You’re the One That I Want

461. Olivia Newton-John/Electric Light Orchestra – Xanadu (from the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (1980)

/ robbarker1979

The Intro

The 1980 musical fantasy Xanadu was a box office failure, even inspiring the Golden Raspberry Awards. But the soundtrack album, featuring Olivia Newton-John, Electric Light Orchestra, Cliff Richard and the Tubes, was a global smash. And the theme gave Newton-John her third chart-topper and – surprisingly – ELO’s sole number 1.

Before

1978 was a mammoth year for Newton-John. The Australian pop star and actress became a superstar thanks to her role as Sandy in Grease. And together with co-lead John Travolta, she was a chart mainstay, with two lengthy number 1s – You’re the One That I Want and Summer Nights. So enduring was the image of Newton-John, sexed-up and dressed in tight black leather at the film’s finale, she adopted it for her next LP, Too Hot, released at the end of the year. Its first single, A Little More Love, was a worldwide hit and peaked at four. But 1979 was a barren year for UK singles success.

She began 1980 by duetting with Andy Gibb on I Can’t Help It in the US, as well as a TV special – Hollywood Nights. Then came Xanadu. Originally conceived as a low-budget film cashing in on the roller-disco craze, it grew in scale as big names joined the production, most notably Newton-John and the legendary dancer Gene Kelly, in what was toby his final role.

Xanadu, directed by Robert Greenwald, was based on the 1947 movie Down to Earth, which also featured Kelly. The new film was named after the nightclub setting, which in turn referenced Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s 1816 poem Kubla Khan. However, the filming ran into difficulties due in large part to several script changes. The soundtrack LP was split, with tracks by Newton-John (plus Richard, the Tubes and Kelly) on side one. All tracks there were written by John Farrar, who before writing You’re the One That I Want had been in The Shadows. Side two exclusively featured ELO, with the final song featuring both acts together on the title track.

ELO was originally conceived by Roy Wood, singer-songwriter in 1969 chart-toppers The Move. He spoke to fellow Brummie Jeff Lynne of psychedelic pop act The Idle Race, about a new group that would ‘pick up where The Beatles left off’, employing classical instruments on a full-time basis. Lynne liked the idea but was determined to try and find fame with his own group rather than join The Move to get things started. But by January 1970, when Trevor Burton left The Move, he’d changed his mind – on the condition that he and Wood concentrated on their new project – the Electric Light Orchestra.

That summer, a track intended to be a B-side for The Move developed into the first ELO track. And what a debut 10538 Overture was, when it finally hit the shops in 1972. Written by Lynne, with around 15 Chinese cello parts played and overdubbed by Wood, there had been nothing like it before, and it reached nine in the charts. The debut eponymous ELO LP had been released the previous December, and was and is still known in the US as No Answer, due to a misunderstood note left by a United Artists Record Executive. Their call to the UK to find out the name of the album had resulted in ‘no answer’. This album features a far less slick sound than later work, and features only three core members – Lynne, Wood and Bev Bevan on drums.

The Move finally became defunct shortly before the release of 10538 Overture and around the time of ELO’s live debut, which saw the trio joined by Bill Hunt on keyboards and French horn, Andy Craig, Hugh McDowell and Mike Edwards on cello, Wilfred Gibson on violin and Richard Tandy on bass. This line-up proved short-lived, as the making of the second ELO album later in 1972 saw a raft of departures. First Craig, then – most importantly, Wood, who among other reasons cited being unable to hear the classical instruments over the electric when performing live. Wood took Hunt and McDowell with him and of course, went on to form Wizzard, who scored two number 1s with See My Baby Jive and Angel Fingers (A Teen Ballad) in 1973. With Wood’s departure no doubt in mind, Lynne ensured that all band members were properly amplified when playing gigs from then on.

