Popchartfreak

Hey Sven! :) I didnt realise Hammer To The Heart had had a release of sorts last year, New Zealand it was a sorta hit too it turns out, so I'm a bit late on it and surprised they didnt push it as a single - I thought it was better than the 1st single off the new album and Guilty has passed me by so far. :o Thanks for all the picks! :dance: cheers! B-)

Hi Sergej! :) Thanks as always for the picks and hoep all is fab! B-)

Totally agree. My earlier comments about having preconceived opinions and people trying to change facts to support that worldview apply here when anybody tries to blame this on the EU. Nobody forced Putin to invade Ukraine in 2014, he chose to do it, and when the EU and USA did f*** all, that was the just the go-ahead he needed to go ahead and grab another huge chunk of Ukraine. Presumably someone who believes that first "do nothing" was the right thing to do will also believe that "do nothing" will apply until Putin really feels secure by playing Risk. I mean, when could that fantasy ever happen!!? It's never happened before!! Never ever! Not in 1939, not in 1914, and not once in the whole history of humanity. Oh hang on, that's right, tyrants invade all the f***ing time, always have always will, and if you dont want to live under a tyrant you have to stand up to them. Note to Americans, Trump just issued a declaration that only HE and HE ALONE has the right to make laws. If that isn't proof that democracy is about to end in the USA you really are a moron and deserve everything you have coming to you. Those who would rather they have a say in their future are really going to have to do more than moan on social media and wave some flags on a nice walk for a couple of hours. The judges currently the only ones trying to hold back on the deluge of attacks and respect the Constitution are going to be targeted next in the forthcoming coup. Don't believe me? Believe Trump: "in four years, you don't have to vote again. We'll have it fixed so good, you're not gonna have to vote."

Ooh both on 36's, must be due another batch of 39's I predict! :dance: Gran canaria contestant, 5 weeks on holiday, I'm jealous, sunshine and pub quizzes and beaches. Maybe I should do another break soon! Round 1: 39 helped by getting the movie song title right this time after getting it slightly wrong for that act's 3 in 10 last week. Yes I rushed to the Guinness Book Of Hit Singles to double check, I am that sad :lol: Round 2: 36 (beat me to ) 3 in 10: 3 (

Yazz's newie was OK, not as good as the previous 2 nor some of her later solo stuff but not a bad record. The cover of Kiss was quite chunky in comparison to prince's more delicate original, but I think it gave a bit of oomph to it and Tom some street-cred setting up his move to become more relevant musically, ably assisted by his son/manager. I thought the previous album singles were weaker than the monster hits and his early stuff, but Robert's She Makes My Day is quite nice, a change of pace that might well pay dividends in the 90's...

voted. Good semi 1, there were some that we had no room to vote for but hope they qualify along with the 10. There are some obvious easy qualifiers and quite a few good/interesting ones that might be more more borderline, but cherrypicking 2 a bit of hype from us for Gusgus and driia just because.

Most people don't search for facts and data. I was in the USA at election time and most information on the old media was in the form of short adverts, and now people are bombarded with online propaganda and huge media outlets owned by billionaires. Large swathes of the human race suffer from self-delusion: as in, they have pre-existing beliefs and twist everything to support their own personal delusions, from flat-earthers and aliens to religion. None of these things have any logic or science or facts to them but people cling to them. Anti-vaccers like Kennedy is another symptom of this. I am happy for anybody to believe anything they want to - AS LONG IT DOESN'T HARM SOMEONE ELSE. At which point I jump off. old diseases from my childhood are now cropping in the USA so anti-vaccing is now causing harm so it needs to be called out for what it is. If people choose not to vaccine and die that's their own choice, but once kids start dying because measles and TB are spreading they lose that right in my opinion. Meanwhile, Musk just literally fired crucial Nuclear weapon operators because the kids he hired had no idea what these people do - keep the nuclear weapons safe! - and blocked their accounts instantly. Oops. Once they realised they had no way of contacting these experts they had to put out a request for them to get back in touch. Me, I would refuse to come back without a tripling in wage or say f*** Off I have transferable skills, I will transfer them elsewhere, as any guarantees they offer about job security have been proven to be worthless. They have ignored due process and the law. Reap what you sow if you hire people who dont know anything about shit. See previous comments from me on external hirings in local government, paying people more than the staff who end up doing their job for them so they can collate bollocks to sell bollocks to provide the outcome bollocks to idiots without skills or knowledge who get elected by people who have no idea what they or anyone else does. You might say I'm cynical, but that is the only sane way to approach humanity, baseless optimists are dangerous to the rest of us.

