Simon Mayo and Gary Davies are our hosts for tonight’s TOTP and they seem to spend the majority of the show in very close proximity to each other (almost leaning into each other’s necks at one point) and start the show by brandishing their bare legs together. I think it was to make a point that the Summer of 1989 was a hot one but if they were trying to promote themselves as the new Wham! they failed dismally.
Opening the show tonight are Living In A Box with the title track of their second and final album “Gatecrashing”. It must have been a lean week for booking acts as they’d only moved up two places from No 39 to No 37 and yet still managed to bag themselves a studio appearance. The extra exposure made little difference as the single moved up just one place the following week before tumbling out of the Top 40 altogether. In its defence, it was probably doomed from the start. It was initially scheduled for an April release to consolidate on the success of previous Top 10 single “Blow The House Down” but had to be pulled after the Hillsborough disaster (in their hometown of Sheffield) due to its unfortunate title. By the time an acceptable amount of weeks had been deemed to have passed, all momentum had been lost. That’s one theory. Mine is that it wasn’t much cop as a song in the first place.
Undeterred, the band would return with their joint biggest hit ever later in the year, the polished ballad “Room In Your Heart”.
Next the last great Bond theme in my opinion. Licence To Kill was the second and final film to feature Timothy Dalton as 007 and Gladys Knight‘s theme tune has all the classic hallmarks of a Bond song. Yes, that’s probably because it was based on the horn parts from the Goldfinger theme but for me that doesn’t detract from it and it deserves a high place in the list of Best Bond songs ever. I’m assuming there is one….
*checks internet*
…OK, I found this list from Esquire magazine which ranks all 24 James Bond tunes (including the latest by Billie Eilish) and “Licence To Kill” comes in at No 13. Respectable but I would have thought it would be higher. “Live And Let Die” is of course No 1.
https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/music/g26729930/james-bond-theme-songs-ranked/
Maybe I just an old giffer but some of the songs that have been recorded by today’s artists just don’t even sound like Bond themes to me. Even when I was a younger man and the likes of Madonna, Sheryl Crow, Tina Turner and Garbage took on the chalice, I didn’t like any of them either. So that for me is why Gladys Knight (sans pips) remains the last great Bond song. You are free to disagree of course.
“Licence To Kill” peaked at No 6.
Simon Mayo goes all intellectual next when he makes reference to Italian film maker Federico Fellini and his movie La strada whilst introducing the new video from U2. Bloody pseud! Anyway, the video is to promote “All I Want Is You” which was the fourth and final single to be released from their “Rattle And Hum” album and was probably the best of the four in my opinion.
Supposedly written about his wife, the quiet verses are Bono talking to her whilst the guitar refrains (which are archetypal The Edge creations) at the end of the verses are her reactions. Bloody pseud!
The video (which barely features the band) caused some debate amongst the band’s fans as to who is supposed to have died at the culmination of it. The dwarf or the trapeze artist. You’ll have to watch it yourself to form your own opinion*
“All I Want” peaked at No 4 making it the second highest placed single of the four released from the album.
*Spoiler alert! The Edge is quoted as saying it is the trapeze artist who dies.
Ooh! The Bangles are live in the studio! After being on video for every one of their TOTP appearances for “Eternal Flame” of which there were many, they have finally made it to London to perform follow up single “Be With You”. Despite not being on lead vocals for this one, Susannah Hoffs still manages to steal the limelight in her sparkly mini dress.
This was pretty much their last single release as a band first time around (they split in 1989 before a reunion in 1998). Their discography tells me that there was one final single released from the “Everything” album called “I’ll Set You Free” but it did nothing and was not really anything more than a goodbye to the fans. Talking of which, it is now time to say goodbye to The Bangles in this blog as I don’t think we’ll be seeing them again. Thanks for everything!
Clannad and Bono next with “In A Lifetime” and its one of those studio performances intercut with parts of the video appearances. This seemed to be a family thing with Clannad as that format was used previously for sibling and one time band member Enya when they combined her sat at the piano in the studio with her official promo for “Orinoco Flow”. Back then I assume it was either because the show’s producers thought Enya on her own would be too boring or because her record label wanted to get the most for their money out of the rather expensive looking video. Or both.
In the case of Bono and Clannad, I think it was just because Bono was too busy to join the folksters in the studio so they had to shoehorn him in via the video otherwise it would have looked weird. Which raises the question of why didn’t they just show the video again anyway? What did having Clannad in there in person add to the performance? I may be being harsh here but they don’t look the most exciting thing I’ve ever seen on stage. That said, Maire Brennan does have very piercing eyes.
Over the course of this blog, I’ve found many examples where a song taken from a film soundtrack has ended up being far more enduring than the film itself. Off the top of my head there’s “Against All Odds” and “Together In Electric Dreams”. I’m sure there are others. In the case of Prince and the very first Batman film (if you discount the film made out of the Adam West TV series), it’s a case of the opposite I’m afraid. I could never understand the appeal of “Batdance”. It doesn’t even sound like a cohesive song in that it seems to be a load of riffs, grooves and bits of film dialogue all spliced together and just shoved out there to promote the film rather than being a properly composed song. It doesn’t even feature in the film itself.