Wood only featured on two tracks on ELO 2, released in 1973. Neither were the cover of Roll Over Beethoven, which soared to six in the singles chart. The new line-up included Tandy switching to keyboards to replace Hunt, plus new recruits Mike du Albuquerque picking up the bass and cellist Colin Walker. Third single Showdown showcased a new, funkier direction and surprisingly missed out on the top 10, finishing at 12.

Further changes came during the making of the next LP, On the Third Day. Gibson was sacked, Walker quit and Mik Kaminski joined as violinist. Then McDowell bounced back from Wizzard during the end of recording. Concept album Eldorado was released in 1974 and saw the end of Lynne multi-tracking strings and using a full orchestra instead. Albuquerque left during recording.

Lynne took on a deliberately more commercial sound and the line-up finally stabilised after Eldorado. Kelly Groucutt became their bassist and Melvyn Gale replaced Edwards as a cellist. The next album, Face the Music, saw ELO deservedly score a number 10 hit with Evil Woman in 1975.

Sixth LP A New World Record (1976) was the first to feature the classic ELO logo and their first top 10 UK album. It spawned three great singles – Livin’ Thing (my favourite) peaked at four, and then in 1977, Rockaria! climbed to nine and Telephone Line reached eight. And later that year came the huge, multi-platinum Out of the Blue. First single Turn to Stone did respectably (18), but in 1978 Mr Blue Sky, Wild West Hero and Sweet Talkin’ Woman all reached six. The first and latter are obviously classic pop songs.

ELO were now massive, and so were their gigs at the time. Taking a leaf out of George Clinton’s book, Lynne and co performed in front of a spaceship, with elaborate lasers and smoke machines, on a huge world tour dubbed ‘The Big Night’, which was the highest-grossing tour ever at the time. They also performed a record-setting eight sold-out gigs at Wembley Arena.

ELO’s fame peaked in 1979 with the multi-platinum LP Discovery. Featuring a mix of ultra-glossy pop and rock with disco influences, this album contained four top 10 singles – Shine a Little Love (six), The Diary of Horace Wimp (eight), the highlight, Don’t Bring Me Down (three) and Confusion/Last Train to London (eight).

Whoever had the idea of Newton-John and ELO for the soundtrack to Xanadu, it was a great move. A side each for the lead actress, fresh from Grease, and one of the biggest bands of the late 70s. Throw in legends Richard and Kelly, plus a hip band in the Tubes, and it was bound to do well. And it was certainly way more successful than the film itself.

However, initially the signs weren’t promising in the UK. Newton-John’s Magic was released first and although it was a US number 1, it couldn’t manage better than 32 here when released in May. ELO’s I’m Alive came next and climbed to 20. It was time to bring out the big one.

Review

Xanadu was written by Lynne as an ELO song with Newton-John in his place as lead singer. It’s easy to see why people rushed out to make it number 1 for a fortnight in the summer of 1980. Especially as there had been two months of sad ballads in the top spot beforehand.

Although disco was fading in popularity and the ridiculous Disco Demolition Night had taken place the previous year, Xanadu was designed as a coke-fuelled floorfiller. It ticks lots of boxes, and I can remember playing my brother’s single as a boy and loving it. Which makes sense as it’s like a hit of pure sugar from a bag of sweets. And yet, if you strip away Lynne’s sheen, it sounds rather throwaway now. The soaring chorus is strong – with piano flourishes reminiscent of Dancing Queen – but the rest doesn’t leave much of a mark. It’s an argument you could make about a fair bit of ELO’s material. Of course, there’s classics in there like Mr Blue Sky and Livin’ Thing, but sometimes the production is hiding substandard material. I would bet on many buyers listening to Xanadu once or twice and then forgetting all about it. It doesn’t help that, as I keep banging on about here, that there are so many classic chart-toppers in 1980. Xanadu doesn’t stand the test of time as well as I’d expected it to.

The official video to Xanadu, is, I assume, taken from the film itself. It’s predictably flashy, with a predictably stunning Newton-John mining among roller-skaters and even body-poppers, in a sign of things to come. There’s no sign of ELO at all. The effects may be dated, and I’ve no idea what’s going on at the end when Newton-John turns blue and then ends proceedings in a Marilyn Monroe-style pose in white. But it’s all rather charming, thanks in large part to Newton-John.

