Kris Kross: "Jump"

13 May 1992

"Jump up and down with Daddy Mack and Mack Daddy and you'll never be bothered by bullies again."

— "Bunny" Sawyer

In an episode of the brilliantly written though sometimes overacted comedy-drama Sports Night, the character Dan Rydell has found himself in some trouble due to singing "Happy Birthday" to his co-host Casey McCall without clearing it with the holders of the song's copyright, representatives of Mildred and Patty Hill. When he tells station manager Isaac Jaffe of the situation, his boss asks incredulously, "it took two people to write that song?"

Inside the pullout lyrics section of the 27 May 1992 issue of Smash Hits are the words to "Jump", a recent number one smash in the US which was now climbing the singles charts in Britain. As was standard practice, the songwriter credits are included. One Jermaine Durpi is listed as being responsible for its words and music; he must've done well from a single that had spent eight weeks at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 (and certainly better than the two boys who did the rapping and all that jumping in its video).

But if you take a look on the Wikipedia page for "Jump", it gets much more extensive. Durpi's name is still there but so are Joe "The Butcher" Nicolo, Alphonso Mizell, Berry Gordy, Deke Richards, Freddie Perren, Marshall "Rock" Jones", Leroy "Sugarfoot" Bonner, Ralph "Pee Wee" Middlebrooks, Gregory "Greg" Webster (I realise a lot of these people have nicknames but "Greg"?), Clarence "Satch" Satchell, Bruce Napier, Walter "Junie" Morrison, Marvin "Merv" Pierce, Roy C. Hammond, Louis Freese (aka B-Real; a little on-the-nose with that whole 'keeping it real' hip hop philosophy, isn't it?), Lawrence Muggerud (aka DJ Muggs), Senen Reyes (aka Sen Dog), Lowell Fulson, Jimmy McCracklin, James Brown, J.B. Weaver Jr. (aka Schooly D), Anthony Criss (aka Treach), Keir Gist (aka KayGee), Vincent Brown (aka Vin Rock) and Herb Rooney. Bloody hell, I've even heard of a couple of these people!

Yes, it apparently took twenty-six people to write something as simple as "Jump". By comparison, "Happy Birthday" being co-written by a pair of sisters isn't so crazy. The royalties can't be great when you have to share them with more than two dozen others. It might be understandable if Dupri had forgotten or neglected to give credit to a mate who collaborated with him but this is clearly not what happened in this instance. Instead, we've got a case of attempting to cash in on the sample craze.

Sampling is one of those musical trends that's much older than people might think. If you had asked me when I was in my teens or even well into my twenties I would have guessed that it started in the mid-eighties with the rise of hip hop and house music. In truth, the practice had been going on for close to a decade prior to that and there were even earlier examples. Few cite The Beatles' better-than-it-has-any-business-being "Revolution 9" as a pioneer in sampling and this is the Fab Four we're talking about, they're frequently credited with innovations that they had little to nothing to do with (the music video, the double album, the concept album). Besides what about musical quotations as a form of proto sampling? To go back to The Beatles, when Roxy Music's Graham Simpson played a solo cribbed straight from "Day Tripper" on the remarkable opening track "Re-Make/Re-Model" on their debut album, no one demanded reparations or a Lennon/McCartney/Ferry writing credit and they were by then being managed by the notorious Allen Klein, a shyster who leapt on the chance to bilk someone — anyone — out of their earnings. But apparently borrowing the actually drum beat or guitar riff is just going too far.

(Whatsomore, this was the very same year that Canada's Barenaked Ladies released their debut album Gordon which included the track "Hello City" with lines pinched from The Housemartins' 1986 hit "Happy Hour". As far as I can tell, songwriters Paul Heaton and Stan Cullimore have never received royalties and not even a thank you for allowing us to pass off your words as our's)

So with all these individuals claiming their piece of the "Jump" pie, the song much use a lot of samples. More musically-minded individuals out there can probably spot at least half-a-dozen bits swiped from other tunes but I am only able to pick out the one — and it happens to be the most obvious of the lot. Those three piano notes from The Jackson Five's brilliant "I Want You Back" are repeated throughout "Jump" so maybe The Corporation — a Motown team up of Gordy, Mizell, Perren and Richards — deserves their share of the credit. As for the rest, I have no idea and no opinion.

Being a burgeoning indie kid in the first half of 1992, I ought to have had no time for something like Kris Kross. The two boys were only a year or so younger than myself but they still managed to look like babies. Plus, wearing their clothes backwards was stupid and something that they couldn't even be consistent about (I don't think they ever wore their hoodies the wrong way round). Yet, I liked "Jump". Evidently putting all those samples to good use, it was fantastically catchy. Friends who were also into indie or swayed towards rock in general didn't care for it but neither did those annoying guys at school who were so hung up on rap having a "message". Without having to make it sound like they were "keeping it real", "Jump" managed to seem far more authentic than increasingly irrelevant acts like Public Enemy and NWA. 

In some ways, the Kris Kross story mirrors that of Musical Youth some ten years' earlier. Both had memorable number one hits in their respective homelands while mastering genres that had normally been reserved for much more senior acts. Both, rather depressingly, caught the attention of Michael Jackson. Both struggled to replicate the rapid success that greeted them early on. Both would eventually see members pass away decades before they should've been contemplating the end. A shame that Chris Smith and Chris Kelly weren't as fortunate to cash in as all those "songwriters" who somehow managed to get a writing credit for something they had next to nothing to do with.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

The Lightning Seeds: "Sense"

Miranda Sawyer seems to think that "tuneful weediness" is a bad thing. Huh. Ian Broudie's rather faceless unit had been busy inventing Britpop with their nifty singles like "Pure" and "The Life of Riley" and they had more of the same with "Sense", a co-write with the late Terry Hall. 'More of the same' would be a hallmark of a group that couldn't bring itself to record anything other than perfect indie pop but what else does one need? But I would say that since I'm such a sucker for all that tuneful weediness.

Marky Mark & The Funky Bunch: "Music for the People" / Marc Almond: "My Hand Over My Heart"

25 December 1991

"Finally — music that matches his admirable chest posturing."

— Miranda Sawyer

Hark! Marks Shooting Sparks! What a Lark! You might say she's a bit of a "mark" for the lads named "Marc". Did Hits colleagues Frith and Andrews put "our" "Bunny" up to this?

Pet Shop Boys and Billy Bragg aside, Miranda "Bunny" Sawyer has chosen some very questionable Singles of the Fortnight during her four year "stint" at the top pop mag. She went with a forgettable slice of Euro-pop over The Stone Roses' "Fools' Gold", passed on underrated bangers like The Chimes' cover of "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" and Billy Joel's "The Downeaster Alexa" in favour of the bland dancefloor twosome of Touch of Soul and Beats International (not even their good song!) and brushed aside Blur's "There's No Other Way" in order to prop up the questionable talents of Vic Reeves. Even the Pet Shops ended up being dismissed by her when she took their masterpiece "Being Boring" to task while going with a lame MC Tunes collaboration with some sprogs and a Madonna greatest hits promoting new track that was better as a concept than as an actual song. (And then there's her indecisiveness. This is the third time she anointed co-SOTF, something her cohorts at ver Hits generally avoided doing)

So, let's get this over with. New Kids on the Block had been one of those music phenomenons that seemed depressingly long term. They had been so prevalent within the culture that it felt like they would never go away. Then, 1991 came along and they were gone — and suddenly it was as if they would never return (which, in effect, they never really did). Their fans had moved on and everyone else hated them, something that's difficult to come back from. 

