We thought we’d start with a gentle reminder, especially for those folk not from Birmingham, of some of the Birmingham artists who have had top 40 records. There are a few missing but we are working on the list and will update as we go along but it’s a good reminder of why it’s always good to know what’s going on in town as there is always something musically exciting about to happen around here:
Albert Ketèlbey *
Apache Indian *
Applejacks *
Au Pairs
B15 project *
Babylon Zoo *
Bentley Rythym Ace *
Black Sabbath *
Broadcast *
Chicken Shack *
City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra *
DCS *
Dexys Midnight Runners *
Diamond Head
Donna Lewis *
Duran Duran *
Electribe 101
Elo *
Fashion *
Fine Young Cannibals *
Fleetwood Mac *
Fuzzbox
General Public
Groove corporation *
Jack Webster *
Jamelia *
Jasper Carrot
Joan Armatrading *
King Adora *
Maisonettes *
Magnum *
Moody Blues *
Mousse t *
Move *
Musical Youth
Nick Mason *
Nightingales
Ocean Colour Scene *
Pato Banton *
Phyl Lynott *
Pop Will Eat Itself *
Power Station
Pram *
Rene and Renato *
Ruby Turner *
Soweto Kinch *
Spencer Davies Group *
Spizz *
Steel pulse *
Stephen “Tin Tin” Duffy *
Steve Winwood *
Suburban Studs
The Beat *
The Honeycombes
The Idle Race *
The Steve Gibbons Band *
The Streets*
The Twang
Traffic
Toyah Wilcox *
T’pau
UB40 *
Wizzard *
Ok so what have we missed?
Aren’t Neds Atomic Dustbim from around here? Could be wrong…
Good suggestion Pete but I suspect they were from Stourbridge way along with Wonderstuff who are not on the list for the same reason. In fact I feel a West Midlands Top 40 list coming on or should that be Greater Birmingham?
Bally Sagoo? Balsall Heath if I remember rightly. Think he scraped the top 40 a few times in the late 90s - Tum Bin Jiya was one.
And Editors if one Brummie in the band counts.
Editors? Wikipedia says “based in Birmingham” but it also says they first got together in Stafford, so I don’t know if they count. They have been here since before they were called editors though, I vaguely remember seeing them in bar academy when they were called Snowfield (and yes, they were pretty dull back then too)
bitty mclean rings a bell
Cozy Powell
Tiswas - The Bucket of Water Song
Erdington Band “And Why Not?”, I think they had a top 40 hit in the 90s, can’t remember the name.
How about Rockers HiFi?
Not sure if they had a top 40 hit, but I remember ‘Push Push’ being played a hell of a lot around 1994/95
Two drummers with the same initials and 100% brummie
Carl Palmer (ELP Asia etc)
Cozy Powell most other rock bands