SATURDAY 26 JANUARY 1974

(Author's Note: the following represents the UK Top 30 singles from the above week, reviewed in ascending order from numbers 30-1.)

 

30. CLIFF RICHARD: Take Me High/Celestial Houses (EMI 2088)

 

 

Cliff must think he's still in Eurovision - yet another old-fashioned oompah-oompah singalong for thou-shalt-not grandparents. Take me high - is he planning to go up a skyscraper?

 

 

29. STEVIE WONDER: Living For The City/Visions (Tamla Motown TMG 881)

 

 

We have Innervisions so already know about this one. Edited down for the single but you need to hear the whole thing - it's really scary how it ends. Go out and buy the album already.

28. MILLICAN & NESBITT: Vaya Con Dios (May God Be With You)/I Want Our World To Be Like A Beautiful Garden (Pye 7N 45310)

 

 

The old miners from Opportunity Knocks. God bless the miners who will hopefully bring this rotten government down but what does this record mean to anybody under 70? If I said I liked this I'd never get a girlfriend.

 

 

27. LULU: The Man Who Sold The World/Watch That Man (Polydor 2001 490)

This is GOOD. You can hear Bowie on this but it's very different from his own version - more like a James Bond theme. Shows you how good Lulu can be when she gets rid of Eurovision.

 

 

26. ALICE COOPER: Teenage Lament '74/Hard Hearted Alice (Warner Bros. K 16345)

 

He sings this like the end of the world is approaching. Not as catchy as "School's Out" but maybe as scary. It's like he's telling you not to smoke.

 

 

25. HAROLD MELVIN & THE BLUENOTES: The Love I Lost (Part 1)/The Love I Lost (Part 2) (Philadelphia International PIR 1879)

 

 

Typically good Philly Sound stomper. Too sophisticated to be a really big hit, though.

 

 

24. GILBERT O'SULLIVAN: Why, Oh Why, Oh Why/You Don't Have To Tell Me (MAM 111)

I don't know, Gilbert! Another melancholy Two Ronnies ballad but for all I know he could really be singing about Jeremy Thorpe.

 

 

 

23. ROXY MUSIC: Street Life/Hula-Kula (Island WIP 6173)

Oh this is so great. The way Bryan Ferry snaps his fingers on Top of the Pops to this is pop music. The way he sings "telephone" to make the word sound like "tele-postbomb." The whole album Stranded is brilliant and anybody who doesn't like it has no brain. My father thinks he's a ponce, though, whatever that means - I think Frank Muir said it on Call My Bluff.

 

 

 

 

22. WIZZARD: I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday/Rob Roy's Nightmare (A Bit More H.A.) (Harvest HAR 5079)

 

 

We all love Wizzard in this house - Roy Wood is so funny. I don't understand why people are still buying this after Christmas, though; is it being sold cheap?

 

 

21. STEELEYE SPAN: Gaudete/The Holly And The Ivy (Chrysalis CHS 2007)

 

 

Christmas carol singers, out looking for pennies. But it's January!

 

 

20. RONNIE LANE Accompanied by the Band "SLIM CHANCE": How Come?/Tell Everyone (GM GMS 011)

Really good and subtle record from the guy who used to be in the Faces but isn't Rod Stewart.

 

 

19. STYLISTICS: Rockin' Roll Baby/Make It Last (Avco 6105 026)

Yuck, this is terrible, little boy dancing in iron shoes, oh isn't he cute well no he isn't, you wouldn't believe what I get from my father for not already being famous so don't need to be constantly reminded about it.

 

 

18. MOTT THE HOOPLE: Roll Away The Stone/Where Do You All Come From (CBS 1895)

They're really good and catchy all the time. Ian Hunter sounds like he's got a brain, which can be useful.

 

 

 

17. DRUPI: Vado Via/Un Letto E. Lei (A&M AMS 7083)

He's Italian so of course my mother likes this. Hoarsely-sung ballad with old-fashioned arrangement like it didn't get into Eurovision. Nice walking bass line towards the end, though. I was disappointed that he wasn't Droopy, the dog from the cartoons.

16. DIANA ROSS: All Of My Life/A Simple Thing Like Cry (Tamla Motown TMG 880)

My father thinks this sounds like a Sunsilk commercial. She's so boring; no wonder Tony Blackburn likes her.

 

 

15. DAVID ESSEX: Lamplight/We All Insane (CBS 1902)

More music hall than "Rock On" but there's never anything straightfoward about what David Essex does. Still, he does know what he's doing, which is more than you can say about Ted Heath's government. The B-side is so wild it could be Roxy Music.

