Cool Cut
23/03/89 (Andy Crane & Mark Goodier)
The Reynolds Girls – “I’d Rather Jack” (10)
Getting us underway for a second time and the song went up two more places.
Alyson Williams – “Sleep Talk” (18)
Making her studio debut and her tune went up one more place.
Donna Summer – “This Time I Know It’s For Real” (3) (video)
At is peak.
Coldcut featuring Lisa Stansfield – “People Hold On” (24)
Lisa makes her studio debut and this tune became her first of seventeen top 40 hits when it peaked at number 11.
Pat & Mick – “I Haven’t Stopped Dancing Yet” (34) (breaker)
The duo's only top ten hit and it peaked at number 9.
Roachford – “Family Man” (29) (breaker)
Peaked at number 25.
Bangles – “Eternal Flame” (33) (breaker)
A future number one.
Kym Mazelle – “Got To Get You Back” (35) (breaker)
Peaked at number 29.
Kim Wilde – “Love In The Natural Way” (32)
In the studio tonight but this one got no higher.
Paula Abdul – “Straight Up” (4) (rpt from 09/03/89)
Went up one more place.
Madonna – “Like A Prayer” (1) (video)
First of three weeks at number one.
Bobby Brown – “Don’t Be Cruel” (27) (video/credits)
Peaked at number 13.
30th March is next.
It was an early Easter in 1989, and here come Mark and Andy once again to cheerfully and efficiently take us through the show. These two really did work well together, but unfortunately this would be the final time they did so. The Reynolds Girls are back, bouncing around like Easter bunnies for what be their last moment in the TOTP limelight. Alyson Williams looks like she had taken some fashion tips from Grace Jones, judging from her big leopard-skin hat. She has a formidable presence and voice to match, but this gospel-cum-dance effort never really coheres, and can't seem to make up its mind what it wants to be.
ReplyDeleteWe get a surprisingly large amount of Donna Summer's happy clappy and epilepsy-inducing video, but that's fine as it is an excellent song. Next up, it's Rochdale's very own Gracie Stansfield, like Yazz before her benefiting from collaboration with Coldcut to achieve her first hit. I am not a great fan of her largely bland catalogue, to put it mildly, but at least this one is reasonably lively. I notice she hadn't yet cultivated her Betty Boop kiss-curl.
All the breakers will be coming our way again save for Kym Mazelle's dull, generic effort, so we move on to Kim Wilde, looking lovely again but now beginning a major slide in chart fortunes which she would only be able to temporarily arrest a couple of times in the early 90s. This is a nice enough song, but certainly not as memorable as the hits that immediately preceded it. Lenny Henry and Nicky Campbell make another appearance in the Paula Abdul repeat, before we get the same snippet of Madge as a week earlier. The odious Bobby Brown plays us out, sexually harassing his girl and, like Roachford before him in this show, purloining a title that had adorned an earlier and better song. Given his reputation, it also seems like quite an ironic choice...
It was not only Coldcut that brought new stars through the back door by putting them on their own singles, such as Cold Cut featuring Yazz & The Plastic Population, and now Cold Cut featuring Lisa Stansfield.
DeleteBananarama came through using Fun Boy Three in the same way, so you could really piggyback on an established performer already given a record deal by just joining them, and then it would help getting your own record deal afterwards if you did well on TOTP with your mentors.
There were probably others who secured their own record deals following a piggyback, but I can't think of any at the moment. Would be nice if anyone can jog the memory.
The Glitter Band?
Deletebananarama had already got themselves a record deal (releasing the single "aie a mwana") prior to their collaboration with the fun boy three
DeleteI thought of some more recent ones. The Beatmasters featuring The Cookie Crew in 1988, and lo and behold we see The Cookie Crew on their own in the TOTP studio starting off 1989 with their own hit.
DeleteAlso in 1986 Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam featuring Full Force, and then what happens?...Full Force not only get their own record deal that year having piggybacked off Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam, but then take Samantha Fox under their wing in 1988 to superstar status with two massive American top ten hits, called I Wanna Have Some Fun, and Naughty Girls Need Love Too.
Blink and you miss it, John, but Alyson Williams' leopard skin print hat had a zebra skin print top. Ineed to get out more!
DeleteLet's hope no animals were harmed in the making of that hat...
Deletehere is the archive copy, which i think is slightly longer.
