Chart Music: the Top Of The Pops Podcast - Chart Music #46 (Part 2): 17th December 1987 – Mission Accomplished, Agent King Cole

Episode Date: December 17, 2019

The latest episode of the podcast which asks: why didn’t they let Simon Bates do Top Of The Pops USA?We're out of the Critics' Choice series, Pop-Crazed Youngsters, so it's time to grasp the fly-encrusted and whiffy end of the Eighties Stick. It's a Thursday evening one week before Xmas in 1987, and your panel are a) in a Soho pub, chucking their musical-journalistic weight about, b) trapped in a bingo hall in Nottingham being handled like a piece of meat by randy octogenarians, and c) sprawled out on a rug in Yorkshire, with a garter snake wrapped around their glasses, waiting to be dazzled by the life-affirming beauty of Pop. Two of these people made the right choice that night.Musicwise, this is a heavily adulterated, gelled-up, suity, unwiped arse of an episode, with only a couple of standouts. Mike Read and Gary Davies pretend to be mates. Wet Wet Wet attempt to do True and fail. Mel Smith's attempt to encourage kids to hide in fridges is denied by the BBC. Mick Hucknall - leader of the Kennyist band in Pop - reminds us he can sing a bit. Nat King Cole cock-blocks Rick Astley. We finally get to see a bit of Top Of The Pops USA. And Kirsty and Shane and Neil and Chris ride in to save the day. None of these people are The Young Gods.David Stubbs and Sarah Bee join Al Needham for a rummage through the Quality Street tin of Xmas 1987, and - as always - the detours and tangents are manifold, including what it was like to work at Melody Maker in the Laties, how to buy a shark in Yorkshire, the lack of a decent wine cellar at Dingwalls, the pointlessness of CD Walkmans, the annual F-word debate, how Marti Pellow ruined Stars In Their Eyes, and an open apology to the Pogues for a 33 year-old LP review. Now available in Fun-sized portions, and full of rich, chunky swearing. Video Playlist | Subscribe | Facebook | TwitterSubscribe to us on iTunes here. Support us on Patreon here. This podcast is a member of the Great Big Owl family. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The following podcast is a member of the Great Big Owl family. This will certainly have an adult theme and might well contain strong scenes of sex or violence, which could be quite graphic. It may also contain some very explicit language, which will frequently mean sexual swear words. What do you like to listen to? Um... Chart music. chart music. Chart music. Hey, you pop crazy youngsters and welcome to part two of Chart Music number 46.

I'm your host Al Needham and here I am with Sarah B and David Stubbs. Me dears, we've already discussed in the previous part about 1987, late 1987, and yeah, we were just basically poking at it with a stick like it was something that was shifting about in a bin bag. Yes. It's safe to say we're not really looking forward to this, are we? It's going to be bracing in some ways, grimly, fascinatingly duff in certain respects,

but sometimes the crap is more interesting than the chocolate. Yes. Unless you're eating it, of course. Yeah. Well, as I've said, you know, I kind of go into these things with a sort of optimistic ear and I'm ready to hear a good thing. Because out of the three of us, Sarah,

you're probably going to be the one who was most likely to have watched this when it came out originally. Well, yeah, I probably would have done. Yeah, David would have been in the pub. I'd have been at the bingo hall. You're nine years old. This is your your time isn't it pop wise it is yeah which is not to say that everything about this time is going to give me the kind of proustian rush it's weird the stuff that gives you the sort of brain tingle of like oh my god i remember you know the stuff that kind of hot wires your memories

and gives you that sort of weird jolt back into the past. It's never what you think it's going to be. All right then, Pop Craze youngsters, it's time to go way back to December of 1987. Always remember, we may coat down your favourite band or artist, but we never forget, they've been on top of the pops more than we have. Hi, good evening. Welcome to the last time of the box before Christmas. It's 7pm on Thursday, December 17th, 1987. And as The Wizard by Paul Howcastle dies off,

and a sample of When I Think of You by Janet Jackson kicks in, we are confronted by our hosts in suits, which, as we'll see, will be a reoccurring theme of the night. Those hosts are Gary Davis and Mike Reed. Davis is still holding down the lunchtime slot on Radio 1, as he has since 1984 and would do until 1992, but he's also become the de facto Bull of the Woods on Top of the Pops. Not only is this his 23rd Top of the Pops presenting gig this year, but he's also presenting next week's Christmas Day special with Mike Smith.

He's also started to hold down a very prestigious Top of the Pops related side job of which we'll talk about in greater detail in a bit. Reed on the other hand is on a downward spiral at the BBC. His main TV presenting job at Saturday Superstore, finished when the show was replaced this year by Going Live, and his Radio 1 activities are now restricted to the weekend, where he presents Singled Out, the formerly titled Round Table on Friday evenings, the Saturday mid-morning slot, and Sunday Oldies, the replacement for Jimmy Savile's old record club on Sunday afternoons. He's still busy on the BBC, though. Last week, don't you know, he was a panellist on Call My Bluff.

How have the mighty fallen? It's really kind of annoying because if you think it's only about two or three years since he tried to get relax um banned and you just think and now he's trying to sort of rock up in his shades or whatever you know like he's still kind of mr with it or whatever it's just like fuck off to radio 2 you little tit you know you're you're pete murray now how dare you loiter around the kind of pop scene you know after you've you know after your censorious um drivel there's a 10 yearyear gap between Davis, who was 30 last week, and Reid, who is now 40.

And you can really tell, can't you? Yeah. I'll tell you what they look like. They look like around about Series 5 of Minder, when it was starting to get a bit less violent, regrettably. And they look like a couple of villains, you know, but slightly kind of market villains. You know, they've got Mike Reid, who's the brains of the outfit, dealing in antiques or whatever,

and he's just rolled up on the manor. And Gary Davis is his dubious muscle. He's got a no-match for Dennis Waterman. He's got a job lot of filofaxes to get rid of. Exactly, yes. That are a bit okay. This episode is right in itself already. Yes. The more episodes of Top of the Pops that I

watch again now, as I seem to be doomed to do, the more episodes of top of the pops that i watch again now as i seem to be doomed to do the more you just i just see this the darkness there's such a black hole of ego and kind of seething resentment and stuff in in the presenters you know it's like i kind of want to read an oral history of the entire kind of all the kind of power struggles and everything else, except that I really don't. There's just a darkness about it. You can see that some of them, there's just this kind of boiling resentment that they're not on the stage themselves. And just the kind of, you know, false chumminess between them. And you know that actually they're all kind of

trying to stab each other in the back. I don't know. I feel like there's probably a BBC drama to be made out of this, which I would not watch because I've seen enough of it. I think that part of that sense of the void is the void you sense in their knowledge. It goes back to really kind of Savile

and David Travitch, the Snow Eleven 60s and 70s. The fact that you just get the impression for them this is just showbiz and it's all kind of Savile and Davey Travitch, the Noel Evans 60s and 70s, the fact that you just get the impression for them this is just showbiz and it's all kind of interchangeable, really. It could be Call My Bluff, it could be Top Gear or whatever. It's just having these kind of slick presentational skills. And by and large, you know, these people, you don't really feel there's any actual connection between them and the music that they're presenting and fronting.

