MADE IN LONDON: SHUT YOUR MOUTH

MADE IN LONDON: SHUT YOUR MOUTH
Nothing says love like a thoroughly unsuccessful girl band. Back in the halcyon days of 2000, missing the Top 10 wasn't the end of the road, and this UK-based trio seemed to have a shot when their debut Dirty Water made Number 15, seemingly a cause for optimism and hopes of longevity. In the event, this, their second single, crashed out at an embarrassing Number 74. Embarrassing to the record-buying public because this is IMMENSE. Okay, the heavy guitars, playful bass and flown-in-from nowhere brass don't sit exactly right with the screaming white-girl soul vocals, but what a chorus! Inevitably, their album, A Perfect Storm vanished pretty much without a trace.

OBLIVIA: COLLAPSE ON ME

OBLIVIA: COLLAPSE ON ME
Oh, if these guys had been from somewhere in England and been around in 1996 this song could have been their very own Wonderwall. Or at the least, their very own Slight Return anyway. Instead, this song came out in 2001 and the band were from Sydney, though Josh the singer was Irish. Oh well. This is very Britpop, but also a bit country - I used to see it on the country channel all the time, but seemingly nobody else paid any attention. It's all about accepting someone despite their large cases full of emotional and personal baggage. Ah, to be loved like that

EFUA SOMEWHERE

EFUA: SOMEWHERE
Faulty memory alert - I'd always assumed this song had been a massive hit but it didn't crack the top 40 in the UK or the US. Surely some mistake, Everyhit? Anyway, I'm a sucker for giggly essays on love that interpolate Dr Seuss, so I have fond memories of this song, being as it is the only song in that group, and it's a great bit of jazzy (well there is scratching and hits) dance pop anyway. Jazzy B from Soul II Soul was involved, as you may be able to tell, and its chorus is just crying out to be stolen and put into a big diva house number. It will help if you're all soft inside.

MINT ROYALE: DON'T FALTER

MINT ROYALE: DON'T FALTER
Ask me on a day when the sun is out and I'll probably say this is the best love song of the decade so far, the biggest up in the very up-and-down career of Mint Royale (i.e. Shake Me: good. Rock'n'Roll Bar: bad. Show Me: very good. Sexiest Man In Jamaica: bad) and still the only real impact Lauren Laverne had, musically, since announcing the end of her band with the delightfully whimsical exclamation "We were Kenickie... a bunch of fuckwits!". Make another record soon, Lauren!

THE BLACKEYED SUSANS: BLUE SKIES, BLUE SEA

THE BLACKEYED SUSANS: BLUE SKIES, BLUE SEA
This was recorded live for a crappy morning television program, and despite the fact that the audience is cheering, they all seemed completely bored. Which goes to show that the only thing worse than people who actually watch morning television is those who watch it being filmed in the studio, because this is gorgeous song, a swoonsomely beautiful, slightly bitter but mostly fond reminiscence of love drifted away. Do not download if you hate slight country overtones. Or divine choruses, for that matter.

KELLI ALI: INFERNO HIGH LOVE

KELLI ALI: INFERNO HIGH LOVE
Kelli was the charismatic singer in the Sneaker Pimps who got kicked out because the other two guys didn't like being upstaged, or possibly just because they hated fun. And pop. So now their records occasionally just graze the charts, which is fitting enough, but sadly Kelli's two solo albums didn't even do that. If you can get past this song's occasionally awful lyrics, you may find it to be a rather spiffy uptempo number with some nicely-placed neo-disco touches in the mix that sounds just like a forgotten single that spent one week at #58, never to be heard again.

SHIVAREE: ALL BECAUSE YOU TOLD ME SO

SHIVAREE: ALL BECAUSE YOU TOLD ME SO
"Fish are flying, birds are swimming", coos the delightfully named Ambrosia Parsley on this swinging, sort of 50s-show tune number about an admission of love making things all a bit chaotic and unwieldly. "I'm tired, been fired, all because you told me so!" she adds. The album this comes off, Rough Dreams is a bit of a lost classic, actually, and you should track it down for more delightfully off-kilter numbers like this one.

CINERAMA: YOUR CHARMS

CINERAMA: YOUR CHARMS
Reportedly, this wonderful little pop song was written as a response to a challenge set by John Peel, who gave the title and requested a song be written to fit it. A small part of Peel's legacy, but a fantastic one nonetheless.

LUSCIOUS JACKSON: NERVOUS BREAKTHROUGH

LUSCIOUS JACKSON: NERVOUS BREAKTHROUGH
No doubt a few people were tricked into buying Luscious Jackson's frankly awful final album because this opening track sounded brilliant on a listening post. "I was off kilter/Now I've got shelter/Thanks to you/I'm gonna breakthrough" goes the endearingly goofy rap, but there's synthesised brass, a (gasp) funky, insistent beat in the verses and a great mantra of a chorus. PS. Yes pedants, I know they were a three-piece when this came out. Haha. Seek out Jill Cunniff's stuff with The Cooler Kids, really. It's great.

JIMMY SOMERVILLE: DARK SKY

JIMMY SOMERVILLE: DARK SKY
It's a shame Jimmy's post-Bronski career didn't stay at the top for long enough for this song to be a hit. It's gorgeous, isn't it? Surely someone else other than me went and bought it? No? Oh well. I can't quite work out if it's bleak or uplifting, the former must be what was intended but there's something about the bouncy, propulsive bass that makes it so much more than that.