Hits 21 - 1996 (5): Chemical Brothers, Boyzone, Spice Girls, Robson & Jerome

Episode Date: November 7, 2025

Hello, everyone! Welcome back to Hits 21, the show that's taking a look back at every single UK #1 hit..You can follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Hits21UKYou can email us: [e-mail] 21 DOES NOT OWN THE RIGHTS TO ANY MUSIC USED IN THE EPISODES. USAGE OF ALL MUSIC USED IN THIS PODCAST FALLS UNDER SECTION 30(1) OF THE COPYRIGHT ACT 1988

Hits 21 Hi there, the 90s, the 90s, where me, Rob, Hi there everyone and welcome back to HITS 21, the 90s, where me, Rob, me, Andy. And who, when? Are looking back at every single UK number one of the 1990s. If you want to get in touch with us, email us, we're at Hitz21 Podcast at gmail.com, or Twitter at Hitch21 UK. Thank you so much for joining us again. We are currently looking back at the year 1996, and this week we'll be covering the period between the 6th of October and the 16th of November.

So around this time, exactly 29 years. ago. Hits 21 does not own the rights to any music in this episode, but usage of all the music on this podcast falls under Section 30 Clause 1 of the Copyright Act 1988. Check it. All right then, it's time to press on with this week's episode and Andy, autumn-ish 96. What are the UK buying in terms of albums? Well, we've got a bit of a variation this week. We've got some different things. We start with Cooler Shaker, who were at number one last week, and just straddled a period over into this one, so they're still at number one with K. As Manuel from Fulte Towers once said, they're at number one with K, which was number one for two weeks and went double

platinum. Then Cooler Shaker is knocked off the top spot by Peter Rondray, of all people, with Natural, quite ironic really, considering the amount of production and auto tune that would have been put into that album. Natural went to number one for one. one week and went single Platinum. Then it's one of our favourite, well I say our favourite. I'm not sure if you two dislike them generally as much as I do. It's Simply Red, who I satirically say one of my favourites, because other than Love the Farrell, I can't stand Simply Red.

They went number one for two weeks with their greatest hits. And that went six times, Platinum. Lots of people out there who like them more than me. then we've got the beautiful south with their latest blue is the colour football is the game Everton's the etc etc and no it's just blue is the colour

and that went number one for one week and went five times platinum and finally seeing us out it's everyone's favourite pop combo of modern times it's boys own with a different beat which went number one for one week and went triple platinum proving that democracy simply doesn't work

In the news, the Tory government's majority falls to a single seat after the defection of an MP to the Liberal Democrats while Labour stands 17 points ahead in the polls with the next general election not far away and the Stone of Scone or the Stone of Scone or the Stone of Scone is returned to Perthshire in Scotland from which it was captured in the 13th century. In Australia, the government buys back 640,000 firearms

from its citizens after tightening gun control following the Port Arthur massacre and in Guatemala 84 people are killed drawing a crush at the Estadio Matteo Flores in Guatemala City and in Afghanistan the capital city Kabul is taken by Taliban

forces as the terrorist militia group gains control of the country's government as well. In outer space the Hubble telescope produces clear images of Pluto for the first time and in America Bill Clinton defeats Bob Dole in the US presidential election to remember

in the White House. Do I don't like this? No, he doesn't. In America, obviously they've just elected a president. Who have they elected for their number one albums on a weekly-ish basis? Well, it doesn't start off all that surprisingly. After Celine Dion's falling into you falls out of view, counting crows count the millions.

It's a week at the top for recovering the satellites before mid-November is dominated by compilations, a week at number one for Van Halen with a comprehensive set that, while spanning their entire recorded output up to 1996, is somewhat pompously named Best of Volume 1. In the years since, just to let you know, they have scored a grand total of one charting single and released two new studio. albums, one of which, completely unrelated, was covered on Todd in the Shadows train records. And yes, there is no Volume 2 that has been issued in the 29 years since. Those champing at the bit for alternative takes of Don't Pass Me By and Maxwell Silver Hammer were finally suckered, you can decide on the spelling of that one, by Anthology 3 by the Beatles. hear a band who can't stand to be in the same room as each other

record throwaway comedy songs in hoary old rock and roll covers and realise that the stars of Abbey Road were not in fact McCartney and Harrison but a lot of cellar tape and hope number one singles in America Macarena holds steady before Losingdale Place at the top to Black Street and Dr. Dre Lucrative here for Dr. Drey With No Diggity

And that about bags it up President Clinton Sorry I should have to say that We all do from time to time All right So the first of four songs again This week Is this

This We're going to be able to be able to be able to be able to be a lot more, and more, and I'm going to be a lot, and I'm You're the devil in me I brought it from the gold You said your body was young but your mind will marry old You're coming on strong and I like the way The visions we have are fading away You're part of the life I've never had I'll tell you that we're just too bad

I'll tell you I'm just too bad Setting Sun by the Chemical Brothers, released as the lead single from the group's second studio album titled Dig Your Own Hole. Setting Sun is the Chemical Brothers fourth single to be released in the UK and their first to reach number one. And it's not the last time we'll be coming to Ed Simons and Tim Rallens during our 90s coverage. Setting Sun went straight in at number one as a brand new entry. It stayed at number one for one week. In its first and only week atop the charts, it sold 99,000 copies, beaten competition from Your Gorgeous by Baby Bird, Rotter down by the Beautiful South, and Kevin Carter by Manick Street Preachers.

When it was knocked off the top of the charts, setting Sun fell three places to number four. By the time it was done on the charts, it had been inside the top 104, 11 weeks. The song is currently officially certified Silver in the UK. As of 2025, Andy, how are we feeling on The Chemical Brothers, the Brothers, the Brothers Chemical, if you will? Yeah, this might be a short segment, to be honest with you, because this is another one of those songs that is similar to both the Fuji songs we've covered so far, where I think I gave similar comments about both of those, which was that I really like this, but I only feel like I can sort of stand in admiration of it, to be honest. because like I'm not particularly O'Fay with like pretty like authentic full on dance music and like it's just I don't really have the vocabulary to be honest but this is very very good and I actually I really I've liked it more every time I've listened to it to be honest

because one thing I always love about like really dense really heavy 90s dance music is just the amount of detail they tend to get in there and I always you know like making that distinction between the kind of throwaway dance music that's like probably about two or three tracks on the mixing desk and then something like this which is probably about it feels like about two or three hundred i know it obviously isn't but like it just feels like there's just endless work on into this really um i think it toes the line expertly between being really invasive and really like demanding on your ears and grabbing your attention without ever becoming annoying or grating because that drone noise that

gr-g-g-g-g-g-r thing that runs all the way through could very easily just be like oh you know give them the broom to the kid's bedroom like turn that racket off turn that noise down and it never quite gets to that point I think it's very artfully done how it's definitely designed to be loud and in your face and extremely noisy but it's not designed to do it in a kind of what I'm going to use the name scrylix

for future reference you know who does that kind of thing and just decides to just terrorise everybody who listens to it. I also really like hearing those Tomorrow Never Knows drums. It's nice to hear things passed down through the years like that. It's funny that Ed mentioned Anthology 3.

