Welcome back my friends to the flamboyance that never ends, as Fabulously Flamboyant Friday sashays up to the crease to deliver yet another light-loafered, lubed-up googly from the gasworks-end of musical magnificence.
Please be welcome to part four in our short series of articles, guaranteed to contain no weirdos, nothing obscure, nothing remotely challenging and no tunes not thoroughly well known to both the man on the Clapham omnibus an’ ‘is dear ol’ mum.
Over the next few weeks, we shall continue our countdown of the UK’s all-time, best-selling artists, as measured (for the most part) by physical single sales. So be assured, pop-pickers, only the most popular pop performers and their most poptastic pop choonage will make the utterly ruthless cut for these articles.
This week, we reach the Top 30 and kick off tonight’s entertainment with Blondie and their very easy-on-the-eye vocalist, Debbie Harry.
Formed in New York in 1974 by an ex-Playboy Bunny (Ms. Harry) and her (jammy sod) boyfriend, Chris Stein, Blondie quickly became popular on the American new wave scene. They remained a largely underground band in the States but quickly found success in Europe, with their first two albums (both containing strong elements of US punk and new wave) proving particularly popular in France and the UK.
Worldwide success came in ’78 with the release of their critically acclaimed and monster-selling third album, Parallel Lines. Over the next few years, Blondie released a seemingly endless string of hit singles, moving away from their new-wave roots to embrace a splendidly eclectic mix of musical styles, including disco, pop, funk, soul and reggae.
However, by 1982 their classic period was over. The band wobbled along for a bit but eventually broke up. Blondie had released six splendid studio albums with each, IMHO, improving on its predecessor. One of the reasons for the split was the declining health of Chris Stein. Happily for our tale, our Debs stood by her chap, nursed him back to health (over a goodly period of time) and they are both still (reasonably) hale, hearty and happy, still recording and still touring as Blondie.
Their worldwide sales are nudging up towards 50 million and they have a new album out next year, but it is their astonishing UK single sales between 1978 and 1982 that lands Blondie at a very respectable No.30 on our chart rundown.
Artist No.29 is the one and only Lady Gaga. Having sold an estimated 170 million records, Gaga is one of the world’s best-selling music artists and the only female artist to achieve four singles that each sold 10 million copies or more. She has racked up 13 Grammy Awards, 2 Golden Globes, 18 MTV Awards and Time magazine named her as one of the 100 most influential people in the world in both 2010 and 2019. She’s not really my cup of tea, but she turned in a rip-snorting guest appearance on the last Rolling Stones album, so I’ll give her credit for that.
At No.28 we find Boyzone, another act from the Louis Walsh stable (manager of fellow Irish bands Westlife and Jedward – jeez, thanks Louis…).
Created in 1993, Boyzone quickly found success and racked up sales of 6.3 million albums and 8 million singles in the UK alone, with around 25 million records sold worldwide. The lads landed six No.1 singles in the UK and nine No.1 singles in Ireland. Of the 24 singles they released in the UK, 21 entered the top 40 and they’ve also had five No. 1 albums in the UK.
Boyzone first split up in 1999, but made a very successful (and very lucrative) comeback in 2007. This lasted until 2018 when it was announced that the band would split for good. Since then, some of the lads have been successfully touring with a couple of their Westlife stable mates as the unimaginatively titled Boyzlife.
Praise The Lord! At long last – at No.27 we finally find a proper band! Status Quo!
The mighty Quo have landed over 60 chart hits in the UK – which (according to their website) is more than any other band in the UK. However, I suspect Cliff Richard & The Shadows might have a thing or two to say about that. Anyway, they have released over 100 singles and 33 studio albums, with 29 of them charting in the UK – which is apparently another UK chart record. In the past, they have been ranked as high as 10th on the UK’s best-selling-artists-of-all-time singles chart, but they’ve been slipping down of late. Nevertheless, they remain one of only 50 artists to have achieved more than 500 weeks on the UK Albums Chart – a goodly feat indeed, and they thoroughly deserve their lofty position on our chart.
At number 26, it’s the “Princess of Pop”: Britney Spears, a bony lass oft credited with the revival of teeny-pop in the late 90s. Our little pop princess has sold over 150 million records worldwide, which of course makes her one of the world’s all-time, best-selling music artists.
Spears signed her first record deal in 1997 – aged just fifteen – and was an almost immediate success. Rolling Stone magazine called her debut single, Baby One More Time, “the greatest debut single of all time” (a touch hyperbolic, methinks) and her first two albums, …Baby One More Time (1999) and Oops!… I Did It Again (2000), are ranked as two of the best-selling albums of all time. Her sophomore album held the US record for the fastest-selling album by a female artist for about a decade and a half, and, when taken together, her first two albums made Britney Spears the best-selling teenage artist of all time. Not a bad effort at all.
Unfortunately, fame and success were not particularly kind to Ms. Spears, and her struggles with mental health have been well (and in fact luridly) documented. Allegedly, the singer began behaving erratically after her divorce and the subsequent loss of custody with regard to her two children. A series of public incidents followed which raised concerns about her mental health and she was eventually admitted to hospital for psychiatric assessment. Eventually a “conservatorship” was established (a court order issued for the protection of individuals who are unable to make their own decisions due to mental incapacity or illness). Apparently the order was put in place to protect both her and her career, with her father’s lawyers claiming the conservatorship was necessary because “her life was a shambles” and she was in significant physical, emotional and mental distress. Ms. Spears’ legal team disputed this version of events. Nevertheless, the conservatorship lasted for well over a decade, with most aspects of her personal, financial and professional career being controlled by her father.
