911 'Party People... Friday Night'

Chart Peak: 5
YouTube

Spike, Jimmy and Lee scored their 5th Top 10 smash in the last 12 months with 'Party People'... It raced onto the chart at No. 5 on 26th October '97

Since I mentioned our in-jokes in the LL Cool J post, I might as well point out that my brother claimed to have misheard the chorus lyric in this song as "Fucking Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday night," although I don't really believe him. Obviously they weren't really saying that anyway.
The first single from their second album is a tricky time for boy bands, usually about the last chance for them to get really big rather than selling to fans. In the event 911 fell into the latter category, at least so far as the UK was concerned, but they had enough of those fans to make it to the standard three-albums-and-a-Greatest-Hits lifespan for a 90s boyband.

I've long had a bit of a soft spot for 911's more upbeat songs, probably because they remind me of PJ & Duncan's similar work and whilst 'Party People' is no masterpiece it's likely their best song to appear on a Now album - as I've mentioned before, the best 911 song of all is of course 'Bodyshakin' and that never made it at all. It is of course totally soulless, careerist nonsense but we all need a bit of that in our lives and at least it never pretends to be anything else.

Also appearing on: Now 35, 36, 37, 41, 42, 43
Available on: Moving On

911 'A Little Bit More'

Chart Peak: 1 [1 week]

YouTube

Dr. Hook's 1976 hit 'A Little Bit More' was given the 911 treatment in January '99 and gave the boys their first No1 single... Their current album is a collection of their favourite songs which, according to Jimmy "appeal not just to our fans, but also to music lovers who remember them first time around!"

We'll gloss over the implication in that quote that "911 fans" and "music lovers" were two separate groups of people, shall we? As I said last time, 911 were a band who had a certain charm so I find it hard to dislike them, but do also find it hard to persuade myself that much of their music is any good. By the time of this eleventh single, they (or at least the record company) were clearly desperate for a Number One single; there's an infamous story that when their cover of 'More Than A Woman' was at the top of the midweek charts, they posed for photos with a massive 1, only to be pipped at the post by Spacedust. Evidently somebody at Innocent thought the best thing to do was more covers, so we got a whole album of them and this addition to the barrage of Number One singles in early 1999. The sleeve of Now 42 takes no chances and shows them posing with Casper the Friendly Ghost instead.

Apparently, 'A Little Bit More' was already a cover when Dr Hook did it, having originally been recorded by its author Bobby Gosh. In any version though, it's a pretty hideous song, sounding more like an ode to date rape than the romantic anthem it was probably intended to be. It neither deserves nor gets a good performance from the boys, and the whole thing comes over as a box-ticking exercise. Although it succeeded in topping the chart, it was so late in their career that they had no momentum left, and this was the propenultimate single of their original career. Don't worry, there's a new album coming out in 2014.

Also appearing on: Now 35, 36, 37, 38, 41, 43
Available on: There It Is

911 'The Day We Find Love'

Chart Peak: 4

YouTube

'The Day We Find Love', which was a No. 4 smash in February '97, gave Lee, Spike & Jimmy their biggest hit to date... it followed their previous successes with 'Don't Make Me Wait', 'Love Sensation' and 'Night To Remember'

Yes, 1996-7 was the era of the teen-oriented Shalamar cover version. I've got to admit that at the time I did have a little bit of a soft spot for 911, who always seemed of the more fun boy bands of their era, especially compared to the rather po-faced likes of the Backstreet Boys. But for my money they never bettered 'Bodyshakin', which is one hit of theirs that never made the Now! series.

Like most acts of this type, they let the side down with too many slow songs (especially considering they were originally discovered as dancers), and this is one of those; it's another song that I remembered existing but not the sound of. It sounds like a record that's trying too hard to be grown-up and fails to work on any level at all really. Don't say I didn't warn you about the end of Disc 1, eh? See you on the other side.

Also appearing on: Now 35, 37, 38, 41, 42, 43
Available on: The Greatest Hits And A Little Bit More