The first number 2 hit of the year, which didn't make it to number 1, was David Essex's A Winter's Tale, kept off the top spot by a cover of The Supreme's classic, You Can't Hurry Love by Phil Collins. Next, Eddy Grant's Electric Avenue had a little trouble from Men at Work's Down Under. Eurythmics's Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This) was kept in the dark by Bonnie Tyler's Total Eclipse of the Heart.
Culture Club's Church Of The Poison Mind was a definite wall flower when compared to David Bowie's Let's Dance. Not something that we could ever accuse George of being. Too True, Words by F R David was kept at bay by the Spandau boys and Sheffield bands Human League and Heaven 17 were also frustrated by the brothers Kemp and friends as their songs (Keep Feeling) Fascination and Temptation were both denied.
Wham!'s Bad Boys had no chance against one of the standards of modern pop music, The Police's Every Breath You Take. Here's a pop quiz question for you then, why is Sting such a pr**k? Because or inspite of his abilities as a songwriter? Answers on a postcard please...
Irene Cara's Flashdance... What A Feeling (the feeling of finishing second) was a great pop tune, but couldn't budge the kitsch nonsense of Rod Stewart's Baby Jane just as I.O.U. by Freeez was kept in the cold by Paul Young and his stunning cover of Marvin Gaye's classic Wherever I Lay My Hat (That's My Home). Spandau Ballet's Gold was misnamed, as Give It Up by KC and the Sunshine Band put them in the shade.
Madness' Wings Of A Dove couldn't quite get off the ground, as a cover of Neil Diamond's Red Red Wine by UB40 prevented them from making it to number 1. It's funny, but one of the great bands of the 80's could only muster a single number 1 hit, which they achieved with House of Fun in 1982.
Tonight I Celebrate My Love by Peabo Bryson & Roberta Flack also got the treatment from the brummie boys. Three very strong pop singles fell by the wayside next, as Karma Chameleon by Culture Club took up its six week residency at the top of the charts. Hard luck for David Bowie, Tracey Ullman and Lionel Richie with Modern Love, They Don't Know and All Night Long (All Night).
Then another monster number 1, Billy Joel's Uptown Girl took up the baton, first keeping Lionel Richie and then Paul McCartney & Michael Jackson's Say Say Say and Love Of The Common People by Paul Young off the top spot.
And finally, this year's Christmas number 2, was a return to chart action for 70's pop mainstays, Slade with My Oh My. Those pesky Flying Pickets denied Noddy and the boys with their tremendous a cappella rendering of Yazoo's number 2 hit from the previous year, Only You.
Wow! There are some corkers here aren't there? Leaving aside the three obviously naff ones, step forward St. Winifred's, Renne & Renato and Cliff Richard, the rest are solid gold, top tunes. From the greatest 1980's number 1 single, Don't You Want Me, to the Pet Shop Boys cover of the Elvis classic, You Were Always On My Mind they all resonate. The dross that is served up nowadays by Mr Cowell and his ilk just wouldn't stand a chance. Even the best Chritmas number 1 of recent times, 2003's Mad World by Michael Andrews featuring Gary Jules, is a cover of an eighties hit by Tears For Fears. I rest my case.
1980 - There's No One Quite Like Grandma - St. Winifred's School Choir
The prophetic Stranglers with Golden Brown was prevented from getting to the top spot by 1981's gargantuan Christmas UK number 1, Don't You Want Me Baby by none other than The Human League. Annoying, yet strangely catchy, Toni Basil with Mickey was held off the top spot by the no less annoying, or let's face it, catchy, Tight Fit with The Lion Sleeps Tonight. Just An Illusion by Imagination was just shaded by Goombay Dance Band with Seven Tears.
Chirpy Cockney Chappies, Chas & Dave with their dreadful Ain't No Pleasing You were given no chance by the 80's pop juggernaut that was Bucks Fizz with My Camera Never Lies, whilst Bardo (who s/he?) with One Step Further got short shrift from two pop denizens Paul McCartney & Stevie Wonder with Ebony and Ivory.
The boys also held off the pitiful challenge by the England World Cup song, This Time (We'll Get It Right) / England We'll Fly The Flag. Tsk Tsk, if it's not Germany or Argentina, it's Paul McCartney & Stevie Wonder. Yazoo's version of Only You couldn't get past this years Eurovision Winner, Germany's Nicole with A Little Peace.
Underrated band of the 80's, Soft Cell with Torch couldn't shift Adam Ant with Goody Two Shoes. Not many people could to be brutally honest. That Stuart Goddard they say, he couldn't half write a good tune, and… well what's happened to him since is a national disgrace. The man's a genius, and should be treated as such, maybe even given a royal palace. He of all the 1980's pop stars was the one we all wanted to be and I defy anyone to claim otherwise.
