This is the series where I feature The Guardian’s idea of the 100 best UK #1s ever, and we see what I have to say about them (which usually isn’t much, to be honest).
Well, I really wasn’t expecting the amount of dissenting messages I received after the last post in this already tedious series, where I posted Whigfield’s Saturday Night and described it as “dog shit.”
Now, admittedly I was referencing the bit in This is Spinal Tap, where their album Shark Sandwich receives a two word review:
…but perhaps I didn’t make that clear enough.
Look, I really dislike Saturday Night, but I accept that it has its positive points. Just as the premise here is that There’s No Such Thing as a Guilty Pleasure, I’m not wrong for hating it, and if you like it, then you’re not wrong either. Pop music: it’s all subjective, see?
Also, as I said in the Comments to that last post: “See, what I did here was think ‘this would be a good idea for a series’, I didn’t actually bother to a) check what the songs I’d have to post were, or b) think of anything to write about them before I started it. And since I’ve been dumb enough to mention how many posts there will be in the series in the title, I can’t just quietly drop it. You’d think I’d have learned from my 50 Reasons series, wouldn’t you….?”
In the same way as that, when I used to do The Chain here, I wouldn’t peek to see what the next tune was until the time came for me to write the post, so I don’t know what I’m going to have to write about in this series until I start to write the post.
Constructive criticism noted: from now on, I’ll try to engage a little more. Hopefully, there won’t be many more songs that I think are so bloody awful as to make me resort to an equally scathing and short review that might get a few of your danders up.
OK, so what’s next on the list?
Justin Bieber – What Do You Mean?
Oh great. Thank you, God.
Here’s what The Guardian had to say about the record which they decided was the 90th best UK Number One….Ever!:
“There will be howls of protestation at Bieber being on this list, a man routinely cited as everything that is facile about pop and celebrity. Well, he’s had his moments, but this is one of his equally frequent triumphs. Taking the Insta-filtered aesthetic of the then-popular tropical house sound and marrying it to a melody that flits like a bird of paradise always coming back to its perch, it has the melancholically fleeting beauty of a package holiday sunset.”
My exposure to Bieber has been limited, thus far. Up until now, all I really knew about him was that:
- He was a child prodigy, and therefore annoying
- He changed his hair-style and immediately a large chunk of his audience was aggrieved
- He once turned up at a gig at the O2 two hours late (I wish I could find the footage of a Dad, who had accompanied his daughter to see him, announcing “We hate him now”, but I can’t)
- He’s had some run-ins with the law
- He genuinely doesn’t seem to give a flying feck
All of which makes me rather like the rude little sod. Isn’t this what pop stars are supposed to be like?
As for the tune itself: s’alright. It’s a perfectly fine pop record, and it sounds like most pop records do to these old ears these days.
I mean, it’s no Saturday Night, but what is?
But in the Top 100….? I can probably think of some others which could have replaced it. But since I don’t know what’s to come, I can’t exactly list them.
NB: when this is done, I will not be venturing an alternative list of my favourite UK #1’s ever.
Anyway, more soon (less controversially, I hope).
A History of Dubious Taste 