The second of three on the list for Roxette as Joyride hits 50 on the year - back on pop-picking upbeat form and a bit like The Look or Dangerous, as opposed to the big ballads, as Phase 2 of Roxette kicks off. Still sounds good, too. Then You Turn Away is the first of two remaining OMD's in the top 50, and isn't one that ever gets remembered these days, being single 3 or 4 off the album, but it's really sweet and melodic. A remixed pumping version might have been bigger, but not as nice. Kym Sims was on the radio yesterday, still a semi-regular oldie and sounding pretty good for a dancefloor boogie or summer day.

 

 

Rod Stewart's back for a 20th anniversary visit to year-end top 100, Rhythm Of My Heart not quite a Maggie May, but it's got bagpipes, it's anthemic, the chorus is a good one and it has a widescreen landscape vista appeal to it. File under "Not quite Top-Tier Rod But Pretty Good". There was an Elton John multi-artist covers album out, I think, and Kate got the single slot with her version of Rocket Man, one of Elton's most hauntingly sad songs. The reggae rhythms were quite pleasant, and it's nice and all that, and Kate was never going to do a copycat cover, but it's not as majestic as Elt's original. Paula Abdul was still huge in the States, I was in Florida as per usual, and Blowing Kisses In The Wind was a top 10 US single, much better than some of the UK choices off her latest album - they never got round to this pretty strings-laden ballad.

 

 

Up at 44 and 43 it's a double Army Of Lovers feature, at 44 it's the 3-time charted wacky Crucified, camp as a row of tents, over the top and the most exciting track in this batch of ten. Still works, and totally deserves to be a big UK hit to this day - but never hit those heights. A later partial re-invention called Alcazar by the main man behind Army Of Lovers would crack the charts in a decade or so, and Army Of Lovers are still dropping good new tracks, though. Obsession was a strange little record that I preferred to Crucify at the time, borrowing the O Superman backdrop from Laurie Anderson and trip-hopping over it without an actual chorus anywhere in sight. Never short of a hook, though, The Bee Gees are back for a 24th year of Year-enders, a UK hit and one more to come higher up this list. Secret Love is pure catchy Gibb pop singalong, with a quick revisit to the You Win Again thumping rhythm, albeit slightly more bpm. Very Good but not classic Bee Gees. That leaves Julee Cruise's flop follow-up to Falling, as shown during the darkly funny Twin Peaks series, where she got to sing Rockin' Back Inside My Heart - I can't take the show away from the song moos and vice versa, they both supplement each other, and if you havent seen the series you really should search it out. 50's vibes to the music, classy and lovely.

 

 

 

50 ( 44 ) JOYRIDE Roxette 5 14

49 ( 43 ) THEN YOU TURN AWAY Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark 3 10

48 ( 42 ) TOO BLIND TO SEE IT Kym Sims 6 12

47 ( 41 ) RHYTHM OF MY HEART Rod Stewart 2 14

46 ( 40 ) ROCKET MAN Kate Bush 3 13

45 ( 39 ) BLOWING KISSES IN THE WIND Paula Abdul 3 10

44 ( 80 ) CRUCIFIED Army Of Lovers 6 21

43 ( 38 ) OBSESSION Army Of Lovers 2 12

42 ( 37 ) SECRET LOVE The Bee Gees 5 14

41 ( 36 ) ROCKIN’ BACK INSIDE MY HEART Julee Cruise 2 12

 

so, who gets Song Of The Batch? This mad epic monster, natch...

 

Some "Gražios Dainos" stats again.

 

Cathy Dennis - Everybody Move (15-16-13-14-17)

Kylie Minogue - What Do I Have To Do (20-19-18)

Voice Of The Beehive - Monsters And Angels (7-5-3-7-10-11-14-16-15-16-18)

Belinda Carlisle - Summer Rain (20)

Belinda Carlisle - Live Your Life Be Free (15-15-13-10-10-9-8-8-11-11-12-17-19-20)

Belinda Carlisle - Do You Feel Like I Feel (2-1-1-1-1-3-4-4-6-8-11-12-13-14-16-18) (Her best song !!!)

