I gave you all the love I got, I gave you the 24th of September 1992 edition of Top of the Pops!
The future is britpop
24-9-92: Presenter: Mark Franklin
(21) MESSIAH – I Feel Love
Precious Wilson gets tonight's show underway with this Donna Summer cover that became their second of three top 40 hits when it peaked at number 19.
(NEW) SADE – No Ordinary Love
From her number ten album Love Deluxe, this single will peak at number 26 this year, but return to the charts next year to peak at number 14.
(NEW) OMAR - Music (and chart rundown)
Peaked at number 53.
(22) BOY GEORGE – The Crying Game
A second studio performance but the song got no higher.
(17) SUEDE – Metal Mickey
The second of the 'big four' britpop bands to make their debut, this was their first of nineteen top 40 hits but number 17 was its peak.
(14) BOYZ II MEN – End Of The Road (via satellite)
On the long road to number one.
(13) TASMIN ARCHER – Sleeping Satellite
Another future number one makes its studio debut.
(16) DEF LEPPARD – Have You Ever Needed Someone So Bad (video) (Breakers)
Got no higher.
(15) PEARL JAM – Jeremy (video) (Breakers)
Got no higher.
(12) THE PRODIGY – Fire (video) (Breakers)
Went up one more place.
(ALBUM TRACK) MIKE OLDFIELD – Sentinel
From his number one album Tubular Bells 2, this single became his fourth of four top ten hits when it peaked at number 10.
(1) THE SHAMEN – Ebeneezer Goode (video)
Second of four weeks at number one.
1st of October is next.
Messiah make a pig's ear out of the Giorgio and Donna classic, the original changed music forever, this was forgotten within minutes. Some copyright baiting going on: Star Wars stormtroopers helmets, Orac from Blake's 7, and Ebeneezer Goode on violin.
ReplyDeleteSade sends us to sleep with a soporific exclusive, goes nowhere in particular and takes its own sweet time getting there.
Ah, Omar did have another hit - oh, er, maybe not. Bad luck Omar. Didn't he get in trouble with the rozzers?
Boy George gets on the show again after shuffling up to No.22, really impressive, I'm sure. Seems to have brought his 80s clone along to mime the twangy guitar.
Suede, quite a tense performance as Brett Anderson looks as if he's constantly about to smash himself in the bollocks with his mic stand. Never my favourite of the Britpoppers, but they do give proceedings a boost of energy.
Boyz II Men dressed as Schoolboyz II Men, somewhat worryingly. Still painfully slow.
Tasmin Archer Badger, a star is born! Well, for about one and a half singles, anyway. Decent enough slice of sincerity pop, Mark preferred her to Suede, at least.
A few picoseconds of the Breakers, Def Leppard sounded awful, Pearl Jam sounded about as fun as a song about teenage suicide can (i.e. it doesn't) and the Prodge with one of their weakest (terrible CGI in the video, too).
"The power of Christ compels you!" Remember Tubular Bells? Want that again, only nowhere near as good? Has Mike Oldfield got a tune for you! Dispiriting flogging of a dead horse from someone who was capable of better. Step away from the Enigma record, Mike!
The Shamen, the video this time. Jerry Sadowitz contacts his lawyers.
It seemed that in 1992, everyone wanted to cover a classic 70s single, and Messiah I thought should not have touched this Donna Summer classic, mainly because of its changing music forever as you say, and that should have been left exclusively to Donna. The Star Wars characters on stage just made it worse, and perhaps was used to justify the cover by having other distracting visuals.
DeleteI thought the girl in the Omar video in almost only her underwear was more watchable than Omar himself, and the Boyz II Men studio set in America looked a shambles with an outdoor set being done indoors with heavy lighting, and this was certainly no sunlight.
Had another look at the Omar video clip on this show in the 20-11 chart rundown, and the girl coming off the coach in the video with little more than her underwear on, was now in her long jeans inside the bar, so that was a quick change before the man came in!
