#he's saying he fought off 6 golden geckos

[grease-weasel]

Telling his brothers how tough he was today

#he's saying he fought off 6 golden geckos #he actually just got beat up by a few fiends but he's too scared to tell them :[ #hrmmn lore #when they find out the king hunts them down nobody hurts the little guy who takes rex on walkies #found family (arlo forced himself into the Kings/hj) #fallout oc #fallout #fallout fanart #my art #!! greasel posting !! #fallout new vegas #fnv #the kings #pacer fnv #the king fnv #rex fnv #rex fallout new vegas #the king fallout new vegas #pacer fallout new vegas

[getyourgossip0-blog]

Now that's what I call a tracklist: how the compilation's 100th edition sells its history short

New Post has been published on http://getyourgossip.xyz/now-thats-what-i-call-a-tracklist-how-the-compilations-100th-edition-sells-its-history-short/

Now that's what I call a tracklist: how the compilation's 100th edition sells its history short

Released on 20 July, the 100th edition of Now That’s What I Call Music shifts from its regular programming: instead of summarising the last quarter in pop, the second disc condenses 35 years of Now into 80 minutes. It uses the biggest names – UB40, Phil Collins, Wet Wet Wet, Kylie, the Justins (Timberlake and Bieber), Coldplay – to tell its story, which rather misses the point. Now compilations are tamper-proof time capsules, where the most pleasure is found in one-hit wonders and sub-genres that were genuinely – but only briefly – popular. They are proof that history isn’t always written by the winners.

Here is how it could have looked. (Listen along below.)

The most significant sound of 1983 – for teenagers and the future of pop – was electro, represented on the first Now by the Rocksteady Crew with Hey You, which sounded like Peppermint Patty jumped ship from Peanuts while holidaying in the Bronx. Frankie Goes to Hollywood were huge in 84, and over by 85, but Propaganda (Dr Mabuse, Now 3) foreshadowed a new kind of European pop. Philip Oakey and Giorgio Moroder created a sad goodbye to the era (Together in Electric Dreams, Now 4) and British pop went into hibernation for much of the rest of the decade. US music became dominant on the dancefloor, with Prince’s success creating space for Cameo (Single Life, Now 6) and glorious one-offs such as Sly Fox’s Let’s Go All the Way (Now 7).

Not all was hopeless in mid-80s Britain. Stock, Aitken and Waterman, before they relied too heavily on pre-set buttons, gave us Mel and Kim’s weekend anthem Showing Out (Now 8), while mild experimentalism came via the Communards’ creepy So Cold the Night (Now 9), which used the bassoon as a rhythmic instrument. It wasn’t enough. Some turned to soft metal and the Brontëan passion of Heart’s Alone on Now 10, but the slick and tinny high-80s sound was dying by 1988; Johnny Hates Jazz’s puny but endearing Turn Back the Clock (Now 11) desperately attempting to stop the 90s from ever beginning.

1991’s biggest-selling singles act … the KLF perform at the 1992 Brit awards. Photograph: Richard Young/Rex Features

The rising sound of 1988 came from Chicago, and the media panic over acid house, but London played its part: the aerosol snare of Theme from S-Express (Now 12) signified an imminent DIY future for dance music. Soul II Soul (Back to Life, Now 15) instigated Paul Oakenfold’s Movement 98 and a tranche of early Ibiza-friendly 98bpm records (the Grid’s Floatation; JT & the Big Family’s Moments in Soul). By 1990, the primary colours of acid house and the frivolity of hip house resulted in Betty Boo (Where Are You Baby, Now 18) becoming a Smash Hits cover star. The major labels, iron-fisted in the 80s, had lost control of pop and in the chaos the KLF (3AM Eternal, Now 19) became 1991’s biggest selling singles act in Europe. The underground went overground – breakbeat-led hardcore (SL2’s On a Ragga Tip, Now 22) was the foundation stone of jungle, drum and bass, and genres yet to come.

Future thwarted … Tasmin Archer. Photograph: Mick Hutson/Redferns

Enough futurism – there was other stuff going on. Latin superstar Gloria Estefan was one of the biggest artists of the 90s never to have featured on a Now, but Jon Secada was her songwriter and backing singer, and the slippery, discomforting chords of his Just Another Day (Now 23) went Top 5 in 1992. A TV ad for the Soft Reggae compilation went with the bawled tagline “The softest reggae yet!” – as if L’Oréal had been trying to perfect a formula. UB40’s sound was inescapable in the early 90s, but Chaka Demus & Pliers’ Tease Me (Now 25), was soft, witty, and should be an oldies radio staple. The Brit awards saw the future in the form of Guiseley’s Tasmin Archer, (Sleeping Satellite, Now 26), named 1993’s best British breakthrough act – they were wrong.