You know, it's almost... It's quite naked, really. You know, it's almost, it's quite naked, really. You know, their sheer lack of knowledge, their lack of interest. You know, people like Davey Travis, who famously didn't even own a record player. You know, you just don't get the impression that they have any engagement with the music, what's happening in the music, wouldn't ever pick up a copy of a music paper. They probably wouldn't even pick up smash hits. You know, that does change later on you

know even if it's something like janice long or whatever you know who and obviously john peel you know there's a genuine engagement with the music that's powerful i totally agree with you on the fact that the the presenters in the music are drifting apart but this would be the point and probably the first point since the early 70s where the presenters are dressing exactly like the pop stars yeah because it's an extraordinarily suity episode atop of the pops isn't it we're going to watch it is so suity it's so suity it's like because you you uh you put in the notes like everyone's in suits and and then i realized that you weren't kidding literally everyone's in suits even even the women it's like it's like you're watching a dinner dance of a fucking merchant banking organization where the uh where the

managers are allowed to go up on the stage and then all the kids are like the office juniors and they're in suits as well and the only difference is is is one load of suits are about 500 pounds more expensive than the other load of suits. And yet history just, you know, from this perspective, it's all just one big suit-y sludge. Yeah. And, you know, all the same. Yeah. You know, there's no real kind of like,

yeah, that's the more expensive one. It's like, no, they all just look... And they're boxy and voluminous and flappy and all the things that suits should not be. Yeah. It's a sort of throwback, really, to, I mean, the ironic wearing of suits, whatever, and suit and ties. When I was at Universal in the early 80s, I wore a shirt and tie every day,

but it was in a sort of, it was in a kind of radical sense. It was almost like, you know, it was a rejection of the sort of hoary, sort of medallion man type, sort of open neck shirts, or rock look, or whatever, which I just thought would become a sort of hoary sort of medallion man type sort of open neck shirts or rock look or whatever which i just thought would become a sort of hoary cliche whatever and all the kind of really smart bands you was even public image people like that they all wore you know they wore suits or they wore you know shirts and ties or whatever um as if to say look we we mean business you know

we're serious then later when you've got the zoot suit becomes a big thing you know blue ronald's turk and all that kind of stuff and And so, yeah, you've got really kind of boxy suits and whatever. And then it's kind of a sort of post-neuromantic thing, you know, referring back to a classier, more stylistic age. And I think that the kind of prevalence of suits throughout this episode is a slightly sort of tired extension of that particular idea. It's almost like a sort of forlornness that kind of overarches this entire episode about um there was once a more gracious age of soul and style

and finesse and we've just lost all of that we're just these pasty white inferiors yeah it just kind of manifested this sort of conservative default in this form doesn't it um as opposed to you know nothing against a good suit. These are, you know, but these are, none of these, I would say, are good suits. Yeah, they're horrible. Yeah, it's like the bands are terrified that they're going to pitch up a BBC Studios

and be turned away for not wearing Italian-style shoes. So we'd better not wear our jeans might not get in the presenting pool at top of the pops for 1987 apart from these two were mike smith steve wright janice long john peel simon mayo peter powell still and simon bates still wow fucking hell you can't get shot at Simon Bates, can you? I don't think Bates would have worn a suit. I think he'd hold fast to sports casual, wouldn't he? Yeah. Yeah.

Which is worse. Yeah. But yeah, Mike Reid here, kind of, I was trying to think of what his Reservoir Dog name would be. And it was, you know, because he does look, you know, he looks quite sort of funereal or gangstery in you know in in his own way um but i don't know mr beige maybe mr tope yes mr tope and uh they're still doing the um the the two presenter thing um but they were starting to

move away from it though in 1987, sometimes they'd let Davis or Smith present on their own just like in the good old days but they soon went back to the two presenter thing by the end of this year and they'd go through 1988 doing the same thing and they only started

to phase it out in April of 1989 I think it was kind of the buddy-buddy era in some ways, wasn't it? Yeah. It was chaps hanging out together with the, you know, with the sleeves of their suit jackets folded right up to their elbows and stuff like that. A bit of a kind of mind-by-vice thing was happening in films. There's probably a thesis to be written about this.

That's what they're going for, isn't it? Yeah, the buddy-buddy sort of thing you had about 87. They are not buddy-buddy, are they? You know, they... I don't know, maybe I'm projecting, but it's like not buddy buddy are they you know they i don't know maybe i'm maybe i'm projecting but it's like i just think they fucking hate each other don't like it should be me up there on my own carrying this entire thing yeah well in the case of reed that you can believe that but as the episodes of chart music roll on me dears we're we're kind of

groping towards the conclusion that gary was sort of all right, wasn't he? Yeah. I mean, Sarah, you were there, the last Gary Davis one we did in 1991. He started to look a little behind the times, but he was still hanging in there. He could still hang tough, if you will. Oh, yeah, he's definitely...

Well, you've put him next to Mike Reid, obviously. Mike Reid is going to make anyone look good. But, yeah, he's all right. The thing is that it's kind of a diagnosis of exclusion, isn't it, with Top of the Pops presenters? Like, who makes you feel the least creeped out and the least kind of oily? And Gary Davis, I think, a relatively low kind of oil quotient. Not literally, but I mean, he's he's got you know his hair's nice yeah you can carry off the kind of he's got on here he's got like a sort of self-stripe jacket

and open collared horrible shirt with mauve stripes but you know it's 1987 what are you going to do you can't you know it's it's all right it's like but the others the others do actually go into the negative whatever and with with g Gary Davis, he's just about, you know, it's almost like the bank account of his charm was about £3.50 in it or something like that. And it's better than just being kind of horrendously overdrawn, as it were. Gary Davis has also become the voice of the chart. The unveiling of the new Top 40 happened on his show

up until October of this year. And then it switched to sunday for the uh for the big reveal which was a huge mistake because that tuesday dinner time trek to save it or spend it to hear the new chart on the radio behind the tub was an absolute integral part of the week when i was at school and you know it upsets me to think that pop craze youngsters who were a few years younger than me were missing out on that thrill. But having it on Sunday made it a bit more unified, didn't it, I suppose. Yeah, yeah. It was something to do on Sundays as well. Yeah, it took the edge off the whole kind of back to school dread as well.