Steve Miller Band with Abracadabra was fightin' a losin' battle with another juggernaut in Irene Cara with Fame and Trio with that bloody awful Da Da Da (Yer 'avin' a laff incha?) were similarly tossed aside by the great Irene.
Duran Duran didn't have a prayer, let alone any to save when faced with the Rock Gods that were Survivor with Rocky III (yes three!) theme Eye of the Tiger. Dire Straits with yet another dirge - Private Investigations wasn't spared either. Tho' I'm glad we were!
Jam's penultimate single, The Bitterest Pill (I Ever Had To Swallow) also copped for the power of the Tiger. Strong stuff eh? Musical Youth with Pass the Dutchie also made life difficult for the boys as they prepared to leave the scene. Fat Larrys Band's cosmic hit Zoom couldn't get off the ground (who writes this stuff?) against The Youth either. Kid Creole & The Coconuts with Annie I'm Not Your Daddy weren't number 1 thanks to Culture Club with Do You Really Want to Hurt Me. All time pop godess and Aunt to Witney Houston, Dionne Warwick must've been heartbroken to see Eddy Grant with I Don't Wanna Dance stop her from achieveing top spot. Human League also learned not to mess with Eddy as their Mirror Man stalled.
And travesty #44,786 in a series of at least 50,000, saw the great Shakin' Stevens prevented from achieving the Christmas number 1 by Renée and Renato with Save Your Love. Man those eighties were cruel.
In January 1980, Billy Preston & Syreeta - With You I'm Born Again was held up by Pink Floyd - Another Brick in the Wall, is this a good thing? In the same month, Abba - I Have A Dream was held up by The Pretenders - Brass in Pocket, is this a good thing?
Moving on to February, Whispers - And The Beat Goes On was held up by Kenny Rogers and his Coward of the County, I am undecided whether this is this a good thing or not. Liquid Gold - Dance Yourself Dizzy was held up by The Jam's double A side, Going Underground / Dreams Of Children in April 1980, not necessarily a bad thing in my opinion. (Though we did have a K-Tel Disco compilation for Christmas this year and I loved groovin' to Dance Yourself Dizzy!)
In May of this year, Paul McCartney with Coming Up was held up by Dexys and Geno, was he bothered? I dopubt it. Hot Chocolate and No Doubt About It was held up by two time Eurovision winner Johnny Logan - What's Another Year, and to think that we used to slightly resent Ireland for winning Eurovison quite so often. Lipps Inc's disco smash Funkytown didn't quite make it either and this was due to Don McLean's blubbing, sorry, Crying.
Leo Sayer - More Than I Can Say was held up by Odyssey - Use It Up and Wear It Out, two great tracks in my book - look I'm way past that "LEO SAYER!!!??" stage. You know the one... In August, Diana Ross - Upside Down was trumped by ABBA with The Winner Takes It All. Well, Pink Floyd had done it to them earlier in the yearm so fair dos. Randy Crawford - One Day I'll Fly Away was held up by Kelly Marie - Feels Like I'm in Love, probably neither good or bad.
Stevie Wonder - Masterblaster (Jammin') was held up by The Police - Don't Stand So Close to Me, is this a good thing? Well, to answer amy own question, a good song is a good song. And both are good songs. Poor Stevie suffered the same fate with Happy Birthday in 1981 too. The towering monster smash, D.I.S.C.O. by Ottowan, was also held up by Don't Stand So Close to Me, but than to all intents and purposes, nobody could! And finally, in November, Status Quo (aka The Quo) saw What You're Proposing fail at the final hurdle because of Barbra Streisand with Woman in Love, mmm...
Maths revision. The Young Ones (with Cliff of course) got to the UK number 1 spot with Living Doll. As I had bought the single in the period immediately prior to this momentous event, I felt more than a little bit chuffed with myself. Lol!
We got tons of holiday homework for Chemistry in this the week of Good Friday. Maths, was I reported, 'depressing' and I even attampted to learn some of my 50 French questions and answers for the exam. That was 'bl***y hard'. I went to bed at 10pm.
German revision. And now, spurious diary entry alert... '[I] drew out £200 for [my] mum to pay for [a] shower.' I'll not attempt to make any analysis of this remark - your guess is as good as mine.
In drawing out the £200 I took a little more out, in order to buy a Liverpool shirt for the princely sum of £17. It was an Adidas one, with Crown Paints the sponsor. It served me well, as Liverpool stuck six past Oxford at Anfield, and Everton lost 2-1 away at Luton. So, now the points were level, and goal difference previously +36 and +29 was now +35 each.
