UK Number One Hits From Scotland Vol 2 Quiz

Answer: Lewis Capaldi

"Someone You Loved" topped the UK pop charts for seven weeks in 2019.

A somewhat melancholy song about a lost love and bereavement, it nearly did not see the light of day as a recording. Capaldi wrote the words before deciding it wasn't any good, so stopped working on the tune. After he was persuaded to finish it and put it on an album, the single became a big success.

He told 'New Musical Express': "There's a lot of music out there that has a lot of production on it. There's something to be said for just a song with just piano and vocals. I'm not saying this is the song to do it, but maybe it cuts through a bit more."

Answer: Michelle

Michelle (McManus) won the televised song contest "Pop Idol" in 2003.

In the final, she beat off her rival Mark Rhodes, after both had performed "All This Time".

As was customary for "Pop Idol", the winner's first single was released late in the year in a bid to achieve the coveted Christmas number one spot.*

It did not manage that, though: not hitting the top spot until January 11 2004, where it stayed for three weeks.

* It is a legal requirement in the UK to precede the words "Christmas number one" with "coveted" or some similar adjective.

Answer: Wet Wet Wet

In 1994, the Scottish band Wet Wet Wet released "Love Is All Around", which was on the soundtrack of the movie "Four Weddings And A Funeral". The song was an altered cover of the number five hit by The Troggs in 1967.

The Wet Wet Wet version reached number one in the UK in May 1994 and stayed there for 15 weeks. By that time radio presenters were sick of the song and stopped playing it. That 15-week run was at that time second only to the 16 weeks of Bryan Adams with "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You". That, too, had featured on a movie soundtrack - "Robin Hood: Prince Of Thieves."

Marti Pellow, lead singer of WWW, recalled: "We did everybody's head in the summer of 1994. I still think it's a brilliant record. Its strength is its sheer simplicity. Any band would give their eye teeth to have a hit record like that. I'm very proud of it."

WWW had 24 UK top 30 hits, including two other number ones: "With a Little Help from My Friends" in 1988, in collaboration with Billy Bragg and Cara Tivey and "Goodnight Girl" in 1991.

Answer: The Bluebells

In 1984, The Bluebells released "Young At Heart", a song that had been on a Bananarama album. It reached number eight in the charts.

The band split soon after, then had a massive stroke of luck when Volkswagen used the song in a car commercial. The band reformed and took the re-released song to the top of the charts for four weeks in 1993.

The band again split up, but reformed on several occasions for specific events in the years that followed.

Answer: Kelly Marie

"Feels Like I'm In Love" was written with Elvis Presley in mind. Songwriter Ray Dorset, of Mungo Jerry fame, explained: "I wrote "Feels Like I'm In Love" in 1977 with Elvis Presley in mind and even recorded it Elvis-style on my demo.

"My producer, Barry Murray, was about to send it to Elvis when he got a phone call saying Elvis had died. After that, I kinda put it to bed for a while.

"Kelly Marie had a few minor hits in France and had been hanging around our office a bit. I thought she had a good voice, so I asked her if she wanted to record the song."

Released in 1978, the song built slowly and took 18 months on the club scene to make number one in the UK charts.

Kelly Marie, birth name Jacqueline McKinnon, won the TV talent show "Opportunity Knocks" four times.

Answer: Aneka

Aneka, birth name Mary Sandeman, was a Scottish folk singer who sang in Gaelic.

In 1981, in search of a different image, she asked songwriter Bobby Heatlie if he had anything she could record.

In the book "1000UK No 1 Hits" he said: "I'd been working with Mary on some Scottish folk albums, when she said to me she'd love to have a bash at some pop songs. Now keep in mind that she was almost six feet tall, spoke in a frightfully posh voice and was the respectable wife of a small town GP with two children. I never thought in a million years that she had a chance of making it in the pop world.

"Anyway, she kept pestering me and I kept forgetting to write something for her, until one day she called me to say that the studio had been booked to record a song that I hadn't written yet. To cut a long story short I wrote the chorus, and I threw the whole thing together by taking bits from other songs that I had written years before."

Record companies in the UK passed on the song, but a German company picked up on it and it went into the charts, reaching the top 20 in 13 countries, six of them peaking at number one.

Answer: Jim Diamond

"I Should Have Known Better" was one of three top five hits for Jim Diamond. The others were "I Won't Let You Down" (1982), as lead singer of PhD, and "Hi Ho Silver", the theme song from the TV show 'Boon", in 1986.

Diamond enjoyed a varied career in music after starting his own band at the age of 15 in 1966. It was not until 1981 that major success came with his band PhD ((Phillips, Hymas and Diamond)

Over the next 30-odd years, Diamond performed solo and in a number of collaborations until his death in 2015.