Britpop’s year is remembered as 1995, but dance music was bigger, invigorated by happy hardcore (N-Trance’s Set You Free, Now 30), uplifting handbag house (Livin’ Joy’s Dreamer, Now 31) and whatever the Bucketheads’ joyous disco cut-up The Bomb was meant to be. Oasis aside, the most consistently successful UK act between 1993 and 1997 weren’t Pulp or Suede but Eternal (Power of a Woman, Now 32), whose run of homegrown, Topshop R&B singles – 12 Top 10 hits between 93 and 97, twice as many as Pulp, Shed Seven, Sleeper and Menswear combined – ran parallel to Britpop.

Spice Girls (Say You’ll Be There, Now 35) brought back a bubblegum sensibility in 1996 that dominated British chart pop for the rest of the nineties (All Saints’ I Know Where It’s At, Now 38; Steps’ Heartbeat, Now 41; Billie’s Honey to the Bee, Now 42). On Now 40, Aqua’s Doctor Jones – the second of three No 1s – was up against portentously titled post-Britpop items such as the Verve’s Sonnet and Legacy by Mansun.

A new golden age of R&B … Kelis. Photograph: Tim Roney/Getty Images

A new sound was needed for a new century. Still in demand in 2018 according to posters dotted around the North Circular, DJ Luck and MC Neat’s A Little Bit of Luck (Now 45) was urban, British, minimal and hard as nails, while So Solid Crew’s 21 Seconds (Now 50) was arguably the last time the media was scared by a No 1 single. British bubblegum was killed off by the more grownup, complex and beautifully baffling R&B emerging from the US at the turn of the century. Sisterhood may have suffered with the breakups of 90s R&B groups such as Jade, TLC and En Vogue, but solo singers produced a new golden age of R&B (Aaliyah’s More Than a Woman, Now 51; Ashanti’s Foolish, Now 52; Kelis’s Milkshake, Now 57). Previously a backroom songwriter, Christina Milian produced a masterpiece in Dip It Low (Now 58) – it’s a scandal of Vienna-type proportions that it was held off No 1 in 2004 by the tiresome Fuck It/F.U.R.B. (Fuck You Right Back) craze.

Almost undocumented by the music press but huge north of the Wash in the early 00s was the Blackburn-based All Around the World label, which provided donk-heavy foot fodder from acts such as N-Trance, Aquagen and Ultrabeat (Pretty Green Eyes, Now 56). Down south, 3 of a Kind were the ultimate one-hit wonder – one single, one No 1 hit in Babycakes, a last gasp of UK garage and one of its most endearing moments. Based in rural Kent, Britain’s Xenomania production team had scored their first No 1 in 2002 with Sugababes’ Round Round (Now 53) but by 2006 their main project, Girls Aloud (Biology, Now 62), had become broadsheet critical darlings. Girls Aloud were, of course, the product of the 2000s’ talent show craze. While you have to wade through a swamp of Sneddons to find anything else worthwhile, Shayne Ward’s Max Martin-produced gem No U Hang Up (Now 68) is worth a nod.

A brief flutter of excitement … Beth Ditto of Gossip. Photograph: Simone Joyner/Getty Images

Girls Aloud’s Something Kinda Ooooh and Justin Timberlake’s equally invigorating SexyBack fought drear like Snow Patrol’s Chasing Cars and America by Razorlight on Now 65. The Magic Numbers (Forever Lost, Now 61) were physical and musical exceptions in a landfill indie landscape of identikit Wombats, Maccabees, Frays, Views and Hoosiers. There was a brief flutter of excitement as a bunch of exciting and excitable female-fronted guitar bands (CSS, New Young Pony Club, the Gossip) emerged in the mid ‘00s: the Gossip’s Standing in the Way of Control was on Now 66, alongside the first appearance by Calvin Harris who, along with David Guetta (Flames, Now 100), seems set to remain a Now regular until the apocalypse. Amerie’s Take Control (Now 67) provided a more imaginative way of using guitar riffs than any band in the UK could manage, though it presaged the oddly rock-heavy summer of 2008 (Sex on Fire, I Kissed a Girl, Pink’s So What).

