Hits 21 - 2001 (2): Shaggy & RikRok, Westlife, Hear'Say, Emma Bunton

Episode Date: November 6, 2022

Hello again, everyone, and welcome back to Hits 21, the show that's taking a look back at every UK #1 hit single of the 21st century - from January 2000, right through to the present day. Twitter: @Hits21UK Email: [e-mail]

Hit 21! Hits 21. All right there, everyone, and welcome back to Hits 21, where me, Rob. Me, Andy. And me, Lizzie. Look back at every single UK number one of the 21st century from January 2000 right through to the present day. If you want to get in touch with us, you can find us over on Twitter. We are

at Hits21UK That is at Hits21UK and you can email us too. Just send it over to Hits21Podcast at gmail.com. Thank you so much for joining us again. Just like our previous episodes,

we'll be looking back at four number one singles from the year 2001. We're not in the year 2000 anymore. I always feel very happy when I get to put an added number onto the end of 2000. Because it just reminds me that we're no longer stuck in the first year where the show is definitely moving on. This time we'll be covering the period between the 4th of March and the 14th of April in 2001.

Before we come on to this week, we're just going to take a quick glance back at last week. Our poll winner on Spotify was Hole Again. Of course. Damn straight. The only sensible choice, really.

Yeah, as a big fan of rolling, I understand why that wouldn't have been the sensible consensus choice. I realise I don't put enough effort in with regards to promoting that poll. I just kind of stick it on the episode and then

mention the winner a week later. So what I'll do is just alert anybody who listens to us who doesn't know. If you go onto Spotify and you go onto our podcast page on Spotify, and if you go onto our latest episode, there's a poll underneath it that you can vote in, and it'll just be for what your favourite song is of that week. So please go and do it we get enough votes to get

the opinion of a decent cross section of our listeners but the more the merrier and everybody's opinion is completely valid, please don't troll on the vote, please be entirely serious with your vote, that's the only thing that I would

ask but you know as Terry Covelly says in the I'm entirely serious with your vote. That's the only thing that I would ask. But, you know, as Terry Covelly says in the thick of it, if you go to a high school bully and say, please don't tickle me, that's when they really go for it. So, yeah, I may have left myself open to some shit polls in the future that will really skew things up, but never mind. Another thing we could do to promote it is every time anyone says the word poll, we can just add in a... over the top of it, so that really instills it into people's heads.

And if you do vote, we won't do that. So there we go. I'll hold you hostage to that. Go vote, or we'll put obnoxious sound effects on it. Well, Andy, I'm going to leave that bit in just so I can do the... The big claxon every time you say pole. And I probably have to do it when I've just said pole two times. Every time I say what?

Now, pole. That's our secret word of the day. Anyway, as always, we're going to introduce each new episode by giving you some news and pop culture headlines from around the time that these four songs were number one in the UK. Divers at Coniston Water in the Lake District searching for the speedboat that once belonged to Donald Campbell, recover the wreckage, along with Campbell's remains. The boat had been lying at the bottom of the lake ever since 1967, when Campbell was killed while attempting to break the World Water Speed record. Meanwhile, the Eden Project in Cornwall opens all of its doors to the public for the first time. The visitor attraction in the town of St Austell had opened partially

in the year 2000, but it wouldn't be until March 2001 that the full site was available for visits. The Eden Project would go on to be a filming location for 2002 awful James Bond film Die Another Day, and is said to have contributed £1 billion

to the Cornwall economy and has contributed the end of Pierce Brosnan's career as James Bond. Amazing. And in sport, Manchester United are confirmed as Premier League champions for the third season in a row and the seventh time in nine seasons. Arsenal finished second, while Liverpool and Leeds United finished third and fourth respectively. Manchester City, Coventry City and Bradford City are all relegated. But things will turn around on that front in the future that's why I've decided to because it's the first proper chance we've had to put that in so I mean we could have kind of done it last year

but I figured hey new year why don't we just put in the Premier League winners every year. Just you watch out for Bradford City they're going to take over good joke City got relegated out of the Premier League where they belong to be honest Andy we did belong out of the Premier League for a very long time but things are

things are better now it's a funny story well it's a funny story about this actually um i became a city fan in 99 um and i went to a couple of games in like 99 and 2000 when we were in the second tier the year that under joe royal city were promoted into the premier league and then i kind of stopped paying attention. And I remember some kid coming up to me at some soccer school during the May to June half term and with a newspaper in his hand saying, ah, City got relegated.

And I'm like, oh, did we? I didn't even know we were still playing. Because like I was six, seven years old and it was like, what? Oh, I didn't realise that football just ended forever last year There's a kid with a newspaper in his hands

have you just come from the 1830s? Well yeah Extra, extra, extra City relegated Yeah I know it was What day is it young boy? Why it's relegation day Well Lizzie you'll be familiar with where I was what day is it, young boy? Why, it's Renegation Day!

Well, Lizzie, you'll be familiar with where I was. Andy, you won't be yet, but you may be, which it was Avondale Recreation Centre in Stockport. And I was upstairs above the sports hall and the swimming area where you had that viewing platform where you could look out onto both halls. And I was sat at a table and some kid wandered up to me with a newspaper with the Premier League table and he put it down on the table in front of me and pointed at it

and just went like, look, shitty city got relegated or something like that. And I'm like, okay, I'm seven years old, leave me alone. Like, you know, be nice. I love the idea that he spent his pocket money on the newspaper just to lord it over some kid he doesn't know. I know. Can I buy the paper, Governor? It happens to bundle.

Can I order Telegraph, please? Oh, God. The films to hit the top of the UK box office during this period are as follows. Enemy at the Gates for one week, Miss Congeniality for two weeks, and Rugrats in Paris the movie for one week. And the first series of Celebrity Big Brother

broadcasts on Channel 4 in aid of Comic Relief. Comic Relief will rear its head again when we get into talking about the songs this week. The eventual winner after a week-long series was comedian Jack D. ITV, meanwhile, airs the 5,000th episode of Coronation Street.

Just for context, by the way, we're more than 40 years into Corrie at this point, in 2001. Last year, they aired the 10,000th episode. So they're going at double the rate these days. Jesus Christ. Yeah. Anyway. Feels like it. In this 2001 episode, Ryan Sykes breaks into Emma and Kelly Watts' house, remember them,

where Emma finds him, talks him around, and then lets him go. Meanwhile, Ken Barlow says an emotional farewell to Adam, who has chosen to live with his father, Mike Baldwin, instead. I remember that. that was nice. In terms of other British series that make their debuts during this time we've got the Channel 4 comedy drama Teachers which my dad was a huge fan of and the Channel 5 endurance games show Touch the Truck which was hosted by Dale Winton and saw 20 contestants aiming to win a Toyota Land Cruiser by ensuring they were the last person to keep their hand on said truck. And I spent the whole time reading that sentence, picturing in my head, Lynn, idea for a TV show.

20 people touch the truck. Must not repeat not turn into an all-night rave. Well, I actually watched some of this and then sent you to the link did you know it's mental did you watch any of this it's insane i'd seen it before it's crazy it's just the lengths that they go to that woman who eventually finishes second i forget her name she was given a 15 minute medical break because her blood oxygen levels went so low that she couldn't stand up anymore and like there was a guy who hallucinated that he was in a job interview or something like that along the way he's like he's just there's a camera on the truck looking at him and he's got both his hands on the truck and he

seems like he's you know kind of all there and then something comes over him and he just starts talking as if he's giving a job interview and the at that point the doctors come over and go you're right mate um we're just going to take you away from the truck and we'll make you go and sit down uh this is probably a bit dangerous for you now to be honest it's like that a bit like that netflix show awake from the other year have you seen that is this making people stay awake for however long yeah so well it's more sadistic than that so it's whoever stays awake the longest but you still don't win the money even if you do that so while you're staying awake as time passes for 24 hours or whatever you're given like a limitless box of

pennies and you count out the pennies one by one and put them into a second box and spend all your time doing that and you have to count it and remember how much you've counted and you win that if after 24 hours of staying awake and doing all sorts of activities that distract you you then have to remember the number of exactly what you counted and if you're with like £1000 away from it

you don't get it it's just like the most sadistic thing in the world that you have to deprive people of sleep to the point of exhaustion and then maybe not give them the money it's mental it's absolutely crazy yeah somewhere in the world that's someone's thing meanwhile in the u.s wcw monday nitro broadcasts its final show from panama city beach florida with a simulcast with the WWF's Monday Night Raw television series, officially ending a six-year-long rating struggle

in professional wrestling known as the Monday Night Wars. Also in this period was WrestleMania 17, which still is widely regarded as possibly the greatest wrestling show of all time. What happened? A lot of things. It ended with Stone Cold beating The Rock and turning heel by aligning with Vince McMahon. Okay.

