I got my eye on you, and I know what you are, you're the 13th of February 1992 edition of Top of the Pops!
Short and sweet
13-2-92: Presenters: Claudia Simon & Steve Anderson
(US 6) COLOR ME BADD – Heartbreaker
Getting the show underway but the song only peaked at number 58.
(6) MICHAEL JACKSON – Remember The Time (video)
Peaked at number 3.
(9) RIDE – Leave Them All Behind
In the studio performing their only top ten hit and it got no higher than number 9.
(NEW) BRYAN ADAMS – Thought I’d Died And Gone To Heaven (video)
Will peak at number 8.
(4) THE PASADENAS – I’m Doing Fine Now
A second studio performance but the song was now at its peak.
(12) SIMPLY RED – For Your Babies (video) (Breakers)
Peaked at number 9.
(13) THE TEMPTATIONS – My Girl (video) (Breakers)
Surprisingly only made number 43 back in 1965, 27 years later it will reach number 2.
(17) PEARL JAM – Alive (video) (Breakers)
Their first of thirteen top 40 hits and it peaked at number 16.
(1) WET WET WET – Goodnight Girl (video)
Fourth and final week at number one.
20th of February is next.
Presenter Claudia Simon the standout attraction on the show, with open top white blouse revealing black bra underneath, ooh er! Two Claudia Simon shows on the same night from BBC4, well that has got to be good.
ReplyDeleteNow then, and on to the music, and opening with Color Me Badd - it was the US No.6 this week, but their UK peak position for this one was eventually only No.58. Then looking what else was to come from them after this point, their final two singles peaked outside the Top 60 in the UK, so effectively its goodbye and goodnight right here on this show.
Then the Michael Jackson video gets two weeks in row as main slot, and not yet No.1. A new break from tradition for TOTP right here this week, and a moment of TOTP history with this new about-turn.
TOTP for it wrong with Color Me Badd as it was All 4 Love that was at number 6 in the US Chart.
ReplyDeleteYes, I seem to remember that Color Me Badd followed up I Wanna Sex You Up with I Adore Mi Amour in the US, but in the UK the first follow-up was All For Love.
DeleteSuffice to say that while All For Love was a top ten hit on both sides of the Atlantic, I Adore Mi Amour failed to break Top 40 in the UK as their third single release, managing only No.44 as their follow-up to All For Love, and they were never to break the Top 40 again, despite three more singles in the early 90s including the one on this week's TOTP, Heartbreaker.
Color them heading down the dumper, was getting serious NKOTB vibes from this bunch of chancers, though fair play to them for busting a few dance moves in between singing off key.
ReplyDeleteThat Michael Whackson video again, only without the so-called comedy bits, it really is all production and no real tune, this, isn't it?
Ah, Ride, this I did like at the time, is it accurate to call it shoegaze? It's that sort of thing. Very decent wall of guitar noise, and their one single to catch on with the public.
Bryan Adams with Thought I'd Died and Gone to Boredom, this seemed even longer than the Jackson video last episode. People who accuse War on Drugs of sounding like him forget how yawn-inducing he could be.
Pasadenas, much as before, then Breakers with Simply Vomit and their unpleasant sounding chat up lines, The Temptations do this week's song from a movie (Claudia likes it - maybe she wasn't a fan of Macaulay Culkin considering what happens to him in it?), and grunge crops up again as Pearl Jam appear for a few seconds, but TOTP obviously were not keen.
Then the Wets video to end on again. Is this the last we see of Steve? RIP, anyway.
Looks like Bryan Adams will be a doing a Michael Jackson with two shows in a row as main slot on TOTP with the same single, so TOTP were in full force now in obliterating the rule of only playing the same song two weeks apart.
DeleteYes, THX, this was Steve Anderson's fifth and final TOTP, after which he apparently got fired according to the Popscene website but no reason is given. Shame we couldn't at least have swapped his appearances for those of Adrian Ponce.
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DeleteArthur, do you think that Steve Anderson got fired cos he was looking at Claudia in that way in the caption picture above?
DeleteIt seems the next few weeks we will have three shows a week to review, cos Adrian Rose is still a regular on TOTP for at least the first half of 1992.
I think poor old Steve was let go because they had too many presenters! Don't they get pared down to a couple of alternating presenters eventually?
DeleteYes, but only Tony Dortie and Mark Franklin wee allowed to present on their own, at least up until the end of 1992 anyway. All the other presenters during the year like Simon, Rose, Oke, etc had to double up with another.