It's like, you know, little individual elements are like, oh, that's interesting that sort of make it onto the Beatles albums. You then, 30 years later, get some of those same elements so they're like, oh, that's just worth keeping, which obviously that was a hugely influential part of psychedelia.

And here it is, 30 years later, on setting Sun, like the exact same drumbeat. You can almost imagine Ringo Starr sat in the room with them playing this, which is a bizarre thought. I will say this is very, very similar to, is it Left Forever Bee that it's called? I'd slightly prefer that, if I'm honest, but that might be because it closes out the film. There's only one Jimmy Grimble, which I have huge nostalgia for. So that might be why I prefer that one. But this, yeah, this is just like another one of those that I wish I had a little bit more time with before we could talk about it because it kind of needs to cook.

But I think it's just like very, very well made. It's not like immediately grabbed me and made me think, oh my God, this is incredible. And I don't think it's up there. Like if I was to sort of measure my scoreings in this way, I don't think it's up there with either of the Prodigy number ones this year to make that comparison. But I definitely think this is a really, really good thing to have at number one and just shows off the diversity that we're experiencing this. here really and boy howdy will you see some diversity in styles this week um so yeah really enjoyed this really enjoyed this just trying to have much more to say except this is good i like it i totally agree andy although i think i'm a little bit more positive or uh positive on this

than you i think this is sort of on the edge of fantastic it's not quite but it's it's almost there sort of confuddling to me as well just in the sense that you know i've always been surprised that something this kind of proudly abrasive managed to not only make a big mark on the charts, but actually, you know, top the charge, you know, there's a moment towards the end of the song where the whole thing collapses, the beats fall away, any sense of direction is lost,

and then all these abrasive and loud noises sort of implode on themselves, like some sort of supernova explosion of feedback. And it's one of the most arresting and scary noises we've ever covered on the show, and it's fucking brilliant. You know, I like the Chemical Brothers a fair bit. You know, it's a shame that, hey, boy,

girl doesn't get to number one because that's my favourite of theirs. But even this feels like a more extreme cut of theirs. You know, the screeching feedback, the relentless drum fills that get louder and louder and more compressed, Noel Gallagher's voice being backmasked on top of itself, like you're trapped in a tornado or something and you're only getting glimpses of clarity and the outside world. You can only see little pieces of sky or something as you're being flung around. This actually sounds like the suddenly enveloping Terryue experience during a panic

It's like when you suddenly realize your breaths are very shallow and that you can't hear your own voice in your head and that there's nothing to do to stop the inevitable. You just have to kind of let it happen and then try and get out the other side of it. The drum fields reminded me of Tomorrow's. If they've been directly sampled, you know, the... No, it wouldn't have been a sample because nobody directly samples the bill,

so I'd very much doubt it. Of course it'd be too expensive. It is the exact same drum beats, yeah. Yeah, which, you know, I guess is appropriate because Noel Love the Beatles and the Brothers Chemical apparently approached him. on that basis, they said they had a couple of, quote, Beatlesy songs and they wanted him to get on this one. I think if you weren't around at the time, you maybe have trouble knowing that it was

Noel on the track, you know, like say if you're 15 years old now and you just get shown this and then go, who's singing on that? And I don't know if they would be immediately saying Noel Gallagher out loud. But I think once you're aware, there is a bit of star quality that I think he is maybe responsible for his popularity too. You know, I don't know if this gets to number one without like, oh, Noel Gallagher's on this, you know, like, you know, a bit of advertising with it. But I'm happy about that. And I could, and the other thing as well is that the reputation that Noel likes to prepare for himself and given how he likes to be perceived, I think it's nice that he lends himself over to an electronic act for this, because, you know, he's all very like,

oh, real music, dude, what's that? I don't like a lot of tuning keyboards. But so, okay, fair enough, maybe in a softer moment he was happy enough to do this, although the Chemical Brothers, they supported Oasis, didn't they? It was at Nebworth, so they probably knew each other through that association. But yeah, I'm really into this. It sounds like civil unrest. It sounds like something is wrong somewhere, but you can't find the source of the problem.

The one thing I will say is that it hangs in a funny place where it's maybe not repetitive enough for me to get truly lost in it, but maybe also lacks a bit of variation to work 100% successfully is a pop song, but it's a little bit of, it's a little indie what could, you know, having a bit of success, bit of a push by a major publisher, because I think it was Virgin that sort of handled the publishing rights. Well done. It must be mentioned that this song does get used in one of the best scenes from The Inbetweeners when Will sits at the front of the Nemesis Inferno incensed that Simon Neil and Jay can't join him because someone's already sat there and he

kicks up a fuss calling them inconsiderate arsoles and then finds out that the people at the front of all got learning disabilities and they're there on a special visit. And then he sits at the front miserable for the entire ride while this song screeches over the top of the soundtrack and you just get Will's dismal frowning face being catapulted through the air at 60 miles an hour while he looks like he's having the worst day of his life. Was this also the theme tune to a TV show for a while? In my head, I have it that like it was briefly used as a theme tune to never mind the bus cocks, but somehow that doesn't fit. I don't that I mean The theme tune to Buzzcox is quite a lot like this,

so I can see why you might conflate the tune here, but I don't think so. The only thing I can see is a load of this song playing while a load of records, LPs are falling. That is the Buzzcox opening. Yeah, I don't think so. I don't know why I've put those two things together. Maybe the In Between Us episode went straight into Buzzcox on E4

back in the day, but I'm not sure. But Ed, setting sun. Largely the same as you folk, only maybe slightly. less so um yeah rob you mentioned that this was um one week at number one i've got to say that is one of the less surprising things that you've said in your introductions in the last few weeks not because this is a bad track it really isn't it's good but yeah it's it's a bit of a almost a novelty in a way and you can as you say question how much knoll's star power lifted it up

to number one at this point because, God, they're, you know, in 1996, Oasis were white-hot. No one knew that their third album was going to be dogs codlings, but, yeah, it is a true drone, this. I mean, I was listening to Lainan, it's like, is there actually a second chord here? It's like, no. So credit to them, you know, kudos that it retains enough textural interest.