After

Press screenings of Xanadu were cancelled, which raised suspicions that Universal weren’t confident. The suspicions proved true, and it sunk at the box office, despite critics applauding the soundtrack. A double feature of Xanadu and Can’t Stop the Music inspired the first ever Golden Raspberry Awards (or Razzies), highlighting the worst in cinema every year since. Greenwald won the initial Worst Director Award and his movie was nominated six more times.

One further track was lifted from the soundtrack. It’s love theme, Suddenly, was a Newton-John/Richard duet, and it reached 15. Refusing to let the failure of the film curtail her career, she followed the project with her most successful album, Physical, in 1981. The surprisingly risqué title track, hidden behind a memorable ‘keep fit’ video, was a Billboard number 1, but somehow only made it to seven on these shores. Newton-John also made a video version of this album, with a short film for every song. One song, Landslide, was her final UK hit for eight years, reaching 18 in 1982. A year later she starred with Travolta once more, but the romantic fantasy Two of a Kind was a flop. Nevertheless, as with Xanadu, the accompanying album did well.

Newton-John’s fortunes began to slide with the release of her 1985 LP Soul Kiss, and she went on hiatus after giving birth to daughter Chloe in 1986. She returned in 1988 with the album The Rumour, but although the title track was written and produced by Elton John, it failed to make an impact. The next album – her last to be produced by Farrar – was Warm and Tender, and it also got nowhere. It took the nostalgia of The Grease Megamix in 1990 to return her to the charts, peaking at three. In 1992, a planned comeback was waylaid when she discovered she had breast cancer on the same weekend her father died. Fortunately she recovered, and added cancer awareness to her impressive resume of charity and humanitarian work.

Gaia: One Woman’s Journey was released in 1994. Co-produced by Newton-John, this album chronicled her time with cancer. In 1995 she reunited with her showbiz pal Richard for his musical Heathcliff, and their duet Had to Be finished up at 22. In 1998, the Martian Remix of You’re the One That I Want did extremely well, becoming a number four hit.

Newton-John concentrated on releasing material in Australia from then on, but occasionally toured the UK. She married John Easterling in 2008, and continued to act, including two cameos in popular US musical comedy drama Glee. Occasionally she’d reunite with Travolta, including on the charity festive album This Christmas in 2012, or to celebrate the Grease phenomenon.

In 2017, Newton-John’s cancer returned and spread to her back. Despite significant pain, she was able to relieve her pain with cannabis oil. But on 8 August 2022 she died, aged 73. As a mark of respect, Melbourne and Sydney lit up some of their most famous landmarks.

Two more ELO tracks were released from the Xanadu soundtrack – All Over the World (one of Lynne’s best, which went to 11) and Don’t Walk Away (21). Next came their sci-fi concept LP Time in 1981, on which they replaced their trademark strings with synths. Its first single, Hold On Tight, was their last top 10 hit, peaking at four. The last Time release, The Way Life’s Meant to Be, could get no higher than a paltry 85.

Lynne wanted to release a double album in 1983, but CBS blocked the plan and he was forced to edit down Secret Messages to a single LP. This, combined with dwindling ticket sales and arguments with his manager Don Arden, took their toll. He decided to wrap up ELO. Rock ‘n’ Roll Is King sold respectably, reaching 13, but no further singles made the charts.

Bevan went to play for Black Sabbath, while Lynne concentrated on production, working with the Everly Brothers and ABBA’s Agnetha Fältskog. He also collaborated with Tandy on the soundtrack to Electric Dreams (1984). However, ELO were contractually obligated to complete one more album, so Lynne, Bevan and Tandy reunited to record Balance of Power, released in 1986. The first single it spawned, Calling America, was their final top 40 hit (28). ELO leader Lynne disbanded the group once more and produced George Harrison’s comeback album Cloud Nine in 1987, before the duo joined supergroup The Traveling Wilburys.

