I can't believe Faye won. UGH.

Fully deserved bottom places for all of those songs though. Steps doing ballad singles on the whole was a BAD IDEA. Unless they are overblowm melodramatic screamathons such as One For Sorrow.

Unsurprising results so far, but I did have a mini soft spot for When I Said Goodbye, so it's a shame to see it come last out of the main singles.

23. Too Busy Thinking About My Baby - 3.53

 

 

UK #2, 2001

 

This was twinned with It's The Way You Make Me Feel, well the name of the song featured on the single sleeve at least so chart sources have taken it to be a double a-side despite the lack of a music video. A cover of the Marvin Gaye classic, it wasn't particularly inspiring and was a product of the ITV Motown Mania show, which didn't quite live up the the legacy of 1999's ABBA Mania. It's the only song in this rate to score an average below 5...

Just hit me how much Lee looks like Josh Radnor (Ted Mosby 'How I Met Your Mother') in that performance! :lol:

 

No surprises as of yet. Even 'I Know Him So Well'. I thought that was really good though. :(

Just hit me how much Lee looks like Josh Radnor (Ted Mosby 'How I Met Your Mother') in that performance! :lol:

 

No surprises as of yet. Even 'I Know Him So Well'. I thought that was really good though. :(

 

HA! He actually does :lol: :heart: Josh is nommier though.

Faye rightfully won. I think Lisa would've had more chance of winning if she'd stayed the "cute quirky" one tbh. Fame whores usually only pick up points for the LOLs.

 

I ADORE Words Are Not Enough, although I can understand why people say it's one of their worst. I remember thinking the video was really impressive too when these days it looks TERRIBLE.

I don't really see what's so great about Faye compared to the rest... apart from the fact she's the prettiest (as an aside on that, how GORGEOUS did she look during the Love's Got A Hold On My Heart video? It was basically the only time she had her trademark blonde curls long rather than the usual short, definitely her best look [sorry gooddelta but the dreads were awful!!!] so god knows why she didn't keep it).

 

http://i55.tinypic.com/f1cxva.jpg

 

I think if I did the member rate, I would have put Lee and Faye as the top 2 purely because they (mostly) left the limelight post-Steps and didn't bug me like the other three with more crap music (H and Claire was an AWFUL project, and don't even get me started on the unmitigated shite Lisa Scott-Lee put out). But while they were in the band I honestly didn't care about any of them in particular.

 

And oh dear, some of those bottom 5 songs I actually gave decent marks to, at least relative to the rest of my rate - although considering my rate was one of the more scathing ones that doesn't mean much! I don't mind those ballads at all though I wouldn't rush to listen to them so I'm not too bothered about their places. Really there are only four songs I care about here: Heartbeat, One For Sorrow, Deeper Shade Of Blue and Chain Reaction. If any of those four crash out before top 10 then this rate is officially a DISASTER.

No surprises so far. Really hope Heartbeat goes top 10!

Talking of Faye, a recent video of hers and H having a recent interview has been uploaded and she doesn't appear to have aged a day :o

 

Faye rightfully won. I think Lisa would've had more chance of winning if she'd stayed the "cute quirky" one tbh. Fame whores usually only pick up points for the LOLs.

 

I ADORE Words Are Not Enough, although I can understand why people say it's one of their worst. I remember thinking the video was really impressive too when these days it looks TERRIBLE.

 

I completely agree!

 

And ha, it's like the A1 - Take On Me video which I thought was technically incredible at the time and was declaring it 'best video ever'. Now I look back at it and think 'dear GOD I was easily pleased'!

 

I don't really see what's so great about Faye compared to the rest... apart from the fact she's the prettiest (as an aside on that, how GORGEOUS did she look during the Love's Got A Hold On My Heart video? It was basically the only time she had her trademark blonde curls long rather than the usual short, definitely her best look [sorry gooddelta but the dreads were awful!!!] so god knows why she didn't keep it).

 

http://i55.tinypic.com/f1cxva.jpg

 

I think if I did the member rate, I would have put Lee and Faye as the top 2 purely because they (mostly) left the limelight post-Steps and didn't bug me like the other three with more crap music (H and Claire was an AWFUL project, and don't even get me started on the unmitigated shite Lisa Scott-Lee put out). But while they were in the band I honestly didn't care about any of them in particular.

 

And oh dear, some of those bottom 5 songs I actually gave decent marks to, at least relative to the rest of my rate - although considering my rate was one of the more scathing ones that doesn't mean much! I don't mind those ballads at all though I wouldn't rush to listen to them so I'm not too bothered about their places. Really there are only four songs I care about here: Heartbeat, One For Sorrow, Deeper Shade Of Blue and Chain Reaction. If any of those four crash out before top 10 then this rate is officially a DISASTER.

