The Japanese stock brokerage Yamaichi Securities collapsed, under pressure following a general economic crisis in south-east Asia. The news precipitated a run on the company's parent bank, and forced Korea to take out a loan from the IMF. Meteorologists suggested that 1997 would be the hottest year worldwide since records began in 1860.

Daylight army patrols in West Belfast ceased, ending a 28-year period of martial law. The government was criticised by Health and European Legislation committees for exempting Formula One from a ban on sponsorship by tobacco companies. The government's clunking fist Legal moves began to stop an online lottery in pubs, and a booming trade in unofficial Diana memorabilia.

The new British Library opened, twenty years after being commissioned. Firebombs went off near J Sainsbury stores in Chislehurst and Lewisham. Eurotunnel re-financed its debts. Sweden won the Davis Cup, beating the FARCE 3:0. Iran qualified for the World Cup finals. Celtic won the League Cup, beating Dundee Utd 3:0.

UK Singles Chart for w/c 30 November 1997

Number One	Perfect day - Various - 2nd week (Number 778 in seq.)
Highest new entry	Baby can I hold you - Boyzone - number 2
Fastest climber (within top 40)	Something about the way you look tonight / Candle in the wind '97 - Elton John - up 1 to 10
Fastest climber (within top 75)	(as above)
Lemming-like fall	R u ready - Salt n Pepa - down 31 to 55
Top 40 debuts	Reds United, Sex-O-Sonique
Top 40 exits	Meredith Brooks, Huff And Herb, Robert Miles, Sex-O-Sonique, Sleeper, The Woolpackers
Top 75 debuts	Bizzi, Chimera, Jose Cura, Buckshot LeFonque, Reds United, Sex-O-Sonique
Top 75 exits	Bizzi, Chimera, Tanya Donelly, Double 99, Rosie Gaines, Buckshot LeFonque, Partizan

Twenty-eight (count 'em!) new entries this week. The rock fans will be pleased to see Machine Head in at 73 with Take my scars. Dance versions of popular ballads are nothing new: Chimera's rendition of Show me heaven was the third to be released; Maria McKee's definitive version had spent three weeks at number 1 in early autumn 1990, and Tina Arena's note-for-note cover made number 25 in late 1995. Chimera's performance could only make number 70; there's since been a rendition by Saint, number 36 in April 2003. We know nothing of Buckshot LeFonque, Another day (in the hood) at 65. We do know a lot about Tanya Donelly, the former Throwing Muse and Belly frontsperson was striking out on her own; The bright light shone to number 64.

Bizzi's party entered at 62 for Bizzi, and Sinéad O'Connor put This is a rebel song in at 60. The top 40 days are over, and O'Connor has had just one hit single in the years since. And she rather likes it that way, we feel. More Irish talent at 56, the Saw Doctors' Simple things, their first song to miss the top 40 since 1994. In at 54 for Sarah Brightman and the London Symphony Orchestra featuring Jose Cura performing Just Show Me How To Love You. Mercifully, this was as high as they got, we couldn't be typing that every week for the rest of the year. Partizan and Natalie Robb had Keep your love in at 53, and DJ Supreme and the Rhythm Masters put Enter the scene at 49.

New at 46 came del Amitri, with Some other sucker's parade. Justin Currie and his band broke through in early 1990, with the timeless Nothing ever happens. The song eventually rose to number 11, and launched the group on an eight-year run of consistently good material and consistently moderate hits. Three more top 20 hits lay in their future - 1992's Always the last to know, 1993's When you were young, and Driving with the brakes on from 1995. The group is probably best remembered for their next single, the bluesy and brief number Roll to me. ...Parade became their smallest hit since cracking the top 40 almost eight years earlier. Next release was in support of the Scottish squad at the 1998 world cup, Don't come home too soon, a number 15 hit. The squad did, the band broke up, and - apart from a brief reunion in 2002 - that's that. Justin Currie is now touring in support of his solo album.

Keith Sweat's biggest hit was I want her, number 26 in 1988. He never really went away, though didn't have another top 40 hit until two songs crept into the chart during 1996. A re-release of I want her managed number 44. Sleeper's career came to a quiet end, Romeo me landed at 39. Boys II Men put A song for mama in at 34, continuing the pattern of one top ten hit and everything else deep in the 20s. The group almost returned to the top 40 in 2007 with their biggest hit, End of the road. But didn't. A shame.

The M People. What a waste of space, time, effort, and insisting that they were worthy of veneration when the group was capable of nothing more than screeching without reference to tune, tempo, or music. Their latest release is Fantasy island, regrettably (or mercifully, we're unsure which) not a cover of the Tight Fit classic, but some nonsense of their own derision. It was the group's smallest hit in forever, only making number 33. Regrettably, radio was playing this far more than it deserved ie at all.

Sex-o-Sonique had I thought it was you at 32. Huff and Herb's Feeling good sampled Nina Simone's classic; the original hadn't been a hit in the UK until 1994, making number 40. Paul Weller's Mermaids made a small splash at number 30. Meredith Brooks was in Follow That! mode: I need landed at 28, the somewhat stronger follow-up What would happen went on to make 49 the following February, and that was it for the Bitch. Super Furry Animals excorsied their Demons at 27.