Thanks Jade! :) Fashionably late today again, missed the first few questions got the rest right Round 1: 20-something I lost count :lol: Round 2: 39 3 in 10: 3 (a gift to me, I can rattle off 20 or 30 no prob, albeit longer than 10 seconds :lol: )

If there's one thing we know for certain, it's that laws and agreements and telling the truth are concepts totally alien to the lying Abbott & Costello of global politics. You can't believe a word that comes out of their mouth and they have been mutually supporting each other for over decade. Trump was visiting Russia on invitation way before he was a TV reality star and shit cameo in Christmas movies and head of numerous bankrupt corrupt businesses. When people show you who they are, you believe that's what they are and only a moron would think otherwise, except for those making conscious decisions who are supporting the aims of the Dynamic Duo to end democracy. The only difference is one already has total control by murdering and the other one is in the process of converting the nation to that point. We will see in 2 years how successful that has been to that aim. If you think this is hyperbole, you really are naiive.

Kylie's first single that I proper rated after liking then getting fed up with Lucky, and the best track on the album. Never heard that B side though..... Milli Vanilli - The record was pretty good at the time, not so fussed now though. Odd how there's a lot of European models popping up fronting European acts around this time..... :teresa: Frank Farian of course vocally behind the male bits on Boney M records, mimed to by former model Bobby Farrell.

two tracks, one in each semi that I rate and have charted: that'll be Viva L'Opera and Kiss Them For Me, hopefully they will make the final :dance:

Enya's was a very unique-sounding lush track at the time, and fabulous, and second only to Kim Wilde's Never Trust A Stranger, one of her greatest (if not the actual greatest) hits, it needs to be better remembered as in a concert setting it's easily the most euphoric track in her catalogue, so exciting. The Christians did a great version of Harvest For The World, so good they still get radio play for it when The Isley Brothers original is drop-dead brilliant. Saw Garry in concert 2 years ago, giving it a good go. And then there's one of those highly annoying tracks, which might have been cool to the acieeeeeeeeeeed crowd but as I did neither drugs nor clubbing then it was mostly a sort of novelty record. Thankfully never gets played as an oldie. :teresa:

Ahh Kasey Kasem/Shaggy from Scooby Doo, big fan of his I was back then and always caught the US top 40 when I could get the signal, or was in the States. failing that Paul Gambaccini on Radio 1 for his US chartshow :cheer: I have a letter from Gambo, almost spoke to him at a Comics fair once, and saw him last year interviewing Madeline Bell of Blue Mink at her concert.

Thanks Jade and hope you like the Youtbe Rollo! Round 1: 33 (I got one word wrong: , tut) Round 2: 39 3 in 10: 2 )

Best: much better list than the last motley crew, and Matchbox 20 only just miss out here as the US started to have some great chart-toppers that flopped in the UK TLC - Unpretty Cher - Believe Santana - Smooth (feat. Rob Thomas) Enrique Iglesias - Be With You Mary J. Blige - Family Affair Worst: unusually every track made my own charts and I liked them all at least a bit so I can only nominate the one that gets on my nerves these days, from unnecessary overplay when there's a way-better cover already existing, and a great original better than any cover: Christina Aguilera, Lil' Kim, Mýa and P!nk - Lady Marmalade

Yes it's that Middle-America thing in the 80's, they just couldnt cope with anything a bit gay (Domino dancing), George Michael had a similar drop from multi-chart-topper to zero, though his may also have been to do with refusing to do videos when MTV ruled everything but even so he still went top 10 until 1996. Soon as he was outed that was it, not a single Hot 100 hit again, not even a duet with Whitney could overcome it. So Last Christmas charting each year is something of a minor belated apology.... Don't Worry Be Happy is a joyful optimistic record, we could do with one like that right now. Chains Of Love should have been top 5, and A Little Respect makes it a double-release of classic pop for me from Erasure. Wee Rule was fun and quirky, I liked it.

yay 1981 is back! :cheer: Classic top 3 still! Glad to see Bill & Grover doing so well, I under-estimated that one a bit at the time. And Angel Of The Morning of course (a twice chart-topper for me this century). Ottawan top 10, a guilty pleasure that one :D Jessie's Girl should have been a UK hit, one I liked at the time, and Hall & Oates is rather surprisingly their most popular song these days (You Make My Dreams) as I was much more into their other hits in 1981. I dont remember that Jefferson Starship track! Which is odd considering Jane in 1980 was fab.

82% white. This might seem to be inaccurate from adverts (and some media) which these days operate at minimum a 50/50 ratio but that's the reality and they comprise the vast majority of voters. In the USA the white population is down from 64% in 2010 to 58% in 2020 and so the USA can be said to be pretty much multi-racial now with whites as the majority group. Some of the non-white recent immigrant groups who voted Trump (and yes they did vote for him - my view is the main link here is gullibility to propaganda. I'm being kind there) may soon have other views, which may or may not be relevant, depending on whether they remain in the country or get kicked out. TBC.....

