Olivia Dean – Man I Needpublished at 17:38 GMT
17:38 GMT
Mark Savage
Music correspondent
Here’s something you might not have expected: Radio 1’s biggest
song of 2025 was inspired by Michael Jackson’s 1987 single The Way You Make Me
Feel, and Haribo’s insanely fizzy Tangfastic sweets.
The revelation comes from Olivia Dean herself, who explained
the writing of Man I Need in an interview with the hit podcast And the Writer
Is…
“I came in that day and there was a lot of
energy in the room,” she recalled.
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And I was like, ‘Guys, let’s make something really fun. I want to make something I can dance to. I want to make something that when I perform live, it’s just gonna be like a Tangfastic.”
“We started with the drum beat and I was like, ‘Yeah, I want
to do something kind of like Michael’s The Way You Make Me Feel-esque’
“And I sat at the Wurly [a Wurlitzer electric
piano] and we kind of just, like, wrote it.”
If it’s that simple, maybe we should all have a go. I’m
basing next year’s number one on the beat to Madonna’s Material Girl and a pack
of Bourbon biscuits.
But seriously, from all that frivolity came an absolute
belter of a song – classic in the best sense, full of warmth and nostalgia
without ever feeling forced.
No wonder it’s topped the chart.
You can watch Olivia Dean perform Man I Need in the Radio 1 Live Lounge here., external