Saturday 24 April 2010

Los Umbrellos 'No Tengo Dinero'

Chart Peak: 33

YouTube
The Mysterious Los Umbrellos are due to release their Euro summer anthem 'No Tengo Dinero' on 31st August 1998... They are Al Agami, Grith Hojfeldt and Stine Kinch
Yes, apparently they're so mysterious their names are reproduced in the sleeve note. And there's a photo of the single cover, which includes some people who might or might not be in the band. That probably represents as much as most people want to know about Los Umbrellos, although if it really doesn't satiate your appetite I can also tell you they were from Denmark.

Their origins notwithstanding, their only UK hit is in English and Spanish, and seems an effort to combine the Latin sound that was really big the following year with Shaggy-style pop-reggae (it even includes the word "punani", which might have been a problem had more people heard the record. Whilst it can't honestly be described as good, I didn't think this was any worse than a lot of other novelty hits that summer, and was mildly surprised to see it become so much less successful than most of them.

And with that, Now 40 is finally over. The second disc goes some way to making up for the rotten first one, but this must still rank among the weakest in the series. I'm sure it could have been better too.

Next month we'll be back in the 1980s. Let's hope the standards pick up a bit.

Available on: 50 Stærke Danske Hits (Vol. 4)

Friday 23 April 2010

Kerri-Ann 'Do You Love Me Boy?'

Chart Peak: 58

YouTube
Kerri-Ann, the latest Irish teen pop sensation, is due to release her first single 'Do You Love Me Boy?' on 27th July '98... She signed her record deal while still at school where she was also a champion Irish dancer
Yes, you read that chart position right, though apparently this did make it to Number 2 in Ireland. In case the phrase "Irish teen-pop sensation" isn't enough of a giveaway, she was managed by Louis Walsh, and signed to Polygram, which might lead a cynical person to suspect that her presence here might even have been some sort of quid-pro-quo for the inclusion of the Boyzone track on the first disc. Scurrilous allegations aside, it must rank as one of the most obscure tracks ever to crop up on a Now! album, having made so little impact at the time and leaving very little impact on posterity. She never released another single in the UK, despite further success in her homeland.

It'd be fun to say that 'Do You Love Me Boy?' was some sort of lost classic, but of course it isn't. It's just a throwaway (and not in a good way) piece of inanity for which somebody seems to have pressed the "latin" button on their sythensiser. If you like castanets, you'll be impressed by this, but that's not enough to make me want to hear this more than the twice I had to for the sake of this post.

Thursday 22 April 2010

Adam Garcia 'Night Fever'

Chart Peak: 15

YouTube

We're almost back where we started here, with a song from the other big musical movie of the late 1970s. Garcia played the lead in the recently-open stage musical of the story, and the almost-title track was picked out here as a single from the cast recording (coincidentally, the original was the only Number One the Bee Gees managed off the soundtrack). Presumably in order to stay in character, he doesn't attempt to replicate a Gibb-style falsetto, but unfortunately that turns out to be the most distinctive element of the song. The immaculate disco sound of the original is also replaced by a generic late-90s boyband style production: admittedly, I don't know whether this was remixed specifically for single release, but if that was how it sounded on stage it certainly doesn't convey the era to me at all. It feels rather out of place and doesn't make much sense here.


Available on: Saturday Night Fever

Wednesday 21 April 2010

Imaani 'Where Are You?'

Chart Peak: 15

YouTube

The UK's Eurovision entry in 1998, which placed them in the Top 3 for the third year running: indeed the contest was in Birmingham following the victory of Katrina & The Waves the previous year. Only Dana International precluded a repeat of the same success again. I'd always had this idea that Eurovision songs were supposed to be written by people from the country represented, but apparently one of the co-writers of this was Scott English, whose 'Brandy' later congealed into the Barry Manilow/Westlife hit 'Mandy'. Perhaps he was granted a special exemption because of his name or something.

Anyway, the song is OK, but has that slightly stilted quality of a lot of Eurovision. Imaani herself (born Melanie Crosdale) puts in a decent performance but unfortunately for her it didn't get her very far; a follow-up single was cancelled although she did guest on a couple of dance tracks thereafter. Of course, it struggles to follow the excitement of somebody speaking Dutch over footage of the Mini factory, but then what wouldn't?