Meanwhile, in American comedy, I guess you could say, yeah, Malcolm in the Middle makes its debut on British TV, as does Will and Grace. Oh, lovely. Yeah, they came... You see, it's in that era of TV that doesn't really exist anymore where you would hear about a show from America. Oh, and don't the Americans like that?

And then at the end of the first season, if it had done really well in the US, it would get syndicated and then we'd get it and oh all this new american show oh let's sit down and watch it and i seem to remember uh andy you'll know more about this than me that's how lost came to the uk right it is so for those who don't know the reason why you may know this why i might know this is because i used to host a podcast about Lost called Flashback, a Lost podcast available on all good podcast providers. And yes, the answer to that is that Lost didn't

start in the UK until after Season 2 had started airing in the US over a year later. Which meant that when I got into it, I could just catch up on like 30 episodes online by entirely legal means. But yeah. And also around that time Sky One lost the

rights to it and so Lost just went off the air in the UK for like three years and that was normal for shows that were big in the US to just disappear from the UK and because it was the early days of the internet they were just gone. That happened all the time. It was a really weird era where we were not quite there with globalization yet so we were about halfway there, It was a really weird era where we were not quite there with globalisation yet. So we were about halfway there. It's a bit weird. Yeah, I'm trying to think what the last show like that was.

Because I'm pretty sure Mad Men did a similar thing. Like it started on BBC, but only about a year after it first aired. And then it just got gobbled up by Sky like everything does. Yeah. Andy, how are the album charts looking at this point in history? Have the Beatles left yet? The Beatles have left. They left last week

and got replaced by Texas and by Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavoured Water but only for a week each. And also Dido replaced them last week as well. This week it's looking very varied. There's a lot of sort of random ones that are in and out.

So Dido remains at the top of the chart with No Angel, continuing that six-week run that took her ten times platinum with that album that I think exists in most people's households or most people's families' households, that album that exists. It was replaced by Songbird by Eva Cassidy. Whenever I say the word Songbird, I picture Ben de la Creme saying that word as Maggie Smith on Drag Race.

I just wrote Songbird, so I just had to mention that. Anyway, Eva Cassidy was only number one for two weeks, though, before she was replaced by a little group called Hearsay with their album Popstars stars inspired by the tv show pop stars in which they've assembled a group of five pop stars um more about them at another time potentially um and after two weeks at number one they were replaced by the stereophonics with their new album just enough education to perform which just ekes in at the very end of this period that we're covering this week. Stereophonics are a band I have very little to say about,

which is a problem because they're going to be coming up in the future. I will say that was a fairly drab era for albums that we've just covered there. Eva Cassidy here saying Stereophonics. You're all right, mate. It's okay. All available now in a charity shop near you. And have been for about 15 years. Lizzie, how are the States looking? Yeah, another very busy period on the singles chart.

Stutter by Joe featuring Mystical would be number one for most of March before eventually giving way to Butterfly by Crazy Town for one week and then Angel by Shaggy featuring Ravon for one week and then Butterfly again for one week. Yeah, so Butterfly would finish at number 29 on the year-end Hot 100 and Angel would finish slightly higher at number 17. 29 on the year-end Hot 100 and Angel would finish slightly higher at number 17. Meanwhile by April 14th Janet Jackson will begin a seven-week run at number one with All For You which was narrowly beaten to number one in the UK by a song we're covering this very episode. It would finish at

number three on the year-end list. At number two was Fallin' by Alicia Keys which was actually number one for most of the period after 9-11 and at number one do you want to take any guesses? because I guarantee you won't get it oh I don't know, from around this time? no I don't know, go on 2001 is Hanging by a Moment by Lifehouse

what? I don't even know that yeah me neither for the second year in a row a really fun fact, for the second year in a row really fun fact for the second year in a row the number one song on the year end list didn't get to number one

on the weekly charts wow how weird is that one of those weird things yeah yeah also in terms of albums Shaggy would still be at number one

until mid March with Hot Shot before giving away to Every Day by Dave Matthews Band for two weeks. Everyday went triple platinum in the US and finished at number 20 on their year-end list, but it only got to number 89 on the UK weekly charts.

After that, Hotshot by Shaggy would return to number one for another two weeks and would eventually be overtaken by Tupac's posthumous album Until the End of Time, which went four times platinum one for another two weeks and would eventually be overtaken by tupac's posthumous album until the end of time which went four times platinum and finished at number 40 on their year-end list but only got as high as number 31 in the uk weekly albums charts a lot of um a lot of differences between uk and america this week yeah i mean janna jackson jumps out at me as you know that's a big one because janna jackson is i think so so much bigger in the us than she is here you know seven seven weeks at number one in the us and she's never

really been that big deal over here to be honest like whereas in the us i think she's sort of on par with the likes of you know jlo and gaga and all those really janna jackson is right up there with those whereas i think in the UK most people would struggle to name more than one or two songs by her Yeah in the US she's up there with Michael Yeah Well she did the Superbowl

Exactly Well yeah more on that at the time She has a really good All For You is fine I think I haven't listened to it that much But the four albums that she does before that Control, Rhythm Nation Those are really good. Like, All For You is fine, I think. I haven't listened to it that much. I like All For You. But the four albums that she does before that, Control, Rhythm Nation, Janet, and The Velvet Rope,

they're great records. I like all of those. Absolutely. Yeah. Totally agree. I am a fan of those. So, thank you for that comprehensive report, Lizzie. No worries. And now we're going to move on into our four songs for the week.

And the first of the number one singles we'll be talking about this week is this. Hello, man. Hello. Open up, man. What do you want, man? My girl just caught me.

You made her catch you? I don't know how I let this happen. But who? The girl next door, you know. I don't know what to do. So it wasn't you. All right. Honey came in and she caught me red-handed,

creeping with the girl next door. Picture this, we were both butt naked, banging on the bathroom door. How could I forget that I had given her an extra key? All this time she was standing there, she never took her eyes off me Oh, you finna go, my love, since you're a villa Just for some weakness, I'll let you clean up your pillow You better watch your back before you turn into a killer

Best of you, the situation that you cause a winner To be a true player, you finna know how to play If she say a night, can't be so say a day Never admit to a word where she say And if she claim a you, tell her baby no way But she caught me on the counter Wasn't me Saw me banging on the sofa

Wasn't me I even had her in the shower Wasn't me She even caught me on camera Wasn't me She saw the marks on my shoulder, heard the words that I told her Heard the screams getting louder, she stayed until it was over Honey came in and she caught me red-handed, creeping with the girl next door Picture this, we were both butt naked, banging on the bathroom door

I had tried to keep her from what she was about to see Why should she believe me when I told her it wasn't me? Okay, it's It Wasn't Me by Shaggy and Rick Rock. Released as the lead single from Shaggy's fifth studio album that Lizzie mentioned before, entitled Hot Shot, It Wasn't Me was Shaggy's eighth single to chart in the UK and his third to reach number one, after O'Carolina and Mr. Boombastic both reached the summit in 1993 and 1995. It Wasn't Me went straight in at number one as a new entry, knocking Atomic Kitten off the top of the charts. It stayed at number one for one week, selling 345,000 copies in its only week atop the charts.

Jesus Christ. That is such an anomaly. Wow. It really, really is. That's almost ten times what Limp Bizkit did. It beat competition from Nobody Wants To Be Lonely by Ricky Martin and Christina Aguilera, which got to number four. I'm Like A Bird by Nelly Furtado.

That's a name. That got to number five. So Why So Sad by Manic Street Preachers, which got to number eight. And also Found That Soul by Manic Street Preachers, which got to 8 and also Found That Soul by Manic Street Preachers which got to number 9. When it was knocked off the top spot, It Wasn't Me fell one place to number 2. After leaving the charts in 2001, it charted again in 2002, then again in 2012 and then

again in 2014. It was officially named the biggest selling song in the UK of the year 2001, it went on to sell nearly 1.5 million copies in the UK and to this day it has spent a total of 30 weeks inside the top 100 so we are dealing with quite a big... It is quite a big deal. I do think, though, that 30 weeks is relatively light for a song that did this well, to be honest. And also, one week at number one for the biggest song of the year.

