The Glorious 10th - Welcome To...

The original album cover.

The one they replaced it with when Woolworths refused to stock the album 

because people were blowing their brains out all over the Pick 'n' Mix.

Welcome to the Glorious 10th. Thank you for playing along. I think you got almost all of them this month, although I'm sure you'll be surprised by some of the omissions.

Let's start with the ones that are in my record collection but didn't make the 10. The first person to name each of these gets a bonus point. Let's start with the one everyone thought would be there...

Frankie Goes To Hollywood - Welcome To The Pleasuredome

I need to bring back my old series The Top Ten Songs I Hated When I Was A Kid to properly discuss FGTH, although this wouldn't be the song I featured. I've had a curious relationship with this band, largely down to the fact that even as a teenager I felt I could see through the Paul Morley hype machine. I actually preferred Holly Johnson's solo work... though I did grow to give Frankie their due eventually. Not enough to squeeze them into this Top Ten though, sorry.

Steve can have 1 point for that though. And also for suggesting Welcome To The Terrordome... though I was always more of a Run DMC man than Public Enemy.

The Swede then gets a point for Jim Reeves - Welcome To My World, recalling my hospital radio days. Although obviously I prefer the Elvis version.

Lynchie (I'm sorry, Lynchie, I feel like I should be linking to you... is that possible?) gets a point for Manic Street Preachers - Welcome To The Dead Zone, which was a serious contender for a while. He also gets a point for another very close call, Alice Cooper - Welcome To My Nightmare. He doesn't get any points for Pink Floyd though. And neither does anyone else. However, he can have an extra point for saying that Bon Jovi - Welcome To Wherever You Are wouldn't be in my Top Ten. It is in my record collection though. (Which probably doesn't surprise any of you.) So is this, which nobody mentioned, but it's much better than Jon By-Jovi...

Oh, and before I go any further, I can honestly say that I had never heard Mr. Mister - Welcome To The Real World until you lot started banging on about it. And I don't want to ever hear it again, thanks.

Meanwhile, Charity Chic gets a bonus point for Welcome To Paradise by Green Day, from the excellent album Dookie. Another contender for the prized #11 slot.

Martin arrived then, desperate to reclaim his crown after last month's poor showing, swooping up bonus points for... Fleetwood Mac - Welcome to the room, Sara, The Kinks - Welcome To Sleazy Town, and Prince - Welcome 2 The Dawn. I know, I know, last month I said Prince was a shoe-in for the Top Ten, but I forgot this because of his annoying habit of using text speak in his songs. One extra bonus point to Martin for remembering it despite that.

And I'm going to stop Martin there, because I'm sure I had a rule somewhere about limiting your guesses to ten. Well, if I didn't, I do now. Some of Martin's "bubbling under" suggestions might have nabbed him points... one of them would have scored big if he'd chosen to take it off the boil and cook it properly. Oh, and I did promise him this: he loses a point for Oxide & Neutrino. I mean, really.

Last month's winner C arrived then and stole a bonus point from Martin for putting Welcome to the Real World by ABC in her Top 10. She also nabbed a point for Ryan Adams - Welcome To New York, though she'd have doubled that up if she'd mentioned the Taylor Swift original. 

Alyson gets a point for Brad Paisley - Welcome To The Future, which really did come close to making the ten. Good guess, Alyson. Hope you're fully recovered now. And you can have a point for The Music - Welcome To The North as well.

Finally, Jez rolled along with Hot Club De Paris - Hello, I Wrote A Song For You Called ‘Welcome To The Jungle’, which I'd forgotten all about, but it's pretty cool.

Surprised nobody suggested the title track from this. 

Although it is only a minute long.

What about points for good songs that aren't in my record collection?

Brian can have a point for Welcome To My Revolution by Utopia. Love Todd Rundgren. Must check out some more Utopia.

C gets 1 point for Welcome To The Jungle (Jim) by They Might Be Giants. I love TMBG too but I'd never heard this one before. It's great. And a point for Welcome To My World by Depeche Mode, because the lyrics made me smile.

The Swede gets a point for Welcome To Feeling by Sam Beam & Jesca Hoop, another one from my infinite Wants List. And that's even shorter than the Dandy Warhols track above!

Martin can have a point for Tori Amos - Welcome To England, which isn't as annoying as I worried it might be. Although the video is pretty much Wicker Man meets The Omen.

Rigid Digit also steals "that's pretty cool" points for Stiff Little Fingers - Welcome To The Whole Week and Welcome to the World of Plastic Beach by Gorillaz, mainly because it features more Snoop than Damon. 