DeleteFour tunes at peak position further down the chart, and within the Top 40, but no TOTP mention or play:
ReplyDeleteNo.27 Diana Ross - The Force Behind The Power
Good Lord, what was this all about, unless she was singing about herself? While this one got shunned completely by TOTP, her next two singles later in 1992 would get to Top 20 positioning, so lots more to come from Ross.
No.28 Europe - I'll Cry For You
The same group that brought us The Final Countdown in 1986 were still at it in 1992. Last Top 40 achievement for them, and penultimate single before packing up for good in the same year 1992.
No.29 Tina Turner - Love Thing
Considering that more often than not, you would now have to be inside the Top 20 to get a Breakers slot, Tina and the other two positions above her were unfortunate not to get their single on the show at all despite all three being comfortably inside the Top 30.
No.32 Texas - Alone with You
After five singles in a row to peak outside the Top 40 since their No.8 debut single in early 1989, they finally break Top 40 again, but unfortunately still no TOTP for them after all that relief in getting into the charts again. Good Lord!
Two bad episodes in a row, this being the worst of the three this week.
ReplyDeleteCMB are apparently still a thing but they've lost the pastel suits and anything that made them interesting. About to join NKOTB in being washed away by British boy bands.
MJ - Urgh we spent NINE MINUTES on this last week, can we not? (And all this Jacko excess is made worse by knowing that it's only going to get more overblown still)
Ride - It says something about an episode when RIDE, middle of the road, nobody's favourite, pleasant but just there Ride, are the best thing on it. But here we are.
Bryan Adams with what might be the world's ugliest video.
Pasadenas we've seen before.
Breakers have some biggies in there. Not a Simply Red fan but I do enjoy Pearl Jam's Alive. It'd be the best thing tonight if it were longer and/or in the studio.
And then a final zzzz before a better (albeit longer lived) number one comes along.
I Don't Know Where It Comes From was a terrific single by Ride, but I doubt it was on TOTP because they do a swear in the lyrics. Doesn't sound much like Leave Them All Behind, either.
DeleteThis show was transmitted the day after my 30th birthday, which was a bit miserable. Unknown to me, most of my friends had bought tickets to see Bob Dylan (who I just don’t get) that night, and only two mates joined me for birthday drinks in the town centre’s long gone pub.
ReplyDeleteSteve’s back for the last time, again wearing that bloody tie accompanied by some leftover Christmas baubles, and Claudia’s wearing – ahem!
Color Me Bleuuch with some ‘yo yo’ rubbish, the return of that pervert’s moustache, and sub-KNOBS mush. Get gone and don’t come back.
Not bloody Wacko again! We suffered enough of this last time. Next!
Ride give us shoegaze at heavy metal sound levels. What a charismatic bunch of lads.
Steve, the camera’s over here. Turn ninety degrees, man!
Great. Next up it’s Bryan Adams with exclusive of the wheat – er, week – er, weak in all honesty.
Couldn’t we have had The Jesus and Mary Chain instead of the Pasadenas’ boring karaoke turn again? Note the chap in grey crouching and sneaking across the back of the audience at the end.
Simply syrup next in both song and video form. That kid yawning had the right idea.
The Temptations with an okay kit, but I wish that bloody kid had been left home alone.
Pearl Jam, absolutely rivetting.
What better way to celebrate Valentine’s Day? That wet Wet song again? I’d rather have had a testcard of Claudia in that remarkable outfit.
So happy 60th birthday Arthur Nibble next month! Only 6 years behind you. Well I only had two people come to my 40th birthday in 2008 at a drinks bar, so you're not alone on the miserable roster. Count me in as another for a Claudia testcard in that outfit.
DeleteI think The JAMC were refusing to appear on TOTP at this point because of the Candy Talking ban that pissed them off.
DeleteThanks, Dory! I used to do solo gigs (always first on the bill and rightly so) on the West London circuit in the '80s and 90's, and I had this stupid idea to hire a hall and put on a gig on my 60th which includes my stage comeback after 25 years. What was I thinking!
DeleteTHX, thanks for that info. I had to look it up and didn't realise the American version of TOTP wanted to rename the band as the J&M Chain to play a video, the band saying that would have made them sound like a shoe shop franchise and refused the change and that was that.