 

"Live Your Life Be Free" is my favourite Belinda album.

 

 

Some "Gražios Dainos" stats again.

 

Cathy Dennis - Everybody Move (15-16-13-14-17)

Kylie Minogue - What Do I Have To Do (20-19-18)

Voice Of The Beehive - Monsters And Angels (7-5-3-7-10-11-14-16-15-16-18)

Belinda Carlisle - Summer Rain (20)

Belinda Carlisle - Live Your Life Be Free (15-15-13-10-10-9-8-8-11-11-12-17-19-20)

Belinda Carlisle - Do You Feel Like I Feel (2-1-1-1-1-3-4-4-6-8-11-12-13-14-16-18) (Her best song !!!)

 

"Live Your Life Be Free" is my favourite Belinda album.

 

Great tracks and yes that album has a load of bangers. I hope you got to hear her recent fab tracks Sanity, If U Go and Big Big LOve. Back on anthem form for me :wub:

George Michael's second track on the 100, and also under-rated as a single, classy Heal The Pain had no video, as per George's want at the time - he wanted people to focus on the recording not the popstar and decided not to feature in videos, which was really making a point at that time given the reduced awareness that went along with that. It's very much not of it's time so it hasn't dated like a lot of stuff that made the charts. Another track opting for acoustic guitar is Electronic's Get The Message, a CD single I bought in Paris or Amsterdam, I think (oooerrr get me, I can't remember which it was). The added strings, and wah wah guitar bits make this a great record. It's a shame Electronic didn't continue as an ongoing project for the future. I bought Hey Stoopid on vinyl, appropriately as Alice first made my year end in 1972 with School's Out and Elected, and his previous was in 1989 (Poison) and I enjoyed this Glam Rock veteran rocking return, nostalgia getting the best of me.

 

 

At 37, Lenny Kravitz's best 70's soul moment, pure gorgeousness with It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over, another track not of it's time and looking back but one of Lenny's greatest moments, if not his best-ever. Still fabulous right now with his equally retro Human which sounds like an 80's track, and a lost classic. A fave act of the late 80's and early 90's was Gloria Estefan, I loved the Florida latin rhythms and restrained synth or orchestral ballads, and I was in Florida on holiday when the news broke that her tour bus had crashed and her back had been broken. For a while there it seemed as though she might never walk again. It came as a relief that she got back to some form of normal, and Coming Out Of The Dark was her comeback song and a statement of her own personal battle. So it seemed a lot more emotional and personal than it otherwise would have been. Saltwater was yet another Julian Lennon revival, 7 years after his debut hit, and sounding even more like his dad and The Beatles. I still rate the song, and the message - 20 years on from the original environmental protest pop songs and nothing had changed. Julian had quite a few Australian number ones, but sadly not in the UK - this was his nearest to the top spot, I think.

 

 

At 34, a track that was rated 100 at the time, but the multiple summer re-entries since as a summer feel-good classic have boosted it higher. Will Smith finally went out of fashion in recent years, but I was a fan of his records and movies as the first black actor blockbuster regular movie headliner, so I care not a jot if this one doesnt get played quite as often these days. Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince did good here and they will both be back. Still evokes hot lazy summer days. Natalie Cole had been hitting since 1975, and this year she decided to bring back her late dad's memory and classic crooner duet Unforgettable, which worked as a single, an album and a tour with full orchestra (which I saw). It was so nostalgic seeing Nat back in the charts, and sad to think he never lived to see his now grown-up daughter's success, and even sadder now that Natalie also died too young.

