Artist · chart history
Propellerheads
Band Bath United Kingdom Active 1995–2003
Propellerheads formed in 1995 in Bath, United Kingdom and was active until 2003. Propellerheads has 12 chart appearances on 11 radio countdowns from 10 stations on RockLists, spanning 1997–2026. The most successful song on radio countdowns is “History Repeating”, which appears on 10 lists with a best position of #28. The station that charted Propellerheads most often is WFNX (Boston, MA), with 3 appearances. The artist’s biggest year on year-end countdowns was 1998.
Propellerheads were Will White and Alex Gifford, a pair of Bath studio rats who teamed up in 1995 and set about proving that big beat could wear a dinner jacket. Gifford came with a past: he'd blown saxophone for The Stranglers on Dreamtime, 10 and the live All Live and All of the Night. The duo's first release, the Dive! EP, came out on the independent Wall of Sound in 1996.
The Bond connection did the rest. Their remix of "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" for David Arnold's Shaken & Stirred tribute album got them noticed, they worked with Arnold again on "Backseat Driver" for the Tomorrow Never Dies soundtrack, and then came "History Repeating", with Shirley Bassey, a voice already bound up with Bond, out front. It's a slinky, finger-snapping collision of jazz and breakbeats that sounds like a spy theme wandering into a club at two in the morning. The self-titled 1997 EP, meanwhile, carried "Bang On!", all chunky beats and cheek.
Decksandrumsandrockandroll landed in 1998, on Wall of Sound in Europe and DreamWorks in America and Japan, and its title is a fair recipe for what's inside: "Velvet Pants" struts on fat drums and a groove you could skate on. The pair wound down in 2003, leaving one of the slickest parties of the big beat years on record.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs by Propellerheads on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Peak year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | History Repeating | 10 | #28 | – | 1998 | |
| 2 | Bang On! | 1 | #87 | – | 1998 | |
| 3 | Velvet Pants | 1 | #28 | – | 1997 |
Albums with charting songs
Where each song was first released, from MusicBrainz.
Year-end chart timeline
Combined year-end countdown points per year. Taller bars mean more songs placing higher across more stations.
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