Nevertheless, the New Kids name was enough for the younger brother of one of its key members to emerge just as the quintet was busy falling off the map. If there was one New Kid who received the lion's share of the hate it was Donnie Whalberg. While Jordan, Jon and Joey were pop pretty boys enjoying their spell of fame and Danny made do with being the "other one", Donnie was the one who commanded attention. He appeared unhappy with his situation and seemed to be the one who craved credibility. To the others, the New Kids were just a boy band; to him, they were hip hop-savy street toughs. It mattered little that this gambit made them look even wussier.

Just what we needed was a second Whalberg to come along. Making matters worse was that he had the spotlight to himself. Without the preening Jordan, there was no one around Mark Whalberg to counteract the phony tough guy persona. What he had was this seemingly nameless Funky Bunch to make him look even more menacing, something they just about managed. Mark's other major accomplishment happened to be making me wish for the return of older brother Donnie.

Yes, this is major movie star Mark Whalberg we're talking about, a man who has got a lot of mileage out of starring in Boogie Nights (which he has more recently disavowed). But prior to that, he was a rap "talent", one who wasn't going to lower himself into "singing" or any of that sell out pop nonsense. Except that debut single "Good Vibrations" was as pop as it comes and its only really notable features are the big-voice of backing singer Loleatta Holloway and Marky's six-pack in the accompanying video. As if addressing this decent into commercialism, he returned with the street ode "Wildside", an update of Lou Reed's "Walk on the Wild Side". Honestly, I found "Good Vibrations" to be the more convincing of the two.