 

 

Karl Keaton never had a hit, but I took to his 80's synth-soul-styled Love's Burn at the time anyway. A great voice that could easily have appeared on a Motown hit record, but very much out of step with the sounds of 1991. If it had been 1986, it might have been a different story, as it's a pretty fine track. And on to the lowest-rated chart-topper of 1991 at 31 - Bananarama had been making my Year End's since 1982, just missing the odd year like 1985, and the latest version as a duo covering a Doobie Brothers UK flop of all things, really worked. It reminded me how good the song was (and the Doobie's would get the belated hit a few years later) and It sounded very 1991 but also very Spanish guitar and rhythms, and you could dance to it. Preacher Man had hit 72 on this list, and Sarah & Keren have year-end slots sporadically into the 2020's, cos they is still great!

 

 

 

40 ( 35 ) HEAL THE PAIN George Michael 3 18

39 ( 34 ) GET THE MESSAGE Electronic 3 16

38 ( 33 ) HEY STOOPID Alice Cooper 5 17

37 ( 32 ) IT AIN’T OVER TILL IT’S OVER Lenny Kravitz 4 16

36 ( 31 ) COMING OUT OF THE DARK Gloria Estefan 2 15

35 ( 30 ) SALTWATER Julian Lennon 3 14

34 ( 100 ) SUMMERTIME DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince 10 33

33 ( 27 ) UNFORGETTABLE Natalie Cole & Nat ‘King’ Cole 2 14

32 ( 26 ) LOVE’S BURN Karl Keaton 2 14

31 ( 25 ) LONG TRAIN RUNNING Bananarama 1 14

 

 

There were 2 that stand over the rest from a 2024 point of view, so both grab a feature slot:

 

 

 

Lenny Kravitz is my favourite from that latest bunch, made #1 for me and I still think it's a really classy song. From the previous bunch, Joyride was the one that I loved the most at the time - and I still love it, albeit in a slightly more nostalgic way now

Lenny Kravitz is my favourite from that latest bunch, made #1 for me and I still think it's a really classy song. From the previous bunch, Joyride was the one that I loved the most at the time - and I still love it, albeit in a slightly more nostalgic way now

 

 

I love Lenny's track, it needs a movie slot to bring it back to a new audience (and extra chart points) :wub: Roxette records seem so sad now, even the upbeat ones, since Marie passed away. Joyride was probably their last great poprocker, I tended to go for the ballads more though they still had fun ones amongst them. :)

From here-on I can't really omit any tracks they are all great, and have all done over half a million "sales" in my chart points, so a quick bit of chart and then the video!

 

Two chart runs have helped this romping Britpop track (it pretty much is) end at 30 for the year. The Mock Turtles never really had much of another hit, but sometimes it's enough to do one great single and leave it at that. There are hints of 60's bands about the Manchester-based band, without being able to point to one in particular, and it's cool, it's understated, and it's fab gear. The Mock Turtle was of course taken from Alice's Adventures In Wonderland's character. Chart position in the real world? 18 in 1991 and 19 in 2003 which is ridiculous for such a classic 90's track.

 

30 ( 73 ) CAN YOU DIG IT? The Mock Turtles 6 25

 

 

 

It's the second of three inside the top 50 for Roxette, and my favourite of theirs in 1991, Fading Like A Flower (Every Time You Leave) was proper rock ballad, but not pomp-rock, it's still has that pounding tempo to it that slots it somewhere between Listen To Your Heart and The Look. It's chart position was helped by a dance remix grabbing some more chart points, enough for it to hold steady despite getting leap-frogged by other tracks over successive years. Still sounds great.

 

29 ( 28 ) FADING LIKE A FLOWER Roxette 3 23

 

Cathy Dennis was in her pop heyday with All Night Long (Touch Me), though she had ironically bigger hits to come as a songwriter (because this is a 1984 obscure song cover originally by the band Wish and singer Fonda Rae, and as featured in the movie A Nightmare On Elm Street 2). I still just love this dance track, what a great song. It sounds very 1991 these days, but I think the song itself, and Cathy's vocal, still carries it, and that hook is fabulous when it arrives. The song construction has loads of great little verse touches, so to speak, then there's a mini chorus before the main big singalong chorus. Getting my melodic moneysworth, as shown by the 20-week run it had in my charts, that wasn't the norm in 1991 for one that peaked as low as 4. 1st of 2 in the top 30. The song will also be in my year-end for 2024 sampled by Kungs, David Guetta and Izzy Bizu, a great version too.

