Tommy used to work on the docks

Continuing my trip up the list of the most streamed songs for each year.  

1986 : Livin' On A Prayer - Bon Jovi

"Woah, we're halfway there
Woah, we're living on a prayer"

Serendipitously, we actually are halfway there on the list and I can't say I'm surprised to see this taking the year - like last year's winner, it's a fine sing-along track and one that's wheeled out every summer.  And I'm expecting another super cheesy video (but without an intriguing ending this time).

Oh yes, it's 4:08 of extra mature Stilton - but it's also disappointingly simple cheese.  The first half is the band "rehearsing" for a gig (ie pissing about on stage) in arty black and white and the second half is the band "at" the gig (ie pissing about in front of about 50 extras, filmed to looked like a full arena - and failing) in colour.  Given the song has a reasonably strong narrative and defined characters I'm amazed they didn't go full "Papa Don't Preach" with Jon playing Tommy being all moody and down on his luck.  There is also a HUGE amount of hairspray involved - I wouldn't be surprised if they'd single-handedly been responsible for the hole in the ozone layer.  And there's most definitely no intriguing ending to this one - it just feels like they couldn't be bothered to do anything.

Wikipedia has surprisingly little on a rawk staple - apparently Jon didn't like the original version and was going to ditch it, but Richie convinced him to give it another go.  And I suspect Jon is quite happy about that now.  Unusually (particularly because there's really nothing to them) there's a section on the lyrics (which adds absolutely nothing to anyone's knowledge) and in there Jon makes the point that the song works because Tommy and Gina are named in the song, so we relate to them better - which sounds like bollocks, but I suspect he's on to something.  To balance this plausible statement, I'll also point out that Wikipedia claims that Jon said  "trickle-down economics are really inspirational to writing songs".  Yes, of course he did...

Unsurprisingly, it went down well in the US - getting to #1 there and in Canada as well (and, less obviously, Norway and New Zealand).  It got to #4 in the UK, but I was surprised to see it only got to #20 in Germany - it feels like the sort of thing they usually LOVE over there.

And we have one more "fact" of interest from Wikipedia - this is a very cute video (if possibly not exactly of world-shattering importance).  But, once again, we've got no cover versions - are they gonna become rare as we move forward in time?  (I should point out we're still talking about 35 years ago, which is more than half my lifetime ago - and I'm OLD!).  secondhandsongs.com offers us Hazell Dean (I wasn't expecting that - it's terrible but definitely different.  Weird Hazell Wiki-rabbit hole - her first album was a selection of Bacharach & David covers - no, really!), Tori Amos (I really liked this, but it's less surprising - she has a good line in cover versions subverting masculine stereotypes given that she's made a whole album of them), Alvin & The Chipmunks (just NO!), Tiffany (not quite as bad as Hazell's version, but still not good) and The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (just a bit odd really).  Well, that's a mix, isn't it?  (and do check out the Tori Amos one - it's really well done).

I'm not really surprised this took the year, but I'm expecting some strong competition, so let's see what the year throws up.  The best selling tracks of the year were The Communards' "Don't Leave Me This Way" (a fine track you don't hear enough these days), Nick Berry's "Every Loser Wins" (a dreadful track), Boris Gardiner's "I Want To Wake Up With You" (a track I'd completely forgotten about), Cliff Richard & The Young Ones' "Living Doll" (it still makes me giggle) and Diana Ross's "Chain Reaction" (not her finest moment imho).  Which, apart from #1, isn't the best top five ever, is it?  But I suspect the charts will do better for us...

Well - it's quite an interesting mix including Madonna's "Borderline", "Live To Tell" and "True Blue" (not a bad selection), The Damned's "Eloise", Whitney Houston's "How Will I Know" and "Greatest Love Of All", Sigue Sigue Sputnik's "Love Missile F1-11" (this was so try hard at the time, but I actually quite like it), The Bangles' "Manic Monday", Prince's "Kiss", George Michael's "A Different Corner" (what a way to start a solo career), Queen's "A Kind Of Magic", Falco's "Rock Me Amadeus", Simple Minds' "All The Things She Said", Grange Hill's "Just Say No", Janet Jackson's "What Have You Done For Me Lately", Spitting Image's "The Chicken Song" (a terrible song, but a very well done terrible song), Peter Gabriel's "Sledgehammer" and "Don't Give Up", Chas & Dave's "Snooker Loopy", Wham!'s "The Edge Of Heaven", A-ha's "The Sun Always Shines On TV", The Housemartins' "Happy Hour" and "Caravan Of Love", Bananarama's "Venus", Chris de Burgh's "Lady In Red", Sinitta's "So Macho", Peter Cetera's "Glory Of Love" (I love this despite it not being my sort of thing at all), Cutting Crew's "I Just Died In Your Arms", Cameo's "Word Up", Run DMC's "Walk This Way", Paul Simon's "You Can Call Me Al", Pet Shop Boys' "Suburbia", Berlin's "Take My Breath Away" and Europe's "The Final Countdown".  There are a load more different genres in there than in previous years and it's interesting to see Cameo and Run DMC starting the hippi-hoppiness which we're going to be seeing a lot more of.

The top ten of the US best selling list is quite surprising - because it's absolutely terrible!  The top selling track is Dionne & Friends' "That's What Friends Are For", it's followed by Lionel Richie's "Say You Say Me", there are two Mr Mister tracks, there's one Eddie Murphy track (what?!?) and there's one I've never even heard of (Klymaxx's "I Missed You").  Things do get better further down, but there's nothing new that jumps out at me.

But I think the list from the UK charts is a good selection (with obvious exceptions) and I like how there's a lot more variety there than previous years - I don't imagine I could pick one winner, but that's what we have the internet for and they have declared that Bon Jovi are the one and true kings of 1986 - and I can live with that.

1985 - A fine track from a fine year
1987 - Good song, bad hair (again!)