I've got the key, I've got the secret to the 22nd of July 1993 edition of Top of the Pops!
Massive hit
22-7-93: Presenter: Mark Franklin
(23) SHARA NELSON – Down That Road
Getting the show underway with her first of five top 40 hits and it peaked at number 19.
(7) ROXETTE – Almost Unreal (video) (and charts)
Got no higher.
(20) URBAN COOKIE COLLECTIVE – The Key, The Secret
Performing their first of two top ten hits and this one was the biggest peaking at number 2.
(24) ORCHESTRAL MANOEUVRES IN THE DARK – Dream Of Me (Based On Love’s Theme)
In the studio but it got no higher.
(36) DANCE 2 TRANCE – Take A Free Fall (video) (Breakers)
Got no higher.
(34) US3 feat. TUKKA YOOT – Riddim (video) (Breakers)
Got no higher.
(33) N-JOI – The Drumstruck E.P. (video) (Breakers)
Got no higher.
(27) REM – Nightswimming (video) (Breakers)
Got no higher.
(14) CRAIG McLACHLAN & DEBBIE GIBSON – You’re The One That I Want (video) (Breakers)
Went up one more place.
(25) UTAH SAINTS – I Want You
Jetting in from New York to be here tonight but the song got no higher.
(29) THE WATERBOYS – Glastonbury Song
Making their studio debut with their fifth and final top 40 hit and it got no higher.
(NEW) JASON DONOVAN – All Around The World
Performing his seventeenth and final charting single but number 41 was a high as it got.
(1) TAKE THAT – Pray (video)
Second of four weeks at number one.
29th of July is next.
SHARA NELSON - Kicking off with a tune I really want to like but there's something about it that puts me off. I think it might actually be Shara's vocal.
ReplyDeleteThis is a big new entry for ROXETTE. It's not their best track by a long-way but easily the best video game tune we've had to date (which is not hard). Which Pickard twin is that in the video I wonder?
URBAN COOKIE COLLECTIVE – Still got and occasionally play the album (yes there was an album!) "The Key, The Secret" a really catchy dance tune that was everywhere in the summer of 93.
OMD for possibly the penultimate time on TOTP (I can only think of Walking On The Milky Way after this one). He's had an idea (Based On a Love Theme) don't you know. Proper Dad dancing tonight from Andy to an album track at best.
Breakers:
DANCE 2 TRANCE – Truly awful
US3 feat. TUKKA YOOT – Got Riddim but no tune
N-JOI – 1991 has gone lads
REM – "Nightswimming" from the truly magnificent "Automatic for the People" album.
CRAIG McLACHLAN & DEBBIE GIBSON – This weeks Home and Away star is CRAIG McLACHLAN who, along with our Little Miss American, takes to the stage. Even Andi Peters gets a look in which tells you how much musical pedigree is involved here.
UTAH SAINTS – I think this is definitely "light" over "substance". Really impressed they use sampling and try to be a proper band but it just doesn't work here for me.
2020's "The Soul Singer" still THE WATERBOYS best song in my opinion but I did enjoy "Glastonbury Song". A great live band I would imagine.
JASON DONOVAN is back and "All Around The World" is his best track in ages so naturally it tanks. Oh well...
TAKE THAT plugging their 1994 Calendar in video form and the Producer is now thinking "we could have run the credits over the end of that video"... it won't be long.
As an aside Mark has fixed his hair, which is good as it was really bothering me, lol.
US3 on the Breakers this week, came a week after Oui 3 on TOTP in the studio, and quite intrigued as to why a girl was wearing a tiger bikini in a nightclub in that video clip on The Breakers, but what a hottie I must say. Need to see the whole video!
DeleteN-Joi was impressive on this one, despite not emulating their 1991 success, but this Drumstruck EP needs to be heard in full, and another exercise for me over this bank holiday weekend, along with watching the US3 video in full.
This episode starts so strong!
ReplyDeleteShara Nelson with a great track, and do I spot Cass from Skunk Anansie on bass?
