Now That's What I Call A Music Blog

Tag: Tina Turner

  • NOW 21 – It’s got an ‘ology. A V-I-B-E-ology

    NOW 21 – It’s got an ‘ology. A V-I-B-E-ology

    Now_21Like 1988 before it, 1992 is not one of those banner years in the annuls of music. Flipping through the ‘1992 in music’ page on Wikipedia turns up such nuggets as Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love got married, Kylie parted company with Pete Waterman and Billy Idol punched a woman in the face. Three of pops darkest days I’m sure you’ll agree. Musically it is devoid of much worth commenting on. 1992 did see the release of Hiphoprisy Is The Greatest Luxury, Sugar’s Copper Blue and Take That and Party, but it also begat The Bodyguard soundtrack, still one of the biggest selling albums of all time. You idiots. The accepted wisdom is that 1992 (and to some extent, 1993) are the dark hinterlands between the grunge ‘explosion’, which generated just three top ten hits, and 1994’s birth of Britpop (copyright 6Music for the whole of this year), which ruined everything. And judging by NOW 21, those sorts of people who get asked to discuss the merits of Right Side Fred versus The Breeders on BBC Four filler shows are absolutely right: 1992 smells worse than teen spirit.

    As seen on 'I'll Say I Love Any Kind of Music for £250 plus exees'
    As seen on ‘I’ll Say I Love Any Kind of Music for £250 plus exees’

    NOW 21 is the last NOW album I have any experience of in the real world. Whilst I was now fully ensconced in a world of John Peel, the NME and whatever my now-moved out brother was sticking on C90s for me, a friend of mine had NOW 21 on CD and insisted on putting it on whenever I was at his house. I hated it at the time, and was only interested in the Jesus and Mary Chain track mainly because it seemed so out of place. It wasn’t a patch on the JAMC stuff I was listening to at home, but I just couldn’t understand why Far Gone and Out was on it. My mate didn’t care and insisted on only playing Bohemian Rhapsody and Mr Big’s Be With You. I never did keep in touch with him when I left school. Can’t think why.

    NOW 21 is top heavy with number ones, but sadly shoots its wad too early. It begins with Bohemian Rhapsody, re-released the previous Christmas as a tribute to the death of Freddie Mercury, making it the only song to score a Christmas number one twice, in the same version. You know this back to front so there’s little point in me discussing it further.

    We Wet Wet’s Goodnight Girl does warrant a bit of further discussion. Like With a Little Help From My Friends, this is probably long forgotten as a Wets’ number one, but top spot it did reach. No idea why though. It’s a trite, piano-based soufflé of a song which features no drums whatsoever. That’s a no-no in my book. It also has, to my ears at least, some rather suspect lyrics: “I won’t tell a soul, I won’t tell at all, Do they have to know about my Goodnight Girl”… make of that what you will.

    Far more wholesome, if nonetheless bonkers, is the triumphant return of Shakespeare’s Sister. Stay is just so wonderfully hat stand that you can’t help but love it. I’m sure most of those who pushed it to number one are the same kind of people who made Babybird’s You’re Gorgeous a hit, i.e. people who don’t really listen to music. Of course, Stay makes no sense without its video, which makes the fact it was so popular even more amusing. I wonder what cultural historians of the future will make of this one.

    They’ll have far more fun dissecting that one than they will explaining the continued success of Simply Red, who offer us Stars this time round. That’s preceded by the albums token “song from a hit movie”, with the Temptations My Girl, and followed by The KLF’s Justified and Ancient, a re-recording of the final track from their White Room album, with new vocals from Tammy Wynette. As a fan of the original album version, I’m not keen on this, and see it as the KLF taking their joke to the extreme where it becomes irritating rather than amusing. The fact that it was in the running for the Christmas number one in 1991 was probably the point. The KLF will, amazingly, feature again later.

    Justified and ancient
    Justified and ancient

    Madness provide the third re-release on side one. It Must Be Love is great, obviously, but it does make you start to wonder if there was anything new that was good about at the time. The fact that Genesis could score top ten hits in 1992 probably means the answer is no. I Can’t Dance is one of those songs that was probably more successful as a result of its (admittedly, through gritted teeth) amusing video, taking the piss out of Levi commercials, than it was for the inherent merits of the song itself. Julia Fordham’s Love Moves in Mysterious Ways is, possibly, the token act being plugged on side one. A fairly forgettable piano-based dirge, it’s not particularly memorable even given Fordham’s slightly odd vocal recalling Beverly Craven’s much better Promise Me, with hints of the heavy breathy type of singer that would become popular when Mariah Carey started selling millions. I’m amazed more X Factor finalists haven’t given this a pop; it’s right up their street as an example of fragile yet strong singing. Oooo-oooh.

    The next half does get better, eventually, but takes its time getting there. Crowded House’s Weather With You is always embedded in my mind thanks to an impromptu sing-along on the last day of school, when someone decided it was a perfect way to say our goodbyes to everyone, whilst I was writing sub-Pixies lyrics in everyone’s ‘Farewell Journals’ or whatever the hell they called them.

    Deeply Dippy, the final number one on the album, has survived pretty well, I think. It’s a cracking pop tune which never seems to get any respect. If Ian Dury had written and performed that exact same song, everyone would say it was a masterpiece. I think it’s almost a masterpiece, with only the slightly weedy brass section holding it back.

    The afore-mentioned Mr Big is next with their horribly hand-clappy sing-a-long-a-barnyard Be With You. An unbelievable hit at a time when grunge was supposed to be ruling the charts, this recalls the worst of the likes of John Cougar Mellancamp and other US country-rock acts that you only know the names of if you ever watched America’s Top Ten. We Brits can conjure up our own insipidness though, thanks to Everything but the Girl, once again scoring a surprise hit with a cover version a few years before they had their trip-hop renaissance which they were working on at the same time as Tracey Thorn was providing vocals for Massive Attack. Honest. Just as forgettable is Roxette’s Church Of Your Heart. You know this is a duffer because the bloke sings it.

    I said things got better. Well not quite yet. Bryan May’s Driven By You stinks up the speakers next. With this May makes his second appearance on a NOW album. Just like he did on NOW 19. Christ. Driven By You, younger viewers may not know, was especially written for a Ford car commercial (no doubt to one up Vauxhall who had been having great success using the riff from Eric Clapton’s Layla for a few years). In the ad, it sort of worked, as a Top Gear, petrol-head, greasy overalls theme to shots of jets, R and D departments, Transit vans and the like. As a song, it fails miserably mainly because May seems to have forgotten to change the lyrics from ‘everything WE do’ to ‘everything I do’ for huge sections of the thing, even confusing matters by saying ‘we’ and ‘I’ in the same sentence. So is he singing to Anita Dobson about how together, everything they do is driven by her? Or is he suggesting that the Ford Corporation of America are responsible for the continued married bliss they share? I’m none the wiser.

    Hair
    Studio Line

    So, to the good stuff, and there’s very little. The Wonder Stuff appear for the second NOW in succession with the jolly Welcome to the Cheap Seats (with uncredited Kirsty McColl on backing vocals).The incongruous Far Gone and Out follows it, to the bafflement of a nation of teenage NOW buyers. It’s C-grade Jesus and Mary Chain (as was most of the album, Honey’s Dead), but it’s still miles better than most of the crap on offer here. JAMC were on a Warners subsidiary, so one can only assume this was a potential sop to grunge, having failed to snag a Nirvana or Pearl Jam track for inclusion. I’m speculating wildly here, but you have to but this makes no sense at all.

    James’ Born of Frustration is a bit more at home, its rallying warble still sounds great. It’s better than Sit Down anyway (though most James singles are). The first half finishes off with one of the rare appearances for The Cure. High sounds like pretty much every Cure song, with that twangly guitar, lyrics tumbling from Robert Smith’s gob, and mention of a cat. Textbook stuff.

    Textbook could also describe the running order of CD 2.  Apart from the now standard ditching of some odds and ends at the finale, and one hilarious hand grenade of a track, it’s dance all the way, kicking off with Shanice’s I Love Your Smile. Even a cold hearted cynic like me can appreciate how nice this is, but that’s also its problem: it’s sickeningly nice. And you hum it for hours afterwards. The Pasadena’s cover of I’m Doing Fine follows, bringing banality to the niceness of Shanice to produce a horribly soul-less version of the soul classic. I never got on with these guys at the time, finding their reappropriation of soul legends for their own ends cheap and tacky. My opinion has not changed.

    Next up, one of Kylie’s forgotten hits, despite it reaching number 2 at the time. Like The Pasadena’s, Give Me Just A Little Bit More Time is a drab soul cover with uninspired SAW production (without the A this time) and a horribly strained vocal from Ms Minogue, who by the year’s end, would be finally stepping out from under the Hit factory’s wing. On this evidence, not a moment too soon. The cover versions continue with East Side Beat’s Ride Like The Wind. It’s a surprisingly listenable track, sounding every inch the forefather of the likes of D:Ream and similar chart botherers who would go on to litter the charts (and NOW albums) in the coming years. It’s an Italian DJ re-working a Christopher Cross non-hit (in the UK at least) from 1979. The original is a late era disco track from the time when everyone was releasing disco records (i.e. when they got rubbish). ESB’s version adds a slightly ballsier vocal and more bass, but essential they aren’t that different.

    The Daddy Mack'll make you... JUMP! JUMP!
    The Daddy Mack’ll make you… JUMP! JUMP!

    That’s followed by the Fisher Price hard house of 2 Unlimited with the forgettable Twilight Zone, which doesn’t even sample the Theme from The Twilight Zone. Idiots.

    Thankfully, all that nastiness is firmly blown away by the musical equivalent of a photobomb thanks to the compiler dropping KLF’s America (What Time Is Love) into the mix and showing everyone else on the record how to produce ball-busting dance music. Yes, it’s another cover version on a side filled with them, but at least it does something different to the original chart version (which in itself is only one of various versions of the track). Featuring the riff from Ace of Spades and the singer from Deep Purple, along with a hellish choir, a ludicrous prologue…you need to hear the full 9 minute version to appreciate this tune’s almighty power, but even the truncated radio version here is enough to satisfy. It’s also crying out for someone more talented than me to mash it up with Neil Diamond’s America.

    We continue with two pretty good tunes: Civilles and Coles’ Deeper Love sounds like the kind of thing that would have inspired a fair few people. It’s got some swing to its standard house beat and a really good sassy vocal to add some grit to this particular oyster, not sure about that protracted ending though. It’s not one I particularly liked in the day, but sounds pretty good now. As does Opus III A Fine Day. What both these tracks have is the inability to date them. Deeper Love could be from anywhere between 1987 and 1995. A Fine Day, too, is fairly impossible to pin down. I was genuinely surprised to see it on this album, thinking it at least a year younger than 1992. This has turned up on at least two Pete Waterman compilations even though he had bugger all to with it, other than it was released by his PWL label.

    Erasure’s Breath of Life seems a little out of place in this kind of company, and it’s clear from their lowly position midway through CD2 that their star was starting to wane for the record company. Including them was still obligatory because they were still having top 10 hits (and would continue to do so for another decade) and it’s a great tune, it’s just unfortunate that former album openers now found themselves in the pick n mix bin, next to McHammer, stinking up the charts with the god-awful Addams Groove. Produced to promote the Addams Family movie, it desecrates the original famous theme, but at least has the grace to bury it in the mix so much you can barely hear it. By this point he’d dropped the Mc, so this was credited as just Hammer on the single, which would prove to be his last top 10 hit, with only one further single (something called Do Not Pass Me By, hopefully a cover of the Ringo Starr composition) even breaching the top 40. And no one cared. The pop-rap vibe continues with Salt n’ Pepa’s Expression. Clearly inspired (i.e. ripping off) Madonna’s Express Yourself, this is all about getting the sisters to do it for themselves and “believe in me”. I’m not quite sure how “come on and work your body” fits into this proto-Girl Power theme, but there you go. It’s not aimed at me so I’m not meant to get it. By this point any innovation S n P may have once showed has long gone, and they are now sounding like almost every other ‘new jack’ R n’ B act starting to occupy the UK charts at the time. Like Ce Ce Penniston who followed up the wonderful Finally, with the bland and by-the-numbers We Got A Love Thang (god, even typing that made me cringe). Meh.

    Seasoning in the sun
    Seasoning in the sun

    The next track is thankfully odd enough, if not necessarily any good, to elicit some interest: Paula Abdul’s Vibeology. It’s a little strange that such an odd thing would turn out to be her best track since Straight Up. I suspect it’s the result of some studio off cuts that didn’t quite make a whole song, being handed over to a producer to slap together. It’s a world away from the dreary ballads she seemed to have made her stock in trade, and pointed to a new direction she could have taken. If Madonna had recorded this, it would still be the subject of academic studies. As it is it’s left as a curious mix of sex, funk, juvenile humour, schoolgirl excitement and Paula’s Bart Simpson impression (“Let’s do it!”). I like it but I’m not sure why, as it’s not good in any sense of the word as I understand it.

    The final dancey track is Alison Limerick’s Make It On My Own. This is one of those tracks that seemed to be forever laying in the ‘fun’ pubs and would be wine bars of my home town, at the time when I was first experimenting with fake IDs. It’s very good and worth having a new listen to.

    But it’s all downhill from there: Tina Turner’s Way of the World starts off sounding like Let’s Stay Together… just like Be Tender With Me Baby did on NOW 18! It’s as a beige as a newly refurbished flat on Homes Under the Hammer, and just as mercenary. Ms Bullock had ceased to be relevant to NOW and its listeners for a while now so her inclusion with a number 13 hit, from 5 months previous, that barely anyone remembered at the time, let alone now, seems like unnecessary padding. At least Curtis Stigers’ I Wonder Why was a big hit. Its inclusion is at least understandable, even if the song is all kinds of wrong. Lounge-jazz sax invades this penthouse ballad with all the subtlety of a thrown brick and with even less charm. It sounds like the theme to a long forgotten yuppie soap opera about people who stare out of their high rise apartment windows across a city that doesn’t understand them anymore, high paid jobs they hate but which they can’t live without and relationships so convoluted you end up marrying yourself. Twice. Stigers has a very strange voice too, like he’s got a permanent bit of phlegm vibrating in the back of his throat he’s long since given up trying to dislodge. Listened to on headphones, there’s a constant rattle in the background that convinces you your Sennheisers are bust. Again.

