“One, two, three, four – let me hear you scream if you want some more…”
Anyone who got within a sniff of a dancefloor in the mid-noughties will know the lyrics, the hypnotic electro beat, possibly the gymnastics-inspired video typical of chart-friendly club tracks of the era (because if it didn’t look like a sexy work-out, were you even making dance music?)
Twenty years later, it’s happening all over again. Princess Superstar’s Perfect returned to the charts in the UK earlier this year – and entered the Billboard chart in the US for the first time ever – thanks to its part in the viral film Saltburn.
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“I was like, oh sh*t, that’s my song,” Princess Superstar, aka Concetta Kirschner, tells Sky News, chatting on Zoom on an early morning call from LA. After Saltburn’s release, Perfect was suddenly all over TikTok and Instagram. “I mean, [the filmmakers] had asked for it, but I had no idea what it was going to become.”
Back in the day, it was the mash-up of Perfect with Exceeder, the electro house track by Dutch DJ and producer Mason, which became a hit, and it’s this version again that has found a new audience in the 2020s.
It isn’t the only song revived by Saltburn, which is set around Oxford University in 2006 and features a range of nostalgia-fuelled hits for those of a certain age – from MGMT’s Time To Pretend and The Killers’ Mr Brightside, to Girls Aloud‘s Sound Of The Underground and Flo Rida’s Low. Sophie Ellis-Bextor‘s Murder On The Dancefloor, which soundtracks the final very naked scene (avoid at work/with your parents), rose to number two in the UK chart once again some 22 years after its release.
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With the entire back-catalogue of pretty much every song ever recorded now available at a phone swipe, it’s a phenomenon that has been happening more and more in recent years – most notably with Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill topping the chart for the first time ever in 2022 (37 years after its release – a record) thanks to its use in a particularly memorable scene in the hit sci-fi series Stranger Things.
And like Ellis-Bextor, British noughties stars Natasha Bedingfield and David Gray have also seen some of their biggest hits resurrected in recent months; Bedingfield’s 2004 track Unwritten entered the charts again for the first time in 19 years – all thanks to the Sydney Sweeney rom-com Anyone But You – while Gray’s Babylon has become a TikTok favourite.
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‘I sort of faded away – now I’ve got record deals coming at me’
Image: Princess Superstar’s dance track Perfect is a hit once again. Pic: Joseph Cultice
For Princess Superstar, the noughties female rapper known for her raunchy lyrics, now married and a mum to a 12-year-old, Perfect (Exceeder)’s newfound popularity isn’t just a nice passing trend – it has relaunched her career. “I never stopped making music, it’s just it never was really popular [anymore], I sort of faded away,” she says. “And then I had a baby and things slowed down.”
The singer, also known for her 2002 track Bad Babysitter, describes Perfect’s second-time-around success as “akin to winning the lottery” for a musician. “I’ve got record deals coming at me, and tours, and all the things I used to do are back again.”
When she was asked if her song could be used in Saltburn, she says she didn’t think about it too much. “I remember not really recognising any of the actors’ names, except for Richard E Grant.” She didn’t get a “tonne of money” for it at the time, she laughs, but she never expected to. “It’s fun to say that because you just think, oh, okay, that’s a cool thing to do, having no idea it would completely relaunch my career.”
Image: Saltburn, starring Barry Keoghan, has revived a number of classic noughties hits. Pic: MGM/Amazon Studios
Now, she says, she owes writer and director Emerald Fennell a thank you, maybe a fruit basket, Hollywood-style. “I’ve been making music for 30 years, I started in 1995, and I’ve never been on the Billboard charts in the US [until now],” she says. “It’s only ever been the UK and Europe that really embraced me.”
Perfect has now also been remixed by David Guetta, one of the most successful DJs of all time, and her social media sites are filled with appreciation – from young fans who have only just discovered it to those who loved it the first time around. “Back when I was famous last, we only had MySpace – I was everybody’s MySpace song, that’s what they say in the comments of my TikTok. What an amazing world we live in today… that music distribution can happen that way.”
She is pleased for Ellis-Bextor, too. “How amazing – ladies in our 40s and 50s, getting to have that success in pop music is really rare. I love it because I feel like it helps normalise ageing.”
It’s Murder On The Dancefloor… again
Image: Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s Murder On The Dance Floor charted at number two in 2001 – and again earlier this year. Pic: Laura Lewis
Ellis-Bextor, who had already enjoyed a revival in recent years thanks to her kitchen discos held online during the pandemic lockdowns, is now even closer to national treasure status. At the BAFTAs earlier this month, she performed Murder On The Dancefloor in front of A-listers including Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling and Bradley Cooper.
