Rajiv Gandhi, the prime minister of India, was assassinated. He died instantly when a bomb contained in a bouquet of flowers exploded at a political rally in Tamil Nadu. Suspicion centred on Tamil separatists from Sri Lanka.

Rucksana Khan was mauled by a pit bull. In a clear panic, and following sensationalist reporting in the populist press, interior minister Kenneth Baker was pressured to introduce a bill making life difficult for pit bulls, tosas, bandogs, rottweilers, and Neapolitan mastiffs. The problem that Mr. Baker declined to address is that violent and stupid dogs are often owned by violent and stupid people. The most sensible course of action would be to license dogs, and make their possession dependant on completing a course on how to own and care for a dog.

Bryan Gould revealed Labour's plans for a Greater London Assembly, a supervisory body that would co-ordinate such activities as transport and planning. The body would have about 70 members, with a third or a quarter elected each year. The government cut the base rate by ½% to 11½% as a recession looked inevitable. British prime minister Joe Ninetyone told the CBI that the government was winning the battle against inflation; the RPI rose by just 6.4% in the year to April.

After fourteen years of misrule, President Mengistu Haile Mariam fled Ethiopia for the sanctity of Zimbabwe. The TSB lost £5 million from its operations in the Channel Islands. The TCCB announced its fixture list for Pakistan's tour next summer, containing five one-day internationals and only five tests. Purists were agahst. In this year's fixtures, England beat the West Indies at the one-day lark. Purists were agahst. Paul Gascoigne completed his move to Lazio, who paid £4 million now, and £4.5m when Gascoigne plays for them. On his return from a drugs ban, Ben Johnson finished fifth.

Three bids were entered for INR1, the UK's first national commercial radio station, to broadcast on 100-102FM. Under the rules made by Lord Chalfont and the Radio Authority, this station was reserved for something other than pop music; of two further INR stations (INR2, 1215AM, launching from autumn 1992; INR3, 1053/1089, not before 1994), at least one would have to be spoken word. The bidders were:

• UKFM, based in Glasgow and owned by Radio Clyde and Lord Hanson, proposed a programme of pre-1960 popular music and light classics. (The 1960 date had been plucked out of thin air just before bids were submitted as a demarcation between Pop and Non-Pop music. We have no idea if it's been revised in the years since.)
• First National Radio was headed by Chiltern Radio and Showtime, and would broadcast a programme of popular entertainment, including music from the stage, screen, and concert hall. The service would originate from Milton Keynes.
• Classic FM was headed by the Daily Telegraph and the Really Useful Group, and would broadcast familiar classical music from London. The group had withdrawn from bidding in April, but after GWR replaced Carlton Communications as the broadcast partner, they submitted a speculative bid anyway.

A fourth bid from Metronome, providing "environmentally-friendly music with no additives" was deemed inadmissible, solely for want of the £10,000 application fee. EMAP had considered bidding with an easy-listening service, but withdrew when the 1960 demarcation line became known; had it been a clearly moving "30 years before present", it's understood they would have gone for it.

UK Singles Chart for w/c 26 May 1991

Number One	The shoop shoop song (it's in his kiss) - Cher - 5th week (Number 664 in seq.)
Highest new entry	Kylie Minogue - Shocked - number 10
Fastest climber (within top 40)	Move your body - Technotronic - up 19 to 12
Fastest climber (within top 75)	(as above)
Lemming-like fall	Gonna catch you - Lonnie Gordon - down 31 to 74
Top 40 debuts	Harry Connick Jr
Top 40 exits	Frances Nero, Nomad
Top 75 debuts	Hi-Five, Nikke? Nicole!
Top 75 exits	Lonnie Gordon, Nikke? Nicole!, Paul Weller Movement, The Roman Numerals, Soul Family Sensation
Simon Mayo's Record of the Week	Farewell mister sorrow - All About Eve

