The History Of Pop Part 38 aka My baby's got no money, he's got his true belief

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

The last of 1997, and if you think some of the big hits are being held over until next time...you'd be right. But the nation was in NO MOOD for pop party fun as - sob! bawl! - DI DIED, and weren't we all glad that Sir Richard Ashcroft was there to help us through it. There's no sign of Elton on this Now, by the way, even though he bossed the charts - to sully such a beautiful track by including it on a compilation would of course be unthinkable, so you'll have to save your ticks.

Hanson's "Mmmmbop" won Now 37 at a canter, after tying with the Spice Girls for a long time. The Cardigans ended up in third. And now, over to you lot.


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Comments

[awesomewells.livejournal.com]

Yes Kylie was different but this has less do with what the music sounded like and more to do with whether people were willing to take it seriously. It seemed like there was a sea-change in attitudes towards pop that started with All Saints that meant people who would never have admitted to liking the Spice Girls were able to go "hang on, this is great" to later stuff. Which meant Kylie could finally become credible doing PROPER DISCO POP rather than through appearing on Nick Cave albums.

(It's not immediate, of course, didn't that Impossible Princess album flop?)

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

I wonder at what point the marketing of All Saints as credible actually tipped over into them being credible? As I remember it was all based around Shaznay writing the songs, but when they covered 'Under The Bridge' I remember a LOT of "omg how dare they! they are just pop girls!" reaction. Maybe when they started working with Orbit? Was that after Orbit had worked with Madge?

I guess there's also the way that All Saints were really explicitly r&b-influenced, kind of a synthesis of Eternal and the Spice Girls, and unlike Eternal they timed their emergence simultaneously with the emergence of Timbaland, so there's the production angle as well...

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

That was specifically from RHCP fans though. "They probably don't even realise what it's about" - this logic particularly annoyed me (and still does).

It was one of the tracks that got customer complaints when we put it on in the bookshop.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

EVERYONE at my school was an RHCP fan. I think they were probably the most popular band in my year. I remember people being annoyed that they changed the gender of the city.

I also remember seeing some Year 7 girls singing the chorus while everyone was waiting to be picked up, and people pointed and laughed and were all like OMG they don't know it's really about DRUGZ!!!111 but we do therefore WE ARE SO COOL!!!!!1111

16-year-olds :(