Like Princess Superstar, she didn’t know much about how the song would be used in Saltburn until she saw it. “I knew it was going to be all of the song and none of the clothes, and that was about it,” she told Sky News on the BAFTAs red carpet. “Naked dancing, count me in!”
Fennell chose songs that perfectly tap into the nostalgia of the era, Ellis-Bextor added. “Music’s so clever, isn’t it? There’s nothing else like music that can transport you through time.”
And unlike some artists who get bored of their decades-old hits, the singer says she has always been on “good terms” with hers. “So for me, this is like an old friend taking me out for another spin… I mean, TikTok wasn’t around when it came out first time around. It’s a real privilege to see how people are interacting with my music. Long may it continue.”
So why is this happening now?
Image: Wham!’s Last Christmas returns to the charts every December – and finally made Christmas number one in 2023
The obvious answer to that question is streaming, and streams being accepted by Official Charts in the UK. But while the resurgence of older tracks does seem to be happening more and more, it isn’t a completely new phenomenon.
“I’m old enough to remember in the 1970s there was a song by Laurel and Hardy which got into the charts called The Trail Of The Lonesome Pine, and that was from one of their films from about 40, 50 years before,” says Martin Talbot, chief executive of Official Charts. “And the first single I ever bought, in fact, was a single by The Goons called The Ying Tong Song, which was re-released in the early ’70s but actually was originally recorded in the 1950s.”
Both tracks became popular once again after being picked up by radio presenters, he says – so much so that the records were repressed and re-released.
“The difference now, and what makes it exciting now and why it gets so much attention, is because these days it’s instantaneous… If you go back to pre-digital, you would have to find a record shop, hope they had something in stock you wanted, then you’d have to buy it and take it home [to play]. There was a big delay with all this stuff.”
Image: Kate Bush topped the charts with Running Up That Hill in 2022, decades after the song was first released
Official Charts first started accepting streaming for singles in July 2014, with 100 audio streams equating to one single purchase, and for albums in March 2015. Video downloads and streams were added for singles in 2018, and in January 2023 for albums.
Since then, more and more older Christmas classics have returned each December – with Wham!’s Last Christmas finally charting at number one for the first time in 2020, and at Christmas number one for the first time last year. It also happens now following the deaths of very famous stars.
This still happened, pre-digital, Martin says – it just took a bit longer. “When Elvis died in 1977, and when John Lennon died in 1980, it took a few weeks, two or three months in some cases, for the old tracks to come back into the charts again, because none of those records were available [immediately].
“[Pre-digital] that demand would have to persist and would have to remain for some time for a record label to get around to pressing the vinyl again, pressing the CD, getting into shops. There was a big commitment upfront and investment required to respond to the demand.”
Never Gonna Give Him Up: The revival of Rick Astley
Image: Rick Astley made his debut on the Pyramid stage at Glastonbury in 2023. Pic: Sky News
For living artists, or former artists, if their songs get picked up in films or TV shows they can then go viral on social media. And if it’s viral enough it can mean a career revival, as it has for Princess Superstar. Take Rickrolling – the internet phenomenon which started in the mid-noughties, with links posted online for one thing, but unexpectedly directing those who clicked to a video of Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up instead.
“Rick Astley suddenly came to everybody’s attention for the first time in quite a long time and suddenly became cool with a generation of fans,” says Martin. “With all due respect to Rick Astley – and he would admit this himself – he wasn’t thought of as cool when he first broke through.”
This led to a full Ricknaissance when, last year, the musician performed on the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury – showing off his talents by throwing in Harry Styles’ As It Was and drumming to AC/DC’s Highway To Hell among his own hits – before performing a surprise set of Smiths covers with Blossoms.
Now, in an era in which pop is embraced, music is less tribal, and Astley’s talents as a musician are obvious, he has become an icon. “I think music is way less separate and people’s tastes are way more eclectic [now],” Astley told Sky News before his Glastonbury set last year. “I think they’re quite as happy to go and see the biggest rock band in the world, then go and see Elton on the last night, maybe catch someone like myself, you know, at 12 o’clock.”
On the flip side, all this makes it much harder for new artists to break through, says Martin. A rock act today, for example, is competing not just with their contemporaries, but with the greatest of all time, from Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin to Foo Fighters and Queens Of The Stone Age. However, despite the resurgence of old hits becoming more common, the charts boss says he cannot ever envisage a time when the entire Top 40 is made up of them.
“The charts, particularly the singles chart, is all about the youth audience, and every young person wants their own thing,” he says. Because what teenager doesn’t enjoy the rebellion of turning up loud that new band or artist loathed by their parents?
“Absolutely – and so it should be,” says Martin. “That’s what it’s all about.”