Cliff Richard and The Young Ones, Living Doll
I also bought (this was quite some spending spree) the Comic Relief single by Cliff Richard and The Young Ones, Living Doll. I'm not sure about Cliff, but the Young Ones were a complete smash with me and my school mates. We used to spend far too long discussing each episode in Art on a Tuesday morning. This single was a chance to own a piece of them. Remember, we had no DVDs and videos were very much a luxury item. Although I do remember taping one episode on the integral cassette recorder that was part of our TV cabinet. So, we listed for hours to the audio of Bambi - that's the one when they got to appear on University Challenge if you remember.
I had an interview today for Sixth Form. Since my school didn't have its own year six facilities, there was just the one choice for those of us who wanted to pursue more academic interests after the age of 16. I noted that the interview went OK. And, yes, you guessed it, that was 16 year old speak for, "We covered a wide range of issues relating to my intended move up to sixth form college, including my academic and extra-curricular interests, future career prospects and pastoral issues pertaining to the next two years of my education..."
We also had 'boring' lessons in both Chemistry and German. French was a bit of a nightmare - we were given 50 questions, for which we would have to come up with an answer, revise the lot and be prepared to answer two groups of 5 questions in the exam. So in retrospect, it wasn't a nightmare, it was quite a useful bit of work that would make revision particularly easy for the oral exam. Mmm.
We must have had English too, as I noted that I would have to do my last essay over the weekend. Words I guess were spoken. And finally, in the grand tradition of students / procrastinators the world over, I noted that I would start my revision on Monday next week...
The Bangles, Manic Monday
I loved 1980's music and I took great delight in building my singles collection. Today, I bought Manic Monday by The Bangles. Or, rather my Mum bought it on my behalf. As I was in school she took my instructions and added the purchase of another 7" single for me to her other tasks. As you may or may not know, this was written by Prince. Now there's man how knew how to craft a killer tune. I loved it then and I love it now. Thanks Prince, thanks girls.
Ace, Brill, Fab, Magic - I scored 34 (out of 36) for my essay on The Crucible. Now, I really, really wish that I had kept copies of my marked English essays. We weren't allowed to have them back from the examining board, and some of my essays, like this one, were really quite good - both in my opinion and that of the teacher. We covered a number of classics, two I remember, were Great Expectations and Romeo and Juliet. I've recently done an OU course where some of the leg work that I did all those years ago would have been useful. There's also the element of reflection on what I thought of things and how I expressed them as a 16 year old. Would I agree now with the opinions that I expressed then?
I also handed in my Odour of Chrysanthemums essay and noted that I should be getting on with my poetry one. One of the poetry essays I wrote covered the UB40 song, One in Ten. 'I am a number ten, a number on a list.' Must've been an attempt by someone at the examining board to make them appear hip and trendy... sorry, to bring the course material into the 20th century... no, no, sorry, to reflect that the body of work in English Lit should be open to the addition of new fresh material, whatever its genre or the date that it was written. Sound convincing?
And finally... 'Day was as usually (sic) boring + cold.'
In what was a potentially decisive moment in the chase for the First Division Championship, Everton scored a 2-0 vistory over Liverpool at Anfield. Again I went up to school to play football. It was I report, 'a great laugh.' I came home knackered.
In our latest money making plan, one of my mates had placed an order for some football programmes. My share was 21 programmes, for which I had paid a pound. At the time, I believed that I had already sold 3 for 20p each. Quite how it actually panned out, more of which later. In unrelated news, I report my purchase of The Power of Love. Now of course we all remember that there were 3 1980's songs with the same title, but the version that I bought was the one by Huey Lewis and The News. It was the featured song in the film Back to The Future, rated by me as one of the best films EVER made.
Just the other week I happened to be browsing in Woolworths, as you do - or very soon, as we used to do. Tsk!. I was struggling to escape the clutches of the kids – you know how it is, “Daddy Daddy, can we look at the lego? Daddy Daddy, can I buy that? Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaase…”
However, escape I did, and I headed over to the CD aisle. And there, in its pristine, shiny glory, was 100 Hits: 80’s, brackets, 100 Classic Tracks of the Decade, close brackets. Now I’m a sucker for 1980’s music, and I’ve got a few 80’s greatest hits CD’s but this one caught my eye. It has a great mix of some sublime stuff, some kitsch nonsense and some real heavyweight chart hits. All in all, a great mix.
The set is arranged into 5 discs with each holding 20 tracks. I won’t bore you with the track listings, but I will insist that you read what I have to say about one track from each disc. Are you sitting comfortably? Good, then I shall begin.
