I still like You're Beautiful, and yes most people dont pay detailed attention to song lyrics. I have a lot of time for Blunty, he's funny and self-deprecating and his music just got better as he went along, from my point of view, even at the time though this wasnt his best track - Wise Men, maybe was. He tends not to do ballads too much in the last 15 years, so it's odd how the typecast image wont go away.

21. McFly - I'll Be OK

#1 for 1 week W/E 27th August

#52 in EOY

Coincidentally, You're Beautiful is beaten by the song that finally knocked it off. This is the first of two number 1s to feature here for McFly, who were in the prime of their career at this point, with their fourth overall just a year after debuting. It is probably safe to describe this as a 'non-number 1', given it's plummet to 8th place the next week and exiting the top 40 a month after debuting, indeed the second week drops became a bit of a McFly quirk. Starting life as two songs where the best parts were put into one, the song was selected to give listeners a positive, encouraging message, the intro is similar to that of The Who's Won't Get Fooled Again, a named influence of the group and the single coincidentally contains a B-side of their cover of Pinball Wizard.

As you can tell by my tangents, I don't have a lot to say about this one. I do enjoy McFly though and 5 Colours in Her Hair and Obviously were both solid jams, I wasn't 'indie' enough at the time to find them uncool and wasn't quite the right audience to be absolutely head over heels for them, but their songs were enjoyable and I do find some things I quite liked about this - the guitar intro is great, the false ending and harmonising work well and they are clearly in their element, but asides, there's nothing here that you haven't already heard from them, it's also a little faceless and watered down lyrically and lacking the character and personality of some of their better songs. It just elicits no strong reactions and while I can't say anything bad about it, I have no reason to come back to it either, so just before the top 20 feels about right for it. TL;DR drumroll It's OK x

I liked the other singles from this campaign, but this one's a bit... eh.

“I’ll Be OK” is very meh - I’d actually put Blunty slightly ahead. I’ve always found “You’re Beautiful” slightly unsettling but it’s not a bad song at all. Later singles were better indeed.

Enjoying the commentaries - can't really argue with any of the placings, nothing I enjoy has appeared so far.

20. Nizlopi - JCB Song

#1 for 1 week W/E 24th December

#12 in EOY

Now this really did come out of the blue. Nizlopi were a duo formed in Leamington Spa made up of vocalist Luke Colcannon and guitarist John Parker (the name based apparently on a Hungarian girl in member Luke's school he used to like), Luke Colcannon wrote this song at his parents' house based on a real life memory of when his father picked him up from school in a JCB Digger, and how this made him feel strong when he was bullied due to his dyslexia. Clearly being a bit of a hero for him, a plethora of imagery is likened to him like Bruce Lee and B.A Baracus and transforming into a Tyrannosaurus Rex. The duo being completely unknown at first, the song could only manage as high as number 160 when originally released in June. They didn't stop there though and the rising superpower that was the internet and online marketing worked it's magic on them, and they started to develop a cult following amongst their online fanbases and promoted the song heavily across radios, receiving particular airplay from Dermot O'Leary's Radio 2 show at the time, and eventually Animation studio, MonkeeHub, caught wind of it and released a rather lovely hand drawn animated video, which began to bring further attention to the song and made further buzz online being frequently shared via email (YouTube was born this year, though it's realisation wasn't quite there yet), even playing on ad breaks between TV shows and music channels. It was re-released in December and topped the charts, beating Westlife in the process, and was looking on course to be Christmas number 1, however even with two days advantage in sales, it couldn't compete the other rising superpower of X Factor. True one hit wonders in every sense, they only had one further song even making the top 100 (with another animated video which didn't quite have the same impact) and though they did release another album, they split in 2010, reuniting on and off until 2020, with Luke now working as a travel writer and John a freelance session double bassist. Their most interesting future link was that a then unknown Ed Sheeran was a guitar technician at their earlier gigs, and was influenced by their sound.

I have so much nostalgia for this one, I remember first seeing the video on an ad break on Cartoon Network or Nickelodeon or something and I was a bit mystified, but I did find it quite charming and I honestly still do. I always love hand drawn animation and it really captures the childhood whimsy of the song perfectly, purely as an animated video with a song attached, I think it still works really well, but without that video as a song? Hmmm, well I like that they added a garage rap to the end to diversify it at least, but this is another one of those acoustic, emotional singer-songwriter type songs, and there's no subtext here, this has just about as just about the most cloying and cheesy lyrics you could get, and WOW they are bad...'the engine rattles my bum like beserk', 'me and my dad havin' a top larrrf' 'My dad's B.A. Barakas only with a JCB and Bruce Lee's nun chuckas'. I was just about the right age to get the nice childhood sentimentality of the lyrics and it certainly works well for a younger audience, but nowadays, it's quite hard not to cringe. I can't bring myself to dislike it, it's the right sentiment and worked in that moment as something completely genuine that made everyone feel a bit more warm inside, just don't think about it too much as a song x

Just awful. Never got the appeal at all.

