Here's my weekly look at the Top 30 from 26 years ago. The plan is for these posts to go out at 17:30 on a Wednesday.
Here is the Top 40 in full.
Obviously some of the records will be the same as last week so therefore the review will be the same for these. I've indicated which ones are new so you can skip the others if you read last weeks post.
Once again my opinions are inevitably going to differ from other people, but I'm not trying to convince anyone something is good or rubbish, I'm simply giving my opinion.
So this is the top 30 from this week in 1998 with my verdict on each record:
30. Ultrasound - Stay Young (New)
When I was on Champions League Popmaster in 2018 my 2nd bonus question was a clip of this record to which I had to name the band playing. I struggled to find an actual tune in amongst the noise I was hearing let alone identify the band. I had no idea, but had been given the year and remember lots of obscure indie bands having one or two hits around then. I answered Warm Jets, who were one of those bands who's Top 40 career consisted of 2 songs that charted in the 30s earlier on in the year. I therefore hate this for costing me points on Popmaster but would have hated it anyway.
Verdict - Rubbish
I once expressed my opinion that I think Jay-Z was a bit shit and someone responded "how can you diss Jay-Z, his game is so tight". My response to that was what the fuck does that even mean. This record came out in an era where rapper like Jay-Z were getting well established from talking a load of shit. It's therefore refreshing to see Public Enemy talking sense on this record. Proper rap music.
Verdict - Good
N-Tyce were the first girl group to have a Top 40 hit following the success of the Spice Girls but they never reached anywhere near the same heights. The girl group who got the closest to the Spice Girls success in the 90s was B*Witched and the week they made their Top 40 debut was the same week N-Tyce had their final Top 40 hit to date.
Verdict - Rubbish
This was originally the Top 40 debut for the Wombles back in 1974 and it returned to the charts after "Remember Your A Womble" returned to the charts earlier on in the year. Once again I question why and who was buying this. Maybe it was because the tennis was just around the corner.
Verdict - Rubbish
Crowded House had been split up for nearly 2 years at this point and this was the solo Top 40 debut for Neil Finn. At number 26 it was his highest charting solo Top 40 hit. It's a very stereotypical boring acoustic guitar and vocals type record a lot of musicians make for themselves when their commercial peak is behind them.
Verdict - Rubbish
It's Rod Stewart doing a cover once again. To be fair this time he's covering a song that was originally by his old band The Faces. I remember him appearing on TFI Friday where he performed this and then went out on the piss with Chris Evans and Gazza afterwards which led to Gazza not being picked for the England squad at the World Cup.
Verdict - Rubbish
This was Top 40 hit number 17 of the 90s for Gloria Estefan. Not bad when you consider all her well known hits came in the 80s. It's a dance record, very generic and bland. There was still more of that to come before the decade was over.
Verdict - Rubbish
At the time I remember this being this opening song of Top of the Pops for a few weeks in a row. At least that's what it felt. There also seemed to be a lot of people on the stage so I assumed they were a band with many members, but it turned out there were only 2 of them in Savage Garden. Never before have I seen a song contradict a band name so much. I do like some of their music, but not the soppy ballads.
Verdict - Rubbish
The 4th Top 40 hit for Embrace and their first that wasn't an EP. I would say this was their best known song of the 90s. Again though this is boring indie music which no doubt led to the Stereophonics and Travis finally making the Top 10 with their boring songs.
Verdict - Rubbish
The problem with a major football tournament happening is the amount of crap music it produces. This was the final Top 40 hit to date for Chumbawamba and it's one for the football fans to sing along to, but like with most football records it's terrible.
Verdict - Rubbish
What the fuck happened here? The first 2 Top 40 hits for Aqua were complete piss takes but then came this which was a proper song. I just could not get my head round the fact that Aqua could make a record like this. It take my hat off to Soren Rasted and Claus Norreen, the Aqua members in the background on stage but writers of all their hits. They clearly knew what they were doing.
Verdict - Good
Although this wasn't the beginning of the solo career of Wyclef Jean it's the record that kickstarted it. What a record it is and you can apply it to a lot of situations. It has all the right ingredients, it's both a record for the busker on the street and for the radio and above all it's got soul.
Verdict - Good
18. Shania Twain - When (New)
My initial thought when playing this record is that it sounds far too America. Yet it was by a Canadian and wasn't even released in America. The point is that country music is often a bit crap, but country music made for the pop music like this is just intolerable.
Verdict - Rubbish
17. Alexia - Gimme Love (New)
When I was reviewing "Uh La La La", the Top 40 debut for Alexia I was initially listening to the wrong version but found the right version at the second attempt. It took a lot more digging to find the correct version of this which was the Pump Friction vs Precious Paul mix. Again it's incredibly cheesy and the singing is extra irritating.
Verdict - Rubbish
Todd Terry may have now been finished in the Top 40 as an artist but he was still around. It was his remix of this Fleetwood Mac cover by The Corrs which gave The Corrs their Top 40 debut. At the time I recall someone asking me if I liked The Corrs, I thought about it and then said actually yes they are pretty good.