You mean, you're mentioning the amount of detail, Andy, and I think you're quite right there. It retains enough to keep you interested throughout. There are enough stocks and starts and dynamic shifts, I had to say it, to keep you going. And, yeah, it's pleasing that UK audiences did get it to number one, because it is an undeniable palate cleanser. However, by that token, we are in the age of The Prodigy, and this, to me, ends up sounding like a slightly less flavorful and attitude-ness.

prodigy like prodigy sounds a little bit of character and also, yeah, you can question how much Noel Gallagher's

presence is actually you know, well, I'll leave it to you, oh to you guys, do you think that Noel Gallagher is actually a creative boost

to this song or do you think that basically could have been anyone, but it didn't harm the latter for me. If I'm honest, I think it could

basically have been anyone. I do agree with Rob that he brings star quality because you recognize the voice, but I don't think the song would be any the worse off without him, no. It's very much his kind of lyrical style, I guess. They didn't hand that to him, but that's not necessarily a great thing because they're not, you know, amazing lyrics or anything

even by his sort of vague and distorted standards. But, yeah, you mentioned Andy as well, you know, the similarity to Let Forever Be, and I keep expecting it to turn into that. Yeah. Because it sounds so similar. similar. And, you know, having listened to a bit of Chemical Brothers, this in some way falls into kind of an unsatisfactory halfway house between, you know, private psychedelic reel, which is their full-on wishy-wushy 10-minute opus of, you know, trans psychedelia inspiration at the end of this

album. And, uh, and let forever be, which is the more tuneful version of this. Because let's be honest, this ain't catchy. In many ways, it's the texture, it's that and the pooh, pooh! That actually make it stick in the head, not the sort of masked catterwalling of Noel Gallagher.

Not that it's a bad performance, but it's not a charismatic performance either. Might have been with Liam. I think it's good, but I will say this. I just don't think, either by their standards or the standards of similar music, obviously. the time, I don't think

this is quite vault worthy for me. Alright then, so moving swiftly on to the second song this week and what a change of pace it is. It's this. Smile, an everlasting smile, a smile can bring you near to me. Don't ever let me find you gone, because that would bring no tears to me. This world has lost its soul.

Let's start a brand new story now, my love You think that I don't even mean a single word I'm saying It's only words and words are all I have to take your heart away Okay, this is Words by Boyzone. Released as the lead single from the group's second studio album titled A Different Beat, Words is Boyzone's sixth single to be released in the UK and their first to reach number one. And it's not the last time we'll be coming to Boyzone during our 90s coverage. The single is a cover of the song originally recorded by the Bee Gees,

which reached number eight in 1968. Words went straight in at number one as a brand new entry. It stayed at number one for one week! In its first and only week atop the charts, it sold 232,000 copies beating competition from tripping by Mark Morrison and no diggerty by Black Street. When it was docked off the top of the charts, Words dropped one place to number two. By the time it was done on the charts, it had been. been inside the top 100 for 15 weeks. The song is currently officially certified platinum in the UK.

As of 2025, Ed, I know you are amongst the three of us, a bit of a Bee Gees officinado. How do we feel about boys' own covering the Bee Gees? The Sound of Celery. Because, fuck me. Way to take the flavour out of a track. In the original, Barry Gibb, whatever you may feel about his voice and his particular stylistic choices, his use of vibrato, his sort of nasally tone, what you can say is that he used dynamics, did-la-da, and something called character, and something called investment, and something called not being an insipid clothes horse in order to push the emphases of the song in the right places and make it sound not like a total fucking flatline. Here they just multi-track the voices at the emphatic points because they are fundamentally impotent as vocalists. I don't have much more to say. This is bollocks.

Yeah, I mean, you'd think it was a shit song, but listen back to the original. I really, really like it. I mean, you could maybe do without the chinty strings on it, but I think is very effective and quite an unusual bit of songwriting, if you look at the way it's structured. But this just sucks the energy out of it. It's just total piss. They've got no character,

and those bloody synth strings. God damn. Yeah, that's it. That's all I've got to say. I think it's wank. Yeah, the second BG's cover to get number one this year. Maybe a sign that Boyzone were trying to just move into the empty space that take that I'd left behind.

That was the advert for a members for the auditions in the paper that Louis Walsh put in, I'm forming the Irish take that. Would you like to join? Oh, that's so brazen. Oh my God. And they fucking failed. Well, critically. I think if you look up brazen in the dictionary, I don't think Louis Walsh would be outside of the first two pictures you'd see, actually. And boy, do we get their attempt at rehashing a take that number towards the end of this year as well. But for now, we just have this. I think this is flat but respectful. tender but boring

it's one of the biggies kind of mid-table hits if you take their whole songbook of singles for other artists as well I think this you know upper mid-table maybe just about qualifying for the UA for Conference League or something you know this is

I like words but you know they did better songs later I think you know and boys owner here to sing it Ronan honks a bit but not as much as it will on later songs the other boys are there but this is the Ronan show

and Ronan is fine I suppose he's adequate the mix and arrangement feel a bit smothering to me like the song needs its own let it be naked version like things need to be stripped back but I don't I don't hate this I don't hate it

the thing with Boys Own and Westlife is that they want all of their songs to sound like warm hugs five velvety voices caressing you gently and this is about the closest boys own get without sounding like they've just given up all hope of ever making music that they want to make.

This is definitely Louis Walsh's idea, but for now, Boyzone, they seem happy enough to carry it out, and that doesn't last very long. I don't like this, but I don't feel any major sense of hatred. It sounds very chintzy and swollen in the back, but I think there's enough they just kind of perform this adequately without butchering it necessarily from a kind of easy listening adult contemporary point of view that's not the case for everything like this this episode and i think having robson and jerome so close to this does maybe add a couple of points in boy zones favor which maybe just keeps it oh it is so close to drowning in the piehole but it's just on the surface, just on the surface.

And I do think it will just about stay there. I don't like this, but it doesn't make me angry. Andy, words on words? I do have some words on words. First of all, I'm just going to come back to how Ed started, because I wouldn't have picked celery for that analogy, if I'm honest. I've always thought that celery has quite a surprising taste. That, you know, it tastes cooked without being cooked.

There's something about it that tastes like it's being. roasted or something. I've always thought... Well, yeah, this sounds very undercooked, so I'll give you that. Well, I mean, whether or not you like celery, I always think it has quite a distinctive unusual taste. I probably would have chosen something like turnip or something. Celery's too interesting for this. And actually, I thought the same thing about this is such a tangent. This is such a tangent. But you know, in Doctor Who, Peter Davison, when he was the doctor in the 80s, and he wore a stick of celery on his jacket for pretty much no reason.

And I always thought that was, that's too quirky for him. Like, he's a really boring doctor. Celery's too quirky to be associated with him. And I would say the same of Boiseum. That I think that's unfair on celery, that point. So, yeah, nobody cared about that. But I'm standing up for the celery if no one else will. Yeah, the crosses that you bear sometimes.

This is, the thing I kept coming back to is they've had worse. but this is still awful. And so I'm in very much the same place as Rob where it's like, I'm tempted to not pie whole this because there's something in the same universe as this, which is much worse than this, this week. And also, Bois-Zone last year had two songs in Born to Runner Up, both of which were awful and one of which, father and son,

was abominable. Like really just, I wanted to claw my eyes out with how embarrassing it was to listen to. I felt second-hand embarrassment for these five boys for being riddled with that. There's this characterization that they have, which will later be the same with Westlife, which are only a few years off now, and we made the same comments about Westlife right from the start, which is that they're characterised as if they're 30 to 40 years older than they are. Like relentlessly, this really feels like end of the night at a pub, you know, you're kind of happily married, like 50, 60-something dad of four adult kids

gets up with his last beer of the night to sing something like this just to kind of send the evening off because he likes to sing songs sometimes and I'm going to do the whole Chris Addison in the thick of it thing about the average normal working British person and like they feel like that

they don't feel like these barely out of teenage years supposedly cool, youth-oriented like hip attractive guys not at all I feel younger than them listening to this now despite being like 10 to 15 years older than them than they were when they recorded this.