 

28 ( 24 ) TOUCH ME (ALL NIGHT LONG) Cathy Dennis 4 20

 

 

 

A teen-pop US boyband, ostensibly, but also late 80's smooth soul sounds with a 90's more-urban backdrop update to sound more 1991, this UK chart-topper was popular at the time, and not so much these days, which is shame - partly due to the lyrics I think, which seemed daring (and therefore teen-appealing, teens always like to push the boundaries of what is or isn't offensive), but which really isn't in comparison to today's graphic X-rated descriptive cash-generators bleeped for radio plays - if you MUST get graphic in song then at least have the guts to stand by your artistic expression and refuse to bleep it. To me, it's hypocrisy, use a different word if you want airplay and don't use the one that will not get you airplay in the first place. As for this, I still like it, great melody and harmonies, it's pretty tame and boys fancying girls is the number one preoccupation of most teens, always has always will, they just aren't as naive these days compared to previous generations. Is it a bit flattered by this chart position? Yes, prob by about 10 or 20 places.

 

27 ( 23 ) I WANNA SEX YOU UP Color Me Badd 2 16

 

 

Wind Of Change was a lyrical rarity, a political song about change for the better, that foretold soon-to-be actual world events with the crumbling of the Soviet Union as master over other Eastern-block nations, and freedom for countries under dictatorships as they started dropping like pins one after the other from people power. The world in late 1991 really did seem to be on the way to a brighter, more fair and balanced democratic future. The Scorpions, a West German rock band, would have been full-on with the later union of East and West Germany, and grabbed a global hit with this singalong, wistful track. The record seemed to take ages to hit in the UK though, I'd been charting it for a while after a Florida holiday where it was on A listing locally. If ever a record was of it's time, this is it. Of course, we hadn't counted on the invention of the internet, the greatest propaganda tool in history for liars and dictators and morons, consuming the world slowly under a constant barage of disinformation, misinformation and blatant manipulation of the viewing masses. George Orwell's 1984 should be essential reading for every human being. Still, this is a nice song and it's healthy to dream of the optimism behind it.

 

26 ( 22 ) WIND OF CHANGE The Scorpions 5 22

 

 

25 ( 21 ) JACKY Marc Almond 1 10

 

Top 25 time and another number one bites the dust, this time Marc Almond's Trevor-Horn-produced cover of Scott Walker's banned Jackie - not quite sure why the spelling changed, maybe to make it seem more male-oriented than female. Either way it's a good cover of a brilliant original, both have sweeping strings to carry the rousing and controversial song. Scott's is the definitive of course, and Marc's has more of a dance-beat aimed at the dancefloor which does it no creative favours really but did introduce it to an actual audience. It has it all, drugs, alcohol, bordellos, queers (when that name was offensive to gay people long before it became a "rescued" cuddly catch-all term for anybody that feels like using it), money, politics, religion. It really does cover all the controversial bases, no wonder it got banned! This sort of dramatic 60's ballad totally suits Marc Almond, which is why he often dips into the 60's back catalogue for forgotten gems. It was also the first of a hat-trick of chart-toppers from the Tenement Symhpony album. I didn't hear the original until 1976 when it popped up on a Hits of 1968 album I bought, at which point I went mad on it and played it to death for most of the year on as full-blast as I could dare before I got shouted at to turn it down.

 

 

 

PS Marc annoyingly doesn't allow me to promote his youtube back catalogue, he was just so offended I'm guessing that I didn't shout "Hi Marc!" when he stuck his head inside Centre Stage at the Yumbo, that he's banned everyone from linking them. So this might work...

