On 05/09/2026 at 08:34, gooddelta said:

So this is one of the two songs I remember from the time in 1991 and it would be in my top five I think without looking at the list.

Any Dream Will Do is a fantastic composition and imo works nicely in Jason’s hands, dramatic in the right places, the kids choir backing works well and I love the instrumental too. We did a production of it at primary school too so I got to know the song so well. I still listen to it a lot, one of about three Jason songs I actually enjoy (along with Especially For You and When You Come Back To Me).

I like the intro. When You Come Back to Me is probably my favourite.

2 hours ago, Jaz13music said:

I’ve noticed you mentioning getting CD singles of number ones in the past and forgot to ask about it. Have you collected all the 90s ones? That’s a fantastic achievement!

Yeah - I have all #1's from 1989 - 2006 on Single CD. For the 1990's only a very few Top 20 hits are missing:

#4: 1990 New Kids On The Block - Cover Girl (there is only a hard to find Promo Single CD available, the chart position was solely derived from 7" sales)

#11: 1990 Malandra Burrows - Just This Side Of Love (no Single-CD was issued - I would accept the compilation "Stars Of Soap" as replacement - Gooddelta confirmed that it is vinyl-sourced on this compilation)

#14: 991 Dannii Minogue - Baby Love (you won't believe it, but there was no Single-CD issued in the UK - however, there are German and Australian versions, but these are very hard to get. Currently, there are only 3 Austalian sellers selling this on discogs)

#20: 1994 Green Day - Welcome To Paradise (this is not that expensive - this is just due to bad odds that no seller I put bulk orders in the past had this one)

1 hour ago, DaTilt said:

Yeah - I have all #1's from 1989 - 2006 on Single CD. For the 1990's only a very few Top 20 hits are missing:

#4: 1990 New Kids On The Block - Cover Girl (there is only a hard to find Promo Single CD available, the chart position was solely derived from 7" sales)

#11: 1990 Malandra Burrows - Just This Side Of Love (no Single-CD was issued - I would accept the compilation "Stars Of Soap" as replacement - Gooddelta confirmed that it is vinyl-sourced on this compilation)

#14: 991 Dannii Minogue - Baby Love (you won't believe it, but there was no Single-CD issued in the UK - however, there are German and Australian versions, but these are very hard to get. Currently, there are only 3 Austalian sellers selling this on discogs)

#20: 1994 Green Day - Welcome To Paradise (this is not that expensive - this is just due to bad odds that no seller I put bulk orders in the past had this one)

Wow that’s really brilliant! I’m very impressed!

3 hours ago, Gezza said:

I don't have all the 90s ones but I do have all the 00s ones! (sorry I know you weren't asking me! 😁)

That’s impressive, fantastic work! I thought I had a decent collection but you’re all putting me to shame!

Nothing much of loss so far. 'Any Dream Will Do' is my fave to depart from all those. I think it's really nice though obviously cheesy as anything. The Lee Mead one can go in the bin however.

11 George Michael and Elton John - Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me

2 weeks in December 1991: {1}-1-2-3-4-8-24-42-56-70->10

Kept off #1: Diana Ross - When You Tell Me That You Love Me

#15 in EOY 1991

Weekly sales at #1: 55k; 82k

Falling just short of the top 10 in this countdown is the middle one of a group of 3 consecutive #1s at the end of 1991 which all entered at the top, the first time this had ever happened. There's now only one group of 3 consecutive #1s of any type in the year that remain to be revealed in the top 10, so they must be the ones many of you have been referring to! So to Elton John's 1974 hit which could only reach #16 in the UK, but went to #2 in the US. George Michael had performed the song at Live Aid in 1985 with Elton playing piano, and later it became part of his solo live sets. At one his Wembley shows in 1991, he brought out Elton as a surprise guest before the second verse to take shared vocal duties. It's this live version that became the 4th #1 of George's solo career, and the 3rd #1 for Elton.