The biggest country act of all time … Taylor Swift at BBC Radio 1’s 2012 Teen awards. Photograph: Brian Rasic/Brian Rasic/Getty Images

November 2008: in came Obama and, lo, a new lightness (Shakira’s She Wolf, Now 74), playfulness (Lady Gaga’s run of 2009 No 1s), and a sense of something regained (Alicia Keys’ Empire State of Mind, Now 75). This optimism soon bled into an over-ripe maximalism, and some of the scientifically loudest records ever made (Rihanna’s Only Girl (In the World), Now 77). Meanwhile, David Cameron’s Britain dabbled in the darker arts of loud but sombre stadium dubstep (Chase & Status’ Blind Faith, Now 78; Nero’s Guilt, Now 79). As Madonna and Britney Spears’ careers suddenly faded, a new heroine emerged from the world of country. There had been R&B/country crossovers before (Usher and Tim McGraw, Now 60) but adopting that internationalism made Taylor Swift (We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together, Now 83) the biggest country act of all time. She even had Obama on her side, with the president calling Kanye West a “jackass” after he invaded her prize acceptance at the 2009 MTV Video Music awards.

Foxes was an example of an emerging, less thrilling, 2010s British pop; her Let Go for Tonight (Now 87) was perfectly fine, but it represented a shift to a rather blank, home counties sound, as if Tim Henman had been appointed pop tsar. Sam Smith, Jess Glynne, Tom Odell, Ellie Goulding, and tousle-haired jack of all trades Ed “Hello Dave” Sheeran – this was chart pop as a career, in the way insurance or banking used to be, with a professional distance and a pre-rock attitude. At least Foxes had a proper stage name.

Stressed out … Drake. Photograph: Gabe Ginsberg/Getty Images

The charts were starting to become harder to read – in 2014, Oliver Heldens and Becky Hill’s Gecko (Overdrive) (Now 88) was the last UK No 1 to have made it on sales alone, as streaming became incorporated into the chart the following week. It was also becoming harder for outliers to break through, though Philip George’s Wish You Were Mine (Now 90) – deep house made in his bedroom – was an exception from a period when Robin S’s Show Me Love appeared to have been the most influential record ever made.

And so we enter the very recent past, the era of Trump, and some exceptionally good but also exceptionally mopey R&B. There was the new tough-but-weepy Bieber (Let Me Love You, Now 95), the Weeknd’s The Hills (Now 93) claimed “when I’m fucked up, that’s the real me”, while Drake bemoaned how “stressed out” he was as a Timmy Thomas sample played on Hotline Bling. Black British music had begun to dominate the second side of Nows (Stefflon Don’s Hurtin’ Me, Now 98; Dave’s No Words, Now 99). Indeed, the second disc of Now 99 was as exciting a sequence as Now had ever produced – Ramz, J Hus, B Young, Not3s, Mabel et al – at least until it weirdly petered out with Maroon 5, James Bay and U2.

The rather conservative “greatest hits” choices on Now 100 are therefore all the more disappointing, but no matter – the pop continuum is what counts with Now. I’m already looking forward to 35 years from today, and seeing the future of pop from the vantage point of Now 200.

Bob Stanley is a founding member of Saint Etienne and the author of Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Story of Modern Pop

[getyourgossip0-blog]

Now that's what I call a tracklist: how the compilation's 100th edition sells its history short

New Post has been published on http://getyourgossip.xyz/now-thats-what-i-call-a-tracklist-how-the-compilations-100th-edition-sells-its-history-short/

Now that's what I call a tracklist: how the compilation's 100th edition sells its history short

Released on 20 July, the 100th edition of Now That’s What I Call Music shifts from its regular programming: instead of summarising the last quarter in pop, the second disc condenses 35 years of Now into 80 minutes. It uses the biggest names – UB40, Phil Collins, Wet Wet Wet, Kylie, the Justins (Timberlake and Bieber), Coldplay – to tell its story, which rather misses the point. Now compilations are tamper-proof time capsules, where the most pleasure is found in one-hit wonders and sub-genres that were genuinely – but only briefly – popular. They are proof that history isn’t always written by the winners.

Here is how it could have looked. (Listen along below.)

