50. Spiller feat Sophie Ellis-Bextor - Groovejet (If This Ain't Love) - 2000
Easily the most interesting and hyped up chart battle of the noughties is when Spice Girl Victoria Beckham aka 'Posh Spice' released her debut solo single, Out Of Your Mind, on the same week as real posh girl Sophie Ellis-Bextor. Whilst Out Of Your Mind was an average and now long forgotten garage track which was overhyped due to Victoria's appearance on it, Groovejet by Sophie, and Italian dance producer Spiller was a glorious house track which is still a radio favourite today and was easily one of the best of the 42 UK #1's of 2000!!! Sophie won the battle, and seemingly won the war as well!!!
49. Alice Deejay - The Lonely One - 1999
Will I Ever was Alice Deejay's biggest commercial success of the noughties, but that accolade really should have gone to its successor, The Lonely One. A thumping trance song, a lot less of an obvious single than its more poppy predecessors, The Lonely One unfortunately only got to #16 in the UK but reminds me, like so many other songs do, why 2000 was probably the best ever year for commercial dance. Tacky Clubland tracks rule the late 00's and looped house covers of 80's songs dominated the middle of the decade but the early noughties were home to original and interesting, lively dance songs - Alice Deejay never released a cover version and this was part of their huge charm. Five excellent singles, one stunning album - possibly my favourite dance act of all time.
48. Kelly Llorenna - Tell It To My Heart - 2002
If there was ever an act I was more obsessed with than Alice Deejay, that accolade would go to Northern dance diva Kelly Llorenna!!! The peak of her very long career - 20 years so far! - was around 2001/2002 when she hit the UK top 20 five times with Set You Free, True Love Never Dies, Tell It To My Heart, Forever and Heart Of Gold, all of which were excellent. Her Taylor Dayne cover Tell It To My Heart was easily her biggest solo hit, a fantastic reworking of an already brilliant song, head and shoulders above most of the other tacky 2002 80's covers due to the brilliant production and Kelly's power-house vocals. A classic.
47. Delta Goodrem - Out Of The Blue - 2004
If there was ever an act I was more obsessed with than Alice Deejay and Kelly Llorenna, it's easily Australian singer Delta Goodrem. Her second, but not last, entry in the countdown is the hugely underrated Out Of The Blue. Maybe not the strongest choice of lead single from second album Mistaken Identity, it was nonetheless a joyous swaying piano pop affair which bought a much needed touch of class into the dire UK charts at the time. Piano ballads were the last thing that was popular in 2004 and Delta was seemingly heading the genre all on her own (well apart from Everytime by Britney Spears!!!). A gorgeous song that she performed an excellent new rendition of at her recent Believe Again tour (probably better than the single version), it went top ten in the UK, like all but one of her singles did but she remained anonymous to most.
46. Natasha Bedingfield - These Words - 2004
If ever there was anybody who breathed new life into the dying pop genre in 2004, it was Natasha Bedingfield. Having been underwhelmed by debut single, Single, These Words completely changed my opinion of Natasha. A brilliant ode to writing a hit song became a huge hit in itself when the chirpy pop song stormed in at #1 in the UK, easily the best chart topper of 2004. The great quirky video of Natasha's doodling becoming a reality was sadly scrapped for the US, who got a slightly more boring video, which nonetheless gave her a big hit there - one of the few UK stars to have a clutch of hit singles in the US in the noughties, I hope we haven't seen the last of Natasha in the UK because despite releasing a shocking comeback single here in 2007 - I Wanna Have Your Babies - her 2008 US material, for example the top 5 hit there, Pocketful Of Sunshine, was as good as anything she had released here in her glory period.
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