Sawyer expresses distaste with Whalberg's earlier releases which makes her especially delighted by "Must for the People". It's better than "Wildside" but, again, I'm not sure I buy this attempt at turning rap into a modern day folk music. Perhaps it's simply the fact that he goes out and says it directly which is so distasteful. If he wished to make music for the proles then by all means do so but he doesn't have to state it so directly. But that's just me. The other thing working against this is that it doesn't stand out enough.

~~~~~

"Which title does the above title remind you of, readers?"

- Miranda Sawyer (again)

Like Simply Red and UB40, Marc Almond spent much of his career reliant upon cover versions. "Tainted Love" often comes up in those Buzzfeed 'Songs You Didn't Know Were Covers' lists (even though plenty of people knew this all along); other Soft Cell hits were composed by the singer along with Dave Ball but good luck trying to remember any of them beyond "Say Hello, Wave Goodbye". His next major hit was a team up with Bronski Beat on "I Feel Love", a well-intentioned, spirited rendition that nevertheless couldn't hope to come close to Donna Summer's sublime original. Almond wouldn't have another number one hit until his outstanding duet with Gene Pitney on the Bachrach-David clone "Something's Gotten Hold of My Heart" in early 1989: yet another cover.

The release of Memorabilia: The Singles earlier in 1991 gave Marc Almond a second wind. "Tainted Love" returned to the charts and quickly became a cog of eighties' retro while the Willing Sinner was preparing new music of his own. His performance on "Something's Gotten Hold of My Heart" proved he could hold his own with alongside a legend like Pitney and he went back into sixties mode as inspiration for the album Tenement Symphony. Though much of the material was co-written with former Soft Cell mate Bell, its finest tracks were (fancy that) its pair of covers. The first single released was a version of the Jacques Brel number "Jacky" which had also been a recorded by Scott Walker for the classic Scott 2. This showed that Almond was ahead of the game: the Scott Walker revival was still the better part of a decade away. Not a huge hit in the autumn of '91 but it did all right. The third single arrived the following spring. Once again, our hero had plundered un-fashionable material from the sixties. "The Days of Pearly Spencer" had previously been a flop in the UK when released by Irish singer David McWilliams but this memorable cover gave Almond a Top 5 smash.

But it is the record released in between "Jacky" and "Pearly Spencer" which is of concern to us here. I was initially underwhelmed but it has grown on me over the last several days. Nevertheless, work that sounds like rejects from ABC's The Lexicon of Love can only be of limited interest. Whatsmore, I suspect Sawyer herself knows this. Her review goes into much more detail about Kylie Minogue than Almond himself.

"My Hand Over My Heart" is of course reminiscent of Kylie's number one hit from '89 "Hand on Your Heart". Sawyer advises Hits viewers to play the 12" at 45 RPM in order to "hear the Kylie single she never made!" I will have to take her word for it. I did indeed give the extended mix a listen but having go at a faster pace on YouTube didn't do anything to make me think this had been a Stock Aitken Waterman classic hidden in plain sight. Somehow or other, the music played faster but Almond's voice remained steadfastly Marc Almond, somehow sounding more like himself the more I tried to speed it up. Perhaps playing the physical vinyl copy made for different results but this only convinces me further what a generational vocalist Almond has always been. Quite right too. It's a shame such a so-so song would be what gives him his sole appearance in this blog but I'm glad to have him here all the same.

As for Kylie and her much cherished pop sound of old, Miranda Sawyer and the Hits "viewers" wouldn't have to wait long. 1992 was about to begin with things being nice and familiar — though not for long.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

The Beautiful South: "Old Red Eyes Is Back"

I guess I sound a little grumpy above, huh? Well, call me resentful that I had to write about bloody Marky Mark instead of one of my favourite groups. I'm also a little ticked that they keep getting shafted by others. "Old Red Eyes Is Back" is a firm fan fave but it fell well short of Sawyer's predicted Top 5 spot, only getting to number twenty-three. I wonder if the grotesque sleeve turned people off? This is the start of Paul Heaton's series of songs about drunks, something that would eventually become a Beautiful South cliche. For the time being, however, "Old Red Eyes" was stirring, bittersweet and even funny in places. For my money just a notch below upper tier South. Their commercial fortunes seemed to be heading downhill but they were at a creative peak, though you wouldn't know it if you didn't bother buying the 0890 album, an LP whose deep cuts vastly out pace the singles. If only everyone appreciated them as much as me. (Note: The Beautiful South will eventually be appearing in this space but with a record I don't even like all that much. Look for me to be back in grumpy mode when we get to it) 

Pet Shop Boys: "DJ Culture"

16 October 1991

"Pump up the posh people time as Neil and Chris gird their designer-clad loins and topple headfirst into the swirling frenzy that is nightclub culture."

— Miranda Sawyer

This October, 1991 issue of of Smash Hits includes a Gordon Bennett! feature about the precarious state of the single. "Top of the Pops no longer features a Top 40 rundown. Sales of singles have reached an all-time low." Ver Hits proceeded to ask youths from all over Britain about it.

Their answers vary (some prefer not to have B sides, others like them and wish for more extras; some would like to buy more 45's, others seem content to wait for albums to come out) but they all seem to agree that singles had become a rip off and were no longer worth bothering with. While the Hits seemed concerned by this development, it's likely that the big record labels were happy with their prediction that "by the end of the century singles may no longer exist". In Britain they were allowed to grow prohibitively expensive for the average youngster while in the US they were being gradually phased out so that listeners would be forced to buy albums just for one song (aka to pull a Chumbawumba). CD formatting would revive the single somewhat in the mid-nineties but the days of kids snapping up 45's on a weekly basis en masse were drawing to a close.

And they certainly weren't snapping up many of the new releases in this same issue. Of the twenty-two records either reviewed by Miranda Sawyer or mentioned in the Also Released This Fortnight sidebar, not one managed to make the Top 10. Only eight were able to crack the Fun Forty — and the bulk of them aren't especially memorable. "The Show Must Go On" is mostly notable as the last Queen single released during Freddie Mercury's lifetime; "Caribbean Blue" (not reviewed since they evidently had to make room for the likes of Five Star and The Osmond Boys) is perhaps Enya's second or third best remembered song, so that's something I guess.

This even goes for "DJ Culture", Sawyer's Single of the Fortnight. There had been a time when the release of a new Pet Shop Boys' single meant a guaranteed Top 5 smash but this was no longer the case. Following the success of "So Hard" (their tenth Top 10 hit on the bounce) a year earlier, they had struggled to keep the megahits coming. The much-loved "Being Boring" proved to be their lowest charting single since the original version of "Opportunities" flopped back in 1985. In a move that smacked of desperation, they put out a cover of U2's "Where the Streets Have No Name" which returned them to the upper reaches of the chart but this also prompted a backlash. Then, the magnificent "Jealousy", closing track and one of many highlights on their album masterpiece Behaviour, only got to number twelve. There's nothing wrong with peaking within the Top 20 but for sure this was a come down.

With the coming Pet Shops' greatest hits package Discography: The Complete Singles Collection it was decided to tack a pair of new tracks to the end of it, just as Madonna had done a year earlier on her Immaculate Collection. Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe agreed to do so but weren't overly keen on it. "Chris spent the whole time saying, 'Obviously they'll both be flops'," recalls Tennant. Putting new material on best of's is supposed to be a good incentive for potential purchasers but it sets up an unwinnable situation: people flock to the compilation at the expense of one of the supposed 'greatest hits' on it.

"DJ Culture" failed to dent the Top 10 — while Discography proved unable to give them that long sought after number one album; quite why it didn't become one of those mega-selling comps like Eurythmics' Greatest Hits or The Beautiful South's Carry on Up the Charts is anyone's guess — but the song was ahead of its time in at least one respect. Having been composed in the aftermath of the First Gulf War, Tennant observed that supposed war hero leaders like George Bush and John Major began using Churchill as a way of bigging themselves up. Instead of speaking their minds, they relied upon "samples" of quotations, just as DJ's and remixers sampled other records.

What Tennant wasn't to know at the time is that through television syndication and social media everyone began sampling the words of others in order to pass themselves off as wits. (I am by no means being judgmental: I am as guilty as anyone of quoting Seinfeld, The Simpsons and The Office as a means of trying to be funnier than I actually am) The 1995 VHS reissue of the Star Wars trilogy (as well as the subsequent 'Special Editions' that hit theatres a couple years' later) resulted in a lot more people becoming familiar with lines from these iconic pictures. Oddly enough, it was around this point that the famous misquote "Luke, I am your father" became much more prevalent in the culture; thinking about this blog post has made me wonder if misqotes are as accidental as we make them out to be.

