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BuzzJack Music Forum _ Spice Girls _ Downtown or Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)?
Posted by: Jay ☆ 24th August 2019, 11:53 AM
Which is your favourite Children in Need charity single? Emma Bunton's Downtown or Spice Girls' Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)?
Vote now and feel free to discuss!
Listen here:
Posted by: Jade 24th August 2019, 11:57 AM
I voted for 'Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)' which I feel gets a bit too much of a hard time! Although I do agree with the criticisms of the video. 'Downtown' is nice enough but there are so many other 'Life In Mono' tracks that I'd choose to listen over it.
Posted by: Jay ☆ 24th August 2019, 12:17 PM
I've voted for Headlines! I don't often listen to Downtown anymore.
~~~
01. 61,978 Take That - Patience
02. 30,639 Akon feat Eminem - Smack That
03. 30,582 Emma Bunton - Downtown
04. 21,718 Justin Timberlake feat T.I. - My Love
05. 16,686 Westlife - The Rose
06. 16,472 Beyonce - Irreplaceable
07. 13,928 Fedde Le Grand - Put Your Hands Up for Detroit
08. 11,202 All Saints - Rock Steady
09. 10,583 Girls Aloud - Something Kinda Ooooh
10. 10,571 Razorlight - America
I had completely forgotten about this - Downtown only needed to sell 58 more copies and it would have peaked at #2! 
It was released a week earlier to download, selling 5,025 copies to enter at #24. I know in 2006 that it was common to have a download only week before the physicals came out, but it's a pity the label didn't time the download release to coincide with the physical instead. I know in the grand scheme of things that #2 vs #3 isn't much difference, but a higher peak is always nice! 58 downloads probably would have been sold late on Saturday night just before the physical release chart week began lol~
Downtown became the final ever Spice Girls related UK Top 10 hit in the UK 
01. 57,954 Leona Lewis - Bleeding Love
02. 32,881 T2 feat. Jodie Aysha - Heartbroken
03. 26,847 Take That - Rule the World
04. 25,044 Timbaland feat. OneRepublic - Apologize
05. 24,355 Mark Ronson feat. Amy Winehouse - Valerie
06. 24,009 Shayne Ward - Breathless
07. 19,542 Alicia Keys - No One
08. 17,646 Kylie Minogue - 2 Hearts
09. 15,807 Girls Aloud - Call the Shots
10. 15,386 Sugababes - About You Now
11. 14,941 Spice Girls - Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)
446 more copies needed to be #10. 
Who would have thought that a comeback/original single from Spice Girls would perform less well than Emma's cover version from the year before? Headlines had two weeks of availability on download, as well as one week available via the Greatest Hits, before the Headlines physical was released. In its previous two weeks it sold: 7,197 (#20) & 5,900 (#23) = 13,097 downloads sold prior to physical release week.
Posted by: Spiceboy 24th August 2019, 05:38 PM
Omg I did not know Headlines had two weeks on download sale prior to the physical, that is ridiculous if they had sold the same amount in the week of release that would have been over 28,000 copies which would at least have been enough to chart at #3 like Downtown... oh that’s really annoyed me now 
Posted by: Spiceboy 24th August 2019, 05:45 PM
Ps I prefer Headlines, I do like the song Downtown more but I prefer the Petula Clark version to Emma’s has a bit more of a boost to it (her voice is better too). Headlines is a gorgeous song it just wasn’t strong enough for a comeback track they really needed another stomper of a song something like Something New ala Girls Aloud or Don’t stop moving ala S Club 7 (thank god they didn’t go with Voodoo though that is just atrocious, I’ve actually deleted that from my iTunes!
Posted by: Blond 2.0 24th August 2019, 10:01 PM
Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)
Posted by: pippa 26th August 2019, 03:14 PM
Headlines.
Posted by: Spiceboy 26th August 2019, 03:40 PM
Who voted Downtown? Whoever it is doesn't want to come forwards 
Posted by: Mr.X 26th August 2019, 04:31 PM
I had to go with Headlines PURELY because Downtown is a cover and that Headlines was ok during the live Return tour.
BUT both are still not that amazing, are they? Emma releasing two Children in Need singles back to back - and neither setting the charts alight in the slightest - must have been quite a slap in the face. She was part of two of the worse selling ones ever right?
Headlines was such a disaster though. The song is fine, my main issue with it is how lazy the lyrics are and as a 5-some their singles at least seemed to have a bit more lyrical imagination than just about pining for a lover. Headlines didn't. And then there are the other issues:
- Terrible promo; Two mimmed performances on TV shows, one of which wasnt even broadcasted. Terrible staging/design/costumes/styling.