The most significant sound of 1983 – for teenagers and the future of pop – was electro, represented on the first Now by the Rocksteady Crew with Hey You, which sounded like Peppermint Patty jumped ship from Peanuts while holidaying in the Bronx. Frankie Goes to Hollywood were huge in 84, and over by 85, but Propaganda (Dr Mabuse, Now 3) foreshadowed a new kind of European pop. Philip Oakey and Giorgio Moroder created a sad goodbye to the era (Together in Electric Dreams, Now 4) and British pop went into hibernation for much of the rest of the decade. US music became dominant on the dancefloor, with Prince’s success creating space for Cameo (Single Life, Now 6) and glorious one-offs such as Sly Fox’s Let’s Go All the Way (Now 7).

Not all was hopeless in mid-80s Britain. Stock, Aitken and Waterman, before they relied too heavily on pre-set buttons, gave us Mel and Kim’s weekend anthem Showing Out (Now 8), while mild experimentalism came via the Communards’ creepy So Cold the Night (Now 9), which used the bassoon as a rhythmic instrument. It wasn’t enough. Some turned to soft metal and the Brontëan passion of Heart’s Alone on Now 10, but the slick and tinny high-80s sound was dying by 1988; Johnny Hates Jazz’s puny but endearing Turn Back the Clock (Now 11) desperately attempting to stop the 90s from ever beginning.

1991’s biggest-selling singles act … the KLF perform at the 1992 Brit awards. Photograph: Richard Young/Rex Features

The rising sound of 1988 came from Chicago, and the media panic over acid house, but London played its part: the aerosol snare of Theme from S-Express (Now 12) signified an imminent DIY future for dance music. Soul II Soul (Back to Life, Now 15) instigated Paul Oakenfold’s Movement 98 and a tranche of early Ibiza-friendly 98bpm records (the Grid’s Floatation; JT & the Big Family’s Moments in Soul). By 1990, the primary colours of acid house and the frivolity of hip house resulted in Betty Boo (Where Are You Baby, Now 18) becoming a Smash Hits cover star. The major labels, iron-fisted in the 80s, had lost control of pop and in the chaos the KLF (3AM Eternal, Now 19) became 1991’s biggest selling singles act in Europe. The underground went overground – breakbeat-led hardcore (SL2’s On a Ragga Tip, Now 22) was the foundation stone of jungle, drum and bass, and genres yet to come.

Future thwarted … Tasmin Archer. Photograph: Mick Hutson/Redferns

Enough futurism – there was other stuff going on. Latin superstar Gloria Estefan was one of the biggest artists of the 90s never to have featured on a Now, but Jon Secada was her songwriter and backing singer, and the slippery, discomforting chords of his Just Another Day (Now 23) went Top 5 in 1992. A TV ad for the Soft Reggae compilation went with the bawled tagline “The softest reggae yet!” – as if L’Oréal had been trying to perfect a formula. UB40’s sound was inescapable in the early 90s, but Chaka Demus & Pliers’ Tease Me (Now 25), was soft, witty, and should be an oldies radio staple. The Brit awards saw the future in the form of Guiseley’s Tasmin Archer, (Sleeping Satellite, Now 26), named 1993’s best British breakthrough act – they were wrong.

Britpop’s year is remembered as 1995, but dance music was bigger, invigorated by happy hardcore (N-Trance’s Set You Free, Now 30), uplifting handbag house (Livin’ Joy’s Dreamer, Now 31) and whatever the Bucketheads’ joyous disco cut-up The Bomb was meant to be. Oasis aside, the most consistently successful UK act between 1993 and 1997 weren’t Pulp or Suede but Eternal (Power of a Woman, Now 32), whose run of homegrown, Topshop R&B singles – 12 Top 10 hits between 93 and 97, twice as many as Pulp, Shed Seven, Sleeper and Menswear combined – ran parallel to Britpop.

Spice Girls (Say You’ll Be There, Now 35) brought back a bubblegum sensibility in 1996 that dominated British chart pop for the rest of the nineties (All Saints’ I Know Where It’s At, Now 38; Steps’ Heartbeat, Now 41; Billie’s Honey to the Bee, Now 42). On Now 40, Aqua’s Doctor Jones – the second of three No 1s – was up against portentously titled post-Britpop items such as the Verve’s Sonnet and Legacy by Mansun.