It's just crazy. Wow. Yeah. It's really strange, though, because it doesn't go straight out of the top ten or anything. It, like, bounces around. Like, it goes to two, then four, two then four then like seven then two again and it's just it takes a while to go yeah i think when we talk about the next song it will become clear why this wasn't number one for longer that's because yeah it will definitely become uh clearer i just want to say as well

before we go too far into this um there was one song in the year 2000 that sold a million copies or eventually went on to sell a million copies and as we all know that was Bob the Builder there are four songs in the year 2001 that all went on to sell a million copies one of them was Whole Again the next one is It Wasn't Me and then the third and

fourth entries are the next two songs on this episode which means that the four songs that sold a million copies in the year 2001 were all number one, one after the other. So that means that all five that were in this two-year period were released between December and March.

And basically March, yeah. Wow. What a busy time. Wow, crazy. Really, really is something. I think that's why I have quite vivid memories of all of these songs this week compared to like

slightly hazier bits before and afterwards like all of these songs maybe apart from the final one this week they all feel like moments in pop chart history they all feel like pretty big moments to me and so at least for this week the

first of this the first of these moments uh is it wasn't me lizzie was this a moment for you it was a moment for me um i do remember it pretty well i don't think it was really a moment but i guess i'll start with a question is it fair to call this a novelty song yes yes i was going to raise the exact same point right i was going to raise this as a question of is this comedy factor that around shaggy in general intentional or not do we all think yes yes i think in this song, okay. I don't know about the rest, because, like, I haven't... Other than Mr. Boombastic, it's kind of... Oh, and Angel, obviously, which is coming later this year.

But, yeah, I think with this in particular, like, this is based on a comedy routine by, I think, Eddie Murphy, right? by, I think, Eddie Murphy, right? And it's like, you know, I feel like the joke does wear off quite quickly, as in it's like, he's given all of this advice and then the punchline is, the other guy turns around and says, well, I think you're talking out of your arse.

Off he goes, and that's kind of it. But I don't know, this has had, it's had a longer lasting effect because i think at the time we probably didn't know that this sort of defense of just like saying it wasn't me when it plainly was you and that there's clearly evidence that it was you that's recorded would become a much bigger thing in popular culture and i think it's maybe had a bit of a bad effect in that sense at least as far as the song itself goes i think it's i think it's okay it definitely does have its moments and it's it's kind of nice to hear it in in isolation again

but i think after the first time i just don don't see who's, who's like buying this after the third or fourth listen, once the, the penny's dropped, that it's clearly just, hey, the guy's giving bad advice, I guess it is just the hook is kind of irresistible in that sense of, you know, it was me, and that's the whole thing, um, and I also think it just, it goes on a little bit too long. You know, after the last sort of bit where Rick Rock says, you might think you're a player and such and such. That's the end of the song, but then it carries on. There's another like 40 seconds after that

where he just goes back to the butt naked thing. And it's like, this doesn't really need to be here so yeah i kind of think it's it's all right um i don't i don't definitely don't hate it but i don't love it either yeah i feel quite similarly but what about you andy i feel very similarly as well um the first kind of point i wanted to raise was a different possible 90s inspiration, which maybe is just a coincidence, or maybe it was inspired by that Eddie Murphy routine from the 90s.

That might possibly explain it. But the thing that always comes to my head with this song is there is an episode of The Simpsons in the 90s where Bart Simpson quite clearly does something that's entirely his fault and then looks at the crowd and says i didn't do it and it really really takes off to the point where a single is released of him repeatedly saying the phrase i didn't do it and

it gets really old really fast it's a novelty hit and then it disappears and bart is completely forgotten i feel like that must surely have factored into this in some way. It's the exact same intent. It's the exact same idea behind the song of it clearly was you, but you're saying it wasn't, which is a source of humour. Say the line, Shaggy. Yeah, it is.

Intentionally or not, it's very similar to the I didn't do it thing. Yeah. Anyway, that was just sort of what came to mind with me. I think that this just sort of what came to mind with me. I think that this is sort of... I see why it's popular, but not for the reasons that I think most people like it. I think most people are

really into the It Wasn't Me aspect of the song, which for me is really tiresome and I don't like at all. But I actually quite like Rick Rock's sections. By the way, Rick Rock, so obscure, doesn't even have a Wikipedia page. When you click Rick Rock's name, it just goes to It Wasn't Me.

Oh. Yeah. And actually, he sort of does most of the legwork in this song, really. Like, he carries pretty much the whole song, apart from Shaggy's relatively brief, somewhat rap, somewhat singing sections in the middle and those bits are actually okay they're quite catchy you can really sing along to them

one of the things I don't like about this song is that it has that what I'm going to call Craig David quality of you know when I repeatedly called out Craig David last year for lyrics that are just weirdly fixated on certain points and go too far and kind of break the mystique slightly. I think there's a lot of that in this where the thing is, this is presented like it's going to be a story song of like, right

my girlfriend walked in on me having sex with another woman so I'm going to say it wasn't me and you'd think it would then develop from there but we don't get that. It's not a developing story we just get more and more detail about what she saw like it's just an event that that is described for three minutes straight and it goes into so much unnecessary detail like she didn't just catch you she saw you having naked sex on the bathroom floor and she came in using the key that you gave her, you were caught

very, very much red-handed, as Rick Rock says. You know, they go into such unnecessary detail about how obviously guilty he is of sleeping with this girl, that I think it just comes across, I think that's where the novelty factor comes from, that it just seems silly. It comes across as, like, over the top

of, like, how more obviously could you have been caught and so to me it doesn't really work on that level but it is really really catchy and it's a good idea like as as a sort of concept it works i just think the execution is a bit silly and i'm not 100 sure that this was supposed to be a novelty song I think it just comes across that way because the lyrics go so, so heavy on this point and make it a really kind of unsubtle, ha ha, yes, it was you because she caught you naked on the bathroom floor.

I definitely think that that aspect of it figures into the whole unsavoury side of it that comes across these days where you're being a bit of a pig, really. You clearly cheated on your girlfriend. You're trying to get away with it despite the fact you were caught red-handed and it's treated as this oh what's he like boys will be boys it's treated as that kind of thing when you know it's not and yeah it shouldn't be like gaslighting it is kind of gaslighting we should and i know it's just a song and it's just a bit of fun but we you know we

shouldn't make light of that really i. I think it probably would have worked better, a song like this being sung from the woman's perspective, of he said it wasn't me, but I caught him doing this. I think that would work much better of like, we could get behind the singer of like, yeah, he did do it. And why is he saying it wasn't him? You go get him, girl. I think that would work much, much better.

Like an Eamon Frankie type thingie i was just gonna say yeah you know we don't need to have both sides of it though i just think that version on its own would be superior and there are songs like that out there you know of about women who've walked in on their man cheating and then they've thrown them out like that that's a thing that's a whole genre of song. And this would work much better in that sense. You must not know about me. Yes, exactly. I can never love you. Exactly. And I just think that the focus of this is wrong. The intent is wrong. And the lyrics are laughable.

But having said that, it is really, really catchy. And it's in my head all the time this week because of the fact I've had to listen to it a few times. It is in my head all the time. Definitely the catchiest song of the week. But I don't know. It's a bit of a mess. And it's one of those songs that will hang around forever. I think it will be with us forever and ever

and ever because it's got that novelty factor. But I'm not sure if that's a good thing. Yeah, I agree with both of you in the sense that I think it's decent kind of novelty fun It's inherently comedic and quite transparent About that and I always appreciate a laugh

I agree with the two of you that it is very Infectious that you remember all of the Key parts and still remember them A long time after you've You know, forgotten about the song And it does a Decent job of kind of pulling you a long way before it drops the punch line that no rick rock isn't going to follow shaggy's advice

unfortunately i think yeah over the years i think people have kind of forgotten the resolution to this song and that's not necessarily the song's fault, although I would charge it with making the punchline the least catchy part of the song. Because all the stuff about, it wasn't me, go and gaslight your girlfriend, just say that it wasn't you, tell her, you know, like, this preposterous situation that they're cooking up. That's all the catchy and funny stuff. And then when it gets serious serious it's melodic and it's nice but who remembers the stuff after you know i'm sorry for nothing or whatever he says like who in which average person in the street would sing that bit first if you ask them to sing a bit from it wasn't me you know and it, it feels like the bit where, you know,

the actual resolution of the song, the emotional message that you're supposed to take away, which is, no, don't lie to your girlfriend when you've done something like this. Just own up and try and work it out. Or take your punishment like a man, you know, own up to it, that sort of thing. That's the bit that nobody really remembers

because it just kind of gets tacked on at the end as a bit of like a coda section which then is like you say lizzy overwritten slightly by going back to the bridge where he just he just repeats the situation again and i kind of like the fact that because i I had forgotten over the years that this is how the song ended. That it was Rick Rupp basically saying, yeah, you think that you're so hot, Shaggy, but, like, this is total nonsense. Like, what are you talking about? I'm just going to go and own up to my mistake and see if she'll forgive me. And that's nice. it was a nice kind of ending because it does the kind of it means that the

subject of the joke is Shaggy in the end he's the target of the joke by the end of the song but through the majority of the song that people actually remember the target of the joke is this girl whose name we never know and whose perspective we never get

and I wish they'd made that last bit a little catchier, if only so that that bit would endure just as much as the saw me banging on the counter, wasn't me, you know, that bit. But never mind. I think it's decent. I don't hate it.

