My Random Music

Now the countdown is complete I don't think there's a single obscure number one of 1983. Interested to know if there's any 1983 number one that anyone on here didn't know already.

5 best: PhD - I Won't Let You Down Hot Chocolate - Girl Crazy Junior - Mama Used To Say Iron Maiden - The Number Of The Beast New Order - Temptation worst: Joan Jett And The Blackhearts - I Love Rock 'N' Roll tiebreak: Japan

Does anyone here listen to this? For those who don't know it's a radio station with a playlist of every Top 40 hit from 1952-1999 that gets played at random and won't get repeated until they've got through the entire playlist. There's no presenters and just 1 advert an hour. The problem with most retro stations is that they never play anything I haven't heard before and often they play something I've heard far too many times in my life. Every time I listen to Retro Charts Radio I hear something I've never heard before. I honestly couldn't think of a single way you could make it better. Obviously I don't like everything they play but I'd much rather sit through 3 minutes of a boring song than 3 minutes of irritating adverts you get on other stations.

Interesting how all the records in this countdown so far are all very well known and still regularly played today. In the 90s there were several that faded into obscurity straight after they topped the charts. In this countdown I'm certain I would know all these songs even if I wasn't a music nerd and I'm aware there's still more really well known ones to come.

I was alive in 1983 but too young to remember it. The Top of the Pops reruns filled a lot of gaps in my knowledge though. I like "Candy Girl". The first time I consciously remember it was when New Edition made their 90s come back with "Hit Me Off" and they showed this on Top of the Pops 2. I couldn't believe it was the same band.

The 5 best: Modern Romance - Queen Of The Rapping Scene (Nothing Ever Goes The Way You Plan) Imagination - Just An Illusion Eric Clapton - Wonderful Tonight (Live Version) Pluto - Your Honour Roxy Music - More Than This The worst: Bow Wow Wow - Go Wild In The Country

I like all 3 records in your Top 10 so far. Armand Van Helden is possibly my favourite of the year. I did find the superstar DJ thing a bit cringe but it was undeniably good music. Remember hearing the Five record for the first time on the radio in my car. Whilst other songs of theirs is more students union guilty pleasure material this is a genuinely good song. Blondie were quite unusual in having a comeback record that's up there with the records they did in their prime. Very few musicians manage to do that.

You hear a lot of people who were there in the acid house days say that before the raves they'd be getting into fights in the pubs and clubs on a Saturday night. The Prodigy certainly bridged the gap between rockers and ravers. Admittedly I hated it when they started incorporating guitars at the time because I was a rave purist but over time I've grown to like it. Still can't get into "Firestarter" though.

I've gone through many phases which I guess in itself reflects me as a person because I don't like too much of the same thing generally speaking. As a teen in the 90s rave music was my thing and it certainly went beyond the music. I saw a lot of the DJs had long hair so I grew mine, when I saw footage of raves I saw a lot of adidas being worn so I started wearing adidas myself. There weren't many others at school into rave, plenty were into house music but would turn their noses up at anything above 130 BPM, so it made it hard to gauge what being an authentic raver entailed. When I got to college and met new people I remember one person being surprised I was into rave because they didn't think I looked like a raver. I asked what sort of music I looked like I was into and they said indie which is one genre I've never got into and absolutely detested it at the time. More broadly I like my music to have a good beat and would rather listen to something hard and fast than something slow and soft. One of my big interests outside of music is motorsport which is all about speed. I'm also quite speedy in a lot of things I do so I guess that does say something about me as a person.

In the mid-90s The Offspring were much bigger than their chart positions would suggest. Once Kurt Cobain died grunge fizzled out and punk was to be the next big thing with The Offspring and Green Day being the main bands. It didn't last long and Britpop quickly took over as the guitar music of choice for people in the UK. 1999 was the time some of these guitar acts who were popular pre-Britpop came back out of the wilderness, The Offspring and Lenny Kravitz getting their only number ones and another notable comeback that springs to mind was the Red Hot Chili Peppers with "Scar Tissue". They also all seemed to have haircuts whilst they'd been away.

Garage was having a bit of a dry spell in the Top 40 when "Sweet Like Chocolate" topped the charts. The only UK Garage records I can think of that we'd had in the Top 40 in 1999 up to that point was the two Da Click records. Then afterwards aside from the re-issue of "Straight From The Heart" I don't think there was anything until we got the Dreem Teem, Artful Dodger and DJ Luck & MC Neat at the end of the year. I love UK Garage but "Sweet Like Chocolate" was far too cheesy for me. I thought garage was going to fizzle out commercially after it topped the charts but then it became bigger than ever the following year.

