And so we reach the end of another year, and it's time to look at the songs that have been the twenty most popular in the Radio Newtown chart throughout 2008. We'll be doing the countdown in reverse order, over the next four days, and today we look at numbers 20 through to 16.

 

20. Brakes - Royworld

 

An interesting year for the London University four-piece. A tour of libraries culminated in a memorable show in that most rocking of venues, the Westminster Reference Library, which was completed despite the attentions of a clutch of 'tweedy old crow' librarians going 'shhhhh'.

This song was number two for FOUR weeks in late summer and early Autumn, and makes it into the twenty finishers for the year-long race.

 

19. Heilige Nacht - Helene Fischer

 

In the race to be this year's Christmas number one, this was just beaten by the hugely popular Take That and 'Greatest Day' (which, unsurprisingly, you will find much higher up the countdown for the year). However, its popularity over the festive season is enough to get it into the Top 20 of 2008, the first of three entries for the German Schlager-musik pin-up girl. Only one other act has more than one entry in the Top 20, which makes it even more surprising that her third of four releases during the year stalled at 21 in the weekly chart. But here's the last of the Christmas spirit as those German Christmas markets pack up for another year...

 

Edited December 26, 200816 yr by Kit Curran

18. Stop and Stare - One Republic

 

The follow-up to last year's hugely successful Timbaland collaboration, One Republic finally got acclaim on their own with this superb song. Only the phenomenon that was Duffy prevented this from topping the chart in March, making it all the more surprising that no more hits have hit the Top 20 since. But they've marked themselves down in history with this entry into the countdown of biggest songs of the year.

 

17. Don't Stop The Music - Rihanna

 

After the 2007 success of 'Umbrella. Ella. Ella', 2008 gave Rihanna a pretty tough act to follow. But she did her best by getting this song into the Top 20 of the year. Unique among this list, it is the only song of the twenty not to have reached number one or two: it actually got only as high as no 4, but it turned out to be a long runner in the chart, and the three songs that beat it in January all made it into the Year's 20 as well. It was produced by StarGate, the production team behind Blue's early success, and who had a number one in the Radio Newtown chart themselves with 'Easier Said Than Done' back in 2002.

 

Edited December 26, 200816 yr by Kit Curran

16. The Promise - Girls Aloud

 

And so we finish today's segment with the first chart topper, courtesy of those five pop poppets who are singers, actresses, comediennes, arbiters of musical excellence and virtually anything ITV wants them to be. A string of catchy songs has kept the band in the charts constantly since 2002, when they were formed from 'PopStars - The Rivals' reality TV series.

Strangely enough, rivals One True Voice don't have any songs in the Top 20 of 2008...

 

This reached number one in October. In case you missed it, here's their performance from yesterday's Christmas Top of the Pops.

 

 

Look out for numbers 15 to 11 tomorrow!

Edited December 26, 200816 yr by Kit Curran

Continuing our countdown of the year, numbers 15 to 11 bring us two of the most controversial hits of 2008. Firstly...

15. I Kissed A Girl - Katy Perry.

 

Not sure why this should have been controversial. She kissed a girl. She liked it. So? But more than a few people were stirred up by this TATU-style flirtation with girl on girl action. The song spent a month climbing the Top Ten before finally reaching the summit on 7 September, the week of its physical release. It looked set to be the start of a golden career for the dark-haired temptress, until her image was tarnished by... a string of horrific fashion howlers at the MTV Awards in Liverpool. It's difficult to pick up what was worse... the American footballers uniform, the mindless bandwaggon jumping of her Barack Obama dress, or the wearing of the letters of her name down the side of what was more a swimsuit than a dress. Add to this the rather simple look of continual surprise, and it's little wonder than Hot N Cold didn't make the same impact in the Radio Newtown chart. Still, it was fun while it lasted, so enjoy the pounding glam rock beat of one of those hits out of nowhere (and ignore the childish and totally unfunny parodies that clog up YouTube to this day).

 

14. Dance With Me - Dizzee Rascal featuring Calvin Harris and Chrome

The first ever hit for Dizzee in the Radio Newtown chart, on its initial release, as a 'new single from Dizzee Rascal' it attracted little attention. However, it gradually started to pick up support due to its soulful vocal from Chrome but, probably vitally, also its wonderfully deadpan contribution from Calvin Harris, the man behind two of the most oddball hits of 2007. It eventually climbed to the number one spot for a week on 3rd August and gave Harris his second number one, after 'Acceptable In The Eighties' had been such a success last year.

 

Edited December 28, 200816 yr by Kit Curran

13. 3 Days Awake - Luetzenkirchen

After the supposed 'controversy' over Katy Perry snogging her own sex, it's difficult to know where to start with this one. Binge drinking, possible drug use, and explicit language in the English lyric made this track from German producer Tobias Luetzenkirchen a true trouble causer. But it shot to the top of the chart in late summer and stayed there for four weeks. Even ignoring the subject matter of the track - it's hard to call nihilistic techno a 'song' - it's still notable for its highly amusing video featuring a rabbit and a dog on a night out in Berlin.