This was one of the easiest for me to rank, as it sits in the middle ground between the previous six which are in some way not great, and the remaining ten which I think are all pretty decent at least. This one is OK - vocally it's a good performance from both considering it's in a live arena and there are some nice harmonies. I'm not too familiar with Elton's original version - I've only really come to know it through this one - and personally I wouldn't have it as one of his absolute top songs, but its UK peak didn't reflect how high his star had risen at that time, so this version did something to rectify that. The arrangement around the piano is quite similar to here, so I feel similarly about either version - in fact rather than while either of them are singing, the most noteworthy moment of this one is George's introducing his guest to the stage: "Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Elton John!" Which also lent to the title of George's 1998 Best Of... and Elton would later become a Sir, and appear on a #1 with LadBaby... but all that's for another time.

The #2 in the second week was a Diana Ross ballad - it's a nice enough song but very much within her comfort zone. It returned to #2 behind the next #1 two weeks later, and again in a new 2005 version in which Diana sang it alongside Westlife. It's also notable that the week in 1991 it entered at #10 was the first time there had ever been 3 new entries in the Top 10 - the song entering just above it at #9 was the debut chart hit for US grunge band Nirvana, entitled 'Smells Like Teen Spirit'. I wonder what became of that one.

I'll break for a few days now and commence the top 10 towards the end of this week!

I like Don’t Let The Sun… both the original and this version, though it didn’t really add much to be truthful. The vocals are great especially George’s, and the Elton introduction is a nice moment. I think I’m pretty much agreeing with your top 10, but in what order?

It's OK. My version of course goes like "don't let your son go down on me"

Dizzy was the first record I ever bought thanks to my great-grandparents giving me 10 shillings to treat myself on comics and records when we moved to Singapore for 2 years. That was a fortune back in the olden days, and I am of course talking of the Tommy Roe original bought from Changi Village evening market stall, a bubblegum classic so good that the late William Orbit sampled it for Bass-o-matic's Fascinating Rhythm in 1990 and Vic covered it in 1991 with a fun upbeat slice of fun I was bound to enjoy as a Vic & Bob fan. To keep on with the reminiscing, Tommy Roe's Greatest Hits was the first CD album I bought, I saw him in concert around then and then Vic and Bob in 1991 doing their comedy tour with added music hits. Phew!

George & Elton, happy to see them top the chart, but TBH I got fed up with hearing it. And it put me off the original version, which I wasnt keen on in 1974 - too dirgey - but grew to love by the early 90's buying the CD re-issue before this came out and set me back to square one on it. George was great, love him, love Elton, but this track not so much.

I don't really have a connection to Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat as I've never seen it or been involved with a production (my big one at school was Bugsy Malone!), but do prefer Jason's version to the Lee Mead one at least, even if the latter was likely the first one I came across.

'Bring Your Daughter... To The Slaughter' getting to #1, especially for two weeks ahead of its harsh drop, is an interesting chart moment (and the whiplash of this and another chart-topper back-to-back when working through a #1s marathon is quite funny) but I'm not a fan of it musically either. Shame they couldn't have reached the top with one of their more iconic songs instead.

I'm normally a big sixties music advocate but do actually think 'Dizzy' works better at a faster pace, which feels apt for its title and lyrics. So I like this daft version more than the original!

I think I first discovered 'Don't Let the Sun Go Down On Me' through X Factor as Joe McElderry sang it for both Wham!/George Michael week and as a duet with George in the final. I agree with your sentiments that this duet is vocally competent but just alright as a song.

There was really no big need for this cover version as it sounds very similar to the original. The Diana Ross song is also not very memorable, so no big steal here. I would rank this somewhere around the middle overall but behind Color Me Badd.

I really liked that Diana Ross song.

Yeah quite a nice duet and song. A bit more interesting as a duet to the original.

The Diana Ross song that was at #2 is a bit better though.

Edited Monday at 12:335 days by TheSnake

3 hours ago, Popchartfreak said:

Dizzy was the first record I ever bought thanks to my great-grandparents giving me 10 shillings to treat myself on comics and records when we moved to Singapore for 2 years. That was a fortune back in the olden days, and I am of course talking of the Tommy Roe original bought from Changi Village evening market stall, a bubblegum classic so good that the late William Orbit sampled it for Bass-o-matic's Fascinating Rhythm in 1990.

I didn’t know about that sample, thanks for that titbit! Fascinating Rhythm is a great song!

2 hours ago, Jade said:

I don't really have a connection to Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat as I've never seen it or been involved with a production (my big one at school was Bugsy Malone!), but do prefer Jason's version to the Lee Mead one at least, even if the latter was likely the first one I came across.

