Technotronic

In 1989, a hot new dance act appeared, about which nobody knew anything. Characterised by a thumping beat, an exciting rhymic snare drum and a repetitive vocal, this brave new sounded conquered the charts. From where did it come? Belgium, that's where.

Technotronic was the brainchild of Jo Bogaert (real name Thomas de Quincy), an American-born philosophy teacher. But debut hit "Pump Up The Jam" was fronted by blue-lipped Zairean born fashion model Felly, who appeared on TV-Am at the time. But wait! By the time of follow-up "Get Up (Before The Night Is Over)", sung by the same voice, the rapper doing the promo was younger, hipper Ya Kid K. Nobody seemed to mind and over three and a half million singles were shifted, swiftly followed by four million "Pump Up The Jam" albums. Felly was never heard of again.

The beauty of Technotronic singles were that they all sounded the same. The aprehensive snare drum beat, the thumping base... third release "This Beat Is Technotronic" celebrated the fact, and introduced the exciting sounding rapper MC Eric in a song which featured the couplet "I saw your posse/but now it's me who's bossy". At around the same time, Ya Kid K scored a hit with Hi-Tek 3 with a song called "Spin That Wheel". Actually quite a good little track, it was later feebly re-issued to cash in on the success of Teenage Mutant Hero/Ninja Turtles by re-titling it "Spin That Wheel (Turtles Get Real)". See what they did there?

As 1991 dawned on Technotronic, it brought with it some startling news for Bogaert. Ya Kid K was heavy with child... and MC Eric was the Dad. The group had whethered a Milli Vanilli style incident with Felly, but sadly for K and Eric (who once ironically sung the lyric "You don't wanna get sacked, so be a good party goer" on a Technotronic hit) they were out and new faces were brought in to front Technotronic.

"Turn It Up" was released in December 1990 under the banner "Technotronic featuring Melissa and Einstein" but was sadly rubbish. It got to number 42 in the charts and whoever Melissa and Einstein were, they were never heard of again.

"Technotronic - Pump Up The Hits" is all you need and it's £1.88p off Amazon. Go and buy it this minute.

Alas, the mysterious Bogaert refused to give up on the Technotronic project and has been flogging it to death ever since. Collaborations with Reggie and Monday Midnite followed, along of course with "Pump Up The Jam (re-mix)", "Pump Up The Jam '95" and "Pump Up The Jam 2005". Finally, the project went full circle when Technotronic teamed up once more with Ya Kid K for the dull sounding track "The Matriachi". Bet that was good.