Verdict - Good
This was the official Scotland record for the World Cup. Scotland did end up coming home as soon as they possibly could from the World Cup and haven't been in the World Cup since. It's a pretty dull song, but what sort of irritated me was them referring to the "stupid plane", first of all why is the plane stupid and also they could have also got the Eurostar home.
Verdict - Rubbish
Miami bass music was reasonable big in America but never made much impact on the UK Top 40. This was one of the Miami bass records that did make it into the UK Top 40. It no doubt influence the direction that UK garage took and I love that sort of beat.
Verdict - Good
In the early 90s Stock & Waterman tried transforming Bananarama into the new Abba with this being one of their records but it failed to reach the Top 40. Now Pete Waterman tried the same with Steps and was more successful in doing so. Each female was given a verse each whilst you wouldn't even know the males were on the record from listening to it. Unfortunately we'd get more of these over the next few years.
Verdict - Rubbish
The 2nd Top 40 hit for Sweden based American singer Lutricia McNeal which was also her highest charting Top 40 hit. It was also the first Top 40 hit as songwriter for Rami Yacoub, one of Max Martins sidekicks. I did find it a little irritating at the time but I'm not minding it now.
Verdict - OK
12. 2Pac - Do For Love (New)
The posthumous hits kept coming for 2Pac with this being his 6th posthumous Top 40 hit and 8th Top 40 hit overall. This one has an animated video and I remember it appearing quite frequently on the music channels. It was one I would stay on the channel to listen to.
Verdict - Good
The Top 40 debut for Leann Rimes. I once took part in a quiz where a question was who charted in 1997 with "How Do I Live" to which I confidently answered Leann Rimes. The answer was Trisha Yearwood who reached number 66 with it. Leann Rimes was in 1998 and is the better known version. Although not the first person younger than me to chart, I do recall a younger Leann Rimes charting making me start to think have I missed the boat already in my music career.
Verdict - Rubbish
After being pleasantly surprised by who much I liked the first two hits for All Saints I decided to buy their album. On it was 2 covers and these were released as a double a-side for their next single. Maybe having 3 decent singles in a row was a step too far, the cover of "Under The Bridge" is particularly poor given how good the original is.
Verdict - Rubbish / Rubbish
Geri Halliwell had left the Spice Girls but this song had already been recorded with her on it. England United were a supergroup consisting of the Spice Girls and a few indie musicians and this was the official England song for the World Cup and was universally hated and was overshadowed by "3 Lions" and "Vindaloo". I agree with popular opinion on this.
Verdict - Rubbish
Bus Stop were Daz Sampson, the person who represented the UK at Eurovision a few years later and Flip & Fill. This is a cheesy eurodance remake of the Carl Douglas record which featured the man himself. I already knew the originally and remember wondering why people were singing it all of a sudden, then heard this and thought oh dear.
Verdict - Rubbish
The 2nd Top 40 hit for Sweden based American singer Lutricia McNeal which was also her highest charting Top 40 hit. It was also the first Top 40 hit as songwriter for Rami Yacoub, one of Max Martins sidekicks. I did find it a little irritating at the time but I'm not minding it now.
Verdict - OK
There was a pub near where I grew up that had live music at the weekend. When I say live music I mean a singer, ocassionally one with a guitar and a karaoke machine. They'd sing the classics, but this song immediately slotted into the sets and I recall one particular night I swear the singer did this song around 5 or 6 times. Needless to say I got sick of it very quickly.
Verdict - Rubbish
When I first heard this record with it's sample of "Can You Feel It" by The Jacksons it caught my attention because I like what it is sampling. Then I listened to the record the whole way through and realised that was the only redeeming feature, the rest was cheesy nonsense.
Verdict - Rubbish
4. Mariah Carey - My All (New)
When I was reviewing her previous hit "Butterfly" I mentioned how I recalled Mariah Carey promoting it on The Big Breakfast. I'm now thinking it may have been this single she was promoting. Put it this way they are pretty similar to each other and people must have felt cheated with her transformation to R&B singer on "Honey".
Verdict - Rubbish
One of the big songwriting teams in the R&B world is Rodney Jerkins, Fred Jerkins and LaShawn Daniels. This was their first Top 40 hit as songwriters. Both Brandy and Monica had only been in the lower reaches of the Top 40 prior to this. I remember hearing how great Brandy's "Never Say Never" album was supposed to be and given I liked this song I decided to buy it. This song aside it really wasn't that great and I ended up selling it.
Verdict - Good
This brings back memories of the god awful TV show "Man O Man" that was hosted by Chris Tarrant. This was the theme music to that as I recall. The TV show and record suited each other though given how dreadful they both were.
Verdict - Rubbish
On May 31st 1998 we had the news that Geri Halliwell had left the Spice Girls. The same day B*witched topped the charts with this their debut single. They really couldn't have timed it any better. I immediately thought come back the Spice Girls all is forgiven. Actually I didn't because the Spice Girls weren't finished yet, but this is every bit as bad as your average Spice Girls record.
Verdict - Rubbish
If we give the records which were good 1 point each and those which were OK half a point, the final score is 8/30, or 27%. Not a very good week.
No comments:
Post a Comment