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Thank God for the weekend! Everybody clap your hands!! We're gonna stomp all night now!!! There is a lot to love about Steps hook-laden lead single from their third album, Buzz. Stomp quite rightly gave them a second number one smash in the UK, solidifying their already pretty concrete status as the premiere pop act at the time in all the land. It was a love letter to having a good time as much as it was a love letter to pop. Sampling (sort of) Chic's Everybody Dance, Stomp was and is a musical endorphin rush that was bound to lift even the gloomiest of moods. After the deliciously dark pop of A Deeper Shade of Blue and the Latin-infused Summer of Love, this saw Steps immerse themselves in 70s inspired disco and it was glorious. Sharing the vocals once more between the group added to this song's convivial feel - enhancing the message that partying the weekend away and seizing opportunities for merriment in an oft-bleak world was something that should be embraced with a shimmy, a shake and some kick ass dance moves. I was absolutely pre-disposed to like any Steps song by this point in their career - they had absolutely earned that - yet Stomp just made me so gleeful the first time I heard it that it was like an aural hug from the pop gods on high. Lee's hair might have been a little out of control at this point, but it was all forgivable the moment I saw him roll up to the party on a motorbike in the accompanying video (Lee in leathers = yum city). Of course, said video was a bright, colourful affair that saw the group up to no-good hi-jinks in the pursuit of euphoric feelings. It was all over Saturday morning television (as was their own performances of the song - see here on YouTube). And let's not forget that WIP were on the remix tip for not only Stomp but a rather splendid new mix of their other number one, Tragedy (my favourite mix of the song - I still get goosebumps when the knob twizzlers extraordinaire work in a quick hey-yeah towards the end of the mix)! So yes, while there are other Steps songs I love more than this, they absolutely deserved a number one hit (and deserved to be the sort of title of their remix anthology a few years back).
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