ELO returned to life in 2000 with the release of the box set Flashback featuring, among various out-takes, an inferior new remake of Xanadu. A year later a new album, Zoom, was released featuring only Lynne from the classic line-up – bar Tandy on one track. A new line-up followed, with Tandy returning to the fray, for a planned world tour, that never materialised.

Lynne and Tandy eventually returned under the name Jeff Lynne and Friends for Children in Need in 2013. They went down so well, the project expanded into Jeff Lynne’s ELO in 2014. A tour and a new album, Alone in the Universe, followed in 2015, but Tandy left a year later. ELO were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2017. The last Jeff Lynne’s ELO album to date was From Out of Nowhere in 2019.

The Outro

Xanadu grew a cult following over the years, with a spin-off musical hitting Broadway in 2007.

The Info

Written & produced by

Jeff Lynne

Weeks at number 1

2 (12-25 July)

Trivia

Births

18 July: DJ Gareth Emery/TV news presenter Tasmin Lucia-Khan/Engineer Scott James Remnant
19 July: Liberty X singer Michelle Heaton

Deaths

14 July: Welsh poet Andiron Talon Davies
15 July: Scottish painter Dorothy Johnstone
18 July: Theatre director Robert Kidd
21 July: Physiologist Isabella Leitch
23 July: Poet Olivia Manning
24 July: Comic actor Peter Sellers (See ‘Meanwhile…’)

Meanwhile…

19 July-3 August: Great Britain and Northern Ireland win five gold, seven silver and 9 bronze medals at the controversial Olympic Games in Moscow.

22 July: Unemployment hits nearly 1.9 million – a 44-year high.

24 July: Shortly after dinner with his former Goon friends Harry Secombe and Spike Milligan, actor and comedian Peter Sellers dies of heart failure. He was 54.


427. John Travolta & Olivia Newton-John – Summer Nights (1978)

/ robbarker1979

The Intro

John Travolta & Olivia Newton-John spent 16 weeks at the top of the charts in 1978 thanks to their starring roles in the film adaptation of Grease. First You’re the One That I Want for nine weeks and then this for seven more. If you weren’t a fan of Travolta, this period must have been hard work.

Before

Grease hadn’t even been released in the UK when their first chart-topper reigned supreme that summer. But the soundtrack album was already familiar. Frankie Valli’s brilliant performance of the Barry Gibb-penned theme tune had been a number three hit, then You’re the One That I Want. Next up to have a release was the only single so far to feature in the hit Broadway stage show.

Cleverly released in late-August to tie in with the end of summer, Summer Nights was written by the show’s creators Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey as a comical duet in which Danny Zuko and Sandy Dumbrowski (as she was known before Newton-John’s casting resulted in a name change) separately relay their blossoming relationship to classmates. Danny shows off to the Burger Palace Boys, as the T-Birds were originally known, acting like a proper lad. Unbeknownst to him, at the same time Sandy us telling the Pink Ladies a very different story about Danny’s sweet side.

Summer Nights was written when Grease transferred to Broadway. Before then, this scene in the original show was soundtracked by the song Foster Beach. In addition to Travolta and Newton-John, the soundtrack version featured other cast members on backing vocals, including Jeff Conaway as Kenickie and Stockard Channing as Rizzo on backing vocals.

Unlike the previous two singles from the film, Summer Nights actually sounds musically like the 50s, which is the era it’s set. Sort of, anyway. The film is set in 1958 but the backing vocals to this song are lifted from Da Doo Ron Ron (1963) and Breaking Up Is Hard to Do and Surfin’ Bird – both from 1962.