Something to talk about on Monday morning, I suppose. Yeah. Hi, good evening. Welcome to the last time of the Fox before Christmas. In the studio tonight, we have Pogues and Kirsty McCall, Simpy Redd and the Pet Shop Boys. And up 11 places to this week's number 21, Wet, Wet, Wet with Angel Eyes. Yay! CHEERING AND APPLAUSE Davis in a horrific late 80s striped mauve suit with billowy sleeves

and a purple and white striped shirt opened at the throat welcomes us to the last Top of the Pops before Christmas as he stands on a rostrum with some of the kids he partially spoiler alerts the show and then hands off to read in a black suit who introduces angel eyes home and away by wet wet wet formed in clydebank in 1982, Vortex Motion was a punk covers group fronted by a trainee painter and decorator called Mark McLachlan who changed their name to Wet Wet Wet soon after in tribute to the Skritty Polity song Getting, Having and Holding,

their style from Clash covers to Soul covers and the lead singer's name to Marty Pello. After linking up with a local club owner and setting up their own independent label, funded by a benefit gig by New Order, they released a demo in 1985, sparking a feeding frenzy amongst nine different British record labels. They eventually settled for Phonogram after adding a clause to their contract that the label had to deliver a crate of whiskers every month for the manager's cat.

However, after getting through two producers and being unsatisfied with both, the band were flown to Memphis, where they were linked up with their original choice, Willie Mitchell, the producer of Al Green, Annbbles and syl johnson in the early 1970s but when phonogram turned those demos down they went back to their original material did some overdubs and finally put out their debut single wishing i was lucky which got all the way to number six in june of 1987 helped by their supporting of Lionel Richie on his European tour. This is the follow-up to Sweet Little Mystery, which got to number five in September of this year, and is a remake of the song Home and Away, which featured in a compilation tape of Scottish

artists a year ago. It's also causing ructions with Chris Difford as the lyrics lift an entire verse from the 1985 squeeze single Heartbreaking World and it's up 11 places this week from number 32 to number 21. Now then me dears if you'd have told me back then that there was this band that had just come out who were all working class and they came from Glasgow and they were massively into soul and they'd actually gone to Memphis to sit at the feet of the masters. Oh, fucking hell. I would have ran through the windows of the local record shop to get their latest release. And then I would have gone, oh, it's wet, wet, wet. And then I would have gone, oh, at least it's not Primal Scream. Oh, wet, wet wet wet and then i would have gone oh at least it's not primal scream

oh wet wet wet the very nadir of whitey boy brit soul um do johnny hates jazz count no no probably they are then i don't know but i in some ways i can't i can't blame them it's like you know there is a truckload of money available for someone who can do this kind of very safe and dull kind of non-dimensional take on soul stuff. But it's very drippy. It is dreadful, really. I mean, it's quite telling in a way that they took their inspiration from Scrutipaliti because this is almost like a kind of homeopathic sort of extraction, really, from what Scruti were about and their relationship between black and white music and everything like that.

I mean, it's just straightforward, dull veneration of black authenticity. This was such a common thing at the time. Yeah, of course, Willie Mitchell, Al Green connection, as if somehow by osmosis that some of all of that will rub off on them. And I mean, there was just a lot of this in the culture at the time. A lot of people venerating sort of stacks and things like that. The worthy musics of like the 60s or the 50s or whatever. But, you know, but very frightened of contemporary black music.

You know, they weren't ever going to sort of listen to Eric B. and Rakim or anything like that. No. You know, this is like music that's been, you know, there has to be sort of black music has to have like aged respectively. It has to be this 30, 40-year gap before it can be properly venerated or whatever. I just find it rather pretty sick-making at the time.

I mean, look, Wet, Wet, Wet were not the young gods and therefore that made them a complete no-no. Marty Pellow, there was something utterly repulsive about him. I mean, every time he sent it was a bit like he was kind of like the priti patel of white soul really and so you know the face is kind of um it's twisted into like that kind of perma smirk you know i'm sure that like you know there must have been at the time you know somebody might have said to um marty peller you think it's funny then um your complete artistic poverty but that's just his face, and he just

seemed like the most awful, vile, smug tosser. You can just imagine a scene like in Hell, where everyone and all these kind of things, they're in a kind of vast sort of lake of like Satan's boiling snot or something like that, you know, for eternity. Ed Sheeran is up

to his neck in it, and Robbie Williams mysteriously is only up to his waist in it. So Ed Sheeran says to Robbie Williams, why are you only up to your waist, man? You're Robbie Williams, and he says, I'm standing on Marty Pellow's shoulders. That's what I reckon. But the strange thing was, then he got into heroin,

and he seemed quite sort of human after that. It had a kind of, you know, sort of positive effect on him. Good career move. Yeah, yeah, definitely. He just seemed, you're not such a bad old stick, really. Oh, yeah, you're showing your human side there.

Yeah, he only had to, like, go through this horrendous experience and almost die to win your respect. Indeed, well, yes. Yeah, I mean, I don't suppose that had any particular bearing on anything at all.

But, I mean, after that, you know, I did think, OK, well, perhaps he just happened to have one of those faces and I've been a bit, sort of been a bit unfair after that, you know, I did think, OK, well, perhaps he just happened to have one of those faces and I've been a bit unfair to you, you know, in my kind of earlier whatever. But this is an utterly, utterly dreadful, insipid, sort of inferiority,

conflictive white inferiority complex fare. And as for the suits, I mean, the guys, the non-pillow guys, they just, I mean, the suits are wearing them. You know, they just look like kind of very reluctant wear a suit once a year at a wedding type suit wearers um yeah i mean let's get it out the way straight away i hated marty pello for so long for fucking up stars in their eyes because you watch stars in their eyes and it'd be fucking brilliant. And then all of a sudden some twat would turn up and go, oh, tonight, Matthew, I'm going to be Marty Pello. And you just go, oh, fucking hell, he's won then, aren't they?