Kneecap say they have been “removed” from playing at a music festival in Scotland this July.
It comes after the organisers of TRNSMT said the group, made up of Liam Og O hAnnaidh, Naoise O Caireallain, and JJ O Dochartaigh, will “no longer perform” at the event following “safety concerns” raised by the police.
Last Wednesday, the Metropolitan Police said O hAnnaidh, who performs under the stage name Mo Chara, was charged with a terror offence over the alleged display of a Hezbollah flag at a gig in Kentish Town, north London, in November 2024.
The hip hop trio from Belfast had been due to perform at the Glasgow festival on Friday, 11 July.
However, in a statement posted on social media, the rappers said they will instead play their own solo headline show at the 02 Academy in the Scottish city three days before TRNSMT.
The Irish language group said: “To the thousands of people who bought tickets, flights and hotels to see us play, we are sorry…it is out of our hands. Glasgow has always been a huge city for us.
“We’ve played there many, many times, with no issues – ever. Make of that what you will.
“To try to make up for it, we will be at your O2 Academy on Tuesday, 8 July.”
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They also quoted a statement from TRNSMT, which a festival spokeswoman confirmed via email, saying: “Due to concerns expressed by the police about safety at the event, Kneecap will no longer perform at TRNSMT on Friday, 11 July.
“We thank fans for their understanding.”
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Later on Wednesday, the group shared a news story on X which said they had “pulled out” and added: “Kneecap didn’t ‘pull out’ of TRNSMT – Kneecap were removed.”
What have the police said?
A Police Scotland spokesman said: “Any decision on the line-up at TRNSMT is for the organisers and there was no prior consultation with Police Scotland before acts were booked.
“Officers have highlighted the potential reaction of such a large audience to this band would require a significant policing operation in order to support the delivery of a safe event.
“We have also passed on information from the public around safety concerns to allow organisers to make an informed decision on the running of the festival.”
Kneecap member faces terror charge
Last week, the Metropolitan Police charged O hAnnaidh, 27, with displaying a flag in support of Hezbollah.
Hezbollah, an Islamist militant group based in Lebanon, is a proscribed terror organisation in the UK.
He is due to appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on 18 June.
Image: Liam O hAnnaidh, who performs under the stage name Mo Chara. Pic: Reuters
Kneecap release new song
On Friday, Kneecap shared a link to their new song The Recap – which opens with Sky News presenter Wilfred Frost reporting about the counter terror police investigation – on Instagram, linking to their WhatsApp channel.
Last year, Kneecap won a discrimination case against the UK government in Belfast High Court after former business secretary Kemi Badenoch tried to refuse them a £14,250 funding award when she was a minister.
Ms Badenoch, who is now leader of the Conservative Party, has called for Kneecap to be banned and suggested they should be dropped from the Glastonbury Festival line-up. Some other politicians have made the same demand.
The new track mocks Ms Badenoch’s attempts to block their arts funding and the Conservative Party’s election loss. It features DJ Mozey.
Former Hollyoaks star Paul Danan died by misadventure after taking a cocktail of drugs, a coroner has ruled.
The 46-year-old played Sol Patrick on the Channel 4 soap from 1997 to 2001 and was later known for his reality TV appearances on Celebrity Big Brother and Celebrity Love Island.
An inquest into Danan’s death was told he was found unresponsive and slumped on his sofa in front of the TV at his home in Brislington, Bristol, on 15 January.
Image: Paul Danan appeared on Celebrity Big Brother in 2017. Pic: PA
Emergency services attended and confirmed he had died, with his body being identified at the scene by his partner Melissa Crooks.
A post-mortem examination concluded his death was due to the combined toxicity of heroin, methadone, codeine, pregabalin, cocaine and zopiclone, contributed to by benzodiazepine use.
Assistant Coroner Debbie Rookes reached the conclusion Danan had died by misadventure after hearing written statements from emergency services doctors and his mother Beverley Danan.
In a statement, Mrs Danan said: “Paul helped so many people from all walks of life but just couldn’t help himself in the same way.
“His smiling face and love of life will always be remembered.”
Ms Rookes concluded Danan had died from the combined effects of prescribed and illicit drugs.
She told the hearing at Avon Coroner’s Court in Flax Bourton, near Bristol, that there was no evidence Danan, who suffered an accidental overdose in May 2024, had intended to take his own life.
A previous hearing was told Danan did not leave a note.
The coroner said: “Paul Danan was clearly much loved and is very much missed.
“Mr Danan had a long history of drug misuse and struggles with his mental health. His death was caused by a combination of drugs, both prescription and illicit.
