Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s Homicide On The Dancefloor: 16 Information You By no means Knew

Except you’ve been dwelling beneath a rock, you’re most likely effectively conscious that Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s 2002 hit Homicide On The Dancefloor is again in a giant approach.

Sure, because of the tune that includes on the Saltburn soundtrack, Sophie’s signature tune has been racking up streams, resulting in it creeping up the UK singles chart.

And the momentum is exhibiting no indicators of slowing down, with Sophie even charting in America for the primary time because of the deluge of streams which have are available off the again of Saltburn’s success.

To have fun the monitor’s really surprising comeback, we’ve rounded up 16 information you most likely by no means knew about Homicide On The Dancefloor…

The identify Gregg Alexander won’t essentially ring a bell, however you is perhaps conversant in his work as frontman of the New Radicals, finest identified for his or her 1998 hit You Get What You Give.

Gregg’s different work contains co-writing Texas’ Internal Smile, Ronan Keating’s Life Is A Rollercoaster and Misplaced Stars, a tune recorded by Adam Levine for the Start Once more soundtrack, which earned an Oscar nomination in 2015.

He additionally labored with Sophie on quite a few her different hits, together with Music Will get The Finest Of Me, Blended Up World and I Received’t Change You.

Again in 2019, Sophie recalled to Music Week that Gregg Alexander had begun work on Homicide On The Dancefloor when he’d “needed to go to a membership after which his automotive wouldn’t begin”.

“He recorded it right into a cassette participant and it was actually unfastened,” she informed the music outlet. “The verses weren’t actually there, it was simply him singing nonsense lyrics. However he had the refrain.

“I bear in mind being in fairly a high-tech studio and being performed his cassette of this actually tough recording. So I nurtured it and completed the lyrics – it was fairly simple and enjoyable. It began us collaborating on fairly a number of issues collectively after that.”

Homicide On The Dancefloor peaked at quantity two within the UK, the place it was stored off the highest spot by Daniel Bedingfield’s storage bop Gotta Get Via this. She did beforehand hit primary with the Spiller collaboration Groovejet (If This Ain’t Love), although.

In truth, Sophie was beforehand embroiled in one of many 2000s’ most notorious chart battles with Victoria Beckham, after they launched Groovejet and Out Of Your Thoughts, respectively, in the identical week.

Not solely did Homicide On The Dancefloor match its earlier chart peak, it did so in the very same weekend, simply 22 years later. This time round, it was Noah Kahn’s Stick Season that held it off the highest spot, although.

Sophie made the highest 5 in Australia, Canada, France, Italy, New Zealand, Eire and The Netherlands to call however a number of, though it by no means troubled the US charts (that’s, till Saltburn got here alongside, in fact). Homicide On The Dancefloor was additionally the most-played tune on European radio in 2002.

Of performing her songs in her personal distinct accent, Sophie informed the Telegraph final yr: “Singing as I communicate felt like the one solution to do it. I don’t wish to be a type of singers who’s singing about being actually unhappy with an enormous grin on my face.

“Altering my accent would make the emotion really feel a bit bit showbiz.”

“I’d simply seen the film for They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? a few dance marathon, and by the top of it they’re all completely out of their minds,” Sophie informed Music Week in 2019.

“That sort of grew to become the concept of perhaps we do a dance competitors, the place I’m making an attempt to do all the pieces I can to win.”

Sophie recalled to Vulture: “I used to be new to the pop scene. Lots of people had been being launched to me and no one knew a lot about me. I simply thought, ‘Possibly I gained’t inform them all the pieces about me’.

“I assumed it felt like an excellent juxtaposition to loads of the smiley pop movies that had been round in that period to truly simply be actually horrible. It was loads of enjoyable. And I do assume with pop music, when you’re not having enjoyable, one thing’s going improper.”

“The picture of pop music was being in a membership high-fiving fashions who had been pretending to be your mates,” she beforehand informed Music Week.

“I didn’t need that. I needed to be a woman that’s actually disagreeable, I needed to be a villainess who’s merciless and evil!”

However it actually wasn’t the final. The 2 Sophies have labored collectively a whopping 15 instances, together with the movies for Sophie’s hits Catch You, Take Me Residence, At present The Solar’s On Us, Not Giving Up On Love and Hypnotized. The pair are shut in actual life, and the director is even godmother to one of many singer’s 5 sons.

Sophie Muller can also be accountable for iconic movies like Annie Lennox’s Why, Gwen Stefani’s Cool and Wind It Up, Shakira’s Hips Don’t Lie, The Killers’ Mr Brightside, Lily Allen’s Smile, Mika’s Grace Kelly and, extra lately, Kylie Minogue’s Padam Padam.

The top choose on the dance competitors is performed by Colin Stinton, who has additionally appeared in Foyle’s Conflict, Physician Who, The Bourne Ultimatum and Surprise Girl 1984.

In case you thought it was, it’s most likely since you spent a lot of the early 2000s watching MTV Hits and The Field, the place it was on common rotation.

The music video added a number of additional particulars, together with the aforementioned foot-stamp and the jubilant cry of “the aaaaltogether!”.

Among the many most noteworthy of those are a model in Chinese language by the singer Kelly Chen and a transforming by Swedish musician Papa Dee, who launched it as Homicide In The Dance Corridor.

Papa Dee’s model was then used as a pattern by Skepta on his tune Love Me Not.

Sophie even put her personal spin on the monitor when she recorded orchestral variations of her favorite songs for the reworked biggest hits album The Tune Diaries.

Describing the 2019 model as “fairly bizarre”, she informed Music Week: “I labored with Ed Harcourt and he instructed making it Spanish, so we put in castanets.”

Simply over a decade in the past, Sophie took half in Strictly Come Dancing, and whereas her signature hit feels excellent for the present, she really didn’t ever dance to it (notably, singers who join Strictly by no means carry out to their very own music on the dance flooring).

In truth, there’s solely ever been one routine to Homicide On The Dancefloor in Strictly historical past, which was finished by eventual champions Ellie Leach and Vito Coppola throughout Halloween week in 2023.

Now we have a sense that would change in 2024, although, given the tune’s new-found reputation…

All through lockdown, Sophie stored her followers entertained by placing on weekly Instagram live-streams that she known as “Kitchen Discos”, during which she’d carry out her personal songs, in addition to choose covers, from her household residence (normally with chaotic outcomes).

Homicide On The Dancefloor was, clearly, a staple of her “Kitchen Discos”, throughout which she lined all the pieces from Children In America and Like A Prayer to Dame Vera Lynn’s We’ll Meet Once more and A Spoonful Of Sugar from Mary Poppins.

“It needed to be a second of utter jubilant triumph,” she informed Leisure.ie final yr. “It needed to be a second that made us, the viewers, complicit in all method of horrible issues.

“It needed to have sort of post-coital pleasure and a form of additionally little camp streak, that I believe this movie additionally doesn’t shrink back from. And so it may by no means be something apart from Homicide On The Dancefloor. It’s too good to be true.”

The dance anthem that’s Princess Famous person’s Excellent (Exceeder) made its approach again into the UK singles chart after being utilized in one other main Saltburn scene.