July 22, 20231 yr I find Level 42 to be such an odd band. They don't seem to have anything about them that makes them stand out, the songs are pretty mediocre and the band themselves don't have any star quality whatsoever.
July 22, 20231 yr I find Level 42 to be such an odd band. They don't seem to have anything about them that makes them stand out, the songs are pretty mediocre and the band themselves don't have any star quality whatsoever. I know they were so MOR but they are a band I really enjoy as they had such a long chart career!
July 23, 20231 yr their early 80s and 90s stuff is bad but in 87 they hit gold with the Running in the Family album that album is great and had an incredible run of singles from Lessons in love - Running in the family - To be with you again -It's over
August 2, 20231 yr Author I find Level 42 to be such an odd band. They don't seem to have anything about them that makes them stand out, the songs are pretty mediocre and the band themselves don't have any star quality whatsoever. I agree. I can't think of a single song of theirs that does anything for me.
August 2, 20231 yr Author 60 - Madonna - Holiday 5Rswx2Z7SDw 68th best seller of 1984 Chart Run 53-40-29-13-7-6-13-18-26-35-56 Her debut hit in the UK and also in the USA where it was a hit the year before. She chucked it back out in 1985 when it was one of 3 concurrent top 15 songs for her with Crazy For You and Into the Groove, and then again in 1991 to promote the Immaculate Collection, not that it needed promotion. Later in 1984 she would start a run of 16 consecutive top 5 hits - surely the longest for anyone in the 80s?? Edited August 2, 20231 yr by Colm
August 2, 20231 yr Author 59 - S-Express - Hey Music Lover fqF9UjEsue8 68th best seller of 1989 Chart Run 29-14-6-7-9-12-21-33-49-72->10 As was the case with most dance acts in the late 80s - S'express suffered from ever decreasing chart positions. Their peaks would go 1, 5, 6, 21, 32, and 43 before the inevitable re-release of Theme from S'express in 1996 hitting the top 20 again. That they've managed to release two Best-Ofs while having just six top 75 hits to their name is a credit to someone's continued faith in the market for this sort of stuff! It's still a cracker of a song with all the fun and sample frenzy of their first two hits. Edited August 3, 20231 yr by Colm
August 2, 20231 yr Author 58 - Hue & Cry - Labour Of Love 1CYZ6q7Wr9c 68th best seller of 1987 Chart Run 61-61-47-47-50-34-17-13-6-6-12-17-24-30-47-72 I remember the lyrics in the verse of this making absolutely no sense to 11 year old me in 1987. If Hue (or Cry) wasn't dressed in a suit in the video and on Top of the Pops I think I'd have been convinced of Labour Of Love's funk credentials. At least they were more interesting than Level 42. They found top 20 success while Looking for Linda in 1989 but not much else. According to Wikipedia they're released 10 studio albums since 1992 none of which charted in the top 100. Edited August 2, 20231 yr by Colm
August 2, 20231 yr Author 57 - Kenny Rogers And Dolly Parton - Islands In The Stream K2RBS_U0GoQ 67th best seller of 1983 Chart Run 70-45-35-26-15-11-8-8-7-8-10-24-32-52-68 What happened here then? I would have expected a classic like this to have made the top 5 in the UK, being written by the Brothers Gibb. It went top 5 in 10 other countries and number 1 in 4 of them - USA, Canada, Australia and Austria! This was only Dolly's second hit in the UK while Kenny was much more established. The b-side for the American release is some obscure track called I Will Always Love You
August 12, 20231 yr Author 56 - Bow Wow Wow - Go Wild In The Country UrzKNGEl-ZA 67th best seller of 1982 Chart Run 75-50-46-48-23-16-9-7-11-20-33-38-56 I have no recollection of this band or this song. Bow Wow Wow were formed by Malcolm McLaren by luring two band members from Adam and the Ants, and then launching an audition process for a lead singer. They agreed on a 13 year old Annabella Lwin. Always with an eye for a marketing tactic, McLaren released their debut single as the world's first cassette single - the aptly named C30, C60, C90 which was about the joys of home-taping which was "killing the music industry". RIP. As a 15 year old on Top of the Pops in 1982, Anabelle wasn't short of attitude or confidence. The single is a product of its time with its mashing together of new wave guitar and world music rhythms - which McLaren often used. The band had one further hit in the form of much covered I Want Candy which was originally recorded by New York band the Strangeloves.
August 12, 20231 yr Author 55 - Eddy Grant - Gimme Hope Jo'anna R-ZplG81oZg 67th best seller of 1988 Chart Run 66-44-36-25-12-8-8-7-14-30-46-56 And here's an example of a sound that Malcom McLaren was often accused of ripping off. Eddy hadn't released a single in over 3 years and hadn't had a hit in 5, when he released this anti-apartheid song, which was banned in South Africa. It became a hit all over Europe topping the charts in Belgium, Netherlands, Italy and Spain. No more singles were taken from the album, File Under Rock, which perhaps surprisingly, failed to reach the UK Top 100 despite being a minor hit in other European countries. He had to wait until the 21st century before troubling the charts again with a re-mix of Electric Avenue in 2001.
August 12, 20231 yr I remember really liking that Eddy Grant song when I was a child. Just listening to it now for the first time in many a year and I can see why, it's very cheery. Also, I'm quite fond of that Hue & Cry song too. Definitely not one I hear a lot but it's pretty catchy. I'm off to add it to my 80s playlist
August 12, 20231 yr Go Wild In The Country was a great new wave/pop song. I liked their other hits 'I Want Candy' and 'C30 C60 C90 Go' as well.
