30 August 1990
Bombalurina is the name of a feline in the musical Cats, and the ‘executive producer’ of this record is Cats composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, who apparently wanted a number one pop hit. Why he thought this was best done by getting an irritating English kids TV presenter to front a cover version of this appalling song is beyond me. However, it worked, so I guess that’s why he’s paid the big bucks.
Languishing in two-channel provincial Ireland had its benefits after all; I grew up unexposed to the dubious charms of Timmy Mallett and his peculiarly joyless and insecure brand of ‘wacky’ fun. That said, I doubt anyone could have made this better: a cartoonish notion of house music as a mere bank of sound effects (from “Uno! Dos! Tres! Quatro!” to “Aw yeah!” and back) to present what is basically an embarrassingly twee, dated and sexist skit about leering in public at women and girls in swimsuits. One of Billy Wilder’s lesser films, a 1961 political satire called One, Two, Three, uses an older version of this song in an interrogation scene as sonic torture, which is about right.