Nineteen new entries on the chart this week, beginning with the bizarrely-named Nikke? Nicole!, in at 73 with Nikke does it better. Again, we have no idea who they are, but we do know that they're the 14th act this year whose debut week is their farewell week. We'll have twenty more by the time the year's out. Alison Moyet's second single of the year, Wishing you were here, is new at 72, and Marc Cohn's Walking in Memphis is up four to 66. Jan Hammer had put the gentle piano strains of Crockett's theme to number 2 in 1987; a wholly pointless and rather evil remix saw the tune back amongst us at 64. Kym Mazelle was up two to 62 with No one can love you more than me. Second single of the year for Jane's Addiction, Classic girl is the soft ballad from Ritual de lo Habitual, and enters at 60. A somewhat unnecessary live version of Ruby Tuesday enters at 59 for the Rolling Stones, and a re-release of Now is tomorrow makes number 57 for the Definition of Sound.

Hi-Five come in at 55 with I like the way (the kissing game). A group of young lads, the group were an update to the doo-wop tradition, latterly taken up by the best bits of Boys II Men. Though massive in Texas, this was their only minorly significant hit in the UK. The group went on hiatus in the mid-90s, but returned in 2000 with a sequence of children's albums. New at number 54 came the flimsy vocal talents of Mariargh Cantsing with There's got to be a way. No there hasn't, this song's going absolutely nowhere, and if she weren't shagging her record company boss, Cantsing would be dropped right here.

Instead, we'll head off to France, where the Germans are coming! Wind of change by the Scorpions knocked Enigma's Sadeness off the top in mid-March, and spent seven weeks at the head of the chart. In their native Germany, the song is now spending its second week at number two, stuck behind Roxette's Joyride. It'll go on to spend eleven weeks as Germany's number one, and half a year in the top ten. None of that counts for anything in the UK, where Wind of change comes storming in at number 53, and will fall faster than the Berlin wall it's written about. Ver Scorps can meet as many world leaders as they like, starting with Mr. Gorbachev, but this will cut no ice with the parochial British public. The anthem to European unity and the demolition of communist-era imprisonment is not going to do anything here.

Living Colour have their second hit, Solace of you is more cod-reggae, albeit far less hooky (and far less staccatto) than Love rears up its ugly head, and only enters at 52. Great Manchester chancers Northside come in at 47 with Take 5, and the Divinyls climb nine to 44 with I touch myself.

The ITV Chart Show was a repository for all sorts of crazy adverts. Every LP worth getting would be advertised in one of the two internal breaks, and the second pause, just before the top ten, was the single most prized slot for music. Imagine our surprise, then, to see an advert for Highway 5 take up thirty seconds of prime screen estate on the 1 June episode. This is The Blessing. This is Highway 5. It's in stores now. With the subtext, Go out and buy it, you bloody people! We've knocked the single down to 99p, we've got a chart run of 63-47-46-42, we've won Simon Mayo's Chartbeater, we've hit big in the MRIB chart and in the Scottish chart, what more do we have to do to get in the national top 40? The band was fronted by William Topley, a British vocalist with a really deep voice, and the blues-soul of the Mississippi delta. Quite why this song spent so long on the verge of hit status is completely beyond us, but even the last-ditch commercial effort didn't work, and the tune wouldn't make the top 40 until a re-release the following January. If they'd waited a bit longer, it may well have beaten number 30.

A fast climb - but not the fastest - as Kirsty Maccoll climbs 18 places to 39 with Walking down Madison, her first top 40 hit since Days in summer 1989. Salt and Pepa climb 15 to 37 with Do you want me, and Kenny Thomas is new at 36 with Thinking about your love. Harry Connick Junior's Recipe for love / It had to be you rises 16 to 35, the Little Angels's Young gods is new at 34, and there's a one-place climb for Siouxsie and the Banshees's Kiss them for me, now number 32.