Quoting Churchill went from something that only the lettered would do to an idiot's favourite passtime. Knowledge of the source mattered little. My own Churchillian quote choice is the one about the female MP (possibly the UK's first though I have no idea) who was critical of the prime minister being intoxicated. He shot back that while, yes, he was drunk, he would be sober in the morning but her unattractive state would be harder to clear up. Is this even close to what he actually said? Who's to say? What matters is I used Churchill in my own words. Bully for me.

Tennant misquotes Oscar Wilde with the line "And I my lord, may I say nothing?". There's no place left for the true wit to thrive. They've been replaced by an endless stream of quotations and misquotations. Those individuals with a unique voice inevitably get drowned out by the din of everyone else getting a lyric wrong or repeating a famous person with garbled syntax. We're now coming to a point in which those with the largest platforms complain that they are being silenced while what they actually have to say is of little value. There's no room for the public intellectual when everybody has a voice that they don't even use responsibly.

With "West End Girls" capturing them on the cusp of stardom and "Left to My Own Devices" at a creative peak, it's only right that the Pet Shop Boys would bring their six year run of unbeatable singles to a close with a third in a series of brilliant half-rapped, half-sung records. It isn't quite as astounding as either of them but the song's bridge rates as one of their finest. The dreamy "indulge yourself, your every move" passage turns it into yet another certified PSB classic. Sawyer astutely observes that they're "at their best when they're wistful" — it just takes time for the wistfulness to settle in. (This could be explained by the song's cut-and-paste roots, having been pieced together over the past several months)

Amusingly, Sawyer manages to double down on her blasse attitude towards "Being Boring", a single she assessed a year earlier as lacking the "swooshy drama or singalong chorus that Pet Shop Boys songs are made of". She didn't trash it but her lack of enthusiasm for what many — myself included — rate as Tennant and Lowe's greatest moment is still baffling. Much as I love "DJ Culture", I couldn't possibly say that it "knocks spots" off of "Being Boring". There's a reason one of these two songs remains a firm part of Pet Shop live shows to this day while the other has almost become an afterthought (to quote Sawyer, "sad but true"). 

I picked up Discography that November. I was grateful to have "DJ Culture" and other new track "Was It Worth It?" but I was even more thrilled by singles mixes of "Suburbia", "Heart", "Left to My Own Devices" and "It's Alright". (I was even excited to finally have "Where the Streets Have No Name": those kids in Smash Hits weren't the only ones who seldom bought singles) The two tracks at the end felt like a bonus, which in effect they were. The Pet Shop Boys had been such an important part of my life but I was now beginning to wonder how I might cope without them. (Was it even a certainty they'd carry on past this greatest hits they'd just put out?) It was time for them to step away for a while so that we might be allowed the opportunity to miss them. And just like "Liz before Betty, She after Sean", they were set for a rebirth of their own.

 

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

MC Buzz B: "Never Change"

Bunny's runner-up for SOTF and one she seems to gush over more than the Pet Shops — "he's the Shakespeare of rap (only not as boring)". This MC Buzz B bloke (aka Sean Braithwaite) made significant use of Bruce Hornsby & The Range's "The Way It Is" thus putting him ahead of the curve of rapper's using samples of MOR adult contemporary, a trend that would continue throughout the nineties. He maybe could have dialed back on piano loop a bit but otherwise this is a splendid effort that deserved better than going absolutely nowhere. Really the only other decent single reviewed this fortnight in a batch of flops that aren't much fun to listen to.

Billy Bragg: "Sexuality"

26 June 1991

"His bonnet bee is buzzing about sex this time, brothers and sisters. Billy says: don't worry if you haven't got a body like Madonna because he'll like you anyway."

— Miranda Sawyer

The concert didn't get off to a great start. Coming on stage at approximately 9:00 PM, Billy Bragg didn't appear keen to be there for long. He zipped through a handful of numbers, not even pausing for between-song banter. His nibs looked distracted and his rather sloppy performance indicated that he didn't care. Then, a heckler emerged to save the show.

"These people aren't your fans", he shouted. "They're on your bandwagon."

Bragg didn't respond much at first. He simply kept on playing. But the disturber in the crowd wasn't going to let himself be ignored. With each number, our friend in the audience found a way to be offended. If Bragg played something from the recent Mermaid Avenue project, the heckler accused him of commercial pandering; if he played an old favourite, he'd sulk that the rest of us weren't around when they first came out. And, he demanded, what were these people doing dancing at a Billy Bragg concert?

"They can dance if they want to," replied Billy. "They can talk if they want to. This concert's for them".

The crowd roared with approval. At last audience and performer were seeing eye-to-eye. Bragg's patience eventually evaporated and the heckler was forcibly shown the door. His solo acoustic set ended well; after a short break, he was back out with his band The Blokes and they proceeded to tear the house down. What had started off as a by numbers show had come to a close with everyone looking pleased with themselves.

After the show ended, I went down to the campus pub with my friend Tasya. As she proudly looked at the copy of the setlist that she snagged from the stage, I sipped at my pint and wondered why anyone would shell out twenty bucks just to roast a supposedly favourite singer. Didn't he have anything better to do? What did he think he was achieving? And what was he doing at a Billy Bragg concert to begin with?

I had been a fan for about seven years at that point. It started off with "Sexuality". At first, I was into the catchy tune and I dug the video, particularly the bit in which he covers the first two letters of the sign for 'ESSEX' with 'SAFE' and 'NO'. I've always been a sucker for sunshine indie pop because of course I am. It was the song's message that resonated with me most though. Having been ostracized by a small group of so-called friends the previous year, it was welcoming to have a singer accept me for who I am.

Gay? No, I'm not that way inclined. But the fact that these people had a problem with it seemed to be reason enough to be rid of them. Even if I happened to be gay, what the hell was it to them? No matter my sexual orientation, I didn't deserve their harassment.

Luckily pop music wasn't going to turn its back on me. My modest collection of tapes had no interest in judging me, even if none of them were up to tackling my current state of angst. I was then listening to Pet Shop Boys and Erasure, groups with strong LGBTQ connections but they weren't in the business of addressing straight fans who were being wrongly outed at school. Few, if any, are.

Billy Bragg wasn't even addressing my predicament in "Sexuality" but that's how I chose to take it. Being sex-positive meant that it was all good, something I was already aware of, but I needed to hear someone state it. "Just because you're gay", Billy sang, "I won't turn you away": here was someone who was going to accept me no matter what, so to hell with those losers at school.

Bragg's 1991 album Don't Try This at Home has often been labelled as an attempt to make him into a proper pop star. With a full band, a selection of big name guests and goofy videos, it seemed like Go! Discs was finally going to cash in on their long term investment. To an extent this worked out: the LP sold well and some new fans had come on board. But to deal with gay pride was bound to be a risky chart proposition. "Sexuality" only barely outperformed his last real hit "Levi Stubbs' Tears"  when it had all the elements to possibly take him into the Top 10. If Go! figured they had a new pop star in the works, their protegee wasn't about to make it easy for them.

It was on a summer's night in 1998 that a lanky individual in his late-twenties went to a Billy Bragg concert. He was probably a decent enough fellow. I'm sure he could be a nice guy with progressive ideals that dovetailed with most of us who go to see the Bard of Barking. The only trouble was, he figured he owned a piece of Billy and could dictate just how he wanted him to be. He tried to stick around but he didn't allow himself much common ground, something you need to have if you wish to be a real fan of his.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

Cathy Dennis: "Just Another Dream"

Miranda Sawyer describes this fortnight's also-rans as a "sorry troupe" and she couldn't be more correct. Alongside a down the dumper Bros and Martika, there's a bevy of no-names. 35 Summers, The Party, Subsonic 2, Paul Varney: not exactly a bumper crop of stars. (Dannii Minogue also appears but at least she was something of a hit maker, even if her singles were on the duff side as well) Cathy Dennis seems like a big name only she wasn't terribly big in her homeland despite a string of early-nineties hits in North America. I thought she was really good at the time though I wonder quite what I saw in her at the time. Her voice seemed really good then but, as Sawyer states, she struggles with a "nasely squeak". The song itself is nothing special either: Dennis would go on to compose far better pop songs a decade later but that's no reason to be curious about her own brief career as a starlet. Lousy and yet probably the second best new release this fortnight. The world of pop was entering a sorry state indeed.