I feel like I'm listening to my parents here and I should not feel like that. This should make me feel old to be listening to this kind of thing and it doesn't at all. It's just really maudlin. All of their music sounds like stuff that's made for awake, if I'm honest.

And I don't know. I can't put my finger on how this got popular, this style because all of their big hits so far have been this kind of warm and cozy, never go above about 56 BPM, just like Irish cuddles and nothing more. It's to take that rebound probably. Well, this is the thing that all I can think of

is that there was a massive gulf that nobody else chose to exploit because this couple of years is a really quiet time for boy bands because we've had, you know, at the early part of the decade we had all the American ones, we had like new kids on the block and boys to men and blah, blah, blah.

and then we've had take that dominating for a few years at the end of the decade we're just a couple years off from Backstreet Boys and N-Sync and 9-1-1 and lots and lots of little imitators around that time we're in a slight reprieve here and Boys owner just slotting in as kind of the only option like the sort of

that's just it, it's the set menu for boy bands right now and I think that's the only reason they're getting away with being as boring as this Ronan continues to suck all life and expression out of every word that he sings he has this amazing talent actually I will call it a talent because a lot of people couldn't do this if he tried

a talent of just removing emotion from songs like wholesale just removing it honestly he could do it to anything I feel like you could give him something like this woman's work and he would just make it sound like singing happy birthday it's just it baffles me

so I don't like this at all and it was really, really boring to listen to. It's not the worst thing of theirs, and it didn't make me as annoyed or as angry as father and son did. But that's no excuse. I still think just because there's worse stuff to compare it to, it doesn't mean that this isn't also pie whole territory. And it is pie whole territory, I'm afraid.

Yeah, this is rubbish. Yeah, it takes me, what you've said there, it takes me back to what I think I said about Ronan when we covered when tomorrow never comes all those episodes ago. And I said that when Ronan Keating turned 20, he actually turned 40. Yeah. Like, that's, that's what he is.

He was an adult from, he was basically as soon as he was out of, like, kids' clothes, he was just an adult. I can definitely get that from his solo stuff here listening to it. He just sounds like a boring kid. Like, that kid just, you know, he's quite handsome and he stands at the side. He looks quite charming. But you realize there's just no charisma coming from him at all. He's just a nice kid who stands at the side with a slight smile on his, face.

And he's got that. Yeah. A fucking picture on the cover of the single, Christ. But this just doesn't follow the marketing strategy or the kind of fandom ethos for any other boy band that I can think of because all the boy bands that I can compare them to, aren't you supposed to like, they're supposed to be a bit edgy and just not particularly threatening, but in that kind of, you know, just a tiny bit edgy enough for like young girls to feel a little bit excited by them.

You know, like Robbie Williams was the breakout star of Take That, despite. contributing very little to the band musically he was seen as like the naughty one that was his character so he took off and then you know even in modern times you've got like harry styles was the breakout of one direction because he was the sort of cheeky slightly naughty edgy one who you know your mum might be a little less trusting of him than the other four that seems to be the way that like there's supposed to be a little bit of edge to these bands all i can think of really is mcfly a kind of similar that they were always very kind of nicey nice but also they would genuinely release some really good music so they got away with that as well as

You remember they were more like a power pop band, really, weren't they? And that appeal has never been demonstrated anywhere else, as far as I can think of. Question is, who is the less edgy, Boys Own and Westlife? Well, yeah, that's the thing. Westlife is the only comparison, isn't it? And I don't get it. I don't get it, Boys' Own and Westlife. Just don't get it.

I would say Westlife just because Brian McFadden was in the group. Yeah, actually, I know. I agree with Rob. Westlife, because of a bit of tabloid drama with Kerry Ketona and stuff with Brian McFadden. So, yeah, Westlife. Well, the thing we're running Keating is that he's perfect for the one show. And I'll just leave it at that. So, the third song, oh, a bit of excitement now.

The third song up this week is this. I'll say you'll be fair Giving you everything All that joy can break this I swear Last time that we had this conversation I decided we should be friends But now we're going round in circles Tell me will this deja vu never end

And now you tell me that you're falling in love Well, I never, ever thought that would be Hey, this time You gotta take it easy Throwing far too much emotions at me But any fool you can see that falling I gotta make you understand I'm giving you end

Okay, this is Say You'll Be There, by Spice Girls, released as the second single from the group's debut studio album titled Spice. Say You'll Be There is Spice Girl's second single to be released in the UK and their second to be released in the UK and their second to read. number one and it's not the last time we'll be coming to the Girls of Spice during our 90s coverage say you'll be there went straight in at number one as a brand new entry it stayed at number one for two weeks in its first week atop the charts it sold 349,000 copies beating competition from insomnia by Faithless flying by cast and beautiful one by Wade and in week two it sold 163,000 copies beating competition from If You Ever by East 17

and Gabrielle Unbreak My Heart by Tony Braxton, place your hands by Reef, follow the rules by Living Joy and You Must Love Me by Madonna. When it was knocked off the top of the charts, Say You'll Be There dropped one place to number two. By the time it was done on the charts that have been inside the top 100 for 21 weeks. The song is currently officially certified two times platinum in the UK. As of 2025, Ed, lead us out on Spice Girls.

I think you've very shrewdly and diplomatically chosen me first so we can pave the way, who I think we both know is going to have the most to say about this song. And that's not because I... Maybe. don't like it I think this is brilliant I really like this song

it used to be my favourite spice girls single until quite recently when I found myself listening to those first three number ones I'm not going to go too far into the one that's coming up soon

because I don't want to spoil my feelings on that but it's not quite anymore however I'll just lord the great elements about this yet it's a really good song the surprising hard-edgedness of it as a second single is really cool

the sort of nasty Stevie Wonder adjacent synth, unusually organic but quite cool choice of a harmonica solo I think is great and again another video which is just perfectly pitched to capture

that hard-edged attitude of it I remember as a It's been really cool with all the fucking ninja stars and stuff being thrown around. I don't think I've seen it in years, but it plays in little fragments in my head whenever I think of this song. Yeah, it is a great pop song. It's an easy vault for me.

It's my favourite song this week. But, listening to this with the book-ending songs, it is the most conventional of their first three number one singles. the way it moves sectionally and the fact that it's very clearly like this is the genre it's an R&B track you know it's a very good one but you could argue

that the singles surrounding it are they feel a bit more like kind of experiences there's a sort of epic grandeur to them in a way that kind of makes them feel like a a rallying point in some ways where this is just a really, really good song. And that doesn't, and I'm not really giving it.

