superbossanova

+15 Sugababes - Easy +12 Matt Willis - Up All Night +10 Editors - Munich +8 Gnarls Barkley - Smiley Faces +6 Girls Aloud - Whole Lotta History +5 Busta Rhymes - Touch It +4 The Feeling - Fill My Little World +3 José González - Heartbeats +2 Texas - Sleep +1 The Streets - When You Wasn't Famous -2 Sunblock featuring Robin Beck - First Time This year blows. Managed to scrape together 10 songs worthy of a play from me but not a single REALLY great track among them. Most of the rest aren't even awful, just too much BLAH. Unfortunately I suspect 2007 will be even worse. Or at least that was the feeling I had at the time but perhaps lots of the good top 10 hits were one-weekers, can't remember!

Looks like I might have bang on with my prediction of the top 30 all selling over 500k! Good to see the original outsold the AK cover. Beautifully tender ballad and one of the best #1s of the 80s. Rollercoaster... at the time I probably liked this even MORE than C'est La Vie but I'm not sure what I was getting so excited about now. Although the bridge still gives quite a thrill it only leads to a limp duck of a chorus. Still, good memories. :heart: And To You I Belong is also gorgeous, didn't comment on that earlier as I had half my mind on going to bed - though gooddelta said almost everything I would have said, anyway! I also like Anything, but I think I already made that confession in another one of Gezza's threads. Still, as a vocal group they DO work well I think (must be the brothers thing), even if on their own things are a bit iffy. Of course the rest of their songs were crap though. I guess this one was well-timed with it being February and one of the only love ballads at the top of the charts at the time, hence it managing to climb to #2...

I kind of agree with gooddelta on Lady Marmalade, but I do like it in a "enjoying it despite its inherent tackiness" way. But yes, it's DATED as hell and always sounded like it was aimed at drunk slappers to go off to at low class hen parties more than anything. It kind of sticks out like a sore thumb on the album too, but then in terms of obvious commercial cuts there wasn't MUCH else besides so maybe that's why. As for Under The Bridge - well, it's okay, but I never liked that song much in any form. I only remember being a bit amazed at the video with them walking around the hole in middle of the floor which looked down to the city, wondering if they were going to all FALL OFF or something at the end... really cool how they did that.

Argh! f*** Billie, lol. I almost wish I had never asked now, I was happier thinking Another Level had pipped it instead - much easier to hate them than Billie. :D

Freak Me sold more than I expected! This countdown really puts into perspective how much of a fluke it was for them though, considering it shifted more than double of their next biggest hit on this chart. It's a bit limp for me, but it does bring back summer '98 nostalgia so I can't hate it TOO much. Anything released from about June to December 1998 is almost impossible for me to hate as it was such a significant time for me musically. :drama: I'm also wondering - was the week Freak Me entered at #1 the closest Pras got to being #1 with Ghetto Supastar? Or was that its first week at #2 when Billie held it off? And Babe is AWFUL. Completely tuneless vocals, etc, easily the nadir of Take That's career. :puke2:

I think the Oasis runs were mainly to do with record stores, which tend to lean to more indie releases, still having their vinyl releases in stock, rather than the bargain bin affect. That tended to kick in from about 3-6 months after release while some of the Oasis songs were still in the charts for two or three years afterwards. It was mainly their early singles that did that - with I guess newer fans who had jumped on board in 1995 going backwards to complete their collection. The chart run for Whatever, for example, is quite a sight, looking more like one for a 2011 hit, not a 1994 hit! But yeah, it wasn't uncommon at the time but clearly the OCC didn't like it, which is presumably why they introduced this rather pointless (at least in retrospect) rule. But to go back to my original point it was nothing to do with What Makes A Man as that wouldn't have been affected by it anyway. :lol:

The period seemed to be arbitary rather than anything specific. Like I said, sometimes songs disappeared for only one week and sometimes more... perhaps it was allowed in again when its sales returned to a normal level, I don't know. Also, what is with this chart run for What My Heart Wants To Say by Gareth Gates? It was excluded from the top 200 for two weeks, fair enough, but then it was allowed back in again, then re-entered the top 40? :blink: Did it somehow record that entire climb without ever outperforming the market by 5%? That seems like a stretch of the imagination to me to do so for three straight weeks. *19 35 53 64 xx xx 58 49 35 26 48 67 xx xx xx xx 95 94 107 111... etc.

