Official Chart Pop Gem #21: Holly Valance – Kiss Kiss

We remember some of the greatest TV stars turned pop stars. And a few others.

Each week we put out a call out to you guys, our Facebook fans and our Twitter followers for your ultimate Pop Gem. An Official Chart Pop Gem is one of those songs that used to be a permanent fixture on the radio, but has somehow faded into pop obscurity, only ever seeing the light of day at the odd wedding disco or old pub jukebox desperately in need of updating.

TV Stars to Pop Stars

Our theme this week was fairly simple, we thought. Plenty of TV celebs have made the transition from screen star to pop star, so wouldn’t it be a good way of unearthing a Pop Gem by remembering some of the greatest TV stars turned pop stars? Our only conditions: it had to have charted and no Kylie – it was Kylie's turn last week. It was, in the end, the toughest one we’ve had to pick in a while.

Would Adam's hit get to breathe again?

After all kinds of suggestions from the slightly weird (Anita Dobson’s singalong version of the EastEnders theme, anyone?) to the totally ridiculous (even Neighbours star Stefan Dennis admits Don’t It Make You Feel Good is not a musical highlight) we narrowed it down to the three most popular nominations:

– I Breathe Again by Adam Rickitt (one of Coronation Street’s many Nick Tilsleys)
– Torn by Natalie Imbruglia (Neighbours’ wholesome princess Beth)
– Kiss Kiss by Holly Valance (Neighbours’ sulky madam Flick Scully)

After careful deliberations involving playing the tunes over and over again, discussing who had the best hair and, crucially, would you play it a barbecue while everyone was still sober, we had to choose a winner. Step up, Miss Valance, you made it.

Holly's Kiss Kiss was a Number 1

At the launch of her career in May 2002, Holly had the lot: the looks, the voice and the tunes. Oh, and a video where she danced around with precisely zero clothes on, which kinda helps. Her debut single, and our choice today, Kiss Kiss, was a Number 1 and sold 432,000 copies, yet seems to have fallen down the back of pop’s sofa. Its follow-up, Down Boy, reached Number 2 and the album Footprints was a Top 10 on the Official Albums Chart.

A couple more Top 10 hits followed but Kiss Kiss’s dizzy heights were now out of Holly’s reach and she jacked in the tunesmithery to go to the USA and try her luck at acting once more. More recently, she was a contestant on BBC Saturday night staple Strictly Come Dancing. Don’t you fancy cha-cha-cha-ing your way back into the studio, Holly?

Watch the greatest telly-poppers ever

Watch our TV Stars To Pop Stars video playlist, a collection of the amazing, the frightening and the downright puzzling tracks that TV stars-turned-singing stars have produced over the years. Warning: contains a lot of bad, bad hair.