14August

A Korean Air jet crashed while landing on Guam, killing 250. Floods affected Wales and Southern Ireland. The end of Grobbelgaate (©WSC 1994) as the jury cleared Bruce Grobbelaar, Hans Segers, and John Fashanu of rigging matches; the jury was unable to reach a verdict on charges of corruption against Grobbelaar. The South Crofty tin mine closed, with the loss of 275 jobs. The Princess of Wales visited Bosnia to promote her politics on land-mines; and was photographed with Harrods heir Dodi Fayed. Medallists at the World Athletic Championships in Athens included Denise Lewis, Colin Jackson, Steve Backley, and the men's relay sides. Australia retained the Ashes, beating England 3-1. Sri Lanka set a world record Test score, 952/6 against India. Dead this week: Jeanne Calment, world's oldest woman, 122.

The TCCB announced plans to reform domestic cricket. The Benson and Hedges Cup and Sunday League were to merge from 1999 into a two-division 50-over one-day contest, lasting the entire season. The top division would play each other home-and-away, and the bottom division home-or-away. The County Trophy expands to include 60 sides, with county second XIs allowed to compete with the Minor Counties and national sides of Scotland, Ireland, the Netherlands, and Denmark. The county championship would be split into three conferences of six sides. Conference A would play home games against Conference B, and away matches against Conference C, but no inter-division matches. End-of-season play-offs would determine the exact places, by a mechanism that, er, hasn't been worked out yet. But we will get one, very much so. Other universities could join Oxford and Cambridge in staging first-class cricket. There were also plans to merge some of the semi-professional leagues beneath the counties.

In the event, the Sunday League increased to a neither-here-nor-there 45-over length for six years before the next round of tinkering reduced it back to 40-overs. The County Trophy used the proposed knock-out format until 2006, when it was changed to a group tournament, taking up half the season. No sensible proposal ever emerged for the County Championship play-offs, so the competition split into two divisions of nine from 1999. There was some consolidation of semi-pro cricket, and universities such as Loughborough were given the leg-up. The B&H league cup survived until 2002, reverting from a knock-out to group play, and abolished only for the ban on cigarette advertising. Its replacement: 20/20 cricket.

Twenty-one new ones this week. Time has not been good to memories of Camp Lo (Luchini! AKA (This is it), 74), California Sunshine (Summer '89, 56), Vincent de Moor (Flowtation, 54), Mad Moses (Panther party, 50), and Rhythm Masters (Come on y'all, 49). Jesus Jones's career came to a very quiet end as Chemical #1 could only make 71. The group split, at least one of them worked on Xfm for a while, but they've since become the house band for the Sultan of Dubai. Nice work if you can get it. Newton's second single was another cover; Don't worry was a re-make of the Kim Appleby number 2 from 1990. His version peaked 53 places lower. Faith No More put Last cup of sorrow in at 51, their smallest hit since the 1988 debut We care a lot. The Faiths split after their greatest hits in 1998, but have since reformed for a few gigs. Wu-Tang Clan had had an unexpected number one album in June, but first single Triumph could only make 46.

Creeping into the chart was Best Regrets, the fourth and final hit single from Geneva's album Further. By the time their follow-up emerged, at the end of 1999, fashion had moved on so far that they didn't get any sort of hearing, and the group quit the business soon afterwards. A shame. Coldcut had been busy dance masters in the late 1980s, having a couple of top ten singles in 1989, but had rather vanished afterwards. More beats and pieces was the first hit single credited to the group without a vocalist, and came in at 37. Discohopping was the belated followup to the Klubbheads' Klubhopping; the first song had been a top tenner in May 1996, the follow-up scraped in at 35. D-Influence's Hypnotise came in at 33, we know it's soul, but little more.

A couple of old records moved back up the charts this week: the Rembrandts went from 39 to 36 with I'll be there for you, accountable to the continued presence of Friends on the nation's televisions. We never worked out why Universal should have moved 37-29 with Rock me good; the single had scraped the top 20 two weeks earlier before falling faster than a speeding anvil. It's not even as though they'd appeared on the Lottery show.