A new golden age of R&B … Kelis. Photograph: Tim Roney/Getty Images

A new sound was needed for a new century. Still in demand in 2018 according to posters dotted around the North Circular, DJ Luck and MC Neat’s A Little Bit of Luck (Now 45) was urban, British, minimal and hard as nails, while So Solid Crew’s 21 Seconds (Now 50) was arguably the last time the media was scared by a No 1 single. British bubblegum was killed off by the more grownup, complex and beautifully baffling R&B emerging from the US at the turn of the century. Sisterhood may have suffered with the breakups of 90s R&B groups such as Jade, TLC and En Vogue, but solo singers produced a new golden age of R&B (Aaliyah’s More Than a Woman, Now 51; Ashanti’s Foolish, Now 52; Kelis’s Milkshake, Now 57). Previously a backroom songwriter, Christina Milian produced a masterpiece in Dip It Low (Now 58) – it’s a scandal of Vienna-type proportions that it was held off No 1 in 2004 by the tiresome Fuck It/F.U.R.B. (Fuck You Right Back) craze.

Almost undocumented by the music press but huge north of the Wash in the early 00s was the Blackburn-based All Around the World label, which provided donk-heavy foot fodder from acts such as N-Trance, Aquagen and Ultrabeat (Pretty Green Eyes, Now 56). Down south, 3 of a Kind were the ultimate one-hit wonder – one single, one No 1 hit in Babycakes, a last gasp of UK garage and one of its most endearing moments. Based in rural Kent, Britain’s Xenomania production team had scored their first No 1 in 2002 with Sugababes’ Round Round (Now 53) but by 2006 their main project, Girls Aloud (Biology, Now 62), had become broadsheet critical darlings. Girls Aloud were, of course, the product of the 2000s’ talent show craze. While you have to wade through a swamp of Sneddons to find anything else worthwhile, Shayne Ward’s Max Martin-produced gem No U Hang Up (Now 68) is worth a nod.

A brief flutter of excitement … Beth Ditto of Gossip. Photograph: Simone Joyner/Getty Images

Girls Aloud’s Something Kinda Ooooh and Justin Timberlake’s equally invigorating SexyBack fought drear like Snow Patrol’s Chasing Cars and America by Razorlight on Now 65. The Magic Numbers (Forever Lost, Now 61) were physical and musical exceptions in a landfill indie landscape of identikit Wombats, Maccabees, Frays, Views and Hoosiers. There was a brief flutter of excitement as a bunch of exciting and excitable female-fronted guitar bands (CSS, New Young Pony Club, the Gossip) emerged in the mid ‘00s: the Gossip’s Standing in the Way of Control was on Now 66, alongside the first appearance by Calvin Harris who, along with David Guetta (Flames, Now 100), seems set to remain a Now regular until the apocalypse. Amerie’s Take Control (Now 67) provided a more imaginative way of using guitar riffs than any band in the UK could manage, though it presaged the oddly rock-heavy summer of 2008 (Sex on Fire, I Kissed a Girl, Pink’s So What).

The biggest country act of all time … Taylor Swift at BBC Radio 1’s 2012 Teen awards. Photograph: Brian Rasic/Brian Rasic/Getty Images

November 2008: in came Obama and, lo, a new lightness (Shakira’s She Wolf, Now 74), playfulness (Lady Gaga’s run of 2009 No 1s), and a sense of something regained (Alicia Keys’ Empire State of Mind, Now 75). This optimism soon bled into an over-ripe maximalism, and some of the scientifically loudest records ever made (Rihanna’s Only Girl (In the World), Now 77). Meanwhile, David Cameron’s Britain dabbled in the darker arts of loud but sombre stadium dubstep (Chase & Status’ Blind Faith, Now 78; Nero’s Guilt, Now 79). As Madonna and Britney Spears’ careers suddenly faded, a new heroine emerged from the world of country. There had been R&B/country crossovers before (Usher and Tim McGraw, Now 60) but adopting that internationalism made Taylor Swift (We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together, Now 83) the biggest country act of all time. She even had Obama on her side, with the president calling Kanye West a “jackass” after he invaded her prize acceptance at the 2009 MTV Video Music awards.

Foxes was an example of an emerging, less thrilling, 2010s British pop; her Let Go for Tonight (Now 87) was perfectly fine, but it represented a shift to a rather blank, home counties sound, as if Tim Henman had been appointed pop tsar. Sam Smith, Jess Glynne, Tom Odell, Ellie Goulding, and tousle-haired jack of all trades Ed “Hello Dave” Sheeran – this was chart pop as a career, in the way insurance or banking used to be, with a professional distance and a pre-rock attitude. At least Foxes had a proper stage name.

