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Post by evansabove on Jul 19, 2011 19:35:07 GMT 1
Got a bit lost. Are you talking Pollard or Madonna? tut tut- I know one poster who is gonna be very angry with you! I have learned to ignore his posts, it's more pity than anger My that was a cheesy video from Su Pollard. I wonder how long the marriage lasted of the couple the BBC was following. I remember watching the series and loving the theme tune at the time
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jul 19, 2011 19:38:59 GMT 1
Apparently they are still married to this day!
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Post by evansabove on Jul 19, 2011 19:49:34 GMT 1
You would have thought doing a video with Su would have scarred them for life!
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Post by PurpleCareBear on Jul 19, 2011 20:37:14 GMT 1
A-Ha - Take On Me Their best song by far ! The video is amazing. I don't mind A1's cover,it's ok.
Madonna - Crazy For You I like this song, although it's a bit ..ordinary. I think I'd like it even more if some else had recorded it ? T'Pau ? George Michael ? Swing out Sister ?
Madonna - Holiday Nice and simple,and singalongable. I like.
Madonna - Borderline I never even heard this when it was in the charts,and only got to know it years later,when I bought Immaculate Collection. One of her best.
Su Pollard - Starting Together Genius. I adore !! I don't know why I've not yet bought a Su album.
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Post by Earl Purple on Jul 19, 2011 22:55:38 GMT 1
Do not despair we have some very good #2s coming up. One of them is from around 1960 but they are all good at this point until we reach the very drab "I Can't Wait" by Nu Shooz. We'll then have the delights of dancing to "So Macho" and "You Don't Have To Take Your Clothes OfF..." but until then we can relax a bit.
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jul 20, 2011 17:49:36 GMT 1
15TH MARCH- MANIC MONDAY- The Bangles (1 week)1986 Finally kickstarts!! THIS is a great record and no mistaking. Now I know I don't really like Prince but his hits in other people's hands prove that he was a good songwriter- I have to give him credit for that."Manic Monday" shimmers onto the ear in an instantly engaging manner, you can hear Hoffs swoon when she sings "All of the nights / Why did my lover have to pick last night To get down/ Doesn't it matter That I have to feed the both of us Employment's down/ He tells me in his bedroom voice/ C'mon honey, let's go make some noise". What's so wonderful about the record is its playfulness. It's a simple enough song about that Monday Morning feeling, but its sense of fun and chirpyness wins the listener over and indeed you sense that the singer doesn't mind that much really deep down. Meeting "Manic Monday" at this point is an absolute joy, I'd almost forgotten all about it but it sounds fresh and bang up to date for 1986, which is more than can be said for any of the year's No 2's to date....the bar has been set!
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jul 20, 2011 17:52:00 GMT 1
22ND MARCH- ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS- David Bowie (1 week)1986 is a year, which more than any other we have been through yet, was more closely tied to Film and TV- perhaps a natural consequence of the visual age when a video had been a necessity not a luxury and MTV was the coolest thing around. We've already met a couple of BBC tie in's (this was also the year of Eastenders Nick Berry's No 1 with "Every Loser Wins") and here to entertain us for one last time in this thread is Bowie with the theme to the film of the same time. Now the film was hyped to within an inch of its life back in 1986 and when released was of course panned and became a box office flop, but to be honest Bowie's theme rises like a pheonix from the cinders, and ranks amongst his best work of the decade. What makes this more fulfilling than his previous No 2 hits? Well I think the answer is simple, he's simply more relaxed at this point in his career. During 1982-84 he's under threat by more outragous pop stars, being more visually daring and pushing more boundaries who use him as an influence, so much so that he feels the need to step up his game, to create something extra-ordinary- in short to over egg the pudding which is what the 1983 hits are slightly. By 1986 those pop stars and that pop movement (New Romanticism) have faded and a new conservatism sweeps the pop world (this is my theory anyway- I'm TMing that!) He's got more time to focus on the record, no doubt the film tie- in helped initially to enable this to enter at No 8 and rise to No 2 but i'm sure after that it became a bit of milestone around its neck. Anyway he's bowing out (geddit) on a high, post 1986 we just won't discuss ok.....
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Post by Earl Purple on Jul 20, 2011 18:28:46 GMT 1
I would disagree about David Bowie in that I think his earlier 80s work was good too. I never felt he was one to copy the other genres around him, for example I wouldn't really describe his early 70s music as fitting with glam rock even if one of the glam rock #1s totally stole his riff.
Absolute Beginners was his last really great song. Some of his later music has been passable but nothing great since this one. I did actually expect this song to reach #1 and therefore in some ways it underperformed peaking at #2. It wasn't on a Bowie album, only on the film soundtrack, and not sure how many Bowie fans would have bothered buying that. He did also star in the film as an actor as did a lot of other celebrities. He had acted before, sometimes with a more major role, for example in "Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence".
With regards to the Bangles, "Manic Monday" followed "Going Back To Liverpool" which was about unemployment, but I never actually noticed the line in Manic Monday about her supporting her partner. "Kiss" was out at the same time and in the US, it reached #1 with "Manic Monday" at #2 behind it so he had the top 2 singles. The Bangles would top the US chart with "Walk Like An Egyptian" and of course would top both the UK and US charts with "Eternal Flame" in 1989.
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Post by evansabove on Jul 20, 2011 18:41:01 GMT 1
Manic Monday is one of my all-time favourites. The Bangles were a much underrated band. Outside of the singles, the albums were full of good songs but their flame didnt seem to burn for very long
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vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Jul 20, 2011 18:48:07 GMT 1
I would disagree about David Bowie in that I think his earlier 80s work was good too. I never felt he was one to copy the other genres around him, for example I wouldn't really describe his early 70s music as fitting with glam rock even if one of the glam rock #1s totally stole his riff. The two riffs were written pretty much contemporaneously, either side of the Atlantic. If it's the ones I'm thinking of.
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jul 20, 2011 18:49:02 GMT 1
Manic Monday is one of my all-time favourites. The Bangles were a much underrated band. Outside of the singles, the albums were full of good songs but their flame didnt seem to burn for very long No it certainly wasn't eternal! boom boom
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jul 21, 2011 17:32:40 GMT 1
5TH APRIL- WONDERFUL WORLD- Sam Cooke (1 week)The lure of "Americana" was seldom stronger in the UK than it was in the mid 80s. The rock N roll invasion of the 50s was the first wave but in the new neo-conservatist times of Reagan and Thatcher and that "special releationship" the american dream was alive and well in the UK. When that collided with the power of the TV advert it was a major success, mind you life of Cooke had everything the stuff of legends are made of. One of the founding fathers of soul and being shot dead at just 33 years of age back in 1964 provides the adequate elements of cult status but "Wonderful World" only made No 27 when first released back in the 50s. Indeed the charts of April 1986 were looking decidedly like the 50s anyway with Cliff Richard's remake of "Living Doll" sitting at No 1 whilst this was at No 2, it was the first song that was directly linked to a Levi advert, and it was the levi brand was to launch a whole barage of oldies back into the charts over the course of the rest of the 80s, and provided regular chart toppers up until the mid 90s. The track itself is lyricaly quite simple, Cooke lamenting his lack of academeic qualificiations and attainments but asserting that he knows he loves his girl. It's this simplicity and innocence that really appeals, the attraction of a bygone age when life was simpler that draws the crowd. The song is earnest enough and delivered with casual assurance and confidence and it's hard really to find fault, unusually for 1986, but then this isn't really 1986 is it?.......
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jul 21, 2011 17:33:28 GMT 1
MAY 10TH- LIVE TO TELL- Madonna (1 week)Yes she's back with a 4th No 2 hit of the decade (and her last), becoming the first of only 3 acts to get as many No 2 hits in the decade (the others are still to come). "Live To Tell" is everything "Crazy for You" tried, and in my opinion failed, to do. With this song she manages to nail the ballad without submitting to the cliches that so often hamper the genre, and as this is 1986 it is of course linked to a film, in this case "At Close Range" featuring then husband Sean Penn. The video marked the first of what was to become many, many, image changes, a more subtle, toned down version of Madonna emerged from the toy boy, strutting, nymphomanic image of the "Like A Virgin" period, and was indeed the first single from the "True Blue" album, an album that would catapult her into international superstardom, from which she has never really left. It is therefore a snapshot of the birth of a superstar, it's a fitting testament really, epic in scale, and profound in emotion, it's no "Bridge Over Troubled Water" and I wouldn't pretend as much, but it's the sheer class of the song that impresses and feels like a more developed production than her previous attempts (good as they are). Some of this is due to production techniques obviously, but "live To Tell" is a clear indication of where she intends to go with her career, to be that superstar you have to appeal to a wide range of the audience, and the whole "True Blue" era is just that, an attempt to leave the wannabe's behind and become almost peerless, and you know what? Looks like history taught us that she did. The history of this time has become imbeded now in the history of Madonna. No female star is more aware, some would say pre-occupied, with image, understanding the appeal of "new", or at least to appear "new" on a regular basis!, through twists and turns (not all of them successful) she has stamped her mark on most of the new stars that followed her (certainly in the pop arena) from Britney to Kylie, Christina to Lady Gaga. In part of course it was fortune, she coincided with the birth and evolution of MTV and so had a platform that female stars didn't have before her, but of course you have to the vision to dominate and understand......
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Post by evansabove on Jul 21, 2011 20:48:52 GMT 1
LTT was the start of Madonna really stepping up her game and taking her already substantial success onto another level. It's a really simple video but what was striking at the time was her change in appearance and image which of course was to be her trademark
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Post by Earl Purple on Jul 21, 2011 22:24:24 GMT 1
I wasn't particularly a fan of Madonna at the time yet Live To Tell reached #1 in my chart, the first time she ever did so. She had previously reached #3 in my chart with Material Girl which was a fun bit of pop, but with this song I did suddenly stand up and take notice. I think it was at this point I got the idea her career, which had been going for 2 years, would continue on for some time to come.
In the UK chart it was #2 on the one week that "Rock Me Amadeus" was #1, and the next week both singles fell back 3 places as two songs entered the top 2 and "Lessons In Love" by Level 42 retained the #3 spot.
I'll be interested to see what you think of the next song. At the time I wasn't that keen on it, but when I did my 1986 special on my online radio show (in 2004) it shone out enormously and the fact it was denied the top spot by "The Chicken Song" made it feel almost as unjust as "Vienna" being denied by "Shaddup You Face". The female singer involved then had her most famous previous hit reach #1 in two separate cover versions.
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borneoman
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Post by borneoman on Jul 22, 2011 7:00:03 GMT 1
Live to Tell lost to that silly Rock me Amadeus Travesty!!! Live to Tell is one of the best ballads ever, really few ballads can pull it off without sounding sappy and being a total snoozefest Live to Tell went to #1 in the US right?? loved Manic Monday and the Bangles in general too. Agree their albums are very solid with no fillers but great tracks. When they broke up, I was convinced Susanna Hoffs was gonna be a superstar like Madonna... but alas... but not crazy about the lyrics of Manic Monday, the bit that goes "'Cause that's my fun-day My "I don't have to run"day"
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Post by raliverpool on Jul 22, 2011 19:30:02 GMT 1
I would disagree about David Bowie in that I think his earlier 80s work was good too. I never felt he was one to copy the other genres around him, for example I wouldn't really describe his early 70s music as fitting with glam rock even if one of the glam rock #1s totally stole his riff. The two riffs were written pretty much contemporaneously, either side of the Atlantic. If it's the ones I'm thinking of. Which (Jean Genie & Blockbuster) were both similar to the 1970 Morrison Hotel album track by The Doors' Roadhouse Blues ..... which itself was a rip off of the 1964 Transatlantic Top 20 hit Tobacco Road by the Nashville Teens which was a cover of the John D. Loudermilk 1960 original. That distinctive blues guitar motif has also been utilized in songs by Jefferson Airplane; Edgar Winter; Status Quo & Spooky Tooth to name a few others.
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Post by raliverpool on Jul 22, 2011 20:02:34 GMT 1
PS. Loving this thread. Re: The Madonna #2s debate, I concur with gezza.
Live To Tell is a truly amazing ballad (to think at the time when it only made #2 it was regarded as a flop because of the hype and success she'd had in the previous 18 months); Borderline was a quality tune sung very endearingly but she had not yet found her USP as it could have been a Cyndi Lauper ballad; Crazy For You was a very effective ballad but has dated badly IMHO; and Holiday was a big hit in the slipstream of the momentum she had been steadily building in 1984, which grew in pace with the Like A Virgin & Material Girl singles with excellent videos that were homages to famous movie scenes; but exploded in the UK with the Desperately Seeking Susan movie; the Into The Groove single & especially the very endearing Live Aid performance (where her 21:30-21:45 Hours Philadelphia performance slotted in between the underwhelming Elton John/Wham! team up; and the Wembley Stadium finale) which was watched by 15/16 million in the UK.
Who knows if Tears For Fears had not pulled out of performing in Philadelphia in that time slot with five days notice what would have happened, as Madonna was originally down for only appearing with the Thompson Twins (with the backing band for both being Chic whose Nile Rodgers had produced both their corresponding albums) just after midnight (UK time) in a similar format to the Phil Collins/Sting; Paul Young/Alison Moyet; Hall & Oates/The Temptations & Mick Jagger/Tina Turner team ups throughout the concerts.
But from the minute Bette Midler hilariously and iconically introduced Madonna to the stage a pop legend was about to be made ....
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borneoman
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Post by borneoman on Jul 22, 2011 21:08:48 GMT 1
just realised Crazy For You hit #2 twice in two different chart runs (here in the mid 80s and then again in 91)... is that a record??? has it happened more times??? (a sorta 'bad luck' record)
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Gezza
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Post by Gezza on Jul 22, 2011 21:24:14 GMT 1
depends if you count different covers of the same song- "The Loco-motion" for example hit No 2 for different singers in different decades
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