I don't think I'd heard either of these two songs. In fact I don't think I've ever heard a McFly song ever. Though I have heard of them.

Upon hearing them, I don't think I've missed much.

I hear you on the cringe side of Nizlopi now. Loved it at the time though.

McFly by this stage just passed me by as formulaic fanbase stuff, and I don't remember this song at all as I play it - so consequently it would be down the list somewhat for me. It's not bad as such, it's just not memorable. Nizlopi, oh dear that was a pet hate at the time, I think had it been an angry or lush version I might have been more tolerant of it as I generally like childhood call-backs, but it just annoyed me every time I heard it. Ed Sheeran, hmmm, that might explain why I invariably react badly to his ballads, they take me back to this....😇sadly bottom of my list of the number ones of this year, still.

I know The JCB Song sounds cringe but it's a guilty pleasure of mine.

I wish my dad had been Bruce Lee and drove a JCB. 😆

Edited November 5, 2025Nov 5 by montyj

Meh, never cared for 'JCB Song'. Not that you should do I guess lol.

Definitely not my cup of tea either. A curious novelty for the Christmas charts.

I'd heard that Ed Sheeran had said Nizlopi were his heroes and can kind of hear their influence on some of his stuff.

I was surprised how well “The JCB song” did in the Christmas #2s rate last year. I’m not especially keen, though it would have been a much more interesting Christmas #1 than Shayne Ward.

Well I liked it a lot, and still do, although it's not something I'd seek out very often. Same with 'You're Beautiful'. There's a DIY sense of simplicity to those songs which I found quite charming and rare for a huge hit.

19. Oasis - Lyla

#1 for 1 week W/E 28th May

#31 in EOY

Almost ten years on from their and Britpop's stratospheric peak, it's safe to say the Oasis juggernaut was certainly not quite what it was, off the back of a frostily received Glastonbury performance, this would be, to date at least, the year where they got their final number 1s before their initial split in 2009, though they didn't pick a bad end as it was the first where they had more than one in a calendar year. Lyla was the lead single from Don't Believe the Truth, their sixth album and first to not feature Alan White, their long time drummer after he left the band (possibly though not entirely related to a brutal brawl he got in with Liam which landed them both in prison and needing medical care), though the album was seen as a return to form after their last two efforts. The song itself duly became their seventh number 1, though Noel has never been particularly complimentary of it (and the choice of it as a lead fuelled tensions between the band and record label and led to them not renewing their contract initially) calling it 'not even the fifth best track on the album', 'specifically designed for pogoing' and 'poppiest thing since Roll With It', he has come round to it through when performing it live, though it still did not feature in their recent reunion tour.

It's weird ranking a song from one of my favourite bands so low, but I don't think it's controversial to see Oasis released some really pedestrian work in the 2000s, and this was one of those. Saying that, I'd definitely take it over the Hindu Times and Go Let It Out. it's got all the classic big guitars, the 'far and neeeyaaaarrr' line from Liam is fine and the chorus is cool singalong stuff, but it does just feel like Oasis on autopilot like many songs of this era, there's just nothing here that they haven't already done better in the last ten years and it just sounds so blatantly like they were running out of ideas. It's decent, but nowhere near top of the list of songs I go back to, Thankfully have more positive things to say about their other one here x

I've really gotten into some of Oasis's early singles the last month or so, but I hadn't heard this one. I agree it's not a patch on their earlier work.

Fair placing for this Chez. I have never been a big fan of Lyla, it’s very basic bitch Oasis.

I sort of lost my patience with them in the 00s, but they redeemed themselves a bit with the follow up to this which is a classic.

One of their absolute worst, if not the worst. Hideous.

Thankfully the next single was a lot better.

This was my Oasis comeback year and I like Lyla, still sounds pretty good, the chorus is the weakest part though, that needed a re-write. I'd have it higher up the list (I think, having not seen what's yet to come). I read the 90's diary of their tour manager. Its no wonder they fight all the time, Liam would try anyone's patience, and they were invariably out of it on drugs and alcohol and sex. Going the whole template rock'n'roll band thing. Especially Liam.