Ah Bugsy Malone is brilliant, that’s much more my kind of thing!

“Dizzy” is a fun cover. I remember seeing it at #1 on TOTP aged 7 and it was all quite entertaining.

I remember seeing a live performance of “Don’t Let The Sun…” on TV and the superstar collaboration being a really big deal with Elton only coming on for the second verse. It’s nothing very special though.

I think I’d probably have exactly the same top 10. I only really like 5 of them though most of the others have a little bit of nostalgia value.

I’d probably go:

17 The Stonk

16 I Wanna Sex You Up

15 Bring Your Daughter…

14 Don’t Let The Sun…

13 Dizzy

12 Do The Bartman

11 Any Dream Will Do

I always quite liked "I Wanna Sex You Up". There seemed to be two different versions of this track - the one which begins with "Come inside, take off your coat, I'll make you feel at home..." (which is the version used on the music video and the version that was played on Top of the Pops) and the second version beginning with "Hey beautiful lady, I need you tonight..." which was regularly played on radio (specifically Longwave Radio Atlantic 252!) a few years later. I always preferred the latter version.

I always had a soft spot for the "Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh" backing vocals too which made the song stand out for me. I didn't catch the song on Top of The Pops at the time (I saw TOTP very sporadically in 1991), so when I heard the song a few years later on the radio, innocent me thought they were singing "I Wanna SET You Up", so I didn't clock the subject matter of the song!

Edited Thursday at 14:062 days by donnahjaneymack

10 Chesney Hawkes - The One And Only

5 weeks in March / April 1991: 59-45-32-18-5-{1}-1-1-1-1-2-5-11-25-43-52->16

Kept off #1: James - Sit Down (3 weeks)

#7 in EOY 1991

Weekly sales at #1: 42k; 61k; 51k; 46k; 33k

Let's begin the top 10 then. Chesney Hawkes is the son of Leonard "Chip" Hawkes of the 1960s band The Tremeloes - the backing group for Brian Poole, whose daughters Shelly and Karen Poole would have similar nepo musical connections when they later found fame as Alesha's Attic. Chesney shot to fame at the age of 19, when he appeared as the title character in the film Buddy's Song, and this song, written by Nik Kershaw featured in the film. Once it caught on, it ascended the chart with four successive climbs of either 13 or 14 places taking it from low Top 75 to the Top 5, and it then embarked on 5 weeks at the top. It is often cited as an archetypal "one hit wonder" song - he did have one subsequent Top 40 hit which reached #27, however despite some later success as a songwriter, this song remains what he is best known for.

This one I remember very well from the time - at least from my school friends singing the chorus, and sometimes "call me, call me by my name", and maybe stretching to other parts of the verses. It is certainly catchy, and a wholesome, positive affirmation of individuality - no matter how much the lyrics lean into the obvious, it's hard to recall such a huge hit centred around the concept of just being yourself. The music is similarly simplistic but brightly-coloured pop rock, not a million miles from the sound peddled by a certain Canadian we may hear from later but who had yet to have a UK Top 10 hit at this point. I suppose for a song so completely presented at surface level, and with little follow-up success to accompany its legacy, there would soon come a point where it became played out, but for sure it scaled its heights with dignity and pride.

However for three consecutive weeks, the song it held to #2 is also a guitar-based anthem with a similar lyrical theme of embracing all walks of life. And yet this one truly is a bona fide classic for the ages, with Tim Booth's wistful lyricism of how it feels to be disenfranchised building up to the huge chorus. Sadly I haven't (yet) had the pleasure of experiencing the "sitting down" 'dance' in any public venue. Nevertheless it would be challenging for the top of this countdown if it had been allowed its turn at the top!

Aww I’d put “The One And Only” a little higher for being straightforwardly joyous. Chesney comes across well too, making self deprecating jokes about people only wanting to hear him for the one song. I think at the time he apologised to James and said yours is the better song.

Yeah, such a memorable song, I particularly enjoy the verses, lovely melody and chords.

Forgot to comment on George & Elton but am not that passionate about it, a good vocal performance and decent cover.

I don't think there was much publicity at the time about Nik Kershaw being the writer so I didn't know and only found out many years later. I think I would put the song higher up as well.