Best Song: Ja Rule - Clap Back
Ja Rule got a lot of stick for his rap and R&B crossover music. Then he released his "Blood in My Eye" album which was purely a rap album with no R&B singers to be seen. It was also mainly a 50 Cent diss album too. I loved that album and this was the only Top 40 hit from it.
Worst Song: Ozzy & Kelly Osbourne - Changes
This was originally a Black Sabbath record and was covered by Black Sabbath singer Ozzy Osbourne together with his daughter Kelly. It was off the back of the success of the TV show "The Osbournes" which introduced the world to Ozzy Osbourne's family. It's a terrible record.
Top 40 Review
My memory of the 2003 Christmas charts was the usual hype about what could be Christmas number one, but then the actual Christmas number one seemed to come out of nowhere. It was a very dreary cover of the Tears For Fears record "Mad World" by Michael Andrews & Gary Jules.
There were 7 Christmas hits in the Top 40 but the only one you hear anymore is "Christmas Time (Don't Let The Bells End)" by The Darkness. Pop Idol was in it's 2nd and final series and the finalists released a cover of "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" as The Idols. Cliff Richard was in the charts as usual with the record "Santa's List". The rest were all novelty records.
We also had non-Christmas novelty records from Noddy plus we had Shane Richie do a cover of "I'm Your Man" which was the Children in Need record.
My music choice around this time was rap and R&B and that's where the points are coming from. Outkast had "Hey Ya!" in the charts which I was a little skeptical about at first but ended up liking. There was also "You Don't Know My Name" by Alicia Keys.
Another record getting full marks was the Simply Red cover of "You Make Me Feel Brand New" by The Stylistics. It's a cover that's been done well and impressive that Mick Hucknall does both the high notes and low notes.
Dance music wise we had just 2 records. There was "Cry Little Sister (I Need U Now)" by Lost Brothers featuring G Tom Mac which isn't bad. There was also "Feelin Fine" by Ultrabeat which was a dreadful cover of the happy hardcore record of the same name by Unique.
The usual boy bands/girl groups/pop idols were taking up a big chunk of the Top 40 and it was a big fat zero for all of those.
It almost seems that by 2003 it was established that Christmas was the time for releasing shit records so that's what people did. A very poor Top 40.
Score: 4.5
Table
The Christmas charts in 2003 fall well short of the best year score and is proving my theory of the charts taking a nosedive at Christmas time:
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