That's an acceptable level of vindication for 3 Of A Kind, bottom 5 and at least ranking below A1! I guess I can see why it's not for everyone but I have always thought it's a legit classic of the UK garage genre.

 

And yes I accept that my opinion on 'Take On Me' is unfairly influenced by circumstances beyond the sound of the song itself, I'm glad others are able to be less annoyed by it :kink:

 

I think I might have moaned about 911 during the listenthrough (it's hard to remember what I said about each individual one of these identikit midtempo boyband songs) but from a quick revisit it's not really that bad.

AK ruined Eternal Flame, wonder if people liking it so much knew the original?

There were loads of dreadful number ones in the 00s and early 10s when xfactor was dominant. Their awful cover version releases every Christmas were absolutely dire.

AK ruined Eternal Flame, wonder if people liking it so much knew the original?

 

Yes, I knew it. Didn't change the fact that I thought it was a lovely version with really nice vocals that at least changed the production up, unlike some of the other covers here.

 

Incidentally, some pressings of the re-released Right Now album in 2001 featured a different version of the song that was more faithful to the original, and only features Natasha on lead vocal. I only heard this for the first time recently as for some reason my copy of the album included the radio mix.

 

 

Glad it came 'last' anyway!

 

------

 

I don't have any major issue with the results so far, there are certainly far worse here than this few at the bottom. I don't think B*Witched have any offensive chart toppers either, Rollercoaster was probably the only candidate, although that was quite fun, as C'est La Vie is a classic and To You I Belong and Blame It On The Weatherman are beautiful, but did any girl group produce a particularly offensive chart topper in this period? In my opinion, no. If it had stretched to 2007 I'd have said Walk This Way by Girls Aloud and Sugababes perhaps.

Edited September 18, 20222 yr by gooddelta

Babycakes is one of THE worst records of all time, let alone one of the worst number ones. Those who awarded 1 point should be deported to the Moon.

AK ruined Eternal Flame, wonder if people liking it so much knew the original?

 

Yes I know the original and it is much better but I don't hate the AK version. It was a decent rehash imo.

“Which band had a UK #1 with Take On Me?” is still my favourite pub quiz question ever.

Number 19: Fatman Scoop featuring Crooklyn Clan - Be Faithful

 

 

Average score: 11.53

Highest scores:

25 Roba!, Jester, King Rollo

Lowest scores:

1 Torple, Daan, Rabbitfurcoat

 

In case you didn’t catch it, this record was performed by American rapper Fatman Scoop and a hip duo called the Crooklyn Clan. The song, which has too many samples to even list, was originally released in 1999 but reached #1 for 2 weeks upon re-release in October 2003.

 

Fatman Scoop has been labelled as the DJ Khaled of the early noughties, shouting over his records and reminding you who he is at every opportunity but seemingly contributing fairly little of musical merit. While this gained several maximum scores, overall it still had enough fans to finish fairly low in the rankings. Personally it reminds me too much of Uni bops to seriously dislike it.

Number 18: Blazin’ Squad - Crossroads

 

 

Average score: 11.74

Highest scores:

24 gooddelta

23 Roba!, Jade

Lowest scores:

4 Mack., Bjork

 

Number 1 for a week in August 2002, this was a cover of Bone Thugs-n-Harmony’s 1996 hit “Tha Crossroads” and the first of six Top 10 hits for the 10 piece band.

 

There’s something mildly endearing about such an impossibly large group of young guys making it big, but many would say their #2 “Flip Reverse” should have been their chart topper if they were going to have one. I think the consensus is that this is very far from great but up against the worst of the worst it doesn’t particularly stand out.

Number 17: Eamon - F**k It (I Don’t Want You Back)

 

 

Average score: 11.85

Highest scores:

25 Suedehead2, Bumblebrë

Lowest scores:

1 xajnipi

2 Mangø, rio309, MyKindOfLove, chartjack2

 

Number 1 for 4 weeks in April / May 2004 and the 2nd biggest seller of the year (thank goodness for Band Aid 20 I say). His only other Top 40 hit was the equally charmingly titled “I Love Them Ho’s” which reached #27.

 

This one is really polarising - some see it as one of the songs of the year while others think it’s even worse than the answer song that knocked if off. I find it hard to find much positive to say. I think even the song itself is very much a dirge, I’m not prudish about expletives in lyrics but these are beyond vulgar, and his vocals are whiny. Perhaps those who gave 1 or 2 can come to its defence and provide some balance. :lol: Stay tuned to find out whether the answer song has qualified!