All you've got to do is go out there, have your hair slicked back and smile, and you've won Stars in the Rise. And it just fucking ruined it, man. There should have been a ban, a blanket ban on people trying to be Marty Pello on Stars in the Rise this song I mean

they've tried to remake True by Spandau Ballet exactly yes yes yes yes that's exactly what I was thinking

yeah and oh dear haven't they done a poor job readers it's like True if you left it out in the rain yeah

like it's I mean I went because I realised this for the first time and I went and listened to True after this and it was like listening to Wagner or something. It's like this kind of great big glitz-ass chocolate Taj Mahal dusted in gold dust, you know, compared to, it's a, yeah.

I mean, if you're going to do that thing, you might as well go for it and they have not gone for it. They've taken that truth to even drearier places than you thought would be conceivable. I mean, it's quite an impressive feat in some ways. It's earnest, isn't it? That's what the song should have been called. I don't know.

It's kind of studied, isn't it? I mean, this is kind of the problem with if you need to sort of absorb influence in a particular way and just allow it to work through you as opposed to kind of trying too hard to sort of nail what you know the essence of a thing because that's you know i think this is evidence that that doesn't really work it just screams we're not worthy we're not worthy of real authentic black type music and it's just like yeah indeed you're proving the point, and we'll get the fuck off the stage. It's a very poor third to Angel Eyes by ABBA

and Angel Eyes by Roxy Music. In the Premier League of songs called Angel Eyes, this would be struggling to get a spot in the Intertoto Cup. It would be struggling to draw with Arsenal. It's a fucking stupid song title anyway, because if an angel came down, their eyes would be like the last thing you noticed about them.

It's the fucking big wings. Exactly, yeah. If an angel came down now, yeah, you wouldn't go, oh, look at the eyes on that. Yeah, yeah. It's like, you might as well call it

angel arse, really. Yes, angel arse. Look at the celestial buttocks on that, you know. It wouldn't really be your first uppermost in your mind, would it? That's absolutely true. That's the weird Al Yankovic take on this,

if he were to find a reason to do that. I mean, I feel like I'm doing the old Jewish joke about the bad restaurant. Oh, the food here is terrible. I know, and such small portions. But there's so much space. There's too much space in this, and it's probably the least of its faults. But there's so much space there's too much space in this and it's probably

the least of its of its faults but there's there's just too much it's so sort of ploddy and over aerated the bridge

has got these little kind of string stabs which are just really they're just really annoying they're just

what are they doing there it's like David as a fellow Londoner I don't know if you you know the the parakeets that have now taken over. The green parakeets, which, I mean, they started off somewhere in South London.

Now they've basically colonised everywhere, which is incredible. I see them where I am, sort of in East London, like a couple of times a day. They're amazing things. They're sort of this incredibly bright green that you can't believe exists in nature. When you see them, they sort of flock past you. And it's like something out of Avatar. You know, these kind of amazing Japanese paper planes. But they're so beautiful and incredible.

But the sound they make is horrible. It's like being stabbed in the ear with a novelty shrieking machine. Yeah. And that's what these little... That's what it reminded me of. It's these kind of crazy tropical birds that we now have buggering up our ears in London. Lyric-wise, I mean, yes,

they did lift an entire verse off a squeeze song, which is unbelievable, but everybody forgets the fact that they also rip off Grease Lightning as well. You know, it goes on about being automatic, then systematic. And he doesn't have the bollocks to say he's also high dramatic. So, yes, shame on you, Martin. I mean, one development in Top of the Pops that we notice here

is that there's a cameraman right at the front and he's got one of those handheld jobs which looks pretty light so that must be a relief for the kids. Yeah. You suddenly haven't got this enormous Dalek-like thing charging towards you and just bowling you over. And, you know, we're going to see that camera

I'm late already. He gets quite involved, doesn't he? I mean, nowadays, we're almost seen as a one-hit wonder band, aren't they? They're the love-is-all-around hitmakers. So it's important for us to remember that they were pretty massive in 1987, weren't they?

Yeah, they were huge. Smash Hits readers have just voted them the best newcomers of the year. It's like Pop was an empty suit at this point and somebody had to fill it. Well, yeah, they were unbelievably massive. And the thing is that I know I always kind of try to let people off in some ways. But that is a thing is that they are kind of on the cusp of being really, really huge. And that's got to freak you out. When I realised it was where it went, I was like, oh, God, Marty Pellow with that terrible smug, that terrible smug grin that he has. But I think he hadn't quite developed it yet. And he actually looks a bit freaked most of the time it's a very stiff

they're all quite sort of stiff i mean the rest of the band look quite bored yeah and he looks a little bit he looks it always strikes me i know this is a thing i've said before but it always strikes me how young people are when they go on top of the box it's like fucking hell how old is he like 21 or whatever and it's like yeah he looks a little bit like oh what am i doing and there's that kind of you know it looks quite awkward but yes And there's that kind of, you know, he looks quite awkward. But yes, he does have that sort of smirky. I think he developed that. He developed a certain confidence and then went way over with it and just had that, it's like Adam Levine out of Maroon 5

who just has such a bad case of smug face. I mean, he's not developed that male stripper here yet. He's not gone full Nino Ferretto yet, has he? He's got this it's almost a bit permy is here and it's it's sort of scraped back and he's got he's got two earrings as well the hoopie ones yeah one in each i don't know what look he's going for there permy pirate that is the typical spiky gelled lab barnet that endured throughout the late 80s and into the early 90s yeah because every lad i went to school with had that hair so yeah which is which is weird actually they

properly like count the spikes gelled do which didn't look didn't look good on anyone and to use the parlance of the girls at my college at the time marty pello is wicked lush that that is the thing as well isn't it is that he was sort of pretty and it's like you're never going to be taken seriously if you're you're sort of that kind of obviously pretty i feel like we should give him credit for actually being able to sing i know it's a low bar but he can sing he's got a good voice it's just that he's not very good on the high notes though but he he kind of can sing he has got the pipes but it's quite it's quite affected and sort of self-conscious and there's too many kind of flourishes and hiccups and swoops you know like you don't have to prove that you can sing you can just sing i just don't think it's important to be able to sing

at all ralph hutter marquis. Smith, et cetera, et cetera. Well, you know, yeah, of course there's... Oh, no, I'm not even going to... There's got to be something else. There's got to be something else. I mean, just the sort of technical capability is just, you know, it's not enough. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's no good to just flash your melisma about. Yeah, exactly. But, I mean, here's the thing about Pop Crumpet of 1987. I mean, they weren't boys, were they? I mean, Marty Pello's quite young on here,

but he looks kind of grown up. I mean, let's go through the most fanciful male lists in the Smash It's Readers poll. It goes like this. Philip Schofield, Morton Harkett,