It's due with that because I think it is a, it is a very high quality R&B track. But that's basically it. I was just finding another tape on the way, the reason that I'm, you know, I was wanting something, trying to find something interesting to say about this track aside from, oh, it's really bloody good. And that's as close as I can come to a hot take on it, which is, it's great. but I maybe don't find it quite as awesome as the other two.

Wow. That's it. Rob. I, well, I agree with you, Ed. I think this is definitely single of the week. No doubt about that. I think this is, you know, it's streetwise and it's smart. It's smooth and charismatic. There's room for everyone here.

All five are the vocalists, which means that you get more of that five action figures in a pack dynamic that makes the group so engaging. There's even room for a harmonica solo, because of course, why not? You know, I think the secret to what makes this song so, special is in that harmonica solo because as a studio project, I think this is a fantastic showing of the studio as an instrument. You've got five voices in this. You've got your traditional kind

of teen pop and dance pop setting, but there's disco, teeny bit of soul. I'd completely forgotten that this is essentially a sped-up G-Funk number. That kind of arse rattling bass with the really thin, wiry synth lead up the top. Slow this down by about 10% and I'd half expect later into the one, two, three, into the four. Snoop docky dog and Dr. Dre is at the door. But despite all the influences it shows, I think the use of the studio and the presence of all five girls turns it into something doesn't really sound like anything else. Even these days, I think sonically it lives in, it's sort of in its own little universe. You know, you can see other things in it, but I think you have to separate them before you can fully pass them out. I think

looking at it as a solid block of sound, it's just this and nothing else. Uh, I think, you know, in terms of storytelling, I'm glad this came out after WannaBe rather than how the label wanted it to be, which was for this to be the first single, because this feels like a little bit of a sequel. You know, you dropped into the story midway with the first line being the last time we had this conversation. And that makes it seem like the second part of this story that Wannaby started off. You know, in Wannaby, you get a warning that if you want to be close to the Spice Girls and you've got to take them all as they are instead of trying to mold them into something else. In this one, the guys may be formed. a bit too hard so the girls are saying look man just relax a bit we're going steady just be chill about it we might end up together we might just end up as friends but whatever we end up as i'll be the best version of that so please relax and don't be in our bed it's like the guy from wannabe has maybe come on a bit too strong and they're just kind of telling him to calm down and then i guess to become one is the end of the opening trilogy where he's followed the rules to the letter she's comfortable with him and at last they kind of come together pun intended and then i have to talk about the final

chorus mel see this isn't the last time the spice girls finish a song by just having mel see improvise new melodies over the top and it's because they realize in this moment that she has the perfect voice and personality for that lead role in the ending parts of their songs i think you know maybe s club seven kind of crib from that a bit with the every song of ending with joe o'mira doing basically the same. When I was a kid, I did start to wonder if a final chorus really was a final chorus if Mel C wasn't tunefully repeating the lyrics, but in a slightly different rhythm. This maybe for me lacks the maximalist kind of bright first time excitement of wannabe.

This is cooler and therefore slightly harder to feel unconditional, adorable affection for. But it's a very, very slight mark against it, only very slight. And here we are, you know, being presented. with a template for the girl group sound for the 21st century. It's right in front of us. You can hear, push the button in this, something kind of ooh. You know, girl groups doing this kind of talk to the hand because the face ain't listening attitude.

You know, that's something we've seen a lot of on this show, but not in the 90s, only really in the 2000s. This is new, and it's weird to look at this, knowing that it was new at the time, because my world and my memory has always had the spice skills in it. And so for something like this to be presented as new information to the planet, feels strange this feels like you know like the magna carter to me it's been there just as long in my head but yeah i think this is wonderful andy what about you yeah i mean i do have a fair amount

on this but you've kind of nailed it there rob to be honest like almost everything you've said i completely completely agree with um i i definitely agree with that point about how like it's hard to imagine a world without this in it this and wannabe i would say really that like It feels like a building block of all of pop music as I know it. And it's only through wearing retrospective glasses, really, that you can really have any appreciation of this. And it's really helped me to appreciate this as much as I do by doing hits 21 and by going through the 90s

and seeing what a bomb Spice Girls was that was being set off. I am vaguely aware of that because I do remember the Spice Girl starting just about, and I remember how excited I was by them. but I've never really been able to articulate why because it was just like I was at the perfect age where I was just starting to connect to media like in a basic sense

and something as good as the spice girls comes along and I've always just seen it as like I just got really lucky that I was a kid and the spice girls happened and I just got really really lucky it's like being five years old when Star Wars came out you know it's just right time right place but

I do think that even if I was a teenager when this happened I still would have been just as excited and still just as hooked because it's I think the one two punch and it will end up being a one two three punch of these first three singles. I just think what's so impressive about them is that they don't take the easy route on any of this. They put the hard work in and it pays off. It creates a better overall effect and it makes them more exciting and more imperious and more authoritative as like this is what is happening in pop music right now

by not taking the easier route at any point. Like with wannabe, that was just like absolute bull's eye. Like I said last week, I think possibly the best debut single that's ever been released. And it had the absolutely gigantic potential to be a huge one-hit wonder. One of the biggest one-hit wonders ever in the sense that it was huge and successful, but also one of the biggest one-hit wonders ever in the sense that it could have just collapsed from there and nothing could have lived up to it.

and I can imagine at the time the hype there would have been, because there was no album after What I'd Be, the album doesn't come out for a few more weeks from now, the hype of what's going to be their next single, what's coming next. And they could so easily have done a clone of wannabe, or they could so easily have, you know, blinked a bit too early and copped out

and done something a little bit less adventurous than this or something a bit dull or could have done a very cheesy love song. But what they, I say they, you know, I use the collective they, because a lot of people working on the Spice Girls, It's them, it's the girls themselves, but it's also their producers, their songwriters, their PR team. Everybody seems to collectively recognize that the second one needs to be as good as wannabe, if not better.

Like, it absolutely must be another lightning bolt. It can't just be a decent song to follow up, because that's not enough, because the lightning bolt of wannabe was too big that you now need the second one to be just as effective. And I don't think history really remembers it that way. But I do think people who were there at the time and people who were fans of the Spice. girls do remember it that way that this was like just as amazing this was just as big a moment as wannabe really this was my sister's favorite spice girl song at the time both of us were absolutely obsessed with them but this was her favorite i got very funny memory actually because again i was only four years old my sister was seven so she was you know she had a bit more

of a view of the world she was better equipped for the spice girls phenomenon and like she understood like what a big deal they were in terms of music and we we went down to london to see my great uncle in the summer of 96 and he was filming us in the garden and asked us both to sing a song in turn just for the camera and so my sister did the moves from the video and did say you'll be there she's saying the whole thing um and me because i just picked a song that i knew because i got shy in front of the camera and i sung away in a manger it's just and this is in the height of summer so i just like completely let myself down and there's my sister who's like absolutely so on it in the moment she's there in summer 96 sing and say you'll be there on camera and i just failed to meet the moment and i'm so

