They Don’t Know’ was the second of three top ten hits by Tracey Ullman in 1983. She had a couple of minor hits in 1984 and then decided her pop career had probably peaked. So she resumed her comedy career to great success in the USA, where of course she premiered ‘The Simpsons’.

But yes, this stalled at number two behind ‘Karma Chameleon’, a frothy and lightweight zillion-seller, condemning this fabulous song to be forgotten before that year’s Christmas decorations were up. No-one ever said it was fair, but it would have been nice if Tracey and Kirsty had sneaked just a week from Boy George. For young lovers everywhere.

Thanks again freddybobs, and everyone else who has contributed a post, a like or a comment this week. And to everyone who has voted in our ultimate #1s polls below, too. There are still 24 hours to vote before I reveal the results, and it remains close!

Should Have Been a #1…? ’19th Nervous Breakdown’, by The Rolling Stones

/ UK #1s blog / 7 Comments

Welcome to the first of a week of guest posts to celebrate reaching our 1000th number one. First up, long-time follower John Van der Kiste gets things underway with an ode to an unruly, and perhaps unlucky, classic from the Stones…

When is a No. 1 not a No. 1? When it’s so controversial that mainstream retailers won’t stock it, and we argue that sales figures were ‘adjusted’ that week to keep it at No. 2? Or, when the Official Charts Company say no while the music press Top 30s suggest otherwise? That was the fate of The Rolling Stones’ ‘19th Nervous Breakdown’.

19th Nervous Breakdown, by The Rolling Stones

#2 for 3 weeks in February & March 1966, behind ‘These Boots Are Made for Walkin”

In the New Musical Express and Melody Maker charts, it enjoyed three weeks in pole position from 19th February 1966. Ditto for BBC TV’s Top of the Pops, which then based its weekly Top 20 on samplings from these and the other music weeklies, Record Mirror and Disc. The OCC, which has the Record Retailer Top 50 charts as its source from 1960 to 1969, made it No. 2 for those three weeks, with Nancy Sinatra’s ‘These Boots Are Made For Walkin’, walkin’ all over them at No. 1. Otherwise it would have given the band seven consecutive chart-toppers between July 1964 and May 1966.

It was written on their autumn 1965 American tour and recorded in December at RCA Studios, California, its title apparently inspired by an exhausted Mick Jagger saying he was about ready for his nineteenth nervous breakdown. As usual he wrote the lyrics, Keith Richards provided the music. However it’s not about work-related stress, but a poor little rich girl who was given everything by her parents, a mother who owed a million dollars tax and a father still perfecting ways of making sealing wax. She had a thousand toys, but still she cried all night. Jagger was moving in high society circles with glamorous girls ready to meet England’s most rebellious rock star if they could, and like Ray Davies of The Kinks, he was happy to satirise them mercilessly. He also sneaked in a subtle drugs reference, maybe to see if it got past the moral guardians: On our first trip I tried so hard to rearrange your mind… Radio and TV missed that.

There are some wonderful musical touches too, like when Brian Jones’ guitar borrows a distinctive lick from Bo Diddley’s ‘Diddley Daddy’, a 1955 American single. Towards the fade, Bill Wyman supplies that notable bass run. ‘I bounced the string with the top of my finger on the pickup, and ran my finger down the string,’ he said. ‘That’s what created that so-called dive-bombing sound.’ Not to mention a guitar fuzz tone on the riff before each chorus, or the sweet and sour vocal harmonies, or Charlie Watts’ superb drum fills and cymbal beats.

Had it not been for The Animals’ ‘House of the Rising Sun’ (4.29) in 1964, at 3.50 this would have been the longest UK No. 1 in terms of playing time until superseded a year later by Procol Harum’s ‘A Whiter Shade of Pale’.

Because it wasn’t an ‘official’ No. 1, it seems to have flown a little below the radar on radio playlists. Perhaps it remains that bit more fresh for not having been aired so often as the band’s chart-toppers.

John has recently published a book in the Rock Classics Series on the Stones’ Let it Bleed album, plus an On Track title about Gerry Rafferty, with an On Track on Bob Seger, currently being edited and due for publication in July – all three through Sonicbond.

Don’t forget to vote for your best and worst number ones! I’ll publish the results on Sunday…