The UK Top 40, 28/11/04

Album Chart Notes: I’d been listening to Alcazar , then spotted the clock. Annoyingly, duty calls, and we tune in the middle of an interview with Urrrshurrr. Fuck me, but he sounds evil. Wes… is going in February. Keep yer eyes on the prize, Will. Gwen Stefani is new at #14. Ultimate Kylie is new at #4, and is the third greatest hits type thing of hers to have reached the top 20. Which is quite good going, really, particularly considering the other two didn’t have anything on them from after 1992. Unless Everyhit is lying to me, which I sort of hope it isn’t. Here’s ‘Can’t Get You Out Of My Head’. Hooray!

And at #1, it’s U2. We are treated to ‘Miracle Drug’. It’s… half-decent, and then it loses its way after a couple of minutes.

Girls Aloud are in for webchat today.

Wes: So, you going to tell us about the amazing prize?

Nicola Roberts: What amazing prize?

http://tinypic.com/opq8x

Really, she is the greatest living popstar of our times. Their album’s out tomorrow. It’s gonna be good.

New Entries Outside The Top 20: Lemon Jelly #31 (like before but with rubbisher samples and drum things. Bang on average); 2Play ft. Thomas Jules & Jucxi D #29 (he takes his piano noise and applies it to ‘Careless Whisper’. No); Delays #28 (hang on. This is… this is actually really good. No, seriously. It sounds like, erm… Depeche Mode. A little bit. Some bloke wrote “Buy THE DELAYS – ‘Lost In A Melody’ 22/11/04 – It’s Amazing!” on the back of one of the toilet stall doors at uni, which didn’t exactly help matters, but no – this really might just maybe be worth it. But probably not); Thunder #27 (Big & Rich – Ft. Robert Palmer! I knew I was going off Horse Of A Different Color a bit…); Intenso Project ft. Lisa Scott-Lee #23 (opens reasonably, wobbling bass and that, but outstays its welcome rather too quickly); and Status Quo #21 (a Status Quo song having a go at “TV reality shows.” Guessed the rest? Well done).

THE UK TOP 20: GRAFFITI YR SOUL

20) BLUE – Curtain Falls

So yeah, Band Aid’s out next week, which basically means that the singles chart is dead for the rest of the year, with the odd exception. The fact that I’ve no idea what those odd exceptions are worries me a little.

19) JAMELIA – DJ/Stop

Songs sung at DJ’s ‘in the club’ are always rubbish. This is no exception.

18) KEANE – This Is The Last Time (NEW ENTRY)

Oh look, it’s a live version. It’s still nothing like as good as A-Ha. Or ‘Eighties Coming Back’, for that matter. “Keane aren’t as good as the Estonian Eurovision entry from 2003.” Stick that on your fly-poster.

17) ERIC PRYDZ – Call On Me

I only realised this earlier today – here’s Eric:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/totp/artists/images/eric_prydz.jpg

and here’s Pop Will Eat Itself:

http://stat.discogs.com/A/3111-001.jpg

STOURBRIDGE LIVES!!!

16) McFLY – Room On The Third Floor

Southampton drew 2-2 with Crystal Palace yesterday, which isn’t really much to shout about.

15) CHRISTINA AGUILERA ft. MISSY ELLIOTT – Car Wash

But it would appear that I’m going to have to anyway.

http://www.saintsfc.co.uk/Images/04_05/MatchAction/CPalace_Home/celebrates_lg.jpg

I think we’re celebrating a goal. Then again, given our recent form, we might be defending a free-kick. It’s all so very depressing…

14) JAY-Z vs. LINKIN PARK – Encore (NEW ENTRY)

Let’s take ‘Numb’. Let’s make it even less heavy. Let’s slow it all down to the point of obsolescence. And then let’s put some Jay-Z in, for the kids. Misbegotten and a half.

13) U2 – Vertigo

It’s remarkable quite how bored Bono sounds, somehow, he’s not going for this at all. Lemar is still so much better than this. I’ll probably explain why later, because this week remains highly tedious.

12) UNITING NATIONS – Out Of Touch (NEW ENTRY)

Right, is this the first time in chart history two acts whose names start with U have been adjacent? Because that’s probably the most irritating thing here, apart from the quite nice xylophone noises. Otherwise, anonymous disco-house, but none the worse for all that.