Review

Summer Nights doesn’t really work as a standalone song the way You’re the One That I Want does. It is, however, a great standout scene in the film and musical. Catchy and witty, there’s a lot of fun to be had in the lyrics showing the differences between how teenage boys and girls remember summer loving – it’s just that it works even better when you can see the cast giving it their all. According to these, the number one concern for the boys is how far Danny got and for the girls, whether he owns a car? The ‘tell me more, tell me more’ is a real earworm and the aforementioned 50s/60s backing vocals too. Newton-John’s vocal is suitably sweet/twee and Travolta… well, OK, always a better actor than singer, but he plays the part well and he has a great grasp of comedy.

Speaking of Travolta and comedy… obviously, there’s two parts of this song that have to be mentioned. Even as a very young boy, I couldn’t help but find his final ‘oh’ hilarious. Whose idea was it to go with that take?! I get that the point was that Danny’s tough-guy facade goes out of the window when he really thinks back to that summer, but it’s so camp it’s unreal. And then his wailing of ‘Niiiiiiiiights!’, hand aloft, triumphantly… Fair play to Travolta for capturing the sound of Frankie Valli, but it comes totally out of the blue and is just too much! Of course, you can’t imagine the song without those parts, it’s all part of the fun.

After

With the film released in UK cinemas a few weeks after this single, the momentum soon propelled Summer Nights to number 1, only seven weeks after You’re the One That I Want topped the charts. The soundtrack album, still one of the biggest sellers of all time, was mined for further singles, all hits too. Newton-John went to two with Hopelessly Devoted to You, closely followed by Travolta doing the same with Sandy. Then Greased Lightnin’ peaked at 11. Fast-forward to 1991 and the latter, combined with You’re the One That I Want and Summer Nights, were remixed sloppily but to great success as The Grease Megamix, which became a top three hit.

Following the mammoth success of the movie Grease, the musical was revived in London in 1979. Among the cast of this Grease were Tracey Ullman as Frenchy and Su Pollard as Cha-Cha. The film’s producers Allan Carr and Robert Stigwood made a sequel, Grease 2, released in 1982. Starring Maxwell Caulfield and Michelle Pfeiffer, it didn’t achieve a smidgeon of the original’s success, but I have a lot of time for it. 11 years later the musical was revived in the UK again, this time featuring, among its cast, Craig McLachlan, Debbie Gibson, Darren Day, Shane Ritchie and Luke Goss from Bros.

A year later the US was treated to a Broadway revival followed by a tour, featuring tons of celebrities along the way including Rosie O’Donnell, Linda Blair, Chubby Checker, Micky Dolenz and Sheena Easton. Frankie Avalon reprised his movie role as Teen Angel in further US tours in 1996 and 2003. The leads for Broadway and West End revivals in 2007 were decided by viewers of reality series in the US and UK. Grease returned to the US once more in 2008 and then the UK in 2017, this time featuring Tom Parker from The Wanted as Danny. Within weeks of writing this blog, the latest UK version, delayed due to COVID-19, will begin touring, with Peter Andre as Teen Angel. It’s choreographed by Arlene Phillips.

The Outro

Whatever happened to John Travolta, though, eh? As we know, he’s led a career of ups and downs. His next film Moment by Moment, also made in 1978, was panned. It looked like a blip as the 1980 film Urban Cowboy was another hit (though not to the extent of his big 70s films) but it was followed by a string of failures. Notably, in 1983, Two of a Kind – a romantic comedy which reunited him as Newton-John – and Staying Alive, the sequel to Saturday Night Fever. Matters weren’t helped by him turning down roles in several blockbusters, including American Gigolo (1980), An Officer and a Gentleman (1982) and Splash (1984).

Things picked up eventually, thanks to his role in 1989 hit comedy Look Who’s Talking, easily his biggest success since Grease. Two sequels also did well, but he was truly revived critically and commercially in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction in 1994. He received an Academy Award nomination for his role as Vincent Vega and scored his third iconic role to date. Back in the A-list, he starred in popular movies including Get Shorty (1995), Face/Off (1997) and Primary Colors (1998).