DeleteAnyway, back to the song, and Omar was a new entry at No.53 this week of the TOTP short clip, and was at peak position, so would not enter the Top 40 at all!
The Omar single was not a patch on 'There's Nothing Like This' which is summer perfection but good to see something else of his on the show. Someone I know wouldn't agree with that. A colleague at work who left last year was quite in with that scene, being a friend of Paul Phillips of Hi Tension. Omar came up in a conversation on acid jazz / funk favourites and got a "hmmmm" from her.
DeleteThe Prodigy - this was still early Prodigy era, and still no sight of the legendary Keith Flint on the later Firestarter video in 1996 that they were most famous for, although just at the end of this Breakers clip, there looked to be someone like him but not sure if it was him cos it was not close enough to see. Anyone know if he was in the group yet at this point in 1992?
ReplyDeleteMike Oldfield - Interesting that he was doing Tubular Bells on the show, as the single just released was called Sentinel which entered the Top 20 the following week, so not quite sure what was going on here.
The Shamen - The brown video which is a sort of halfway house between black & white and colour was just awful on the eye when you combine that with the speed and strobe of the images making this awful for the viewer. Bring back the gorgeous-chested backing girl from the first studio performance before they got to No.1!
Keith was there, you saw him briefly doing his thing at the end of the clip.
DeleteSentinel was what we heard on the show, it was a variation on Tubular Bells, but not as good.
I believe The Shamen video was shot in sepia, like the beginning and ending of The Wizard of Oz.
Yes, Keith was a founder member of the Prodigy ~ though mainly a dancer at this stage.
DeleteFour songs further down the chart at peak position this week from previous chart regulars missing out on a TOTP feature this time round:
ReplyDeleteNo.24 Peter Gabriel - Digging In The Dirt
First Top 40 single in five years since Big Time got to No.13 in 1987, this was a good comeback single and plasticine video as usual for Gabriel since the Sledgehammer video in 1986 was so successful. I think there was a new album at this point in 1992, as his two singles in 1987-1989 following Big Time couldn't even make it to the Top 40.
No.30 Bryan Adams - Do I Have To Say The Words
Exactly a year on since Anything I Do was 16 weeks at No.1, this was the fifth follow-up single to it, with indifferent success, and this new one could only just flick the Top 30 at peak this week.
No.37 Orbital - Radiccio
Don't remember this one at all, and two-and-a-half years since their debut single Chime in 1990, this new one was the fourth follow-up, and none of them made Top 20 since Chime in 1990.
No.57 Was Not Was - Somewhere In America
Eagerly awaited follow-up to their Top 5 single recently with Shake Your Head featured Kim Basinger and Ozzy Osbourne, this new one had Was Not Was back to no features on their record, which was perhaps the calling for them to call it a day with this flop, and so it was, as there was to be no more from them, as the curtain falls on a group that were in the house of love and walked the dinosaur when they first came onto the scene in 1987. Goodbye and good night!
It's weird how cool the public were on those Bryan Adams follow-ups. Is his next big hit the Musketeers one? I'd say we only like him as a film balladeer but his duet with Mel C will eventually do well.
DeleteOrbital’s Radiccio suffers the curse of the EP release here. The lead track, Halcyon, is one of their best loved tunes, up there with Chime and Belfast for me. Halcyon makes good use of an Opus III “It’s a Fine Day” sample, with this cover having a release earlier in 1992, plus a sample of a Yes track for good measure.
DeleteAlso interesting to note how quickly the public fell out of love with Achy Breaky Heart. Number 15 last week. Number 49 this week.
DeleteThat is a terrible fall down the charts Morgie. I mean it's like falling down the stairs and having to go to hospital with cracked ribs, rather than just getting up and taking a few bruises.
DeleteBilly Ray Virus had his follow up single out this week, so ABH may have been deleted.
DeleteMessiah kick us off with a weird cover before Sade's 90s hit (were there others? I don't remember). It's well done but a bit dull for me.
ReplyDeleteOmar - don't remember this at all.