Stressed out … Drake. Photograph: Gabe Ginsberg/Getty Images

The charts were starting to become harder to read – in 2014, Oliver Heldens and Becky Hill’s Gecko (Overdrive) (Now 88) was the last UK No 1 to have made it on sales alone, as streaming became incorporated into the chart the following week. It was also becoming harder for outliers to break through, though Philip George’s Wish You Were Mine (Now 90) – deep house made in his bedroom – was an exception from a period when Robin S’s Show Me Love appeared to have been the most influential record ever made.

And so we enter the very recent past, the era of Trump, and some exceptionally good but also exceptionally mopey R&B. There was the new tough-but-weepy Bieber (Let Me Love You, Now 95), the Weeknd’s The Hills (Now 93) claimed “when I’m fucked up, that’s the real me”, while Drake bemoaned how “stressed out” he was as a Timmy Thomas sample played on Hotline Bling. Black British music had begun to dominate the second side of Nows (Stefflon Don’s Hurtin’ Me, Now 98; Dave’s No Words, Now 99). Indeed, the second disc of Now 99 was as exciting a sequence as Now had ever produced – Ramz, J Hus, B Young, Not3s, Mabel et al – at least until it weirdly petered out with Maroon 5, James Bay and U2.

The rather conservative “greatest hits” choices on Now 100 are therefore all the more disappointing, but no matter – the pop continuum is what counts with Now. I’m already looking forward to 35 years from today, and seeing the future of pop from the vantage point of Now 200.

Bob Stanley is a founding member of Saint Etienne and the author of Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Story of Modern Pop

[getyourgossip0-blog]

Now that's what I call a tracklist: how the compilation's 100th edition sells its history short

New Post has been published on http://getyourgossip.xyz/now-thats-what-i-call-a-tracklist-how-the-compilations-100th-edition-sells-its-history-short/

Now that's what I call a tracklist: how the compilation's 100th edition sells its history short

Released on 20 July, the 100th edition of Now That’s What I Call Music shifts from its regular programming: instead of summarising the last quarter in pop, the second disc condenses 35 years of Now into 80 minutes. It uses the biggest names – UB40, Phil Collins, Wet Wet Wet, Kylie, the Justins (Timberlake and Bieber), Coldplay – to tell its story, which rather misses the point. Now compilations are tamper-proof time capsules, where the most pleasure is found in one-hit wonders and sub-genres that were genuinely – but only briefly – popular. They are proof that history isn’t always written by the winners.

Here is how it could have looked. (Listen along below.)

The most significant sound of 1983 – for teenagers and the future of pop – was electro, represented on the first Now by the Rocksteady Crew with Hey You, which sounded like Peppermint Patty jumped ship from Peanuts while holidaying in the Bronx. Frankie Goes to Hollywood were huge in 84, and over by 85, but Propaganda (Dr Mabuse, Now 3) foreshadowed a new kind of European pop. Philip Oakey and Giorgio Moroder created a sad goodbye to the era (Together in Electric Dreams, Now 4) and British pop went into hibernation for much of the rest of the decade. US music became dominant on the dancefloor, with Prince’s success creating space for Cameo (Single Life, Now 6) and glorious one-offs such as Sly Fox’s Let’s Go All the Way (Now 7).

Not all was hopeless in mid-80s Britain. Stock, Aitken and Waterman, before they relied too heavily on pre-set buttons, gave us Mel and Kim’s weekend anthem Showing Out (Now 8), while mild experimentalism came via the Communards’ creepy So Cold the Night (Now 9), which used the bassoon as a rhythmic instrument. It wasn’t enough. Some turned to soft metal and the Brontëan passion of Heart’s Alone on Now 10, but the slick and tinny high-80s sound was dying by 1988; Johnny Hates Jazz’s puny but endearing Turn Back the Clock (Now 11) desperately attempting to stop the 90s from ever beginning.