Bruce Willis, Marty Pello, John Taylor, Tom Cruise, Michael Jackson, parkett bruce willis marty pello john taylor tom cruise michael jackson john bon jovi george michael and michael j fox i mean you know compared to what's coming down the line in a couple of years time none of those people are going to have any problems buying some cans and a packet of benson and edges from the off-lights and so on they that's true I mean even Bross who was seen as a complete sea change you wouldn't call them boys so much you know you were encouraged to drop the boy remember I'm your man yes I am who were Marti Pella's being pegged as crumpet but he's still got to do all that other

boring pop star stuff at the same time. Yeah. There's no dance routines going on here, thank fog. Yeah, what would Pans people do with angel eyes? They'd float about, wouldn't they? I suspect that wings would feature somewhere as well in the props department. It would have been great if they'd got them in the harnesses. What do you call them? Yeah, so they'd be descending, yeah,

so there's little sort of hoops attached to their heads and hands clasped in prayer and et cetera, et cetera. Eyes, of course, to the fore. Well, that's the thing. I feel like there's a missed opportunity here. They could have Christmassed it up a bit. Yeah, this is an interesting thing. I mean, it is the week before Christmas. I know.

They've not gone full on with Christmas, are they? No. Where's the fucking tin on with Christmas, are they? No. Where's the fucking tinsel? Hello, my darlings. It's me, Anna Mann, actress, singer, welder. Got to have a backup. I've been in everything, my darlings, and I've been cut from most things.

However, I will not be cut from one thing, and that is my own podcast, Talking to Actors with Anna Mann, where I meet those rarest of creatures, the actors. That's Talking to Actors on the Great Big Hour. It's like there's no...

You would not know, if you watched this with the sound off, you would not know that this was the last Top of the Pops before Christmas. And that's good, I like that. Yeah, I mean that's actually one thing that commends this episode. I like it when Top of the Pops does Christmas though, it's what's what's not to like i mean not that i'm i'm not the most christmassy person but if you're gonna you know it's you can't really avoid it you might as well stick your head in it and you know get some get some glitter going it's only december the 17th it's not proper christmas yet when did christmas start in 90 because you know

obviously uh what happens now is uh all the adverts start in uh late october and you go fuck off it's not christmas yet and then you go fuck off no it's still not christmas still not christmas still not christmas and then first of december you're like oh fuck i haven't done anything for christmas and now and now i'm fucked um i bought nothing i i don't know how how to get a fucking turkey from where. But yeah, I think in 1987, Christmas probably didn't start until, I don't know, like the 15th or something. Do you reckon? Yeah, I'm up a little bit about that. The earliest ever sort of, oh my God, it's Christmas soon for me was July.

And this was at IPC magazines in the building there. And in the lift, you know, Buster Merrifield out of Only Fools and Horses, you know, and he was dressed up as Santa Claus. So they had such long lead times that were already doing the shoot for their Christmas edition, one of these women's magazines. So, yeah, yeah.

Oh, yeah, that is a thing in journalism where, yeah, Christmas in July, and there's a load of, like, PR events and stuff yeah, that is a thing in journalism where, yeah, Christmas in July, and there's a load of, like, PR events and stuff that actually just are called Christmas in July. And, you know, and so you deal with that in the summer and then you forget all about it until you're forced to remember it in October. But, yeah, fair enough, I suppose. But it did weird me out a bit.

I was like, where's the Christmas shit? I don't understand. So the following week, Angel Eyes jumped eight places to number 13, and two weeks later it got to number five. And when the single was released in America, Chris Difford was finally given a co-writing credit. The follow-up, Temptation, only got to number 12, but the next single, a cover of The Beatles with a little help from my friends,

got to number one for four weeks in May of 1988. That's the NME's fault, isn't it? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. That Sgt Pepper knew my father tape. Yes, yes. They'd go on to score two more number ones with Goodnight Girl in 1992

and Love Is All Around in 1994. But the band split up in 1999 when the drummer realised he wasn't getting paid as much as everyone else and Marty Pello checked into the Priory to sort out his addictions where he ran into... Christopher to squeeze. Yes.

Oh, awkward. As he began his solo career. Isn't that nice? It is nice. It is. It's legitimately nice. This is what heroin does. You know, you just realise that we're all human

and we should just be kind to one another. Is that what the two-page advert said in the middle of that? Heroin brings people together. Well, yeah. 🎵 You're a baby And we're those angel eyes Christmas tree, yeah, Christmas party, yeah. Mistletoe hung where you can see every couple's happy star. Read. Standing in front of a cluster of kids who aren't particularly arsed about being around a Radio 1 DJ, or at least this one, gives us a potted history of the next single.

It's Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree by Mel and Kim, or to give the full title, Comic Relief Presents Mel and Kim, performed by Kim Wilde and Mel Smith. Formed in London by Richard Curtis and Lenny Henry in 1985, Comic Relief was officially launched on Christmas Day of that year from a refugee camp in Sudan on a festive episode of Noel Edmonds' The Late Late Breakfast Show. Something else to blame Noel for there.

Their debut single, Living Doll by Cliff Richard and the Young Ones, entered the charts at number four in March of 1986 and got to number 1 for 3 weeks. This is the follow-up, a cover of the 1958 Brenda Lee single, which got to number 6 in January of 1963, and was last seen in the charts when the Jets got it to number 63 in December of 1983, and it teams Kim Wilde, whose last single, Say You Really Want Me, got to number 29 in August of this year.

And Mel Smith, formerly of Not The Nine O'Clock News, currently of Alas Smith & Jones, whose 1980 single, Gob On You, sadly failed to chart. It's moved up this week from number 13 to number 6 and we're being treated to the video sans fridge-related palaver. Here's your Christmassy-ness, Sarah. Yeah, I know. Be careful what you wish for, right? I was going to say this is sort of too wet, but it's not.

It's kind of too dry and crummy. It's like a sort of it's like a cake that you've that you've left in for a bit too long yeah and you get it out and it's like oh this was going to be festive but but now look it's just a bit sad and it's it's kind of you know it's just got to go straight in the bin i mean it does combine the two obsessions of the the pop world of the late 80s which is covering old shit and doing stuff for charity. Wet, dry, I think it's too shit is probably the problem. But it's awful.