Oh yes, the film. Starring Michael Keaton as Batman and Jack Nicholson as The Joker, the hype around it was enormous but for me it was just about justified and certainly the movie did the business at the box office taking in over $250 million in America alone. It didn’t come out in the UK until August, so long after “Batdance” had been and gone. Given the interpretations of The Joker that have come since (Joaquin Phoenix and Heath Ledger for two), it seems strange now to think that we were all in awe of Nicholson’s rather cartoonish portrayal.
Despite being a No 2 in the UK and a No 1 in the US, I’m guessing that “Batdance” is not one of Prince’s most fondly remembered tunes, not even by diehard fans, and only features on the most comprehensive of his compilation albums.
In the long running serial of rappers with not very ‘in the hood’ real names, we have another entry in Rapper KG Demo of the London Rhyme Syndicate who D-Mob collaborate with on “It Is Time To Get Funky” who are up next. The name he was given at birth? Basil Reynolds.
I hated this track then and I still hate it now. Bloody rubbish as my Dad would say. And yes, I do realise I have actually become my Dad when talking about today’s music as that’s bloody rubbish as well.
“It Is Time To Get Funky” peaked at No 9 (somehow).
The Beautiful South released a total of 34 singles over the course of their career but only achieved one No 1 record – there should have been many more including this their debut “Song For Whoever” that fell just short at No 2. Paul Heaton’s vocals are so distinctive. I can’t imagine anyone could ever have impersonated him on Stars In Their Eyes for example.
*checks to make sure*
WHAT! Someone did in 1997 singing “One Last Love Song”. I can’t find a clip on YouTube but I can only assume it sounded nothing like him!
Someone who rarely gets any accolades for his voice is fellow band member Dave Hemingway whose vocals I have always found to be very pure and perfectly pitched.
There’s a great video compilation of their first ten or so singles called “The Pumpkin” that I used to own on VHS that included some very funny bits in between the songs that’s well worth looking out for. My own personal Beautiful South claim to fame is that I used to work with bassist Sean Welch’s partner up until recently. I think he’s into photography now.
Top 10
10. Madonna – “Express Yourself”
9. Guns N’ Roses – “Sweet Child O’ Mine”
8. The Beautiful South – “Song For Whoever”
7. Cyndi Lauper – “I Drove All Night”
6. Cliff Richard – “The Best Of Me”
5. U2 – “All I Want Is You”
4. Sinitta – “Right Back Where We Started From”
3. Prince – “Batdance”
2. Jason Donovan – “Sealed With A Kiss”
1. Soul II Soul – “Back To Life”: They’ve knocked Jason Donovan off his perch (no mean feat in 1989) and are set for a long Summer of ‘A happy face, a thumpin’ bass, for a lovin’ race!’.
The iconic ‘Back to life, back to reality’ line was used as the inspiration by the aforementioned Paul Heaton to base one of his songs around, the rather wonderful “My Book” whose lyrics include ‘Back to bed, back to reality’. Sadly it only made No 43 in the charts unlike Soul II Soul’s blockbuster of a tune.
The play out video is that weird combo of Placido Domingo and Jennifer Rush with “Till I Loved You”. I thought I recognised the song title but not the pairing of Domingo and Rush (almost Liverpool’s front line in the 80s there) so I checked it out. I was right! A version was also recorded and released by another bizarre duo, this time Barbara Streisand and Don Johnson (yes Miami Vice‘s Don Johnson).
Hang on…Wikipedia says then girlfriend Barbara Streisand. Don Johnson went out with Barbara Streisand?! I never knew that!
| Order of appearance | Artist | Song | Did I Buy it? |
|
1 |
Living In A Box | Gatecrashing | Nah |
|
2 |
Gladys Knight | Licence Top Kill | Don’t think I did |
|
3 |
U2 | All I Want | No |
|
4 |
The Bangles | Be With You | No but I assume it’s on their Best Of album which I have |
|
5 |
Clannad and Bono | In A Lifetime | No but I think my wife bought it first time around in 1986 |
|
6 |
Prince | Batdance | Nope |
|
7 |
D-Mob | It Is Time To Get Funky | Negative |
|
8 |
Beautiful South | Song For Whoever | No but I had the album it was from |
|
9 |
Soul II Soul | Back To Life | No but I think my wife had their album |
|
10 |
Placido Domingo and Jennifer Rush | ‘Till I Loved You | NO |
Disclaimer
OK – here’s the thing – the TOTP episodes are only available on iPlayer for a limited amount of time so the link to the programme below only works for about another month so you’ll have to work fast if you want to catch the whole show.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000gx1t/top-of-the-pops-22061989
I make no claim to the rights of this show and all ownership and contents including logos and graphics belongs totally to the BBC or copyright holder(s).
All opinions on the music and artists featured are my own. Sorry if you don’t agree.
Some bed time reading?
http://likepunkneverhappened.blogspot.com/2019/06/june-14-27-1989.html
TOTP Rewind - the 80s 