Then Jez rolled up again with Summer Camp – Welcome to Condale, which I liked, and something from the Frank Sidebottom movie soundtrack which I couldn't find online, but as I never really saw the point of Frank Sidebottom, no points there.

Finally George crawled out of bed a few days after everyone else and with his usual style and aplomb went for the booby prize by suggesting Welcome To The Show by Barclay James Harvest. And because it really is as bad as George said, I'm going to give him 3 points for that.

Another pretty good Welcome To... album without a title track.

OK, enough of the runners up. Let's get to the big ten! What beat Frankie?

These guys...


10. Rufus Wainwright - Welcome To The Ball.

Rigid Digit  gets two points for being the only person to guess this. Camp as a row of glamping tents.

9. Plan B - Welcome To Hell

I figured Charity Chic might steal the points for this one since it was one of his famous bargain buys, and sure enough he not only guessed it, but also - incredibly - predicted its Number 9 placing. Which gets him 5 points!

8. R.E.M - Welcome to the Occupation

An obvious inclusion, which I was sure Steve would get the points for... but didn't. Lynchie gets 2 for being first to suggest it. Jez, Martin & CC also get 1 for knowing it would be in my 10.

7. Ballboy - Welcome To Växjö

CC got a point for being the first to suggest Ballboy, although he went for the song Welcome To The New Year instead of this. It was down to George to steal the 2 point glory by remembering this lesser known track intead.

6. Brandon Flowers - Welcome To Fabulous Las Vegas

I would argue that Brandon Flowers now makes more interesting records as a solo artist than in his day job with The Killers. I don't know if Rigid Digit agrees with me, but he gets another 2 points for being the only one to mention this anyway.

What: no Son of Dork fans out there? Shame on you!

All of which brings us to The Top Five, and a pretty amazing Top Five it is, I'm sure you'll agree (though you may well disagree about the order).

5. The Wonder Stuff - Welcome To The Cheap Seats

Charity Chic gets 2 points here, though sadly his prediction of it being my #2 song fell a bit short. It could well have been: it is a classic.

In another world, Martin and Rigid Digit could wear a dress. They get a point for knowing it would be in my Top Ten, as does Alyson... though I suppose she already wears one.

4. Steely Dan - Any World (I'm Welcome To)

Here's the one nobody got: and right now, a dozen Steely Dan fans are kicking themselves. I can understand why you missed it, but remember (brackets are allowed) the challenge was "to find ten songs with the words 'Welcome to...' in the title". I never said they had to be at the beginning.

Another album-title-only contender.

3. Guns N' Roses - Welcome to the Jungle

Of course, this had to be in there. It could have even been #2, but when I listened to the runner-up contenders back-to-back, my actual #2 just edged it for me. Still an amazing song, whatever your thoughts on Axl Rose.

The Swede got this first - 2 points for that. Rigid Digit gets 1 too. Alyson misses out under the Martin Rule, because she made the mistake of saying it would be on my long list rather than in the Top Ten. Shame.

2. My Chemical Romance - Welcome to the Black Parade

I was surprised how few of you suggested this. Either you all think my record collection largely stopped in the 20th Century, or yours does. This is probably Gerard Way's finest hour, a glorious slab of emo-pomp: Queen meets Radiohead meets David Lynch. And the video has everything a great pop song needs: comas, nurses, skeleton costumes, zombies, post apocaltyptic ruins, exploding televisions and overdone allegory. Eat that, Paul Morley!

Anyway, the only person I can legitimately award points to for this is Jez. Martin misses out for over-guessing and suggesting this would be "bubbling under". No way, this is boiling over!

1. Elvis Costello - Welcome to the Working Week

Well, there could only be one winner, and if Elvis had a song on his first few albums that fit the bill, chances are it would be him. One minute 24 seconds of sheer audio bliss: now that's how to write a pop song!

Now that your picture's in the paper being rhythmically admired
And you can have anyone that you have ever desired
All you gotta tell me now is why, why, why, why?

Indeed. The Swede gets 2 default points for being the first to mention it, but everyone who thought it would / should be Number One gets 5 points. So that's 5 points for Charity Chic, Martin, C, Alyson and Brian. Rigid can have a point too, though he didn't number his predictions.

Points, then. And what do points make? Well, in this game they make points. (The usual apologies if I've added them up wrong.)

Steve - 2 points (play properly next time)

Lynchie, Jez & George - 5 points

Brian - 6 points

The Swede - 7 points

Alyson - 8 points

C & Rigid Digit - 9 points

Martin - 11 points

But this month's undisputed champion, with a peerless 15 points is...

Charity Chic.

Well done, Stevie.

Thank you all for playing. Next month's challenge will be along any second.