1978 John Travolta & Olivia Newton John: You're The One That I Want

As I intimated back on 'Night Fever', I was a Grease fan in 1978. Hell that's an understatement - I was a HUGE fan, and all my mates were too. Dammit, the whole school was. That's the effect it had - the film was a nuclear explosion that radiated a blast area that few could escape and the countdown until it arrived in the cinemas 'over here' was like waiting for Christmas in the middle of summer. To help feed my own obsession, I managed to persuade my parents to buy me a black leather jacket, and when I wore it around my junior school I managed to convince myself I was as cool as, if not quite Danny Zucco, then Kenickie at least.

Looking back, 'You're The One That I Want' was the song that lit this particular fuse. It's kind of easy to see why - screwdriver straight, 'You're The One That I Want' bursts with verve enough to transcend its finale context within the musical to give it an identity in its own right. Powered by a Johnny Cash 'boom-chika-boom' rhythm, it's a song that's meat and potatoes to a singer with the country chops of ONJ - she could sing the guts out of this at a canter and her vocal here toys with the lyric mercilessly. In the film, a leather clad Liv pussy whips Travolta until he howls and begs on his knees and her delivery is no less dominant of Travolta's thin yelp; even though it's mixed lower and rides restrained just behind the beat, she still manages to blow up a storm that strangles everything a 'trying his best' Travolta can throw back at her.

Weddings, parties, bar mitzvahs - 'You're The One That I Want' is everybody's karaoke friend with the added bonus of its own hardwired pantomime routine that only gets better the drunker you are. It's short enough to leave you wanting more too, and in 1978 I wanted more. A lot more. I was only ten, but 'You're The One That I Want' is the song that made me want to grow up fast. I'd seen the film clip nine weeks on the trot on Top Of The Pops and I couldn't wait to start the 'big school' the following year. It was to be my version of 'Rydell High' and I was convinced there would be a leather clad siren waiting for me there and we would hang around the bleachers in our respective gangs, hiding from coach and making fun of the geeks.

Sadly, as I was to learn, confessing a liking for Grease at the 'big school' in 1979 was no barometer of local coolness, and all the Sandra Dee's (and they were there) turned out to be loaded for bigger game than me. And that's when the chills really started multiplyin'. There would quickly follow a Stalinist purge of my recent past where John Travolta would be replaced with John Rotten as the name to drop, but that's another story. But even at the point of most denial, I always had a soft spot for 'You're The One That I Want', and whenever I hear it now at whatever ironic theme bar or club, my singing along is irony free.