    NOW 21 breathes its last with one of the most insipid ballads, in a long history of insipid ballads, which the series has served up so far. Diana Ross’ When You Tell Me That You Love Me sounds like it was released in the early 80s, like it was a rejected song from a Lloyd Webber musical. She sounds like an X Factor finalist rather than one of the most successful soul singers we’ve ever had, and with its pointless key change, synthesised orchestra and choir filled finale, it has all the charm and heart of a Michael Bay movie. This managed to hold off KLF in the battle for Christmas number 1991, but its huge sentimentality was no match for the death of a national treasure. According to Wikipedia it missed the top shot by only a couple of hundred units. Ross tried to rectify this a decade later by re-recording it with Westlife, of all people, but that also stalled at number two. Oops.

    So, is the perceived wisdom right? Is 1992 a dark, post-apocalyptic wasteland of pop nothingness? On this evidence, the answer is definitely yes. NOW 21 isn’t the whole story of the year (it’s not even the whole NOW story of the year) but as a snapshot of where things were it seems the public loved their cover versions, corny love songs and re-releases. But, there’s nothing resembling grunge here and no sign of the great British backlash to come, so what exactly are all these commentators banging on about on 6Music at the moment?  1992 is simply shaping up to be one of those forgettable years. Isn’t it?

    Yes, that is the then voice of the Official Top 40, Mark “Goodie Bags’ Goodier, replacing ‘The Kid’ as the voice of NOW, where he remains to this day.

    NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL MUSIC 21

    Release date

    13th April 1992

    Biggest tracks

    Bohemian Rhapsody – Queen

    Stay – Shakespeare’s Sister

    Lost gems

    America: What Time Is Love? – The KLF feat. The Children of the Revolution

    Vibeology – Paula Abdul

    Forgotten tracks

    (Love Moves In) Mysterious Ways – Julia Fordham

    We Got a Love Thang – Ce Ce Penniston

    Make It On My Own – Alison Limerick

    Way Of The World – Tina Turner

    Worst Track

    Addams Groove – Hammer

    What’s missing?

    Everybody In The Place – The Prodigy

    God Gave Rock n Roll To You – KISS

    Movin’ On Up – Primal Scream

     

    Track listing

    CD1
    Bohemian Rhapsody Queen
    Goodnight Girl Wet Wet Wet
    Stay Shakespears Sister
    My Girl The Temptations
    Stars Simply Red
    Justified And Ancient The KLF featuring Tammy Wynette
    It Must Be Love Madness
    I Can’t Dance Genesis
    (Love Moves In) Mysterious Ways Julia Fordham
    Weather With You Crowded House
    Deeply Dippy Right Said Fred
    To Be With You Mr Big
    Love Is Strange Everything But The Girl
    Church Of Your Heart Roxette
    Driven By You Brian May
    Welcome To The Cheap Seats The Wonder Stuff
    Far Gone And Out The Jesus & Mary Chain
    Born Of Frustration James
    High The Cure
    CD2
    I Love Your Smile (Driza Bone Remix) Shanice
    I’m Doing Fine Now The Pasadenas
    Give Me Just A Little More Time Kylie Minogue
    Ride Like The Wind East Side Beat
    Twilight Zone 2 Unlimited
    America: What Time Is Love? The KLF featuring The Children Of The Revolution
    A Deeper Love Clivilles & Cole
    It’s A Fine Day Opus III
    Breath Of Life Erasure
    Addams Groove Hammer
    Expression Salt ‘N’ Pepa
    We Got A Love Thang Ce Ce Peniston
    Vibeology Paula Abdul
    Make It On My Own Alison Limerick
    Way Of The World Tina Turner
    I Wonder Why Curtis Stigers
    When You Tell Me That You Love Me Diana Ross

     

  • NOW! 18 – The pompatus of love

    NOW! 18 – The pompatus of love

    Now_18In some ways the much-derided (by smart arses like me), and often ignored (by everyone else) re-vamp of the NOW design is nice and simple. No one was calling the albums by their full name, so why bother putting the whole title on the cover? They barely bothered with NOW 17, but retained the iconic balls for one last round. Also, the series had been going for so long now, surely everyone had given up on the numbering by now? The latest release would be just another NOW album, people will flock to buy it anyway, it doesn’t matter what number it is. We’ll keep the number, but we’ll hide it on the sleeve, like a game, or like some cryptic cigarette ad. With NOW 18, the balls were chopped off in their prime and replaced by what I can only compare to old pub wallpaper, with the word NOW! emblazoned across the front (note also the addition of the kiddie-friendly but otherwise useless exclamation mark). It’s breathtakingly dreadful. Even as a teenager I knew this was a horrible design, mainly because it looks cheap and generic. Add some band photos down the side and it’s not a million miles away from the rip-off Out Now! series Chrysalis and MCA records briefly released in the mid 80s.

    This might be excusable if NOW 18 bestrode the charts like a sales statistic behemoth (whatever one of them might look like) but it doesn’t, and I’m beginning to wonder whether it’s me or the music. This blog was a direct result of me wondering if pop music got bad or did I just get old. The question I forgot to ask myself was, do we only like the pop music from when we were kids? Does every generation think their music was the best?

    NOW 18 is certainly not short on number ones; side one kicks off with three in a row, and features a further three later on. The Beautiful South’s A Little Time, Steve Miller Band’s The Joker and Reg Dwight’s first UK number one, Sacrifice, represent probably the lowest key opening to a NOW album so far. Strange that they re-brand, presumably, to appeal more to a hip, happening teenage market (it’s unlikely many who bought the first NOW were still buying them by this stage), and then they choose to open the album with some of the most insipid, turgid, beige-sounding songs of the year. The Joker in particular, featured in a Levis ad, so a nailed on number one, really perplexes me now. What was it about this song (apart from its ubiquity on the TV) that made it so popular, particularly when it failed to score on its original release in the 70s? Lest we forget this is the song that stopped Deee-Lite’s Groove Is In The Heart from reaching number one. Elton John’s song is a mystery too, since Sacrifice and it’s double A side brother, the much better, Healing Hands, had BOTH been released as singles the year before, and neither had charted!

    Lord Baldy Reg

    The dirge doesn’t stop there. It Must have Been Love isn’t a bad ballad (and I was sure it had been a chart-topper but it stopped at number 3), but following on from Baldy Reg (still in hat-wearing rather than bad weave mode) just demonstrates why you shouldn’t pack all your smooch songs too close together. Four songs in and NOW 18 is making me reconsider whether this blog will ever get finished. A lively horn section and a small orchestra jerk me back into action. Sadly it’s courtesy of Phil Collins’ Something Happened On The Way To Heaven, surely one of the worst song titles of all time. The song’s alright, nothing special, but I’m probably giving it an easier ride because of what came before it. Collins somehow manages to snag himself a prime location as the first artist name on the cover, a spot normally reserved for the coveted side one, track one artist.

    Just as side one is starting to feel like a complete washout, NOW 18’s first forgotten gem arrives. Last year Wilson Phillips’ Hold On got itself a bit of a mini revival thanks to the awful Bridesmaids movie (a film whose best scene features a group of ladies in wedding dresses suffering explosive  diarrhoea…), but listening to it again here it still generates that “I haven’t heard this for years” feeling. Given they are the daughters of various Beach Boys and Mamas and Papas, it shouldn’t surprise that they can hold a cracking pop tune. It’s ridiculously uplifting and nice in a fun way rather than being nice because it’s not dreadful.

    The mood then drops immediately, but to be fair, it is for one of the best songs on the album, if not the whole of the 90s: Nothing Compares 2 U by Sinead O’Connor. Given its release date, this really should have featured on NOW 17, and one can only suspect it was held back so as not to affect sales of Ms O’Connor’s album (which sold very well, thank you very much). As breathtakingly good as the song is, it brings to a close the least inspiring side of NOW I’ve experienced thus far.

    And things don’t improve on the flipside either, at least not at first. Thanks to the movie Ghost, Unchained Melody found itself vying with The Joker for the title of Biggest Selling Re-release of 1990. The Righteous Brothers were victorious, becoming the biggest selling single of the whole year into the bargain. I’ve always found this endlessly popular (and endlessly covered) song to be a bit of a slog and in the Righteous Brothers discography I’ve always preferred You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling and the less well-known Ebb Tide, both of which were released as a double A-side later in the year, but performed less well.

    Now That's what I Call a Pop Group Publicity Photo. I love this a bit too much.
    Now That’s what I Call a Pop Group Publicity Photo. I love this a bit too much.

     

    An act whose chart career seemed to end almost at the same time as the the 80s was Belinda Carlisle. Her chart placings had been steadily declining since she burst onto the scene at the tail end of 1987, with successive singles registering lower and lower, so it was a bit of a surprise that the fifth (FIFTH!) single from her Runaway Horses album would not only be a hit, but would be her biggest hit since Heaven Is A Place on Earth. It’s not that much of a surprise though when you learn that single was the car- flogging We Want The Same Thing. Now regarded as one of her best-loved songs, the single version was a radical reworking of the version on the album, at least that’s what Wikipedia says. Not having a copy of the album to hand I can’t verify this, and the interwebs are no help either, offering only this, more famous version. It follows the template of Heaven to a tee, and is a brilliant pop single as a result. A number six finish seems a bit harsh now for such a great pop nugget, but the charts were much tougher in those days.

    Sadly, the charts weren’t quite tough enough to prevent Status Quo’s Anniversary Waltz from reaching number two! Obviously conceived to try and cash in on the success of Jive Bunny the previous year, The Quo take a three-chord-wander their way through a succession of 50s rock n’ roll standards with all the enthusiasm of a pub band on a wet Tuesday night. Dreadful. Much better is INXS’ Suicide Blonde. The first new single after the massive success of the Kick album, this was always going to be a tricky prospect. Luckily, it still sounds pretty damn good, though that harmonica does have a tendency to wow and irritate in equal measure. INXS takes us into a cul-de-sac of ‘indie’ tunes, but with baggy imploding as quickly as it started, it’s left to two old hands and one doomed new act to provide our left-field choices this time around.

    Public Image Limited’s (PiL) Don’t Ask Me is the big “huh?” on NOW 18. Never a big hit (and PiL were never more than critically-acclaimed rather than chart successes) it is a pretty good tune. Not as good as This Is Not A Love Song or Rise, this does strike me as filler for a NOW album. Were Virgin really trying to sell PiL to the kids of the early 90s? One band that definitely was successfully sold back to the kids was Talk Talk. Never as successful as they should have been, a greatest hits album led to a couple of top 20 hits with It’s My Life (on show here) becoming their biggest ever hit, 6 years after its original release. Such a brilliant track, it opened up the band to whole new audience (myself included) who had not been aware of them. Listened to now it’s easy to spot Talk Talk’s influence over so much of the alternative scene in the intervening years, it’s shameful it took a contract-fulfilling compilation to get them noticed in their own country.

    You mean I could have my landline, broadband and TV all handled by just ONE 80's experimental rock band?
     I could have my landline, broadband and TV all handled by just ONE 80’s experimental alternative rock band?

    The La’s also never got their dues and are more widely regarded as one hit wonders. Due to its ubiquity, it may be hard to fathom that There She Goes only reached the dizzy heights of number 18 and remains their only top 40 single. Despite it being a wonderful piece of jaunty pop fluff (allegedly about heroin addiction) I’ll gladly never hear it again. If you like it, I implore you to buy their debut (and to date, only studio) album. There at least five songs on it better than this.

    Side two then finishes itself off with the seemingly obligatory inclusions for Tina Turner’s Be Gentle With Me Baby (kind of like The First Cut Is The Deepest by way of Stay With Me Baby) and Robert palmer and UB40’s I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight, which is playful if not exactly good. Palmer helps a lot.

    Perhaps reflecting the shift in sales to CD’s, there seems to be a definite attempt to theme the halves of the albums now, with, usually, sides three  and four given over to dance music, as is the case here. This reflects the charts at the time, but it’s telling that five of the number ones on NOW 18 were on the first half, in with all the rock and pop, while the second half, almost exclusively dance-orientated features just the one, which we’ll come to in a moment. The Pet Shop Boys return with So Hard, and ‘proper’ bands get a brief look in thanks to the wonderful remix of  The Cure’s already wonderful Close To Me, and the dreadful Ben Liebrand remix of Sting’s already dreadful An Englishman In New York. There’s also the jaw-droppingly simple but effective remix treatment given to Suzanne Vega’s Tom’s Diner, which still impresses.

    Producer-led dance was taking over though: Fascinating Rhythm from Bass-o-matic (which I always thought was a great name for a washing machine) sounded great in 1990, but sounds awfully generic now. It’s probably no fault of the song, but the endless, pointless samples are over the top and irritate enormously. Soul II Soul’s Missing You is pretty ropey stuff compared to their 1989 vintage, despite the presence of Kym Mazelle on vocals. This should have made for a stronger vocal than Carol Wheeler, but somehow it ends up sounding even weedier. Also disappointing is Neneh Cherry’s I’ve Got You Under My Skin; a self-conscious attempt to re-write Prince’s awesome Sign o’ The Times, it fails completely. Cherry’s vocal is fine, and the subject is laudable, but it feels contrived and cheap. Blue Pearl’s Little Brother is only here in anticipation of it being as big a hit as its predecessor, Naked In The Rain. Not a chance, but it’s not as bad as I remember considering it’s a very difficult song to remember.

    Please tell me this image doesn't need a caption...
    Please tell me this image doesn’t need a caption…

    Side four feels like it will be the proper party side, kicking off with Kylie’s Step Back In Time (a change in chart fortunes no doubt prompting her re-appearance, two years after I Should Be So Lucky appeared on NOW 11). Kim Appleby’s Don’t Worry is one of the best songs on NOW 18. Lyrically it’s about getting over a bloke, but everyone knew it was really about the tragic death of her sister, Mel. For a floor-filler it’s genuinely moving stuff. The public agreed pushing it to a number two slot that, sadly, subsequent releases couldn’t match. It was produced by Ken from Bros, fact fans!

    Next we get two absolute jokes of tunes. Technotronic’s Megamix (I can’t believe that’s the title, but that’s how it’s credited… just Megamix) is one of the most shameless rip-offs I’ve ever heard from the music industry. Having sold the public the same song four times (only Rocking Over The Beat showed any sign of variety) they then cut all four together, along with a fifth, unidentified track, and sell it back to the kids again! It’s like KFC taking all your left over bones and bits of skin, re-heating them and then selling them back to you as “Spicy Scraps” or something. And given that all the songs are bloody identical, it couldn’t have been too much of a chore to mix them all together. One point of mild interest comes from the fact that MC Eric (pfft) is rapping a different lyric from This Beat is Technotronic. Meh.

