The Mike Flowers Pops

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The Mike Flowers Pops (also known as The Mike Flowers Pops Orchestra) is a British easy listening band fronted by Mike Flowers and supported by the "Sounds Superb Singers" and "Super Stereo Brass". There were between 13 and 14 of them on stage at any time. The band is known for lounge music covers of both older and contemporary popular music.

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[edit] Emergence

The band became famous in the UK in 1995 when they released a cover version of Oasis' hit song "Wonderwall". Flowers had been recruited by BBC Radio 1 DJ Kevin Greening to cover the "Hits of 95" for Greening's Saturday show; "Wonderwall" was his first week's project. Chris Evans heard the song and made it "single of the week" on his Radio 1 breakfast show, telling listeners that this was the original version of the song. The single, issued by London Records under the name The Mike Flowers Pops, was released while the Oasis original was still in the charts, and itself reached the top ten. It peaked at number 2 in the Christmas 1995 chart, beaten to the number 1 spot by Michael Jackson's "Earth Song". Oasis had previously refused to let other novelty acts parody the song, but were said to have enjoyed Flowers' tape so much that they allowed the group to cut it. The B-sides of the single featured the songs "Son of God" and "Theme From Memory Man".

Following the success of "Wonderwall", The Mike Flowers Pops toured festivals in Europe as well as British universities, drawing relatively small but enthusiastic audiences. At the end of 1996 they toured Britain with Gary Glitter on his last "Who's in the Gang" tour. They played very large venues including Wembley Arena and Birmingham NEC.

Although the band has not received any consistent or widespread popularity since 1995, it has found a small but loyal fan-base. Flowers himself makes fun of this, saying things such as, "1998 was quite a big year for me, I appeared on Blue Peter and Through the Keyhole".

[edit] Discography

[edit] Albums

  • Get Easy! TheFuture Collection Volume 2 (includes "MacArthur Park" by The Mike Flowers Pops)
  • My Unknown Love (single produced and arranged by Mike Flowers. Flowers also plays some keyboard and saxophone)
  • A Groovy Place (1996)
  • The Freebase Connection: The Mike Flowers Pops meets Aphex Twin
  • Collaborations Vol.2 (Includes "Freebass" mix of Flowers' "Freebase" by Funki Porcini.)
  • The Cocktail Shaker-New Groove Kitsch and Space-Age Pop
  • Austin Powers Original Soundtrack
  • Mike Flowers meets Cylob - 1999/Chime Remixes*
  • Constant Friction - Collaboration2
  • The Karminsky Experience Inc - The Power of Suggestion (Flowers contributes a spoken word vocal on "The Wayward Camel")

[edit] Singles

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

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