Coronavirus: Whigfield and D: Ream in their 90s classics that elevate people locked up | Ents and Arts News

Unsurprisingly, pandemic-appropriate songs have resurfaced in recent weeks, with REM’s The End Of The World As We Know It, Queen’s I Want To Break Free, and Akon’s Locked Up, all seeing a surge in sales to As the UK turns to humor in strange times.

Encouraging classics like You’ll Never Walk Alone and We’ll Meet Again also enjoy a comeback, thanks to Captain tom and the queen’s cry to Lady Vera Lynn in his speech about coronavirus emergency shutdown.

But it seems that the songs of the 1990s, that decade of hope and optimism, are also providing the lift people need when forced isolation nears the end of week six.

Dublin’s footage went viral earlier this month when residents ventured outside to perform Whigfield’s famous Saturday night dance, socially estranged, of course.

And in Nottingham, D: Ream’s 1994 number one hit, Things Can Only Get Better, has become the city’s applause anthem to the applause of our caregivers every week, playing throughout the city every Thursday night.

The Lighthouse Family’s High, Aqua’s Barbie Girl, and Wannabe, of the Spice Girls, are also on the Top 100 Block Listening List of the official charts, while Spotify says Lou Bega’s Mambo No. 5 (as Saturday Night, another with a dance routine) is being added to many playlists.

Britney Spears ‘Baby One More Time and Backstreet Boys’ I Want It That Way have also seen Spotify streams increase.

Speaking to Sky News from her home outside Milan, Italy, Sannie Carlson, the woman best known as Whigfield, says she has seen many performances of Saturday Night in the 27 years since its launch, but none like the dance in Dublin. .

“I’ve seen a lot of these videos over the years, but I think this is a lot of fun because they were all safely apart, you know, and they had their little marks where they were supposed to be, which I thought was funny. , ” she says. “It made me very happy”.

Carlson says he believes the song has had an enduring legacy due to its simplicity.

“I think it is very cheesy,” she says. “It’s one of those songs that you really hate or really love, and it’s like children’s songs, it’s easy to sing it.”

“It’s the classic, you can’t not play it at a wedding, because it’s just one of those few times when people can get together and be silly.” And I love nonsense and not taking myself so seriously.

“I think, especially right now, people need that … I don’t know, we just have to get through this and I think music is an amazing therapy for mental health.”

The song also perfectly captured that teen anticipation of a great night, as evidenced by Whigfield dancing in a towel and braiding her hair in the video.

“Well that was the video,” he laughs. “I mean, it was about a girl getting ready to go out on a Saturday night. When people ask, what is the song about? It is not deep, you know? “

The 90s, Carlson says, was his “perfect era” for music.

“I think the music was very melodic,” she says. “It was simpler and it was easier to create an artist. I mean, today … Well, kids can make music from home and there is so much music out there. It is not that you enter the lists and stay there for weeks and weeks; now it’s like, inside and outside. “

In Italy, which was affected by the coronavirus before the United Kingdom, Carlson has been locked up for almost eight weeks and with tighter restrictions.

But she is philosophical about isolation, and says she takes the positives of being connected virtually.

“The funny thing is that I released a new single a while ago and everyone said: you are crazy because it is the worst time, you cannot promote. But I think there are more people listening to radio now than before. I mean, now there is much more union, people connect more in a certain way. It’s as if the world has become a smaller place. “

Like Carlson, D: Ream leader Pete Cunnah has seen his greatest success used in many different ways over the years, especially as Tony Blair’s 1997 election hymn.

He says seeing pictures of the song used in Nottingham excited him.

“A friend of mine sent me the Nottingham tweet with the lyrics playing after the NHS applause, and I burst into tears,” he says. “I have experienced that song in many different ways and never in a month of Sundays had I envisioned it being used in this way.”

“There has been a lot of love for the song and how it is helping people.” You think, God, it’s not my song anymore. It has become … well, it belongs to all of us, I guess.

“That’s kind of amazing as a writer … it’s very encouraging.”

In the early 1990s, Cunnah had the song title and had a clear idea of ​​the type of song she wanted to do.

“When I got the title, Things can only get better, I was just looking for something that would literally put the hairs on the back of my neck and also make people hit the air with joy,” he says.

“I was able to gather those kinds of ingredients somehow at the right time.

“It’s been this kind of injection of joy that people go crazy. When we play it live, I know it’s the ace in my sleeve and I really enjoy it. The energy is still on the record.”

Cunnah is locked in Donegal, Ireland, currently working on a new D: Ream album with co-founder Alan Mackenzie.

After two albums at their peak in the 1990s, the duo released In Memory Of … in 2011 after several years away. The new album, Hope For You, will be her fourth.

Cunnah admits that she went through a period when being known for a hit became a burden, but “you learn to get over it.”

He laughs: “I was like,” There are other songs available, people. “But I can’t go out of a party now if people know it’s me, they make me get up and sing the song. And actually, you beat yourself up and get up. and you have fun with people and there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s a lot of fun. “

Political events in the late 1980s and early 1990s, such as the resignation of Margaret Thatcher and the fall of the Berlin Wall, brought about a sense of change, which was reflected in the music being made.

“Everyone is free (Rozalla), if you think about it, or How can I love you more? For M People,” says Cunnah.

“There was one thing about that kind of early house scene post house that had that feeling of joy … there was a moment in time there where it was very, very happy.

“I know it’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but you know, you need to be entertained and depressed.” That is the light and the shadow, the contrast of the music. That is what it does for people.

“Paul Simon said that every generation throws a new hero on the charts and that he’s not kidding, because my kids love Stormzy; I don’t wear Stormzy. I love all the stuff from the early ’70s. I love the’ 80s. Bowie, the Eurythmics, U2, The Police, that was my era.

“Then I had a second chance when we were dating Leftfield and Underworld and M People. I had a second chance in my childhood.

“But as the music progresses and as you get older, you get used to it and you look back and you see the world through pink glasses and, as it should be, you get away from the things your children like.

“Because you don’t want to hang out with your children, that they like the music they like … because they will be upset with you, let’s say it that way, that you are standing in their territory.” So that’s how it should be. “

Nkosi Inniss, aka DJ Coast 2 Coast, has been organizing weekly “safe raves” for its neighbors in Ancoats, Manchester, an area where former warehouses and factories have been converted into flats and there are many roofs and balconies.

Playing 15-minute sets, he says 90s songs are undoubtedly popular, from Oasis to N-Trance.

“It was a time when a lot of the music that was coming out was euphoric, about love, happiness and togetherness and that kind of thing,” he says.

“For example, Show Me Love (Robin S), I play a remix of that, and Whitney Houston, I’m Every Woman, which is one of my favorite songs, plays.

“N-Trance, Free Yourself – I played it and everyone went nuts on the rooftops.

“With technology now, everything is accessible. It’s not that today’s music sounds similar: there are many different genres, a lot of incredible music now. But I think many of the things that people made music in … even the way where they were making music.

“When I look back at the music from the production side, it’s really crazy, which makes me appreciate that time even more.”

Wonderwall, launched by Oasis in 1995, is always a crowd pleaser, he says.

“The lyrics, maybe Because maybe, you’ll be the one to save me” – at the moment, you could be saved by someone, by the NHS. I feel like it really means something. And as a proud mancuniano, I love Oasis ”.

It sums it up very well.

“Because everyone is isolated, people want music that makes them familiar. That’s what it’s about.”

Watch Whigfield at Kay Burley at Breakfast Live on Sky News Monday morning