Boy George - Lawd this show is full of slow tunes, huh?
Controversial choice perhaps but Metal Mickey is my favourite Suede song. I recognise that Animal Nitrate, Trash, She's in Fashion etc etc are technically better but there's something I really like about it.
Boyz II Men - Drippy and cheesy but can't deny its enduring quality even if at the time I was no fan.
Tamsin Archer - Another fairly slow tune, summer ia most definitely over. But a good one that I didn't like much then (look I was almost 13 and moving from pop to indie/rock at the time) but enjoy more now. Shame she never had a bigger career, she's very talented.
Breakers - more balladry from DL, one of Pearl Jam's best remembered (and another slow one), and the Prodigy bringing some pace to proceedings although this is not my favourite of theirs by a long way).
Ugh Tubular Bells 2. Back to the 70s where you belong please.
Shamen on video after a couple of lives. At least we've been having a few different versions of this (see also Erasure) as opposed to same number one vids week in week out (most of 92's number ones).. though that said there are two more to come so it may be video all the way
I really enjoyed this edition. Plenty of variety with one major arrival. Two things about Mark on this show; 1) He seems to get ever further from late teenage fashions of the time. 2) He really likes 'Sleeping Satellite'.
ReplyDeleteDear oh dear what on earth is this? Some bunch called Messiah taking 'I Feel Love' and giving it a proper car crash makeover. Shamen with a bit of Erasure with a bit of Star Wars. Uh? Singer off key for much of it. The Darthtroopers who could be oversized teenagers, are they supposed to be caged dancers? They do tortured hand gestures behind what looks like wire netting from a garden centre. Rubbish but entertaining.
Sade sounding exactly like Sade. Tasteful, moody, melodic and just like 'Your Love Is King' whilst bearing at the same time no actual resemblance.
It will be a hit in the following year.
Chart rundown with accompanying video! Thank you! Only 20 to 11 though which isn't much time to hear anything. Omar with something quite pleasant but No.11 comes too soon for us to get to know it. At least a video and song not interesting enough to distract you from the chart.
Dickensian top hats were obviously in in '92 and Boy George has retrieved his one from a haystack. Liked the girl on guitar dressed as George in 1982 and that's a beautiful version of a classic song. I have to confess that Barbara Dickson did my favourite version of this.
Suede and a real wow yes moment. Definitely the first song of theirs I heard, on 'The Chart Show' indie chart and a fantastic charismatic 1st appearance. Pre Britpop memories; glamour and androgyny and no yelling about how great everything is or pretending it's 1966. They were only about the current time which is why everyone I knew in college loved them. I did actually try to look like Matt Osman for a while with the clothes and long hair. No way skinny enough though! Brett already quite the artisan, shaking his arse while stepping around a fallen mic stand then casually tossing the stand away without taking out Bernard Butler's legs. Great times ahead.
Satellite time and I've enjoyed them all so far regardless of the song and the same here. Mark introduces it with a rather tasteless quip about Hurricane Andrew messing up their previous satellite attempt. That's a side previously unseen.
The lads appear in their office clothes but not nice of someone to chop their trousers in half minutes before transmission.
It was all the mad melisma singing on certain words that many of us in college found humourous. How little we knew what the next 30 years would bring.
Back to the constellation of Borehamwood with a song ironically about satellites. She was never the most outwardly cheerful was Tasmin Archer. This chorus begins "I blame you..." The next biggest one has a chorus starting "Son of a bitch!.." but it's a charming record that still sounds fresh and original. Love the shimmering spacey sounds. John Lennon lookalike on acoustic guitar.
Breakers not very memorable. Def Leppard. WHY???
Well it was that sort of time and 'Tubular Bells 2' was trendy for a little while. I remember watching the special on TV from Edinburgh castle. John Gordon Sinclair, I think, did the Viv Stanshall spoken parts. I've always liked Mike Oldfield's guitar sound and some of his melodies. Singer / chanter with the voluminous black hair was very attractive. The rest is a very self absorbed muso experience.