- Incredibly, surprisingly bad video; For a group that was so well known for their iconic videos and showed unity betweenn them, it was so f***ing bad.
- The release strategy. Really? The CD two weeks after the digital file is available AND one week after the GH cd? WTF were they thinking?
The best thing about this song was the live performance on tour, where the song kind of came back to life (mainly due to the outro and it sounded a bit more rocky). It still was just kind of 'there' during the tour though, but at least it sounded better than the studio version ah.
Downtown was fun at the time. It's dead now, I always forget about it.
Posted by: Jay ☆ 26th August 2019, 07:34 PM
Completely agree with you about Headlines! The video, the CD, the bad scheduling, lack of promo... disaster!
Quite a few CIN singles did worse than Downtown!
The first few didn't do very well at all, I'm sure Downtown must have outsold them all:
1985 - #80 - Clannad - Almost Seems to Late to Turn
1986 - Didn't Chart - The County Line - Heroes
1986 - #24 - Ray Moore - O' My Father Had a Rabbit
1987 - #61 - Ray Moore - Bog Eyed Jog
1988 - #72 - Spirit of Play with Paul McCartney - Children in Need
1989 - #78 - BBC Children in Need Choir - If You Want To Help
1995 - #60 - Patsy Palmer and Sid Owen - You Better Believe It (Children in Need)
1996 - #40 - Red Hill Children - When Children Rule The World
The BBC struck gold in 1997 with Perfect Day, and then they did well for a number of years after that:
1997 - #1 - Lou Reed and Various Artists - Perfect Day
1998 - #3 - Denise van Outen and Johnny Vaughan - Especially for You
1999 - #6 - Martine McCutcheon - Love Me/Talking in Your Sleep
2000 - #1 - S Club 7 - Never Had a Dream Come True
2001 - #1 - S Club 7 - Have You Ever
2002 - #2 - Will Young - Don't Let Me Down/You and I
2003 - #2 - Shane Richie - I'm Your Man
2004 - #1 - Girls Aloud - I'll Stand By
^ These will have all outsold Downtown.
From 2005 to 2008, I would safely assume that Emma had the best selling CIN single:
2005 - #6 - Liberty X - A Night to Remember
2006 - #3 - Emma Bunton - Downtown
2007 - #11 - Spice Girls - Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)
2008 - #18 - McFly - Do Ya/Stay with Me
A revival in CIN success from 2009 to 2015, apart from a massive misstep in 2011 with The Collective, which I assume Downtown sold more than:
2009 - #1 - Peter Kay's Animated All Star Band - The Official BBC Children in Need Medley
2010 - #1 - JLS - Love You More
2011 - #24 - The Collective - Teardrop
2012 - #2 - Girls Aloud - Something New
2013 - #3 - Ellie Goulding - How Long Will I Love You
2014 - #1 - Gareth Malone's All Star Choir - Wake Me Up
2015 - #6 - Jess Glynne - Take Me Home
Since 2016 there's been less success again:
2016 - #42 - Craig David - All We Needed
2017 - #29 - Katie Melua - Fields of Gold
2018 - Didn't Chart - Jamie Cullum - Love Is In The Picture
So I would guess that Downtown was the 15th best seller out of 30 releases. 
Posted by: Jay ☆ 15th September 2019, 11:21 PM
Not too surprised to see Headlines winning the poll, even though Downtown was a bigger hit!
Posted by: Feel_The_Fever 16th September 2019, 12:22 AM
Headlines.
Posted by: SouthernStar88 16th September 2019, 08:41 PM
Headlines...not the best song but the return of all five of the girls with new material in 2007 has been quite emotional….
Posted by: JosephStyles 16th September 2019, 08:53 PM
Headlines is cute, Melanie C's verse in particular is gorgeous! I voted Downtown though, it was the first version of the song I knew (bearing in mind I was 9 when it came out) and I have fond memories with it 
Posted by: Lukuzz 17th September 2019, 06:32 AM
Headlines
Posted by: isanka 18th September 2019, 10:34 AM
I voted for Downtown.
Posted by: Tawdry Hepburn 18th September 2019, 11:00 AM
'Downtown' isn't great, but it's still preferable to that vile 'Headlice' song.
Posted by: Algernon Monqueef 18th September 2019, 01:05 PM
Headlines by a Texan country mile!!
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