LOL, the thing is *I* don't know what rule I'm on about either. :lol: But I remember in the late 1990s and very early 2000s it was quite common for big hits to rack up loads of time at the bottom of the top 75 because of reduced stock being sold off. Occasionally they even pushed back into the top 40 like Spice Girls - Goodbye returned to the top 40 in May 1999, but usually they just sort of meandered around at the bottom of the chart (Teletubbies Say Eh-Oh! is a good example here). But around this time in 2001 the chart runs became very odd with songs being completely removed from the chart (as in the entire top 200) and then being allowed back in again, sometimes the following week but sometimes they were gone for an even more extended period of time. And then they'd pop back in as if they'd never been away. It was very confusing and I've never understood it exactly but I remember reading an explaination of how it was to do with how the track was performing in relation to the market but it kind of went *whoosh* over my head at the time. I could try and find some examples of what I'm talking about if you want? :lol:

The sales are finally starting to accelerate more quickly now with each entry. I was waiting for that. I think the top 30 could all be over half a million - or at least the top 25, anyway. Don't Let Go (Love) was a VERY important track in the 1997 stage of my formative music years - that, I Wanna Be The Only One, Lovefool and another track coming up later basically SCREAM 1997 for me. Great structure, amazing vocals - controlled, emotive, soulful, powerful all at the same time, and of course, a flawless melody. A 10/10 song for me. And it was great to see the public actually buying a late 90s that isn't MoR dreck like Truly Madly Deeply or I Don't Want To Miss A Thing for ONCE, though I imagine it was more the shock of actually hearing a proper R&B song again that caused such an affect. Was it What Makes A Man that caused the OCC to make that confusing rule about outperforming the market for two weeks in a row or something? It used to happen all the time before that but mainly outside the top 40. That Westlife song was in the bargain bins only like two months after release though, can't think why that would be the case. :heehee: Anyway, I don't remember it happening much after that point but I might be wrong.

Oh, I don't own any of their albums, my comment was just going by the singles! (Slam Dunk, When The Lights Go Out and Until The Time Is Through are basically BSB rip-offs - only Everybody Get Up and Got The Feelin' have a different sound and the former is just not to my taste in that respect). But yeah, I had a huge soft spot for Five as well, but giving my age and only relying on my parent's pocket money I could only buy singles really. Albums tended to be for birthdays and Christmas and as much as I liked Five they always ended up just missing out when making my lists. Plus I always imagined Five albums would encapsulate the very 90s "big singles surrounded by lots of filler" way of compiling albums, which is what has prevented me from going back and buying them now... your comment hasn't exactly helped changed my mind on that, haha. :D

Sigh, I didn't realise Got The Feelin' opened with a six figure sale. That would have been enough for #1 in sooo many weeks in 1998, especially coming in a bit later in the summer. Such a dumb week to release. And screw the football songs for RUINING the charts when they come around (with particular scorn in this case to the unnecessary re-release and re-write of the already great Three Lions; I actually don't mind Vindaloo) - another recent example only coming a couple of years ago when Example was held at #3 with the excellent Kickstarts by two World Cup-related songs, one of them being that horrendous Simon Cowell one. :no: As for the track itself, I confess it's by FAR my favourite Five song and one I still listen to quite often, especially between June-August when that only multiplies. Mainly because I just love the summery sound of it, plus it's the only single from their first album that substansially nods to my favourite "Five sound" that later became their primary one - that being the tracks they did with the Biffco team - and less of the BSB cast-offs that made up much of their first album. Finally Found, too. :heart: Lush balladry that just works thanks to a not so cloying arrangement and some really lovely vocal interplay between the three, especially considering this was their first single. The way the chorus builds back up following the third verse/middle-8 section is especially lovely. And kudos to Gezza for digging up the HMBOMT performance, haha. I wonder if their cover of How You Remind Me from that show is also on YouTube? I've kind of forgotten how it went but I remember it being a bit dodgy. I'm sure it was better than the Nickelback version by any stretch anyway.

