In my post for November I mention the breakstep sub genre of UK garage and how "138 Trek" by DJ Zinc was the only example I could thing of. This month I see I forgot "I Don't Smoke" by DJ Dee Kline which charted first. Maybe the name breakstep came about between the two records.
The other UK garage record this month is "Girls Like Us" by B15 Project featuring Chrissy D & Lady G and as a result it's full marks to the garage genre. The record "What's Your Name" by Angel Lee had a well know garage mix by MJ Cole but for the purpose of this exercise we need to go with the original R&B version which gets no marks.
In fact none of the R&B record this month get any points and all are of the pop variety. It includes the Pink debut single "There You Go" which does have a decent garage mix but again we have to go with the crap original.
The nearest we do get to an R&B point is "Shackles (Praise You)" by Mary Mary. It's a gospel record but does make its way onto R&B compilations. I ended up buying the album but this was the only decent track on it.
Rap wise we have Richard Blackwood making his Top 40 debut with "Mama - Who Da Man?" and comes across as the British Will Smith which is never good. Jay-Z had "Big Pimpin" which is also crap. We did however have "Forgot About Dre" by Dr Dre & Eminem which is another record to have a decent garage mix but this time the original is just as good and almost good enough to be the best record.
Beating it to best record is Moby with "Porcelain". I had contemplated buying his "Play" album based on previous singles, but this one was so good it prompted me to buy the album. One of the all time chill out greats.
This month feels a bit of a turning point for trance music in the charts. We have some decent ones such as "A9" by Ariel and "Embrace" by Agnelli & Nelson. Then there's "It's My Turn" by Angelic, a Judge Jules project featuring his wife on vocals which is a bit cheesy and commercial but I like it. Then we have vocal rubbish from BT & Kirsty Hawkshaw with "Dreaming" and possibly the worst instrumental trance record of all time "Sandstorm" by Darude which just sounds plain lazy. These latter two are examples of commercial trance losing it's way for their respective reasons.
We also have one of the worst house records to make the charts, "You See The Trouble With Me" by Black Legend which just made me think dance music was getting far too commercial that we're getting nonsense like this.
The worst record though reminds me of perhaps the worst nightclub I've ever been too. It's "Reach" by S Club 7 that was played every time I went there. These were the days when pubs shut at 11pm and the only place to get a drink after was the nightclub. This was the main nightclub in a small town that everyone went to after the pub and I can still picture all those drunken people putting their hands in the air to reach for the stars.
Here's a list of the records with the best on top, worst at the bottom and the good ones in green, OK ones in amber and rubbish ones in red (and in no particular order):
Here's a look at the chart:
The worst month of 2000 so far. We also had a slump in June 2001, maybe there's something in that.
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