embarrassed about that because i absolutely would choose to sing spice girls now um but yeah i think musically what makes this work so well is well there's loads of things but first of all something that i always appreciate which is that the verses are just as good as the choruses that the verses have this really sweeping melodic line they they have this really really intricate kind of rhythmic line as well where the beat is it's always kind of dancing around the beat that like last night that we had this conversation it's like dancing around the beat on those lines and it's also dancing around melodically and then in the chorus it always is always just just behind the beat as well so you get two consecutive hits you get i'm pion giving you everything it's just it always takes advantage of

the beat, the melody, the way they coincide to create this dancey effect and also create this really sing-along effect that anybody can just click their fingers and find their way through the song because it's so strongly connected melodically and rhythmically it's just a kind of binding effect which is just, oh, I get so jealous of it. It's like, why can't I write music like that? They make it look so easy. But like I say, this is hard stuff. That is really difficult to write songs that can play with the form so much

but sound like straight down the line pop music and be instantly memorable and instantly catchy and everybody knows every word to this. That is gold dust. So I think they have produced a song here that is just as fantastic as wannabe. Not to mention as well that there's loads of stuff in the production

that first of all, locates it in the era and makes it clear that, yeah, we totally get the sound of the 90s and this is the tastemaker now. They have that bianoo-do-do-thing, which I think is taken

almost directly from Fast Love. And that's why I included that in our theme tune for this year because I thought both Fast Love and Say it'll be there, have that sound. That feels like a real sound of the era. The harmonica as well, like just that adds a bit of a quirk.

That's like, nobody asked them to do that. They don't need to do that to throw a harmonica solo in. And they also have this sort of chef's kiss, which really takes it over the top, which is that, that tiny little spoken word there. Give you everything on this, that's where. Just promise you'll always be there. You're just like, even for the kids who can't sing, you've got that. But like, just for everyone as well, it's just like the little bit of difference.

it always keeps it interesting all the way through. Everybody gets a little bit of vocal highlight, and it's not even just the singing over the chorus bit once as well, because Mel B gets a bit. I've always thought the bit in the second chorus is maybe more enjoyable than Mel C's stuff, because Mel B in the second chorus has got there, Give you everything, all the joy can bring.

And I really like that, as well as Mel C's. Yes, I swear. But, yeah, I mean, a few years ago, when Rob and I were in a karaoke team, they had boy band and girl's, boy band and girl band week, and I decided I wanted to do a spice girl song, and I did this. And I could have done, you know, any spice girl song, really, because not to brag, but like they don't have that huge of a vocal range.

So like men can sing most spice girl songs, but I picked this one because it is just the most fun of spice girls song to sing. It never stays on one note for too long. It always dances around. It always is just a very pleasant thing to take yourself. through and it gets the crowd going every time. It's another total slam dunk for the Spice Girls and I haven't even mentioned

the video just as iconic as one of be out in the desert with that blue sky as well. Yeah. Again, it's the complete package again, it's another 10 out of 10. I don't know how they did this and the story is not over yet. The roller coaster keeps on going. These girls

are the absolute height of pop music. Yes, he had really raised a good point there in terms of it being fun to sing along and I used to be in a sorry to say it probably fairly pish scar band

whose name I shall not mention here but we used to do a cover of this and it was probably the highlight of the set it was fun to play even with the scar rhythm and we made sure that we retained the give you everything in this I swear I just promise you'll always be there and it was that you know

people would just shout along with it because it does cut through all resistance and I think the hard-edgedness of this then bringing a bit more of a as I say I always get in the best possible way a lot of kind of Stevie Wonder from this not just the harmonica but I think the synth landscape it wouldn't it sounds wonderfully kind of different surrounded by these other songs in 1996 but I don't think it would have sounded quite as alien on something like Talking Book for instance by Stevie Wonder.

Can I give you a specific song that I completely agree and as you all know I'm a huge Stevie Wonder fan and the one that I think this actually does have DNA with I wish I think really does

sound a little bit like this Oh yeah I get that Just has that driving rhythm and has a lot of the same instrumentation a lot of the same kind of melodic tricks Yeah, it can pay no higher compliments than that Then yes this actually does sound

quite adjacent to Stevie Wonder It does as I say I mean that's just such a It was meant has no kind of no criticism whatsoever because I love Stevie Wonder too especially 70s Stevie Wonder

it's just as I say I was trying to find something a little bit contrary and a different to say about this one so it wasn't just oh it's brilliant oh it's really well arranged oh they sing it really well and the one thing I could say is it's like look in my mind

I can hook this back to its influences more which isn't much of a criticism really especially not in 1996 off the back of wannabe and you're quite right that it's just it's another complete package and the video to go with it and as I say it's look pick it asked me on another day this might be my favourite but you know it's just surprised me how much I have enjoyed a rediscovering wannabe and the the others the other singles that will follow but yeah fantastic track it's the same for me enough

I can I mean it's it's it's weird because spice girls are one of my absolute favorite acts and I love almost every song of this I can never ever choose a favourite it's so hard it's different different day different answer like this is one of the three or four that I sometimes choose but two become one who do you think you are

lady is a vamp even and stop and too much all of those like I can never choose a favourite it's just it's an embarrassment of riches isn't it really and it is amazing to think at the time when

it was just want to be that people didn't know what else was coming. It's like, I feel so jealous of people sat in 1996, not knowing like, ah, it's not just wannabe, you think that was good? Here's all the rest, you know. It's just, yeah, lovely, lovely. I say that like I wasn't there. I was there. Yeah, but they're probably expecting the, you know, the standard big budget rollout and then

variations on a theme to diminishing returns afterwards, but they kept shaking it up. And they kept working hard, as you say. I think hard working is a good way of putting it. But they did make it so difficult for themselves, really, because, like, I don't know if you would all agree with this. I would be interested to know if you both agree with this, actually. They're like, I think even if you're not ultimately a one-hit wonder, if your debut single is clearly your peak,

then history will still remember you as a one-hit wonder, even when you weren't. But even if statistically you weren't and you had loads of other top ten singles, if you peaked and clearly peaked with your debut single, then that's it. you still won't ever get past that. And I think there are examples of history with that really. And I think that was the challenge

that they faced here. They had to be just as big as wannabe, or they were never going to recover for it. Yeah. Procol harum, my darling, prokulharam. I don't even like a white, a shade of pale very much, and they are one of my favourite bands. But can you name me,

Andy, another prokulharam song? Fuck no. Of course I can't. They were an albums band Well, speaking of an act Who were definitely an albums band And didn't prioritise Cheap Disposable Singles The fourth song up this week

Is this Well, actually, because of some editing I had to do, it's these As I walk in this land The broken dreams I have visions of a manate But happiness Is just an illusion

Filled with sadness And confusion What becomes Are the broken heart in Who happens? Love that's an avidavit party I know I've got to my way to Saturday night at the movies

Who cares what picture you see When you're hugging with your baby In the last row of the battle you need Well, there's technical and cinema school I guess I'll Walk on for your dreams be tossed and love okay so this is what becomes of the broken-hearted

saturday night at the movies and you'll never walk alone by robson and jerome released as the lead single from the duo's second studio album titled take two this triple A-side single is Robson and Jerome's third single to be released in the UK and their third to reach number one. However, as of 2025, it is their last. This triple A-side single went straight in at number one as a brand-new entry. It stayed at number one for two weeks. In its first week atop the charts, it sold 196,000 copies. competition from Angel by Simply Red. I belong to you by Gina G.