ReplyDeletehttps://we.tl/t-BNvSNdzHcj
Without watching it yet, is the archive copy only having more of the Bobby Brown playout, as it was probably a relief that BBC4 finished it up earlier?
DeleteEnthusiastic hosts for a largely duff line up. Didn’t take too long to watch this one.
ReplyDeleteReynolds girls – I’d rather jack – I’d rather not.
Alyson Williams – Sleep Talk – FF
Donna Summer – This time I know it’s for real- Globetrotting Donna lifts the spirts with this SAW gem. Good to see this video rather than a repeat of the studio outing a la Gloria.
Coldcut ft Lisa Stansfield – People hold on – Hold on, so who was Lisa at this point to be ‘featured’? Didn’t like this much.
Breakers – Pat and Mick – Pure escapism. Roachford – much prefer the Mie Oldfield song of the same name covered by Hall and Oates. Bangles – at last! When was the last time they featured a breaker in the 30s that went on to top the charts (if ever), especially a ‘slow burner’ like this? Kym Mazelle – Oh no….
Kim Wilde – Love in the natural way – Just not a great song. More album track fodder. Off to do some gardening soon Kim?
Paula Abdul – Straight up – It was indeed great to see this performance again but I could have done without seeing Lenny Henry come into shot again.
Madonna – Like A Prayer –We get the latter ‘gospelly’ part again in this excerpt. Why???
Bobby Brown – Don’t be cruel – Elvis? Think not.
sct shouldn't you have given your response to the alyson williams track as "ZZZZZ"?
Deleteyou didn't actually have to be famous to get a "featuring" credit as a guest singer on a track by an otherwise-instrumental act - fellow at-that-point-obscure yazz also got one for a previous single of theirs. however it certainly seemed to act as a springboard for both of them to bigger things for a while. in contrast, 10 years earlier toni smith (who i read somewhere died quite recently) never got the credit i thought she deserved as the singer on tom browne's "funkin' for jamaica" (despite also co-writing that) and pretty much consequently disappeared without trace. however around the same time the also-unknown randy crawford sang uncredited on the crusaders' chart singles breakthrough "street life", but luckily for her many were asking "who is that singer?" - after which the crusaders felt obliged to return the favour and help kick-start what became a substantial solo career
I'll add a bronze medal non-credited female vocalist here - Denise Marsa, from Dean Friedman's "Lucky Stars".
DeletePerhaps the ultimate uncredited female singer was Marni Nixon, mother of Andrew Gold, who did the actual singing for the lip-synching likes of Deborah Kerr, Natalie Wood and Audrey Hepburn in classic Hollywood musicals of the 50s and 60s. At least her contributions to those films did become widely recognised in her later years.
DeleteMarni Nixon was Eliza Doolittle's singing voice in 'My Fair Lady'. Hepburn wasn't impressed when told she was being dubbed but got over it. Marni did appear on screen as one of the Nuns in 'The Sound of Music' though I am not sure which one she was.
DeleteThanks wilberforce for spotting my missed pun on 'Sleep Talk'. Hopefully you laughed (or sighed) at the 'slow burner' pun!
Finally a pre-Crusader Randy Crawford sang on one track 'Hoping love will last' on Steve Hackett's 1978 'Please don't Touch' album. A very unlikely combo if ever there was one, but still one of my favourite Hackett solo songs.
Arthur, what a fabulous trip down memory lane with Dean Friedman's Lucky Stars. I remember this in the charts when I was about 10 years old, and being in the wintertime, making it feel like a warm jacket was on just hearing this tune. Absolutely brilliant, and with a rare video that you may like, and in the days when TOTP would play 3 and a half minutes of a video on a 40-45 minute TOTP show in those days:
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PyMnIip-9fY
Aisling and Linda back for their final time in the limelight - is it true they pissed off SAW so much that they decided against working with them again? Ironically, the acts they mention carried on for decades afterwards - the Stones have just announced their next tour!
ReplyDeleteGood grief, Alyson Williams is one formidable woman! And that's just her microphone-clearing high kicks! She gives off a serious "Don't mess with me vibe" that blasts through the none more '89 production. The frequent, hysterical climaxes in the chorus made this stick in the mind at the time, and this had it all come flooding back.
Remarkably, we get more or less the whole of Donna Summer's sugar rush of a video, running on the spot aplenty. I imagine she's taking a flight with Indiana Jones here.
