6 September 1990 We've already had Italia '90 songs, we'll soon have movie soundtrack songs, and here's another hugely-popular flavour of '90s event release: The Song From The Levi's Ad. The ad itself was usually glossy and expensive, with a slightly witty and romantic set-up where someone invariably had to take off or put on … Continue reading Steve Miller Band – ‘The Joker’ →

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 … Continue reading Bombalurina – ‘Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini’ →

31 May 1990 The first of those '90s monsters: the event single that stays at number one for months on end. 'Put 'Em Under Pressure' topped the Irish charts for a then-record 13 weeks. As is the way, the longer 'Put 'Em Under Pressure' stayed at number one the more people grew to hate it. … Continue reading Republic of Ireland Football Squad – ‘Put ‘Em Under Pressure’ →

17 May 1990 "World Cup! English clubs! / Kevin Moran and the Dubs!" - that's the one! This wasn't the first sporting-themed single by Irish band The Memories; in 1974 they had a top ten hit with 'The Likes Of Heffo's Army' celebrating Dublin's All-Ireland win that year. Intriguingly, ten years later they had an … Continue reading The Memories – ‘The Game’ →

10 May 1990 Collective mania; divisive debate; World Cup dominating the front and back pages; everyone hating Eamon Dunphy... yes, the Saipan affair in 2002 was an incredible Irish socio-cultural experience. We'll get to that here in due course, but for now we can marvel at how Saipan really was such an uncanny negative image … Continue reading Liam Harrison and the GOAL Celebrities – ‘Give It A Lash Jack’ →

5 April 1990 In the absence of Bela from Fair City and Tadhg from Ros na Rún duetting on 'Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now', we have this. Soap stars becoming pop stars were a common feature in the singles charts by now, so it was a promotional no-brainer that the Irish soaps would follow suit. … Continue reading Mick Lally – ‘The Byroad To Glenroe’ →

22 March 1990 You're kidding, right? The Berlin Wall had fallen, Nelson Mandela was free, but we still have Jive Bunny records at number one? So much for the end of history. Wait: it gets worse. Amazingly, the sweatshop owners behind this wretched enterprise have found the formula to make a Jive Bunny single that … Continue reading Jive Bunny and the Mastermixers – ‘That Sounds Good To Me’ →

15 March 1990 Like that Internet meme of Stephen Rea with his notebook out, I'm taking names for the Castle: who in Ireland in St Patrick's Day week in the year of our lord 19-Italia-90 was buying a record called 'The Brits'? Anyway, this was a compilation of snippets of well-known recent dance singles to … Continue reading Various Artists – ‘The Brits 1990 (Dance Medley)’ →

8 March 1990 Firstly and most importantly, I'm relieved to see that, as per their official website, this band have finally dropped the grammatically-incorrect possessive apostrophe from their name. If the outlaw glamour of sticking it to the punctuation police is how you roll, you can still savour their original name styling on the 'Love … Continue reading The B-52s – ‘Love Shack’ →

25 January 1990 You know in the video for 'Nothing Compares 2 U' where Sinéad O'Connor is walking in a park? That's the Parc de Saint-Cloud on the edge of Paris; for most of my eight years in Paris I lived near there. It has two front fields right on the bank of the Seine … Continue reading Sinéad O’Connor – ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’ →