Though there were lots and lots of new entries, not every song fell a tremendous number of places. Chumbawumba and Sash!, for instance, fell 5; the Spices were down 4, and Steps dropped just the one place, landing this week at 23. Lisa, Lee, Claire, Faye, and someone called Ian (though he'd subsequently change his name to H) had been cast at the end of 1996 from applicants to an advert in The Stage. The group fell under the wing of Pete Waterman, and received moral support and encouragement from Tony Wilson. The group had toured assiduously, playing to schools by day, and to gay clubs by night. Lead single 5, 6, 7, 8 would take advantage of the tremendous upturn in the singles market in late 1997 to become the biggest-selling single never to make the top 10; this week's position of 23 would be the lowest the group would record until the middle of February 1998. It's only slightly less of an achievement to have a number 1 in Australia with your first hit.

The big breakthrough, the appearance that cemented the group's fame, came on the 5 December edition of Blue Peter. Pete Waterman recalls coming home to find his young kids dancing around, singing the song they'd just seen on the telly. The group had found its niche: all-singing, all-dancing, squeaky clean, and thoroughly fun to be around. The official comparison was with ABBA, though we never quite saw the link. The songs were somewhere between Kylie Minogue in her Stock Aitken Waterman days and late-era Bananarama - indeed, single two was a cover of the 'Nana's Last thing on my mind (May 98, 6), and Better the devil you know was part of a double-A sided single in late 1999 (with Say you'll be mine, Dec 99, 4). The hits continued to roll in - Heartbeat / Tragedy took the number one spot at the start of 1999, a BPI award for Most Popular Newcomer, notoriously beating Belle and Sebastian, and the number one album Steptacular. Their second number one single was Stomp, taking advantage of a quiet week in October 2000, when everyone assumed that Fatboy Slim had the title locked up. The group released a greatest hits album, containing covers of Chain reaction (a 1986 number 1 for Diana Ross) and I know him so well (the 1985 leader for Elaine Paige and Barbra Dickson). The group split from fatigue at the end of the greatest hits tour, though the secret was kept for a couple of weeks until Boxing Day 2001.

It's hard to recall just how huge the group was: they had the rare accolade of a special edition of Top of the Pops in May 1999, a variety special in August 2000, H and Claire hosted Steps to the Stars, featuring a pre-fame Gagagareth Gates and Danny McFly. Since the group split, H has taken the title role in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat; Faye has toured in productions of Love Shack and Me And My Girl; Lee has done The Games; and Lisa made a series for MTV, during which she tried to plug Electric into the top ten. It made 13, and apparently peaking one place higher than your group's debut is a failure.

Such was the future fame of the band that Dru Hill had a tribute song, 5 steps, in at 22. The group's greatest fame, the top ten hits How deep is your love and These are the times, were still in the future. Usura remixed their 1993 top ten hit Open your mind; it made 21. Todd Terry's latest cheesy mix was It's over love, in at 16. The decline starts here: Kylie Minogue's tedious disco noodlings on Did it again made number 14. Don't go down that old path, we will hate you for it. Out of the top ten fell the Prodigy (8-20), Ickle Aaron Carter (9-19), and Louise (10-15).

Just missing the top ten came Reds United, performing Sing up for the champions. This was a tribute to the Manchester United squad who had won the Division I title the previous May, and would end this season by winning the grand non-total of nothing. Lyrically, the track was a bunch of terrace chants performed to a Good Beat, with the chorus to the tune of the Pet Shop Boys' Go west. The club had been responsible for some halfway decent football songs... OK, the club had been responsible for one halfway decent football song, 1994's chart-topping Come on you reds, and some utter drivel, mercilessly documented on Pride of Manchester, which reveals — there was an album of this tosh!

Another act in Follow That! mode: Gala, whose Freed from desire had been huge in midsummer. Let a boy cry could only make number 11. Bouncing back up a place to 10 was Elton John; Lutricia McNeal and the Babs - Céline combo slipped to 9 and 8. New at 7 came the Verve with Lucky man, the follow-up to their September chart-topper. We didn't realise it at the time, but this would be the last official single from the group. It's not the last we'll hear of them, Sonnet would be released to radio in February, and remained on playlists through the spring; there was one week when it, Lucky man, Bittersweet symphony, and Treat infamy - a track by dance act Rest Assured that had the same sample as Bittersweet... - were all in the Network Chart top 40. Sonnet made number 74 on import sales in late May, but that really was it. Lead mumbler Richard Ashcroft has continued to churn out similar tosh on his own.

One place drops for the All Saints, Natalie Imbruglia, Steven Houghton, and Aqua fill places 6-3. Bad karaoke from Boyzone at 2, with their version of Tracey Chapman's Baby can I hold you. It would be the group's third number 2 hit of the year, and one of the songs that propelled Alex Parks to victory in Star Academy 2003. That's possible thanks to the BBC's commitment to quality music and crap presenters. Which in turn brings us to Perfect day, spending a second week at number 1.

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