If it was on, I would not turn it off. While I've been listening to these out loud um my partner has been quite open about the fact that even though she was only about three or four years old when this song came out she was you know she remembers it as you said that like you know she used to laugh about it with her dad and stuff like that so you know it's nice that it has this place in pop culture history for people um but i and i understand why it sold so many because i think it's just one of those where a country can be captured by something and clearly they were the population was at that moment in time but i wouldn't go any further

than just kind of appreciating it for what it was and nothing more really if i if i never heard this song again in my life i don't think it would matter because it just kind of goes around my head anyway and yet i never have the itch to listen to it it feels kind of half finished and it doesn't surprise me to learn that like sort of half shaggy's camp wanted to release it and half didn't even want to put it on the album and like it's got like one hit wonder written all over it except for the fact that he'd already had two hits and he has another one this year

yeah it says a lot about I can't believe Rick Rock's not got a wiki page that's that's something I really thought he would he's 50 now apparently still alive that's good but yeah

apart from that who knows I suppose I should find out what happened to Rick Rock yeah let's find out I found him on Discogs is Rick Rock on TikTok? see I was thinking about this

whether Rick Rock these days would switch to TikTok on Google did you mean um Rayvon's got

a wiki page um because he's the one that's on Angel I don't know if this is the real Rick Rock

but there's an account on Twitter with 230 followers and his website just goes to an index of page. Oh my god. It's gotta be him. I really hope that's him.

Oh, it's gotta be him. It is. Oh my god, it is him. Oh, we should have got him on. He's only got 200 followers. 230 followers. Oh my god. Oh, we should have got him on. Bloody hell. He follows eight people.

Wow. Shaggy one of them. What the fuck facts. Leah Lost, Cast Me, Dan Dan Music Man, DJ Gumshaw, Uber Facts, Zuman Miller and Ellen DeGeneres.

I mean, they are the essentials basically this is actually his twitter account that's amazing he shared a tweet in 2013 I got 1536 points while escaping from demon monkeys beat that and it's temple run

I still play temple run like everyday that is amazing what happens if you're scared half to death twice oh that that first tweet seeing john legend on stage got me thinking it's time to start recording again oh bless him so i guess since i took so long to get here this isn't gonna work right away it's all good i never give up that was his third tweet oh i want to reach out to him i want to he hasn't used a twitter account since february 2021 and he's liked a tweet that says i hope shaggy broke off some change for my man rock for that commercial. I wonder what commercial that was.

Oh. Okay. Next up is this. Uptown girl She's been living in a uptown world I bet she never had a backstreet guy I bet her mama never told her why

I'm gonna try for an uptown girl She's been living in her white red world As long as anyone with hot blood can And now she's looking for a downtown man That's what I am And when she knows what she wants from her time And when she waves up and makes up her mind Okay. Okay, this is Uptown Girl by Westlife. Released as the third single from their second album entitled Coast to Coast,

Uptown Girl is Westlife's ninth single to be released in the UK overall, and their eighth to reach number one. Released as the Comic Relief charity single for 2001, it is a cover of Billy Joel's original song from 1983 which sold over a million copies in the UK and also reached number one. Uptown Girl went straight in at number one as a new entry, knocking Shaggy and Rick Rock off the top of the charts. It stayed at number one for one week, selling 292,000 copies in its only week atop the charts. It beat off competition from Clint Eastwood by Gorillaz, which got to number four, for fuck's sake, and Shit On You by D12, which got to number ten. Yeah, that's Eminem's side project, isn't it?

Yeah. When it was knocked off the top spot, Uptown Girl fell one place to number two, and by the time it was done on the charts, it had been inside the top 100 for just 16 weeks, but that didn't stop it from selling over a million copies in the UK by the year 2021, which is when it was finally declared as a million seller

hey it's comic relief oh god this is going to happen basically every year at this exact point isn't it yep Lizzie how do we feel about Uptown Girl by Westlife a bit like Take On Me

last year it's not a terrible cover by any means, but what's the point if you're just going to play it straight and not put your own stamp on it? There's really nothing to say. Because I don't want to talk about the lyrical content of Uptown Girl or anything, because that's not the point. It's not their song. And, like, OK, you can cover what you want,

but this doesn't really do's not their song. And like, okay, you can cover what you want, but this doesn't really do anything with the song. It is just a case of, like, it's brilliant from the comic relief side because they've clearly just gone, okay, who's the biggest selling act in the UK? What's the song that most people don't dislike? You know, what will get on Radio 1 and Radio 2. This is it. You know, it's just what will make us the most money for charity.

And it does its job. And speaking of comic relief, like, this isn't great, but it's far from the worst comic relief singles, some of which have been before and some of which are still to come. Yeah. I don't want to spoil the ones which are coming but i don't think this is is quite as bad as the stonk by haylen pace for example or um what else have we got here well mama who do you think you are that's not too bad the spice girls when the Going Gets Tough by Boyzone yeah another cover

yeah yeah Love Can Build a Bridge by Cher Chrissie Hynde Naina Cherry and Eric Clapton everyone remembers that

I Wanna Be Elected by Mr Bean and Bruce Dickinson Jesus Christ yeah some of these are rough Living Doll by Cliff Richard and the Young Ones as well,

and Rocking Around the Christmas Tree by Mel and Kim. Mel's missing Kim Wilde. But yeah. But yeah. It gets... Yeah, so I'll just say it gets worse from here. But this is just okay. Andy, I know you feel a little differently,

so I'll let you go last. You can have the final say. With regards to Uptown Girl, I'm not a huge fan of the original. I don't know about you two. How do you feel about Billy Joel's version? I like it in a sort of average sense. The thing is I really like Billy Joel and I don't think it's one of Billy Joel's best but I like

Billy Joel enough that I think it you know it's all kind of automatically good because that kind of spirit is there that just kind of takes you away in so much of his music so I like it but I don't think it's a highlight of his career by any means. I don't really like it, but I don't think it's a highlight of his career by any means. I don't really like Billy Joel, but I also wouldn't rush to turn off a radio if it came on. Yeah, I feel kind of in between the two of you, which is I'm not a huge fan of the original.

I like its construction more than its delivery. I find it to be very loud. I feel like it's being shouted at me, the original. It's very clunky and noisy in a way I didn't really remember. I listened to it a few times this week and I'm just, like, I love that its melodies and various sections are really strong, that, like, the entire thing's feel, it feels like a series of bridges and choruses. The catchiest bit of the song is just the verse and then the various other bits are just you know they build a lot of suspense until it resolves back to the verse and i like songs that

go for kind of unconventional it kind of reminds me a little bit of um the world has turned and left me here by weezer which has no clear chorus but it always has it always has a sense of momentum but with uptown girl i feel like it's gone for like a phil specter sound It always has a sense of momentum. But with Uptown Girl, I feel like it's gone for a Phil Spector sound. I was going to say Frankie Valli. There's a little bit of that too, maybe just in terms of the production, but it feels like I'm being hit over the head

with a small hammer. It just, I don't know, it's just very, very loud. It really got in my ears in a way that i didn't remember i didn't really expect it to um it's just loud and very noisy in a way that i didn't really anticipate um and the westlife version is basically that but more sterile and more how do i put this comic relief you know you know? Like, the whole thing is lit up and airbrushed like it's a mid-2000s American sitcom.

It's just like, it just kind of invites itself into your life, whether you've asked for it or not. So, yeah, I'm kind of like you, Lizzie, I'm not really a fan of this, I don't think it's horrendous, but it's a song that kind of

mildly appeals to me done by a group who kind of don't appeal to me and so it lands somewhere in the middle of those two which is that i don't hate it but i also i feel like if yeah i was i was gonna say like if Westlife had a sitcom this would be playing over a montage or something absolutely, I totally agree Andy, I think you're going to beat this to death with a baseball bat

so have at it allow me to phrase my summary in the words of Catherine Tate's Nan what a load of old shit awful Allow me to phrase my summary in the words of Catherine Tate's Nan. What a load of old shit. Oh, awful.

Awful. Really awful. So possibly prefaced by the fact that, yes, I am a Billy Joel fan, not this song specifically, but, right, Westlife have this habit of covering artists that are very big swings for them that, you know, are really kind of out of their comfort zone for some reason they they went for ABBA they've they went for you know Phil Collins who is you know Phil Collins is not the most charismatic person in the world but he can carry a ballad and they thought you know why don't we do that but ten times more languid and with

Mariah Carey and then with ABBA you know they kind of did nothing to that and now they've picked an artist who the whole essence of why he is popular really I think that the whole selling point of Billy Joel is that he just oozes charisma oozes personality that there is so much kind of tone and soul and a sense of place and time with Billy Joel's music that's what's so great about piano man is what's so great about a lot of his music is that you know you really kind of get a sense of feeling from it and so when he comes out with a cheesy pop song like this you still kind of feel like you can connect with it you know you kind of feel like there is a real uptown girl that he's

singing about that this is about something in particular you can connect with this then you get this cover of it where i i you know i had i remembered this being out and it didn't register to me as you know anything special at the time but i was like yeah whatever it's a bit of a crap westlife cover whatever that's all i thought about it and when i listened to it for the first time last week i was taken aback by how bad this was as a cover. Everything they add to it detracts from the song, and everything they don't do is also a mistake. It's really so

soulless, so tacky, so tinny. They add those big, over-the-top drums to it that don't work at all. They take it down two keys, which is just shameless and really really obvious and even with that they're vocally struggling to hit the high notes as they did before on my love and on a few others as well and against all odds you know they they don't have the

singing ability for these kind of songs it's really like the way they pass it around from singer to singer means it's robbed of all kind of individuality and all sense of that it's a real girl because it's just they're jumping in. I'll sing this line. You sing that line. It's by the numbers. It's got the production of a tweenies track. It's really, really sterile to the point of being borderline unlistenable. I think I really like I really, really hate this.

And the only reason it's not, like, one of my worst songs we've covered on the whole show so far is that actually, as Lizzie said, as a song, you know, it's actually quite, it's all right, if not quite good, because I know you don't really like it that much, Lizzie, but it's all right, and that's nothing to do with Westlife. Much like I Have a Dream, it's an alright song. And I can't take that away from it.

But I don't really think there's anything at all that Westlife do on this song that they can take any positive credit for. This is a real low point. The only thing that's lower for them so far is Against All Odds. And that's taken over the edge for me by the fact that I hate that song already. Whereas this song is sort of okay. And so it's slightly rescued. But oh man, I have nothing good to say about this. Really.

I'm really fed up with Westlife at this point. I don't really feel like there's anything more to say than that. I know I've kind of torn it in you on there. But I just have nothing positive to say about this that isn't entirely credited to Billy Joel rather than Westlife. Awful, really awful, yeah. I'm glad we did get an actual Billy Joel fan perspective on this

because otherwise, like, I don't... Like, admittedly, I didn't listen to them side by side and I think if I did, I might have noticed a few more kind of weaknesses. Like you just mentioned the key change. Not the key change. I didn't mention that. Yeah, the key change.

That's another bad thing that they throw into this needlessly. But yeah, yeah. Yeah, so the key change and the pitch lowering and just how they kind of play in the safest way possible but somehow completely missed the mark i think it's a this is maybe a broader point but i think it's a mistake in general to cover songs that are really well-known classics because this was already like a big classic song before west life covered it you know it was something that i knew as a kid already which considering i was

only eight nine years old that it must have been very very already. And I think it's a mistake to do that, to cover songs that are already massive. Because what can you really, unless you're really going back to the drawing board and doing something completely outside the box with it, I just don't really see how you can ever escape the shadow of the original. So you're either just seen as cashing in on it

or as paling in comparison to it, or both, as is the case with this. I think there are other examples of that coming up. I've always thought McFly's cover of Don't Stop Me Now, as much as I like McFly, I think that was really shameless. That was for Comic Relief as well, I think. I'm not sure.

I think that might have been for Comic Relief. Yeah, it was, I'm pretty sure. And that was just like, they did nothing with it at all to straight cover. And it's like, well, what's the point then? And We Will Rock You, of did nothing with it at all to straight cover. And it's like, well, what's the point then? And We Will Rock You, of course, from last year by five. I think there are very few covers I can think of off the top of my head.

Feel free to jump in with any. There are very few covers I can think of of pre-existing massive classics that work, that actually succeed in their own right. I don't think there are very many at all. That's a challenge. Well, there's one coming up next year year which I think is kind of up there but it's because it takes it and does something completely different with it

and melds it with another song you probably know which one I'm talking about oh yeah yeah and there are a lot of covers in general that work, I've got no problem with covers as a thing but if you tackle tackling something that's already massive i just it very very very rarely works out and i think

this is a real example of that of like you're not capable of this song this isn't your song you didn't birth this so you shouldn't carry it you know it's like oh i hate it hate it yeah all right then third up this week is this crazy and I haven't been around for you lately but I had a few things on my mind when I'm with you I am filled with emotion can't you see that I'm giving you devotion and a love like this is hard to find I know I've been walking around in a daze Baby, baby You gotta believe me when I say Wherever you go I wanna be there

Whatever you do You know I wanna be there You're a symbol I'll be there for you Your eyes up, I'm gonna be there Whatever it takes I'm gonna be there You know I'm gonna be there

Pure and simple I'll be there for you Your eyes up, I'm gonna be there Okay, this is Pure and Simple by Hearsay. Released as the lead single from Hearsay's debut album entitled Popstars, as we found out earlier, Pure and Simple is also the first single released by the group in the UK after each of the five members, Mylene, Dani, Suzanne, Noel and Kim, won the ITV Talent competition Pop Stars. It is the group's

first number one in the UK, but it is not their last. Pure and Simple went straight in at number one as a new entry, knocking Westlife off the top spot. It stayed at number one for three weeks, selling 550,000 copies in its first week at number one, 242,000 copies in its second week, and 81,000 copies in its third and final week. During this time, it beat competition from I Wanna Be You by Chocolate Puma, which got to number six. That was in the first week.

Decent song. Yeah. Mr. Writer by Stereophonics Which got to number five in its second week One of my least favourite songs ever Wow And Butterfly by Crazy Town Which got to number three in its third and final week

Hey Yeah Come on, it's a good song We can't shake that song off this week It's like a rash You're my butterfly, sugar, baby Come on, it's a good song, man. We can't shake that song off this week. It's like a rash. You're my butterfly, sugar, baby. Come on, my lady. When it was knocked off the top of the charts,

Pure and Simple fell two places to number three. By the time it was done on the charts, it had been inside the top 100 for 28 weeks. It is the fourth and final single of 2001 to have sold over a million copies in the UK. Andy, how do we feel about Pure and Simple? Well, for me this was a really, really tricky one to come to an opinion on, because I don't know if you two have this problem, maybe it's because I actually watched Popstars and was

really, really into it as a TV TV show I can't really separate the thing from the song I can't separate the TV show from the song and I just I can't really judge this as a piece of music because for me it's always just like the finale moment of pop stars even though it wasn't the finale the show kept going after this point which is a really weird thing that you wouldn't do these days but yeah I was a was a really, really big fan of Popstars. I had the series on VHS, which I'm really tempted to revisit that now and watch it. And I think because it's...

Because Hearsay were overshadowed by their own failure, but also by Liberty X's big success, and Darius as well outshone them on this series and made it a big success through Pop Idol. And the fact that Hearsay never took off, I think we forget what a big thing this was at the time, that this was like a massive, massive event. It was really the original

equivalent of an X Factor winner's single when this happened. And I think still probably with the exception of Will Young coming up, I think still the biggest in terms of, oh my God, it's the winner's single it's okay and I wouldn't really go any

further than that. I don't have any specific problem with the song. I think it's a weird choice to go with a kind of mid-tempo sort of shrug your shoulders kind of half ballad. I think that's a weird choice for a debut single but given that,

you know, some other artists have launched themselves off the back of that recently. Atomic Kitten have launched themselves off the back of several quite chill songs. Maybe that's just a bit of a thing they were going for. I think the song is absolutely fine. I think the vocals are of varying quality. I think, sorry to say it, Danny stands out like a sore thumb as his voice doesn't gel with the others. His voice is fine, but he's got a much more gruff voice compared to the sickly sweet, almost identical voices of the other four. I think it very clearly sounds like a group that have just got together

that have got teeth and problems. There's not much interaction between the five. But it is okay it is okay i have a very fond memory of me and my sister arranging a dance routine to this song which we then performed for the family um oh yeah i've done that a few times it wasn't dance routines it was actual small plays that we did but jesus what the fuck at the point of the key change, my sister did a sort of power pose, hands on the hips, legs apart, and I dove through her legs and rose up

at the point of the key change. Yes! Which is, you know, the classic move. Yeah, so, you know, at the time I really liked it, but there's not much to say about this, to be honest. It's a pop culture product more than it is a song, and I think everyone who bought it was really kind of buying into the hype to say about this to be honest it's it's a it's a pop culture product more than it is a song and i think everyone who bought it was really kind of buying into the hype and buying into the product

that is hearsay and that was pop stars the tv show rather than the song itself and i think that's what everyone always does with x factor women singles going forward is that you're buying into the pop cultural event that has happened rather than the music which is why so many of these artists disappear immediately afterwards because people don't actually care about the artist or the music it's just about the tv show so it's a weird one to talk about from this kind of critical perspective but it's okay um i think the key change would work much much better if they got rid of the sort of slightly chilled out bridge i think if you do that if you're the only one for me key change wherever you go you've got the momentum there

that would work much better that little chilled out bridge is weird i don't know why that's there it kills the momentum from the song and so the key change stands out much much more um but other than that it's okay it's not any better than that it's a perfectly decent debut single doesn't deserve the status that it got in terms of selling a million being number one for several weeks you know still being known to this day it doesn't deserve that to be honest it's just it's sort of a moment in time that is kind of recorded in history through this song's success yeah yeah a moment in time is a good way of summing this up i think because as much as this probably didn't deserve

to sell the figures that it did we'll talk about this next time when we talk about them again they don't deserve what happened to them afterwards either no because it is a proper like you know b sharps are we hot we are not kind of moment where like they go from like overnight successes to just like overnight social pariahs where everybody fucking hates them for no real reason except they just released oh i mean there is one reason have you ever seen the car crash that was here say it Saturday? No. It was a TV special they got given, which was sort of in the style of Chums from SMTV, where they just performed sketches. They had a comedy wall where they would pop their heads out and tell jokes.

And it's like, I think it's listed on Wikipedia's list of TV shows considered the worst ever made. Oh, my God. It really is truly awful hearsay at saturday so that that was one reason because it's like that yeah they diversify too quick they did not have that kind of cultural capital yeah yeah the thing for me with this is that there are two things that when i was listening to this that i can't get out of my head the first is that the chord progression's really similar to I Try by Macy Gray. Every time it leads

into the chorus, I just expect I try to say goodbye and I choke try to walk away. There's a few, you know, a few fits that are a little bit different in there that kind of make it, you know, give it a different tone.

That was a really admirable attempt at doing Macy Gray's voice there, Rob. What a voice. It kind of came across a bit more Phil Mitchell than Macy Gray, but it was a good effort. It was a bit more Linny doing wheel meat again than Macy Gray, but yeah, sure. The other thing that I always associate this with

is Karsha Peter Kay's one that he did, the show that he did a few years a few years ago i still haven't seen it i mean there's an end of an episode where um i mean obviously you know i guess lizzie you've not seen the show but you know the premise right where it's yeah i know the two friends they carpool together etc um and obviously quite a lot of the series is built around this will they won't they sort of thing with the relationship where there's a there's a huge dramatic irony for the audience where it's very obvious that they both like each other a lot but neither of them are in a position

where they can act on their feelings or anything like that and so or that the peter k's character john i think his name is is particularly bad at discussing his feelings of being open about his feelings because of the way that he's been bruised in the past emotionally and romantically and stuff and so the way that he manages to sort of express himself in a little way um i think it's or is it the other way round she gives him the CD I think and it's now 48 I think there's a little note that just says it just says

listen to track 2 and this is track 2 on that CD I'm pretty sure yeah it is it's now 48 yeah and that's the way that they managed to work out On that CD. I'm pretty sure. Yeah it is. It's now 48. Yeah. And that's the way that they managed to work out.

Well at least it's the way that we managed to work out. That they do actually feel for each other. Yeah a summary of the episode. The episode ends with John playing Pure and Simple by Hearsay on now 48. His CD gift from Kaylee, with a handwritten note telling John that she dedicates the song to him. And so I always think of that. It's decent, Car Share.

I don't love it. I really, really liked the original ending, and then they put another episode out that kind of was a retcon of the ending. But never mind. The song itself there's something about this it's funny Andy that you mentioned Atomic Kitten and you also mentioned the term

Half Ballad, they both appear in my notes which Andy hasn't seen I literally only wrote them about an hour before we were going to come on and record. It's just, it's kind of carefully composed, this kind of half ballad that it feels like there's a little bit that you can feel the way that all of its parts come together in a way that I actually quite like, and it's quite romantic, and I love the way that they've managed the harmonies, and the relationship between the vocals, and the keys, and the sort of like the instrumentation,

like it all, it's all very, not, I wouldn't exactly say luscious, but it feels soft, and quite sweet i think but similarly to whole again this feels cheapened by a pretty artificial environment the production takes any kind of human emotion out of the instrumental performances um and so i get left feeling a little cold And I think also this is just a weaker song by comparison compared to Hole Again. So more points kind of get knocked off for how sort of sterile this feels in places. Which is a shame because the song itself, I think it's slightly better than inoffensive um which sounds like a backhanded compliment but it's not trust me we've got one more song left this week where that will definitely you know you'll understand that when i say slightly better than inoffensive it is definitely a compliment when i apply the same term to a song we've got coming up next um

but yeah it's definitely it was a moment and a fleeting moment at that in british pop culture at least for two or three of the members of the group because obviously kim marsh mylene class they both went on to do other things it basically set them up for life in a way but yeah I think this is it's fine I think it's quite sweet, I think it's kind of spoiled by let's say this kind of unintentional artificiality that I think it has

Lizzie, how about you? You can round off for Pure and Simple Yeah, I've just realised what it sounds like never ever by all things yeah it does sound like yes yeah it's absolutely that it's like um i don't really have much to say about the song but i think i'm glad you've both mentioned the cultural aspect of it because this is a big watershed moment not just for for our podcast, but for music as a whole, in that it's our first talent show number one

that I'm aware of. At least in the 21st century, yeah. Exactly, the kind of 21st century iteration on the pop talent show, not like, I don't know, New Faces or Opportunity Knocks, that kind of thing. But yeah, I can,

I'm just, Andy, going back to what you said about how they face a lot of abuse i think it maybe because it was such a novel thing that you've got this group who have come from nothing and all of a sudden they're like the biggest pop group in the country and it's like it feels unfair like they've they've won the or something. But it is just the kind of novelty of it. And I think also I do feel bad for them because it feels like they were mismanaged. And I wonder if someone like Simon Fuller saw that when he was creating his Idols show and thought, OK, well, what can I do to avoid that? Like step one would be to not just arbitrarily throw singers

into a group if they don't all fit together like you would it doesn't seem like there was any kind of meticulous planning in actually putting them together as a unit so you know is it any wonder that they don't blend together and that one of the members had left within a year because they were falling out with the others like yeah no because that's not how a pop group works you need to like for someone like the spice girls for example you would surely rigorously test to make sure that this is a a workable concept before you launch it and same with like S Club and you wonder if those groups are kind of looking at this moment and looking at this song and thinking well we're dumb because essentially the big pop producers the people who make all the decisions and make all of the money have found a way to create this endless conveyor belt of stars that they can just put together use up

work to the bone and then throw their lifeless bodies in a river once they're done with them and that's like the pattern we will see going through particularly the 2000s but also into the 2010s and like yeah this feels like the end of the line for pop as we know it wow like yeah because well yeah you've had groups that have been put together and kind of they've worked for a bit and then they've got fallen out of favor but this is the first time it feels like it was created with the intention almost to just you know know, work them to the bone. And then once they're no good, doesn't matter. We can move on.