Available on: Original Hits - Dance

Tuesday 20 April 2010

Barbara Tucker 'Everybody Dance (The Horn Song)'

Chart Peak: 28

YouTube

We're still in the dance section here, with a track that the sleevenote explains started life as an instrumental club his by DJ Pierre (AKA The Don). As so often seems to happen in the world of dance, a vocal was added in an attempt to attract the attentions of radio programmers (and ultimately chart compilers) and somewhere along the way, unlucky Pierre seems to have lost his credit; I presume he's the guy in the photo trying to eat a microphone.

Unfortunately, the result seems to fall between two stools; unlike the preceding track, which I could appreciate for what it was, this is obviously trying to be something a bit more and doesn't convince. It can't only have been me that wasn't convinced either, since it didn't sell that well. Oh, and if this was one track earlier in the sequence it'd be as close to the end of the album as 'Horny' is to the start. They missed a trick there.

Available on: Everybody Dance

Monday 19 April 2010

Perpetual Motion 'Keep On Dancin' (Let's Go)'

Chart Peak: 12

YouTube

Another "massive club tune" which "crossed over to the national chart". I didn't recognise it at all by name, but as soon as I listened to it the insistent little piano hook was instantly familiar (I'm assuming it's not sampled from anything else). I must have heard this at least three times while it was in the Top 40, and probably not paid very much attention. Indeed, the sleeve notes, not usually given to understatement or faint praise, explain that it "reached a very respectable No 12", which seems to sum it up rather well; it had moderate rather than massive impact on the mainstream but obviously did the business for clubbers themselves.

And that's not necessarily a problem, because this has enough energy to make sense in its own terms, although it's slightly odd that MC Raw gets a namecheck and co-writing credit for the lyric "Let's go!". It's not a record that crosses over to me so far as to make me love it, but it's more appealing than a lot of the dance tracks I find myself writing about.

Available on: Greatest Hits of Dance

Sunday 18 April 2010

Lucid 'I Can't Help Myself'

Chart Peak: 7

YouTube

Back on a dance tip here, but a less obviously commercial one. To be sure, this was a major hit, and they had a couple more ('Crazy' and a cover version of 'Stay With Me Till Dawn') but this feels so structured to me it seems like it could only make sense at the right point in a DJ set. Indeed the sleeve note describes it as a "monster club track" that was "finally due for release in late July '98"; the copyright date is actually 1997 so it obviously had been well established in the club scene before it came to the awareness of the rest of us. It's all trying to lead up to a climax but I've to admit it mainly passes me by.

Available on: Weekend Anthems

Wednesday 14 April 2010

David Morales Presents The Face 'Needin' U'

Chart Peak: 8

YouTube

We're staying on a dance tip here, and indeed indeed on a similarly alchemical one: like Fatboy Slim, Morales (already a noted remixer) builds this track on the foundations of two old records. In this case, the chorus is derived from The Chi-Lites, but the most important element is the piano hook from the Northern Soul track 'Let Me Down Easy' by Rare Pleasure; coincidentally this was also sampled on A Trip Into Space by Spearmint, which came out as a single at about the same time and was consequently deprived of whatever miniscule chance it might ever have had of becoming a hit.

'Needin' U' itself is an enjoyable record, but once you've heard the source tracks you do find yourself wondering what Morales has really added to them. They're not especially disparate so there's not the excitement of hearing how he could fit them together. It's a good record for dancefloors and certainly a big success in terms of its own intentions: but it's not instantly impressive. This might even be why this is his only major hit in his own right, apart from a vocal version of this that's not as good.


Available on: Dave Pearce Classic Dance Anthems

Tuesday 13 April 2010

Fatboy Slim 'The Rockafeller Skank'

Chart Peak: 6

YouTube

It's slightly hard to imagine now that there was ever a time when this record seemed unfamiliar enough to necessitate that little sticker on the cover associating it with the lyric "Right about now, funk soul brother". This wasn't quite the first Fatboy Slim single to hit the Top 40 (a rerelease of 'Everybody Needs A 303' had done that late in 1997) but as the sleevenote points out, this built on the "incredible success of his Cornershop and Wildchild remixes" (both of which turned up on Now 39) to become "one of the summer's hottest tunes". Even the peak position of 6 seems to understate its popularity somewhat, as it was released in the same week when the football songs in the previous two posts and the official tournament song by Dario G were all new entries to the Top 5.

