Your name isn't Rio but I don't care for sand

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

2005 : I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor - Arctic Monkeys

After a terrible '04, things are already looking up with this one taking the year - I remember it coming out of nowhere to storm the charts and create quite the buzz for their debut album.  I don't remember the video though, so I'll be interested to see if it rings any bells.

Well, the reason I don't remember the video is that it just looks like a TOTP appearance (a brief one at 2:57) - it's fair to say they didn't spend too long on the design of it but that feels about right given the immediate urgency of the song.  They all look soooo young and Alex amusingly introduces the song with "We're Arctic Monkeys - don't believe the hype" (in a much stronger accent than he has these days).

Wikipedia tells us that the video was shot using 1980's TV cameras to give it the retro feel and it was based around OGWT rather than TOTP - silly me.  The track debuted at #1, so a lot of people did believe the hype and I'd also forgotten that they played it at the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics (along with The Beatles' "Come Together").

Wikipedia also gives us some cover versions - Sugababes (rockier than I expected), Baby Charles (a well done funk-jazz version) and The Vines (a slightly psychedelic 60s version).  It also tells us that Tom Jones and Joe Perry performed it at the Concert For Diana and it's fair to say that people didn't like it - but I thought it could have been worse.  secondhandsongs.com has a surprisingly low number of versions - a mere 18 and the only other artist I recognise is Anton du Beke (a swing version that I was expecting to be dreadful but I have to admit it also could have been a lot worse).

I'm actually pretty happy with this taking the year but I'll be surprised if it's that high up in the year-end chart because, although I've just very much enjoyed the albums from 2005, there was some shite music about at the time as well.  Oh yes - there are some shockers in here!

Top of the year is a decent enough song, if not necessarily entirely deserving of its position - Tony Christie (and Paul Kay's) "(Is This The Way To) Amarillo" (first released in '72).  And the rest of top five is mostly considerably worse - Shayne Ward's "That's My Goal",Crazy Frog's "Axel F", James Blunt's "You're Beautiful" (I like this - don't knock it) and The Pussycat Dolls' "Don't Cha" (a well done track, but not great).  Interestingly, Tony & Shayne both featured in the top ten best selling singles of the decade - you'd never remember that, would you?

Looking at the rest of the top 50 year-end, we have the good - Sugababes' "Push The Button" (#10), Daniel Powter's "Bad Day" (#11 - it wasn't a great album, but it's a fair enough single) and Kelly Clarkson's "Since U Been Gone" (#30).  And then we have the bad and the ugly with Black Eyed Peas' "My Humps" (#32 - this really is dreadful).  Other tracks of interest which fall somewhere in between are Nizlopi's "JCB Song" (#12 - a decent enough song which blew up for no obvious reason) and a certain Arctic Monkeys' track (#17).  I have to admit there are an awful lot of tracks I don't recognise in the slightest though.

Looking further down the charts during the year turns up The Killers' "Somebody Told Me", The Chemical Brothers' "Galvanize", Athlete's "Wires", Doves' "Black And White Town", Kaiser Chiefs "Oh My God" and "I Predict A Riot", The Bravery's "An Honest Mistake", Jem's "They", Mario's "Let Me Love You". Green Day's "Wake Me Up When September Ends", Coldplay's "Fix You" and Madonna's "Hung Up".  Not a huge number of top rate singles, but it's also worth mentioning this year for the peculiar number of Elvis Presley singles in the top 10 - a mere 17 (to mark his 70th birthday).

Are the USA going to save the day? (Are they bollocks!). The best selling single over there this year was Mariah Carey's "We Belong Together" which I don't recognise in the slightest and that's a bit of a theme throughout the chart.  There are also a lot of people with multiple entries in the top 100 - Black Eyed Peas, Ciara and Kelly Clarkson had four and 50 Cent had six!

This was an interesting year because I've only just done the albums so I'd been recently reminded of quite a few of these singles - but there were an awful lot that were ringing no bells at all.  I'm perfectly happy to give the year to Arctic Monkeys though - it's a decent track from a decent album.

2004 - One I don't recognise at all
2006 - Fine, but not an obvious winner