1991’s biggest-selling singles act … the KLF perform at the 1992 Brit awards. Photograph: Richard Young/Rex Features

The rising sound of 1988 came from Chicago, and the media panic over acid house, but London played its part: the aerosol snare of Theme from S-Express (Now 12) signified an imminent DIY future for dance music. Soul II Soul (Back to Life, Now 15) instigated Paul Oakenfold’s Movement 98 and a tranche of early Ibiza-friendly 98bpm records (the Grid’s Floatation; JT & the Big Family’s Moments in Soul). By 1990, the primary colours of acid house and the frivolity of hip house resulted in Betty Boo (Where Are You Baby, Now 18) becoming a Smash Hits cover star. The major labels, iron-fisted in the 80s, had lost control of pop and in the chaos the KLF (3AM Eternal, Now 19) became 1991’s biggest selling singles act in Europe. The underground went overground – breakbeat-led hardcore (SL2’s On a Ragga Tip, Now 22) was the foundation stone of jungle, drum and bass, and genres yet to come.

Future thwarted … Tasmin Archer. Photograph: Mick Hutson/Redferns

Enough futurism – there was other stuff going on. Latin superstar Gloria Estefan was one of the biggest artists of the 90s never to have featured on a Now, but Jon Secada was her songwriter and backing singer, and the slippery, discomforting chords of his Just Another Day (Now 23) went Top 5 in 1992. A TV ad for the Soft Reggae compilation went with the bawled tagline “The softest reggae yet!” – as if L’Oréal had been trying to perfect a formula. UB40’s sound was inescapable in the early 90s, but Chaka Demus & Pliers’ Tease Me (Now 25), was soft, witty, and should be an oldies radio staple. The Brit awards saw the future in the form of Guiseley’s Tasmin Archer, (Sleeping Satellite, Now 26), named 1993’s best British breakthrough act – they were wrong.

Britpop’s year is remembered as 1995, but dance music was bigger, invigorated by happy hardcore (N-Trance’s Set You Free, Now 30), uplifting handbag house (Livin’ Joy’s Dreamer, Now 31) and whatever the Bucketheads’ joyous disco cut-up The Bomb was meant to be. Oasis aside, the most consistently successful UK act between 1993 and 1997 weren’t Pulp or Suede but Eternal (Power of a Woman, Now 32), whose run of homegrown, Topshop R&B singles – 12 Top 10 hits between 93 and 97, twice as many as Pulp, Shed Seven, Sleeper and Menswear combined – ran parallel to Britpop.

Spice Girls (Say You’ll Be There, Now 35) brought back a bubblegum sensibility in 1996 that dominated British chart pop for the rest of the nineties (All Saints’ I Know Where It’s At, Now 38; Steps’ Heartbeat, Now 41; Billie’s Honey to the Bee, Now 42). On Now 40, Aqua’s Doctor Jones – the second of three No 1s – was up against portentously titled post-Britpop items such as the Verve’s Sonnet and Legacy by Mansun.

A new golden age of R&B … Kelis. Photograph: Tim Roney/Getty Images

A new sound was needed for a new century. Still in demand in 2018 according to posters dotted around the North Circular, DJ Luck and MC Neat’s A Little Bit of Luck (Now 45) was urban, British, minimal and hard as nails, while So Solid Crew’s 21 Seconds (Now 50) was arguably the last time the media was scared by a No 1 single. British bubblegum was killed off by the more grownup, complex and beautifully baffling R&B emerging from the US at the turn of the century. Sisterhood may have suffered with the breakups of 90s R&B groups such as Jade, TLC and En Vogue, but solo singers produced a new golden age of R&B (Aaliyah’s More Than a Woman, Now 51; Ashanti’s Foolish, Now 52; Kelis’s Milkshake, Now 57). Previously a backroom songwriter, Christina Milian produced a masterpiece in Dip It Low (Now 58) – it’s a scandal of Vienna-type proportions that it was held off No 1 in 2004 by the tiresome Fuck It/F.U.R.B. (Fuck You Right Back) craze.

Almost undocumented by the music press but huge north of the Wash in the early 00s was the Blackburn-based All Around the World label, which provided donk-heavy foot fodder from acts such as N-Trance, Aquagen and Ultrabeat (Pretty Green Eyes, Now 56). Down south, 3 of a Kind were the ultimate one-hit wonder – one single, one No 1 hit in Babycakes, a last gasp of UK garage and one of its most endearing moments. Based in rural Kent, Britain’s Xenomania production team had scored their first No 1 in 2002 with Sugababes’ Round Round (Now 53) but by 2006 their main project, Girls Aloud (Biology, Now 62), had become broadsheet critical darlings. Girls Aloud were, of course, the product of the 2000s’ talent show craze. While you have to wade through a swamp of Sneddons to find anything else worthwhile, Shayne Ward’s Max Martin-produced gem No U Hang Up (Now 68) is worth a nod.