Indeed, this was one of the most ubiquitous tracks in the second half of 1998, not only because it was able to survive England's exit from the tournament but also because it managed to attract so many audiences; catchy enough for kids, energetic enough for clubbers, funky enough for hip-hop fans and melodic enough for the general pop audience. The so-called big beat scene was a massive crossover to the indie market too, possibly because so many of the people involved were ex-members of indie bands anyway... Norman Cook certainly was, and yet for all his past success in so many forms, this set the stage for Fatboy Slim to become arguably his most consistently successful alias; it was only the first of four Top 10 singles from the album You've Come A Long Way Baby, which is trailed on the single cover under the presumed working title Let's Hear It For The Little Guy. If you're wondering why all the backgound digressions here, it's because I wasn't exactly chomping at the bit to listen to it again. That's not say that I don't like the record, indeed I think it's excellent and I'm still slightly in awe of the imagination that it took to make it. But it's a record that most of anywhere near my age have heard A LOT and given its inherantly repetitive nature it's not as easy to enjoy as it should be. Sorry Norm.

Also appearing on: Now 41, 42, 43
Available on: Why Try Harder: the Greatest Hits

Monday 12 April 2010

Fat Les 'Vindaloo'

Chart Peak: 2

YouTube

And the football theme continues, although this being the eleventh of 20 tracks on the disc it may not have been on the same side of the cassette as the preceding track. Still, the sleeve-notes are clearly right to name this as one of the two big [English] anthems of the year's World Cup, as it spent three weeks as runner-up to 'Three Lions '98'. Conspicuously not mentioned in dispatches is the official song by England United, which was comprehensively outclassed, spending only three weeks in the entire Top 40, though it had a relatively long run lower down the Top 75.

Anyway, at the time I hated this record. It had some pedigree; Keith Allen had co-written the other classic England song 'World In Motion' and the music was co-written by Alex James, who not only has the same name as a famous footballer but was a member of my then-favourite band Blur. The third publicly-acknowledged member of Fat Les, though, was Damien Hirst and whilst it's not entirely clear what he contributed on the record itself, he seems to have set the tone for the rather ugly self-indulgent tone of this, which sounds like an ugly collision Cool Britannia and New Lad, laughing up its sleeve at anyone who enjoys it. I could appreciate the irony of a stereotypically jingoistic song picking on something obviously foreign, but the concept doesn't seem to be thought through enough not to become what it's ostensibly parodying. The most interesting thing is the odd way Allen's lead vocal is treated, quite un-chant-like.

Available on: Come on England

Saturday 10 April 2010

Baddiel & Skinner & Lightning Seeds 'Three Lions '98'

Chart Peak: 1 (3 weeks)

YouTube

"Three Lions" is the only record ever to top the UK chart on 3 separate occasions...
Whether that was true was a matter of definition; it depends on whether you count this as the same record as the 1996 version, and whether you count non-consecutive weeks at the top during the same run as separate. Still, there's no arguing that it's one of the nation's more popular football-related hits of all time, doubtless assisted by the wider popularity of the sport at time. I mean, it was always on the telly and my Dad's always been a fan so I never thought it was unusual to be interested in football but somewhere in the 1990s it became bigger than ever, so much so that even I started to take in interest. Not in the game itself, which I don't think I've ever really had the attention span to sit through, but some of the cultural spin-offs; my Dad's old 70s programmes, fanzines (on the rare occasions I saw) the short-lived TV series Standing Room Only and the much longer-lived Fantasy Football League. That last featured David Baddiel and Frank Skinner, two comedians I'd never been keen on before discussing a subject I wasn't very interested in and yet proved to be a favourite of mine at the time. I suspect I wouldn't enjoy it so much today, but it seemed to capture a certain spirit at the time. This of course led to them being called in by Ian Broudie to co-write England's official song for the 1996 European Championship.

The 1996 version of 'Three Lions' was something of a milestone, not only because they didn't let the footballers sing on it, but because of its popularity: a record football fans didn't only buy but actually sang. It even seemed to inspire a relatively solid performance on the pitch. It wasn't totally surprising that two years on, the song was revived (albeit not as an "official" product this time) with a fresh lyric forming a kind of sequel to the original, and even bearing a sample of the original being chanted on the terraces. It went straight back to Number One and proved such a phenomenon that it even found its way to a Now album, whereas they've tended to steer clear of football songs because of their evidently partisan appeal. I even found myself buying it again, which probably wasn't necessary, although at least I got the fresh B-side 'Tout Est Possible', which I've just listened to for probably the first time in a decade or so. Listened to now, the '98 version of the song is a bit of a curio, unsurprisingly not as good as the original and also rather more dated by its topical lyrical references. The self-parodic video also hasn't worn that well, although Skinner's old gag of impersonating the Jules Rimet trophy using only a melon and a bucket of custard makes for a solid punchline. And somehow, David Baddiel's singing is worse than I remember. Still it's hard to think of a subsequent football song that's bettered this, which is presumably why the two versions were re-released together for the 2002 and 2006 World Cups, and inevitably one or both will put in an appearance this summer too.