I've been waiting for Almost Unreal for ages. Written for the film Hocus Pocus, Per's never been happy it ended up in the Mario film instead. I bought the soundtrack, not just for this but because it had 2 Cinnamon Street on it, a reworking of a Tourism track that swaps Per's vocal for Marie's, and wasn't available any other way. The soundtrack wasn't actually bad - Was Not Was and Queen were also on ot from what I remember. I love this video but there's a better version without the Mario clips. Although seeing Fiona Shaw camping it up is fun. That film had a way better cast than it deserved. And Morgie, I believe it's the brother that plays Tony in Hollyoaks (I think Nick) as opposed to the brother from The Upper Hand who plays Tony's brother. Oh and Joe McGann (the dad from TUH) turned up as Tony's evil dad a few years ago. Not that that's relevant to Roxette (soon to be back with a TV tie in rerelease of It Must have Been Love).
UCC one of the best tracks of the year, though did get overplayed. Another one where I bought the album after loving the single and, like Charles and Eddie, it was a bit disappointing. Although I think it had three decent tracks instead of just one. Thankfully I buy way better albums in 94 and 95, thanks Britpop and US indie rock. And Roxette and Kylie of course.
Not satisfied with channeling Anton Du Beke, Andy now looks a bit Brendan Cole. The song is eh though.
REM the best of the breakers, an OK but past their prime visit from Utah Saints and everything else is dross. Great start to the episode though!
Spot on regarding Roxette's Almost Unreal, as the video used for the chart rundown this week. This is in my Top 3 Roxette tunes of all time, along with Spending My Time, and Crash Boom Bang, and thoroughly deserving of being as high as No.7 this week, whatever soundtrack it was part of.
DeleteThree songs at peak position lower down the charts from previous 80s icons, but not high enough to be featured on TOTP:
ReplyDeleteNo.39 Squeeze - Third Rail
First new single for six years since 1987, this was a long awaited comeback which disappointingly got no higher than No.39, but this originally 70s group with songs like Cool For Cats, had a uphill struggle appealing to the next generation in 1993 that was were more into Take That and dance trance music.
No.56 Kenny G & Peabo Bryson - By The Time This Night Is Over
Interesting but not surprising collaboration between two 80s greats, and coming together similar to a tennis doubles pairing that were not making it in the singles competitions on their own. Definitely worth a listen though.
No.57 Vanessa Paradis - Just As Long As You Are There
What a shame that her last ever single didn't even break into the Top 40, as the curtain comes down on her chart singles career at this point in 1993.
Dobrodan! Sorry I’m late. Got back from Croatia on Monday (flight delayed two and a half hours due to the ‘air silence’ at Heathrow for Her Majesty) and a very busy first day back at work yesterday, so I was too knackered to watch this until tonight.
ReplyDeleteMark trying hard to look like the sixth Take That member but, at least, that laughable haircut’s gone.
Brilliant opener from the singer on “Unfinished Sympathy”. Just a shame Shara’s live vocal was nowhere near as good as on record. Outfit courtesy of the Tasmin Archer School of Costume.
Sorry, Roxette’s song and video just left me cold.
Boom! Top biscuit rave pop from The Cookies. Bongo player wearing a key medallion. Not just thrown together, that.
OMD? OMG. You know you’re struggling when you take another hit’s backing track wholesale and ruin it.
Where’s the woman singer in Dance 2 Trance gone? Career takes a freefall.
Tukka Yoot? Yuk.Shabba rip-off.
I didn’t n-joi the next track either. Lucky we got such a brief snippet.
Don’t show your bum, that man! Phew. Stipey meandering again.
I didn’t want that next cover at all. Absolutely terrible.
Utah Saints, rave with a singing guitarist being their USP.
Hear the Waterboys disappearing up their own arses. No, Mark, I disagree with your opinion. Follow-ups “Reading Festival Tune” and “Proms Track” didn’t fare as well.
Ah, shame. Shouldn’t have ended quite like this, Jase. Bye and ta.
An early doors finish for mark and a swift ‘off’ for the Manc Chippendales video. Now, if only there’d been a tribute act called the Manc Street Preachers. Ouch. Tenuous link into the next edition…
Just a quick comment (from Sidders). Another excellent episode, Urban Cookie Collective with one of the tunes of the year. US3 was a much played album this year for me, Cantaloop coming up as a breaker in a few weeks deserved to at least have broken into the top 20.
ReplyDelete