Vic Reeves: "Born Free"

17 April 1991

"Oh dear. It's all too much, but it makes you chuckle and that exercises those all-important facial muscles, eh?"

— Miranda Sawyer

It has dulled a bit since becoming an adult but I am an Anglophile. Unless we're talking about jazz, most of my favourite music comes from the UK. I tend to favour British writers. Their films and TV shows are generally a cut above everyone else's. I'm not quite as crazy about travelling over there nowadays (all things being equal I'd much rather go back to Thailand) but I am looking forward to returning before long.

This began when I returned to Canada and immediately began to miss England — and sought out anything British as a crutch. Music was an obvious outlet but I was probably going to be into that stuff anyway. I began to turn to sitcoms, in part because the American comedies of the age were so dire (aside from The Wonder Years). If it cropped up on one government-supported channel or other and the characters had any kind of British accent I was in. It didn't even matter if I enjoyed them or not.

British sketch comedy wasn't as prevalent. We got A Bit of Fry & Laurie and, eventually, The Fast Show (though, sadly, not for very long) but not much else that I can recall. The phenomenon of Reeves & Mortimer meant nothing over in North America. It was only because of The Wonder Stuff that I had any idea who they were. Meanwhile, Canada was being rocked by The Kids in the Hall: their influence was such that I didn't need Saturday Night Live and I sure as hell didn't need tepid light entertainment, such as Vic Reeves Big Night Out, from across the pond.

Anyone approaching Vic Reeve's brief music career would never know that he was a comedian in his day job. He croons numbers like "Born Free" and its B side companion "Oh! Mr. Songwriter" with as much earnestness as an American lounge singer in a tacky old Omaha bar. Miranda Sawyer detects "many a wink and a winning smile" and I'll take her word for it — she was there and was presumably a fan — but it's all way above my head (and I stand 195 cm so the humour is awfully high up and out of reach). In a way, I can respect this since comedy is often at its finest when it's played straight, I'm just not laughing — not unlike most of his comedy.

I'm afraid the same goes when it comes to "Oh! Mr. Songwriter", the flip side which really won Sawyer's heart. It was the song that was used to play Reeves' show out so it must have already been familiar to her (which also explains its prominence on the single's cover). Good for her and all that but, once again, I'm lost when it comes to spotting the gag. Reeves was adamant that his music career be taken seriously and that he wasn't doing comedy songs and that's great. But as pop songs go neither side is up to much either.

"Born Free" is a song I assumed to be American, recorded by a singer I assumed to be American, written by a songwriting team I assumed to be American. This is where I part ways with my love all most things British: their embarrassing love for most things American. (People from the UK will deny this but you are advised not to believe a word of it) A good comic ought to have done a send up of Brit Americana. Reeves goes about it as authentically American as Matt Munro did in his original recording from 1966; again, if there's a joke in all this then by all means explain it to me. Or belittle me for being am imbecile, whatever rocks your boat.

Ultimately, it's impossible to be an Anglophile. The British themselves had no use for such a concept and the rest of the world can never be English, Scottish and/or Welsh enough to truly appreciate their culture. The bulk of the music I listen to that isn't jazz is from the UK. I tend to prefer their novelists, poets and essayists. Their films and TV dramas and comedies are typically a cut above the Americans. Yet, their are individuals who elude me. I think Delia Smith is a cook but I can't say for sure, I still don't know who Jeremy Beadle is or was and I'll never find Frankie Boyle funny. I'll just be content with The Beatles, Adrian Mole, Blackadder, the British Bulldogs, XTC, Geoff Dyer, Paddington, Kate Bush, Hugh Grant and visiting every so often.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

Blur: "There's No Other Way"

And so it begins: the media's complicated relationship with Damon, Alex, Graham and Dave, the foursome that they sometimes would admire but never quite love, a gang that was supposedly "too clever by half". (Do you ever notice that no one is ever described as "too thick by half"? What's up with that?) Sawyer gets the ball rolling with an extended diatribe about what a load of pretentious gits indie bands are. Turns out, "There's No Other Way" is a banger so what does she know? Well, this would be the story of Blur, a group who would have been critical darlings but for the prejudices of those blasted critics. Sure, there were hacks who praised them from time to time but there was always a strong contingent of naysayers wishing nothing but ill will upon them. I always maintained they weren't just superior to Oasis but also Radiohead but who else took them this seriously? In any event, "There's No Other Way" is their first of many great indie pop numbers. The video is excellent too: much funnier than anything I've encountered from Vic Reeves certainly.

Madonna: "Justify My Love" / MC Tunes: "Primary Rhyming"

14 November 1990

"And the video will no doubt be riddled with sauciness and we'll probably never get to see it. Hmf."

"Tunes himself sounds as menacing as usual, and as usual you can't make out a word he's saying but who cares when he comes out with tracks as vicious as this one?"

— Miranda "Boon-Eh" Sawyer

Two new releases in this issue of Smash Hits came with arty black and white videos that my mum would describe as "racey". One of them includes a gentleman naked right down to his bare ass going for a swim, a couple getting up to all sorts of capers in a bubble bath and another amourous pair getting it on outside in the rain, their bodies covered in leaves and dirt but not in any clothing to speak of. The other has a narrative of a troubled woman wandering about in a hotel corridor who quickly gets seduced by a handsome fellow. Only one these promos was deemed unfit for TV and it wasn't the one featuring pools and baths and rain. Everyone was upset about Madonna's "Justify My Love" while no one seemed to care about Pet Shop Boys' "Being Boring". Curious.

Sex and nudity in music videos has long been issue — and one that has long been beset by double standards. George Michael's supposedly controversial short for "I Want Your Sex" is surprisingly free of titillation yet it ended up being censored. Meanwhile U2's promo for "With or Without You" managed to escape the wrath of the prudes in spite of shots of a naked woman. But it was in 1990 and '91 that this reached its peak. Not much of a fuss was made over Chris Isaak's vid for "Wicked Game" which made prominent use of a clothing-deprived Helena Christensen. In Canada, Francophone singer Mitsou got into some trouble when she and some models disrobed for her hit "Dis-mois, dis-mois". Not only did people get way too upset about some pop videos but they managed to do so in such a maddeningly selective fashion. In the early part of '91, Canadian music video channel MuchMusic did a panel discussion centred around Madonna and Mitsou that only mentioned Pet Shop Boys in passing and failed to bring up Chris Isaak at all.

It should go without saying that the release of a new Madonna single was an event. This wasn't always the case — I don't recall anyone being excited by "Hanky Panky" hitting the shops the previous summer — but it certainly was at the tail end of 1990. Not only did "Justify My Love" come with a very naughty video but it came out to promote The Immaculate Collection, her hotly anticipated greatest hits set. While new tracks off a best of are generally unremarkable, the sort of recording that artists fart out with minimal effort since it's intended to be tacked on to a compilation that is meant to sell like crazy either way, but to Madge's credit, she certainly tried to do something new in this instance. (Not so much with the other new track, the forgettable "Rescue Me" which shouldn't have been good enough for inclusion since "Who's That Girl" and "True Blue" both got left off)

"Justify My Love" is the kind of single that is better as a concept than as a listening experience. Madonna had long been a sex symbol and I like the idea of her throwing it all back in the face of her critics with such a steamy recording (and, indeed, video). Played once, it's a startling experience but on subsequent listens it just sort of glides by. The Immaculate Collection is full of hits that my generation had grown up with and it's only right that she would do something so explicit at a time when we were also getting interested in sex. With AIDS panic all over the place, it was also refreshing to hear someone crying out for a good, hard shag. It just ain't much fun to listen to. Not a blot on her discography but by no means a highlight.

Thus, the ultra pervy Madonna had arrived. She had already exposed plenty of skin in the "Express Yourself" video a year-and-a-half earlier but this was a whole new level of sexual naughtiness. The Truth or Dare (aka In Bed with Madonna, a much better title even if it was also a shameless rip off of In Bed with Chris Needham) documentary would come along the following year, as would her notorious Sex book. She looked to be going family friendly with her appearance in the women's baseball movie A League of Their Own but that was swiftly followed by the Erotica album and her starring role in the pitiful Body of Evidence. Once formidable, now a bit of a joke. But she'd be back — possibly even in this space though that remains to be seen.

But hey, isn't Madonna clever?