Coldcut and Lisa Stansfield, now Lisa had made her name on Razzmatazz as a presenter, not a singer, but there was no mention of that rival here (I think it had finished by '89, yeah?). She became one of the most famous acts of the cusp of the 80s-90s and certainly had the pipes, though her real love was soul music. This is a jaunty, hopeful number and I like how she acts out the lyrics.
The Breakers we'll see next week apart from Kym, who has been taking tips from Chanelle in anonymous dance R&B. Apart from breaking the 20, that is.
Another Kim (sort of), she's back with a pleasant but underwhelming effort, though she still persists with the fnar titles for some reason. If you like this, maybe she'll sing it on her new tour.
Paula Abdul featuring Lenny Henry (hey, he worked with Kate Bush!), but it's a repeat of the military precision routine.
The same "Don't frighten Mary Whitehouse!" edit of the Madonna video, did The Chart Show play more of this, anyone remember? I must have seen it somewhere, back then.
Bobby Brown doing one of those "sexually harass woman in the street" videos that popped up a few times, his rapping hasn't improved from his New Edition days, but this isn't too bad when he sings. But no, not a nice man.
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DeleteConsidering that Bobby Brown was the only male performer on the show, in an all girl performers line-up as Andy Crane quite rightly mentioned, and albeit with Brown only on video and only on the playout, perhaps we should watch the archive copy from Anonymous after all??
DeletePet Shop Boys fans will be interested to know their bizarre movie It Couldn't Happen Here will be released on Blu-ray and DVD in June. Didn't expect that. Now you can see where those weird excerpts we had on TOTP came from. And Gareth Hunt and Barbara Windsor, together at last.
ReplyDeleteHi anonymous, do you have BBC Archive copies of these Mike Smith shows:
ReplyDelete28/03/85, 05/09/85, 24/10/85, 10/04/86, 26/02/87, 17/09/87
As well as 04/08, 25/08, and 22/12/1988? The last couple are shows I believe were recorded in stereo, but were shown in mono for their repeats on BBC4. Thanks in advance for however many of these you can provide.
yep here are most of them
Deletehttps://we.tl/t-rz3WuckWun
Hi Anonymous! Thanks for these as I needed some of them myself. Have you got the following original archive shows, all from 1976? They are 1/04, 29/04, 20/05, 23/09 and 4/11. Cheers!
Deletehere's 4 of the 5 brie:
Deletehttps://we.tl/t-63JK1ERE9j
Great stuff, Anonymous, as usual! Many thanks.
DeleteYes, thanks again for these.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteHi Guys by any chance can you put the 1980s ones above up on WT as it is expired and i also need most of them thanks Meer
DeleteA fine amiable pair pair of hosts who, naturally, get split up just as they could have become major fan faves. I’ve never seen Easter decorations before, and seeing these only reminded me we’ve got Jive F#cking Bunny coming up later this year!
ReplyDeleteNice Reynolds Girls mime by our hosts into colour-coordinated natty choereography. Mr and Mrs Reynolds must have been proud.
Alyson Williams with an outfit and a half, a karate kick to die for, and a fine live vocal. Shame it was all for this dreadful din.
Interesting to see London, Munich and America, the three areas Donna Summer’s career was nurtured, outlined on the maps in that fit-inducing video.
Prototype kiss curls on Lisa Stansfield, accompanied by a bloke hitting his keyboard with a kettedrum stick, or maybe it was a dampener? Julie Joanne could tell us. :-D
Oh God, Pat and Mick are back. Please let this go down next week. Ah (or should that be Argh?).
Roachford uses the same tempo as “Cuddly Toy” for an uncuddly uptempo inferior follow-up.
Oo! Susannah Hoffs. Nice to finally see this on the show after 73 weeks in the lower reaches of the chart (well, it felt like it).
Kym Mazelle with more costume changes than song ideas.
Kim Wilde looking lovely and much better than her youthful self, but with a less than outstanding track.
If only we’d had Mel and Kim or Andy Kim next for the hat-trick.
Here’s the video for Madonna, Mark? It’s the same run-off groove bit we got last time.
We finish with a man, and a poor excuse for one at that. Bobby Brown with a vile video and some forgettable ‘R&B’ as they laughingly called it then.
I wish it was Easter now, actually. I could do with a four day break. I’ve realised I prefer Easter to Christmas. You get a definite four day weekend and two days away from the stalag... er, office, the weather’s usually warmer, and you're given chocolate!
There has been a concerted push in recent years to try to make Easter more like Christmas by encouraging people to buy seasonal decorations, including wreaths and trees! Thankfully I don't think it has caught on - yet...