Diamond co-wrote "I Should Have Known Better", and it should not be confused with a Lennon/McCartney song of the same name.

Answer: Midge Ure

"If I Was" was number one for one week in 1985. It was on Ure's first solo album after he left the band Ultravox.

Born in 1953, Ure played in a number of bands before joining Ultravox. Between 1975 and 2012, the band had 15 UK top 30 hits. That included the 1981 number two "Vienna".

In 1984, Ure co-wrote and produced the charity single "Do They Know It's Christmas?" which was sung by a collaboration of some of British pop's most illustrious voices to raise money for famine relief in Africa. The single sold some 3.7m copies.

Ure also organised the concerts Band Aid, Live Aid and Live 8 with Bob Geldof.

Answer: Darius

Darius Campbell-Danesh was born in Glasgow in 1980. At the end of the 2001-2002 season of the TV talent show 'Pop Idol', Darius (to use his professional name) got to the last three before he was eliminated.

Although Simon Cowell, the top judge, offered him a contract. Darius chose to go it alone and released "Colourblind", a song he had been working on since before the show, as a single. It spent two weeks at the top of the Official UK Charts in July 2002.

Darius went on to achieve success in a number of ventures. He wrote a book "Sink or Swim", about the music business and it was a 'Sunday Times' best-seller. He also won the "Popstar to Operastar" TV show and had successful runs in the West End production of the musical "Chicago".

He had six UK top 30 singles between 2002 and 2005.

Answer: Dunblane

"Knockin' On Heaven's Door" was a cover of the Bob Dylan song and was released as a charity fundraiser following the murders of 16 children and a teacher at a school in the village of Dunblane, near Stirling.

They were shot dead by a man armed with several handguns. He then killed himself with one of the guns. The incident led to bans on the possession of most handguns in Great Britain.

In 1996, Dylan gave approval for a new version of his song, with an additional verse by Scottish songwriter Ted Christopher.

Christopher and local musicians recorded the song at Abbey Road Studios in London. Mark Knopfler played guitar.

Children from the village sang in the chorus. All royalties went to charities.

Answer: The Shamen

Hailing from Aberdeen, The Shamen were formed in 1985 and took a while to break into the charts.

They had a number four with "Move Any Mountain" in 1991 and a number six in 1992 with "LSI (Love Sex Intelligence)".

That same year "Ebeneezer Goode" took them to the top of the charts. The subject matter - drugs - earned some controversy and the song was banned by the BBC. It eventually made it to the top for four weeks before the band members (they claimed) had it deleted.

Answer: Simple Minds

"Belfast Child" was written by lead singer Jim Kerr after the Enniskillen bomb blast in 1987. Eleven people were killed and scores were injured after the IRA set off a bomb at a Remembrance Day commemoration.

Kerr later told 'Q Magazine': "In the second part of 'Belfast Child' I'm trying to relate to people in Northern Ireland who've also lost loved ones. I'm trying to talk about the madness and sadness and emptiness. I'm not saying I have any pearls of wisdom, but I have a few questions to ask. When I'm asked on American TV who my heroes are, rather than saying Lou Reed or Bob Dylan or someone who goes without saying, I say there are these people called Amnesty International and what they are doing I think is rather heroic. It only takes about 30 seconds."

Kerr used a traditional melody "She Moves Through The Fair". The song topped the charts in the UK, Republic of Ireland and The Netherlands.

It was to be the only number one for Simple Minds, though they had 22 top 30 hits between 1979 and 2014.

Answer: Royal Scots Dragoon Guards

The Pipes and Drums and Military Band of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards took "Amazing Grace" to the top of the UK charts in 1972. It also topped the charts in Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and South Africa, selling more than seven million copies over the next few years.

The single held the number one position in the UK for five weeks and spent 27 weeks in the charts in all.

"Amazing Grace" is the title now used for a hymn written by Rev John Newton in 1772. The music now associated with the hymn was not written by Newtown, but is an American tune "New Britain".

The website AllMusic lists over 1,000 recordings. [In 2019.]

(Learn more about this popular hymn in "Amazing Grace" Story Of A Song" on this quiz site.)

Answer: David Sneddon

David Sneddon was the winner of yet another British televised talent show, "Fame Academy".

"Stop Living the Lie" went straight into the UK charts at number one in January 2003.

Sneddon had a number three hit with "Don't Let Go" that same year. He later worked with The Nexus and wrote songs that were to be successful for other artists.

Answer: Stiltskin

OK, although Stiltskin were formed in London, at least two of the line-up were Scottish when they had their number one with "Inside" in 1994.

The band had been around from 1989 and went through several line-ups before folding in 1996.
In 2005, the band reformed and continued to play for several years thereafter.

"Inside" became a hit after it featured in a television commercial for a brand of jeans.