Without knocking the vote, those results for '04 are a bit DISAPPOINTING for such a great list - a very average selection. Hopefully better choices will be made for... ...2005! *dies* Damn, I bought so many of these on this list, some of which I don't even like anymore but I guess that's the nature of being a teenager and having more money than sense (and not even having that much of the FORMER, which says it all about the latter - ha!). Anyway, my votes... +15 The White Stripes - Blue Orchid +12 Hard-Fi - Hard To Beat +10 Basement Jaxx - Oh My Gosh +8 Rachel Stevens - So Good +6 Garbage - Why Do You Love Me? +5 Robbie Williams - Advertising Space +4 Natalie Imbruglia - Shiver +3 Scissor Sisters - Filthy/Gorgeous +2 The Coral - In The Morning +1 t.A.T.u. - All About Us -2 Green Day - Wake Me Up When September Ends An integral year for me. Annoyed I had to leave out a few but that's part of the parcel now innit. Extra special mentions to Doves, Mel C and Nine Inch Nails.

Now this one is just rank!! :puke2: Like there could be anything more ridiculous than possibly the ugliest and charisma-free boyband I've ever seen singing about how they want to "sex you up"... eugh, WTF. No thanks. I am amazed at how this even spent three weeks at #1. Well, I am amazed how it got to #1 in the first place but I guess perhaps the summer slump can explain it remaining there once it had climbed to the summit anyway. It's even more baffling as the British population didn't even care about R&B much in 1991 yet they put this derivative new jack swing shit right at the top? Just crazy but typical of the retarded public.

Ooh, Waterfalls... it's never one I reach for much by choice such is its overplay and ubiquity, certainly compared to other singles from CrazySexyCool like Red Light Special and Creep, but it's hard to put it down as anything less than a brilliant track. Possibly the BEST chorus of the entire 1990s with every line being as memorable as the next - that is just undeniable great songwriting on show there (even if they did plagarise a bit of the hook from that no-mark Paul McCartney song as any Beatles loon worth their salt would remind you, but at least they didn't waste it on a shit track like HE did anyway). And an overall production that sounded ten times slicker than anything they had done before this (which did have a whiff of amateur about it as I think Gezza mentioned earlier, in the sense it sounded like three young ladiezz just messing about in the music game rather than trying to make a chart topping record, but that was the case with a lot of early hip hop TBH), and earmarked as different from the generic R. Kelly or Babyface clone sound of that era, while almost being timeless sounding in the sense you imagine it could still be a hit today without much change to it. Again, that's just the mark of great song composition though.

:lol: The thing is, I'm not at all in a bad mood or anything - at least no more than usual! Just posting my honest opinions about Atomic Kitten/the songs. My apologies to gooddelta and all the other Atomic Kitten fans out there! :D I actually don't hate them anyway (they've done more songs I like than The Saturdays, for example, who have a grand total of ONE - that being Ego, of course). I just hated what they represented more than anything. As a huge girl band loon, at least in my youth anyway, after living through the glory years post-Spice Girls I found it insulting I was supposed to take the idea of a group who were like sixth-string in the girlband league in 1999 (although I actually liked them back then and Right Now is a personal pop classic) suddenly being the hot girlband on the block. :(

That one is the epitome of flat and going absolutely NOWHERE, though I haven't heard it in many years so my memories of it might be overly harsh. They were so irrelevant by 2003/04 anyway, once the Sugababes and Girls Aloud reminded the public that pop could still be exciting and fresh away from ropey bores like them and Blue. They were basically on a par with WESTLIFE during those years with getting top 10 hits without anybody noticing.

I've never even heard of that film, no wonder I couldn't remember it. :lol: Although to be fair I'm almost the complete opposite of a film buff. I thought it was a big blockbuster film which I would at least have been familiar with the name even if I hadn't actually seen it... then again, this is Atomic Kitten we're talking about here, what big budget film would want them on the soundtrack? :drama: The production on it is quite awful I think - so synthetic-sounding compared to the original which is beautifully understated. And Natasha & Liz have good pop voices but it's not exactly emotive. They did work well as a unit though so any song they were doing a lot of harmonies on was usually good in a nice, bland way. The only Atomic Kitten ballads I have time for are The Last Goodbye and Cradle, I think...

Everybody is such a POP CLASSIC. Surely even the biggest music snob hasn't been able to resist getting up on the dancefloor and ROCKING THEIR BODY RIGHT to it at least once, even if only under the influence of alcohol at the time. An absolute joy of a song, the way good pop SHOULD BE. Eternal Flame, on the other hand, is a rancid bore. One of the worst cover versions ever made surely. Also wasn't it included in a film at the time? I remember when the video was played on the music channels it was segued with clips of a film I can't remember the name of. Unfortunately this seems to have been lost in time or something as I can find nothing about it online. :thinking:

Oh, and don't get me started on the Boyzone/Geri battle! I think I've already ranted about this before so I shan't go into it again. But it's true that it was Geri's (or at least the labels') fault really - I mean, that whole 2-CD with extras on the second thing was very common by 1999 and it was a schoolgirl error I guess. It IS kind of funny that she planned everything - the song, video, etc - to pure perfection then messed up with such a simple thing though. I bet she was FUMING. :o

Ooh, I never liked this one much for some reason. I mean it's not bad but it just never goes to the heights I want it to if you know what I mean. I was, however, a big fan of their first single which will be up here later - proper gorgeous girlband balladry and one of my most cherished nostalgia tunes. :cry: Never Let You Down was also rather gorgeous with all its dub-a-dubs. I'm a sucker for things like that in pop songs to be honest. And Won't Take It Lying Down surely won the award for best pop lyric of 2000 with "honey my suspicion is the only thing gonna be getting aroused" - just fabulous! Anyone know what happened to the Honeyz? They really deserved to do MUCH better. I mean sure they were bland but surely no more so than Atomic Kitten who were the biggest girlband in 2001-02!!! That "comeback" single in 2001 was pitiful but still. :( Last time I saw them was that Hit Me Baby One More Time show back in 2005. I was rooting for them all the way but the whole show was practically geared to 80s nostalgia and the poor Honeyz were too recent, and f***ing SHAKIN' STEVENS won which says it all.

Ha! I meant it's not debatable that it's the defining song of 2011, rather than that it's shite. Badly written on my part. I hardly ever read my posts back after writing my usual stream of consciousness-type crap. Much too lazy to do that. :D

I still haven't heard Moves Like Jagger in full. Although that's largely by choice. Thank God I'm not forced to listen to the radio anymore. Anyway, Someone Like You is definitely the defining song of 2011 - even though it's shite - that's not even debatable. It's like this generation's Nothing Compares 2 U in the sense it stands out from the plethora of synthesised crap that populated the charts in both 1990 and 2011 purely for its simplicity while packing huge emotional impact.

1995 was a classic year with a lot of well-remembered songs released. On one hand you have the Britpop "anthems" of the time like Common People and Wonderwall, then you have the airplay giants like Back For Good and Kiss From A Rose. It seems ridiculous that we have to narrow it down to just one when they'd probably be easy winners in some of the other years. And if the criteria is simply what is known by more people, it will be the one with the widest appeal (and therefore the more poppier or "MoR" (for lack of a better word) as that's almost the very definition of them). I think some people are being a bit biased to their own experiences re:Common People - it obviously meant a lot to teenagers and young adults at the time but I'm not sure you can ever say it's had WIDE appeal. You only have to look at the chart run from 1995 in comparison to Wonderwall, Back For Good, etc. to see that.

Great song, and I disagree it needs more "punch" to it. It's clearly aiming for more sensuality to its sound rather than being an all-out rocker IMO. Of course whether or not it achieves that still is debatable but I actually think Natalie in particular has a great voice in that respect. I also LOVE Down Boy but I can't exactly disagree with your review of it either - an acquired taste, perhaps. :lol: I think the thing that makes me laugh the most about it is the way they covered her lack of singing ability by letting her MUMBLE her way through the track. Holly was actually one of my favourite things about '02/03 I confess - talentless she might be but she made great pop tunes and I bought all of her singles and both albums. Also fancied her a bit too, of course - she was such a siren compared to what I was used to before! Was never that fond of Like I Love You, I'm afraid. Personally find it bordering on corny. Neither was I that fond of Justin Timberlake as a solo artist (even though I always felt I should like him, something always put me off) but his next two entries to come in this thread are MUCH better.

Oh my dayz, how did I miss the 2003 voting?! :cry: I wouldn't have made any difference to the results ANYWAY... moving on. Some real underrated gems in '04. +15 Wolfman featuring Pete Doherty - For Lovers +12 Shaznay Lewis - Never Felt Like This Before +10 Dizzee Rascal - Stand Up Tall +8 Scissor Sisters - Comfortably Numb +6 Mousse T featuring Emma Lanford - Is It Cos I'm Cool? +5 The Darkness - Love Is Only A Feeling +4 Keane - Bedshaped +3 Jay Sean - Stolen +2 The Libertines - What Became Of The Likely Lads? +1 Deepest Blue - Give It Away -2 Blazin' Squad - Here 4 One - Deary me, the SQUAD plunged to new lows with this tuneless turd. :manson: Thankfully the LAST time they bothered anyone's ears.