~~~~~

Meanwhile on the fully-clothed end of the spectrum, MC Tunes is Miranda Sawyer's other Single of the Fortnight. Given that they've already taken home SOTF honours on five occasions (with at least one more to come!), I'm not terribly upset by the injustice of denying Pet Shop Boys. Sure, "Being Boring" is their finest moment and it buries both "Justify My Love" and "Primary Rhyming" (not to mention everything else on offer here, even the worthy contender below) but I will say that Sawyer is correct in one sense: it never had to be a single and is better off as an album cut. "So Hard" aside, Behaviour is an LP that might as well not have any 45's culled from it. Fans adore it but Sawyer's indifference was reflective of the public's reaction to it. It only just limped into the Top 20, ending their streak of Top 10 hits going all the way back to "Suburbia" in 1986.  

"Primary Rhyming" isn't up to much, even by Tunes' modest standards. "The Only Rhyme That Bites" (pretentiously credited to 'MC Tunes vs. 808 State'; apparently dance and hip hop artists don't collaborate so much as they are in a fight to the death with one another) was a pretty nice stab at that early-nineties lightning-fast rap style with some seriously scary 808 State production work backing it. The novelty wears off quickly and it's distracting the way he gasps for breath between lines but it was potent for a time. Tunes and 808 slowed things down considerably for follow-up "Tunes Splits the Atom" but that only gave away that he was a third rate rapper and that they had better things to do on their own (or "vs." UB40). Two singles in an everyone was already sick of him.

A good thing, then, that he doesn't factor much into "Primary Rhyming". The pointless 'vs.' credit was done away with but replaced by 'MC Tunes presents...', an acknowledgement that he was stepping aside and let others annoy the public with their raps rather than his. Oh Paul, don't be such a bitch! Okay, let me say that the first part helmed by 'The Microphoness' (aka 'The First Mancunian Lady; "snatching the title from Modom Vera Duckworth", as Sawyer amusingly notes) is rather good. She handles herself well, finding her way around a rap with an easy, effortless style. Had she not wound up on such an otherwise useless record she might well have had a chance at a recording career of some note. Sadly, much of "Primary Rhyming"'s running time is taken by a very youthful, very horrible Dewiz. Young boys never rap well and he proves to be worse than normal. Somehow, he returns for more near the end, with The Mircophoness not heard from again (she must've ducked out of the studio as soon as she heard who'd she be guesting with). Tunes himself only pops in for a twenty second appearance midway through. Sawyer may well be frightened but I am disinterested by the results. The appeal of MC Tunes was narrow enough but having some youngsters spell for him clearly wasn't helping.

You know what? Forget it. Sawyer made a huge mistake passing up on Pet Shop Boys' "Being Boring". That song kills. It's like "In My Life" only more mature and individual. I wish I could have been blogging about it this week. I could've even gone into how much the video turned me on, especially the couple rolling around in the rain. Hmf indeed.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

The Farm: "All Together Now"

Lad culture was just starting and the football terraces were being phased out so I suppose it makes sense that it never occurred to either The Stone Roses and Happy Mondays to create an anthem for mobs of youths to sing along with. A shame since the indie-dance of baggy was suited to just such a number. Luckily those silly sods The Farm were there to pick up the slack. I wonder if everyone who has chanted it in stadiums and in pubs in the thirty-plus years since has realised that it's about First World War troops laying down their lives in no man's land. Then again, football players all about sacrifice so they're no different than canon fodder at the Somme, right? All kidding aside, "All Together Now" is a stirring tune that does its job as well as can be expected. Amazingly, it didn't soundtrack an international tourney until the horribly boring Euro 2004; Greece improbably won by putting their opponents to sleep but at least there was a great song to sing while welcoming Rooney and Ronaldo to the scene. And, alas, bidding a fond farewell to Luis Figo.

Touch of Soul: "We Got the Love" / Beats International: "Won't Talk About It"

16 May 1990

"This is a pop revelation purchasers. It's Black Box crossed with a nursery school!"

"By the time you read this, Norm and his mates should be firmly, and rightly, established in the toppermost regions of the "all-important" Top Forty."

— Miranda Sawyer

For all the talk of the indie revolution, it was electro dance music that was at the real cutting edge of pop in the early nineties. (In fact, the Madchester acts owed their success and acclaim to the techno/rave boffins) Much as guitar bands tried to fight back — first by joining in, then by going on the self-defensive with MTV Unplugged, grunge and the modern rock boom — three chords and the truth didn't cut it anymore. Dance music wasn't always my favourite thing but if it could help take a blow torch to rock 'n' roll mythology then pump up the jams till the cows come home, my friends!

Sadly, little of this thrilling dance pop of the era is to be found in either of this issue's Singles of the Fortnight. With so many DJ's, producers and remixers doing pioneering work, there were bound to be less talented types to jump on the bandwagon. Even some of the more creative figures found themselves at a loss. I'm just spitballing but I wonder if the mediums of computers and mixing desks was less conducive to progression as traditional instruments. Fooling around on a guitar, jamming, playing gigs: they can all lead to unexpected results but is this approach as easy to come by with a stack of old funk records to sample from? Dance albums tended to be all over the place while singles tended to vary in quality or be exactly the same.

Norman Cook had been a self-proclaimed poor bassist in The Housemartins (strictly speaking, not true at all) who moved to Brighton following their premature breakup to begin following his real passion DJing. Possibly due to name recognition from his old group, he initially released records under his own name. A double A side would emerge in the summer of 1989 with "Blame It on the Bassline" getting the bulk of the airplay. It's an engaging if unremarkable track that relies heavily upon MC Wildski's thick British accented rapping and samples from The Jackson Five's "Blame It on the Boogie". On the flip was "Won't Talk About It" featuring a near-unregonisable Billy Bragg singing in falsetto (not unlike his vocal on "Wish You Were Her" from his 1991 Don't Try This at Home album). If stripped of Cook's dance embellishments you'd have something not unlike one of those stark early Bragg numbers like "The Milkman of Human Kindness" or "St. Swithin's Day".

The "Blame It on the Bassline" / "Won't Talk About It" single quickly fell off the charts after a fairly modest showing. At some point afterwards, the "solo" project morphed into something closer to a proper group but not before "For Spacious Lies" was released with a credit to 'Norman Cook featuring Lester'. This single tanked but it set him on a path towards piecing together a collective in the vein of Soul II Soul. Then, "Dub Be Good to Me" came out in early 1990 as the debut release of Beats International and it erupted. This extraordinary mix of a cover of the SOS Band single with samples from The Clash's "Guns of Brixton" and the theme to the spaghetti western Once Upon a Time in the West proved irresistible. Singer Lindy Layton proved to be the thinking person's girl-next-door with a performance that is wise and street smart but also vulnerable and innocent

There's a great deal of variety to the early Cook/Beats singles but they chose to play it safe with the follow-up to "Dub Be Good to Me". Sensing that there was still some life in a single that didn't get much attention ten months' earlier, "Won't Talk About It" was given a revamp with much more of a standard dance beat and Layton replacing Bragg. Soul II Soul had used Caron Wheeler on two singles a year earlier — "Keep on Movin'" and SOTF "Back to Life (However Do You Want Me)" — but they were both equally outstanding and they managed to avoid having one overshadow the other. "Dub Be Good to Me" had been brilliant but this only managed to come across as an inferior retread. Hip hop pair Double Trouble give proceedings a much needed lift in the bridge but it's not enough to keep boredom at bay.