The second of three German acts in the Top 20 of 2008, it's impossible to find an artist more unlike Helene Fischer than Luetzenkirchen, but he had major success both in this chart and performing live in the UK during the autumn, and there could be more for dance officianados from the Munich Deckmeister in 2009.

 

Warning: Do not watch if easily offended, will re-post as German language version if this breaks any T an Cs.

Edited December 30, 200816 yr by Kit Curran

12. Chasing Pavements - Adele

Blimey. After that mind-bending slice of German mania, we come back down to earth with the relaxing voice of Adele. Adele was the subject of unsustainable hype during the first couple of weeks of the year as 'The Voice of 2008', with one BBC show even suggesting that her autograph could become as valuable as Elvis or John Lennon in years to come. Cut through the hype - always generated by any new artist releasing in January, as there is simply nothing else to talk about - and you find a nice album by a nice artist who won't change anyone's life, but is like a cosy comfort blanket in troubled times. Awwww.

 

Here's her first single, which reached number two in January.

 

Edited December 28, 200816 yr by Kit Curran

11. Hooray - Delays

 

Having created some of the all-time classic songs of the 2000s, and having had two number twos in the Radio Newtown chart, ironic that Delays should get their first number one with one of their weaker songs. Yet even Delays' worst is better than most bands' best and the first single from 'Everything's The Rush', their brilliant new album, was possibly the most attention grabbingly commercial song from it, and was easily able to present them with their first chart topper in a weak field in May. It was number one for three weeks, and creates a happy-go-lucky sound for the sometimes melancholy Southampton band, who have fans all over the world and one of the best live shows around. Sadly, a tour in the autumn was curtailed by illness, but hopefully 2009 will present more people with the opportunity to experience the power of Delays.

 

 

And Delays are the other act with more than one song in the Top 20 of 2008, look out for them in the Top Ten shortly, but here's a recap of the chart so far...

 

20. Brakes - Royworld

19. Heilige Nacht - Helene Fischer

18. Stop and Stare - One Republic

17. Don't Stop The Music - Rihanna

16. The Promise - Girls Aloud

15. I Kissed A Girl - Katy Perry

14. Dance With Me - Dizzee Rascal, Calvin Harris and Chrome

13. 3 Days Awake - Luetzenkirchen

12. Chasing Pavements - Adele

11. Hooray - Delays

 

Still to come, music from Duffy, Take That, Can, Madonna, Turf, King of Prussia and more from Delays and Helene Fischer. But who will have Radio Newtown's Top Song of 2008?

Halfway through the countdown of the year on Radio Newtown, we're inside the top ten and it's a second appearance for these guys...

 

10. Love Made Visible/We Together Make A City - Delays

 

A hangover track from late 2007 finally made its big impact in the early weeks of 2008, entering the first chart of the year at 5, and eventually reaching number two - and bizarrely beating the band's own chart topper in 08's final countdown.

Released as an EP, the main track Love Made Visible, shown here, was backed with a Torchteam re-mix, 'We Together Make A City', and displayed Gregg Gilbert's unique vocals to their maximum effect. The official Love Made Visible video is a bit creepy, and may put you off your dinner, but the song certainly deserves to take its place among the very best of Delays' repertoire.

 

And just ahead, the song that beat Love Made Visible to the top spot in January...

 

9. Du Fängst mich auf und lässt mich Fliegen - Helene Fischer

 

A second chart topper from the German Schlager-musik babe, almost exactly twelve months on from her first, Helene Fischer's cheery, undemanding music is like a souvenir from pre-Christmas trips to authentic German Christmas markets (ie, ones actually in Germany), and weeks in sunny Majorca spent in mainly German dominated hotels. Well, if you can't beat em (apart from 5-1 in Munich, 2001), join em, and Schlager musik continues to prove its worth as fun, inoffensive entertainment whilst being bought pints and pints of lager - which funnily enough rhymes with Schlager - by ageing Bavarians... Still one more to come from Helene, the big Majorca summer hit of 2008.

 

 

8. I Want More - Can

 

And just ahead of Helene, more German music, the third of the Teutonic acts to make the Top 20 of 2008, but not through holiday travel, but from the clicking of a random YouTube link. Discovery of this track - originally out on vinyl in 1976, then on CD in 2006 - was better late than never and it became a hypnotic anthem that topped the Radio Newtown chart for two weeks in November. The sound reportedly influenced Johnny Marr's famous riff on The Smiths 'How Soon Is Now?', and was a shining beacon in a month of dire new releases. Funnily enough, the song at number 2 at this time was also from 1976, the advert-revived 'Let Your Love Flow' by Bellamy Brothers. Sadly, even with all this 1976 music around, there was no chance to enjoy a 1976-style summer...