We can have another series and we'll create a new batch of stars and then a new batch and then a new batch. And it just never ends. Yeah. And so, yeah. They feel like a dry run. They feel like guinea pigs to me. Absolutely. like a dry run and they feel like guinea pigs to me absolutely if i can maybe just suggest the tweak that was made between this and the x factor um i i completely agree with what you've said lizzie that there's something missing here and that they you know they are just normal people

who've been catapulted into stardom and quite understandably quite fairly couldn't handle it uh which is totally fair enough i wouldn't hold that against yeah yeah and i think the the tweak that was made is that i think with pop stars and largely pop idol um there was a lot of actually genuinely you know the right intentions in terms of they wanted the best singers and they wanted them yes they want them to have the look and the chemistry with each other but when you watch the series, Popstars, it is genuinely about the best singers a lot of the time. And with Pop Idol as well, I think largely everybody who entered Pop Idol, the first series at least, was a very good singer.

And it became less about that with The X Factor. I think there was a lot of emphasis on who can sing well, who looks the best. But then it's like, well, actually, we need someone with the right personality. who can sing well, who looks the best. But then it's like, well, actually, we need someone with the right personality.

We need someone who's got that kind of PR aspect to them that we can run. And I think the turning point, not to kind of spoil it too much, but I think the turning point is Gareth Gates. I think that's when people realise, actually, when someone's got a story, when someone's got a background to them, let's make it about that

rather than their singing ability and i think we're at the first phase before that now where i think nigel lifko and simon fuller and etc are naively launching quite bland groups of five decent singers into the public eye who are not going to work out because they don't have that hook with the public and when they figure that out everything changes yeah absolutely it's kind of like how from the first season of big brother where it does feel like a genuine let's put all of these people in room and see what happens but we can sort of fuck with them kind of thing yeah to you go you fast forward like three four years it's like let's put all these big personalities in a house and watch sparks fly because, yeah, they're going to clash.

And that's what it kind of morphs into, where the X Factor does become this thing of, yeah, we'll have some good singers in there, but we'll also have these utter weirdos who really don't belong in the singing competition, but we'll use them just enough so that they'll rile up the public but not so much that they will tune out. They will kind of tune in to see them get their comeuppance

even though they're just members of the public who are on a talent show. But even the good singers. Tesco Mary, right? We all say the phrase Tesco Mary. We say her backstory before we say her name. We call her Tesco Mary because that's what he did with her that's like that was the most important thing about it was not that she was a good singer so she worked in tesco and i think that's the point they need to get to before these before you get

that kind of um different angle with the public that's the point that they get to in the future yeah one thing i will say is that the x Factor's name is it's get out clause they're on the search for somebody with the X Factor, what's the X Factor don't know, but Simon Cowell can occasionally lean back in his chair stroke his chin and look at the person on the stage and go, you've got

the X Factor, and it's like what's the X Factor don't know, it's this arbitrary thing that we can just make up, but it means something like big personality or the star factor or whatever that is. It's just all these ingredients that they can just make up and they're not quite there yet.

They've not quite refined the... It's really, even by the time they get to the X factor, they don't quite refine the product because the first winner of that, where the fuck's he? He's on Twitter if you want to check out what he does there. He spends a lot of time on there. One thing that is worth mentioning before we move on

is that they actually all did make a good go of it in terms of their future careers. Mylene Klass is still a name that people know. Kim Marsh, obviously she had like 10 years on Corrie and she's a current as of right now she's a current contestant on Strictly. Not so

much for Danny, Noel and Suzanne. Although Suzanne I think won Dancing on Ice which my mum loves which is why I know that. But yeah, they all made a fairly decent go of it. So props to them. They made it work. And of course Johnny Shentle who would later appear on Totally Scott Lee.

Yeah, he's Mr. Scott Lee. Yeah. Yeah. And like, just on him, I don't, because I know they come up again, but he doesn't get a number one with the group.

And like, I remember it was a big thing around time where like, they unearthed footage of him like being, I don't know if it was scouted or if he was in a previous pop group and it was like this big scandal like oh my god they've been headhunted by all these pr people and put into this fabricated group and it's just like so i think so when something like the voice comes along

it's like yeah they're all pre-trained singers who may or may not have been in previous pop acts it's like well yeah because it's like where do you go from there and you know they need to put money on the table as well yeah okay last up this week it's this Yeah, yeah, yeah

Oh, talk to me Can't you see I help you work things out Oh, don't wanna be Your enemy And I don't want to scream and shout. Cause baby, I believe in honesty and man, the strong truth. I shouldn't have to say now, baby, that I believe in you. What took you so long? What took you all night? What took you forever to see? I'm glad, you know, I treat you so good. I make you feel fine. You know I'll never give it up this time No, no, no Okay, this is What Took You So Long by Emma Bunton

Released as the lead single from Emma Bunton's debut solo album Entitled A Girl Like Me What Took You So Long is Emma Bunton's second single in entitled A Girl Like Me. What Took You So Long is Emma Bunton's second single in the UK and her first to reach number one and also her last. What Took You So Long went straight in at number one as a new entry knocking Hearsay off the top spot. It stayed at number one for two weeks selling 76,000 copies in its first week atop the charts and 65,000 copies in its second week. It beat competition from Bow Wow, That's My Name by Lil Bow Wow,

which got to number six in its first week at number one, and All For You by Janet Jackson, which got to number three, Out of Reach by Gabrielle, which got to number four, and Let Love Be Your Energy, which got to number ten. And they were all in its second week at number one. When it was knocked off the top of the charts, What Took You So Long dropped seven places to number eight. I felt that from Ian.

And by the time it was done on the charts, it had been inside the top 100 for 13 weeks. Crikey. Crikey. That fell out. It's like somebody just ripped the rug out from underneath it. Crikey. Crikey. That fell out. It's like somebody just ripped the rug out from underneath it and it just, that was it. It just smashed all its teeth on the floor and that was done.

Ironically, it didn't take so long to fall out. No, it didn't. Yeah, I think I'll go first on this. Yeah, sure. I have so little to say. I think I know why, which is basically everybody goes out and buys this

because, oh, it's her from the Spice Girls and it goes da-da-da-da-da da-da-da-da-da That's the only reason I think people went out

and bought this because like, oh, it's her and yeah, I remember this sort of and then after about three weeks everyone's just sort of like, oh, it's her. And yeah, I remember this, sort of. And then after about three weeks, everyone's just sort of like,

oh, yeah. God, do you remember that? Why did I buy this? And then there we go. Out it goes, 13 weeks. Sort of pales in comparison. I mean, 13 weeks isn't exactly terrible, but like, Jesus, dropping from number one to number eight.

Yeah. Compared to like what she was used to, like just three years before this, it's nothing. It's a bit of a dropout. It's a shame that this is the only time we'll get to talk about her on this show, because what she does later on her second album, Free Me, is way more interesting. There's some really really good stuff on there that i was actually i'd forgotten about but then when i was pressing play on it and listening to it i was like oh i remember this like um i don't know if you either of you remember is it uh maybe where it's um that the hook is the um and it's all like and it's all like these 60s psychedelia like um retro futuristic stuff

from that i was way more interested in that um whereas like going back to this it's just like you know when i said before that like pure and simple was like slightly better than inoffensive and that's not an insult i think it's because this is slightly better than inoffensive but in a way that i feel like it this is actually a backhanded compliment i'm handing out it's very bland it feels really specifically engineered not to live on its own terms but to live as track nine on one of those driving songs cd compilations that you'd get around this time where it's like why is this on here oh well i am driving and i guess it kind of matches my surroundings yeah fine you know it matches the you know anonymity of every british motorway that there is out there

where it's not gonna hurt me you know it's not gonna ask too much of me everybody involved sounds like they'd rather be somewhere else um her voice never really gets above any kind of you know it doesn't explore her range at any point it doesn't ask anything of you it's really it feels like i don't know some unimaginative amalgamation of like something that ronan keating would have passed on and what cheryl crowe would return with after her small hiatus about a year later it feels like something like soak up the sun but not as rowdy, and Soak Up The Sun is not a rowdy song, it just, it feels like it's asleep as soon as it starts, like, it's not bad, it has some nice kind of melodic turns in various bits, I kind of like the, even though, Andy, I know I'll

leave this to you to point out but rhythmically the opening strands of this match uh a song from last year that we're not that keen on where it does the little kind of twangy at the beginning and you know you think oh this sounds interesting and just goes da da da da da da da and it just it just doesn't do anything that really interests me and i don't hate this i actually kind of like it more than uptown girl um but i don't know i just i'm worried that if i talk about it i'm gonna stop because if i'm worried if i talk about it much longer you may hear my forehead just go on the mic because I've fallen asleep in the middle of speaking so yeah. Lizzie

what do we make of this then? Yeah it's like Dreams by Fleetwood Mac on Pyroton. Yeah yeah not disagreeing it's just like barely staying awake just like come on soldier through it's only four minutes but yeah totally agree with your points in terms of post Spice Girls hits Just barely stayed awake, just like, come on, soldier through. It's only four minutes.