As for "We Got the Love", it's crass and opportunist (and, in Miranda Sawyer's words, stupid and tacky) but it has that spark of life to it that "Won't Talk About It" lacks. The people behind Italian house seldom seemed to strain many brain cells in putting together their recordings but it's hard to argue with the results. While Cook and his entourage was able to dazzle listeners with their musical knowledge, producers/remixers Alex Neri, Leonardo Rosi and Michele Galeazzi were able to get European youngsters on the dancefloor, while also impressing the socks off Sawyer — with something so cleverly moronic to boot! Not bad, not bad. Not something I ever desire to listen to again but not bad all the same. ("We Got the Love" just missed the Top 40 but it did enough to find its way on to the compilation Smash Hits Rave! released later in the year)

Ultimately, these two records indicate the split that had taken place between Britain and Europe when it came to electro dance music. Cook had left a guitar band and members of The Grid, Underworld and M|A|A|R|S had all come out of the pop/rock world. This led many in UK techno to act like they were in rock groups with music that was meant to be substantial. Meanwhile, their European counterparts were busy putting together acts that fitted in better within the world of pop. Beats, choruses, hooks — all that was left was for these boffins to recruit good looking dancers and singers to front their enterprises. Black Box, Technotronic and Snap! were already here but this was just the beginning.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

The Chimes: "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For"

U2 were at heart a Christian rock band but how did they keep this a secret from the public for so long? I suppose it helped that they were subtle with their God stuff, no mean feat when so-called CCM is littered with piety that is enough to make a nun sick all over her habit. This cover by Scottish trio The Chimes, however, should've laid all suspicions to rest. Singer Pauline Henry gives this 1987 classic the full gospel treatment making it sound just as you would imagine an R&B U2 cover would sound. Impressive and not a huge drop in quality from the original. It had been just three years since ver 2 had conquered the world with The Joshua Tree but heartland rock didn't seem to fit in with the nineties. A welcome update, if you will. A year later the Pet Shop Boys did something entirely different with another soul searching U2 rocker while Bobo and The Hedge were readying themselves for destroying their own mythologies. Right they were too.

Fidelfatti featuring Ronette: "Just Wanna Touch Me"

15 November 1989

"It's astonishing how house music seems to produce all the best pop records these days, isn't it?"

— Miranda Sawyer

Vocals that are mostly a non-factor. The same notes and chords repeated ad nauseam. Formulaic in spite of the creators' best attempts to make it seem like anything but. Music that may or may not have been made by the people fronting the act in question. But enough about The Stone Roses.

Actually, no. A bit more on them for now, particularly in relation to how I didn't have the chance to discover them in 1989. It was November and it was beginning to dawn on me that I wasn't especially happy to be back in Canada. I had next to nothing in common with most of my friends (the one exception is still a good friend of mine), virtually everyone hated my music (though, in truth, that likely wouldn't have changed had I still been in the UK) and I had begun tuning out school. I would go to bed at night picturing as many details as possible about life a year earlier in Britain, conveniently leaving out the bad bits. Sometimes it would take hours to drift off to sleep as I tried to bring everything back.

I also began to picture an alternate reality in which we'd remained there for at least another year. I was convinced that I wouldn't have been as miserable there than I was in my current state. It was a life dreamed of with rose-tinted spectacles as a means of escape. It took a long time for me to acknowledge that it wouldn't have been any better over there. Except for perhaps on the evening of November 23, 1989.

Millions of Britons tuned in to Top of the Pops that night likely anticipating yet another hum-drum edition of an increasingly stale show. New Kids on the Block were at number one with a song that everyone called "The Right Stuff" but which was officially titled "You Got It" for some reason. Either way, the song sucked and so did the New Kids. The whole Top 5 was bland and this was the norm for the upper echelons of the hit parade during that time. And yet something was coming. A week earlier, indie techno group 808 State appeared on the show playing their extraordinary hit "Pacific State", which would open the door a crack for an eventual stampede of fellow Mancunian acts, which in turn would lead to bands from all over the country to emerge. But even that couldn't have prepared people for what was to come.

First up was Happy Mondays (or 'Happy Monday' as presenter Jenny Powell has it) with "Hallelujah" from their Madchester Rave On EP. A raucous performance, it introduced the nation to Shaun Ryder, an unattractive man (even then) with not much talent for singing but with charisma to burn. The whole band looked like a group of mates causing havoc at a party. They would soon record stronger material (as we'll see shortly in this space) so if "Hallelujah" hadn't been sufficiently eye and ear catching then it wouldn't be long before young people were going to give themselves over to Shaun, Bez and the rest. If you didn't necessarily aspire to creating music like their's then at least you'd want to be in a group with your pals just having a laugh.

Then came The Stone Roses. They'd only enjoyed minor hits up until this point so for their latest single to be that week's highest new entry was nothing to sneeze at. If ver Mondays looked like chums having a laugh, the Roses looked much more like a proper group. The British indie scene had yet to recover from the demise of The Smiths two years earlier but here were the saviours. And while the foursome retained some elements of alternative rock, they were something entirely different. Indie kids got into them but there was also room for dance music fanatics. "Hallelujah" is probably the slightly better song but the hooks on "Fool's Gold" were enough to ensure that The Stone Roses would be the short term beneficiaries of that landmark TOTP episode.

When I started this blog four years ago I vowed not to do a couple things in these write ups. One was not to get all hung up on discussing if a particular record hadn't 'aged well'. (And I think of stuck with it for the most part: aside from problematic lyrical content, I'm not even sure what being dated even means) The other was not to take Smash Hits reviewers to task for choosing lousy Singles of the Fortnight. (Pop star guest reviewers, however, are fair game)

So, I won't be bashing Miranda Sawyer for going with some Italian house music over a monumental Stone Roses single. It's not like she dismissed "Fool's Gold" or anything; she explicitly picked it as her runner-up and is very enthusiastic about a group that she would have a close connection with. Yet a single by the unfortunately-named Fidelfatti and a very uninvolved Ronette is her favourite and I respect her choice.

Nevertheless, "Just Wanna Touch Me" isn't up to much. Sawyer's raving isn't wrong exactly ("The only way to describe this one is Soul II Soul meets Black Box meets Enya. Really.") but it misses the point. It's far too much of a jumble to make for a truly good house record. The Soul II Soul bit gives way to the Black Box movement too abruptly while the touches of Enya aren't fleshed out enough. It works a bit better on the 12" mix but there is still far too many cliche samples getting in the way.

The record doesn't do anything for me but isn't Sawyer's review a wonderful piece of writing? She doesn't say a whole lot and doesn't need to. "Just Wanna Touch Me" is "berrrilliant" and that's all there is to it. Reading a lot of these singles reviews over the last few years, I am often struck by how often I'm feeling left out in the dark as far as the quality of the SOTF goes. Tom Hibbert seemed to actively dislike some of hit picks while other critics act like they were just choosing something simply because they were supposed to. They'd get through their pile of new releases, pick one that didn't get on their nerves as much as the others and then never listen to any of them again. Reading this, however, I am struck by the feeling that Sawyer not only loves this record but that she'll be secretly stashing it in her purse or under her coat as she exits that office that night. For all I know, she listens to it to this day. And good for her.