Curses. And don't make me wait by 9-1-1. Shit. And in week two it sold 113,000 copies beating competition from Stranger in Moscow by Michael Jackson. No justice. One and won by Robert Miles. Hillbilly Rock and Hillbilly Roll by the Woolpackers. And I'll never break your heart by Backstreet Boys.

Fuck everything. When it was knocked off the top of the charts, Triple A side single, fell two places to number three. By the time it was done on the charts, it had been inside the top 100 for 18 weeks. The song is currently officially certified platinum in the UK as of 2025. Andy, because I made you wait so long to speak about the spy skills, I'll give you a treat. You can go first on Robson and Jerome, what becomes of the broken-hearted, Saturday night at the movies

and you'll never walk alone You're so kind Thank you so much Love you Rob So with this I'm going to use an analogy So you both know Peep Show

Yeah Oh yeah And there's a scene in Peep Show Where Super Hands Is locked in a toilet In Mark's flat The doors The locks broken on the door

And for a few seconds Everybody calmly thinks, well, okay, we can call someone, let's, how do we sort this out? How do we get them out of there? Before Super Hands just instantly just goes, this is bullshit and just kicks the door in. And that is exactly

how this made me feel. Because I thought, I really tried for about a song and a half's worth out of the three to be like, okay, well, let's think about this, what points we're going to make, what features does this have? And then I just saw the red mist and just thought, what are I doing?

This is bullshit. All of these songs are absolute garbage. All of them. Everything they ever released is absolute landfill. Like, it's not worth the effort that it took to print it. It's not worth the five minutes that it took to record any of these songs. It's like, it's absolute hot garbage. So I just, like, I've really failed to engage with any of them.

But I'll very briefly touch on all three, and I won't waste any more time on it. So what becomes the broken-hearted is probably for my money the least terrible of the three, just because I think it suits them a bit more. And I think it's not quite as ginsy and rattled off and done in music 2000s as the other two are, to be honest. It feels like there's been some suggestions. It's the only one of the three that I can actually picture Robson and Jerome themselves maybe going, oh, like this song, why don't we do this song? you know that there actually might have been a little bit of genuine artistic intent there

just a just a kernel just a smidgen of artistic intent there saturday night of the movies is just like you know nakedly going for the audience that loves them it's going for that you know you're only at a family party and there's a specific type of old woman who does that dance you know the kind of arms arms at your sides sort of shuffling like you carry in a couple of heavy weights in your arm but you just do that sort of indistinct shuffle you know that type of audience who just love robson jerome i imagine and it's like yeah you're picking a old 60s standard that they already love you might as well don't build me up but a cup but you probably can't do it that's probably a bit too complicated for you too um and it's just going for the lowest hanging fruit possible like the fruit isn't hanging you're picking fruit up off the floor and saying look at this fruit i just picked if the fruit is hanging that low um and has a terrible terrible backing track terrible backing track so that one gets thrown straight into the bin. And as we'll never walk alone, this is the one where I really saw the red mist and this really pissed me off. I have an unusual history with this song because I was brought

up in a family of devout Evertonians. And I was never really that into football myself. And by the time I'd finished childhood, I was not into football at all. But it's like a religion in Liverpool. Like it really is. It's something that it's sort of hardwired into your head. So when I went to uni and I was making my own decisions. I still wasn't really wearing red for a couple of years and I still like instinctively didn't like anything to do with Liverpool, football, not the city, Liverpool, the football club. And so you'll never walk alone. It's like that, that's like playing the devil's music.

Like that song would never ever be allowed in the house. And so I never heard that song at all until I was an adult because it's just banned. It's like, you know, sort of blacklisted music. But then when I was in uni, we got given an assignment. Funnily enough, one of two assignments that were about Judy Garland. Funnily enough, I guess uni's really are turning people gay, aren't they? But we got one assignment about Judy Garland, which was, well, I tell you what, the one that really was turning people gay is that we had three different versions of

Don't Rain on My Parade, and we had to compare the relative levels of camp between the three songs that we had to write an essay about camp. One was Barbara Streisand, one was Judy and, one was Judy and, and Liza singing it together. That was the campus. And I can't remember what the other one was. May Palm Death. The other Judy Garland-related one we had was that we got given...

It was a similar thing. We got given two versions of You'll Never Walk Alone, which was the Jerry and the Pacemakers version and Judy Garland's, which I think she did that in like late 50s, early 60s. And it was basically not compare them on a musical level, not the music itself, but compare them in terms of their tonal qualities, the signifiers. what's kind of coming out of these songs,

like what's being expressed, what the vision is behind each of these versions of the song. And although I'd been brought up to despise this music and think, oh, this is shit, I fell deeply in love with Judy Garland's version of that song. It's beautiful, and I'm going to request it now on the air that we play that as the outro to this episode, because Judy's version of You'll Never Walk Alone is absolutely stunning.

it's like the sort of feeling you get from really great Nina Simone music it's like it's so soulful and so full of heart it kind of feels like someone is sitting with you through the darkest night of your life and watching the sun come up with you like it's really just unbelievably beautiful it really kind of stuck with me like what a powerful song that is and what a powerful performance that is Jerry and the pacemaker's paled in comparison but you know sort of give it a pass because of the connection

to the Hillsborough disaster and how much it's meant to people since then. This didn't even get a look in that essay. I didn't even know this existed and I can see why because this is just an insult to that song where as much as it's not my favourite song in the world it is with the right singer extremely powerful. It does have some really lovely messages and with Liverpool fans

it's taken on a meaning that means far more than anything that is in the text itself. And what really annoys me, I am going to actually call this out is that this is after Hillsborough and it's not long after Hillsborough. I am calling this out as they're cashing in on it here.

They know what they're doing. This is only six, seven years after Hillsborough has happened. This is easy point. So you go, oh, let's see if you can get a few Liverpool fans singing along to this. You'll never walk alone. Shitty cover that we're doing.

That is right out of the Simon Cowell textbook to do that. It's incredibly poor taste. You could not get away with that these days and it's an indictment of everybody who thought that was a good idea. It's just a disgusting thing to do. But also it just saps all the soul out of the song.

It's just a horrible, horrible, horrible cover of it. So I've said enough, I've wasted enough time. All of these covers are absolute garbage, as is the same with everything they've ever done. Quick quiz question for you. So all of the songs that they've done, all seven songs that got to number one for them, they were all covers.