Steve bannon, the guilty of corruption architect of Trumps' first attempt at fascism says of Elon Musk: “He is a truly evil guy, a very bad guy. I made it my personal thing to take this guy down,” Bannon said. “Before, because he put money in, I was prepared to tolerate it – I’m not prepared to tolerate it any more.” Jamie Raskin, legend of US politics, has stated that it's common knowledge that all the Tech bro billionaires view the USA as now a "post-Constitution" oligarchy, with Musk in control of everything (and future Emperor as under the Constitution he cant run to be President, what with being a foreigner and all). I mean when one wannabe fascist calls another wannabe fascist evil it might be worth taking notice - Poor Bannon not looking like getting that expected early pardon after pleading guilty to fund appropriation unless he has cold-hard dirt on Trump & Musk he can make public without shooting himself in the foot too. Watch this space....

Last Kiss is the best thing Pearl Jam ever did and it was extremely annoying I couldnt get hold of a copy in the USA or UK at the time. That said, these are my faves: Dream Eve Sixpence None The Richer

81 (95) YOU'RE SO VAIN - Carly Simon UXrpJ0VAeC8 Bit of a classic, this one, Carly's sort-of reality-based lyric was always a big secret as to who it was inspired by (it's Warren Beatty, then-boyfriend she confirmed recently) and this song very much cemented Carly's place in the history of rock music, along with the parent album No Secrets. Singer-songwriter folk balladeers were all the rage in 1972, and having Mick Jagger singing along (you can hear him quite clearly) didn't hurt, nor did the added strings for a bit of restrained class. Rated a little higher than follow-up The Right Thing To Do at 86, but it's pretty close in quality either way, and it's up 14 places from then-rating, as befits a classic. That said, it was a hit again in 1991 in the UK and my year-end chart had it at 45 and a number one chart-topper - but 70's nostalgia always did have an advantage over current hits in later years, and that remains true for 1991 (the song above it was Lenny Kravitz' It Ain't Over Till It's Over, which I still rate higher, and below it The Whole Of The Moon, the 1985 revival hit for The Waterboys, which I still rate slightly lower than Vain) so it's about right for a less-classic year.

82 (53) MY GUY - Mary Wells pqMFjBoFIFY Talking of 60's oldies, this 1964 Smokey Robinson song came in slightly behind Little Eva in 1972, but the revived cool, stylish gem sounds better 50 years on, so only drops a mere 29 places, which is pretty consistent. Mary never really had a huge career, for some reason she went elsewhere label-wise when she could have continued to have access to the astoundingly talented Motown songwriters and producers, which is a shame. My Guy is her career highlight, though, and sort of forms a companion piece to the Temptations My Girl - also a Smokey song. That didn't re-chart until the 90's though, so that will just have to retain it's year-end slot of the time as I'm unlikely to re-rate that year! It came 13th!

83 (30) THE LOCOMOTION - Little Eva eKpVQm41f8Y Famously Carole King & Gerry Goffin's babysitter while they toiled away writing pop classics, Little Eva was gifted this party gem in 1962 and grabbed a career for a few years, and then again in 1972 it was a hit all over again, which was when I became reacquainted with it. It still sounded a dancefloor filler hoot, that incessant rhythm chugged along and Eva chimed over the top better than Carole King could have - much as I adore her, Eva had a better voice for this sort of pop singalong. So why is it in my 1972 list? The chance of me getting time to thoroughly do 1962 isn't looking promising, so any pre-1967 tracks that hit in later years will get transferred over so at least the 50's and early to mid-60's get a look-in. Sadly, my kiddie fave Swinging On A Star has never had a revival so that won't be getting an official rating any time soon in my charts. The song, though, would keep on popping up in covers, not least Kylie Minogue's 1988 biggie, but none of them come close to the original. Dropping 53 places though, it sounded more of wow at the time, before later dance music really wiped out all of the 60's dance monsters, bar a few Motown classics.