“Paul had struggled with his mental health for many years. He had taken an overdose in May 2024 but he was adamant that this was accidental and he didn’t have any intention to end his life.
“Although he had occasional suicidal thoughts, he didn’t have any active plans. I don’t have any evidence before me that Paul intended to take his own life at this time.
“Therefore, the conclusion is misadventure.”
Image: Paul Danan pictured outside court in 2010. Pic: PA
The coroner said none of the drugs Danan had taken were found in high levels but their combined effect resulted in “fatal respiratory depression”.
Danan had previously spoken about his struggles with addiction and going into rehab.
The actor had been due to appear for a plea hearing at Warrington Magistrates’ Court on 16 January after being charged with possession of cocaine and cannabis, according to court documents.
He was also accused of driving while under the influence of drugs in Warrington, Cheshire, on 2 October last year.
Sean “Diddy” Combs kidnapped a former aide at gunpoint to join him as he attempted to confront love rival rapper Kid Cudi, his sex-trafficking trial has been told.
Capricorn Clark, who worked for the Bad Boy Records co-founder in different roles on and off for several years, told the court he banged on her door and told her: “Get dressed, we’re going to kill Mescudi.”
Ms Clark became tearful a few times as she gave evidence – which marked the start of the third week of the high-profile trial. She told the court her situation working for the hip-hop mogul was “complicated”.
Combs, 55, who has pleaded not guilty to charges of sex trafficking, racketeering conspiracy and transportation to engage in prostitution, is accused of subjecting his former long-term partner Cassie and others to years of physical, sexual and emotional abuse.
Image: Ms Clark became tearful a few times as she gave evidence. Pic: Jane Rosenberg via Reuters
While giving her own evidence in the first week of the trial, Cassie told jurors she dated Cudi briefly during a difficult period in her on-off relationship with Combs.
On Tuesday, Ms Clark said she warned Cassie about seeing Cudi, saying she took her to buy a burner phone as she thought it could be dangerous given how Combs might react. “The way she was moving, she was going to get us all killed,” Ms Clark said.
Combs arrived at her home with a gun in his hand on the morning of the attempted confrontation with Cudi, she told the court, and looked “furious”.
She says she told him she did not want to go with him, to which he allegedly replied: “I don’t give a f**k what you want to do.”
Image: Rapper Kid Cudi gave evidence last week. Pic: AP/ Richard Drew
Ms Clark said she had never seen “anything like this before”, but got dressed and left with Combs in a black Cadillac to head to the property in the Hollywood Hills.
She said she waited in the car as Combs went into the residence, and called Cassie to warn her. The rapper had her “with a gun and brought me to Cudi’s house to kill him”, she said she told her.
Cudi could be heard in the background of the call, she said, asking: “He’s in my house?”
After the incident, Ms Clark alleged Combs warned her and Cassie not to speak to police and threatened to “kill all you” if they did not convince Cudi not to either.
In the aftermath of this incident, Ms Clark alleged Combs “came at” Cassie with “100% full force”, repeatedly kicking her while she crouched “more and more” into a foetal position and cried “silently”.
The rapper told Ms Clark that if she tried to intervene, “he was going to f**k me up too”, she said.
Image: Diddy’s mother Janice Combs was in court to support him again. Pic: Reuters
Earlier in her testimony, she told the court about the start of her employment with Combs and his label Bad Boy Records in 2004.
She said after he discovered she had previously worked for Marion “Suge” Knight’s Death Row Records – the West Coast rival to East Coast Bad Boy – he told her “if anything happened, he would have to kill me”.
Ms Clark said she perceived this as a “very serious” threat. She also told the court about another alleged incident just a few weeks into the job, when some diamond jewellery on loan to Combs went missing.
She told the court she was taken to a building in Manhattan and forced to repeatedly take lie detector tests over five days.
Image: Combs with his legal team before court began for the day. Pic: Reuters/ Jane Rosenberg
The man who carried out the test told her that if she failed, “they’re going to throw you in the East River”, she said.
Combs was not present for the tests and never spoke to her about them, she said, when questioned by defence lawyer Marc Agnifilo.
During her testimony, Ms Clark mentioned an incident involving fellow rapper 50 Cent’s manager, after both 50 Cent and Combs had done interviews for MTV.
Combs mentioned to the manager that they had some issues and told him, “I like guns”, she said, which she perceived as a vague threat.
Ms Clark also described attempting to leave Combs’s home in Miami on one occasion in 2006, when she was allegedly told to “get the f**k back here” by the rapper.
According to Ms Clark, he told her: “Your problem is you want a life, and you can’t have that here.”
The trial continues tomorrow, with evidence expected from LA police and fire officers.
If convicted, Combs could face between 15 years and life in prison.