Travolta’s career suffered another setback in 2000 when he made Battlefield Earth. This sci-fi drama was a big deal for the actor. Travolta is a practicing scientologist (yeah, sorry) and it was based on a novel by the controversial religion’s founder, L Ron Hubbard, who had asked Travolta to make it. The film bombed. He remained busy afterwards, but the general quality of his roles fell somewhat. In 2007 he starred in the remake of Hairspray, his first musical since Grease. Travolta has been on hiatus since the untimely death of his wife Kelly Preson in 2020.

Newton-John was to have another number 1 in 1980 with the Electric Light Orchestra, so we’ll return to her when we get to Xanadu.

The Info

Written by

Jim Jacobs & Warren Casey

Producer

Louis St. Louis

Weeks at number 1

7 (30 September-17 November)

Births

7 October: Classical trumpeter Alison Balsom
25 October: Footballer Russell Anderson
26 October: Footballer Jimmy Aggrey

Deaths

17 October: Mountain climber Alison Chadwick-Onyszkiewicz
28 October: Cinematographer Geoffrey Unsworth

Meanwhile…

17 October: A cull of Grey seals in the Orkney and Western Islands was reduced after a public outcry. 

23 October: The government announced plans for a new single exam that would replace O Levels and CSEs.

25 October: A ceremony marked the completion of Liverpool Cathedral, whose foundation stone was laid in 1904.

27 October: Four people were killed and four others were wounded in a shooting spree which began in a street in West Bromwich and ended at a petrol station in Nuneaton. The following day, 36-year-old Barry Williams was arrested in Derbyshire for the shootings.

3 November: Dominica gained its independence from the UK.

4 November: A baker’s strike which had led to panic buying resulted in many bakeries imposing bread rationing.

10 November: The panic buying stops as most bakers go back to work. Fancy having all those days off, loafing around…

424. John Travolta & Olivia Newton-John – You’re the One That I Want (1978)

/ robbarker1979

The Intro

1978 was the year of Grease. Romantic leads John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John remained at number 1 for most of the summer with a song that was never in the original stage musical.

Before

The stage show had been created by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey and premiered in a Chicago, Illinois nightclub in 1971. It was set specifically in Chicago and based on Jacobs’s time at high-school there. Noticeably grittier than the later productions and film it spawned, there were a number of other differences. Most of the characters were Polish-American, Doug Stevenson played Danny Zuko and Leslie Goto was Sandy Dumbrowski. The T-Birds were known as the Burger Palace Boys. The only person from the cast of the original Grease to become famous was Marilu Henner, who played Marty. It had a much shorter running time, was shocking and had an almost entirely different soundtrack.

The team behind the musical made a deal to take the show to Off-Broadway in 1972. It became very popular and received seven Tony nominations. By the summer it was on Broadway itself, where it ran until 1980. Barry Bostwick played Danny and Carole Demas was Sandy. During the course of its run, several actors and actresses came and went, becoming famous and/or starring in the movie. Among the Dannys were Jeff Conaway (before becoming Kenickie) and Patrick Swayze. Richard Gere was Sonny and John Travolta was Doody. In 1973 Grease also started a UK run until 1974, featuring Gere, promoted to be Danny, and Stacey Gregg as Sandy. Paul Nicholas and Elaine Paige took over.

It was only a matter of time before someone decided to turn this musical into a movie. Robert Stigwood, manager of The Bee Gees and producer of Saturday Night Fever (1977), produced with Allan Carr, who had worked on Tommy (1975) and Saturday Night Fever. Randall Kleiser made his movie directing debut after being recommended by Travolta, one of the hottest talents of the era.

John Joseph Travolta was born 18 February 1954 in Englewood, New Jersey. His father was a Sicilian-American tire salesman and his mother an actress and singer. The Travolta children all wanted to follow in their mother’s footsteps. He dropped out of high school in 1971, aged 17 and moved to New York, where he landed the role of Doody. His first major role came in the horror Carrie in 1976 and that same year he had a Billboard top 10 hit with Let Her In. Landing the roll of Tony Manero in Saturday Night Fever turned him into a superstar and so he was a natural choice to star as Danny in Stigwood’s latest project (although apparently Happy Days star Henry Winkler had turned it down). As well as suggesting Kleiser as director, Travolta reckoned pop and country singer Olivia Newton-John would make a great Sandy.

