The Fifth Most Depressingly Influential Record Ever

All that is bad about music today is a result of the records we're about to count down - not necessarily the worst records of all time, but those that exerted the most negative influence. The world is a slightly poorer place for each of these. Feel the heckles rise...

5. Starship - Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now
The three components of this particular axis of evil had been around for some time: the "rock ballad" had festered since the days of Stairway To Heaven, had the life sucked out of it by Chicago and been pummelled into submission by Jennifer Rush's "Power Of Love"; the movie tie-in, or the song which tells emotional cripples how to feel during the soppy bits of an action movie, had spawned Berlin's "Take My Breath Away" from Top Gun; and Diane Warren was but a jobbing songwriter penning fun stuff like DeBarge's "Rhythm Of The Night".

But in 1987 these planets became aligned and catastophe followed. What surprised everyone was how much of a success Diane Warren's composition "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" was, given that the movie from which it was taken (Mannequin - tagline: Just because Jonathan's fallen in love with a piece of wood, it doesn't make him a dummy) was shockingly awful, and that Starship were pretty much washed-up hacks. The secret was an unholy synergy: the film advertised the record, the record was an advert for the film, and, like turds polishing one another, both became a success.

So, as usual, the formula was repeated ad infinitum. Diane Warren became a specialist in weepy widescreen schlock (Aerosmith's "I Don't Wanna Miss A Thing", Leanne Rimes, the whole Celine Dion back catalogue) and, worst of all, inspired countless copycat atrocities (there's one in every single Disney film since). Because it was a doddle to write one.

Really. Here's how. Find a generic, meaningless yet vaguely positive title, preferably using words like "wanna" or "gonna". Start your first verse slowly and relatively quietly - your "artist" is going to want to save something for later. Use a minor key, as your shift into major for the chorus is going to be the bit when the hero pushes his way through the crowd to get to the heroine, so you want full tearjerk potential. Under no circumstances should you include a middle 8 - that's just confusing. Then a brief pause, a descending drum fill (you know, the one Phil Collins extended and made a career out of) and then into the final chorus. The artist loves this bit as it's where they can show off, doing all sorts of vocal gymnastics while leaving the basics of the song to the hired help.

So, to summarise: generic, unchallenging manupulative songs sung to order by people who'd be better off in Blood Brothers. Today, they live on in the likes of Westlife, as well as inside every X Factor auditionee. If and when Jordan and Peter Andre carry out their threat to release "A Whole New World", we will be able to play it to Diane Warren and say, "This is all your fault. Happy now?"