14. MARIE OSMOND: Paper Roses/Least Of All You (MGM 2006 315)

The Osmonds' parents must be getting them all to work. Their dog will make a record next. Dull 900-year-old country and western. I haven't even got a Stetson so what's the point?

 

 

13. GARY GLITTER: I Love You Love Me Love/Hands Up! It's A Stick Up (Bell 1337)

Daft title that makes no sense. A football chant slowed down to half-speed. A ballad for the parents.

 

(Author's Note: videos of Joan Jett covers of GG, which are invariably better than the originals, will be posted here.)

 

 

12. SLADE: Merry Xmaƨ Everybody/Don't Blame Me (Polydor 2058 422)

The end of 1973 was really frightening. No oil, electricity or television, wars everywhere else and I wondered if we'd even get to 1974 without blowing ourselves up. Denys Fisher board games and annuals stacked up in RS McColl's. Snow all over the place. A feeling that this was the end. So this Slade song was like a beacon pounding and glowing in the darkness and giving us hope, even though the song sounds doomed in its own way. I watched it on Christmas Top Of The Pops and the audience got up on stage - it was like "Hey Jude" all over again. But why are people still buying it now? Don't they want it to be 1974?

 

 

11. FACES: Pool Hall Richard/I Wish It Would Rain (with a trumpet) (Warner Bros. K 16341)

Don't think a song called "Pool Hall Richard" is going to mean anything here. What's Rod Stewart going on about? Rocks along like the Rolling Stones halfway through side two of one of their albums. You won't hear this on Singing Together. The other side is an old Tamla Motown song. I haven't heard the original but would guess it's better.

 

 

10. ROBERT KNIGHT: Love On A Mountain Top/Power Of Love (Monument MNT 1875)

Old-fashioned sixties song about climbing up a mountain and falling in love. I couldn't do that - I'd be far too worried about slipping on something and falling down.

 

 

9. ANDY WILLIAMS: Solitaire/My Love (CBS 1824)

This is a really sad and desperate-sounding song - he's got nothing left and might as well be dead. There are a lot of people who feel that way just now. Needs the cookie bear back.

 

 

8. ROY WOOD: Forever/Music To Commit Suicide By (Harvest HAR 5078)

Solo this time. Sounds like he's trying to do the Beach Boys on a budget. Catchy and quite sparkly. The B-side, though, is instrumental and sounds like the soundtrack to one of those horrible public information films you see on TV.

7. GOLDEN EARRING: Radar Love/Just Like Vince Taylor (Track 2094 116)

Hear this a lot on Luxembourg - they're from the Netherlands. He's driving a truck and sounds as though he wants to crash it; might well happen at the end. Unsettling.

 

 

6. ALVIN STARDUST: My Coo-Ca-Choo/Pull Together (Magnet MAG 1)

This is some old guy I don't remember from the sixties doing "Spirit In The Sky." Luxembourg again - they ran these ads last year: "Who is ELVIN Stardust?" but it wasn't who anybody thought it was going to be.

 

 

5. THE NEW SEEKERS: You Won't Find Another Fool Like Me (Featuring Lyn Paul)/Song For You And Me (Featuring Eve Graham) (Polydor 2058 421)

They did this on the Morecambe & Wise Christmas show. Another music hall song which sounds like it should be on The Good Old Days. Not for the young.

 

 

 

4. COZY POWELL: Dance With The Devil/And Then There Was Skin (RAK 164)

Moody but forceful half-instrumental with the drums up front and everything eles fading in and out at the back like an incomplete dream, midway between Sandy Nelson and Jimi Hendrix. Another Radio Luxembourg hit.

3. LEO SAYER: The Show Must Go On/Tomorrow (Chrysalis CHS 2023)

Now this one's really scary; he comes on TV made up and dressed like a clown and it is like being stared down by a Dalek. He sounds annoyed about most things.

 

 

2. THE SWEET: Teenage Rampage/Own Up, Take A Look At Yourself (RCA LPBO 5004)

Now THIS is what's going on! The young don't want to know about old music hall miners, they want to smash everything up and change it, and right now who could blame them? This is a majestic rallying call to arms and maybe my favourite Sweet record. And I remenber when they came out with "Funny Funny" and sounded like the Archies.

 

 

1. MUD: Tiger Feet/Mr. Bagatelle (RAK 166)

They are always good fun on The Basil Brush Show and this is a real laugh of a record, but not in a bad way; it's dimwitted but clever, unbelievably catchy and it just makes you feel better about life, which I think is what pop music is supposed to do.