 

I never said that I loved the look of the dreads, I said that they were iconic! It's what I remember her for quite a lot of the time anyway, we had a French teacher at school in 1998 with similar hair and we all nicknamed her Faye :D She definitely looked best with natural hair. And you hit the nail on the head there, she probably won because she's the most tolerable member of the five, the only one who hasn't dragged her way through every crap reality show going for a few more minutes of fame.

18. One For Sorrow (Tony Moran Mix) - 5.78

 

 

UK #2 - 2001

 

How many songs can claim to have reached #2 in the UK on two separate occasions? I have no idea[/notbray] but One For Sorrow is one of them! Given a Tony Moran makeover in the late 90s for the US release (although what came of that I have no idea!), it was much more dancey and produced than the original, moving it massively away from the ABBA template and more into a clubby type pop song. Despite being produced a couple of years earlier it took a while to find its way to the UK (although was included on Pete Waterman's Hit Factory compilation in 2000, I know this because I own it - you are entitled to cringe!) but was eventually tacked onto the double a-side of Chain Reaction and also featured on everyone's favourite - Hits 51! It was popular with some people whilst others felt that it didn't do the original justice at all, and just about escapes the bottom five here...

17. 5, 6, 7, 8, - 5.89

 

 

UK #14 - 1997

 

Where it all began, aah. Launching with a line dancing come Sash!-lite novelty hit was always a risky strategy as they could have ended up just another Vanilla. Luckily the strength of subsequent material prevented that from happening but few people realistically expected Steps to be anything more than a one hit wonder at the time. A high selling hit despite not reaching the top ten, I believe it holds the record for biggest selling non top ten hit of the 90s. There were bigger since, Numb/Encore by Jay-Z and Linkin Park and I'm Yours by Jason Mraz to name just two...

 

But who can forget this school disco classic? Lee took the lead for the only time on a single of theirs with Lisa providing the middle 8, strange that they would later go on to become so insignificant vocally in the band. Australia liked the song a little bit more than us - in June 1998 it went all the way to #1 there! Still, it's very tacky and novelty and its low finish here was much expected.

Glad to see the vastly inferior One For Sorrow remix getting such a middling score.

 

As for 5,6,7,8 for a novelty song it's fine, but I would rather never hear it again.

The original version is FANTASTIC and easily one of their best, but I'm really not a fan of that remix.

 

'5,6,7,8' :wub: The ultimate guilty pleasure.

16. Better The Devil You Know - 6.5

 

 

UK #4 - 1999

 

A big jump in points now with the average moving into the mid 6's. This fairly standard cover of the Kylie classic was released eight years after the original was a hit and included as the double a-side to Say You'll Be Mine, the video being a live tour performance of the song. It had looked set to be their first single not to reach the top five since 5,6,7,8 but like Heartbeat/Tragedy the year before, managed to move to a new peak in the new year of #4 after the strictly xmas nonsense died off (Cliff Richard, Mr Hankey, John Lennon re-issue etc...) with no new product to buy thus maintaining their top five streak. Not bad by any means but a bit of a pointless release perhaps?

Get ready now because two songs I thought might be a little higher up are ready to fall...

Steps version of 'Better The Devil You Know' is better than Kylie's. :ph34r:

That Steps remix is Truly great- Shame on you all- as for the p**s poor version of the majestic "Better The Devil You Know" well the less said the better......

Their cover of Better The Devil goes down as one of the very worst covers of any song ever. I can only think of Madonna's American Pie that is worse off the top of my head.

15. Heartbeat – 6.86

 

 

UK #1 - 1998

 

Well I say 1998, which is when it was released, but it actually got to #1 in the first week of 1999...With Heartbeat getting the major push when this double a-side with Tragedy was released in November 1998, it was largely responsible for its #2 debut and got the initial lion's share of airplay and promotion. Naturally of course being a nice xmassy ballad. Lets ignore the fact that the chart was already packed full of them with Boyzone, 5ive, B*Witched, Spice Girls, Honeyz, All Saints, Mariah & Whitney, Emilia, Madonna...basically, if you liked big pop ballads (which I do) then xmas 1998 was the place to be! As soon as xmas was over of course it was time for the new year parties and Tragedy moved to the forefront but more on that later.

 

Technically a million selling single and by far their biggest hit, leading the double a-side, I have to assume that it probably would have stalled at 300-400k sales in total if not for the inclusion of Tragedy on the single! It's a Steps favourite of mine but I'm well aware that most people don't feel the same and thus the #15 finish is not a massive surprise to me. If this was a video rate though it would surely be towards the top - Claire's spikes, Faye's dreads, the woeful animation and skiing footage, amazingly awful in every way!