Really like it, I have the album and had it shortly after it was released in the early 90s. I wasn't one of the people who bought the single during the anti-X-Factor campaign because as much as I dislike any song I've heard from the show the fact it always got Christmas number one never really bothered me.

5 Best: Christopher Cross - Arthur's Theme (Best That You Can Do) Alton Edwards - I Just Wanna (Spend Some Time With You) The J. Geils Band - Centerfold D Train - You're The One For Me Iron Maiden - Run To The Hills Worst: Toni Basil - Mickey

Best: difficult to pick just one, depending on what mood I'm in it's either Pet Shop Boys - Always On My Mind or Rage Against The Machine - Killing In The Name Worst: so many candidates, probably one of the Spice Girls ones maybe "2 Become 1". The X Factor ones are probably worse but at least they're long forgotten after their week at number one and I'm not going to torture myself by listening to them again to remind myself how they go

The first number one I actually like has now featured, "Flatbeat" by Mr Oizo. Flat Eric may have given the impression it was a novelty record but just listening to the music it's a decent tune. Was never keen on "King Of My Castle" and hearing it multiple times down the pub on a Friday night at the time made me hate it more.

I've only just discovered this but thought you'd be interested to know, the "Serenade" you've crossed out is a different song to the one from 1955. 1955 song https://youtu.be/2aelb8rzqlY?si=8ZrYOoeVZU7rlMVo 1956 song https://youtu.be/LTaXxnshNJ0?si=klCh3JTc1D_LYALM

Agree that all the records featured so far deserve to be near the bottom. I'm not a big fan of boy bands or girl groups generally speaking but when it comes to the likes of Take That or the Spice Girls I remember all the hits and could probably hum them all beginning to end. I could also name every member and would likely recognise them all if I saw them walking down the street. With Westlife though they had a greater chart success at least at the start of their career. Yet I'd struggle to remember most of their number ones and the only member I could name top of my head is Bryan McFadden and that's more to do with his relationship with Kerry Katona than being part of the group. At least their music wasn't annoying I suppose, just boring. There is one boy band number one in 1999 though that I rather like but I won't mention it until it appears.

Could be because Chris Martin did backing vocals on "See It In A Boys Eyes".

Just a small correction, Coldplay didn't make their Top 40 debut until 2000. I was very much into my underground dance music and a bit snobbish towards the dance music that charted but I really couldn't fault a lot of the trance records that were in the Top 40 in 1999. At the same time the happy hardcore scene had gone stale and was starting to gravitate towards more of a trance sound, but I was liking trance itself more. The commercial trance did get silly in the end with the cheesy vocal stuff but that came later. Also agree with Cliff Richard down the bottom. There's nothing to like about it.

Our number 5's are the same, then it would be in reverse order Jamiroquai, Spacedust, Cornershop and Run DMC for me. Just quickly going through the list I would class 25 of the 32 number ones as cheesy pop. Not all cheesy pop is bad and the other 5 records I like fit that category and obviously it is the pop charts but that quantity is too much. Without looking at the list for 1999 I recall it improved in that respect and there were several decent dance records topping the charts. Another thing I notice with my Top 3 is they're not the original records.

The 5 best: Queen And David Bowie - Under Pressure Ultravox - The Voice Madness - It Must Be Love Jon And Vangelis - I'll Find My Way Home The Four Tops - Don't Walk Away The worst: Bucks Fizz - The Land Of Make Believe

You're not alone, I don't like it either. I like 4 of those records in the Top 10 but I count 10 number ones of the year that I actually like so naturally those 4 records would be in my Top 10. One of those records I'd put in my Top 3 but I'll say no more until the Top 3 is revealed. The other 2 records I'd put in my Top 3 are "Gym & Tonic" and "It's Like That".

I like 2 of the 3 records featured so far. Spacedust takes me back to a time when I listened to Dave Pearce on Radio 1 every Sunday night. I get the criticisms of it being a bit cheesy and ripping off someone else's idea but I enjoy listening to it. Mel B is the one I don't like, whilst the Spice Girls weren't quite finished the solo careers that followed were every bit as bad. All Saints have one of the more obscure number ones but that means you don't hear it much anymore as opposed to the overplayed "Never Ever" but I always thought "Bootie Call" was the better of the two. On a more personal note 1998 was the year I opened myself up to music that wasn't rave so my tastes had become more varied and give me fond memories as a result. At the same time there was complete dross such as Steps, B*Witched and worst of all Destiny's Child.

"You're Not Alone" is my favourite so not the same, but 3 records in common in our Top 5s.

Top 5: New Order - Procession New Order - Everything's Gone Green The Four Tops - When She Was My Girl Exploited - Dead Cities Electric Light Orchestra - Twilight As much as I like to pick a worst record I can't this time because all the candidates are supposed to be rubbish so I like to give some leniency.