A brief flutter of excitement … Beth Ditto of Gossip. Photograph: Simone Joyner/Getty Images

Girls Aloud’s Something Kinda Ooooh and Justin Timberlake’s equally invigorating SexyBack fought drear like Snow Patrol’s Chasing Cars and America by Razorlight on Now 65. The Magic Numbers (Forever Lost, Now 61) were physical and musical exceptions in a landfill indie landscape of identikit Wombats, Maccabees, Frays, Views and Hoosiers. There was a brief flutter of excitement as a bunch of exciting and excitable female-fronted guitar bands (CSS, New Young Pony Club, the Gossip) emerged in the mid ‘00s: the Gossip’s Standing in the Way of Control was on Now 66, alongside the first appearance by Calvin Harris who, along with David Guetta (Flames, Now 100), seems set to remain a Now regular until the apocalypse. Amerie’s Take Control (Now 67) provided a more imaginative way of using guitar riffs than any band in the UK could manage, though it presaged the oddly rock-heavy summer of 2008 (Sex on Fire, I Kissed a Girl, Pink’s So What).

The biggest country act of all time … Taylor Swift at BBC Radio 1’s 2012 Teen awards. Photograph: Brian Rasic/Brian Rasic/Getty Images

November 2008: in came Obama and, lo, a new lightness (Shakira’s She Wolf, Now 74), playfulness (Lady Gaga’s run of 2009 No 1s), and a sense of something regained (Alicia Keys’ Empire State of Mind, Now 75). This optimism soon bled into an over-ripe maximalism, and some of the scientifically loudest records ever made (Rihanna’s Only Girl (In the World), Now 77). Meanwhile, David Cameron’s Britain dabbled in the darker arts of loud but sombre stadium dubstep (Chase & Status’ Blind Faith, Now 78; Nero’s Guilt, Now 79). As Madonna and Britney Spears’ careers suddenly faded, a new heroine emerged from the world of country. There had been R&B/country crossovers before (Usher and Tim McGraw, Now 60) but adopting that internationalism made Taylor Swift (We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together, Now 83) the biggest country act of all time. She even had Obama on her side, with the president calling Kanye West a “jackass” after he invaded her prize acceptance at the 2009 MTV Video Music awards.

Foxes was an example of an emerging, less thrilling, 2010s British pop; her Let Go for Tonight (Now 87) was perfectly fine, but it represented a shift to a rather blank, home counties sound, as if Tim Henman had been appointed pop tsar. Sam Smith, Jess Glynne, Tom Odell, Ellie Goulding, and tousle-haired jack of all trades Ed “Hello Dave” Sheeran – this was chart pop as a career, in the way insurance or banking used to be, with a professional distance and a pre-rock attitude. At least Foxes had a proper stage name.

Stressed out … Drake. Photograph: Gabe Ginsberg/Getty Images

The charts were starting to become harder to read – in 2014, Oliver Heldens and Becky Hill’s Gecko (Overdrive) (Now 88) was the last UK No 1 to have made it on sales alone, as streaming became incorporated into the chart the following week. It was also becoming harder for outliers to break through, though Philip George’s Wish You Were Mine (Now 90) – deep house made in his bedroom – was an exception from a period when Robin S’s Show Me Love appeared to have been the most influential record ever made.

And so we enter the very recent past, the era of Trump, and some exceptionally good but also exceptionally mopey R&B. There was the new tough-but-weepy Bieber (Let Me Love You, Now 95), the Weeknd’s The Hills (Now 93) claimed “when I’m fucked up, that’s the real me”, while Drake bemoaned how “stressed out” he was as a Timmy Thomas sample played on Hotline Bling. Black British music had begun to dominate the second side of Nows (Stefflon Don’s Hurtin’ Me, Now 98; Dave’s No Words, Now 99). Indeed, the second disc of Now 99 was as exciting a sequence as Now had ever produced – Ramz, J Hus, B Young, Not3s, Mabel et al – at least until it weirdly petered out with Maroon 5, James Bay and U2.

The rather conservative “greatest hits” choices on Now 100 are therefore all the more disappointing, but no matter – the pop continuum is what counts with Now. I’m already looking forward to 35 years from today, and seeing the future of pop from the vantage point of Now 200.

Bob Stanley is a founding member of Saint Etienne and the author of Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Story of Modern Pop