Perhaps the most extraordinary thing about the song is the extent to which it was embraced internationally, especially in Germany. Indeed the "Football's coming home" lyric struck a particular chord there in 2006, which may explain this version by the Hermes House Band. Or possibly not, as they're not German, but you get the general idea.

Available on: The Very Best of the Lightning Seeds

Wednesday 7 April 2010

Mansun 'Legacy'

Chart Peak: 7

YouTube


Mansun came stright out of Chester to notch up 6 Top 40 hits in just over a year [April 1996 to May 1997] - they also shot to straight to No.1 with their album... [Attack of the Grey Lantern] "Legacy raced into the chart at No. 7 in early debut July '98 ["early debut July"??]

Well, I've at last justified the 50p I spent on this album; not only can I quote the above sleevenote, but I can reveal  that the version of 'Legacy' featured isn't the six-minute "radio edit" that seems to be available now, nor the even longer "bridge master" but a shorter version closer to the duration of the video. My research suggests that this is no bad thing all told.

I'm pretty sure I never bought a Mansun single, although I do have a clear memory of once being unable to choose between two formats of one of them and ending up with neither. I did buy a vinyl copy of that first album complete with free poster (relax girls) and was mildy disappointed, finding it overlong and a little too in love with Carry-On-style humour. I didn't much care for Paul Draper's voice either. What with their insistent and knowing gimmickry, and their insistence on pretending they were releasing EPs instead of singles, they were always an easy band to dislike and by the time this second album rolled around I was dead set against them, despite the amusing video to this single. In truth, there's a lot to like about this, especially the chiming arpeggiated guitars that the song is set around. But it does have to be one of the most thoroughly miserable songs ever to become a major hit: it's not upset or complaining or dramatic as so many indie songs are, but it seems to come from a persuadedly dark place. One of their later singles was called 'Negative' but this could have been too. Of course it'd be foolish to treat this as any statement on the real lives of the band, especially when it's the penultimate song on a concept album, but there is something a little chilling about it.

This proved to be their highest-charting single ever, perhaps because rules about the length of a chart-eligible single format were tightened the week after this single entered. They had one more Top 10 hit to come in the shape of 'I Can Only Disappoint U', and then against all expectations they just seemed to fade away. If there was ever a band who seemed likely to go out with a bang, it was Mansun, but in the end they just started a fourth album and never finished it. It's tempting to quote the lyric "nobody cares when you're gone" as a conclusion, but enough fans remembered to launch a campaign for the outtakes to be released. And time's been kinder than I expected to this.

Also appearing on: Now 36
Available on: Legacy: The Best Of Mansun

Tuesday 6 April 2010

Massive Attack 'Teardrop'

Chart Peak: 10

YouTube

Incredibly, it is now more than 7 years since Bristol's Massive Attack burst onto the scene with the classic 'Unfinished Sympathy'...
Well, maybe it was incredible then, but reading this when they've just released their first studio album after a gap of seven years it looks surprisingly prolific. Personally, I'd only started buying records in the mid-1990s so 1991 seemed like ancient history in pop terms anyway. A new Massive Attack album was never a regular event though, so there was plenty of excitement about the arrival of Mezzanine, and the first two singles from it became their highest-charting ever: this one earned them their only Top 10 week even though it was released the week after the album.

It wasn't always such smooth sailing, though, with the sessions for the album characterised by a lot of bickering even by their standards, and founding member Mushroom quitting shortly after the release. Indeed, I'm pretty sure I remember reading in Q that he'd forbidden the rest of the band to use the original backing track for this song, forcing them to reconstruct it before Elizabeth Fraser could record her unique vocal. If that's not true, though, please don't sue... If nothing else, it's hard to imagine the track they did use ever being considered second-best, so delicately constructed as it is. Indeed, it seems almost superfluous for there to be a vocal at all. Still, if vocal there was to be, it's hard to imagine anyone more fitting than the former Cocteau Twin to deliver it, even if she does seem to be moving away from her traditional style by singing some actual words here. The only reason it's not really my favourite song is that there's something rather non-human about it, which is surely intentional but makes it a little difficult to relate to.