    Next comes the gobsmackingly awful Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Polka Yellow Dot Bikini from Bombalurina (aka Timmy Mallett, crazy name, crazy guy). You all know this, don’t you? Bloody awful… number one all summer… novelty crap… Well, I’m shocked to report that you are wrong. All of you. It’s actually pretty good. I don’t mean in a Pet Sounds/ The Queen Is Dead sense of the word good. We’re not talking about topping a Q magazine list of the greatest number ones of all time. I mean, it’s good in a good, fun pop song kind of way. On NOW 12 there was some discussion (in my head) of the KLF’s Timelords project and how it was a cynical attempt to ‘create’ a number one record. They succeeded. I see Bombalurina   as an attempt to use the same principles but to create, not a deliberately bad record but, a good fun pop record. It samples The Incredible Bongo Band, Holly Johnson, Gil Scott Heron and that “ah yeah” heard on every record in 1990. Mallett can’t sing but holds the whole thing together. And let’s not forget, the song is not some great work of art to start with; it’s pop fluff, Mallet just updated it, retaining the fun (an aspect of pop that was slowly being eradicated) and having a massive hit into the bargain. And all power to him. The man was one of the greatest kids TV presenters ever and by all accounts is a thoroughly decent gent. I’ll not hear a word said against him.

    Legend
    Utterly utterly utterly utterly brilliant

    Fun pop continues with Betty Boo’s wonderful Where Are You Baby?, which is still brilliant, and Dirty Cash from The Adventures of Stevie V. Not a favourite of mine back in 1990, listened to now (for the first time in two decades) it’s actually rather splendid. Dark, moody and still danceable, it’s just a shame about the incongruous rap that appears halfway through. It’s completely out of place, but luckily, quite short.

    The whole thing finishes off with a couple of smoochers. That old Scottish rapper McHammer deconstruction of The Chi-Lites’ Have You Seen Her? deserves little mention, but Jimmy Somerville’s To Love Somebody is rather special. Giving his best vocal performance for years, it somehow manages to make white-boy reggae listenable again. Compared to UB40 this feels a lot more heartfelt and honest. But it’s another notch on the cover version/re-release bedpost, taking NOW 18’s total to a whopping 16 songs! It’s a pleasant end to the album but one which is indicative of the album’s underwhelming whole.

    An underwhelming hole, yeaterday
    An underwhelming hole, yesterday

    In NOW 18’s defence (a bit) 1990 was far from a banner year for pop music, and was definitely a transitional year. Stock, Aitken and waterman were on their way out, with ‘purer’ dance music coming to the fore, mainly from Europe. It wasn’t all good, far from it, but it was to become the dominant sound of the charts and arguably still is today. It should be no surprise to learn that NOW only had two regular releases in 1990, but there were three NOW Dance releases (I may come to NOW Dance at a later date). Indie took a bath, and it would be a few more years before it would re-emerge in any meaningful way in the NOW universe. The notable absence is rap. While the charts today are happy to mix hip hop with chart regulars, the record buyers of 1990 were notably unsure, and after a few fruitful years, it too seemed to be on the wane in the mainstream.

    NOW 18 is a fair reflection of its cover: shouting from the rooftops about good it is, and how big its hits are, just like the Hits Album used to, but just like Hits, it flatters to deceive. There is some absolute class on show here, but it’s suffocated by old songs, insipid ballads, poor programming and a lack of innovation. Ironic given its ‘innovative’ new look.

     

    NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL MUSIC 18

    Release date

    19th November  1990

    Biggest tracks

    Nothing Compares 2 U – Sinead O’Connor

    It Must have Been Love – Roxette

    Unchained Melody – The Righteous Brothers

     

    Forgotten tracks

    Little Brother – Blue Pearl

    Missing You – Soul II Soul ft Kym Mazelle

     

    Hidden gems

    Hold On – Wilson Phillips

    Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini – Bombalurina (seriously… try it again)

    To Love Somebody – Jimmy Sommervile

     

    What’s missing

    King of Wishful Thinking – Go West

    Kinky Afro – Happy Mondays

    The elephant on the room is the best single of 1990…

    Groove is in the Heart – Deee Lite, which had sadly snapped up for The Hit Pack, the latest incarnation of the Hits series.

     

     

     

    Track listing

    Side one
    A Little Time The Beautiful South
    The Joker Steve Miller Band
    Sacrifice Elton John
    It Must Have Been Love Roxette
    Something Happened On The Way To Heaven Phil Collins
    Hold On (Single Edit) Wilson Phillips
    Nothing Compares 2 U Sinéad O’Connor
    Side two
    Unchained Melody The Righteous Brothers
    (We Want) The Same Thing Belinda Carlisle
    Anniversary Waltz (Part One) Status Quo
    Suicide Blonde INXS
    Don’t Ask Me Public Image Ltd
    It’s My Life Talk Talk
    There She Goes The La’s
    Be Tender With Me Baby Tina Turner
    I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight Robert Palmer Featuring UB40
    Side three
    So Hard Pet Shop Boys
    Fascinating Rhythm Bass-o-Matic
    Missing You Soul II Soul Featuring Kym Mazelle
    Tom’s Diner DNA featuring Suzanne Vega
    An Englishman In New York Sting
    Close To Me The Cure
    I’ve Got You Under My Skin Neneh Cherry
    Little Brother Blue Pearl
    Side four
    Step Back In Time Kylie Minogue
    Don’t Worry Kim Appleby
    Megamix Technotronic
    Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini Bombalurina
    Where Are You Baby Betty Boo
    Dirty Cash (Money Talks) The Adventures Of Stevie V
    Have You Seen Her M C Hammer
    To Love Somebody Jimmy Somerville

     

  • NOW 17 – Just what is it that you want to do?

    NOW 17 – Just what is it that you want to do?

    Now_17As the first NOW album of the 90s NOW 17 promises much and delivers little, but it points the way to another world far removed from the Wet Wet Wets, Jellybeans and Johnny Hates Jazzes (?) of the late 80s. In terms of looking forward, NOW 17 gives over a whole side to the fast emerging indie-dance scene and almost all of sides three and four are dance orientated. Classic pop is curiously thin on the ground. There’s also the first computer-generated cover design. Yes… um… I’m sure in April 1990, this cover looked shockingly futuristic, reminiscent as it is of the first Doom, or Castle Wolfenstein video games; you can imagine it popping up as an end of level reward after you’ve mown down another 4,000 monsters. Also, intriguingly, “That’s What I Call Music” is almost an afterthought in the design. Had they finally cottoned on to the fact that nobody ever used the full title, so what was the point?

    The featured artists on the cover are a curious mix as well. For a hip, happening pop compilation released at a time when the charts were filled with ecstasy-laden folk in Global Hypercolour t-shirts and tie-dye flower strewn hoodies, the big draws on NOW 17’s cover still include Phil Collins, UB40 and Tina Turner. His Satan-ness Cliff is on here too, but that keep that one as an evil little surprise.

    Side one provides your pop injection. Erasure’s Blue Savannah has always been on my hate-list for reasons I’ve never quite fathomed; it remains there still, a dreadful way to start the album. Rebel MC’s Better World is, um, better, but is a poor follow-up to the superior Street Tuff. It only just scraped into the top 20, and only one more hit was forthcoming (Tribal Base in 1991; no, me neither). Paula Abdul’s Opposites Attract is brilliant however, and may have actually improved with age. A wonderfully upbeat rap number for the masses, it has got a small tinge of 1989 about it (but far less than some other tracks on show here) but as a party tune it’s damn good.

    I’m sure there is a joke about his name, but I’m not making it

    Also damn good is Beats International’s Dub Be Good To Me, which should have opened the album. It’s one of only two number ones on NOW 17, but also one of the few outright classics. Still sounding refreshing today, its brilliance lies in the ability to find disparate samples which somehow work together (a trick Norman Cook would continue to have enormous success with as Fatboy Slim) and combining that with a wonderful vocal from Lindy Layton. I’m baffled as to why her solo career never took off, despite Fatboy’s help. I’m also baffled by karaoke kings UB40’s continued chart success into the 90s. By 1990 they were only capable of having hits with other people’s songs, so they continued to churn out a succession of their Labour of Love albums at a rate of about one a month. Kingston Town has been performed worse at your local pub, but not by much.

    Thankfully the world was about to be saved by Candy Flip and their Funky Drummer-led version of Strawberry Fields Forever. I’ve never been able to make my mind up about this track. Not then, when I was no doubt the target audience for it, or now when I’m a cynical, dried up husk of a man writing a sarcastic blog about how crap pop music is. I’m supposed to say how depressing it is that a group of fly-by-night kids and (no doubt) a producer with his eye on a quick buck desecrated a classic song in a trendy and wholly inappropriate way. But of course that’s utter nonsense. I’m not a fan of the Beatles’ original version anyway, which in itself was a cynical pocket money grabbing exploitation of the burgeoning late 60s drug scene, so I don’t really give a toss about Candy Flip ruining a great piece of art, because it wasn’t a great piece of art to start with. So the only concern is, is it listenable? Well, just about. It flip-flops from crass to genius with just about every drum beat, but it is a slice of 1990 that says a lot about the record industry’s desire to cash in on what the Stone Roses/Happy Mondays had started the year before. Candy Flip wouldn’t be the last act to be seduced and abandoned by the industry chasing the batik and loon-pant wearing pound, and Manchester and baggy burned out almost as quickly as it started (see also Flowered Up, The Soup Dragons, Mock Turtles et al) and at least the band had a successful afterlife, going on to work with the likes of The Charlatans and Robbie Williams, and two of them went on to form the criminally underrated Sound 5.

    Drug addled pop for ver kids, man. Or something.
    We never had Twitter and the Facebooks. We had to make do with this.

    To follow that, we get sensible, but dull, tracks from Tina Turner and Phil Collins, who tries to perk up I Wish It Would Rain Down by chucking in a gospel choir and an axe-wielding Eric Clapton. It doesn’t work.

    It’s odd to think that side two of NOW 17 is probably the most defining side of NOW in my musical education. I didn’t realise it at the time (probably because I didn’t own the album) but pretty much every track here would point forward to the next decade of my record buying. In terms of legacy, it’s probably second only to the House/Hip hop side of NOW 11 as being about as zeitgeisty as one side of a pop compilation can get. They screwed it up a bit by including The Quireboys, but there you go. In my head this was the sound of summer 1990, yet every track was released between January and April. The opening trio of Step On, Loaded and Enjoy the Silence is about as esoteric as NOW had ever been since Dr Mabuse on NOW 3. These are classics that still stand up today; yes, Step On may be a bit hoary now, but at least it will still get you dancing. The version on NOW 17 is the 7 inch single version. It’s notably different to the most commonly heard version now, the one found on Pills, Thrills and Bellyaches, and all their compilations, which is over a minute longer.

    Don't do drugs kids, etc...
    National Treasure

    Following those three titans of indie-dance, we find a minnow of the form, Jesus Jones. Now pretty much forgotten in their native UK, they did hit it big in the USA when Right Here Right Now was used to soundtrack SCUD attacks on Iraq on CNN during the first Gulf War. Classy. EMI had high hopes for the group, seeing them as their meal ticket into the alternative scene, at the expense of several other acts, including a new group they had just signed called Blur, who are notable by their absence from NOW albums for quite a while… Real, Real, Real is a fair track that sounds like a watered down version of something Pop Will Eat Itself may have been knocking out a few years previous, or a cleaned up Carter USM track. Inoffensive chart-friendly unit shifter and nothing more.

    The Inspiral Carpets were drifting into similar territory after a few years in the indie salt mines. Pretty much every group from within 30 miles of Manchester, with a pudding bowl haircut and jeans the size of a tent, was getting offered a record contract. The Inspirals at least stayed with an indie label and had a sound of their own. Clint Boon’s Hammond organ was much imitated, but he was the one who brought it back from obscurity. Hitting number 14, This Is How It Feels remains their most popular hit, even if it was surpassed, in chart terms anyway, by Dragging Me Down a few years later. On NOW 17, the track appears in its radio-friendly version, replacing the explicit lyric about the ‘guy from the top estate’ chucking himself under a train.

    Chucking yourself under a train is, coincidentally, the thing that Guy Chadwick most sounds like he wants to do when singing for The House of Love. Often lumped in with the shoe-gazing crowd who found themselves sucked into the baggy vortex for a while (see also the exceptional Ride, and the not quite so exceptional Birdland), House of Love are one of the more unusual acts to grace a NOW album, a bit like seeing Tom Waits on a chill-out compilation. Shine On is a brilliant tune, probably their most well-known, and a remix of their debut single from 1987. Such wonderful song writing and talented musicianship would ultimately lead to internal fighting, booze and drugs, and everything else that stops greatness from pushing through into mainstream success. Shame.

    Faith No More’s From Out of Nowhere comes from out of nowhere (sorry) and is a bit of a barn-storming relief after all that depression. It’s never been my favourite Faith No More track, but I’ve learned to appreciate it over the years and it’s certainly impossible to ignore. I’d rather ignore The Quireboys, who close off side two though. You know those bands that make a career out of ripping off another band, like Oasis did? Well, The Quireboys did that with The Faces, seemingly just because the singer sounds like Rod Stewart (and he does a bloody good job of it, too). They had a ridiculous name which ensured no kid could admit to liking them (at least at my school) without being accused of liking ‘queer boys’. They did have one good song, 7 O Clock, but that’s not the track here. Here we’ve got Hey You, and it’s a dreary, pub piano dirge that’s all roll and no rock. Imagine Rod Stewart singing a Chas n Dave number, and you’ll be almost there.

    The leather trouser makes an ill-advised comeback to the charts.
    No caption I write can be funnier than this image is on its own

    After giving us a taste of where NOW would go later in the decade, with what is probably best described as the “Indie Ghetto” (which of course, would end up redefining the term ‘indie’ to mean a sound rather than music from independent labels; acts as diverse as Kylie Minogue, The Prodigy and Bjork were all strictly indie), the second half of NOW 17 gives us the more troubling path for the series. Or to put it another way, it’s the reason why everyone, except some absolute die hards, ultimately abandon the series to seek pleasures elsewhere: pop music becomes annoying.