The audience were surprisingly unbored shitless during that. Maybe they'd seen the posters for the album all over the record shop and realized it was something current. The performance just gets ended like the producer has realised that if it went on for another 2 hours it won't be any different.
The Shamen with the video for 'Ebeneezer Goode' and I take back what I said about it before. I really enjoyed that.
Mark tells us again that he really likes 'Sleeping Satellite'.
Episode presented by the Tamsin Archer fan club.
ReplyDelete“I Feel Love”? I feel bilious.
“No Ordinary Love” – another ordinary Sade song.
Not even a Letraset tag at the bottom of the screen for that snippet of Omar’s functional top 53 smash.
“The Crying Game” again? I could cry. Boy George dressed like a dandy fob undertaker.
Boogie boogie! Where’s Irene Handl? Bert Anderson (as certain music journalists called him) gives us Vic Reeves arse moves and here we both see and hear the first proper splash of Britpop.
Boyz II Men with “End Of The Trousers”, an agreeable slice of slow ‘R&B’ as the kids called it.
Tasmin gives us a stellar song. One of the most unexpected number ones ever. I wonder what her favorite chocolate is? Galaxy? Mars? Star Bar? Milky Way?
Two dull plodder breakers followed by something a bit faster and freakier from Prodigy.
Why, Mike? Just why? Tubular Balls.
Not enough Letraset to spell Fatima Mansions fully in the top 10 rundown.
We finish with a starring role for Gerry Sadoldman.
A good show on the whole, despite the opening three choices. Although Sade’s is not too bad a tune, just not sure it warranted one of these “New” slots.
ReplyDeleteBoy George doing a good performance with Crying Game, this sounds more familiar than I’d have thought, maybe being Pet Shop Boys produced I’d listened to it more than I recall at the time. Googling I see that the B-side of the original Dave Berry 1964 single version is Don’t Give Me No Lip Child which was given an early rough and ready (and very good) treatment by the Sex Pistols. A world away from the original.
Suede, as Angelo mentions, the second of the Britpop big four to perform on the show, but who was the best? Currently my vote goes to Suede, or maybe Pulp, wasn’t a massive fan of britpop Parklife era Blur, and Oasis could just have imploded after their debut and left Mike Flowers Pops to pick over the pieces of their second album. Anyway, cracking performance from Brett and the boys.
Boyz II Men, no recollection (just too bland?), despite this having a 21 week chart run at the time.
Tasmin Archer, love this but had no idea it had buried itself so deeply in my brain. It must take some getting used to as an artist that you will never return to the success of your debut offering.
Breakers. Why do Def Leppard keep appearing, make it stop. Pearl Jam, passed me by, as has their entire output of the last 30 years. Prodigy with their worst track on their debut album, strange choice. They should have gone with Jericho as the A-side, although admittedly both sped-up bonkersness.
Mike Oldfield, at the time I thought he was getting into the ambient house scene with his new (TOTP chess playing) friends The Orb, but looks like The Orb stuff didn’t really go anywhere.
The Shamen, enjoying this now, at the time it saw me consigning my Shamen t-shirt to the duster draw in my progressive house snobbish embarrassment.
I didn't really have a favourite Britpop act, but it would not have been Suede. They took themselves so painfully seriously that Bret's sucked in cheeks pout put me off. Thankfully they've lightened up since. David Baddiel's Bret impersonation of the day may be even more embarrassing than the original, mind you.
DeleteNot to forget The Auteurs in '93's 1st wave of Britpop although Luke Haines would despise that association. They were given huge column inches in Melody Maker in 1993 and hailed as the next big guitar thing after Suede. For me it would probably be Suede at the top as they stood alone for a while, then Radiohead, Pulp, St. Etienne and Oasis for their first few singles.
DeleteGood call with Auteurs Mic. They get the mention in John Harris’ The Last Party Britpop dissection that I’m re-reading as we return to this era with TOTP. For me it was the Tindersticks (in particular first album and City Sickness) who brought me back to guitar “pop” after several years of repetitive beats.