Oddly enough this song had a bit of a revival a few years ago; it was brought to a new audience as the theme tune to House (only in America, apparently, but that's the only place I've ever watched it) and Newton Faulkner and Jose Gonzales released competing acoustic cover versions in 2007, though neither made it to the Top 40. Both served mainly to vindicate the original production.

Also appearing on: Now 19, 29, 30, 54
Available on: Mezzanine: Limited Edition

Monday 5 April 2010

The Verve 'Sonnet'

Chart Peak: 74 (import sales only)

YouTube


The Verve's Album 'Urban Hymns' has now sold over 2 million copies in Britain alone...to celebrate, we include 'Sonnet' the single that never was
To be strictly accurate, there was a limited 12" single released featuring three previously available B-sides, alongside equivalent re-issues of the three hits from the album; apparently this was the result of a compromise between the record company (who were understandably eager for another hit, especially since a moderately popular band who'd split to relatively little fanfare in 1995 had unexpectedly re-emerged as one of the biggest acts in the country) and Richard Ashcroft (who thought three singles from an album was plenty).In other countries where Ashcroft seemed to hold less sway, there was a CD single and demand in the UK was sufficient for that to sneak into the Top 75 for a week; it's now available as a digital single for anyone interested. Under the circumstances I feel a little mean applying the "flops" tag to this post, butI couldn't think of a more succint way to indicate the songs that didn't make the Top 40.

I'd become rather fond of The Verve during their downtime, after buying their posthumous single 'History' and picking up the album A Northern Soul at mid-price; I couldn't resist feeling a little smug when it went back up to full price in 1997. Between that and the first two singles I had pretty high expectations for the Urban Hymns and I can still recall the faint sense of disappointment that began to set in as ballad followed ballad and the whole thing dragged on for what felt like about two hours. There isn't really a bad song on there but there's just too much time where not enough happens, and it's not surprising in retrospect that much of the material was originally meant for a solo Richard Ashcroft album. 'Sonnet' is perhaps a tantalising glimpse of what the album could have been with a different focus: though recognisably a solo Ashcroft composition, it's much crisper and more focussed than many of his others, running to less than four-and-a-half minutes and full of well-crafted little details (note Nick McCabe's distinctive lead guitar work through the verses). I can understand that fans of the more wigged-out part of the band's repertoire or the ones who liked them when they were still called Verve might not be too fond of this one, but at a time when a lot of what they did seemed to be falling between two stools I'm quite glad they went all the way with this. It shows up the Embrace track (same producer, same record company, clearly aiming in the same direction).

This track does have one slightly sadder association, as it was the record Radio 1 played to lead up to the announcement that John Peel had died; no prizes for guessing what they played after the announcement.

Also appearing on: Now 37, 38, 39, 71
Available on: Urban Hymns

Saturday 3 April 2010

Embrace 'Come Back To What You Know'

Chart Peak: 6

YouTube

The 31st of May 1998 was with hindsight a decidedly late date to be saying the last rites for Britpop, but it was the singles chart revealed on that day that finally made it evident to me and my brother that the game was up. In an interesting coincidence, it also includes the follow-up to the Natalie Imbruglia single in the last post, which sheds an interesting light on some of the oddities in chronology thrown up by Now! albums. Its most relevant feature, though, is the failure of several anticipated indie-oriented releases: the single that was expected to break Gorky's Zygotic Mynci into the Top 40 stiffing at 60, Kenickie's big airplay hit 'I Would Fix You' barely scraping the Top 40, a James song I actually liked only getting to 29 etc etc.

The one glaring exception was 'Come Back To What You Know' (yes I am finally going to mention the song this post is meant to be about!) which sailed straight in at 6, the highest-charting Embrace single at that time (it was only outdone in 2006). I had myself bought their three previous hits because it seemed to be what I was supposed to do, and I'd probably have bought the original 7" version of 'All You Good Good People' had I ever seen a copy. Yet I'd listened to each one with declining enthusiasm, and at some point in the six months before this single was released I'd turned on them severely, which perhaps made me the equivalent of somebody who's recently given up smoking. Self-referentially we used to joke about video, imagining they were all captured by some force and turned into zombies thinking "Must... buy... Embrace... record..." Looking at that chart it felt like a tide had turned somewhere and the nation had decided that listening to "alternative" music wasn't supposed to be fun ever again.