    For reasons unknown (probably money, most things are), or better discussed by people who know about this kind of thing, pop music changed in the 1990s. I know they say that about every decade, but the status quo that had been in place since the early 60’s was pretty much abandoned by the decade’s end. Pop bands were replaced by pop producers. Pop has always had its svengalis from Brian Epstein and Andrew Loog Oldham, through Mickey Most, Pete Waterman all the way up to Simon ‘666’ Cowell. But now, the knob fiddlers were coming to the fore, thanks to cheap equipment and a succession of cheaper guest vocalists. They became the new pop stars, and groups were pushed into the shadows again. Think about it: pretty much any guitar-based band now is classed as an ‘indie’ band or an ‘alternative’ band, even if they are as successful as Muse or Coldplay. The only exception to this are bands aimed specifically at kids, like McFly and Busted, but that boat sailed swiftly by and now we’re back to pretty, non-threatening boys sitting on stools singing about kittens. Just like Garage (a term from the 60s), Indie and Alternative would soon no longer mean what they used to, and soon they would be followed by R n’ B and House too. Faceless (or anonymous faced) dance music would soon rule the roost. Sides three and four of NOW 17 are almost exclusively like this. That in itself isn’t necessarily a bad thing. We are, in 1990, a few scant years away from the Superstar DJ era, where Carl Cox, Chemical Brothers and Norman Cook were as popular as the boy bands they battled with for chart supremacy. But this is the start of that path, so instead we get a very rum bunch indeed.

    Ya Kid K and MC Eric. You remember them, don't you?
    Ya Kid K and MC Eric. You remember them, don’t you?

    Take Technotronic… please! (boom, boom). This Beat is Technotronic is just Pump Up the Jam Part Two. In fact it IS Pump Up The Jam, just with different lyrics, sung by someone called DJ Eric. At least Lonnie Gordon’s Happening All Over Again is a great tune, one of Stock, Aitken and Waterman’s last big hits, but also one of their best. It’s probably their most successful attempt at recreating that classic disco sound for the 1980’s, sadly a year too late. Unsurprisingly the song had been written for Donna Summer, with whom they had a brief collaboration, but they had a falling out with the disco diva they did the next best thing and got a younger (and no doubt cheaper) looky-likey. I was convinced as a teenager that Gordon, like Summer, was in fact an old disco songstress that SAW had rescued from obscurity, but no; she was a just your standard session singer who happened to get noticed by the Hit Factory. As is so often the case, Gordon never capitalised on the top 5 success of this excellent track and the dumper beckoned.

    Disco morphs into Hi-NGR with Jimmy Somerville and Cliff Richard (separately, sadly). Read My Lips is a much better plea for sexual tolerance than the awful There’s More To Love (featured on NOW 12) and continues the brash fabulousness of Somerville’s earlier cover of Sylvester’s You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real), a top 10 hit which would have sat much better on this album.  In a similar vein is Cliff’s Stronger Than That, the best track from the album of the similar name. That doesn’t mean it’s any good, because it’s not, but it doesn’t make you want to murder people who were to play it like you did when you heard I Just Don’t Have The Heart (see NOW 16).

    The anonymous side of things come into play next with the 49ers forgettable Don’t You Want Me, Jamtronik’s awful dance version of Phil Collins’ Another Day in Paradise, and the strange, if not exactly pleasant, JT and the Big Family’s Moments in Soul.

    Jamtronik represent a virus that spread across the charts in the 90s and is a throwback to the days of the Top of the Pops and Hot Hits albums: the cheap, nasty cover version knocked together, probably, in a couple of hours. The difference between these bikini-clad clones and those the 1970s (apart from the fact that quality dolly birds like Mary Millington and Caroline Munro were absent) is that they were dance versions, sounding like they’d been knocked up with a £50 Casio keyboard and an Atari ST computer, so they didn’t even have to sound that much like the original. Another Day in Paradise is one of the most offensive singles ever recorded anyway: multi-millionaire pop stars should not make more millions by exploiting other people’s problems, not unless they are prepared to do something about it.  This wasn’t a charity record, remember. So, a dance version, for pilled up clubbers, of a trite, opportunistic ode to Britain’s disposed, written by a man who could solve problems like this with a quick waft of his tax-avoiding chequebook? Sorry, got nothing spare, mate.

    This image really needs a funky house beat. Ah yeah.
    This image really needs a funky house beat. Ah yeah.

    Moments in Soul is slightly odd though and that makes it worth a listen. A kind of dance megamix of recent hits, it manages to combine Art of Noise’s glorious Moments in Love, Soul II Soul’s Back to Life and Milli Vanilli’s Girl You Know It’s True into something listenable. Moments in Love seems an odd basis for the track, being 8 years old by this point, and strangely never a top 40 hit despite several rereleases. Side 3 does close on a high note, thanks to the still brilliant Got To Have Your Love from Mantronix. The production may date this a bit (particularly the horrible synthesised horns) but it’s a pretty great track all the same.

    Side four is a similar hotchpotch of the good, the bad and the ugly. The good is supplied by Adamski’s Killer, featuring, or course, a very uncredited Seal; Orbital’s Chime, giving little indication of the influence they would have over UK dance music for the next two decades; and Electribe 101’s Talking With Myself. Add in E-Zee Possee (sic) featuring MC Kinky (!) with Everything Starts With An E, which sounds nowhere near as dreadful as I thought it would, despite loving it in my teens, and side four looks like it might be shaping up pretty well. But deep and frightful horror awaits.

    Side four begins with Bizz Nizz (an act who somehow managed to be one of the featured artists on the cover) with Don’t Miss the Partyline. Like many dance artists who would appear on NOW albums, this was Bizz Nizz’s only hit, and it did well reaching number 7. But it’s utter crap. And not in a novelty record kind of crap. It’s lazy, money-grabbing, soul-less crap. You think Simon Cowell has the monopoly of conning the kids out of their paper round cash with insipid rubbish (and I do)? Well, he’s only doing what Euro-dance producers (and a few UK ones) have been doing for years before. Partyline features a very basic keyboard melody of about three notes, crowd noises, and a bloke (presumably, a DJ) shouting about the Partyline (this was the golden age of late night TV-advertised chat lines, maybe that was the market they were tapping) and the occasional “are you ready?”. Techno was still in its infancy, so this kind of Diet Techno cleaned up on the charts at the time, being much easier listening (and radio-friendly) than the likes of LFO. And you know what else makes this so dreadful? The guys behind it went on to create 2 Unlimited. Be afraid…

    The rest of side four is never as downright nefarious as that, but is a showcase of where 1990’s dance scene was at: in the toilet. Well, that’s the impression given here anyway. I can’t really say how representative it is.

    D-Mob’s Put Your Hands Together sounds a year too old to be in this company; Tongue N’ Cheek’s Tomorrow is so utterly forgettable I’ve listened to it at least ten times preparing this review and still can’t remember a thing about it; and the least said about Sydney “Who?” Youngblood’s awful cover of I’d Rather Go Blind the better, except it’s probably the worst cover version NOW has featured thus far. And the worst album closer so far, to boot.

    It must be said, NOW 17 does do a great job of capturing the chart mood of the first third of 1990. It’s as disparate and confused as the charts themselves, as maybe it should be. If the kids were strating to buy into the ‘alternative’ (both indie and dance) then where was that going to leave the pop staples like Stock, Aitken and waterman, Cliff, Tina Turner… maybe even Erasure?

    As I said earlier, pop was changing, becoming more fractured than ever before, with more genres and sub-genres. NOW was never going to be able to provide an accurate cross-section of the popular movements as it tried to here. A break was once again required, and there would be no new NOW album in the summer of 1990. Christmas would see its return, along with a bold, and potentially disastrous, new look. It was time to wave goodbye to NOW’s balls.

     

    NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL MUSIC 17

    Release date

    23rd April 1990

    Biggest tracks

    Dub Be Good To Me – Beats International

    Killer – Adamski

    Step On – Happy Mondays

    Loaded – Primal Scream

    Forgotten tracks

    Got To Have Your Love – Mantronix

    Opposites Attract – Paula Abdul (MC Scat Kat is not credited…!)

    Track listing

    Side One
    Blue Savannah Erasure
    Better World The Rebel MC
    Opposites Attract Paula Abdul
    Dub Be Good To Me Beats International feat. Lindy Layton
    Kingston Town UB40
    Strawberry Fields Forever Candy Flip
    I Don’t Wanna Lose You Tina Turner
    I Wish It Would Rain Down Phil Collins
    Side Two
    Step On Happy Mondays
    Loaded Primal Scream
    Enjoy The Silence Depeche Mode
    Real Real Real Jesus Jones
    This Is How It Feels Inspiral Carpets
    Shine On House Of Love
    From Out Of Nowhere Faith No More
    Hey You (Live) The Quireboys
    Side Three
    This Beat Is Technotronic Technotronic featuring MC Eric
    Happenin’ All Over Again Lonnie Gordon
    Don’t You Love Me The 49ers
    Read My Lips (Enough Is Enough) Jimmy Somerville
    Stronger Than That Cliff Richard
    Another Day In Paradise Jam Tronik
    Moments In Soul J T & The Big Family
    Got To Have Your Love Mantronix Featuring Wondress
    Side Four
    Don’t Stop The Partyline Bizz Nizz
    Everything Starts With An ‘E’ E-Zee Possee
    Put Your Hands Together D-Mob & Nuff Juice
    Killer Adamski Featuring Seal
    Chime Orbital
    Tomorrow Tongue N Cheek
    Talking With Myself Electribe 101
    I’d Rather Go Blind Sydney Youngblood

     

     

  • NOW 16 – Not The Man You Used To Be

    NOW 16 – Not The Man You Used To Be

    Now_16NOW 16 signals the end of an era.  Not only was it the last NOW album of the 80s, the decade of its birth, but it was also the last NOW album I owned. 1989 proved to be, pretty much, the end of my love affair with chart music. I’d been dabbling with big brother’s records for a while, but his imminent departure out on his own would mean I’d have to start buying my own copy of the NME now, and my meagre pocket money was not going to stretch to that, Smash Hits AND saving for NOW albums. Something had to give, and it proved to be all things pop that bit the dust.

    Looked back from a remove of two and a half decades, NOW 16 confirms a lot of what had been happening over the previous couple of years: dance music was now very much part of the mainstream; Stock, Aitken, Waterman had half the charts sewn up; pop bands were being replaced by pretty-boy ‘manufactured’ acts; and any attempt to create something meaningful would result in the kind of overblown, overwrought and over-long musical pot-pourri that produces the likes of Sowing The Seeds Of Love. Amazingly, opening the compilation in a near  full version (just 30 seconds shy of the album version, but  still much more than they’d play on the radio), it’s a huge, expensive mess, but I still love it, because it’s a huge, expensive mess, and it’s easily the most interesting song on NOW 16. The rest of the album is mostly a display of pop blandness at its most beige, and was indicative of the severe lack of ‘top chart hits’ EMI, Virgin and Polygram produced in ‘89, but also how dreadful the public’s tastes had gotten.

    With the exception of Tears for Fears, side one is fairly ordinary, without being particularly bad. Belinda Carlisle’s Leave A Light On is strating to demonstrate her lack of variety (or rather that of her writers); Erasure’s Drama is good, but not a classic; and Debbie Harry’s I Want That Man similarly pales in comparison to the best of Blondie, or even French Kissing in the USA.

    “What about Sydney Youngblood?” absolutely no one cries. If Only I Could is a sickly sweet “can’t we all just get alone” ode to world peace with a weedy, hand-clap-heavy, dance beat nicked from Raze’s Break 4 Love, with added funky wah-wah AND Spanish guitar, for no reason other than they had to add something to make it more interesting. It didn’t work.

    The only picture of Sydney Youngblood you're likely to see anytime soon
    The only picture of Sydney Youngblood you’re likely to see anytime soon

    Fondly remembered, but pretty dated is the return of Curiosity Killed The Cat with Name and Number. It’s much better than their earlier stuff; it’s got a neat line in synthesised saxophone and provided the inspiration for a De La Soul song, so not all bad. But people only ever remember the chorus, which everyone my age knows verbatim, and it goes on forever. The Beautiful South and Wet Wet Wet both provide lesser-loved tracks, with You Keep It All In and Sweet Surrender, the latter of which sounds like it was written for some god-awful US teen drama.

    Side two does not improve things immediately, but eventually springs a few surprises. Queen’s Breakthru is among their weaker efforts (though conversely, is one of the better singles off of The Miracle album), but that is followed by the only true ‘classic’ track on NOW 16: Tina Turner’s The Best. It’s not a favourite of mine, but it’s the closest thing we have to a legendary, iconic song here and I don’t think you have to like a classic to appreciate that it is one. To this day, there are people who can’t hear it without doing Ms Bullock’s crazy horse/Tommy Cooper impression dance.

    Champion! The Wonder Horse!
    Champion! The Wonder Horse!

    Far from classic is Transvision Vamp’s Born To Be Sold, a forerunner of the ‘list’ song that would become ubiquitous in 1990 (Madonna’s Vogue, The Beloved’s Hello etc). It’s pleasant, nostalgic and different to the raucous, scream-a-thons that made them stars (alright, made Wendy James a star). It also demonstrates that Ms James did not have the best of voices, and this single was the start of their relatively swift decline. Oddity number one appears with the long forgotten Wendy and Lisa with Waterfall ’89, the ‘89 indicating this was a remix of an ‘87 track about their leaving The Revolution, Prince’s old backing band. Released as a follow up to the chart-dodging Lolly, Lolly, and minor hit Satisfaction, Waterfall also failed to reach the top 40. It’s a good tune, though different to the funky grooves of those other singles, and worth a listen.

    A top 40 hit was probably the least that was expected of Kate Bush, whose The Sensual World appears here to baffle and confuse unsuspecting teenage listeners. I’d forgotten how good this was even if it doesn’t scale the wondrous heights of her classic work. Certainly, only she could have created it and that, in my book, makes it worthwhile.

    Oddity number two comes from the fact that NOW 16 was the subject of some format fiddling. The CD version contained three bonus tracks dotted across, and the first of these appears mid-way through side two, with the Fine Young Cannibals and the wonderful I’m Not The Man I’m Used To Be. I think this qualifies as the best track on the album; I’ve always loved this and never really understood why. It’s fairly basic, even monotonous, melody-wise, but somehow that works in its favour. The thoughtful lyrics seem to resonate with me much more now perhaps than they did all those years ago. It would sadly prove to be The Cannibals’ final chart hit, bar one minor, greatest hits-flogging new track, The Flame in 1996.

    Also disappearing over the pop horizon was Then Jericho. Sugarbox is the kind of overblown balladry that gave rock a bad name back in the 80s. A million miles better than the likes of Whitesnake, it may be, but it’s still got that stadium pomposity, massive orchestrations and barely-concealed naughtiness of the title. Their collaboration with Belinda Carlisle, What Does It Take?, was much better, but failed to make much of a dent on the charts. Also saying farewell to NOW was Living in a Box, whose final hit (and joint best-seller with their eponymous debut single) really sounds like they’re taking the piss. Always good pop song writers, Room In Your Heart sounds like a parody of the kind of heart-tugging ballads so popular at the time. It’s completely beige and inoffensive bar the bizarre ‘other-worldly’ opening, but once we hit the third chorus and Richard Darbyshire is bellowing his head off like a man possessed, you know we’ve entered a whole new realm of scariness altogether. It’s probably the same realm where Richard Marx lurks, awaiting unsuspecting teenage girls to bump off and dump in the river. But that was the other song he sung. Right Here Waiting is the song he sings AFTER he’s bumped them off, and he’s sitting in his bedroom crying over a photo of them, slowly rocking back and forth.

    A boy's best friend is his mother
    A boy’s best friend is his mother

    Bizarrely, things don’t immediately pick up on the start of side three, and these things normally do. By now, this was established as the opening of the dance (and pop pick n mix) party. Technically, yes, Milli Vanilli were a dance act, but Girl I’m Gonna Miss You is a dreary, 2 am, “this one’s for the ladies” sad sack track and is an awful way to start the second half of the collection. Given that the track listing (and programming) of a NOW album involved a certain amount of brinkmanship, you have to wonder what favours were done by ‘Vanilli’s’ people to get them such a prominent spot on the album with a wholly inappropriate song. Thank god for the Rebel MC, returning with Street Tuff. A much bigger hit than Just keep Rockin’, I’m not sure it’s as good though, sounding much more chart friendly and commercial than the earlier track. Still good fun though.

    Bobby Brown’s dominance of 1989 continued with On Our Own, one of the oldest tracks on show, hailing from July. It sounds like exactly what it is, an old, unreleased track, dusted off and given a new verse about the Ghostbusters thanks to its inclusion in that summers’ Ghostbusters II (along with Brown himself, who pocketed a cool half mill for opening a door and asking Dan Aykroyd for an autograph). One of his better tunes, it has dated horribly and anyone not around in 89 will wonder what all the fuss about Brown was all about. Technotronic’s Pump Up The Jam on the other hand is one of those tracks that you know would be a hit pretty much whenever it was released in the past 25 years. While not the most nutritious of jams, it’s pop reduced to its bare bones, being almost an alchemic as 2 Unlimited’s No Limits, while never being quite as irritating.

    The second bonus track on the CD is L’il Louis’ truly odd French Kiss. What begins as a bassy, sexy, stripped down dance track descends into pure filth around the 90 second mark with the arrival of a lady who certainly sounds as if she is enjoying herself. I still vividly recall first hearing this track in the family car one Sunday evening on the top 40 chart show. I’m not sure who was more embarrassed me or my mum; dad took it in his stride, declared it “a load of crap” and calmly switched to radio 2 with little fuss, returning to the charts a few minutes later. I’ve no idea how many times it was played on Radio 1 but it can’t have been many. To hear it on a NOW album is a truly disturbing experience (especially on a packed commuter train, as I did this morning, wondering if anyone else can hear it).

    A rather obvious, but not rude illustration of French Kiss
    A rather obvious, but not rude illustration of French Kiss

    Sanity is restored, to an extent, with Adeva’s I Thank You, which is a huge disappointment following on from her barnstorming Respect from NOW 14. D-Mob’s only just-about-listenable track, Come On And Get My Love is up next, made palatable by the astonishing voice of a then just 20 year old Cathy Dennis, but the voice sounds at least ten years older than that. Briefly a star in her own right, Dennis is now best known as a writer of other people’s massive hits, including Kylie’s legendary Can’t Get You Out Of My Head. Come On And Get My Love would be nothing without her contribution, which says a lot about her talent. Two cool, late night tunes finish off side three, with De La Soul’s lovely Eye Know, and Inner City’s Watcha Gonna Do With My Lovin’, a brief return to form for them before they slid into obscurity.

    The final side of NOW 16 is possibly the best example of everything that was wrong with pop, circa 1989. The last side was often used a dumping ground for the cast offs and filler tracks, and on NOW 16 it’s no different. Two tracks stand out: Shakespeare’s Sister’s wonderful You’re History was a brilliant breath of fresh air on its original release. Now surpassed by the massive success of Stay a few years later, it shouldn’t be forgotten how exciting this sounded. To think this was from someone who was in Bananarama, and who was this crazy falsetto-bawling woman in the background?  It’s got the now-familiar Sister’s oddness sprinkled all over it and I still love it. The other stand out is Neneh Cherry’s Kisses On The Wind, which severely underperformed on its original release, reaching just number 20. I find this truly odd, as it’s on a par with her previous singles. A sexy, hot summer tune it seems a tad out of place on this winter release, but its quality cannot be denied.

    So what of the rest of side four? Well, there’s a double dose of SAW, with Big Fun’s Can’t Shake the Feeling, which no one remembers, and an unholy alliance with Cliff which resulted in the god-awful I Just Don’t Have The Heart, in which The English Elvis (pfft) continues a loveless relationship and strings the ‘partner’ along because he hasn’t got the balls to tell them he doesn’t love them anymore, if ever. The bastard.  Former SAW poster boys, Brother Beyond attempted a comeback without the axis of evil, with Drive On, which reached the dizzy heights of number 39 (and was the final CD only track, at least with this one you can understand why it was only included on the CD). Jimmy Somerville’s Comment Te Dire Adieu (a tentative first solo single, duetting with June Miles-Kingston) just sounds odd. Singing in French is perfectly fine if you’re French. When you’re a wee Scottish guy who looks like a potato it’s a tad off-putting.

    Bonjour
    Bonjour

    The final few tracks pick up the quality a bit, even if they are now all but forgotten. There have been worse cover versions in the NOW series so far, but Oh Well by…err… Oh Well is certainly among the strangest. Who thought a cover of a bluesy Fleetwood Mac weirdy-beardy track from 1969, given a dance beat, would be a good idea? Well, a German producer did, roping in some UK musicians to assist him. To be fair, the track has been covered several times, by the likes of Joe Jackson, Tom Petty and Steve Marriott, but never like this. Euro-dance-tastic, but not camp, it’s a truly once in a lifetime experience, as proved by the failure to follow it up with a similar sounding version of Radar Love. It’s got a certain charm to it but smells of the end of the end of the 80s.

    Redhead Kingpin (and the FBI)’s Do the Right Thing seems to be looking forward, rather than back, and sits in a strange middle ground between De La Soul and Public Enemy. Not featuring in the Spike Lee film of the same name (from no doubt where the title came from) it WAS featured in the film People Under The Stairs! It was their only UK hit but still has a certain something that conjures up a late 80s vibe.  Unlike Fresh 4 featuring Lizz E (!), whose dreadful cover version of Wishing on a Star finishes off the album and is possibly the worst closing song of the series. Whilst it features that weird, ubiquitous hollow waste bin drum sound which seemed to feature on every other dance track for a couple of years, this also features an awful, out of tune vocal performance and layer upon layer of noises. There’s no melody, just odd trumpet noises, dolphin (or bird) noises, whistles; anything they could slap over it to cover up the singing, which is also passed through about 6 echo chambers at the same time. And I haven’t even mentioned the dreadful Cockney rap that appears out of nowhere towards the end. An absolute, sorry mess.

    And that was the end of the eighties.

    Just a week before NOW 16 hit the shops, The Stone Roses and Happy Mondays both appeared on the same, epoch-making, earth-shattering edition of Top Of The Pops. At least it was for my generation. The odd alternative act may have snuck into the charts before, but since new wave died out in the early 80s, the charts were definitely pop’s domain. Soul II Soul and Inner City had breathed fresh new life into British dance music, and De La Soul and Public Enemy was doing it across the pond. I think it’s telling that the TV ad focusses on the dance tracks rather than the pop stars.

    The mainstream of 1989 was in a sorry state, leaving NOW in a state itself, so much so that the revived Hits series (now rebranded as Monster Hits) had nicked all the number ones from the second half of the year, including Black Box’s Ride on Time and Lisa Stansfield’s All Around the World. They even managed to snaffle a Madonna track (Cherish) for inclusion. NOW 16, by comparison, looked out of date. Y’know, for kids.

    1990 was around the corner, bringing with it a fresh approach from the compilers. It was time for NOW to follow the public and embrace the left field like never before. It may be another half decade before ‘indie’ dominated the charts, but for now, and for NOW, 1990 would signal a change of style, mood and attitude. Sadly, it would be doing it without me…

     

    NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL MUSIC 16

    Release date

    2nd December 1989

    Biggest tracks

    The Best – Tina Turner

    Sowing The Seeds Of Love – Tears for Fears

    Lost gems

    I’m Not The Man I Used To Be – Fine Young Cannibals

    The Sensual World – Kate Bush

    Forgotten tracks

    Kisses On The Wind – Neneh Cherry

    Waterfall ‘89 – Wendy and Lisa (youtube only has the original version unfortunately)

    Oh Well – Oh Well

    What’s missing?

    Personal Jesus – Depeche Mode

    You can’t really blame the compilers for failing to include Stone Roses’ Fools Gold or Happy Mondays’ Hallelujah as both were released far too late for consideration.

    Track listing

    Side one
    Sowing The Seeds Of Love Tears For Fears
    Leave A Light On Belinda Carlisle
    Drama! Erasure
    I Want That Man Deborah Harry
    If Only I Could Sydney Youngblood
    Name And Number Curiosity Killed The Cat
    You Keep It All In The Beautiful South
    Sweet Surrender Wet Wet Wet
    Side two
    Breakthru Queen
    The Best Tina Turner
    Born To Be Sold Transvision Vamp
    Waterfall ’89 Wendy & Lisa
    The Sensual World Kate Bush
    I’m Not The Man I Used To Be Fine Young Cannibals (CD Only)
    Sugarbox Then Jerico
    Room In Your Heart Living In A Box
    Right Here Waiting Richard Marx
    Side three
    Girl I’m Gonna Miss You Milli Vanilli
    Street Tuff The Rebel MC & Double Trouble
    On Our Own Bobby Brown
    Pump Up The Jam Technotronic featuring Felly
    French Kiss Lil Louis (CD Only)
    I Thank You Adeva
    C’mon And Get My Love D-Mob & Cathy Dennis
    Eye Know De La Soul
    Watcha Gonna Do With My Lovin’ Inner City
    Side four
    Can’t Shake The Feeling Big Fun
    I Just Don’t Have The Heart Cliff Richard
    Comment Te Dire Adieu Jimmy Somerville Featuring June Miles Kingston
    Drive On Brother Beyond (CD Only)
    You’re History Shakespeare’s Sister
    Oh Well Oh Well
    Kisses On The Wind Neneh Cherry
    Do The Right Thing Redhead Kingpin
    Wishing On A Star Fresh Four ft Lizz E
  • Now That’s What I Call Music 6 – Re-election day

    Now That’s What I Call Music 6 – Re-election day

    now 6Christmas 1985 would see NOW reclaim its crown, in some style. Not only did NOW 6 indicate a return to form, but they also had the trump card of the Now Christmas Album. I’ll discuss the Christmas album (and its various incarnations) elsewhere, but it was a cunning one-two, releasing both within a fortnight of each other, that Hits just didn’t see coming. Released the same day as Hits 3, NOW 6 won out. It had a stronger line-up, better design, and the now all-important brand loyalty. What better way is there is to make people feel all warm and fuzzy about your brand than selling them a lovely, festive collection of classic Christmas hits?

    Despite being released earlier, The Christmas Album didn’t hit the top until the week before Christmas, being kept off by NOW 6, but also by another pretender to the throne: Telstar’s Greatest Hits of 1985. Telstar had been set up a few years previously, and specialised in compilation albums, usually accompanied by a heavy TV marketing campaign. The Greatest Hits of… series would continue into the 90s, but were never a serious threat to NOW as with only one release a year, most of the tracks would have already featured on either of the competing series’ offerings, and those that were exclusive to the album would rarely warrant an additional purchase. 1985’s release did feature Paul Hardcastle’s 19, a rare number one which neither NOW or Hits had included; however it also featured several songs from 1984 including Everything She Wants, Ghostbusters and Do They Know It’s Christmas. It managed a solitary week at number one before the big boys moved back in, NOW 6 and NOW The Christmas Album racking up 6 consecutive weeks between them.

    Speaking of number 1’s, NOW 6 manages to include four, the most since NOW 2, whereas Hits 3 managed only two, one of which, Frankie, had already appeared on NOW 5. (The other was Jennifer Rush’s The Power of Love. Hits 3 also featured Huey Lewis and The News’ The Power of Love, but not Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s The Power of Love. 1985 was a confusing year for pop fans.)  Things like that don’t go unnoticed. At least not by people like me.

    With the pig now sent to the slaughterhouse, a new team brought a more sophisticated look to the album. For this, and the next 10 releases, NOW’s look and feel would be more commonly seen on contemporary cigarette ads than the brash, strutting, look of the Hits series. The NOW! Logo would find itself in various strange locations and scenarios, but never appear out of place. Here it appears as a label inside a leather jacket (this may not be immediately apparent, but the TV ad makes it explicit). It’s a nice idea, and very understated compared to its predecessors. No more Max Headroom-a-like, eye-straining, gut-wrenching, lasers and stripes and whatnot. Simple, clean, efficient. Much like the content, which, after an astonishingly good start, stumbles a bit, before regaining its composure to throw up a few pleasant surprises. As the tagline on the back exclaims: Feel the quality.

    You really can’t argue with side one, at least until the final two tracks. Kicking off with Queen’s One Vision, through Nik Kershaw’s first flop single (but also probably his best), the Maria McKee-penned A Good Heart, the absolutely stunning There Must be An Angel (for me, the best song on a NOW album so far) and Simple Minds perennial Alive and Kicking, it’s about as good a start as a NOW Album has ever had. The final two tracks hint at the mood change to come (Empty Rooms and Lavender both being examples of the overwrought balladry far too popular with rock acts of the time; too well-made to be labelled as ‘soft rock’ they don’t particularly warrant multiple listens unless you’ve got a bottle of whiskey and some paracetamol to hand). The Bryan Adams and Tina Turner collaboration which straddles the gap between the good and the dreary, manages to be both at the same time, featuring a cracking opening riff which dissolves into a deathly dull, well, Bryan Adams song, which just happens to have Tina Turner on it. She pops up again on side two, singing about her thunderdomes.

    Dreariness continues on side two where Phil Collins, Cliff Richard and Elton John battle it out for the prize of most insipid ballad ever on a NOW album, while Kate Bush valiantly delivers Running Up That Hill amid the gloom. Level 42 seems a welcome respite in the midst of this, and Something About You stands up pretty well.

    Side three is a very odd assortment. Whilst it features two number ones (If I Was, and UB40, in collaboration with Chrissie Hynde on I Got You Babe), it’s also possibly, the worst charting side of tracks so far. Of the rest, only one made the top ten. The fact that that one track is Arcadia’s none-more-80s Election Day probably has more to with the fact that they were a side project for Duran Duran than for the fact that it’s a good song. It’s not. It’s stupid, nonsensical, pretentious claptrap which, to make matters worse, features an uncredited cameo from Grace Jones. But, dammit, it’s got something I can’t put my finger on.

    Eighties, by day we run, by night we dance!
    Eighties; by day we run, by night we dance!

    Of the remaining 5 tracks, Lost Weekend was the only one to make the top 20; Uncle Sam and Cities in Dust both stalled at 21, The Communards rather lovely, and under-valued, You Are My World only hit 30 (though their time would come soon enough), and the Fine Young Cannibals make history as Blue is he first single to feature on a NOW Album not to make the top 40. The anti-Tory declamation is no Ghost Town, but it’s a pretty good tune, to be fair, and puzzling that it did so poorly after the top ten success of Johnny Come Home (this may be explained by it appearing, in a different version, on the b-side of that single). The inclusion of Lloyd Cole and a rare appearance for Siouxsie suggests the compilers were still keen to get some exposure for less mainstream acts, but it always feels more like tokenism than because the artists warrant inclusion on the basis on chart performance.

    Incidentally, going back to UB40, as on NOW 1, they make two appearances, with the dreary, repetitive Don’t Break My Heart fitting in right at home on side two. And is just me, or does Ali Campbell sound just like Jim Davidson doing his horrible Chalky voice on I Got You Babe?

    Even just using a picture of Jim Davidson for witty illustrative purposes made me sick a little in my mouth, so here's a kitten instead.
    Even just using a picture of Jim Davidson for witty illustrative purposes made me sick a little in my mouth, so here’s a kitten instead.

    The ghettoised dance side finds itself closing out the album this time, instead of the more usual maudlin closing numbers, and things start off with Paul Hardcastle’s ridiculous For the Money. This was one of the tunes that I had no recollection of until I heard it again, and suddenly it all came flooding back. A truly ‘of its day’ affair, it combines sub-Herbie Hancock synth twiddling with Laurence Olivier talking about ‘money being the root of all evil’, while Bob Hoskins tries to convince another cock-er-nee geezah (Hardcastle himself!) to pull a blag with him, with the persuasive line “Just fink abaht the moneee!” and “it’s the life o’ luxury!” over and over and over again. It’s a bit like an 80s version of Sexy Beast, with Hoskins in the Ben Kingsley role, but slightly less frightening, particularly with his clichéd “just don’t mess it up or the only place you’ll be gahn is dahn the Scrubs!”. All this, plus two badly accented bit part actors pretending to be 1920’s Chicago gangsters (one of whom turned out to be Hollywood bit part actor Ed O’Ross; he dies in nearly every 80s action movie), and some swooning backing singers making the whole thing sound more like one of the song parodies from Alexei Sayle’s Stuff.  Though it’s worth it for the sound of Lord Larry having his voice scratched.

    Jan Hammer’s Miami Vice Theme is the perfect antidote to all that nonsense, being a brilliant example of how electronic music (still sniffed at in most quarters even in 1985) can be evocative, exciting and somehow timeless too. Three things that most certainly DON’T apply to Maria Vidal’s Body Rock, a shameless rip-off of Madonna’s Borderline (though also oddly sounding like Open Your Heart, six months before its release), or Baltimora’s horrible Tarzan Boy.

    The long-forgotten Mai Tai make a return with another nice, fun, dance track. Heart and Soul is another of those songs that you know you’ve heard countless times before but can never remember its title or who it’s by.  It seems odd they only had the two hits (this and History, which featured on NOW 5), as they were certainly no worse than some comparable acts who achieved more success at the time. Like Cameo. Now I like Word Up as much as the next person, but there’s something extremely icky about Single Life. From the opening, which is EXACTLY the same as Word Up, this tells the story of some guy, who you know has a penthouse apartment with black chrome shelves, metal chairs and a Playboy bunny quilt cover. Hearing the giant codpiece singing about the single life just creeps me out, and like the aural equivalent of rohypnol, it’s liable to send you to sleep and when you wake up you’ll feel utterly violated.

    tom-savini
    Word up

    This brings us disgustingly onto Mated, a second duet betweenJaki Graham and David Grant. Even as a ten-year old, this title seemed wrong, just a bit too animalistic for what sounds like a sickly, sweet love song about finding your soul-mate. It’s not my cup of tea at all, and hearing them croon “We are mated” at each other just turns my stomach. I’d argue it’s one of the least romantic romantic songs ever, and a disappointing end to the album.

    nowmastermindAn interesting design choice was taken on the inside this time, in a rare case of NOW taking a nod from Hits. On the gatefold, the blurbs are now accompanied by album covers rather than the standard star photos, at least in most cases. Level 42 miss out, presumably, because the artwork for World Machine wasn’t ready, though the album is mentioned, but poor old Mai tai’s album had been out since June, and since it only got to number 91 they probably could have done with having it plugged better than it is here!

    The rear cover also, teasingly, says “You’ve heard the record, now buy the book”… The book? Now That’s What I Call Music Mastermind, a quiz book compiled by Ashley Abram himself, was available at the time for “a steal at £2.99”. A scurry round the interwebs finds there only appears to be two copies left in existence, both going for over £60! I did find a picture of the cover though, which in a rare case of branding inconsistency, still features the pig. It also looks incredibly cheap compared to the albums.

    So, NOW was back on top. For the next couple of years, an uneasy cold war between the two compilation behemoths would see them only releasing one album each during the year (Hits at Easter, NOW in the summer) with both going head-to-head at Christmas. It was their biggest, most lucrative, time of the year so neither was willing to yield that, and there was always the possibility that a strong line-up could see Hits go back on top. In a years’ time they would get the chance, but until then NOW had seven months to prepare its next chart attack.

     

    NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL MUSIC 6

    Release date

    25th November 1985

    Biggest tracks

    One Vision – Queen

    Alive and Kicking – Simple Minds

    There Must be An Angel (Playing with my Heart) – Eurythmics

    Lost gems

    When a Heart Beats – Nik Kershaw

    You Are My World – The Communards

    Forgotten tracks

    Blue – Fine Young Cannibals

    She’s So Beautiful – Cliff Richard

    Just For Money – Paul Hardcastle

    Single Life – Cameo

    What’s missing

    Money for Nothing  – Dire Straits

    White Wedding – Billy Idol

    Dancing in the Street – David Bowie and Mick Jagger

    (A case could also be made for West End Girls, by The Pet Shop Boys, as it does appear on the accompanying video, but to be fair to the compilers, it only charted at number the week that NOW 6 was released, and, as a first single, there was no indication of what a huge hit it would be, except for the fact that it was brilliant.)

    Track listing

    Side One
    One Vision Queen
    When A Heart Beats Nik Kershaw
    A Good Heart Feargal Sharkey
    There Must Be An Angel (Playing With My Heart) Eurythmics
    Alive And Kicking Simple Minds
    It’s Only Love (Live) Tina Turner With Bryan Adams
    Empty Rooms Gary Moore
    Lavender Marillion
    Side Two
    Nikita Elton John
    Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God) Kate Bush
    Something About You Level 42
    We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome) Tina Turner
    Don’t Break My Heart UB40
    Separate Lives Phil Collins & Marilyn Martin
    She’s So Beautiful Cliff Richard
    Side Three
    Election Day Arcadia
    I Got You Babe UB40 Featuring Chrissie Hynde
    Blue Fine Young Cannibals
    If I Was Midge Ure
    Cities In Dust Siouxsie & The Banshees
    Uncle Sam Madness
    Lost Weekend Lloyd Cole & The Commotions
    You Are My World The Communards
    Side Four
    Just For Money Paul Hardcastle
    Miami Vice Theme Jan Hammer
    Body Rock Maria Vidal
    Tarzan Boy (Original Version) Baltimora
    Body And Soul Mai Tai
    Single Life Cameo
    Mated David Grant & Jaki Graham

     

    Video version

    The video version contained five tracks not featured on the main album (marked with *)

    Queen – One Vision
    Fergal Sharkey – A Good Heart
    Kate Bush – Running Up that Hill (A Deal With God)
    UB40 featuring Chrissie Hynde – I Got You Babe
    Madness – Uncle Sam
    Marillion – Lavender
    Bryan Adams & Tina Turner – It’s Only Love
    Pet Shop Boys – West End Girls*
    Thompson Twins – King for a Day*
    Simple Minds – Alive and Kicking
    Depeche Mode – It’s Called A Heart*
    David Grant And Jaki Graham – Mated
    Gary Moore – Empty Rooms
    The Cult – Revolution*
    Baltimora – Tarzan Boy
    Ian Dury – Profoundly In Love With Pandora*
    Cliff Richard – She’s So Beautiful
    UB40 – Don’t Break My Heart
    Arcadia – Election Day

     

  • Now That’s What I Call Music 4 – Hello, is it twee you’re looking for?

    Now That’s What I Call Music 4 – Hello, is it twee you’re looking for?

    now 4Whilst NOW 3 may have given us the wonderful NOW! balls logo, it also gave us another, less welcome taste of 80s design: wacky, wavy neon lines. So 80s, so Max Headroom, so The Roxy, so ‘bank advert trying to ensnare teenagers paper round money when they should be spending it on compilations of top chart hits’. That rather ghastly theme continues on the cover design of NOW 4, and no doubt onto the bed linen of many teenagers who bought the thing. NOW 4 adopts a slightly less obvious, but more vomit inducing, green background, over its predecessors’ standard black background. Sadly, vomit-inducing is the order of the day for 1984’s NOW! swansong, released just in time for the Christmas, last minute panic present buying market.

    From Boy George’s local chicken shop promotional outfit on the cover and the first stirrings of Arthur Baker’s utterly dreadful “Special Dance Mix” of Paul ‘Macca’ McCartney’s No More Lovely Nights, you get the distinct feeling this is not going to be a particularly comfortable ride. And to make matters worse, the only number one on offer here is Lionel Ritchie’s plasticine head singing the turgid Hello. Incidentally, Lionel, no, it most certainly not you that we were looking for.

    Most of the good stuff on show here are songs that are usually remembered for their 80s kitsch value, rather than an inherent ‘greatness’. A good example of this is displayed early on side one with the appearances of Together in Electric Dreams and Never Ending Story, two theme songs from mildly successful films (even if Electric Dreams is now long forgotten, that whole boy-meets-computer rom-com sub-genre never did catch on). To be fair, Electric Dreams is a much better song than Limahl’s last hit, and deserves more credit. Both Phil Oakley and Giorgio Morodor are too talented to be dismissed, it’s just unfortunate that so much of their art is based around 80s synthesisers, an area which doesn’t travel well.

    Staying with the synthesisers, Oakey’s former cohorts Heaven 17 (born from an early incarnation of Human League) also appear with the now forgotten Sunset Now. The Thompson Twins make their ubiquitous appearance with Doctor, Doctor, a song released a whopping ten months before NOW 4, and before the band’s track that had appeared on NOW 3. The Twins current release, Sister of Mercy, appears to have been snagged by the incoming Hits Album, so NOW! must have figured an old Thompson Twins track was better than none at all (tellingly, a glimpse of the video appears in the TV advert, but the song doesn’t).

    thompson-twins

    This raises the question of what impact The Hits Album was going to have on NOW!, particularly this edition. I’ll cover Hits in more detail in another post, but in short the creation of the rival series would see the end of NOW! being able to feature artists from the CBS and WEA labels, two of the biggest labels in the world, and home to such legends as Michael Jackson, Madonna, Prince, Wham and soon George Michael. It seems almost a massive two fingers to Hits that Jacko appears here, his only NOW! showing, with a track recorded over a decade earlier. Part of a series of ‘lost tracks’ found in a dusty vault at his old label, Motown, some bright spark decided to dust them off, remix them to sound more 80s and release the album in the wake of the phenomenal success of Jacko’s Thriller album. The album did OK, but hardly matched its big brother, probably as the public started to smell a rat that this wasn’t an official release. The single Farewell My Summer Love is a lyrically suspect tale of meeting a girl who’s on summer holiday and maybe meeting her again next year when school is through, or some such nonsense. Compared to Thriller or Billie Jean, this is pretty ropey stuff, but somehow scraped into the top 10. NOW! were obviously not going to turn down the opportunity to have the world’s biggest artist appear, no matter how crap the material, as it was the only chance they were going to get.

    Still, despite losing a couple of their more reliable fillers, NOW! still had a couple of aces up its sleeve: EMI still had Duran Duran, the biggest band in the world, who were two singles away from splitting up, and Virgin had the unstoppable Culture Club, here showcasing the song that Boy George described as a ‘stupid’ and that probably killed his career. Oops. Despite reaching number 2, The War Song would be Culture Club’s last big hit until their late 90s reunion. (And to add insult to injury, it was kept off the top by Stevie Wonder’s I Just Called To Say I Love You and seems to have been the inspiration for the ITV Schools music which would appear later in the decade.)

    Speaking of stupid songs, there’s a fair few on show here: there’s Elton John’s deeply annoying Passengers, the Eurythmics over-produced, and near unlistenable mess Sexcrime (1984) and Julian Lennon’s irritating Too late for Goodbyes, yet another example of the trend for horrible white boy reggae pop fusion which blighted the charts for far too long during the decade. Culture Club and maybe (maybe!) The Police were the only acts who ever managed to pull it off successfully.

    At least side three looks like it might rock things up a bit. Queen appear for the third album in succession, and are backed up by The Quo, Big Country and the first appearance from a little Irish band who were pulling up trees in America, U2. It would not be their last. Yes, it might all be a bit stonewashed jeans and white t-shirt (or leather vest in U2’s case) but the guitar-fest is a bit of respite from the endless bleeps and bloops of the first two sides. It’s short-lived.

    808
    “Without you I’m nothing”, said the Now albums of the 80s

    Fergal Sharkey’s silly Listen to Your Father bridges the gap between axe-wielding and a return to the 808s, with OMD’s ludicrous Tesla Girls. But before the album disappears into the vacuum of nothingness that is Nik Kershaw’s dreary Human Racing there is a treat, supplied by the lovely Kim Wilde. Not a massive hit, The Second Time is a bit of a corker, and not a little bit rude. Or rather, suggestive. It’s pretty bloody obvious what Ms Wilde is singing about, and most blokes at the time would find it hard to resist a line like “Look in the mirrors and see the heat of something new, Why don’t we do it, just do it once again”. Oh my. I think it’s better than Kids in America.

    The first track on Side Four is interesting for two reasons. Firstly, Ray Parker Jr’s Ghostbusters not only appears here, but was also on The Hits Album. Arista, the label concerned (and also home to The Thompson Twins), were not tied to any of the major’s responsible for the compilation albums, so were technically free to license their tracks to whomever they saw fit. The fact that Ghostbusters appears on both would suggest a desire from both camps to have one of the biggest hits of the year on their records (though surprisingly, it never made number one, stuck for three weeks behind that immovable object that was the bloody Stevie Wonder song. The second notable fact is that the track is incorrectly credited. The title is listed as Ghostbusters (Searchin’ For the Spirit). Oh, thinks I, maybe that is in fact the full title of the track. Bracketed suffixes are often left off song titles for space, or simply because they are pretentious toss and are best forgotten. In this case however neither is true; Searchin’ for the Spirit is in fact the subtitle given to an extended version of the track which featured on an alternative single release (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWMEncznDvI). But not here. This is your common or garden single and radio version, identical, bar fading out a few seconds later, to the version on The Hits Album. Was this a deliberate attempt to deceive purchasers into thinking the version on NOW 4 was a different one to that on The Hits Album? Was the incorrect version used on the album, and the extended version was meant to be included? Or was it just a mix up over the title? We will probably never know. And you probably don’t really care.

    Side Four then sort of drifts away. Jump remains a fun, feel-good song, we get the first of many appearances for the slap bass of Level 42, Rockwell’s attempt to be both Ray Parker Jr and Michael Jackson at the same time on Somebody’s Watching Me, and Malcolm McClaren’s Madam Butterfly is a great musical experiment (of a kind which would become ubiquitous in the charts towards the end of the century) once he stops wittering on over the first minute. The final track by Eugene Wilde is a now forgotten piece of fluff of the “ooh baby, let’s go have sex” variety, the inspiration here being Sexual Healing, but looking forward to people like R Kelly and Keith Sweat. Take away the 80s production and this could have been released at anytime in the past 30 years.

    It’s a disappointingly bland finish to an album which has an air of going through the motions about it. With Hits already in the shops consumers weighed up the pros and cons, and went with Hits. NOW 4 is the only album in the series not to reach number 1, and it’s easy to see why. There’s one serious problem with NOW 4, and that’s, ironically, a lack of hits. Take away Ghostbusters, Jump and Hello, and this is a very dull, uninspiring collection. Brian Glover does his best in the advert but you suspect even he thinks this is all a bit thin.

    Historically, NOW 4 is important for one reason (and without it, it would probably have been forgotten altogether) being the first of the series to be released on CD. It wasn’t a conventional CD release however, containing just 15 tracks, and being a mix of tracks from the three albums released in 1984. (The cassette version makes reference to The Best of Now 1984 Compact Disc, but the record makes no reference to the CD at all.) The experiment must have been far from a success as it wasn’t attempted again until Now 8, two years later. The CD itself is considered a rare collector’s item now. At the time of writing one copy is on eBay for over £300, with 19 bids,  and rising…

    Now that NOW! wasn’t the only game in town, and its compilation crown had been toppled, it seemed a serious re-think was in order, and it be a long nine months before NOW! would return.

    NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL MUSIC 4

    Release date

    26th November 1984

    Biggest tracks

    Hello – Lionel Ritchie

    Ghostbusters – Ray Parker Jr

    Jump – The Pointer Sisters

    Lost gems

    The Second Time – Kim Wilde (a truly bizarre video in which Ms Wilde battles an exploding hotel room, a multi-coloured Mummy, and some of the worst 80s fashion ever seen in a music video)

    Sunset Now – Heaven 17

    The stinker

    No More Lonely Nights (Special Dance Mix) – Paul McCartney

    Forgotten tracks

    Warning Sign – Nick Heyward

    Gotta Get You Home Tonight – Eugene Wilde

    What’s missing

    Wild Boys – Duran Duran

    (possibly not ready for inclusion, the track was released two weeks before NOW 4, but seems in retrospect to be a massive omission)

    Blue Jean  – David Bowie

    Track listing

    Side One
    No More Lonely Nights  (Special Dance Mix) Paul McCartney
    Together In Electric Dreams Philip Oakey & Giorgio Moroder
    Why? Bronski Beat
    The Never Ending Story Limahl
    Warning Sign Nick Heyward
    Missing You John Waite
    Farewell My Summer Love Michael Jackson
    Hello Lionel Richie
    Side Two
    The War Song Culture Club
    Passengers Elton John
    Too Late For Goodbyes Julian Lennon
    Shout To The Top The Style Council
    Doctor Doctor The Thompson Twins
    Sunset Now Heaven 17
    Respect Yourself The Kane Gang
    Private Dancer (Single Edit) Tina Turner
    Side Three
    It’s A Hard Life Queen
    The Wanderer Status Quo
    East Of Eden Big Country
    Pride (In The Name Of Love) U2
    Listen To Your Father Feargal Sharkey
    Tesla Girls Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark
    The Second Time Kim Wilde
    Human Racing Nik Kershaw
    Side Four
    Ghostbusters Ray Parker Jr
    If It Happens Again UB40
    Jump (For My Love) The Pointer Sister
    Hot Water Level 42
    Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four) Eurythmics
    Somebody’s Watching Me Rockwell
    Madam Butterfly (Un Bel Di Vedremo) Malcolm McLaren
    Gotta Get You Home Tonight Eugene Wilde

     CD Tracklisting

    now 4 cd

    Duran Duran – The Reflex
    Ray Parker Jr – Ghostbusters (Searchin for the Spirit)
    Culture Club – The War Song
    John Waite – Missing You
    O.M.D. – Locomotion
    UB40 – If It Happens Again
    Tina Turner – What’s Love Got to Do with It
    Bronski Beat – Why?
    The Style Council – Shout to the Top!
    Phil Colins – Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now)
    Giorgio Moroder & Philip Oakey – Together in Electric Dreams
    Julian Lennon – Too Late for Goodbyes
    Status Quo – The Wanderer
    Thompson Twins – Doctor! Doctor!
    Queen – Radio Ga Ga

     

    Video edition

    now 4 video bigThe video version this time around did feature mainly tracks from the accompanying album. Only four tracks were not on NOW 4 (indicated with a *).

    Meatloaf’s Modern Girl and The Thompson Twins’ Sister of Mercy did feature on The Hits Album, further muddying the waters over the various licensing deals that were needed to put these albums together.

     

    Queen – It’s a Hard Life
    Tina Turner – Private Dancer
    Giorgio Moroder & Phil Oakey – Together in Electric Dreams
    UB40 – If It Happens Again
    Limahl – Never Ending Story
    Culture Club – The War Song
    Julian Lennon – Too Late for Goodbyes
    Ray Parker Jnr. – Ghostbusters
    Thompson Twins – Sister of Mercy*
    John Waite – Missing You
    Nik Kershaw – Human Racing
    Meat Loaf – Modern Girl*
    Kim Wilde – The Second Time
    Malcolm McLaren – Madam Butterfly
    Nick Heyward – Warning Sign
    OMD – Tesla Girls
    Iron Maiden – Aces High*
    Fergal Sharkey – Listen to Your Father
    Heaven 17 – Sunset Now
    Depeche Mode – Blasphemous Rumours*
  • Now! That’s What I Call Music 3 – Can U Pig It?

    Now! That’s What I Call Music 3 – Can U Pig It?

     

    now 3

    NOW! continued its first full year in the summer of 1984, with the release of NOW 3. And it’s a porker! It’s the pig one! Compilations don’t get much pigger than this! It’s so big I may need a ham with this review.

    Sorry, I’ll stop being silly now.

    It’s just that the pig made his triumphant debut as a cover star, advert leading man (voiced, of course, by Brian Glover) and general ‘face’ of NOW! As we’ve already seen, the pig has an important role to play in the glorious history of NOW!, but it’s still a bit… odd. There’s no obvious connection between a walking bacon sandwich and pop music. Maybe someone at the design agency thought it was a nice way to honour the origins of the name (see here). Maybe someone over a lunchtime beer thought it was hilarious to put sunglasses on a pig. Google “pig sunglasses” and you’ll see a great number of the world’s population think it still is. For whatever reason, the pig was here, and for a while, he would remain. Though he would remain in the subconcious of a great many pop fans for a lot longer.

    Mark Goodier: The Yorkshire Years
    Mark Goodier: The Yorkshire Years

    Definitely not odd is the first appearance of the ‘classic’ NOW! logo. I say classic in inverted commas deliberately because it’s really only classic for anyone who remembers the albums from 3 to 17  in the series. To be fair, 15 albums using the same logo not only shows tremendous faith in the brand, but also the ingenuity of the various designers who would work on the series.

    After the legendary balls logo (and an almost suicidal rebrand at NOW 18, which we’ll come to in due course) NOW! has relied on the other classic design of bloody big blocky text in some abstract landscape. It works, otherwise they wouldn’t have continued with it for over 20 years. But back in the 80s, bright colours and lightning bolts were where it was at.

    Red, blue, green balls, Impact font (a design classic, if one that’s sadly overused) and a yellow lightning bolt. For my generation it’s as iconic as the Coke ribbon, the Nike swoosh or the Apple…er…apple. Within the design, ‘NOW’ remains the focus, with ‘Music’ secondary but still important. I think it’s clear, and the spines of the albums back this up, that at this point, the marketers were happy for us to approximate the unwieldy full title to the more compact ‘Now Music’. The public, of course, would soon have their own ideas in due course.

    Released at the end of July, just as the school summer holidays kicked off, natch, NOW 3 would have an extra month of chart hits to plunder over its sadly disappointing predecessor. Although only containing 3 number ones, it’s a significantly stronger line-up, and don’t forget, had Two Tribes not dominated the top spot for an astonishing nine weeks (!), there could have been a few more chart toppers to choose from (though as many of the number two’s from the period later turned up on the first Hits Album later in the year, maybe the rival record companies were a bit more reluctant to license their hits to the NOW! boys, despite appearances here for some of those same labels’ hottest artists like Wham and Howard Jones).

    Even given that, the track listing, at least for the first half is top drawer, and chock-a-block with winners, kicking off with the biggest players in town at the time, Duran Duran. Amazingly, in hindsight, The Reflex was only the Durans 2nd number one, and it would be their last too. Sales were no doubt helped by the fact the single version was massively re-worked from the version on their album, Seven and the Ragged Tiger, from which this was the third single. It is brilliant though. Also benefitting from new versions was Frankie Goes to Hollywood, with Two Tribes being released in about 4,675 different formats and remixes, which no doubt helped it squat in the top spot for so long (its predecessor, Relax, would later join it by returning up the charts to number two). The third number one, and along with the Durans and Frankie, vying for the title of chart kings at the time, was Wham’s Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go, kicking off Side Four. When you factor in seminal tracks from Queen, Bananarama, Nik Kershaw and Tina Turner, this is getting on for one of the strongest line-ups in the series. And Ashley Abram does a brilliant job compiling it too, keeping the mood up for the first half of each side, before slowly mellowing out towards the end. Look at the track listing at the end and you’ll see, only a master of his craft could get you seamlessly from The Reflex to Against All Odds before you’ve even noticed. This is textbook stuff, and this style would continue through the series.

    Calm yourselves, ladies
    Calm yourselves, ladies

    Added to this is the fact that there’s no attempt at a themed side this time out. Everything is in the mix, but perfectly pieced together: who would have thought Sister Sledge would sit so comfortably between the synth noodlings of Nik Kershaw and OMD, or that The Weather Girls would be so cosy next to (whisper it) Gary Glitter. Or that the frankly bizarre (in NOW! terms) Dr Mabuse by Propaganda would be included at all.

    Now, I have nothing against avant-garde German synth acts, but this is perhaps the strangest thing to ever appear on a NOW! album. Looked at from a modern perspective it makes little sense: the track had made the charts months before, so was not included in the anticipation of it being a breakout hit; it was not Propaganda’s biggest hit either, that honour falling to the much-more chart friendly Duel, which oddly didn’t make the cut for NOW 5 a year later .(If there was any justice it would have been a massive hit too, but their label, ZTT, were using their meagre promotional resources for the unexpected success of Frankie Goes to Hollywood.)  Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s great that more esoteric stuff like this did make it onto the albums, and this is probably the best example of a decent tune that didn’t make the grade chart-wise, but was still considered worthy of inclusion. This must have been a personal choice for someone…

    Also filed in the ‘Huh?’ category, and conveniently finishing off the final side, we find the aforementioned Mr Gadd, with the dreadful Dance Me Up, sounding like a poppier version of Public Image Limited (his only NOW! appearance beyond a sampled appearance on Doctorin’ the Tardis on NOW 12), some rather painful, Dutch white reggae courtesy of one hit wonders, The Art Company (real name, the slightly more unwieldy, VOF de Kunst, and yes I checked the spelling there). There’s a brief respite with one of Madness’ serious tracks (and therefore one of their least successful), their ode to London’s homeless, One Better Day, before finishing up with Japan lead man David Sylvian’s first solo single (in credit at least), Red Guitar. It’s a lovely, smoky, 80s jazz tune completely out of place with anything else on the album. And like Propaganda, it seems a slightly off-kilter inclusion.

    David Sylvian: niiiice
    David Sylvian: niiiice

    In this respect NOW 3 does a much better job of balancing the massive chart hits with the slightly more left-field choices. It’s also probably the first album in the series to truly know its target market: kids and teenagers. Every self-respecting pop fan is going to welcome Duran Duran, Wham and Nik Kershaw into their record collection. The cooler kids will be happy to proclaim that they’ve also loved the post-Kraftwerk Kraut-Synth (I just made that up, but I think I might stick a copyright label on it) and the jazz stylings of former New Romantics.

    Dad rock is kept to a bare minimum, the initial stirrings of rap get a look in, good and bad reggae pop up, and, interestingly, British music dominates. If there’s an over-riding feel it’s of Roland synths and those god-awful electronic drums. It is definitely a snapshot of a moment, but thankfully it was a pretty good moment. And the public agreed, keeping NOW 3 at number for a staggering 8 weeks, long after the summer holidays had given way autumn. This was a record that would never be topped by a NOW! album while they were still permitted on the regular chart (they would be turfed out to a ‘Compilation Top 20’ after NOW 13). They didn’t call it “The Pig One” for nothing…

    NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL MUSIC 3

    Release date

    23rd July 1984

    Biggest tracks

    The Reflex – Duran Duran

    Two Tribes – Frankie Goes to Hollywood

    Wake Me Up before You Go-Go – Wham

    It’s Raining Men – The Weather Girls

    Lost gems

    Dr Mabuse – Propaganda

    Red Guitar – David Sylvian

    The stinker

    Susanna – The Art Company

    Forgotten tracks

    Don’t Tell Me – Blancmange

    Love Wars – Womack & Womack

    Dance Me Up – Gary Glitter

    What’s missing

    The Lebanon – Human League

    Absolute  – Scritti Politti

    Track listing

    Side One
    The Reflex Duran Duran
    I Won’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me Nik Kershaw
    Thinking Of You Sister Sledge
    Locomotion Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark
    Dancing With Tears In My Eyes Ultravox
    Pearl In The Shell Howard Jones
    Don’t Tell Me Blancmange
    Against All Odds (Take A Look At Me Now) Phil Collins
    Side Two
    Two Tribes Frankie Goes To Hollywood
    White Lines (Don’t Do It) (Furious Five) Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five
    Nelson Mandela The Special AKA
    Love Wars Womack & Womack
    You’re The Best Thing The Style Council
    One Love Bob Marley & The Wailers
    Smalltown Boy Bronski Beat
    Side Three
    I Want To Break Free Queen
    Time After Time Cyndi Lauper
    Love Resurrection Alison Moyet
    Young At Heart The Bluebells
    Robert De Niro’s Waiting Bananarama
    Dr Mabuse Propaganda
    What’s Love Got To Do With It Tina Turner
    When You’re Young And In Love The Flying Pickets
    Side Four
    Wake Me Up Before You Go Go Wham
    You Take Me Up The Thompson Twins
    It’s Raining Men The Weather Girls
    Dance Me Up Gary Glitter
    Susanna The Art Company
    One Better Day Madness
    Red Guitar David Sylvian

     

    Video edition 

    now 3 video frontThe video version featured just 8 tracks from the accompanying album, and 12 additional tracks (marked with *) none of which were even top 10 hits.

    Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark – Locomotion
    Simple Minds – Up On the Catwalk*
    Thompson Twins – You Take Me Up
    Madness – One Better Day
    Farmers Boys – In the Country*
    Helen Terry – Love Lies Lost*
    Loose Ends – Emergency (Dial 999)*
    Working Week – Venceremos*
    Tina Turner – What’s Love Got to Do With It
    Phil Collins – Against All Odds (Take a Look At Me Now)
    Talk Talk – Dum Dum Girl*
    Kajagoogoo – Turn Your Back on Me*
    Gary Glitter – Dance Me Up
    The Mighty Wah – Come Back*
    I-Level – Our Song*
    Limahl – Too Much Trouble*
    The Flying Pickets – When You’re Young and In Love
    Thomas Dolby – I Scare Myself*
    Blue Nile – Tinseltown In The Rain*
    David Sylvian – Red Guitar

     

  • NOW! That’s What I Call Music – Total Eclipse of the Charts

    NOW! That’s What I Call Music – Total Eclipse of the Charts

     

    now

    And lo, it came to pass that on the 28th day of the 11th month of the year of our Lord Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Three, that Lord Richard of Branson did declare “Let there be pop!”, and the British music charts, and the record collections of the nations’ teenagers would never be the same again. From the first bass note of You Can’t Hurry Love, to the final “ooh” of Victims, NOW! was determined to be the definitive collection of the year’s biggest hits, and by jove, did it succeed.

    Glancing through the track listings of later albums in the series you often find yourself staring blank-faced at names that no longer mean anything to anyone. One hit wonders abound, and even some successful artists will elicit the question “what were we thinking?” rather than  “they were great, weren’t they?” Not here.

    Maybe 80s stars were more hard-wearing, maybe I’m being kind to the music I grew up with, but if a contemporary compilation can hit harder than this, I’ve not found it yet: Duran Duran, Madness, Culture Club, Phil Collins, Rod Stewart, Tina Turner, Human League, The Cure, UB40… You can argue the individual merits of the artists, or the song choices included here, but you can’t deny the sheer number of pop titans in attendance here. And that’s looking at it at a remove of 30 years. Imagine how this must have seemed at the time!

    And looking at the track listing (at the end of this post), it’s about as close to “all killer, no filler” as you are going to get. Even the less well-remember tracks would come flooding back with a brief burst of them on the radio.

    Most kids of my generation would record the charts off Radio 1 on a Sunday afternoon, or at least those tracks we liked. The appearance of NOW! almost made that redundant, because they were all here. All we had to do was wait until Christmas, and, if you dropped enough hints when the advert was on the telly, someone would buy it for you (or you could always use that Crimbo money burning a hole in your pocket, and get something tangible rather than blowing the lot on Sherbet Dib Dabs).

    Speaking of adverts:

    Thrilling stuff, I’m sure you’ll agree. Odd to hear Gary Crowley, a legendary alternative DJ, plugging an album of pop hits and telling people to head to Woollies to pick it up, but at the time Crowley was the youngest DJ in the country, ploughing his trade on Capital Radio in London. So he’s down with the kids, but regional? Well, no, he was also presenting a kids show on ITV (Fun Factory, not to be confused with Pat Sharpe’s Fun House), so he would have been a familiar voice.

    A more familiar voice, being as she was one of the hottest young stars on TV, and a successful recording artist in her own right, was Tracey Ullman, here promoting the album in a slightly more dynamic fashion:

    The difference in these two ads is astonishing. One is conservative, to the point; the other is fun, playful. Guess which route the advertising would take after this.

    The official NOW! YouTube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/nowmusic25?feature=watch) note that the Tracey Ullman advert was the first to be shown, and the Crowley ad was second. Far be it from me to suggest the official NOW! people are wrong, but this does seem slightly odd, for a couple of reasons. The first, as stated above, is that the Crowley ad is very conservative, as if the marketing team hadn’t quite found their feet yet. Being unsure how to flog the thing, they simply got a hot DJ to reel off a list of the artists on it, with the cover featuring prominently. The Ullman advert is a lot more confident, as if the suits realised “we can have fun with this”. it also features snippets of videos, which would have required additional clearance to use in the advert, which takes time, and then right at the end, there’s mention of a video collection too (featuring 18 of the 30 tracks). Would they really have left that out of the second advert if it was available?

    But like I said, I’m just speculating on this, and I’m sure the young whippersnapper running the show on YouTube knows their stuff.

    So, back to the album.

    The cover design is excellent; NOW! in huge letters has obviously come to be the main focus of the albums over the years, and this was clearly an early design decision. Filling the word with pics of the biggest stars on it helps as well. Don’t forget, in 1983, NOW! didn’t mean anything to anyone, so a hook was needed to get the punters to part with their cash. And that hook, unsurprisingly, was the stars. Notice how the focus is on the artists rather than the songs. I believe this was a deliberate choice, to steer NOW! away from the murky waters of Top of the Pops and Hot Hits, who would adorn their covers with track titles, only for the unsuspecting buyer to discover they’d bought an album of session musicians knocking out chart hits at a rate of about four a day.

    Here, there’s no danger of being ripped off. You want the biggest chart hits by the original artists, you are going to get them.

    And check out that strap across the top left hand corner:

    now-1-strap

    It would be a long time before a NOW! album could again boast eleven (11!!!) number one singles. They were so proud of the fact that inside they list the other, unfortunate number ones that didn’t make the cut, all 5 of them: Billie Jean (Michael Jackson), Let’s Dance (David Bowie), True (Spandau Ballet), Every Breath You Take (The Police) and Uptown Girl (Billy Joel). There was a sixth, Only You by the Flying Pickets which reached number 1 after NOW!’s release.

    It’s easy to speculate on why these would be excluded over say two UB40 tracks, but these were all successful and more importantly POWERFUL artists (with the exception of Spandau Ballet) who didn’t need, and probably didn’t WANT to appear on a compilation album. Jackson and Sting would only ever appear on one NOW! album each, whilst Spandau Ballet and Billy Joel would never appear. Being as their respective record companies were happy to license other artists to appear (for instance Jackson’s Epic Records was also home to KC and the Sunshine Band) you have to assume it was the artist, or more likely his representatives, choosing not to appear.

    Bowie is an odd one. He was signed to EMI, so contractually there was probably no reason why Let’s Dance couldn’t appear. It was a huge hit, so surely NOW! would have wanted it to be included. The fact that Bowie tracks would appear regularly throughout the 80s further adds to the mystery.

    If all this seems unnecessarily trivial, well, you’ve got NOW! to blame for that, thanks to their decision to include a snippet of trivia about each track on the inside of the sleeve. Open up that sumptuous gatefold (along with b-side, another phrase at least two generations will never use) and you’ll find a wealth of pop facts like Mike Oldfield’s Moonlight Shadow reached number 4 on June 29th and stayed there for 3 weeks. Or that Duran Duran’s Is There Something I Should Know was only available on this album (and this single version would remain so until the release of Decade, in 1989). Or best of all that Victims by Culture Club was “Almost certain to be No.1 by the time you have this LP” (would you settle for number 3?). Alongside these nuggets would be the name of the album the song came from, just to try and get a few more pennies out of the kids.

    Culture+Club
    Culture Club: the record company were even more disappointed than they are

    How this inclusion came about, I’m not sure, but somewhere between NOW! and NOW 2, a change came about and a handy compilation of the biggest tracks of the year added the opportunity for EMI and Virgin to start plugging artists that maybe needed a little extra push. The seeds are here with the inclusion of Waterfront by Simple Minds. The little blurb is notable for its brevity “Released from forthcoming LP & cassette” (sic). No mention of chart placing, no mention of an album title… nothing. And this wasn’t included in the anticipation of it being a hit as they had done with Victims. At this point Simple Minds had had only two top 20 hits, and were knocking on the door of success, but by no means breaking it down. Was the inclusion of Waterfront in such distinguished company an attempt to get some of the success sparkle of Culture Club, Duran Duran and Kajagoogoo to float their way?

    Kajagoogoo are an interesting bunch, even more so in their relation to NOW! Famous these days for one song, and one song only, Too Shy (here as Side 2, Track 3), just as they seemed destined for greatness, lead singer Limahl jumped ship and enjoyed a brief spurt of success on his own, whilst the Kaja’s themselves bravely carried on in the face of public indifference, before finally the public decided they didn’t really like either the group or Limahl and his stupid Crufts-winning haircut.

    On NOW!, the collective of Kajagoogoo make up 3 tracks! That’s 10% of the album! (This kind of dominance would not be seen again until the various Spice Girls ruled the world, fleetingly, at the turn of the millennium. ) So, alongside Too Shy, there’s Limahl’s first solo effort, the long-forgotten Only For Love, which reached the dizzy heights of number 16 (but in fairness was climbing the charts well at the time of NOW!’s release; this was back in the day when records took time to find an audience and could take weeks to reach their highest chart position) as well as the post-Limahl Kajagoogoo’s first release, the rather bland Big Apple, which would trump Limahl by at least going top 10 (the dumper would beckon soon afterwards).

    limahl
    Limahl: Best of Breed Winner 1983

    Multiple appearances by artists on a NOW! are not unknown, but are still relatively rare. NOW! would feature 4 multiple appearances: the aforementioned Kajagoogoo/Limahl, as well as Phil Collins (solo and with Genesis), Culture Club and UB40. In future cases, multiples would generally occur when an artist has two massive hits in separate guises (usually as a solo artist, and another with a group or a duet), so the double bubbles here of UB40 and Culture Club are very unusual, and would suggest either last-minute filler (possibly for the number one’s listed above that they couldn’t get) or bigger attempts to plug the artists’ albums.

    So, a legend is born. NOW! would end up as the 7th biggest selling album of the year. Not bad considering it was only released 7 weeks before the years’ end. And 1984 would bring bigger and better things, as well as the first sighting of the coolest even-toed ungulate you’ve ever seen

    NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL MUSIC

    Release date

    28th November 1983

    Biggest tracks

    Total Eclipse of the Heart – Bonnie Tyler

    Karma Chameleon – Culture Club

    Forgotten tracks

    Only For Love – Limahl

    Kissing with Confidence – Will Powers

    What’s missing

    Let’s Dance – David Bowie

    True – Spandau Ballet

    Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) – Eurythmics

    Blue Monday – New Order

    Track listing

    Side One
    You Can’t Hurry Love Phil Collins
    Is There Something I Should Know Duran Duran
    Red Red Wine UB40
    Only For Love Limahl
    Temptation Heaven 17
    Give It Up KC And The Sunshine Band
    Double Dutch Malcolm McLaren
    Total Eclipse Of The Heart Bonnie Tyler
    Side Two
    Karma Chameleon Culture Club
    The Safety Dance Men Without Hats
    Too Shy Kajagoogoo
    Moonlight Shadow Mike Oldfield
    Down Under Men At Work
    (Hey You) The Rock Steady Crew Rock Steady Crew
    Baby Jane Rod Stewart
    Wherever I Lay My Hat (That’s My Home) Paul Young
    Side Three
    Candy Girl New Edition
    Big Apple Kajagoogoo
    Let’s Stay Together Tina Turner
    (Keep Feeling) Fascination The Human League
    New Song Howard Jones
    Please Don’t Make Me Cry UB40
    Tonight, I Celebrate My Love Peabo Bryson & Roberta Flack
    Side Four
    They Don’t Know Tracey Ullman
    Kissing With Confidence Will Powers
    That’s All Genesis
    The Lovecats The Cure
    Waterfront Simple Minds
    The Sun And The Rain Madness
    Victims Culture Club


    Video edition

    The video version released at the same time contained 21 tracks, including 3 which didn’t feature on the actual album: IOU by Freeez, Never Never by The Assembly and Hold Me Now by The Thompson Twins, which did appear on Now 2.

    Now 1 video

    Phil Collins  – You Can’t Hurry Love
    Duran Duran – Is There Something I Should Know
    UB40 – Red Red Wine
    Limahl – Only for Love
    Heaven 17 – Temptation
    Malcolm McLaren – Double Dutch
    Culture Club – Karma Chameleon
    Men Without Hats – The Safety Dance
    Kajagoogoo – Too Shy
    Mike Oldfield – Moonlight Shadow
    Rock Steady Crew – (Hey You) The Rock Steady Crew
    Tina Turner – Let’s Stay Together
    Freeez – I.O.U.
    Howard Jones – New Song
    UB40 – Please Don’t Make Me Cry
    Will Powers – Kissing with Confidence
    Genesis – That’s All
    Kajagoogoo – Big Apple
    The Assembly  – Never Never
    Thompson Twins – Hold Me Now
    Peabo Bryson & Roberta Flack – Tonight I Celebrate My Love