Which of them was most recently written? And in what year was it written? Would it be what becomes of the broken-hearted in the early 70s? Right song, but not the right year. That was the 66. Was it 66? It was 66. 66.

So every single song they have ever released is at least 30 years old, and the oldest of which Wycliffe's Dover was written in 1940. Isn't that just appalling? I will get my bit out of the way. and then I'll duck for cover when Ed comes in, although I will just say that what becomes of the Broken Hearted was re-released in 1974, which is where I think my confusion came in,

reached number eight in 1974 after a bit of a re-release. I didn't know that. But, yeah, so what becomes the Broken Hearted, the instrumental track sounds better here. Live instrumentation, it actually sounds like, not as cheap and tacky as usual. That's pretty much it. I think if this single was, if this was just what becomes of the broken hearted,

I might have just about resisted pie hole in this. It's not good, but it has a similar appeal-ish to words by Boyzone, you know, respectful and tender, but also very boring and flat and uninspiring and okay, fine. But it's the other two, really, that drag this into the pie hole. I've kind of tried to scrub them from my memory a little bit, but we go back into chintzy karaoke instrumentals the two guys sounding like they're singing at gunpoint it's all mawkish and empty

I don't know I think this episode we have seen the beginning of the influence of both Simon Cowell and Louis Walsh together and the the misery that they will wreak upon the charts for the next 15 years after this point and the legacy that they will leave behind because this indicates the future we're heading for, you know, this is the kind of thing that sells millions. Simon Cowell and Louis Walsh know this.

One of those where you could argue that it reduces pop to being something purely transactional, but also one of those where you could argue that it understands that like this is what the market demands, this is where it's going. And because of that, I am piehole in this, but I don't hate it with every fibre of my being purely, because I don't think this is the worst of this type of thing.

And we're not that far away on this show from having to do this basically every fucking Christmas because, I mean, not to give all our plans away, but obviously the plan after we do the 90s is to do the 2010s. And the early 2010s in particular, and it has a bit of a revival during COVID, the absolute fucking black hole minefield for this sort of thing. and Robson and Jerome can have a point

for being an earlier less demoralizing version of this sort of thing but I'm just a bit tired this kind of stuff just makes me feel apathetic to the point where it feels like I'm just I've been crushed really at the bottom of the ocean I just I feel like I have no power

in my muscles or my bones to hate this to the degree that it probably requires I just kind of acquiesce in misery. Ed, Robinson and Jerome, you can have the final word on these two. So, that was Unchained Melody on the floor in there. And I guess that was, I believe, in the wood chipper.

And these three songs in 1996. And for what? For a little bit of money. There's more to life than a little money, you know? Don't you know that? And here we are. And it's a beautiful day. well I just don't understand it

by the way speaking of Everton Andy I learned this week and you were probably already aware of this of one of the best shop names in the world which is associated with Everton Football Club do you know about this

Is it that they have a they deliberately bought a unit in Liverpool 1 and called the shop Everton 2 so that the address is Everton 2 Liverpool 1 yeah that is so good it makes me want to like football but I don't

That is the kind of beautiful, petty shit that you can only do when you're not a trophy rival with your local rival. Rob, you are absolutely signing your death warrant with Everton Fanzer, you know, you really are, because the thing is, what you say is absolutely true, completely correct, that the only reason that they are able to do that kind of petty shit and it not look ridiculous is because they are minnows in the league and they will never challenge for anything. But you can't ever actually say that to them.

They will always deny that. And there's two things that are true about Everson fans, and my dad in particular, which is that they are the most bitter and twisted football fans you will ever see in your life who take genuine joy out of being miserable and angry. And the other thing that is true about them is that not one of them will ever admit it.

Having supported a club who, for the first 15 years of my life, were in Everton's position, I get it. Like, I totally get it. It is the only thing that you can do where it's like, yeah, we'll win in that way and it's having Everton 2 at Liverpool 1. At least that's clever. At least that's clever, come on.

All right then, so that is the end of this week's episode. Before we go, Andy, I'm just going to check the Chemical Brothers, Boys' Own, Spice Girls and Robson and Jerome. Where are they all going? So with setting sun, well, the sun's not setting, the sun is rising and reversing time. That's going into the vault, Just squeaking in there.

I just thought it was just interesting enough to get into the vault for me. Words, well, words are all they have and words are not enough. That's getting pie holed. Say you'll be there. Well, where they'll be is the vault, obviously. Just promise they'll always be there.

Oh, they're always staying in that vault. And as for Robson and Jerome, well, it's a one, two, three triple punch into the pie hole. You know, in Super Smash Brothers where you do that super powerful punch at the end that punches them off the face of the earth and it knocks them out and destroys them in one punch?

That's what I'm doing to this fucking triple A side that manages to be awful, manages to be vaguely offensive about a recent tragedy and manages to insult the art form of music itself in one fell swoop. I would happily erase this from history and make it a crime to ever mention it. Yeah, I would say,

setting sun i'm vaulting that i'm happy with that words is just just skirting on the edge of the pie hole but it's not dropping in say you'll be there that's a vault pretty comfortably and then that triple a side is a pretty comfortable pie uh for me so ed setting sun words say you'll be there and that triple a side yeah i've pretty probably pretty much clearly indicated them all so i'll say Chemical Brothers it's not going anywhere It's close But not quite

Boisone More like Poison Poison Poison I can work on that one Enjoy To buy scales

Easy Volt Clearly the best thing here Robson and Jerome Have been taken The earth spat them out But I managed to convince the hungry earth that they were cannon and ball

so it begrudgingly composted the fuckers so save the space in the pie hole for someone less slash more deserving and thank whatever deity or lack of a deity you worship

that we won't hear him again on this show there's no sex tuple no sex tuple a side is waiting to roll around the corner like some evil fucking die where every face is ruination. We don't have to talk about them again.

I would just like to say, I'm very sorry to the listener who reached out to us with a comment about what Robson and Jerome meant to him and his mum. They used to kind of bond over these tracks. And I said that I felt pretty rotten

about having driven them into the ground. Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot about that. Double down on actually driving them completely through the floor. So my apologies to you, but no apologies to Robson and Jerome. Good fucking riddance, goodbye, farewell, our feed are same. Yeah. I forgot about that.

I feel really bad. I'm sorry, yeah. I feel like we should put a chart music style warning at the top of the episode, which is like, we may coat down your favourite band or artist, but we never forget, they've been at number one, and we haven't. Yes, but they made this So I feel like the Superior Party That's true

And we did get to number eight once On the music commentary podcast chart in the UK We did get to number eight once Hey I did a podcast once That was on the Singaporean charts briefly But it's actually true I am proud

I am proud of that We had listeners for a while in Slovenia Of all places Croatia Croatia we did what we did decently in Croatia Yeah Hey that's nothing to Croat oh Ed

I've just got that nothing to grow up oh god all right we will call time on this one and we will see you next time bye bye for now bye bye

bye though your dreams be just and blown with hope in your heart and you never walk alone. Oh