I mean, Mel Smith is not incapable of mirth. Kim Wilde is lovely and done some lovely pop. Kim Wilde is lovely, I should say. It's not the people involved. It's the concept of it. It's just dreadful. It's just who on earth would, you know, charity notwithstanding, I mean, who would buy this?

You can't possibly be a fan of music and like this. You can't possibly be a fan of comedy and like this. And, I mean, music and comedy quite often is, at the very best, it's a bit like mixing ice cream and gravy. But it seems to be a kind of degeneration, really. I mean, shortly after this thing, you had Haylen Pace doing the stonk. I think that was the next contribution. No, there's like a further sort of rapid degeneration, you know.

So he's starting off with his kind of, you know, you've got the kind of, you know, the punkish spirit of things kind of translating into comedy, and you've got the young ones who, you know, and it's passable, the thing with Cliff Richard or whatever, it's, you know, quite a kind of sort of sporting little liaison going on there. But this is just... I mean, the idea, David, of the young ones and Cliff Richard

actually getting together on something, that was, you know, that was something that was celebrated throughout the nation. Yeah, yeah, definitely. I would say that was actually funny. But this, nobody really wanted Mel Smith and Kim Wilde together. Getting Kim Wilde and Mel Smith together just because they've got the same name as the greatest ever stockache and warpen act

is not really of the same order. And it's just like, I don't know, it's just a sort of degeneracy of humour that you're getting at this point. It's a bit like with punk, you know, eventually sort of punk degenerates into a certain sort of quirkiness, you know, coloured sort of rimmed glasses-ness that you get, you know, with the fabulous poodles and groups with names like the Dickies or whatever. It's just like where something is just lost,

especially in British hands. Everything just becomes sort of quirky in a dismally British, deeply, deeply unfunny way. Yes. And, I mean, clearly people must have, you know, this must have been sort of programmed and designed, you know, to push certain buttons or whatever, and people would have gone out and bought it,

but God knows who. It is really weird, isn't it? And God help us as a country and a species. I don't think it, well, I wouldn't go that far. It's just a sort of a bit of an inexplicable thing. And it is just really sort of, again, it's kind of, it's quite nothingy in a completely different way to Wet, Wet, Wet, but nonetheless.

I mean, I don't know. This is dry dry dry it's kind of less than some of its parts isn't it really because yeah kim wilde lovely and and brilliant uh mel smith you know funny funny guy uh you know who's who's an intelligent funny guy he was my favorite character on not the nine o'clock news and this is a good song isn't it isn't it a good song if you like that sort of thing placing the right hands yeah you know but it's that's the thing is it just kind of doesn't so yes let's so the video which is what we get here is just kind of i just watched it in kind of bafflement like is it so it's meant to be funny

because it's a comic relief single but there's just no i don't really get it there's a kind of thing there's they're sort of trying to play on the thing of like how kim wilde is is you know this radiant pop star who looks like marilyn monroe's little sister in a sort of 1950s dress and and is sort of skipping around a 1930s semi and mel smith with a big teddy boy, Quiff, uh, who is a, you know, a large, a large pudding of a man, um,

who, who, um, is, and it's meant to be that it's funny because, uh, he's, he's not as attractive as her and she's sort of going,

oh dear, look at the state of you. And, and then there's kind of some, what they're doing together. So what, okay. But,

you know, and then this is, it's curiously sort of joyless, isn't it? Yeah. So they, yeah, I mean, they open the door. There's various kind of guest stars, which is what you would expect in a comic relief thing. But that's a kind of procession of pointlessness as well. So you get Curiosity killed the cat.

As carol singers. As carol singers. By this time, Curiosity killed the cat. They were on a bit of a downward slant. I mean, they'd come back in the early 90s, but in comparison to Wet, Wet, Wet, they are yesterday's men. They've come straight back down yawl, if you will. Yeah.

I wonder if even in 1987 there'd have been people struggling to recognise them, actually. Well, I had to look it up. And then there's some spitting image puppets who are apparently of Bette Midler and Tina Turner. Which really threw me, because I thought, what's Dee Snider out of Twisted Sister doing there? And, yeah, and then there's the Mekon, apparently. Yes.

Kind of lying around the house. Yes, the Mekon's watching the telly, yeah. Apropos of nothing, it's really odd. It's like a kind of complete non sequitur, isn't it, the whole thing? Yeah, and then Griff Rees-Jones pops out from under the stairs and gets shoved back in again. Yeah. Because in the video, the full video, which we don't see,

is Smith and Jones doing that, staring at each other over a table thing, and then all of a sudden, Kim Wilde appears in Griff Rees-Jones' place. Yeah. And, place. And yeah. And inexplicably a big up for Rolf Harris, which of course was fine at the time, but has not aged well.

No. Yeah, there's nothing worse than just being prodded with a comedy stick the whole time, which is what this video is trying to do. It's just intensely annoying. But I mean, obviously to say that they're not the young gods is is very much an understatement whether they've raised more money if they'd released new de la lune by young gods in all its imperious glory i suppose is a debatable point but um even now even something

like this you are it's infected by this idea of like you know the great sort of classical gracious past or whatever in which you know we're in a sort of permanent state of um inferiority in 1987 it's even something like this you know the idea is is coming through well because they're trying to be american aren't they you know they're having oh yeah they make they make mention of the fact that they're eating pumpkin pie and root beer and all that kind of stuff. Set in one of those old school houses that was beloved of videos of the early 80s. Yeah, it is our house in the middle of our street, isn't it? Exactly.

But again, you know, with the whole charity thing was obviously, you know, Band Aid 1984, Live Aid 1985, then Comic Relief and this, you know, you would think that the nation was sort of steeped in a kind of newly fashionable sort of yeasty benevolence but they still vote for bloody thatcher didn't they even when they put up neil kinnick something that inoffensive do you think people were buying this and out of was it just like the thing that you did it's like well this is the comic relief single so

you you're gonna you're gonna buy it because it's for charity and that's just what you do i think that's what they were wanting you to do by 1987 kim wilde's been pushed away from being the new wave influence pop kid to uh she's now become the sultry fox draw yeah and it's paid off because she had a number two this time last year with you keep me hanging on and she also did a duet with junior early in the year which got to number six but um this era isn't what we remember Kim Wilde for, is it? No. I can imagine that she'd get drunk on the tube or something on the late night train and start singing

something. Oh, I'd forgotten about that. That was so wonderful. She just seems so kind of charming and lovable, doesn't she? And of course the charity single is still very much a thing in 1987 and would be for many years to come. I mean, Ferry Aid was the big charity single of the year,

got to number one for three weeks in April of this year, and Kim Wilde was on that as well. Yeah, I think they tried to do one for Elephant Aid, and by that point, I think Charity Fatigue really said, oh, fuck it, I'm not the fucking elephants. You do get a sort of saturation point. But there were quite a lot of comic relief songs, weren't there? Shall we talk about the damage that comic relief

had wrought upon the charts throughout the 90s and beyond? Go on, then. So, yes, 1991 was The Stonk by Hayley and Pace, which got to number one. 1992, I Want To Be Elected by Smear Campaign, which got to number nine. 1993, Stick It Out by Right Said Fred, got to number four.