 

7. If I Had Eyes - Jack Johnson

 

One of the coolest men on the planet had a number one single for two weeks in February on the Radio Newtown chart. Releasing a fantastic album called Sleep Through The Static, he chose this as his headline single, and it became the epitomy of cool during the early part of 2008, even surpassing Estelle's New Yorker tinged hit American Boy.

Johnson was a professional surfer before an accident trying to catch a wave turned him to music. And although he somehow manages to look as though he really ought to be holding a tennis racket on a hardcourt than a rock guitar (looking like a strange amalgam of Greg Rusedski and Andre Agassi), his mellow sounds are always a joy to listen to, and maybe he provided the inspiration for another Hawaiian-born celebrity to reach number one in his chosen field later in the year...

 

 

... which leads nicely onto...

Like this so far:

 

18. Stop and Stare - One Republic

17. Don't Stop The Music - Rihanna

16. The Promise - Girls Aloud

15. I Kissed A Girl - Katy Perry

14. Dance With Me - Dizzee Rascal, Calvin Harris and Chrome

12. Chasing Pavements - Adele

 

6. Misadventures of the Campaign Kids - King of Prussia

 

In the year of an historic US Presidential Election, this song kind of caught the mood of the political mania like no other, and was Radio Newtown's number one for five weeks in September and October, at the height of the campaign. Yet the song is hardly about politics, more of a hormone-fuelled teen joining an election campaign to further their love life with one of the other campaigners. An amusing lyric and a 1960s' almost Mersey-style jangly guitar completed the feel-good quality of this track from King of Prussia, a band of self-proclaimed 'method actors' from Athens, Georgia, US of A.

 

 

Stick around for a few hours to discover the top five most popular songs on the Radio Newtown Top 20 of 2008.

And so we enter the home strait of our Radio Newtown Top 20 of 2008, here comes the Top 20...

 

5. Lass mich in dein Leben - Helene Fischer

 

How I just love Schlager musik! Helene Fischer missed out on the chance to put all her first three hits at number one when Mittem in Paradies reached number three in May. But she finally notched the hat-trick in July, when this first single from her album Zaubermond went to number one for three weeks. If you switched on German public TV during the summer, or went to certain hotels in Arenal, Mallorca, this song and this gorgeous babe were everywhere. Helene even graced Mallorca with her presence during the summer, and will continue to play to enthusiastic audiences throughout Germany in the early weeks of 2009. And to top it all, she's a thoroughly nice, unassuming lady who speaks and can sing in excellent English... so who knows what's in store for Helene Fischer in 2009? Maybe a Radio Newtown Top 20 hit with one of her English language recordings, or maybe even an entry into a forthcoming Buzzjack Song Contest? Watch this space...

 

4. Greatest Day - Take That

 

It entered the chart at number one. It got the prestigious Christmas number one. It's still number one, after six weeks at the top. Yet it still just comes in as the 4th most successful song of 2008 on our chart. But what a song! From their chart topping album The Circus, the Take That boys have followed up 'Rule The World' with an even bigger Autumn/Winter epic. Somehow, you just couldn't imagine 'Greatest Day' (or 'Rule The World' for that matter) being a hit in the summer. Both songs seem to conjure up firework displays on dark winter nights, and Sky Sports montages after particularly important live football games. For a band of hyper-active boys we thought we'd seen the last of at the turn of the century, we now prepare for its second decade with four dignified gentlemen as the wise men of pop, in steady yet fashionable M & S clothing, and belting out gems like this...

 

Here's their performance on X Factor.

 

3. Mercy - Duffy

 

In January, everyone said that Adele would be the biggest female star of 2008. In fact the biggest female star ever. Not even close. With her album Rockferry, the 'new Dusty Springfield' out of Wales, Duffy, blew everyone away and continues to do so with 'Rain on My Parade' still in the charts. But 'Mercy' was the huge breakthrough track, that topped Radio Newtown's chart for four weeks in March. The question is, will Duffy be able to follow up such huge success in years to come? Maybe a question for another day, as for now, let's enjoy a fantastic talent at work, with more wonderful retro imagery as well!

 

 

 

2. 4 Minutes - Madonna feat Justin Timberlake

 

Okay. So you get the most successful female artist of all time, with a string of number ones going back over twenty years, to unleash yet another new musical direction and image. Add one of the most popular ex-boy band pin-ups who has created a new following with his grown-up R n B Style. And to produce it, get music's current Midas man, for whom everything turns to gold, from the zillion selling new-look Nelly Furtado, through his own solo chart-topping feats, up to kick starting the career of a solid but dull US AOR band.

So when Madonna met Justin Timberlake and Timbaland, it would have been a major surprise if it hadn't been good and hadn't been a number one. No surprises, as this topped the chart for five weeks from late March to early May. Just one question, though. If, at the beginning of the song, Timbaland claims he is 'out of time', how come he still had four minutes?

 

Of course, 2008 was also the year in which this very song almost brought down YouTube... you will not find the official video of this *anywhere* on the site... but I think we have a very good substitute... :lol: