1998/1999 - We've got stars directin' our fate And we're prayin' it's not too late

I’ve combined the final couple of years in the Nineties. It wasn’t simply that there were fewer songs appealing to my own appetite, although that was true.  Not only was the music scene in transition but so was my personal life. In February ’98, Kim moved from her grim Grimsby hellhole to a townhouse room in Cricklewood. Just over a year later, she moved in to my flat in Billericay.

My relationship with Kim introduced me to Thai culture. My first trip to Chiang Mai in February 1999 was a real eye-opener; in fact an astonishing feast for all the senses. Music played its part, too. The foyer of any decent hotel seemed to resonate with the beautiful sound of the khim. The player would sit cross-legged before the horizontal dulcimer-like instrument and tap the strings lightly with two spoon-shaped hammers. I could sit and let my mind drift for ages, lost in the Oriental exoticism of it all.

Back in Blighty,  we enjoyed the new Saturday Night Fever musical at the Palladium on my 37^th birthday, full of lively Seventies disco songs and dancing. It wasn’t merely a Bee Gees boogie wonderland. In fact the showstopper was a rumbustious rendition of ‘Disco Inferno’ performed by a character in a ‘Fro-tastic’ wig of prodigious proportions. However the star Andy Garcia’s soundtrack singles were strangely insipid. Clock maintained their impressive chart career of Seventies retro with covers of Michael Jackson and KC, while Bamboo’s number two hit ‘Bamboogie’ was a House mash-up based on a sample of KC’s ‘Get Down Tonight’. Play any Sunshine Band song and you shouldn’t really go wrong, but these updates did little for me.

Seventies nostalgia was given an almighty leg-up by the arrival on the London stage of Mamma Mia in April 1999. The previous December, Kim and I had been entertained by Bjorn Again’s affectionate tribute to the Swedes at  Shepherd Bush Empire, and now the real Bjorn-and-Benny co-production was about to take the world by storm. The first great ‘jukebox musical’ was my next birthday treat and it was hugely enjoyable. I remarked at the time that it was a winner for anyone who didn’t actually hate Abba. Stating the obvious, Mike!

The connection continued with the transition of Steps into what sounded like an Abba tribute group under the writing and production tutelage of the old ‘Hitman’, Pete Waterman. Credit where credit’s due, Pete, but this wasn’t his finest hour. The records still sold by the ton, though.

Britpop was pretty much dead and 1998-99 was the era of the Celts and Continentals. In particular, it felt like the whole world had turned green, wearing the shamrock and downing Guinness. Michael Flatley and his twinkle-toed troupers were tip-tapping on stages round the world and Irish bands were ubiquitous. This was partly created by James Horner’s soundtrack to the all-conquering Titanic movie. I detested Celine Dion’s million-selling ‘My Heart Will Go On’ with a passion and, when Leonardo di Caprio drifted off to die in the frozen Atlantic waters, I actually had to suppress a cheer. 

Boyzone racked up another four number one singles including one which actually still gets played. Their recording of ‘No Matter What’, from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical Whistle Down the Wind became easily their most popular single. That’s not to say that I liked it, of course. In fact, when I first heard it I wondered who the female lead was on the first verse. I felt rather sheepish on discovering the soft tenor voice in fact belonged to Stephen Gately. Oops! Ronan Keating had his own solo hit, then Boyzone’s stools were borrowed by Westlife, who had four number ones of their own, all in 1999. Aarrghhh!  

Amidst all this millennial MoR melancholy, another Irish band slipped onto the scene, with a slightly different take on the Boghran-Tin whistle-and-fiddle folk-pop crossover for which the public’s appetite was so notably flourishing. Apart from success at home, The Corrs had been languishing in the second division, supporting Celine Dion amongst others. However, when they re-released their album Talk On Corners, the UK was ready for a new family group, and promotion to pop’s Premier League was assured.

It helped that the three sisters were - let’s be frank! - easy on the eye as well as on the ear. Sorry, Jim. I know you played your part, but who was watching you on the guitar? Their hit singles flowed like a County Louth stream, all of them tripping beautifully from the radio. What male heart could not melt watching and listening to Andrea Corr dreamily performing ‘What Do I Do?’ or ‘Runaway’? She took flicking and flirting bedroom eyes to a new level, and the Irish lilt to her voice also contributed to The Corrs’ huge success.

Ireland could even boast a new girl group to rival The Spice Girls in 1998. B*witched (the asterisk was essential) burst onto the scene with the throwaway but infectious ‘C’est la Vie’, complete with the obligatory Riverdance sequence. B*witched also recorded the inevitable dreamy ballad a la ‘2 Become 1’. My diary placed ‘To You I Belong’ as one of my favourites of 1998 but, before Googling it just now, it was just another long-forgotten girl group footnote. Other, similarly unmemorable chart-toppers followed, and three years later they were dropped by their label and split up. Such is pop. 

The Irish didn’t quite have everything their own way; this was a great period for the Welsh, too. The Manics were secure in the upper echelons of UK rock royalty, and their singles success continued effortlessly with another Spanish Civil War anthem ‘If You TolerateThis Then Your Children Will Be Next’ (performed here at the new Millennium Stadium in Cardiff) and ‘You Stole the Sun from My Heart’. In my eyes they could just do no wrong. 

New kids from the valleys, The Stereophonics, also stepped up a gear. I’d first heard of them when Kelly Jones performed a solo rendition as a busker of ‘As Long as we Beat the English’, for a BBC Wales rugby promo. I quite liked his husky vocals and sense of humour. While they had already enjoyed some hits, it wasn’t until the ballad ‘Just Looking’ that I began to appreciate their music. As with so many acts, subsequent purchase of their greatest hits CD introduced me in later life to other brilliant tracks like ‘Pick a Part That’ New’ and ‘More Life in a Tramp’s Vest’.

So far, so macho. Enter Cerys Matthews. The description of a ‘smokey’ voice was perfect for Cardiff-born, Swansea-educated Cerys, although her smoking and drinking led her into rehab a few years later. Nevertheless, for all her love of booze and the filthy weed, she and her band Catatonia were a breath of fresh air to the charts.

Although the song had nothing to do with aliens, ‘Mulder and Scully’ shamelessly name-checked the character from TV’s ‘The X Files’ and was a bright and breezy post-Britpop hit I couldn’t help liking. In many ways, I preferred the less successful ‘Road Rage’. Cerys was not a typical pop star, nor even rock star; more a slightly hippy-ish Celtic free spirit. Since then she has undergone more re-inventions than Bowie. Nashville Country artist, Welsh language cultural icon, respected radio presenter and music commentator, I reckon she has done more than most to merit her MBE. Nevertheless, for me it was those two Catatonia singles which will always stand out.  

The Welsh music scene was very incestuous back then. Cerys was one of many collaborators on Tom Jones’ huge-selling Reload covers album. I didn’t particularly enjoy any of them, but ‘Mama Told Me Not To Come’ (with the Stereophonics, and Tom’s half-chuckled “I'm lookin' at my girlfriend - she's passed out on the floor”!) and ‘Burning Down the House’ (with The Cardigans) remain staples of Welsh rock station, Nation Radio to this day. 

The old fox even saved a relationship. Well, at least he did in the lyrics of Space’s ‘Ballad of Tom Jones’. And who sang with them? Yes, Cerys Matthews! It was another of Tommy Scott’s wry, witty ditties, in which he and Cerys exchanged snarling ripostes before recognising that Tom Jones’ music had brought their rancorous skirmishes to an end: 

“There was something in that voice
that stopped us seeing red
The two of us would've surely
have ended up dead”

Ahhhh! And all this despite Cerys singing “I’ll never throw my knickers at you” and Tommy’s “And I don’t come from Wales!”

As for the Scots, Texas had been flying the Saltire successfully for a few years but in ’99, Travis finally hit pay dirt with the brilliant ‘The Man Who’ album. Glorious singles flowed freely all year. None made the top five but all were equally fine. They had entered the public consciousness when their opening chords of ‘Why Does it Always Rain On Me?’ triggered a downpour at a previously warm and sunny Glastonbury Festival. Fran Healy may well have dined out on that anecdote ever since, and that song has been their most famous. I could have picked any one of four to represent their end-of-decade dominance, but their first release from the album ‘Writing to Reach You’ gets the nod ahead of ‘Driftwood’.

With B*witched, Cleopatra, S Club 7 and 15 year-old Billie Piper appealing to the Smash Hits generation of young girls, The Spice Girls were beginning to look like grannies. After conquering the world for two years, the only way was down. The lively Sixties-influenced ‘Stop’ was stopped from maintaining their run of number ones by Run DMC and Jason Nevins in March ‘98, but ‘Viva Forever’ got them back on track in the summer. One of their best ballads, it nevertheless couldn’t emulate reality. Between recording their TOTP performance and the single’s release, and during their US tour, Geri Halliwell left the group. Nothing lasts forever, ladies.

Solo projects were an inevitable consequence. Mel B was the first of the five to top the charts (a dull hip-hop duet with Missie ‘Midemeanor’ Elliott), Emma Bunton came close and Mel C delighted with her rock collaboration with Bryan Adams on ‘When You’re Gone’.  But everyone was waiting for Geri’s debut. Everyone, that is, except me.

In May 1999, the former Ginger Spice promoted her debut solo single ‘Look At Me’ at every opportunity on every possible medium on both sides of the Atlantic. Perform as often as you like, Geri; it was terrible! However, thanks to some creative marketing by Team Boyzone, the boyband’s ‘You Needed Me’ beat her to the top.

Geri’s first number one did arrive a few months later in the form of ‘My Chico Latino’, and that wasn’t much better. Her hit was a pathetic amalgam of ‘Las Isla Bonita’ and ‘Viva Forever’. Fortunately for her, she was riding on the coat-tails of a summer Latino explosion. Ricky Martin’s ‘Livin’ La Vida Loca’ and Lou Bega’s ‘Mambo No. 5’ dominated the summer months. I have no innate antipathy towards Latin rhythms. Far from it. However, for all their frequent airplay, I had no time for either. The only positive outcome of Bega’s record was its use in that memorable paper-stripping scene on BBC1’s The Royle Family in 2000. Mambo, my arse….!

France, Germany, Holland and Italy all had number one singles in 1999. And a right mixed bag they were. Mr Oizo’s ‘Flat Beat’ was a tuneless bass loop and drum sample, propelled to the top via a Levi commercial. After all those delightful number twos, this execrable effort embarrassingly proved to be the single which ended the 36-year wait for an instrumental UK number one. Tragic. Just for the hell of it, here are The Shadows from 1960 with 'Apache' to restore my faith in the genre....

German producer ATB gave us something rather better with ‘9am (Til I Come)’ while Italians Eiffel 65 delivered ‘Blue’. Many rate this one of the worst examples of Euro-Dance ever to be inflicted on an unsuspecting world. I disagree, and so did the million or so people who bought it. Ludicrous, it may be, but it’s another of my now-not-so-secret guilty pleasures. Altogether now, “I’m blue, da-ba-de-da-ba-da…” I could go on….

Dutch Euro-Dance act Vengaboys had three chart-toppers of their own. Think Gina G meets ‘Barbie Girl’. Oh well. At least their cod-reggae update of Typically Tropical’s ‘Barbados’, in the guise of ‘We’re Going to Ibiza’ (Coconut Airways replaced by Venga Airways) had something to tap my toes to.

Ibiza was the place to be for anyone into dance music rather more hardcore than Vengaboys. The Mediterranean mega-clubs bred the mega-rich celebrity DJs, but these didn’t exactly lend themselves to TOTP or any other TV broadcast. There wasn’t much to gain from watching someone standing behind the decks in those torch headsets. They resembled alien insects waving their arms or pretending to twiddle a few knobs. Did they really think they’d con the viewer into believing these ‘performers’ were doing anything other than switching on a pre-prepared digital segue of banging choons they’d mixed weeks earlier. That didn’t stop them having hits.

I truly hated Armand van Helden’s ultra-monotonous ‘You Don’t Know Me’ but when it came to listening on the radio, we Brits contrived some contemporary club tracks more to my thirty-something taste. Basement Jaxx’s ‘Rendezx-vu’ was OK and The Chemical Brothers’ ‘Hey Girl, Hey Boy’ better. However, when it came to sampling umpteen vocals, riffs and synth beats into something completely new that I actually liked, the ex-Housemartin Norman Cook, aka Fatboy Slim, seemed to have it sussed. In January 1999, ‘Praise You’ reached the summit but one of my favourites from that era was ‘Right Here, Right Now' held off the top by one of those blasted Westlife ballads.

Mr Slim also sprinkled some stardust on a song, ‘Brimful of Asha’ by a little-known British Asian combo called Cornershop. A year before ‘Praise You’, their rather boring tribute to Indian movie singer Asha Bhosle was re-mixed into a joyously upbeat dance number and it sold over half a million.

Like most chart-toppers, ‘Brimful of Asha’ went straight to the top. Back then, few reached number one via a climb and so if I didn’t see them on TOTP when they reached the summit, I didn’t usually see them at all. In 1999, no fewer than 35 singles spent at least one week at the head of the queue. Inevitably, for many it was a case of ‘blink-and-you-miss-it’. In most cases, I don’t think I missed much at all.

Even the million-selling ‘Baby One More Time’ led the way for just two weeks, but its chart lifespan exceeded that of just about all others. Britney Spears herself has, of course, proved more enduring than I and others could possibly have predicted. The naughty schoolgirl video worked wonderfully in ridding herself of an outdated wholesome Disney Club image although, at just 16 at the time of release, the “Hit Me…” lyric left a sour taste in the mouth.

Nevertheless, Max Martin’s composition was intoxicating stuff. From that 3-note bass piano riff and Britney’s breathy “Oh baby, baby” to the chorus crescendo, it’s a great pop song. ‘Oops, I Did It again’ followed the fruitful formula and was to deliver more success in 2000, but Spears, despite the odd meltdown and ill-conceived, short-lived marriages along the way, has somehow come through the subsequent few decades almost unscathed Not really my cup of tea but good on her for surviving so many career ‘car crashes’.

For all the new teenage starlets, there was still space for some golden oldies to make successful comebacks. Cher was 52 when she dominated Autumn ’98 with the irritating ‘Believe’ and the even more irritating use of distorting Auto-Tune software. Debbie Harry was an even more venerable 56 when Blondie enjoyed an even more unlikely number one with ‘Maria’, nineteen years after their previous chart-topper. Not exactly their best, but at least they still had the drive and creativity to record their own new material and find an audience. 

Madonna was relatively youthful, yet approaching forty when her latest reinvention hit the airwaves and record shops in 1998. In those days, she rarely disappointed, and the Ray of Light album fell firmly into that bracket. My first exposure to the new stuff was when she appeared on TOTP performing ‘Frozen’, all long golden curls and floor-length Gothic black lacy costume. This was la Ciccone in spiritual mode, part-Earth mother, part witch! It was surprising that Madonna was on TOTP at all, and yet ‘Frozen’ was quite an entrancing mix of classical and electronica, enhanced by producer William Orbit’s trademark three-beat pulse. The album’s title track was a more effervescent ambient/techno/House track based on a long-forgotten English Sixties folk song which I presume must have been unrecognisable in comparison with the Madonna re-tread. Great video, too, which leaves me breathless just watching it. 

The following year, Madonna again turned to William Orbit for ‘Beautiful Stranger’. It was hard to disassociate it from the second Austin Powers comedy The Spy Who Shagged Me, which I did actually see in the cinema. The Guardian critic led me to believe it would be wet-yourself hilarious. Sadly, it wasn’t. Madonna’s song was one of the better things in it; its subtle dance rhythm with a hint of psychedelia made it a brilliant song in its own right. Yeah, baby!

Blur popped up again in 1999, their new album including the glorious number two hit ‘Tender’. It also provided one of Glasto’s greatest ten-minute ‘moments’ when the band reunited for a summer of glorious festival performances in 2009, featuring  ‘Tender’.  I’m not one for Gospel choirs, but, just watching on TV, the a capella section gave me goosebumps. The Lord alone knows what those present must have felt.

Like Blur, I daresay Radiohead delivered some memorable live renditions to vast open-air crowds but I wouldn’t have bothered switching on to see. Radiohead’s OK Computer is one of those albums which constantly appears in rock mags’ ‘greatest ever’ lists. Cue another yawnnnn from me. Yet personal history registers its ballad ‘No Surprises’ as my faves of ’98. That children’s lullaby guitar intro just doesn’t fit the Radiohead brand, though. Far too good!

My musical memories of these years aren’t restricted to the big guns. For starters, there were some delightful Alternative rock and pop singles around.  I really liked Semisonic’s ‘Secret Smile’. Lovely lyrics and a deceptively simple melody, but it failed to make our top ten. Apparently it featured in a film I’d never heard of. The same was true of the cute ‘Kiss Me’ by fellow Americans Sixpence None the Richer. With a title like that, it’s bound to feature on soundtracks, adverts and Valentine’s Day playlists for generations to come. However corny it sounds, I still quite like its joyfully twangy guitars and Leigh Nash’s natural vocals.

We Brits did the unpretentious songs quite well, too. Best of the lot around that time must have been Tin Tin Out’s trip-hoppy cover of  ‘Here’s Where the Story Ends’, sung by Shelly Nelson. It made seven over here in April 1998.

At the weirder end of the scale was the All Seeing I’s collaboration with Tony Christie, ‘Walk Like a Panther’. It gave the old crooner a helping hand back into the charts after a lengthy gap, but it was co-composer Jarvis Cocker’s TOTP appearance in January ’99 which I remember most clearly. He may not have the rich voice of Christie but only Jarvis he could pull off such a singularly eccentric performance.

 Amidst all the rocket-powered trajectories to number one, it was refreshing when two massive records peaked after two or three months. All Saints’ bleak, bluesy and frankly boring  ‘Never Ever’ took nine weeks to make number one early in ’98, while its chart contemporary ‘Angels’ by Robbie Williams spent even longer en route to its highest position of four. The latter must surely be the lowest-charting million-seller in UK history, but laid in concrete Robbie’s solo career foundations.

Two of his best, though not necessarily his most successful, songs topped the chart in this period. Even though the 2000s were still some way off, he released ‘Millennium’ in September 1998. He admitted it was a shameless shoehorning of the great social buzzword into a lyric which had nothing whatsoever to do with the significant calendar event.

Boasting an intro of the incomparable John Barry descending strings from ‘You Only Live Twice’, it could hardly fail. The video, too, was an unusually tongue-in-cheek pastiche of James Bond. Robbie’s Ernst Blofeld-sized ego also deflated sufficiently to allow the final part feature him comically prancing about in a field trying to activate his 007-style jet-pack. Video Gold!

That won him one of his many Brit awards, as did the video for the following year’s ‘She’s the One’. God knows why. Robbie as a champion figure skater? Oh, per-leaze! The song, however, is a superb tear-jerker. It had all the hallmarks of a Guy Chambers melody, and yet, unknown to me, it was actually a cover of a World Party song. From the best video and best ballad to his best lyric. ‘Strong’ wasn’t a classic but did again show Williams’ more sensitive side, featuring the couplet:-

                    “Early morning when I wake up

                    I look like Kiss but without the make-up”

evoking some incomparable striking imagery! One millennium may have passed, but from Robbie, more, so much more was to come.