“I Knew…” is step three – after the solo ballads and ditching the boy racer – of George Michael’s repositioning as an artist with credibility. In the pop landscape of 1987, getting Aretha Franklin onto your single […]

Future shock? If you’d been told before the fact that a Chicago house record was going to hit number one in the UK, you might well have put your money on the showy, song-driven side of house providing it. A record like Marshall Jefferson’[…]

AND ABOUT BLOODY TIME. Finally finished 1986 – I know there’ve been slower years but this one really has dragged – thanks for yr patience. Here’s a poll, and add your usual lists, reminiscences, discussions of the year etc in […]

“Reet Petite” would have fit right in on an advert: I scratched my head for a while trying to remember which it came from. No luck – so I went and looked it up, and of course it wasn’t on one at all. It got to number one on the back o[…]

This post is an introduction, I suppose, to the next few years of Popular. It was going to be part of a regular post but it grew into its own thing, so I’m putting it up as its own thing.
The late 80s are strange times for the British pop chart[…]

Just as Europe’s as close as we’re getting to hair metal, The Housemartins are our nearest brush with 80s indiepop. This isn’t their strident and strummy side, of course: instead it’s a showcase for their deep-rooted brand of […]

The first metal song to get to number one, which more than anything else tips you off as to what a strange, broad, inclusive-despite-itself church metal is. And yes, this surely qualifies. “The Final Countdown” puts its fanfare riff atop […]

“Take My Breath Away” is hardly the first soundtrack ballad to get to #1. But even so it feels like the start of something, a harbinger of the soon-come glory age of the film tie-in, when balladosaurus rex bestrode the charts, roaring and[…]

Here’s a thing: I have never watched an episode of Eastenders. Not all through. Too much shouting for me. I’m neither proud nor ashamed of this but it does mean I missed out on the astonishing storyline in which “Every Loser Wins&#8[…]

Musically, if the Madonna brand stands for anything it’s for smart, up-to-date club pop. But there’s often been a side to her that’s attracted to pastiche, as if she wants to prove she can take on styles way outside her era and rang[…]