Novelty Records

This first essay is branching off from the Muggle Studies homework on music. The topic of the essay will be the appeal of novelty records over the last few years. One might argue, an unusual choice of topic, however I would like to take a look into why these sorts of records are so popular.

Novelty records are those which consist of silly lyrics, unusual topic matter, or performed by a children’s television character. They’ve been around since the 1950’s with Sheb Wooley’s The Purple People Eater, and continue to be a threat to the charts today, an example being last years “Crazy Frog” phenomenon.

Yet these records continue to be a success, the aforementioned Crazy Frog’s remix of Axel F’s hit began as a mobile phone ringtone and went on to spawn (no pun intended) a string of hits including “Popcorn”, “Jingle Bells” and a complete album of annoying songs. It is a truth universally acknowledged, that no one liked the Crazy Frog, everybody found him irritating, and the majority of people wanted to wring its neck.

So why did it climb so high in the charts? When you consider that to buy simply the single you’d have had to fork out around £2.99 and for the album anything from £9.99 to £13.99 depending on the shop, you have to wonder why people do it. Is it because they need a novelty record for a party they’re throwing? Is it to please their children? To me, it seems there is no logical reason for buying the Crazy Frog’s music, yet people still did.

Moving on from the Crazy Frog, I’m going to look at some of the other novelty records we have seen over the decades.

One could argue that songs such as “Yellow Submarine” from the Beatles are novelty records. With such nonsensical lyrics as:

We all live in a yellow submarine
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine
We all live in a yellow submarine
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine

However this was not meant as a novelty record, and so I shall move onto others that were intended as novelty music. One such song is 1980’s sentimental mush “There’s No One Quite Like Grandma” by The St. Winifred’s School Choir. This song with its sickly sweet lyrics and chanting schoolgirls was by no means a good song, yet it managed to reach Christmas number one in England. Were the lyrics the reason for this? Was it the fact that the song was sung by sweet little girls? Whatever the reason, it was voted the third worst Christmas number one by the music retailer’s HMV.

Beating this song to the top spot on this poll is yet another novelty record, that of 1993’s Mr Blobby, by the ‘artist’ of the same name. Spawned from the hit television programme “Noel’s House Party’, this irritating song also reached the Christmas number one spot, in 1993. With lyrics such as:


Blobby, oh Mr Blobby, when disaster strikes you never get depressed
Blobby, oh Mr Blobby, you'll always prove that Blobby is the best

Although he's unconventional in hue
His philosophy of life will steer him through
And despite the limitation
Of his poor co-ordination
He knows he'll show the world a thing or two

It is quite difficult to understand just why this reached the coveted Christmas number one. Was it due to the popularity of Noel’s House Party? Or was it simply because it was the best offering at the time?

If we look at the list of UK Christmas number one’s since 1980, it is interesting to note how many of them are novelty songs.

1980St Winifred's School Choir There’s No One Quite Like Grandma
1981The Human League Don’t You Want Me
1982Renee & Renato Save Your Love
1983The Flying Pickets Only You
1984 Band Aid Do They Know It's Christmas?
1985Shakin' Stevens Merry Christmas Everyone
1986Jackie Wilson Reet Petite
1987The Pet Shop Boys Always On My Mind
1988Cliff Richard Mistletoe & Wine
1989 Band Aid II Do They Know It's Christmas?
1990Cliff Richard Saviours' Day 40
1991QueenBohemian Rhapsody / These Are The Days Of Our Lives
1992Whitney Houston I Will Always Love You
1993Mr Blobby Mr Blobby
1994East 17Stay Another Day
1995Michael Jackson Earth Song
1996Spice Girls2 Become 1
1997Spice Girls Too Much
1998Spice Girls Goodbye
1999WestlifeI Have A Dream / Seasons In The Sun
2000Bob The Builder Can We Fix It?
2001Robbie Williams & Nicole Kidman Somethin' Stupid
2002Girls Aloud Sound Of The Underground
2003Michael Andrews featuring Gary Jules Mad World
2004 Band Aid Do They Know It's Christmas?
2005Shayne Ward That’s My Goal

Out of these twenty-five songs, (from my perception), eight of them are novelty records (including Cliff Richard’s songs – although it is hard to think of his songs as anything but novelty records!). Three of the songs are Spice Girls hits, which are probably number one because of their huge popularity at the time, and the majority of the other songs are actually good songs (excluding Westlife, of course).

So what is it that makes novelty records so popular? It can’t be the quality of the music – most of it is drivel. It can’t be that the artists are good looking – for the majority they’re children’s television characters (such as Bob the Builder, The Wombles, The Smurfs and The Fimbles). It can’t be that the songs are pleasing to the ears and it can’t be that anybody actually likes them.

So what is it? Perhaps the answer is in the name. Novelty. They are kitsch, they are cheesy and they are a novelty. Everyone has them, so everyone else buys them. Perhaps it’s the power of word of mouth – “have you bought so and so’s new song?” – you don’t want to feel left out, so you get it too.

Whatever the reason, novelty records have been around for almost as long as music has been commercialised, and the tradition of the novelty records being released at Christmas seems unlikely to end any time soon.

Who knows – perhaps in the future we’ll see a Hogwarts Experience novelty record reaching the top spot?

Lol, you crack me up Ducky - 50 points.