CD 1: Track 13: Don't Talk To Me About Love by Altered Images (#7, 1983)
Altered Images were a five piece Scottish New Wave band formed by Clare (CP) Grogan, Caesar, Michael Anderson, Tony McDaid and Johnny McElhone. Their first UK chart hit was 1981's I Could Be Happy, closely followed by Happy Birthday. Released in 1983, Don't Talk To Me About Love was their fourth hit, following 1982's See Those Eyes.
Altered Images contribution to 1980's music should not be under estimated, despite their only having 4 big-ish hits. Grogan's seeminlgy weedy warble actually had great power. I know, because it captivated me as a young pre-teen!
Of course, Grogan is perhaps best well known for her role in Gregory's Girl, Bill Forsyth's awe inspiring adolscent comedy from 1981. She is almost an anti-star in the film, only really being revealed as Gregory's girl right at the very end. You see, we were supposed to think that Dorothy (Dee Hepburn) was Gregory's girl. But perhaps that's taking a too-literal view on things. Gregory gets an awful lot of good advice from his younger sister. Perhaps she's Gregory's girl?
Of the others in the band, perhaps Johhny McElhone is the next best well known, for his role as founder member and co-writer (with Sharleen Spiteri) of Texas.
CD 2: Track 17. The Lotus Eaters, The First Picture of You (#15, 1983)
Written by Liverpudlian duo, Peter Coyle and Jeremy Kelly (how many Scousers do you imagine are called Jeremy?), The First Picture of You was The Lotus Eaters’ debut and biggest hit, peaking at number 15 in 1983. Of course, other groups from Liverpool wrote tens of chart hits and hundreds of songs over the course of their careers. So on the face of it having just the one single make it to the hardly dizzying heights of number 15 would appear not to represent that great an achievement. However, this track is a joyous paean to love. It sums up the sound of 1980’s music for me, just the chorus, a simple three lines says so much:
'the first picture of you / the first picture of summer / seeing the flowers scream their joy...'
FYC had a great pedigree in 1980’s music. Two of their number being David Steele and Andy Cox, former member of The Beat - Mirror in the Bathroom and Hands Off... She's Mine, plus covers of Tears Of A Clown and Can't Get Used To Losing You. They were joined by Roland Gift on vocals. They had a run of fine singles, starting in 1985 with Johhny Come Home in 1985 and culminating in 1989 with I'm Not The Man I Used To Be. OK so they had others, later on but a) they weren't so good and b) they weren't in the 80's.
She Drives Me Crazy follows in the tradition of British pop songs about unknown girls, probably seen across the street, or sat behind at school, started by The Beatles' I Saw Her Standing There. I get a sense of aching, of longing just to say something to the girl, but maybe not having the bottle to go and say it.
CD 4: Track 15. Deacon Blue, Real Gone Kid (#8, 1988)
This track was written by Ricky Ross, Deacon Blue frontman, about Maria McKee (A Good Heart, Show Me Heaven). Deacon Blue toured with McKee's group Lone Justice as their opening band and he wrote the song after seeing her perform.
In the vein of one of those BBC Comedy Connections programmes, I like the stories that surround this song. On the face of it, it would be difficult to link Deacon Blue with That Petrol Emotion, but Maria McKee allows just that... for That Petrol Emotion were formed by brothers John and Damian O'Neill, ex of The Undertones. Of course the lead singer with The Undertones was one Feargal Sharkey who had his biggest solo hit with Maria McKee's A Good Heart. See? You can also bring in Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers, if you consider that Sharkey's other big UK hit was You Little Thief, written by the Heartbreakers' Benmont Tench in response to A Good Heart...
Anyway, enough of this nonsense, Real Gone Kid is a great track on any level - sometimes you know, I should just listen to the music
CD 5: Track 1. Aztec Camera, Oblivious (#47 and 18, 1983)
Aztec Camera is a Scottish New Wave or Indie band from the early 1980's. Essentially, Roddy Frame is Aztec Camera - the rest of the line up seemed to change with the wind. Founder members include Campbell Owens and Dave Mulholland. By the time of Oblivious, relased twice in 1983, reaching number 47 and then number 18, Aztec Camera had already released 3 singles which charted highly in the UK Indie chart. On its first release, Oblivious reached number 1 in the indie chart.
It's a great track, quite dark in places, 'I see you crying and I want to kill your friends...', but don't let that put you off. In the chorus, Frame uses the similarity between the words oblivious and obvious to good effect. Sometimes you have to check that the title is Oblivious and not "obvious". As with all of my choices, indeed, all of the tracks across the 5 CD's, this song encapsulates the whole feeling of 1980's music.
As I said at the top, some of it's sublime and some of it's kitsch. There are some big chart hits, but most of all you can sing along to all of them. See if you can get it for much less at Woolworths for a short time only, from today (Thursday 11 December 20080!
£6.99