DeleteYes Tindersticks really were unique. I didn't pick up on them till the 2nd album when Mark and Lard played them a lot. I saw them at the Acoustic Stage at Glastonbury when they had the bad luck of overlapping with Bruce Springsteen. Stuart Staples thanking us all for staying with them. There couldn't have been any more than about 30 of us there! Really intimate set in such a huge space.
DeleteSounds like a great gig at Glasto Mic, I’m no fan of Bruce so I would have stuck to Tindersticks. Festival wise I saw them at Latitude at about the same time, and had a very “tired” Stewart Lee in front of me. On the complete opposite end of the spectrum I was also lucky to catch them in the Royal Albert Hall with added orchestra strings.
DeleteWow that must've been an experience seeing them at RAH. Very special band. Like the anecdote about Stewart Lee. You never know who you may see at a festival. I was at the front for Savages at the Park stage in '16 and didn't realise till I saw his photo that the journalist Dorian Lynskey had been standing next to me for the whole gig.
DeleteI've been absent from posting on this forum for quite a while as very little of the music inspires me to be honest.
ReplyDeleteI tuned into some of this due mainly to 'Sentinel' being on the show. This was the lead track from 'Tubular Bells 2' and does sound remarkably like, um, the main theme from 'Tubular Bells' which wasn't actually released as a single in the UK. Instead we got 'Mike Oldfield's Single' which was a slow rendition of the main tune on side 2 of the album. Anyway, on TB2 we get a rehash of the 'Master of Ceremonies', this time with the unmistakable voice of Alan Rickman.
I note from the rundown that someone has had a go at covering 'Baker Street'...hmmm...had a listen on YT and surprise surprise it is a jazzed up 'thump, thump, thump' treatment which you never hear these days. In fact I was sat in a cafe having breakfast the other day and on came Rafferty's original which I never tire of hearing.
The number one on this show by The Shamen is quite dreadful as are most of the 1992 offerings, hence my lack of interest.
Good to see you back. Keep persevering!
DeleteMessiah - Totally pointless cover
ReplyDeleteSuede - great song, remember it well, but I would never have recognised the title in a million years (is the start of britpop?…)
Ironic to follow a lost satellite performance by Sleeping Satellite 😊
Not sure of the relevance of Genesis 5:6 in the Pearl Jam video?
Mike Oldfield - dreadful cover of his own track !!
Here comes The Messiah. If he's a Stormtrooper does that make God Darth Vader? The original of I Feel Love is so iconic it should not be touched. Why not just remix the original. Donna was still around, get her in!
ReplyDeleteSade are back. Personally my favourite tune of theirs. Bet that outfit took a while to make.
Omar briefly with more soulful vibes and then the return of Boy George on vocals and Girl George on guitar. Very mellow show tonight. Vocal not as good from George tonight I thought.
Suede up next. Always liked them. Hugely talented bunch. Coming Up my favourite album of theirs. What a fantastic performance. Which one is the Pointless brother?
Dish intact it's the Boyz wanting to be Men. Dig the shorts! Schools out but I'm not a fan of this one Who told them this was a good idea.
One of THE tunes of 1992. One of my all time favourite songs. Fabulous Tasmin Archer with the haunting and beautiful "Sleeping Satellite". Superb.
Breakers:
Def Leppard: Average
Pearl Jam: who's Jeremy?
Prodigy: Noise!
More piano up next from 70s star Mike Oldfield. Nice enough but never really understood the appeal myself. Is it Number 1 or Number 4?
Ooh The Shamen video this week. I remember this well, especially the dog. Again I ask, how did this not get banned…
I tend to agree with you about The Messiah. If not there to be the saviour and liberator that the wise ones taught, then if we really do have to have a pop group instead, then I would have preferred that they had Donna Summer on their record as the originator of I Feel Love, and not that awful singer on this performance. Good Lord!
Delete