A History of Pop Music Albums – 1996
Featured Album: Lighthouse Family – Ocean Drive
This is a series of articles looking at albums from 1960 to 1999. Just cannot go on that much longer with the drivel that is the 90’s with worse to come from 2000 onwards!
I will select a featured album for each year and the link for the whole album, Plus list the songs on it.
As before, it is not just about the songs and tunes, it is very much about memories, and good ones, I hope.
Not everyone will like my choices of course, and you may remember some from each particular year that you feel should have been included, so do please post a link to the song.
1996 was the year of the Dunblane massacre. Take That split up (hence a greatest hits album, and cue lots of crying girls on the news). Dolly the sheep was born! On a personal note, this was a tough year at work in November, the French decided to export fire through the tunnel and when I got to work the following morning, on my birthday, it was grim stuff indeed. However, after the initial shock, we got stuck in. Teams going down there, making things safe, ready to repair. I was responsible for ensuring that any activity relating to the repairs was recorded for the insurance claim. I have to say work was a pleasure then, everyone chipping in, getting stuff done, determined not to be beaten and we got things back to normal in about 4 or 5 months, a truly awesome effort from everyone.
The featured album for 1996: Ocean Drive from the Lighthouse Family. “Ocean Drive” is the debut album released by UK duo Lighthouse Family in 1995 on Wildcard / Polydor Records. The album produced one top 10 hit (“Lifted”) and three top 20 hits (“Ocean Drive”, “Goodbye Heartbreak” and “Loving Every Minute”). The album spent 175 weeks on the UK album chart and achieved 6 times platinum sales of 1.8 million copies.
Track listing
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Producer(s) | Length |
| 1. | “Lifted“ | Mike Peden | 4:31 | |
| 2. | “Heavenly” |
|
Peden | 3:47 |
| 3. | “Loving Every Minute“ |
|
Peden | 4:10 |
| 4. | “Ocean Drive“ |
|
Peden | 3:48 |
| 5. | “The Way You Are” |
|
Peden | 5:01 |
| 6. | “Keep Remembering” |
|
Peden | 4:01 |
| 7. | “Sweetest Operator” |
|
Peden | 4:03 |
| 8. | “What Could Be Better” |
|
Peden | 3:57 |
| 9. | “Beautiful Night” |
|
Peden | 4:48 |
| 10. | “Goodbye Heartbreak“ |
|
Peden | 4:11 |
I find the whole album uplifting and pleasant.
More writings on this album here: Ocean Drive
So, on we go with 1996:
The Top 10 Albums with a You Tube hyperlink on the title:
Top Tip: Right-click and open in new tab
| Top Albums of 1996 | ||
| 1 | Alanis Morissette | Jagged Little Pill |
| 2 | Oasis | (What’s The Story) Morning Glory? |
| 3 | Spice Girls | Spice |
| 4 | George Michael | Older |
| 5 | Celine Dion | Falling Into You |
| 6 | Robson & Jerome | Take Two |
| 7 | Fugees | The Score |
| 8 | Take That | Greatest Hits |
| 9 | Simply Red | Greatest Hits |
| 10 | Ocean Colour Scene | Moseley Shoals |
Quite liked “All I want is You” from Alanis, just do not like her voice much. Oasis could be the featured album with their classis Morning Glory album, but I had them the other week. Spice girls were big this year, not my sort of thing though. Quite like some George Michael, but I have always felt he was creepy so never bought any of his stuff. Celine Dion is another that has some great tunes released as singles, but a whole album is too much. I have to confess I did have the Robson & Jerome album, yes totally manufactured with electron wizardry, but they did manage a whole album of some of my favourite songs. Fugees is yet another with a couple of good ones and the rest tripe. Ocean Colour Scene has “The riverboat song” and “The day we caught the train”, two great songs. Overall, this years’ top ten best sellers were very bad, not nice, apart from Oasis.
Most notable albums for my liking for 1996 though are below:
Status Quo – Don’t Stop – Some awesome tracks on this. I do love a bit of Quo
Garbage – Garbage – Not my favourite, but there was something about this I liked.
The Cure – Wild Mood Swings – Always liked this band, probably because they played instruments and had talent, rather than rely on electronic gadgets.
Manic Street Preachers – Everything Must Go – I know there are some fans.
Pet Shop Boys – Bilingual – Good Friday night album
Scoring:
As you know I like to review your “tunes” that you post.
*Note. Anyone scoring a Morrissey (lowest score possible) will be reported and blocked.
Hat tips to these sites:
http://www.everyhit.com/chart1.html these give the top 10 songs for each year.
https://www.youtube.com/ you know them.
Next Time: 1997. Will it get better? Forecast: (definitely not, and do not think for one minute Prodigy will get a mention).
Featured Image: “Lighthouse Family, Pryzm, Kingston” by Drew de F Fawkes is licensed under CC BY 2.0
© Phil the ex test manager 2021