11) USHER & ALICIA KEYS – My Boo

Normally I’d be disdainful, but this week, it’s followed by:

10) SHANIA TWAIN & MARK McGRATH – Party For Two (NEW ENTRY)

Duets are great, aren’t they? Duncan James & Keedie. Tom Jones & Cerys Matthews. Beyonce & Sean Paul. Mick Jagger & David Bowie. And if that’s the canon, this fits like a glove. A really, really horrendous glove. Mr McGrath sounds like an emasculated Mike Mills. The drum machine sounds like it was purchased from The Early Learning Centre. As does the guitar. Shania and Mark leer at each other over backing from… god knows what, but whatever it is, it’s shite. Puns are exchanged – “I’m having a party/a party for twooo/inviting nobody/nobody but yooo.” It’s like walking in on your parents having sex. But worse.

9) JOJO ft. BOW-WOW – Baby It’s You

In this month’s Plan B, Neil Kulkarni has written about ‘Leave (Get Out)’. Read it. It’s very good.

8) GWEN STEFANI – What You Waiting For?

I get why people like this, really I do. I just don’t happen to agree particularly, for some reason. I’m not sure why. I get it, I just don’t ‘get it’. Or something.

7) EMINEM – Just Lose It

I do like it one hell of a lot more than this, though.

6) BRIAN McFADDEN – Irish Son (NEW ENTRY)

You see, now he is rock, he sings like he has a throat infection. Basically, Brian has a go at the Catholic schools of Dublin and sounds a bit like U2 probably do in his mind. It’s probably controversial. I should probably care. But… nah.

5) NELLY ft. CHRISTINA AGUILERA – Tilt Ya Head Back (NEW ENTRY)

So, did you ever wonder what Christina Aguilera’s cover of ‘Car Wash’ would sound like if it had involved Nelly instead? No? Well, this is sort of the answer, but somehow… better. Somehow Nelly sounds so much better when he’s being kept in check, and ‘tina does a very good job of that. In fact, this is a duet… and it works. Dear god, The World’s Shortest Man and The World’s Gruntingest Woman have – gasp! - chemistry! They are loving it, just playing about with each other, Nelly’s libido comes under attack and it’s all good. Disregarding the cod-soul backing, which is a bit poo, but still – I like a Nelly single! Fuck me!

4) GERI HALLIWELL – Ride It (NEW ENTRY)

This doesn’t quite work, though. It sounds a bit like the Lisa Scott-Lee song from earlier, with yet more fucking singing about DJ’s and that shite, and her voice sounds incredibly similar to Victoria Beckham’s. No thanks.

3) LEMAR – If There’s Any Justice

Right, Lemar’s take on ‘Vertigo’, better than this, and better than the original too. Lemar has drama. Somehow he gets the song, the song that Bono treats like his attempt at being cool with the rock kids, Lemar actually sings it like he is indeed at a place called Vertigo, that it really is everything he wishes he didn’t know, and yet you give him something he can feel, that your love is teaching him how to live. Lemar is not cool, particularly, and that’s great because Lemar isn’t at all bothered about being cool. Popworld can interview him across a car park via loudhailer and he doesn’t flinch. He can put a song called ‘Soulman’ on his album with a completely straight face. And so, what you want is for someone to take Lemar somewhere interesting, somewhere more interesting than just “My, what a soulful voice he has. Let’s make him sound like Roachford.” Because apart from ‘Cuddly Toy’, Roachford never really had any particularly great tunes (not on his debut album anyway), but ‘Cuddly Toy’ remains so awesome that you can only be annoyed that he never got anything else of much note. And Lemar’s cover of ‘Vertigo’ is so affecting, so touching, so flat-out awesome that you just don’t want his career to go the same way. Two requests, then:

a) Someone please give the boy some tunes;

b) Someone please encode his cover of Vertigo to MP3 or something, because the BBC will eventually take it down and I can’t be arsed waiting for it to be the B-Side to his next single. Though obviously when it is the B-side to his next single then I will go out and buy it, because I am a good boy.

Thanks.

2) DESTINY’S CHILD – Lose My Breath

I was going to try listening to that Delays single again, but I can only find some distinctly dodgy RealPlayer video streams of it which sounded awful, so not for now. It sounded quite good a couple of hours ago in ‘proper quality’, though.

1) GIRLS ALOUD – I’ll Stand By You

I am becoming very convinced by this though. Next week, of course, it’s Band Aid. To get you in the mood, here’s the video for ‘Bad Cover Version’ by Pulp. Even if their David Bowie lookalike isn’t particularly convincing, the bit with ‘Bjork’ more than makes up for it.