DeleteNot the right place to mention this, but two random things I found out about Bryan Adams. Firstly, before that number one we couldn't get rid of, Bryan's six previous UK 'hits' had peaked at 55, 41, 51, 50, 57 and 68. Secondly, we've missed a Year Zero flop in previous weeks, as the follow-up to "Can't Stop This Thing...", called "There Will Never Be Another Tonight", peaked at 32.
ReplyDeleteRIP meat Loaf.
ReplyDeleteWhen I got married we were going to get married to Rock n Roll Dreams Come Through. There was a delay after the CD started, and we actually married to Out of The Frying Pan and Into the Fire - ironic as we were both second marriages. After 27 years, my wife passed last year, and she got Rock n Roll Dreams to send her off.. Meat ans Steinman were a part of our life.
Amazing story Charlie, I can say that Meat Loaf was a great influence on me growing up in my teens listening to his music, being totally enamoured by the Bat Out Of Hell album, and imagining what life was like for the teenager on Paradise By The Dashboard Light, and that Meat was looking back on his own teen years during the Sixties. RIP Meat.
DeleteA funny and touching story, Charlie. Hope you're keeping well after the loss of your good lady.
DeleteWhen I moved into my first home and bought my four-in-one sound system (Panasonic turntable, CD, radio and twin cassette) which I've still got 35 years later, my parents bought me "Hits Out Of Hell" as a sort of christening gift.
The Hits Out Of Hell compilation video VHS I had bought too in the 80s from Our Price, and I remember being frustrated at the editing, where they chop off the beginning and end on some of the videos in order to jump to the next one, for example they go straight into Meat's first lines on Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad and we don't get to see the intro with Jim Steinman on piano, and also Jim and girl opening the video for You Took The Words Right Out Of My Mouth was completely edited out.
DeleteIt was only when iTunes and UTube arrived where you could watch or download the videos in full and completely unedited that I could finally have a sigh of relief! I expect that iTunes and UTube will have a lot of traffic for Meat's songs and videos this weekend!
Lovely interview here with Lorraine Crosby who dueted with Meat Loaf on that hit....
Deletehttps://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0bjkknv
RIP
Yeah, but they put a different girl on the video to mime her lines, and Crosby lost out. The same happened on the videos from the Bat Out Of Hell album where Ellen Foley had her lines mimed by another girl who was the face on the videos.
DeleteGood Lord, it's a bit like the Black Box and Milli Vanilli scenarios.
Happy Valentine's Everyone from February 1992.
ReplyDeleteLet's see what we have in the way of lurve tonight.
Very nice shorts Claudia.
All in black and from the American top ten..Color Me Badd. One of those RnB pop songs that they loved over the pond and we were indifferent to until this crap took over the charts in the 2010s
Not surprised this wasn't a hit here. That moustache was a really really bad idea. Romance points = 3
Liking the Twilight Zone reference in the countdown Steve
Easily better now we've lost the messing about at the start, it's MJs best tune from Dangerous. Romance points = 8
Next up it's Ride who I never realised managed a Top Ten hit. Part Indie, part Grunge. Severely lacking in a tune. Romance points = 0
Turn this way Steve... there's a good boy
I thought we'd seen the last of Bryan but he's still plugging his latest album. This is easily the lesser of the Waking Up The Neighbors singles. Still better than Ride though and one of my ex work colleagues at WHSmith was obsessed with him. A very blue video. Romance points = 7
Now time for some plastic Las Vegas palm trees and a proper romantic tune. They do a good job of this to ber fair and I quite like it. Still think one of them looks like Cat from Red Dwarf. Romance points = 9
Everybody's favourites next the Breakers.
Simply Red. Seen this last year. Still average. Are those all Mick's love children?
The Temptations back with that Culkin brat. Nice tune, shocking movie.
Pearl Jam. Decent tune alert.
Valentine's Day favourites Wet Wet Wet still at the top and we get the video this time.. Romance Points = 10.
I'm off to buy some flowers for Wifey!
Love Morgie x
You have a lot of catching up to do Morgie, as you're 11 shows behind. I'm guessing that either you are keeping to the same week thirty years ago as this 13th Feb 92 show is exactly 30 years to the week, or it's just coincidence.
DeleteOh and Claudia Simon has already been on five more episodes after this one, and looking good in the latest one on last night on BBC4, 30th April 92 edition.
Yes got some catching up to do. Glad to hear there will be more of Claudia
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