August 13, 20231 yr I like all of the tracks so far, some I like a lot, and a few I love. Holiday drops into the love bracket along with History. Hey Music Lover is fab. Scritti Politti is up there too, I forgot to mention earlier. Re: Level 42, often mildly pleasant and nothing special, their muso laid-back jazz-funk was really the only lasting legacy of the 1981 jazzfunk UK music scene, but sometimes they poppedout a good single like Sun Goes Down, Something About You, a fab track like Lessons In Love and latterly good ones in 1994 Forever Now and Love In A Peaceful World, which is when I saw them on tour, with the pretty substantial back catalogue and decent current stuff. Pretty much Greatest Hits is all anyone should need though, and there would still be a bit of filler. Eddy Grant is wonderful, a shame he sort of retired from music. Fab in The Equals in the 60's, then a reggae icon in the 70's, a global smash in the 80's around 82/83 and Jo'anna was his last hurrah sadly. Bow Wow Wow I never got. Adam & The Ants were the tribal drum real deal, McLaren's project were merely OK and not much more. Bee Gees should have had lots more hits in the 80's but they were persona non grata after Saturday Night Fever subsided and the Disco Sucks movement killed their career off overnight. So giving away hits to veterans was good for Streisand, warwick, Rogers, Parton & Ross, but they should have been actual Gibb hits. Islands In The Stream is OK, but Kenny & Dolly have much better early 70's classics - but it was nice they got a later career smash.
August 18, 20231 yr Author 54 - Terence Trent D'Arby - If You Let Me Stay hMhEzd9Bsb4 67th best seller of 1987 Chart Run 62-38-22-15-7-7-7-8-12-20-33-51-72 D'Arby's debut single from a very, very hyped act in 1987. The hype came from both himself and his record company. He claimed that his debut album was the most important album since Sgt Pepper's and his record company had such confidence of his potential to be a major recording artist that they released a demo cassette titled "Work in Progress" months before the album had even been completed. The chart performance of the album did seem to support such haughty aspirations - it spent 13 weeks as the highest selling artist album (as opposed to compilation album) in its first 12 months. Eight of those were consecutive weeks in early 1988, the longest spell at the top since Brothers in Arms in 1986 and the longest for an American since the Kids from Fame in 1982. Sales by the end of its tenure were at 1.4 million. The follow up was a flop, missing the top 10 and exiting the top 75 after just 5 weeks. If You Let Me Stay is the first of 6 singles in this rundown to spent 3 weeks at number 7. Edited August 18, 20231 yr by Colm
August 18, 20231 yr great record, but ol Sananda has always seemed intent on career self-destruction following. Delicate was a goodie off the 3rd album, but by that time he had to agree to pose naked on the Q cover (and inside) to try and make a comeback after the 2nd album disaster. It worked, somewhat. I know I bought that edition of Q... :o
August 18, 20231 yr Author His name change was part of his attempt to distance himself from the madness of his music career and the baggage that he wasn't able to shake off.
August 18, 20231 yr Author 53 - Bronski Beat - Why? H3LbzjFJdSA 67th best seller of 1984 Chart Run 22-7-6-7-11-16-27-31-58-66 Follow up to the absolutely essential Smalltown Boy (which should be experience in the 12" version for full gravitas). In the top 10 when Stevie Wonder's I Just Called, and the Ghostbusters theme were selling extremely well, Why? would have made number 4 in many earlier weeks of 1984. In fact, its weekly sales outpeaked those of their I Feel Love/Johnny Remember Me duet with Marc Almond which made number 3 the following year. Jimmy Somerville left after that hit and was replaced by vaguely similarly-voiced (but nowhere nearly as iconic) John Foster and the band continued to modest success. Edited August 18, 20231 yr by Colm
August 22, 20231 yr Author 52 - John Parr - St. Elmo's Fire (Man in Motion) 7-u17jx0r0Y 67th best seller of 1985 Chart Run 56-45-38-27-10-6-6-6-9-17-27-44-71 John Parr hit big with the theme for the film St. Elmo's Fire, which was a US box office hit in the summer of 1985. It hit number 1 in the USA and finished as the 18th best seller of the year, there. The song is the product of something of a supergroup - members of Toto, REO Speedwagon and Mr. Mister all appeared on the single. It was in the top 10 in the UK while Jennifer Rush and A-Ha took up residence in the top 2 and is one of only 2 singles in this rundown to spend 3 weeks at number 6. John had some other minor chart success after this but never made the UK top 40 again.
August 22, 20231 yr Author 51 - Bomb The Bass - Megablast/Don't Make Me Wait/ b_42p66WeM0 XdfqWEqObhM 66th best seller of 1988 Chart Run 20-6-6-9-14-21-29-34-51 Pleasingly, the follow up to Beat Dis wasn't just an inferior version of that debut hit, although Megablast certainly was that. Despite Megablast getting the primary slot in the title of the double-A-side, it was Don't Make Me Wait that got most of the airplay and is considerably the stronger of the two tracks. The record hit the top 6 in the exalted company of Groovy Kind of Love, He Ain't Heavy, Teardrops and The Only Way is Up. Tim Simenon went on to become a highly regarded and versatile producer and continued to also have hits under the Bomb the Bass banner.
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