Newton-John was born in Cambridge on 26 September 1948. Her Welsh father had been an MI5 officer and worked on the Enigma project in the Second World War. Her maternal grandmother was Jewish Nobel Prize-winning physicist Max Born and her third cousin is comedian Ben Elton. In 1954, when she was six, the family emigrated to Melbourne, Australia.

Newton-John’s singing career began at the age of 14 when she formed all-girl group Sol Four. She entered and won a talent contest on TV show Sing, Sing, Sing and won a trip to the UK. Although reluctant to go, her mother encouraged her and while here she recorded debut single Till You Say You’ll Be Mine in 1966. When friend and fellow singer Pat Carroll moved to the UK, they formed a duo but she turned solo once more when he returned to Australia.

Music mogul Don Kirshner briefly hired Newton-John to feature in short-lived girl group Toomorrow. From there she released her first solo album, If Not for You in 1971. The title track, written by Bob Dylan and recorded by George Harrison the year previous, was a big hit, peaking at seven in the UK. Follow-up Banks of the Ohio did one better and a cover of Harrison’s What Is Life climbed to 16 a year later. Newton-John’s version of Take Me Home, Country Roads went to 15 a year later.

In 1974 Newton-John entered the Eurovision Song Contest for the UK. She finished fourth with Long Live Love but it did respectably enough chart-wise, reaching 11. Later that year she scored her first US chart-topper with I Honestly Love You and her second with Have You Never Been Mellow in 1975. Despite this and scoring several Grammys too, there was a backlash in the States over a foreigner recording country music. Nonetheless, Newton-John left the UK to live over there. She returned to the UK singles chart in 1977 with the ballad Sam, peaking at six.

Following a dinner party at Helen Reddy’s home in which she met Carr, Newton-John was offered the role of female lead, renamed Sandy Ollson and was told they would make the character Australian to accommodate her accent. However she was initially reticent, fearing she was too old at 28 to be playing a high-school senior. It’s fair to say she probably doesn’t regret changing her mind in the end.

The scene in which Danny and Sandy are finally reconciled had until the film been soundtracked by a song called All Choked Up. It was in similar in theme to You’re the One That I Want but as the name suggests, much closer musically to an Elvis Presley pastiche. It was decided that one of Newton-John’s top songwriters and producers, John Farrar, who was a fellow Australian and had featured in The Shadows from 1973-76 would write two brand new songs for the movie. One was Hopelessly Devoted to You and the other, You’re the One That I Want.

Neither really fitted with the rest of the soundtrack which mostly evoked the spirit of 50s pop and rock’n’roll. The former was a country-tinged love song in more in keeping with Newton-John’s usual output. Kleiser was not fond of the latter. Fortunately, the rest of the world didn’t really agree with the film’s director.

Review

Me neither. I’m a self-professed hater of musicals. And yet, there are a few exceptions and this is probably the biggest one. It’s certainly the most famous. Like many of my age, I was first shown Grease as a child in the early 80s. I remember being enthralled from the opening bars of The Bee Gees-written theme tune sung by Frankie Valli when a friend down my street loaded his VHS copy (the Gibbs really were on fire back then). I also remember being really disappointed when the animation ended and an actual film began. The disappointment soon dissipated though.

I loved everything about Grease. I didn’t understand all the risqué jokes and sexual stuff going on but I was bowled over by the characters and music, like most people. And I also think I was chuffed that Danny and Sandy got together and even then, knew that there was something very exciting about Newton-John wearing the tightest clothes I’d probably seen at that point while purring ‘Feel your way’. Not thrilled with the perm, though.