In fact, when I listen to it now, this record isn't quite as bad as it seemed at the time, and no worse than many other Embrace singles (it's certainly better than 'One Big Family') but it still suffers from a sense of more of the same: their determination to turn every song they wrote into a big fist-pumping anthem makes it seem inevitable that you'd get a bit tired of them by about the fourth single you heard, whichever one it actually was. It also contrasts uncomfortably with Danny McNamara's flat and rather charmless voice, which with hindsight might have worked well fronting a more humble-sounding band. It seems like I might not have been completely alone, either; whilst this single was clearly anything but a flop and the album went straight in at the top a couple of weeks later, there was a certain sense that they never became quite as big as they might have if they'd managed to release an album in the spring or sooner. And their one attempt to play against type with the 1999 comeback 'Hooligan' seems to have generated more confusion than momentum. It was pretty much downhill from here commercially until 2004, and I wasn't too sorry. My feelings have softened now and I realise I can't blame them entirely for the gulf that seemed to re-open between popular and "serious" music around this time, but I still can't really enjoy this. Nice string arrangement though.

Also appearing on: Now 38, 41, 59, 63
Available on: The Good Will Out

Friday 2 April 2010

Natalie Imbruglia 'Big Mistake'

Chart Peak: 2

YouTube

The second time in a row that I've found a copy of a single, although I didn't personally buy this one: I inherited this copy from my brother somewhere down the line, although he kept the three postcards so the disc rattles about a bit in the sleeve. It was also Imbruglia's second consecutive single to peak at 2, held back on this occasion by Céline Dion. It didn't quite match the million sales of 'Torn' cited in the sleeve note (I believe that figure was later revised downward somewhat, although thanks to to downloads it's unequivocally into seven figures now).

Anyway, this post isn't about 'Torn' but about the curiously forgotten follow-up, which has more than a little in common with 'Road Rage' in its production and air of supressed feistiness. Those distant-sounding percussion samples are very 1998. The singer has a writing credit on this one alongside Mark Goldenberg (who also co-wrote 'Novocaine For The Soul' by Eels, suggesting they were aiming for something a bit beyond the usual soap-star cash-in) and she's presumably responsible for some of the slightly "off" lyrical images: most notably the memorable if strange moment when she tells you to "close your eyes and think of all the bubbles of love we... made" which feels a slightly counter-intuitive thing to say to someone you're trying to get rid of. I suppose she means that bubbles burst.

I'm not going to call this an all-time classic, but of all her hits it's probably the one I warm to most now and it's a good enough song within the pop mainstream to put just about all of Disc One to shame.

Also appearing on: Now 39, 61
Available on: Glorious: The Singles '97-'07

Thursday 1 April 2010

Catatonia 'Road Rage'

Chart Peak: 5

YouTube


And finally, on the 24th track, we actually match up with my record collection (not counting the copy of Now 40 itself I own for research purposes). I didn't actually buy the single during its chart run (though plenty did - according to one uploader this was their biggest seller) but in my last few weeks of teenagerhood I'd picked up the massive International Velvet album on vinyl. I'd obviously heard the breakthrough hit 'Mulder & Scully' and quite liked it at the time, but once I played the LP this was the obvious stand-out track and the one that really seemed to establish them (or at least Cerys Matthews) as major stars.

Like their previous hit, 'Road Rage' hints at topicality in its title, but it's a much more topical-sounding record entirely, a smoothly grooving dub-influenced number. It's driven by the bassline of Paul Jones (just to give a mention to one of the other band members for a change) while Matthews coos an exasperated lyric in a disturbingly quiet voice, as if she's on the verge of doing something dramatic. Unfortunately the tongue-twisting line "as all you've got to lose alludes to yesterday" is cut out from this radio edit, and the published lyric "It's not over till my rage runs colder" isn't audible in any version I've ever heard. Inevitably, it shows its age a little now, but it's still a delicious piece and for the first time on this album I've made an addition to my highlights playlist.

Although this was the last evidence of it in the Now series, Cerys sang on no fewer than nine Top 40 hits between January 1998 and December 1999, including both a duet with Tom Jones and one about him. 

Also appearing on: Now 39
Available on: Greatest Hits