A few weeks ago, we mentioned the major promotion effort behind a tedious movie about a tedious band. Almost inevitably, some of The Doors's old songs were re-released, and Light my fire - originally a number 49 hit - makes it all the way to 29. It's hackneyed, it's old, it's even less entertaining than Sonia's version of Only fools (never fall in love), new at 28.

The German invasion continued as Kraftwerk put The robots in at 27. The synth-pop masters are best known for The model, a number one single at the start of 1982, but had had just three other hits, and hadn't charted since Tour de France just missed the top 20 in 1984. This song was Kraftwerk being Kraftwerk, there's nothing more to say. Speaking of groups being themselves, Pop Will Eat Itself entered at 25 with 92 degrees. Not a song about Stephen Fry, indeed, we're not sure what this song was about at all.

There's no move at 23 for Your swaying arms, and MC Hammer is back at 21 with Yo!! sweetness. The most interesting part of that song is the punctuation in the title. Simple Minds rose 9 to 20 with See the lights, and there's no move at 18 for The Wonder Stuff.

T'Pau rose four to 16 with Whenever you need me; they were the biggest thing to come out of Shropshire since Peter Jones (1). Formed around lead singer Carol Decker, and subconsciously channelling the utterly obscure Yankee band Til Tuesday, ver Pau took their name from a character in obscure sci-fi nonsense Star Trek. After debut single Heart and soul was used in a jeans commercial in summer 1987, it became a top five hit. The follow-up, China in your hand, was a power ballad that would become the group's signature song, spending four weeks as the best-seller in the UK. Three more singles were released from their debut album Bridge of Spies; one of them caused the group to be banned by their local commercial radio station - Beacon Radio's programme controller Pete Wagstaff took exception to the concept expressed in Sex talk, and decided not to play it. Neither did anyone else, but mostly because the song was a bit pants.

The group released a second album, Rage, in late 1988, showing a similar mixture of power ballads and soft rock classics. T'Pau didn't recapture their previous form - of the three singles released from Rage, only one scraped a week in the top 20, and best track Road to our dream missed the top 40 entirely. Third album The Promise came out in 1991, and the group was beginning to show signs of creaking. It was no surprise that they split after this swan song, releasing a best of in 1993. Soft rock with poodle perms was the popular idiom of the late 80s, and none came soft-rockier or more poodley than Decker, but the group never quite escaped the albatross of China in your hand. A shame, their catalogue is far more hit than miss.

Queen rose 14 to 14 with Headlong, and the fastest climber is Technotronic's Move that body, up 19 to 12. Anyone going to sing it? Thought not. Out of the top ten went Zucchero and Paul Young (10-15), and OMD (8-13). Not replacing them was Denny Minogue, Success found itself short of success, stalling at number 11.

Who pushed Denny out of the top ten? Her big sister Kylie, her new single Shocked was the highest new entry at number 10. In the great* Kylie Minogue songbook, Shocked has a special place. It's not because of a tedious groove, it's not because of the trite vocal arrangements, but it's thanks to the lyrics. The demure, innocent princess of pop is perhaps the only person who could smuggle the line fucked to my very foundations onto daytime radio without anyone noticing.

REM went up four to 9 with Shiny happy people, and if there's a smuggled lyric in that song, we're yet to discover it. Cathy Dennis's Touch me (all night long) fell two to 8, and if there's any sense in the lyrics there, it's still a mystery after all these years. KLF's Last train to trancentral is down three to 7, and Soft Cell's cover of Tainted love slips a place to 6. Amy Grant climbs four to 5 with Baby baby, and the decline of Beverley Craven starts here, Promise me slips one to 4. Crystal Waters retains top spot on the MRIB survey, but Gypsy woman (la da dee) is down one to 3 on the only chart that counts. Colour Me Bad rise five to 2 with I wanna sex you up, meaning that Cher's The shoop shoop song (it's in his kiss) retains the top spot for a fifth week.

| Permanent link