The pure pop brilliance of You’re the One That I Want never dims despite decades of overexposure. It’s unlikely I’d ever put it on by choice but that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy it every time I hear it. Pure cheese of course, but the strutting verses are cool and the chorus ultra-catchy. It’s always hilarious to watch Travolta miming to those legendary opening lines sung by him like a cat in pain and ‘It’s electrifying’ will never not be funny. Unfortunately I can’t hear it without singing ‘Those new yoghurts you’re supplying, they’re electrifying!’ due to a 90s advert for St Ivel Shape. Weird how these things stick.

After

I’d assumed until now that You’re the One That I Want reigned supreme for almost the whole of the summer of 1978 because Grease was a box office smash and this marks the happy ending of the movie. Amazingly, Grease hadn’t even been released in the UK at this point. The US release came on 16 June, the day before it topped the chart in the UK. The British premiere came on 14 September. So for many, the clip from the film used to promote this single was their introduction to Grease. Which means you can take that mammoth nine-week run, the longest of the decade (equalled by Bohemian Rhapsody and Mull of Kintyre/Girls School) mostly as a sign of sheer love of the song.

However by this point the term ‘new wave’ was being coined to describe the alternative music scene that had risen from the ashes of punk. To the young music fans of acts like Blondie and The Police, the sight and sound of You’re the One That I Want on Top of the Pops throughout that summer must have become a huge annoyance. The Boomtown Rats proved the point to great effect later that year.

Travolta and Newton-John went number 1 across the globe with this first release from what was to become the highest-grossing musical of all time up to that point. It soon became prone to spoofs, from the likes of The Goodies and sadly Hylda Baker & Arthur Mullard. This ageing duo, both comic actors (the latter a horrible bastard), dressed up as Sandy and Danny and performed a truly dire version on Top of the Pops, which took them to 22 in the chart later in 1978.

The Outro

As I write this, You’re the One That I Want is ranked the fifth biggest-selling single of all time. It’s unlikely this will change. In 1990 it saw chart action once more thanks to The Grease Megamix. This amateurishly edited medley of You’re the One That I Want along with Greased Lightnin’ and Summer Nights peaked at three. It remained popular for years though – it was still getting played in my student union in the late-90s. To mark the 20th anniversary of the Grease film phenomenon, a dance version called You’re the One That I Want (Martian Remix) climbed to four in 1998. I have no recollection of this whatsoever. Nor do I remember the London cast recording by Craig McLachlan and Debbie Gibson which reached 13 in 1993.

The Info

Written & produced by

John Farrar

Weeks at number 1

9 (17 June-18 August)

Trivia

Births

20 June: Footballer Frank Lampard
22 June: Race car driver Dan Wheldon
30 June: Comedian Romesh Ranganathan
2 July: Actor Paul Danan
23 July: Footballer Stuart Elliott
31 July: Coldplay drummer Will Champion/Racing driver Justin Wilson

Deaths

23 July: Footballer Tommy McLaren
30 July: Scottish Labour MP John Mackintosh
31 July: Actor Carleton Hobbs
14 August: Writer Nicolas Bentley/Nuclear physicist Norman Feather

Meanwhile…

17 June: Media reports suggest a general election is on the cards in the autumn as the Labour minority government led by James Callaghan appears to be coming to an end. Only four months previous the Conservatives were 11 points ahead but it now looked like Labour would return with a majority.

19 June: Ian Botham becomes the first cricketer to score a century and take eight wickets in one innings of a Test match.

21 June: An outbreak of shooting at a Post Office depot in Belfast between Provisional IRA members and the British Army results in the deaths of one civilian and three IRA men.
Also on this day, the Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice musical Evita opens at the Prince Edward Theatre in London. 

6 July: 11 people are killed when fire breaks out in a sleeping car train in Taunton, Somerset.

7 July: The Solomon Islands are annexed to the Crown and made independent from the UK. 

25 July: Louise Brown becomes the world’s first human to be born from in vitro fertilisation in Oldham, Greater Manchester.