1994, Absolutely Fabulous by the Pet Shop Boys, Jennifer Saunders and Joanna Lumley, number six. 1995, Love Can Build a Bridge by Cher, Chrissie Hine, Nenna Cherry and Eric Clapton, number one. 1999, When the Going Gets Tough by Boyzone, number one. 2001, Uptown Girl by Westlife, number one. 2003, Spirit in the Sky by Gareth Gates and the Q-Mars, number one 2003 Spirit in the Sky by

Gareth Gates and the QMars number one 2005 All About You McFly number one 2007 Walk This Way by the Sugar Babes and Girls Aloud number one

and so on and so on and so on the worst thing is so on. I mean the worst thing is almost the insult to Indians that you know that the mitigating factor in this is where it's all for charity but of course you know not to put a political hat on but you know charity is a very very 19th century way

of dealing with like any issue of gross social inequality or whatever and come the 21st century and you're getting really heavy hairs you know even if something like Tomones or whatever on some sort of fundraiser and he's worth two or three hundred million and he said we're trying to get a big push now we're going to try and push towards the 20 million like says i tell you what we'll give nothing you just give 50 million and just try and get by on the rest of like you know what you earn and if like you know it's it's nonsense like that you know and you know, like, constantly kind of banging the sort of drum,

you know, for various causes or whatever, but not paying their taxes. And this should be an issue of taxation, not sort of people putting their hands in their pockets. And therefore, it isn't a coincidence that, you know, whilst everybody's full of, like, feeling, you know, like, generosity and feeling good about themselves, about sort of putting a few coins in a bucket or whatever, they're still bloody voting for Thatcher.

So the following week, Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree nipped up three places to number three, where it spent two weeks. The follow-up, a cover of The Beatles' Help with Bananarama and La La Leenie Noo Noo, also got to number three for two weeks in March of 1989. What did comedy do to deserve this? If you mind, Melvin, everyone's dancing merrily

In the new group of Old Fashioned Away Wow, yeah, that was fantastic. Mel and Kim are rocking around the Christmas tree. At number 17 in the charts, the band are currently on tour and have done a great new version of a classic Cold Porter song called Every Time We Say Goodbye. Here's Simply Red. CHEERING AND APPLAUSE Every time we say goodbye

I die a little Davis, on the balcony surrounded by more trainee bank clerks who can't do up their fucking ties properly, tells us that we're going to be treated to another cover version. This time, it's Every Time We Say Goodbye by Simply Red. We've already covered Simply Red in Chart Music number 22, and this, their ninth single, is the follow-up to maybe someday which only got to number 88 in august of this year it's a cover of the 1944 cole porter song which had never

charted in the uk before and it's the fourth cut from their second lp men and women which got to number two in the lp charts in march and it's up this week from number 33 to number 17 now neither of your two have done simply red yet so uh let me just kick off by a simple question are simply red the kennyest band in all pop music history the kennyist the kennyist by that i mean yes is can anybody name a member of simply red who isn't mick hucknall ah no this is bothering me the other day i mean cold cold player also very much like that famously but um but yeah um but yeah i can name all of cold play but there you go there you go that's me i mean, if you were a Nazi war criminal still going around in the mid-80s, being a member of Simply Red would be a good move, wouldn't it?

That's right, yeah. Martin Borman on keyboards. Yes. Well, didn't they change the line-up quite a bit, didn't they? I mean, basically it was him and some others. But, yes, you do make a good point. I could not, under any circumstances, name another member of Simply Red.

No wonder there were people like my mates at college who really thought that Mick Hocknall's first name was Simply. Simply and the Reds. And here, if you're in Simply Red, you're not even being asked to go on top of the pops this time, are you? No. Because this time it's just Mick Hocknell in a suit, which makes him look like Lion-O out of Thundercats at a christening.

And there's a female cellist and there's a bloke on the piano who might be in Simply Red, but I don't fucking know because no fucker knows who else is in Simply Red. It's what we've been talking about throughout this series, this idea of soul veneration being the kind of sort of defining note of the time. And Mick Hutton was Simply Red. They got famous through covering the Valentine Brothers, and he's too tight to mention.

Yeah. Pointlessly. And again, all he seems to be saying is, oh, there was such great soul music. There was such a sort of classical and gracious times, you know, past times, and I'm just and gracious times, you know, past times, and I'm just this pasty, you know, twat. Why?

What is the point of all of this? You know, but nonetheless raking in the acres on a sort of industrial scale. And then, you know, that's signified here by hiring in the, you know, the classical instruments or whatever, you know, as if, you know, you can sort of, you know,

denote style and grace as if it's something you can sort of hire by the hour. I mean, they're looking at him pretty homicidally, actually, as if to say, you know, you can imagine like, you know, you know, 20 takes, you know, I want to get it right, you know, take 20. And so it's like, look, you can't, we got it right from the start, you know.

But, you know, what can you say? What the hell is happening with his hair? He looks like he's sort of... That's just his hair, David. That's kind of the point. Half of it looks like it's some sort of new wave of heavy metal who's decided to recant and has shaved off half of it on one side

and then he's run out of batteries on his clipper. He's going for a Phil-okey, isn't he? Yeah, something like that. He's Phil-blokey. It's kind of like the cover of Kylie's first album on his clipper. He's going for a Phil-okey, isn't he? Yeah, yeah, something like that. He's Phil-blokey. Yes. It's kind of like the cover of Kylie's first album, where she's got one of those, you know, the hat with the open, whatever you call them,

and it's all swept over to one side, like some noodles falling off a plate in slow motion. At this time, Mick Hucknall's going around telling everyone that he's the greatest singer-songwriter in the UK, but he's leaning hard on the cover versions i mean their second album men and women it's got three cover versions on it it's got this it's got something by bunny whaler and it's got let me have it all by sly and the family stone so it's like what are you going on about here mick exactly i know but plonking his own stuff alongside it as if it sort of ranks in the same order. But this is the dawning of the whack out a slow cover version for Christmas trend, isn't it?