I would definitely defend Eamon’s original - it’s a massive earworm! Ofc, it’s a little more than PG13 but I don’t really have a problem with that in this context.

'Crossroads' is absolutely terrible :puke2:

Glad 'Be Faithful' is gone. Way too shouty for my ears to enjoy, the rest is ok but it's just so off putting for me the vocals. 'Crossroads' is absolute dirge. Not a fan of Eamon either.

Well I've now 'lost' both my top 2 and my bottom 2 from my ranking, very mixed bag of results in the last couple of days :lol: Glad to see Fatman Scoop spared being in the top 10 but the Eamon song is really intolerable, ah well, hopefully Frankee can be top 10 so at least the song progresses in some form (I do very slightly prefer her version due to having less whiny vocals but they're both horrendous).

 

Glad 'Be Faithful' is gone. Way too shouty for my ears to enjoy, the rest is ok but it's just so off putting for me the vocals. 'Crossroads' is absolute dirge. Not a fan of Eamon either.

 

Sounds like you would have wanted 'Be Faithful' to be higher on this then? x

Number 16: Boyzone - You Needed Me

 

 

Average score: 11.91

Highest scores:

24 Dot Mirrorball

22 Daan

Lowest scores:

3 King Rollo

4 AaronTM

 

Number 1 for a week in May 1999, this Anne Murray cover was the last of their 6 chart toppers. It headed a Top 3 of new entries including Shania’s “That Don’t Impress Me Much” and Geri’s “Look At Me”, outselling the latter by only 748 copies.

 

Was this the right Boyzone song to include or would another have done worse? I suspect that Boyzone is an act where it’s difficult to pinpoint any single record that was particularly offensive, though taken as a whole their contribution to music via a series of lacklustre records arguably left much to be desired. Of course they also created the template for another group of Irish hitmakers to churn out even more formulaic covers after the turn of the century.

Number 15: Eminem - Just Lose It

 

 

Average score: 12.06

Highest scores:

24 Torple, Jester

Lowest scores:

2 Mack., DJ Cheeky Magpie, coi, CJK

 

Number 1 for a week in November 2004, this was the lead single from his 5th album “Encore” which yielded 5 Top 5 hits.

 

Not taking anything away from his 4 classic Number 1s in the early 00s, there really was no excuse for this. Aside from being a lazy regurgitation of parts of “Without Me”, aside from the puerile humour and the irritating “ah ah ah ah ah”, the whole track is apparently a disturbing Michael Jackson parody. Nonetheless this had enough supporters to fall a few places short of the final.

Edited September 19, 20222 yr by JulianT

Number 14: Westlife - Queen Of My Heart

 

 

Average score: 12.09

Highest scores:

20 rio309, Bjork

Lowest scores:

1 DJ Cheeky Magpie

3 xajnipi

 

Number 1 for a week in November 2001, this was the first single from their 3rd album, “World Of Our Own”, and astonishingly their 9th #1 in 2.5 years. The B Side to this was “When You’re Looking Like That”, a cheesy disco favourite now probably considered one of their best songs.

 

Amazingly this was the only 1 of the 25 songs not to receive any scores higher than 20. Similar comments to the Boyzone one apply here: the problem with Westlife is more cumulative over their whole catalogue rather than with any individual track. “Queen Of My Heart” is at least an original song but sounds like it was written specifically to fit into the Westlife formula and really lacks much musical oomph. Based on the Westlife rate currently taking place in the pop forum “Mandy” is their least well liked #1 and might have been a slightly better choice, but I doubt it would have done much worse than this. Have they qualified with their feature song though?

So here’s what’s left - which 3 will miss the final?

 

Gary Barlow - Forever Love

Peter Andre - I Feel You

Teletubbies - Teletubbies Say “Eh-Oh!”

Spacedust - Gym And Tonic

Cliff Richard - The Millennium Prayer

Five & Queen - We Will Rock You

Mariah Carey featuring Westlife - Against All Odds

Will Young & Gareth Gates - The Long And Winding Road

Ozzy & Kelly Osbourne - Changes

Sam & Mark - With A Little Help From My Friends

Frankee - F.U.R.B. (F**k You Right Back)

Crazy Frog - Axel F

Chico - It’s Chico Time

Pleased that each of my top 7 have escaped a top half finish, hopefully FURB is in then next three so none of my 'best' 10 make the final.

 

 

Sounds like you would have wanted 'Be Faithful' to be higher on this then? x

 

It was my 25 pointer so I think that would be a resounding yes :P

 

Teletubbies to miss please. Can't be doing with that making the top worst #1 songs.

Edited September 19, 20222 yr by Roba!