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adRNP-IqBVc

24 ( 19 ) KISS THEM FOR ME Siouxsie & The Banshees 5 15

 

Kiss Them For Me was sadly Siouxsie's last sizeable hit, I think the world could do with a Banshees comeback of sorts after 13 years of non-stop hits by 1991. The Steven Hague (Pet Shop Boys producer) Bhangra/baggy production-sound change got it a fair amount of play in Florida/USA (and a US chart hit), which is why it's so high - it had a long run with a repeat holiday peak, and is the highest Banshee year-ender for me since 1985 when Cities In Dust also hit 24, but with a chart-topping run. This ain't anywhere near as classic as that one, but it's still very good. The title is taken from a Jane Mansfield film, and the song is about the movie actress - one who I liked as a kiddie, and I was genuinely stunned when I heard the news she'd been beheaded in a car accident, the newspaper headlines and mangled wreckage photos, became unshakeable even with years passing. Siouxsie's about my age, so I'm guessing it impacted her too.

 

23 ( 18 ) WALKING DOWN MADISON Kirsty MacColl 1 13

 

I can't hear any Kirsty record these days without getting sad at the way she died with her kids about her due to the actions of a still-free absolute tosspot in Mexico, and just at a time she had been getting into fun Cuban-styled music too in the early 2000's. I was inspecting Parks & Gardens along the Bournemouth Boscombe Overcliff when the news came on the car radio. This record is by far my fave solo Kirsty track, though, love it love it, topped my charts and I really went for the style change, it's funky beats and rhythms are pure Johnny Marr (who sent the track to her), hip-hop-ish production courtesy of her then-husband Steve Lillywhite, and words and tune by Kirsty after a writer's block. Social commentary scathing lyrics, a rap, and an album title pun that was fun - Electric Landlady having fun with famous Hendrix album Electric Ladyland, and it was recorded at Electric lady Studios. Just brilliant and one of the best records of 1991.

 

22 ( 17 ) MOVE ANY MOUNTAIN The Shamen 1 18

 

Not the original Progen mix (which I never got to hear) this is the 1991 Beatmasters remix, which was a terrific pulsing dance track with loads of mini-hooks thrown out amongst the ongoing beat. I could happily dance to this full-blast after a couple of ciders in a club, singing along of course! It even became a rare rave-era dance-track US top 40 chart hit, The tragedy of this video was the choice of Tenerife to film it in. Core band member Will Sinnott went swimming off the Canary island La Gomera, which lies opposite to Playa De Las Americas on Tenerife, and drowned. The waters off the Canary islands are treacherous, and tourists manage to kill themselves unaware (or ignoring) the red warning flags. I've been there myself and watched many blissful idiots (Hi to one in particular) get swept away down the coast inside 30 seconds when a giant 20-foot wave suddenly came out of nowhere. "I told you so" is a very useful phrase to keep on using to prevent further instances. So, in short, Will really shouldn't have died and The Shamen might have had a very different career, though possibly not as commercial as people like me felt sorry for their loss and admiration at carrying on. It took a while to top my chart, this, but it had a long run and stayed fresh over a long period.

 

21 ( 16 ) SAFE FROM HARM Massive Attack featuring Shara Nelson 2 21

 

Just missing the top 20, it's the first of two from Massive Attack, both featuring the great soulful vocals of Shara Nelson, and both peaking at 2 in my charts, but outdoing quite a few number ones by virtue of a long chart run (in this case). Safe From Harm followed-up the breakthrough biggie, but wasn't quite as iconic, but it's damn fine trip-hop cool 90's dance rhythms and classic soul vibes courtesy of Shara and samples from Herbie Hancock, and Funkadelic, and serves as a sort of advance subtler blueprint for some less massive dance-tunes of Faithless in Robert Del Naja's rapping not entirely unlike Maxi Jazz's. The band had to change their name (temporarily) to Massive following the Iraq hostilities of 1991 and the subsequent war. Not really necessary, we were quite capable of differentiating between politics and music, but radio was always keen not to offend listeners. Still is. I over-rated it a bit at the time, I'd knock it down 15 or so places I think, in favour of some other tracks like The Shamen, Kirsty Maccoll, Lenny Kravitz these days, but it's still classy.