Those of you who haven't been following pop since it was popular won't recall Robyn, new at 26 with Do you know (what it takes). The popstrel would have a top ten hit with Show me love in 1998, but then be dropped by her UK label. Copyright problems ensured that she would remain an exotic novelty; though she got out of her contract for her native Sweden at the turn of the century, she couldn't release tunes here until the start of this year. Konichiwa bitches was set to be the big comeback single, except there was no publicity, and it peaked outside the top 100 last March. Never one to give up, she's released With every heartbeat, which has suddenly become the biggest hit of her career, and possibly the defining hit for the British summer. Both weeks of it.

No such delayed success, sadly, for the Wildhearts' Anthem, in at 21. By this time, they'd been having minor hits for three and a half years, only twice breaching the top 20. This was perhaps their last chance to have a big hit, it didn't happen, and we're poorer for it. Keeping them out of the top 20 was Kym Mazelle's cover of Young hearts run free, a note-for-note version of the original.

Dropping out of last week's top ten was the established hit from Oasis (10-16 in its fifth week) and new releases from Texas (5-15) and Peter Andre (3-12). Missing the top ten was Olive; the follow-up to their number one smash You're not alone was Outlaw, stalling at 14, and beaten by Little Kim's Not tonight, in at 11. Boyzone dropped from 7 to 10, Coolio held at 9.

No move at number 8 for Meredith Brooks's hit Bitch. Success had been a long time coming for her; less than a year before her fortieth birthday, and over a decade after releasing her first records, there was suddenly a hit single. She had to sign with Capitol Records, and toured heavily in support of Bitch. Two other singles were released from album Blurring the Edges, but to much less success. After this hit, Brooks forgot to promote anything this side of the pond, preferring to concentrate on the Lilith Fair tour of North America. A second album, Deconstruction, was released in 1999 to little fanfare, and third LP Bad Bad One emerged here in 2004, two years after its release elsewhere. Her most recent credit is producing Hilary Duff's first two albums. She's remembered as a one-hit wonder, and someone whose talents were lost in the shuffle.

Notorious BIG was down just one to 7, and Mary J Blige's Everything was new at 6. It was a step up for Blige; she'd been having top 40 singles since the start of 1993, and a brief string of top 20 hits in 1995. This, though, was the first time she'd had a top ten hit under her own steam, and it remains her biggest solo single. For our money, Blige's sensible soul was at its best on 1995's I'm going down and 2002's No more drama, but we always have a lot of time for her.

Backstreet Boys dropped a place to 5, making way for Wet Wet Wet's cover of Yesterday at 4. Though we didn't know it at the time, this was the end of the line for the Wets as a hit-making behemoth. From the first flush of success (1987's Wishing I was lucky and Sweet little mystery), Marti Pellow and his lads slowly moved from out-and-out pop to smooth soul; 1989's Holding Back the River album was perhaps too much of a transition too quickly, but they were honing their skills for 1992's High on the Happy Side masterpiece. The single Goodnight girl rescued their career from an imminent trip to Ver Dumper, allowing a greatest hits package to emerge in 1993. Their place in Pop Division I was assured by 1994's cover of Love is all around. Two more studio albums - 1995's Picture This, and 1997's 10 - came out, but the group's internal divisions proved fatal. But nothing that couldn't be cured by the application of money, with a number of live shows in 2004, and a second hits album.

Down one to 3 came Gala, down one to 2 came Puff Daddy. New at number one was Will Smith. He was no stranger to the top of the charts - as half of DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, he'd had a number one hit in 1993 with Boom! (shake the room). His new hit, Men in black, was taken from the film of the same name, and - after George Michael's Fastlove - was the second chart-topper in little over a year to be based around Patrice Rushen's Forget-me-nots, itself a top 3 hit in 1982. It was the beginning of a brief but productive pop career for Smith - by the end of 1998, he would have three more top three hits, and he's had a couple of smashes in the years since. None of them have been at all memorable, though, suggesting that his talents in the pop arena are located only in the fronting-a-good-hook department.

| Permanent link