Monday, June 09, 2008

Mint condition

Last year we thought it was a bit too convenient that Britain's Got Talent, set up as an X Factor for all sorts of entertainment, has as its breakout stars a six year old singer and an amateur opera singer. While Connie Talbot's people are taking their time about things - after all, there'll always be a housewives' market - Paul Potts got to release a full album about two months later. So imagine our surprise this year when the winner turned out to be a teenage breakdancer. Yeah, a breakdancer, to perform at the Royal Variety Performance. What year is it again?

And yet, now look what's happened. The track George Sampson performed to has scorched past all opposition to number one without so much as a marketing plan. We doubt the Singin' In The Rain remix would have been something Mint Royale would look at with fondness regardless, given they did it for advertiser's money in the first place. That nobody directly involved in the show has made extra royalties money out of the sudden windfall is, we suppose, one thing; the complete mockery it makes of what the Official Charts Company would like us to believe is the world's most accurate current singles sales list is quite another.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I thought it should have number one when it was first released. But maybe that's just me.

Chris Brown said...

You might want to check which of the four major labels owns the rights to this track. Hint: it's not EMI, Warner or Universal.

Personally, I was a bit disappointed that this was even such a big hit first time round, because I like Mint Royale and don't really appreciate them being most famous for an irritating novelty record; to some extent the same applies to 'Sexiest Man In Jamaica'.

Simon said...

Really, there's a whiff of big beat novelty about a lot of Mint Royale's earlier singles (From Rusholme With Love, the Terrorvision Tequila remix), and at least the Sexiest Man In Jamaica sample is from a fairly obscure Prince Buster/Selecter live album. Buster did TOTP with them looking vaguely uncomfortable at being dragged over from Jamaica just to repeat that one line.