 

 

and so into the 20..at least one of which should be obvious in comments here, and a few from mentions back a ways.

20 ( 15 ) SET ADRIFT ON MEMORY BLISS PM Dawn 2 22

 

Into the top 20 with the best Spandau Ballet record, it's True! Or rather the fab samples from the bloated, over-played biggest hit of Spandau Ballet. I'd much rather listen to PM Dawn's daisy-age gentle atmospheric rap any day. The band generally were very listenable, but this remains their biggest track commercially, and also for me, a little bit flattered from (yes of course) a lot of plays from a Florida holiday after it had already been a UK hit, so basically an extended chart-run outdoing a bunch of chart-toppers while peaking at 2.

 

19 ( 14 ) CRAZY Seal 2 26

 

Talking of extended Florida holiday runs, here's a fab Trevor-Horn-produced masterpiece that gave Seal a second Year-End top 20 placing following Killer with Adamaski in 1990. Crazy is equally as brilliant as Killer, but peaked at 2 despite 6 months on my charts, again due to it getting big on US radio later in the year after doing the Biz in January, and kick-starting Seal's rather good solo career. He'd have monsters in my Year-ends well into the late 90's, albeit not necessarily the UK charts. What a voice, what a song, what a production, and if anything it's too low on the list, courtesy of another bigger track hogging the top spot and denying Seal at least a few places higher on the list. Both Killer and Crazy were co-writes with Seal, but given neither co-writers had anything of this quality again, and Seal managed fine without them, I'm assuming Mr. Seal Samuel did most of the heavy-lifting on the song-writing side of things...

 

 

18 ( 11 ) WHEN HE’S GONE The Bee Gees 1 27

 

The Bee Gees spent their whole career having hits and having flops, oblivious to trends in the chart, sometimes they were in sometimes out of fashion, and the quality of the song melodies was usually consistent regardless. Secret Love was a nice slice of Chain Reaction pop and that worked for them, but this follow-up, When He's Gone, stiffed. I'm putting it down to Robin taking the lead vocal, they tended to do better with Barry on lead by and large, but I actually preferred the chorus on this one, and it was one of the last full-price vinyl singles I bought before they died a death. Playing it now, having not heard it in yonks and yonks, I can see it lacked the commercial edge of Secret Love, and it was a bit dour and too West Coast plodding in its production, more 80's than 90's. A more 90's sound might have been a better choice, but I do still like it. Just not as much as I did at the time. It's very over-rated here in terms of chart position, maybe around top 50 wouldve been about right. They'd be back in the year-end top 20 in 2 years time though, as they update and I go to see them on the radio 1 Roadshow in Exmouth. Now, if only I can sort out that video-recording I took to post on Youtube, of the Gibbs arriving in the helicopter and singing on stage.....

 

17 ( 64 ) SIT DOWN James 2 38

 

Second or third time lucky for Sit Down, and James finally get that breakthrough anthem with Sit Down, kicking off a great career for the next 33 years and counting - they have had a new album and several chart tracks for me in 2024, including the fab current single Life's A Shocking Miracle - and been consistently great or good throughout. This is famous, I mean everyone knows it, it's a singalong 90's standard, joyous and rousing, and so good even a remix didn't knock down it's popularity. It did however give more total "sales" to this one to the tune of a 38 week chart run, the longest one yet on the list, and which boosted it from an under-valued 64th of the year to the 17th best of 1991 and there are still 2 or 3 tracks ahead of it which it really should be in front of, but maybe just short of the top 10 is about right for me. I expect it would be top 10 in a popular vote for 1991 though.