vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 9, 2010 12:51:49 GMT 1
Heartbeat Country (31 December 1994) It took Celine Dion nearly three years; it took Nana Mouskouri 23 years. But Bill Maynard took nearly 38 years from his Eurovision debut to his chart debut. Indeed his son had been a Eurovision entrant before Maynard made the 75... Walter Williams had been on stage since he was a nipper, but when an adult had to change his name as his agent said Williams was too common. Bill saw a billboard for Maynard's Wine Gums and voila. As part of his variety act had developed something of a expertise, which, in 1957, got him invited to perform a candidate song for Britain's debut entry to the Eurovision Song Contest. Not a contest between singers, per se, in those days, but between songs; the song he performed in a semi-final (alongside Bond girl Shirley Eaton) was eliminated but each song had to be performed twice in the final in differing arrangements, and Maynard was invited to perform "Don't Cry Little Doll". It came fourth. Sandwiched by chart-toppers Lita Roza and Ronnie Hilton, incidentally. Obviously Maynard has television credits coming out of his ears, but his musical career is suitably esoteric; a one-off single extolling the virtues of stock car racing, a 1975 comedy single about the pheasant plucker's son, singing a track on a Wurzel Gummidge EP with Jon Pertwee and Una Stubbs, and finally this cash-in on the TV series, released under the name Heartbeat Country. And indeed in a very country-folky style. I do remember seeing the pub-based video, but can't find it in the usual places. So if you dare listen, click on the download. Since then, he continued with acting until a heart attack put him on the shelf for a few years, but he still does bits and dabs. And his chart career is better than his son's; Maynard Williams' band Ryder struggled to 98 with their Eurovision entry.
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vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 9, 2010 13:56:14 GMT 1
Anthony Hopkins (27 December 1986)
It probably seemed a good idea at the time. After all, Richard Chamberlain and Richard Harris had both had thespian hit singles in the UK. William Shatner...not so much.
At least Hopkins was trained as a pianist, but there's not much of that in evidence here. Indeed the whole song is a bit of an obscurity; Hopkins must have been asked to record it when on a wave of success, having been awarded the Laurence Olivier Outstanding Achievement award for his part on the London stage in Pravda, and was preparing for a run as King Lear at the National, so it was presumably quite a quick project. But it was such a side-project that in the 352 pages of Quentin Falk's biography it does not warrant a single mention.
In 1987 came the CBE, 1992 an Oscar and 1993 a knighthood...and 1996 a return to music as he scored the film "August". Since then various music projects have followed, including a performance with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, as well as the acting, but no return to the charts as yet.
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vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 9, 2010 21:23:48 GMT 1
Hunterz And The Dhol Blasters (10 September 2005)
Hunterz’ family is from Uganda, forced to flee to Britain just before he was born as Idi Amin cracked down on the Indian community there; trained in classical Indian music, he used his well-regarded reputation to get into bhangra production work in the late 1990s and thence performance, via which he came to UB40’s attention and he co-wrote "Reasons" with them. Works primarily as a producer and an album with bhangra artist Rishi Rish is due this year.
Dhol Blasters are a collective of bhangra dancers and dhol players (the dhol is a Punjab farmer goatskin drum, beaten with sticks made of cane) formed in 1985 by dholi Gurcharan Mall, and they hold the world record for the longest "dholathan" of 53 hours, set back in 2001. They have appeared on literally dozens of albums and have nine under their own name. Very much in demand, especially in their native Birmingham, and a natural choice to produce the bhangra sounds on "Reasons". One of the few acts on the list to have performed on Blue Peter, and another act with Eurovision links; they provided the interval entertainment in 1998.
Of course this single was credited to UB40 featuring Hunterz and the Dhol Blasters, but of course it's not UB40's sole top 75 appearance. Rather surprisingly, perhaps, it is their last.
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vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 11, 2010 11:14:59 GMT 1
Ils (23 February 2002)
Remember 4 Vini above? This is another artist signed to Botchit & Scarper. Ils, aka Ilian Walker, was into dance music as a teen and bought his own sampler before he left school, and started his own Shepherd's Bush studio at the age of 19 thanks to a Prince's Trust grant. Although Ils' background is not conventionally electro; growing up in a hippie commune, his first toe in the musical waters was as a funk guitarist and bassist, and he has expressed a wish to work with some of the leading lights on the indie scene.
He has been releasing trance breakbeats since 1994, and is currently doing so for B&S, but his one chart appearance (from 23 singles and 4 albums to date; most recent album "Paranoid Prophets" was voted Album Of The Year for 2007 by, er, breakspoll.com) came on Adam Freeland's Brighton-based Marine Parade. Although it was bittersweet success; Freeland ran out of money to release the album "Bohemia" (which included vocal contributions from Plavka [of Jam & Spoon fame] and Bulgarian duo Desi & Roni), and had to cherrypick tracks to survive. Ils therefore took the album to Distinctive for release with Freeland's blessing.
Perhaps the marginal success of this single was assisted by its use in an Orange advert; Ils' tracks have also been used for a Carling advert and, bizarrely, an Ann Summers promo film.
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Post by rubcale on Apr 11, 2010 13:04:37 GMT 1
Great thread and I hardly know any of them!
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Post by Earl Purple on Apr 11, 2010 13:34:50 GMT 1
I have known a handful of them, particularly once you get post-1998. Biscuit Boy and Campag Velocet's singles were both hits in my chart. Goldfinger failed although I do have that song, but reached NM #1 with a different single "Spokesman" which was the follow-up and narrowly missed the UK top 75.
BellRays had two hits in my chart, Fire On The Moon and They Glued Your Head On Upside Down. Not sure which was their UK hit. The Gallagher project coming up later had 2 hits in my chart, the one that was a UK hit was the smaller of the two. When they come up I will tell you what their bigger NM hit was.
I have 4 singles listed by Brendan Benson, Folk Singer being the first in 2002, then Metarie in 2003, Spit It Out in 2005 and Cold Hands (Warm Heart) listed also in 2005. Of those four, Folk Singer was a fairly big hit, Cold Hands Warm Heart was smaller and Spit It Out lower still. Metarie failed to reach my chart.
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vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 11, 2010 20:31:43 GMT 1
Inner Sanctum (23 May 1998)
Not a particularly distinctive name, there are at least four other acts with this name, one another techno artist, the other three thrash metallers (mirabile dictu).
This particular Inner Sanctum is a project of Canadian DJ Steven Bolton, ex-Studio 54 turntable twiddler, and Birmingham singer SK (Steve Kimber), who had gone to Canada for a year of travelling and ended up staying there for nearly a decade. They formed the duo Sotto Voce to capitalize on the Culture Beat Eurodance vibe that had become popular in Canada and generated sufficient success to get as far as producing an album, before Kimber suggested covering The Smiths (a band he had admired). Their version of "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now" sounded so different from the Sotto Voce sound they decided to go a bit further, under a different name; they chose their name as an ironic swipe at "the biz", as they considered themselves firmly outside the music world's own inner sanctum.
SK returned to the UK in 1998 and brought the track tape over with him so he could record vocals over here; indeed an album's worth of material was produced, and Bolton took the finished "How Soon Is Now" to a Floridian music festival. Malarky Records (a subunit of Big Life Records, home of Coldcut, Soul II Soul, Yazz, inter alia) were impressed, picked up the track, brought it back to the UK and had it remixed by various DJs for club use. "How Soon Is Now" received the Mixmag seal of approval, which helped project it into the national charts.
Kimber is now working under the name Amberphonik, producing retro-styled electropop, and will soon have a single out - for the first time, under his own name. Bolton still DJs and produces, and the Inner Sanctum/Sotto Voce duo have recently recorded some new material.
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vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 11, 2010 21:25:38 GMT 1
International Airport (4 September 2004)
There is a number of things that surprised me in doing this list; one of them was finding out that The Pastels had never made the national chart. Singles or albums. And that this is the closest they have come to making it.
International Airport is a one-man-band-type name, the disguise of Tom Crossley, one of The Pastels' regular contributors and member of the band of Alasdair Roberts (formerly known collectively as Appendix Out). He started to perform as International Airport in and around Glasgow in 1996, picking up a typically shambling following from the city of Postcard Records, Orange Juice, Belle & Sebastian, Camera Obscura and so many others of that ilk. Stephen Pastel signed them up to his imprint Geographic Records, a Domino sub-label seemingly devoted to Pastelites, and the first International Airport single was released in 1999; debut album "Nothing We Can Control", mixed by John McEntire of Tortoise, followed in 2000, but there was not a hint of chart-dom.
That came in 2004, when second album "Reunion Of Island Goose" was being mixed. McEntire was working with Teenage Fanclub at the time and asked them to have a go at sprinkling oofle dust on a track. They went one better than that, recording their own version, and Crossley then mashed up the Fannies' version with his original. End result was a split single/EP, credited to Teenage Fanclub/International Airport, and a brief acquaintance with the charts; as far as I can see, Geographic's second biggest hit (behind a number 68 from TF with Jad Fair). Crossley's most recent appearance on record was on The Pastels' collaboration with Japanese band Tenniscoats, last year, for which he provided the flute accompaniment.
Unfortunately the sound quality of this video is hardly representative of the whimsical fractures of the song, but the EP is available on itunes, so you can get an idea of the different approaches via the previews.
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vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 11, 2010 23:43:25 GMT 1
Jhelisa (1 July 1995)
Jhelisa Anderson comes from a musical family. Aunt Victoria was a back-up singer for James Brown, and her daughter Carleen had half-a-dozen solo hit singles; Mississippi-born Jhelisa's father was a gospel DJ, singer and pianist, and from the age of five Jhelisa sang with the family group, the Little David Band.
On leaving school she headed for LA to make her name, but ended up in Britain in 1991, joining cousin Carleen. Jhelisa was discovered by Johnny Male (who ended up in Republica) and Guy Batson who formed Soul Family Sensation with her, signed themselves to One Little Indian, and had a top 50 hit. It was sadly fortuitous timing for her. Will Sin of OLI's star act The Shamen drowned filmin the video for breakthrough hit "Move Any Mountain"; very soon afterwards, and in another link with a 75 act, occasional vocalist Plavka quit because she was not allowed to record solo material whilst in the band. OLI therefore placed Jhelisa with Colin and Mr C as an emergency measure, and she had a couple of top tens providing the vocals for "Phorever People" and "LSI".
Acid was not her scene, and she signed up to the new Dorado Records, a label started by Ollie Buckwell aimed at the jazz-hip hop market. First album for the label "Galactica Rush" featured backing vocals from Carleen and provided her with her hit single; a follow-up album was also released, before Jhelisa stepped away from the limelight to become a support act (to Sting and James Brown, amongst others), backing singer and occasional actress.
In 2004 Jhelisa moved to New Orleans, where she proved a star at the Jazz & Heritage Festival, worked on solo material and produced other acts for her own label Rentavibe. Sadly she lost nearly everything in Hurricane Katrina; amongst her lost possessions were the files for the "A Primitive Guide To Being There" album. Undaunted, she completed it in Atlanta - and even made a short film about the experience of Katrina. Still constantly performing (she has created a tribute to Nina Simone show) and currently recording another album in Rome.
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Post by Earl Purple on Apr 12, 2010 8:27:04 GMT 1
Assuming that is Association, I have that as being by International Airport & Teenage Fanclub with a release date of 23 August 2004. This is normal as the date it would chart would be 12 days after its release date.
It failed to reach my chart.
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vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 12, 2010 8:48:03 GMT 1
Kreuz (8 July 1995)
The should be Krautrock with a name like that, but no, it's new jack swing. Kreuz formed in London in the early 1990s as an eight-piece; within a couple of years they were down to three. Sean Cummings on vocals, Wayne Lawes (a trained classical guitarist and studio engineer) on bass and Rickardo Reid (who had received a scholarship to the London College of Music) on keyboards.
It was in this guise that they were signed to Motown and honed their songwriting skills, which served them well in the long term; Motown seemed to lose interest and they were dropped after their debut album, and follow-up Kreuz Kontrol, which gives away the pronunciation of the band name (and gave them the hit single), was on an independent. But their experiences on Motown had refined them for the industry and they remained in demand. For the next few years they remained as a songwriting/production unit under the name Full Crew Productions and also provided session services; they have worked with some of the very biggest names in r&b/dance, including George Michael, Mary J Blige, Destiny's Child and Mariah Carey. They were even given the task of helping to break Craig David in the States by remixing "Fill Me In".
Reid and Lawes still work together, under the name Syklone, and their most recent top 40 appearance was producing Nathan's hit "Come Into My Room"; Cummings is still sessioning as a backing singer.
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 12, 2010 18:39:57 GMT 1
L.A. Ganz (9 November 1996)
Not much to say about these. Warren "K-brew" Killibrew, Adrian Williams, Lawrence "L" Young and Corwyn Hodge, attending school together in Kentucky, formed an a capella gospel/R&B vocal quartet WALC (see their first names), and won a north American talent competition. This seems to have encouraged them to more ambitious things; they moved to LA and were recruited by Jive to perform a couple of songs for the film "Booty Call", and also came up with this song in half-an-hour as a single release. Not successful in the States, so a fairly short run.
Young and Hodge are still musically active, Young via performing in LA clubs and writing, as well as promoting his daughter's career; Hodge became a Disney cast member, performing in vocal groups in Orlando, and he and five fellow themeparkers formed the a capella sextet Mosaic, which reached the quarter-finals of last year's America's Got Talent. They now regularly perform in Vegas. (The town, not the Terry Hall/Dave Stewart project.)
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Post by Earl Purple on Apr 12, 2010 20:22:32 GMT 1
That Inner Sanctum one is the worst thing I have ever ever heard. Totally destroying a classic song.
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 12, 2010 20:25:47 GMT 1
The Like (18 June 2006)
OK, I should hate this band. All with an "in" to the industry; daughters of an industry mogul, leading producer and Attractions drummer (they covered an Elvis Costello song for a War Child charity album), forming a hobby band whilst still in their mid-teens. Yet I find them irresistible...and it's not just me; the Guardian described their hit as "a brilliant pop construction with an air of mystery" and the NME called it "a dizzy slab of superior fuzz-rock".
Tennessee Thomas and Charlotte Froom were LA schoolfriends in a band together, and "Z" (Elizabeth Berg) was introduced to them by mutual friends, on the basis that Berg, a literature obsessive, wrote darkly disturbing songs that the other two might find congenial. One midnight jam session later and they were a band, Thomas' mum suggesting the name "The Like" because it seemed to be the commonest word they used. Tres valley girl. Albeit less valley girl was that Thomas has had to put a fine arts degree on hold whilst she popstars.
They might be one of the most likely (ahem) to come off the list; their second album is due out in a couple of months and is being produced by Mark Ronson, so a second hit single is not out of the question. For the moment they are on here with one of the tracks from their debut "Are You Thinking What I'm Thinking?", which in itself was a bit of a retrospective - their first three releases were all Like-punned EPs and the album a re-recording (produced by Wendy Melvoin of Wendy & Lisa/Prince & The Revolution fame) of those songs. Since then they have replaced Charlotte on bass but added an organist, giving them a very Inspiral Carpets vibe, and are coming to the Camden Crawl next month, so maybe more big things over here to come.
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vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 12, 2010 20:27:30 GMT 1
That Inner Sanctum one is the worst thing I have ever ever heard. Totally destroying a classic song. I will at least give them credit for one thing - not making an artless, soulless, karaoke cover-by-numbers. They did try something different. Perhaps though more likely to draw techno fans to the Smiths than vice versa...
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 12, 2010 23:25:49 GMT 1
Lost (22 June 1991)
Six months earlier there was a race for the 75 Club. Deep C just about nicked it, their track "African Reign" stealing the spot from the Lost track "The Gonzo". Then Deep C went and ruined it all in early June by having a follow-up reach number 73. Fortunately, a fortnight later Lost ensured they would become members when "Techno Funk" made the number 75 position all its own for a full seven days.
Lost is Steve Bicknell. A DJ who started out at the Brain Club in 1990, "The Gonzo" was his first release, on Paul Oakenfold's rave-friendly Perfecto Records. By the end of the year Bicknell was using the name Lost as a brand for his techno sets in Brixton, usually in conjunction with Sheree Rashit, with whom he started Cosmic Records. It was a swift end for the Lost name as a recording alias, as Bicknell started to release tracks under his own name, but despite numerous releases - seven alone being called Lost Recordings - not one has yet hit the chart.
The Lost nights continue, now touring rather than solely anchored in London (Andrew Weatherill was DJing at the last Lost night), and Cosmic Records has spawned a number of subsidiaries to cover some slightly less techno areas.
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Post by Earl Purple on Apr 12, 2010 23:46:59 GMT 1
Like had 2 hits in my chart and What I Say And What I Mean was the other and charted twice, peaking at #54 and then #15. June Gloom peaked at NM #13 (entered in March though!) but ended up lower in the chart of the decade (because the other one had 2 runs).
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 13, 2010 7:43:45 GMT 1
Michael Lovesmith (28 September 1985)
Lovesmith has been involved in music since the late sixties. The Missouri-born songwriter was part of the Stax production lineup and wrote for the Isley Brothers before heading for LA and Invictus Records with brothers Louis and Danny, where they recorded the album "Under My Wings" under the name The Smith Connection (the Love was a later prefix).
The legendary songwriting trio Holland-Dozier-Holland had been working in California during temporary leave from Motown; when they returned, they persuaded Lovesmith to go with them, and 1975 saw Lovesmith's first published material for the Detroit label (a Jackson 5 b-side). Although a staff songwriter at Motown for some years, he never had much crossover success, his only big hit coming with a 1990 cover by Troop of "All I Do Is Think Of You", one of his earlier Jackson numbers. Under his own semi-pseudonym, Lovesmith released four albums, but his greatest success came over here thanks to northern soul nights getting his music across. I can't find anything fresh he has done since 1999, and he was quoted on Michael Jackson's death as being a "former" Motown artist, so perhaps he has retired.
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Post by Earl Purple on Apr 13, 2010 8:17:42 GMT 1
That Inner Sanctum one is the worst thing I have ever ever heard. Totally destroying a classic song. I will at least give them credit for one thing - not making an artless, soulless, karaoke cover-by-numbers. They did try something different. Perhaps though more likely to draw techno fans to the Smiths than vice versa... It might not have been a karaoke colour-by-numbers and for some perhaps it wasn't totally artless, but in my opinion it was definitely soulless. It took at least 90 seconds until anything happened at all, nearly 2 minutes for the song to begin and then it never sounded like the singer meant a single word of what they were singing. Soho sampling the riff on Hippychick was ok. That is to me a valid use of sampling. If I were going to try to introduce dance-music fans to the Smiths I would probably play them The Queen Is Dead not that song.
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vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Apr 13, 2010 13:05:25 GMT 1
Melissa Manchester (5 April 1986)
In the States she is a star. A dozen charting albums, 15 charting singles including an Adult Contemporary number one and a Billboard top five, a Grammy award and two Oscar nominations. Over here her one chart appearance was a duet with Al Jarreau. Then again, we had glam rock. Think we got the better end of that deal.
Manchester was born in the Bronx, daughter of a Noo Yoik orchestra bassoonist, and attended the literal (and original) Fame academy before attending New York University and studying songwriting under Paul Simon. At 17 she became a staff songwriter and backing singer at Warner-Chappell and was introduced to Bette Midler by fellow WC (pun intended) artist Barry Manilow. This led to a stint as a Midler backing vocalist and, in 1973, a solo deal. 1975 saw her first top ten hit; 1980 two Academy Award nominations in the same year; and 1982 her Grammy for Best Female Vocal Performance for "You Should Hear How She Talks About You", her biggest US hit.
She concentrated more on the film industry in the 1980s and had her one hit single with the closing theme from "Out Of Africa", a John Barry composition. Manchester broadened her film industry experience into acting (she appeared in Midler mini-me Mayim Bialik's series Blossom as the titular character's mother). The acting and film scoring has taken over in recent years, with just one album in the past decade, as Manchester got fed up with the industry's turn away from singer-songwriters, although a new single was released last year and Manchester regularly performs live. And she is still friendly with Manilow; she backed him on his last album.
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