But yeah, totally agree with your points. In terms of post-Spice Girls hits, this feels like the most likely to be a hit because of its broad appeal, but also the one I have least interest in revisiting because of that. And you think of the other Spice Girls solo hits from 2000, 2001, and they're all very distinct in terms of their sound. Mel C, she's moved on to moody dance and hip-hop and R&B. Geri Halliwell's leaned into queer themes, very overtly queer themes as well.

Mel B is doing the Jam jam and lewis r&b sound more confidently than she was on the last spice girls album like um i feel so good um by mel b it was in the it was in the chart around this time i want to say it was kind of maybe falling out just a bit but yeah go and listen to that if you thought that the Spice Girls R&B stuff was a bit underwhelming, because it does sound a lot more interesting and a lot more confident. And even like Victoria's unnervingly artificial sounding collaboration with True Steppers has grown on me a lot lately as someone who I think previously would have like, because I love Groovejet so much, I think I might have written it off a bit. But yeah, I found it sort of working my way, working its way into my heart.

But just this is like, Rob, you said driving music. I say drive time music. Yeah. It's real radio to Vodder. Like, yeah. I think I don't want to steal what Andy, I don't want to steal your comparison again,

because it's just going to be, we're going to be kind of going in a feedback loop. But I really did have to check it wasn't by the same writers because it does all the same beats, but thankfully spares us from the vocalist in question. But yeah, she just doesn't sound particularly committed to anything on this it sounds like right we've got to get a hit you know the Spice Girls name's fading you've got to stay relevant but it's like do you even want to do that it's okay if you don't because

hey you've had a busy few years and it's okay to just kind of want to leave that behind and i think rob like you mentioned on the next album it feels like you know pressure's off i can kind of do some fun stuff if i want to instead of this which really does feel like we've got to reach the broadest appeal possible and we don't have much time to do it and we don't have many ideas. So this is all we've got. And well, this is the end result. And like, is it any wonder this is our only number one? Yeah, not going to disagree too hard there. So Andy, come in hot and heavy with your comparison that we were teasing.

And now you must give us. Well, you're both very kind kind but it's not just mine we all realized it i think i was the first one to say it but you two very much realized it as well i think it's quite glaring really it's that this sounds so much like life is a roller coaster so we've got the same song yeah so first of all the no no no no it's just like literally the same it's got the same instrumentation throughout the same sort of beat they're both well this isn't quite in the c major this is sort of flirting with the key of c major but it's in a related key and even the kind of the way as you said lizzie the way the beats hit in terms of the emphasis it we found love it's like what took you so long like it hits in the exact same way it's like

written as the same song and yeah it's kind of remarkable that it's not any of the same writers i checked that as well i looked at all five of the writers who worked on this song one of whom wrote wannabe or helped to write wannabe and then they wrote this so i i'm not i'm not a big fan of this i will say that it's better than life is a roller coaster like this is basically a female life is a roller coaster i think and not to kind of you know put everyone into gender boxes but i think that's in terms of the way this was produced in terms of the idea of it it's let's do a more kind of sensual a more feminine take on that song. That's kind of what it feels like to me.

I think the reason why Emma is quite, her solo career a lot of the time is quite sort of generic and quite sort of straightforward and the songs are a bit thin is unfortunately her voice is really not the strongest. It's, I think, certainly the weakest of the five from the Spice Girls.

And I think it's no coincidence that the two with the strongest voices did the most interesting things with their solo career. You know, Jerry's got the, apart from Mel B maybe, Jerry's got the loudest, most resonant voice. So her music is like balls to the wall, rollercoaster madness a lot of the time. Mel C has definitely got the strongest tone to her voice, definitely got the most interesting, most versatile voice, so her music tends to be quite alternative and different.

Posh is a different case. Mel B, who knows what happened there. But with Emma, yeah, she has quite a generic, quite quiet, quite sort of thin alto voice, which is sort of death for a pop star, really. So what she gets given is quite piecemeal, and there's not much substance to it. And it kind of, I think it plays into the Baby Spice vibe quite a lot as well,

in that she's still sort of treated as sort of sickly sweet, as kind of, you know, kind of a little bit sort of impish, and hee-hee-hee, look at me, you know, just as kind of you know kind of a little bit sort of impish and hee hee hee look at me you know just a kind of there's a bit of a vibe to it that I think is a little bit saccharine and a little bit annoying like I say it's not as bad as Life is a Rollercoaster

purely because the bit that I really like is the bridge there I believe in honesty because I think that's like that's something a little bit different it's something that very slightly challenges her vocal range

to a sort of minor extent, but I completely agree with what both of you have said that, you know, what you've said Robert, that this doesn't challenge her at all, that it's really really by the numbers you know, it's, there is very very little to say about it, unfortunately and I think it's largely just because she's Emma Bunton

is why this did so well. I do think there is potential there, you know, and I agree with you that some of her later solo tracks are much better than this, that she does have more to offer. But if you were to think, right, what kind of music would suit Emma, I kind of would think something like Ronan Keating to be honest because she is sort of that kind of artist unfortunately and that

kind of singer and that's I find it really really hard to not make it sound really insulting but it just is what it is unfortunately I feel like of the five she is the hardest sell as a solo artist and that's where we are with her basically but it's

okay like it's all right it's really boring and it took me like three listens to actually engage with this and listen to the whole thing actively and not switch off and not look at my phone and lose interest in it it was really hard to stay awake for this song um it's really really dull but i've heard worse just about um yeah yeah it's it's not it's not great to be honest it's not great yeah i do kind of agree that um emma was possibly the weakest vocalist of the spice girls but there's definitely moments like where her her softness really kind of is just perfect and nobody else in the spy skills could do that like um you know in two become one where she doesn't bridge yeah definitely like yeah a little bit wiser bit like yeah that nobody else in the spy

skills could really have done that bit and made it sound like so... It's all about how she's managed, I think. It is all about how she's managed and how she's written for, because she perfectly suits the surroundings on Free Me. Totally. Absolutely, yeah. And don't get me wrong, she really had her place in the Spice Girls.

Obviously, I've done my whole diatribe about how brilliant the Spice Girls are before, but one of the things that was so great about them is that they were the perfect mix. The five of them really did all genuinely bring something completely different to the table that worked as a combination, and Emma was a big part

of that, that you needed someone who was very, very sweet and relatable to contrast with the big personalities of the other four. As a solo artist though, that really exposes her, and that's the problem I think. Yeah, fair enough. Okay then, so we're doing

we'll do our Vault and Piehole Inductions for this week. So, it wasn't me. Is that going in the Piehole or the Vault for anybody? Nah. No. Not for me either. Uptown Girl Westlife. I'm putting that in the Piehole or The Vault for anybody? Nah. No. No. Not for me either.

Uptown Girl, Westlife. I'm putting that in the piehole. Goodbye. Okay. In it goes. Yeah. Pure and Simple by Hearsay. Nah.

Nah. Nah. Okay. And What Took You So Long by Emma Bunton. No. Marginal. Marginal for me. I thought about it, but no. No, it's not that bad. No. No. Okay then, so next week

we are going to go in the next episode, we're going to go for the 22nd of April through to the 2nd of June. So another decent bit of time is going to be covered by the next episode that we do. And also, not to...

I don't want to spoil it, but there's a little bit of a hint, a little bit of a cliffhanger. There is going to be a Hits 21 first next week. It's a particular phenomenon that takes place a few times over the course of the next sort of 20 years or so

that we're going to be covering and this is the first time it happens in the 21st century so I'm curious about how we're going to deal with it but we'll cross that bridge when we get there so thank you very much for listening please do vote in the poll which I will leave um at the uh it's it's underneath the episode in spotify if you just sort of click on it

and it's there underneath and you can just click on a on a song that you liked more than any other and then it'll go and then there'll be some magic happens and it counts your vote please do that yes Yes, yes, yes, yes, the poll. I'm just giving myself more editing to do because I hate myself. But yes, we will see you next time. See you next time. Bye-bye.

See ya.