The singer is now back in control of her career, but, unfortunately, questions about her health have once again started to appear in the tabloid press. So, will the pop princess get the fairytale ending she desires? I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
At number 25 – and a damn fine placing that has honestly surprised me – we find Wales’ favourite Elvis Presley impersonator, Shakin’ Stevens.
A graduate of the boyo brood-warrens of Ely, in the far-western townships of deepest, dampest Cardiff, Shaky and his band (The Sunsets) were regular and much-loved performers on the chicken-in-a-basket South Wales pub ‘n’ club circuit of the early 1970s.
Shaky’s big break came in ’77 when he was invited to audition for the West End musical Elvis! He landed the role and enjoyed a very successful two-year run, which substantially raised his profile and landed him a decent recording contract. Stevens grabbed his opportunity with both hands, dumped The Sunsets and went on to land 33 Top 40 hit singles over the course of his very lucrative solo career.
At No.24 we find a popular beat combo called U2, fronted by a cliff-dodger called Bonio. Apparently, they are very successful and much loved by all.
Our No.23 slot is filled by what is, without the slightest scintilla of doubt, the Isle of Man’s most successful musical export – The Bee Gees.
Although born on the Isle of Man, our heroes actually grew up the the magnificently named Chorlton-cum-Hardy, before emigrating to Australia and then returning to the UK. They began performing in the mid-50s and hit the big time in the late 60s.
The absolute peak of the Bee Gees’ career came in 1977 with the planet-rogering success of their Saturday Night Fever soundtrack album, which sold by the truckload (approximately a gazillion copies a year for what, at the time, felt like an eternity) and earned them 5 Grammy Awards, including Album of the Year.
Throughout their lavishly hirsute and luxuriantly medallioned career, the Bee Gees have sold over 120 million records worldwide, placing them firmly amongst the best-selling music artists of all time. Apparently, they are also the most successful trio in the history of contemporary music and have of course been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In the US, apparently, only Elvis Presley, the Beatles, Michael Jackson, Garth Brooks and Paul McCartney have managed to sell more records than the Bee Gees.
At No.22 we find Robbie Williams. Robbie, of course, first found fame as a member of the hugely successful boy band, Take That. Robbie and the boys were not noticeably short of success, selling shedloads of records from 1990 to 1995. Robbie launched his solo career in ’96 and was enormously successful, with 7 UK No. 1 singles and 13 UK No.1 albums. Impressively, 6 of his albums are among the top 100 biggest-selling albums of all time in the UK, and he claimed a Guinness World Record in 2006 for shifting over 1.6 million tickets for his tour in a single day – I bet his promoters loved him!
Williams has received a record total of 18 Brit Awards and has shifted twenty million albums and nine million singles in the UK alone. He has also sold well over 75 million records worldwide, which of course makes him one of the best-selling music artists of all time.
And our final artiste for tonight, sadly just failing to make the Top 20, is George Michael, who makes it into our chart at a very respectable No.21.
Although a very gifted singer/songwriter, George, sadly, is probably best remembered for his high jinks and sundry shenanigans. In 1998, pretty much at the height of his career and still officially “in the closet”, George was arrested in a Beverly Hills khazi for engaging in a lewd act in a public restroom. To give the chap credit, he owned his arrest with commendable aplomb (via the “Outside” video) and later admitted his outing-by-arrest was quite possibly “a subconsciously deliberate act”.
Famously, George’s troubles did not stop with getting cuffed in the khazi – in fact, he was soon on a roll. He was later arrested for drug possession and UK tabloids gleefully published allegations of cruising for cuddlesome companionship on Hampstead Heath. He followed this up by getting nicked for drug-impaired driving (which landed him with two-year driving ban) and in 2008 he was again arrested in a khazi, this time in a Hamstead Heath public convenience for possession of Class A and C drugs.
Unfortunately, George had saved his most spectacular run-in with the rozzers for last. In 2010, whilst somewhat tired and emotional, he managed to crash his car into the front of a Snappy Snaps store in Hampstead. This little jolly landed him an eight-week prison sentence, a five-year driving ban and a whopping great fine. He eventually served four weeks in chokey and the substantial dent in the Snappy Snaps wall was subsequently adorned with a one-word graffito that simply said “Wham!”
As an encore, George temporarily closed the M1 Motorway when he managed to fall out of the passenger door of a car doing about 70mph. Unsurprisingly, he wasn’t feeling too chipper after his tumble and decided to have a little lie down on the tarmac until the emergency services arrived. An air ambulance later airlifted him to hospital with quite nasty head injuries.
George eventually saw sense and checked himself into a drug rehabilitation facility in Switzerland for treatment. Unfortunately, it would seem this treatment was too little, too late. His biographer, James Gavin, claims George had stopped writing songs and further suggested his voice had been very badly damaged by drug abuse. Sadly, in the early hours of Christmas Day in 2016, George Michael passed away, aged just 53.
There is no doubt that George Michael was a tremendously talented individual. Unfortunately, like so many cast from this mold, he also possessed a full range of human frailties and weaknesses. Sadly, it would seem, these unhelpful aspects of his personality came to dominate his life and eventually he succumbed. He has undoubtedly left us with a tremendous body of work, but I’m afraid I don’t believe he came anywhere near to fulfilling his considerable potential as both a writer and a performer.
So that’s yer lot for this week’s edition of Fabulously Flamboyant Friday. Next time we’ll take a look at the Top 20, but for now and for this week it’s TTFN Puffins – Good night, and may your Frog go with you. Not ‘arf.
Featured Image: Birchflow, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
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