Addendum: Hardly anyone reads this blog so I'm probably safe but in case anyone misinterprets my point above — "Music that may or may not have been made by the people fronting the act in question" — let me explain. I do not wish to suggest that John Squire, Mani and Reni weren't playing on "Fool's Gold", merely that they may as well not have been. Mani's bass playing is effectively a loop while Reni's drumming is basically "Funky Drummer". A couple bars were enough for each of them to lay down. Squire's guitar part is much more extensive, particularly on the famed nine mimutes, fifty-three second 12" version, but I'm not sure he had to play the whole way through either. It wouldn't be for another year or so that I began getting into Madchester and I was initially puzzled by the supposed connections between acid house and rave culture and this new brand of indie. I eventually realised that it was down to the tricks of house music being brought into rock: vocals that are mostly a non-factor, notes and chords repeated ad nauseam, formulaic in spite of their best attempts to make it seem like anything but and, yes, music that may or may not have been made by the people fronting the act in question.

~~~~~

Also of some cop

The Stone Roses: "Fool's Gold" / "What the World Is Waiting For"

I've already gone on and on about bloody "Fool's Gold" so what about its companion on this double A-sided single? Their critically acclaimed debut album was released earlier that year and one of the first things people noticed about it was that these weren't humble people. "I Wanna Be Adored" opens the album and its last two tracks are "This Is the One" and "I Am the Resurrection". Hammering the point home, "What the World Is Waiting For" got an undeserved boost from solid if unspectacular B-side to woefully out of its depth lead co-billing. There have been plenty of double A's in which one side of the single vastly outperforms the other but there should be at least some semblance of equality between the two. The Beatles released a handful of double A's because they couldn't agree on a flagship side but The Stone Roses did it here to make a statement. A bit boring, as Sawyer says, and, in retrospect, a troubling sign of where they were headed. In that respect, at least, the two songs went well together: what the world was waiting for turned out to be little more than fool's gold in the end.

Pet Shop Boys: "Left to My Own Devices"

16 November 1988

"According to this record, a day in the life of a typical Pet Shop Boy consists of getting up at half-past ten and going shopping, but somehow this single twists such everyday normalities into something distinctly threatening."

— Miranda Sawyer

The Christmas Number One sweepstakes of 1988 were heating up after a slow start a fortnight earlier. Bros, the hottest British act of the year, made their bid with the double A-side "Cat Among the Pigeons" / "Silent Night", a mix of yet another cut from their album Push and a seasonal favourite that might get more than the hardcore Brosettes to shell out. Rick Astley, the bookies choice a year earlier, was back with the SAW composition "Take Me to Your Heart". Michael Jackson was really starting to scrape the bottom of the Bad barrel with "Smooth Criminal". Kim Wilde taking the blubsome, heartbroken waif angle with "Four Letter Word". Phil Collins going all Motown on "Two Hearts". A-ha with yet another standard A-ha record "You Are the One". Ver kids were spoiled for choice when it came to buying presents for their brothers and sisters — and, indeed, for spending their prized Christmas record tokens from their uncles and aunties.

Also present is the Pet Shop Boys, who were the upset winners a year earlier. I don't know if them taking the best ever version of "Always on My Mind" to the top was a huge upset but Rick had been the one expecting it and a whole generation of pop kids are salty to this day that The Pogues didn't manage to pull it off so it seems at least a few people were upset by it. In any event, "Always on My Mind" proved to be one of the strongest non-festive Christmas number ones of all time and is frequently cited as the among the greatest cover versions ever recorded. It proved to be the apogee of their imperial period with a video that teased their upcoming film It Couldn't Happen Here with momentum aplenty to take the perfectly acceptable but still kind of underwhelming follow-up "Heart" to its own trip up to the top of the charts.

Their chances didn't seem quite as good the following year as they aimed to be the first group since The Beatles (back when it wasn't even a big deal) to nab back-to-back Christmas chart toppers. The following issue of Smash Hits did a feature in Bitz about the potential winners and they didn't like the chances of "Left to My Own Devices". They were "in poor form this festive season" and that "grannies won't have a clue what they're on about". In short, they were no longer content to make music that could appeal to as many people as possible; Tennant was beginning to write in a much more autobiographical fashion and Lowe was drawing upon house music for inspiration. Mass popularity had arrived and now it was time to guide the listeners and viewers to some new places.

"Left to My Own Devices" wasn't the biggest single that Christmas but it was the best tune on the charts. "Heart" had been an enjoyable let down but it led them towards their most creatively fertile period. Just being a standard synth-pop duo was no longer good enough. Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe began approaching their albums thematically but Introspective arrived at a time when they could sacrifice LP cohesion in favour of an ambitious plan to record every track long. Other groups cut singles that would be extended for the 12" mix but they were interested in doing the reverse. "The idea," Tennant would later explain, "was to have an album where every track was a single". (Indeed, a companion EP could easily be compiled of the four singles from Introspective, as well as Eighth Wonder's cover of "I'm Not Scared" and the original b-side release of "I Want a Dog": suffice it to say it would be vastly inferior to the album itself) Introspective was met with mixed reviews (William Shaw thought they were guilty of "messing about a bit too much", while my mum was furious that there were only six songs on it) but it is now regarded as one of their finest works and the start of their creative peak.

Written in piecemeal fashion by Tennant and Lowe and with perfectionists Trevor Horn and Stephen Lipson producing, "Left to My Own Devices" took its time gestating before a proper song resulted. This could easily have turned the work into a mess but all concerned were on the same page in crafting their grandest number to date. It would be the first song they'd record with an orchestra and the video would be their first in ages to lack a narrative. But for all the new elements involved, it is classic Pet Shops. Tennant proved again that he's better at spoken word than singing (the trio of "West End Girls", "Left to My Own Devices" and "Being Boring" are all either rapped, narrated or whispered; it would only be until "Yesterday When I Was Mad" that he may have taken talking over their records a step too far) and their streak of pristine singles was in no danger of coming to a close. The only thing missing was that the eight minute album version was just that much more epic and over-the-top.

"Left to My Own Devices" peaked at a routine number four but it was out of the Top 20 by the time Bruno Brookes announced that year's Christmas number one. They would never be as popular as they had been in 1987 but their devoted fanbase remained and they happened to be at the peak of their powers. Loneliness, isolation, making a virtue out of not fitting it, dark humour: those of us who remained committed were set to learn a lot from them. Meanwhile, other pop stars would be factoring into the 1988 Christmas number one stakes including a certain synth-pop duo who were the chief rivals to the Pet Shop Boys.

The singles were reviewed this fortnight by Miranda Sawyer, another one of my favourite writers from the year I was a Hits devotee. In common with both Sylvia Patterson and Tom Doyle, she had the perspective of being a similarly obsessive fan of the magazine prior to working for it and it shows in much of her writing. Pop kids of the time could live out their fantasies of being pop stars, meeting pop stars, snogging pop stars, bashing pop stars and taking the mickey out of pop stars and this generation of hacks had that same mindset about them. The days of older, more serious critics lampooning Duran Duran were long gone and in their place were these young writers who loved pop and making fun of it as much as possible.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

Neneh Cherry: "Buffalo Stance"

Not a favourite for the Christmas Number One, "Buffalo Stance" proved to be a slow burn up the charts and it didn't peak until the New Year by which point the Swedish singer/rapper and step-daughter of jazz trumpet player Don Cherry had made a name for herself with a legendary performance on Top of the Pops. The kids didn't know what a "Buffalo Stance" was nor were we clued in to the fact that the song seemed to be about prostitutes. The only stuff that mattered was that (a) it was a brilliant pop song and (b) Cherry was an awesome pop star. We'll be seeing her here again before long.