Geri is "Heidi Range", very underrated member of popular girl group.

There's a good song in 'Lift Me Up' somewhere, but I always felt it would be a better song with somebody else singing it. The vocals are so bad.

Hard core love the video though!

Alien love!

Westlife's version of 'I Have A Dream' did me smile during the Christmas of 1999, an six-year old Mack quite enjoyed this. This version however I remember quite well but necessary for the right reasons:

Not sure if they would be allowed to do this now.

Hot take but I actually prefer Westlife's version of I Have a Dream to ABBA's...and it's actually for backhanded reasons as the original is easily ABBA's worst song and miles below their usual genius, it's the sort of cheesy rubbish that's more within Westlife's ballpark and they do a decent job of jazzing it up. Their version of Seasons In The Sun though is awful, especially as it was written as a very personal song for a close friend dying.

Everything else so far is crap so appropriately placed, Millenium Prayer is a new kind of bad not many records achieve x

Lift Me Up Is average at best so fair placing. Emma Bunton’s track isn’t much better imo so it wasn’t like there was a clear better song in that chart battle.

No issues with the 5 out so far, although I don't hate 'The Millennium Prayer' as much as some seem to. It was somewhat refreshing to have a #1 that defied convention, by having so little airplay, and actually climbing to the top (justice for Alice Deejay though). I had slightly been rooting for it against Westlife in the Christmas #1 battle as the latter were appearing increasingly contrived. I remember when Mark Goodier announced it on the chart show, with only the top 2 left, he started playing 'I Have A Dream' getting people to think it was #2, and then just said it was one of the contenders along with 'The Millennium Prayer', before playing the latter in full - nice bit of trolling there. By the time of the EOY chart rundown where Cliff was eventually announced at #3, I thought yep, this has gone too far now.

I also remember the top 2 announcement when 'Lift Me Up' got to #1, as Mark did radio interviews with both contenders. Emma was very gracious and made a point of congratulating Geri on her #1. When a few minutes later Mark asked Geri if she wanted to say anything to Emma in return, Geri replied "I just want to thank everyone who has supported me", which came across a little awkward (all good friends again now, of course).

True, from a chart watcher's perspective it was somewhat interesting to see how The Millennium Prayer behaved, but I do wish it could have been for any other song. Like you say, Better Off Alone was SO close to doing it in the summer, climbing in sales for weeks and under 500 copies adrift at its closest.

Yes, Geri had a big ego at the time although her personality seems to have mellowed a lot these days, Emma has always been lovely it seems.

Dont mind 911's particularly but also not keen on it either. 'Private Number' was nice by them. Will need to remind myself of 'Bodyshakin' though as I may have forgotten how it goes lol.

I also like Westlife's cover of 'I Have A Dream' too though wouldn't say it's more than a 7 out of 10 at most. 'Seasons In The Sun' however, not for me.

Aw at 'Lift Me Up'. I was a fan of that myself as a kid and still am to a degree though I guess listening to it now I totally get the vocals being off putting for others. Always found the song and the video for it cute though. 'Mi Chico Latino' is the better of her first run of singles saying that so hopefully that's not out just yet!

This doesn't Lift Me Up from Geri not for me sorry.

With all the Lift Me Up discussion, I've played it again not having heard it in ages. In my memory it was the "hook" I had an issue with that got on my nerves after weeks of hearing it, but it is quite sweet outside of that on the verses and bridge. Upgrade to "about right".... 🙂

14 hours ago, gooddelta said:

Yes, Geri had a big ego at the time although her personality seems to have mellowed a lot these days

I think her ego is still very much present It's perhaps just manifested itself in a different way these days.

30. Westlife - Swear It Again

Rank: 5/10

Reason: Back to Westlife and this time their debut single, Swear It Again. Written by future mega successful songwriters Steve Mac and Wayne Hector, this is the kind of ballad that was everywhere in the UK music industry from late 1998 to about 2002 when the pop bubble as we knew it burst and a wind of change swept through the charts in 2003. A lot of boybands were pushing these lushly orchestrated, well produced ballads with sweeping strings, albeit moreso around Christmas (and it wasn't only boybands - acts ranging from Spice Girls to B*Witched and even Emilia all had their own stringy winter ballad hits).

So the April release for Swear It Again was a bit different, and indeed releasing a ballad as a debut single was a bit unusual as they are not always that impactful to set up a new group, but Westlife (known previously as Westside before a name change) had been doing the schools and PA circuit since 1998 and the group - managed by Louis Walsh with some help from Ronan Keating (as a bit of a PR push I'm sure) - pushed Swear It Again first partly I suspect because it was proving popular on the road, plus it gave the opportunity for lots of swooning into the camera and to sell the band's look to a teen audience.

I think this song was nice enough, it's a bit of a plod in places and a fairly unremarkable debut single but it was popular by its own merits, with two weeks at No.1 and has 181m streams on Spotify, and even made the top 20 in the US, so definitely made a lasting impact. The production is nice, and the track established early on the Shane lead vocal/Mark dramatic ramp up/middle eight format that pretty much all of their big hits had. So they settled straight into the groove they would largely stay in, and it was all perfectly fine and nice. But they had better hits to come than this.

I agree with this being the lowest of Westlife’s three original #1’s for the year. It’s nice enough but not a patch on the other two.

Yuck and this is where the nightmare of their career began!

(I do quite like one of their others still to come though)

I also much prefer the 2 Westlife songs to come.

29. Boyzone - When The Going Gets Tough

Rate: 5/10

Reason: I'm just flip flopping between the two big Irish boybands here but between them and Ronan they took up a lot of 1999's No.1s. For the Comic Relief single, Boyzone released a cover of the 1985 No.1 When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Get Going, by Billy Ocean. I don't ever really feel the need for a major act to cover No.1 singles from recent history - 1985 to 1999 is what 2011 is to today, to me it still feels relatively recent. Also this cover is very barely changed from the original. But it was for charity and I guess they usually go for something recognisable to the general public to maximise exposure.

In its defence, they did a fair job with the song and it suits them. The video features a lot of comedians and other actors and presenters from the time, many who are still known today like Jo Brand, Davina McCall, Harry Hill, Graham Norton and, for some reason, the cast of Emmerdale, including Lisa Riley who has just been on I'm A Celeb here. The song is decent and good fun, and does bring back memories of it being around at the time, and the lead vocals are well split between Ronan and Stephen.

Being released in aid of a UK charity, the track wasn't really pushed far elsewhere and got to No.2 in Ireland and charted low in a few European countries but that was it. This was the last hurrah for Boyzone's original era in my mind, because You Needed Me and Every Day I Love You were so forgettable that they may as well have been left completely. And by that point, the band were old news, it was all about Westlife. But five years on top was a good innings.

Boyzone, the usual cheap n cheerful charity cover that makes the original sound better in comparison, I'd have it lower down, The Westlife track I actually liked though, and I hadnt had to suffer crimes to cover versions from them yet.

'Swear It Again' was a very pedestrian debut for Westlife so the average score feels fair. That CD single actually has a track on it called 'Ronan Keating interviews Westlife' so Louis Walsh indeed seemed to be making the most of that connection to help launch them.

The Boyzone cover is marginally better and at least something more fun and upbeat from them, but I'd never choose it over the original. I remembered Harry Hill and Graham Norton being in the video but had forgotten about the rest of those appearances! Random soap opera crossover, sure why not. I do miss the EastEnders Children In Need medleys

Not huge on the Boyzone cover, but I think it's in about the right place.