Of course, there's When I Fall in Love by Rick Astley that's out at the minute at number two. There's also Love Letters by Alison Moyet. Other cover versions in the top 40 this week are Some Guys Have All the Luck by Maxi Priest. Never Can Say Goodbye by the communards and of course what do you want to make those eyes at me for by chicken steven but having said that we are a long way away from mad world and all that shit yeah i suppose so yeah but you know basically simply reds were definitely not the young gods and right down there in the sort of debauched culture bunkers wherever you know we would have been utterly disdainful of all of this

and felt like we're almost like humanity divided into two separate species. Oh, David. It's just perverse. It's just like, you know, I'm sure that Mick Huckman would be the first to say, of course, I could never do justice to Sarah Vaughan's version of this. Well, then don't even try. Step aside. Let us listen to Sarah.

Don't defile the world with your inferior effort yeah the last thing the words can say of course i think i brought qualities to it that people like sarah vaughan just really weren't capable of reaching just like why are you doing this why are you inflicting this on us i'm not sure that he would say that actually because um one thing you can say about mick hucknall is that I don't know, maybe he would, but having recently read David Bedden, our chum, hi Dave, interviewed him and did a Baker's Dozen on The Quietest, which is where a musician chooses their kind of 13 favourite records.

And it's interesting when people do the Baker's Dozen thing or anything like that where it's musicians talking about other people's music because I think it always speaks to their character if they've got a lot to say about the work of other people because, you know, not everyone does. And, you know, you can tell he's a real fan, he's a real lover of music and he knows a lot about it

and the enthusiasm and the kind of respect and thoughtfulness that comes across in this is quite palpable. I mean, yeah mean yeah covers you can i've often kind of been bemused at the idea like yeah why why would you bother you know you're not bringing anything new to it it is going to be inferior but i don't know it just occurred to me when you were when you were saying that like why why would anyone you know what what the fuck are you doing just sit down and shut up i wonder if the compulsion to do it is something in something you could compare to the sort of tradition of folk songs where it's passed down from one generation

to another and people may be bringing something new to it maybe not but making sure that it's still heard and there must be so many songs that i've heard for the first time through a cover version and maybe that's not the ideal way to do it, but, you know, then you go and you seek out the original. And it is kind of keeping things in the consciousness. There's a sort of gateway argument there, which is fair enough. But when they would say, if you are going to do a cover, though, cover it the way that Soft Cell covers Tainted Love or whatever, or a certain ratio covers Shack Up,

or Talking Heads cover Al Green's Take Me to the River, you know. Bring something formally and significantly different. You know, there's a sort of faithfulness about this cover that I kind of find cloying and annoying and pointless. However, with my whole thing about Mick Hocknell, there's a big Alan Shearer type, but, but, with the Valentine brothers, they have got no complaints whatsoever

about Mick Hocknell covering Money's Too Tight to Mention because they got very nicely looked after on that one. Thank you very much. Yeah, Money suddenly got baggy and loose for them, didn't it? Yeah, Money got very loose indeed, yes. I mean, like every single Simply Red performance of the era, it's a reminder that Mick Hocknell can sing a bit. That's what we're supposed to take away from all this.

And here he is with a thoughtfully wrapped gift that you can put under the Christmas tree of your record collection. But that became the sort of death of soul in the end, the fact that it was reduced to a set of learned gymnastic vocal movements. I don't know, I mean, it's quite, in comparison to Marty

Pellow, whose singing is quite studied, I think there's this kind of effortlessness about Mick Hucknall's performance here where he knows what he's doing and he's very relaxed and confident in his ability. And I'm not sure that it probably doesn't add very much

to anything but his own wallet. But he's good. He's a good singer. And this is a great song. And, you know, what are you going to do? What are you going to do? Simply Red were extremely erratic in the charts around about this time. It wouldn't be until the early 90s with Stars and all that lot that they really bedded in as a regular chart-busting act.

as a regular chart-busting act. And of course, if Mick Hocknall's to be believed in his interviews at this moment, the song really should be called Every Time We Say Goodbye, I Go Off and Shag Someone Else. He does have quite a reputation as a notorious shagger. I've heard so many mixed things about Mick Hocknall. So my Facebook, which is a reliable repository of pop anecdote and scurrilousness, and said, what's so Mick Hucknall then?

And various people seem to have had brushes with him. And someone said that they'd nicked a cab from under his nose once in Manchester while he was distracted chatting up some ladies. So that was a good effort. Someone else said that she'd ended up in a queue behind him at an airport or something and was stunned by how fancy-bully he was. So there you go. Yeah, just like I never knew and in the flesh it's undeniable. Right.

He's a sexy motherfucker. So there you go. Some people just got it i mean i think i think history will probably be kind to him i think it's kind to him now it's kind of being kind to him now i mean and and the thing about you know whether or not someone is a horny blighter or a kind of cheesy twat or a you know that's kind of you hope that's going to burn off in the end and then what's left is is you know what is the work you know and i i i kind of, you hope that's going to burn off in the end. And then what's left is, is, you know, what is the work, you know?

And I, I, I kind of give him a pass for, um, holding back the years. Like if, if that had been the, if they'd been a one hit wonder and that had been it,

I mean, you would really, that would kind of resonate through the decades, wouldn't it? The best song. So the following week, every time we say goodbye, jumped six places to number 11, where it stayed for two weeks.

The follow-up, I Won't Feel Bad, would only get to number 68 in March of 1988, but they roared back in early 1989 when the LP A New Flame spent seven weeks at number one and yielded three top 20 singles, including a cover of Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes' spent seven weeks at number one and yielded three top 20 singles, including a cover of Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes' If You Don't Know Me By Now, which got to number two for three weeks in April of this year, held off number one by Eternal Flame by The Bangles. But how strange the change from major to minor. Every time we say goodbye. Right then, let's just leave this here because I'm feeling a bit queasy. I can't go on with this episode. It's fucking awful.

Come and join us, Pop Craze youngsters, for part three when we see if this bag of cat's arsehole stinks a little less minging. Thank you, Sarah B. Keep holding on.

Thank you, David Stubbs. Keep the faith. My name's Al Needham. Stay Pop crazed. Shark music.