A third instalment of tracks which didn’t make my #UncoolTwo50 list – which starts TOMORROW; there is still time to enter, all you need is a list of 50 singles from 1977-1999. In fact what you could do is take the 30 I’ve put up so far and use those and then you only need to find 20 more – nothing could be simpler.
Some harsh cuts this time particularly in the funk, soul, dance & R&B departments. It’s a bad business and no mistake.
80. SOS BAND – “Just Be Good To Me” (1984)
The massive zeppelin type craft on the cover of the SOS Band album is an accurate representation of this 80s soul/funk behemoth; not that Beats International’s remake of it is anything to sniff at, you understand, but the original has a pomp and splendour it’s difficult to match.
79. SHALAMAR – “Work It Out” (1980)
This made it into the Top 50, then I decided to swap it out partly because I’m not completely sure it was actually a single? Wikipedia doesn’t have it. Anyway I was on a very heavy early 80s soul tip during the preliminary rounds of listmaking and some of it’s fallen away, a bit of a shame I think: I’ll decide over the early days whether more might return. A lot of soul music is pleading or raging; Shalamar here are sweetly reasonable, and I love it.
78. JX – “There’s Nothing I Won’t Do” (1996)
Another one that got all the way in and was cruelly forced out by a track along similar lines I liked more. Rex The Dog got a shout with the Knife’s “Heartbeats” remix in the 00-23 leg of the macro-challenge, anyway. “There’s Nothing I Won’t Do” comes out of the tracks in euphoric fashion but does it actually go anywhere else after it’s first minute? It’s still awesome so perhaps that shouldn’t matter.
77. KLYMAXX – “Meeting In The Ladies Room” (1984)
UH-OH! The dry boom and snap of mid-80s funk is one of the sounds I found myself loving most making this list. Ultimately there just wasn’t room for Klymaxx’ jaw-dropping saga of shoulder-padded rivalry and the bathroom blitz. “I had to leave my condo for this!”, this being a place in the low 70s on the list, yes, I’m sorry, I’d be annoyed too.
76. DOLLY PARTON – “9 To 5” (1980)
Clearly a perfect record but I’ve just heard it too often – it’s at its most beguiling when it sneaks up on you a bit. Appeared in the original Uncool50 list as part of a stretch of genre-bending records about work, capitalism, the pressures of modern living, and made sense as part of that chronological mix. Which also included…
75. WHAM! – “Wham! Rap (Enjoy What You Do)” (1982)
Listen Mr Average you’re a jerk! The British “The Message”, but that isn’t on the list either. I understand that there’s a kitschy dimension to some people’s appreciation of this song and I’m not going to lie and say I can’t see it, but I do honestly think this is a really great, funny, catchy record. If they’d only ever made this it would be a strange Brit-funk lost gem, except it’s very obvious when you hear it that this is not somebody who would only ever make one pop record.
74. CHAKA DEMUS & PLIERS – “Murder She Wrote” (1993)
The rough-and-smooth combination on pop-ragga hits is such and endlessly pleasing formula! Here’s some sweet voiced loverman and then what pops up but “Yuh face is pretty but yuh character dirty!”. Hoping – though not with much expectation – that others can carry the torch for the Summer Of Ragga.
72=. OMNI TRIO – “Renegade Snares (Foul Play Remix)” (1994)
The actual rave and jungle records I have in my list are very much at the “would you care for this Waltzer to go a little faster Miss?” end of the genre so this was a last outpost of the more credible, scientifically programmed (yet still deeply slamming) wing of drum&bass. If we were only voting on intros or moments, the drums at the start of “Renegade Snares” would be Top 10.
72=. JUSTIN TIME – “Sweet In Pocket ‘97” (1997)
And here’s its inverse, some happy hardcore that simply gurns too hard to be included. The complex interplay of breaks and multiple keyboard and vocal hooks on “Sweet In Pocket” seems just as intricately crafted as Omni Trio’s work but I admit the enormous 4/4 drumbeat may draw one’s attention from that just a little.
71. AALIYAH – “Are You That Somebody?” (1998)
This one was a difficult cut, on one shoulder sat an angel saying “you need a Timbaland production on your list” and “it’s so innovative”, and on the other sat a devil saying “it’s brilliant but do you actually ever play it Tom, outside the context of thinking of clever and forward-thinking it is?”. And the devil won. Again, I did have an Aaliyah track (“More Than A Woman”) in another challenge.