The speech had 2 aims: rally the troops back home by spreading propaganda that they swallow wholesale. Tick job done, all fired up so they dont notice they are losing democratic freedoms back home and will soon be very much worse off. The other was to fire up the shit-stirring far right in Europe so they can get a boost to achieve their fascist dreams. While that's not apparent yet on X, I do see a lot of UK Trump supporters going "yes but" and basically saying let the dictators have their way cos I'm all right Jack and I dont see why I should have to pay for some other spongers. While I'm here I might as well add in this rant not entirely unrelated to my above comment. Selfish people basically are always around and not caring about anyone but themselves, but they are happily displaying it now, as opposed to moaning behind closed doors in case someone noticed they were dicks. Short-termists with no grasp of consequences in the long run, basically, and limited morality. I realise I'm being judgemental and sweeping here, two unhelpful things as a rule, but I've had a decade of offering up measured and rational warnings to anyone happy to listen, about the importance of looking at likely consequences and what was bleedingly-obviously (another fave catchy little quip of mine) going to happen, and people in general always default to the "oh everything will be alright", think I'm over-reacting, and move on to what's on telly instead. Meanwhile the West has been giving ammunition to dictators to use against democracy and is the left's failure in all this. Trying to impose new views, theories and policies that have not been offered up for a vote after being thoroughly and publicly discussed and not working on sorting rational compromises where needed was always going to end badly. I said so over 5 years ago and here we are. People talked about things offline instead of online to avoid getting personally attacked and ruined, and guess what? The majority of people seem to hold similar views. This most-likely made the difference in a wafer-thin election result (assuming Musk wasn't also "involved") and now all those advances are under risk in the USA. That's something other democracies might want to ponder.

Don't remember most of Jim's posthumous hits bar one monster goodie, but this one is actually way better than the barrel-scraping of the early 70's. Quite nice. Adam Faith was still a fave at that time but I don't remember this one. Nice strings. Good advice lyrically, one of the current crop of professional misery-wallowers could do with covering it. I rather like this, its about time I bought his Greatest Hits. The Shadows' vocal hits all passed me by, but Mary Anne is quite nice, though I prefer the Hot Chocolate flop of the same name which no-one but me bought. Roy was another fave of the time, but yet another I don't recall knowing then, Roy makes it sound so effortless as if anyone could hit those big notes. My dad could, too. It's a good track, the best so far in this batch. And so on to those I did know at the time and loved, from the point of view of 7-year-olds: Paper Tiger - catchy little ditty and I love her voice. Was Sue really 39!!? She looks about 25 in the video i just watched. Great tune and mid 60's go-go dancer vibes, always a plus for me. A Windmill In Amsterdam was iconic for my generation of kids, great fun and a song I knew all the words to, aided and abetted by Ed Stewart's Juniors Choice over the years, it was an ingrained regular requested track. I play it for succeeding kiddie members of the family, just as I put Crazy Frog on t'other day to see the reaction. If there's one thing always in supply in our family, it's fresh new malleable kids in need of hearing great (and not so great) old pop music and watching great sci-fi fantasy. No contest this week though, Sandie was generous, easily a big hit for her too, but Tom's manly vocals suited it to a tee, witness its comebacks over the decades. It's Not Unusual, I loved it then I love it now I loved when it belatedly topped my charts in 1987-ish, cos it def would have topped my kiddie charts, along with Ronnie Hilton. So, more importantly, what was I up to in the 2 weeks up to my Aunty's birthday on the 17th? Still living in Chesham. Still watching TV avidly: This first post is the one the BBC told me to remove when I put it up for sale as a card, with picture drawn by me of a TURDIS. I'm being very careful here not to get told off again for using a copyrighted name, but it's my drawing and my 60-year-old review so I think any copyright claims would be highly dubious given nobody ever made a penny out of it. So, TURDIS-obsessed me wrote: "Today is Monday Feb 8th on saterday I saw Dr who and at the end they got home B But after that they got in the space - ship and at the end I did not no were they land next and they will tell me next week and when Dr who finished my mummy ternd the TV over and we watsched thank you Lucky stars and we saw gene pitnei" Frankly, 7-year-old me could write a better script than some of the shite churned out the last 18 months :teresa: Next! A picture of a TV outside, not sure how that works! Also a yellow 4 legged animal watching the TV with red horns and a fuzzy red fur or wings or something. It may have something to do with the Web Planet episode, my earliest traumatised TV memory of a lady butterfly getting her head stuck in a hole and dying while escaping giant ants will be coming up soon. "Today is Monday Feb 15th on satarday" (I rubbed it out knowing I spelt it wrong last time and tried again) "I saw Dr who and I saw that there was some Big Beetalls and I was fritind that I got a pillar and after that my mumy turned the Tv over and we watched thank you lucky stars and I saw adam Faith and then I saw the news and after that I saw the wether and after that I swichet the TV of and after that I swichet the TV on" If that doesn't make you go "awww"...proof that kids did hide behind a Pillow watching Doctor Who, and proof that I was very meticulous from a young age, and proof that despite my comments above I did in fact hear that Adam Faith record on Thank Your Lucky Stars. Maybe that's why I liked it!