DeleteSo it's Ladies night again on TOTP all introduced by a much more relaxed Mark Goodier and the ever professional but bland Andy Crane.
ReplyDeleteThe Reynolds Girls are back to open the show again with an identikit performance of “I’d Rather Jack”. Nice enough the first time, bored of it already.
So that's what Alyson Williams looks like. A live vocal as well helps lift this performance way above the actual record but it's not as good as it thinks it is. Sleep Talk nearly sent me to sleep.
Donna Summer and This Time We'll Play The Whole Video For Real. Lucky Donna. Video has way much more energy than her studio performance a couple of shows ago so good idea to play this instead.
Coldcut are back this time introducing us to the fabulous voice of Lisa Stansfield who will go on to massive success (and be even bigger than Yazz). The Lisa "look" is already in full effect, hair, mole, pale white skin. “People Hold On” is a rather nice pop tune as well.
Breakers:
Pat & Mick. Second of 3 charity records from the Capital FM DJs. “I Haven’t Stopped Dancing Yet” easily the worst of the three but their biggest hit. Go figure that one out?
Roachford – Never been sure what to make of “Family Man”. It seems a reasonable enough tune and has all the right ingredients (as per Cuddly Toy) but it's just lacking something to make even remotely memorable. Shame.
Bangles – “Eternal Flame” finally makes the Top 40 after 5 weeks in the Top 75. A real slow burner and of course a future fixture at number one.
Kym Mazelle – Don't remember this at all. Sounds OK, will have to give it a full spin.
Kim Wilde back in the studio with “Love In The Natural Way” which grew on me tonight with the full song. Shame it got no higher but I guess most people had the album by now.
A “Straight Up” repeat for Ms Abdul which means we get a bit of Nicky and Lenny and a ton of red noses.
Madonna – “Like A Prayer” starts it Number One run and we get even less of the video than last week. Come on TOTP she's Number One! Show us more!
Don’t Be Cruel? Sorry Bobby I think you reap what you sow. Not as good a his first hit by quite a way.
Morgie, Pat and Mick didn't just release three singles - there were at least seven of the buggers! They had a crack at Brendon's hit "Gimme Some", released a medley of their hits with two other songs which was called the Concrete Megamix, then had a go at "Shake Your Groove Thing" and "Hot Hot Hot". Of these other four, only the last effort charted, luckily only as high as 47.
DeleteI Haven't Stopped Dancing Yet was a remake of the original by Gonzalez which charted in the great disco year of 1979, and one of my favourite dance floor classics of all time, well before Pat & Mick got to it a whole decade later in 1989. There is rare but grainy video for Gonzalez, but at least it has somehow survived, and displays those glorious disco years of the late 70s:
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iFXrFIx5Go
I particularly like the use of the whistle as a musical instrument. Hopefully someone will find an original crisp version, but at present this seems to be all there is of the original video.
Seven! Thankfully we will be spared 4 of them then. Wow.
ReplyDeleteAlyson Williams - Unusually, she's performing the album version here. Perhaps that was easier to chop down to 3 minutes. Good performance of a track that I like.
ReplyDeletePaul Ciani must have liked Donna Summer as much as I do - I nearly fainted when it actually got almost to the very end!
Coldcut / Lisa Stansfield - A brilliant dance track and she was hardly a newcomer because as well as her TV work she'd been in a band called Blue Zone. A shame that later on her career became so ballad heavy.
I rather like Kym Mazelle's track, admittedly it doesn't stand out much from similar fare of the time though.
Kim Wilde - The previous studio act (minus Lisa Stansfield) went to my school, now for someone who married a former pupil! This is a rather nice song, but probably most had the 'Close' album by now which is why it underperformed I expect.
Bobby Brown - Not a particularly great song or video, and even more unfortunate in hindsight.
So, Reynolds girls open a second time. I don’t remember this ever happening before?....
ReplyDeleteAlyson Williams - started out really well, with a really good gospelly feel, then... bifety bifety drum beat. Was there nothing original at the time?....
How weird that I never knew the Donna Summer track was SAW...
Lisa Stansfield makes first name checked appearance. Pleasant enough for the genre.
Breakers: so so karaoke version cover, Roahford ok, bangles too short, kim mazelle too long
Kim Wilde - so so
(Chart rundown. New Order - was Hooky Really smiling there??)
Madonna weirdly started about 4 minutes in...