In the 1990s, few British pop acts struck as peculiar a note as the pairing of Robson Green and Jerome Flynn, who vaulted from their work as television performers to chart prominence in 1995 through sleek interpretations of the tracks “Unchained Melody” and “White Cliffs of Dover.” Issued as a double A-sided single, the release quickly registered as the decade’s top-selling British single. Though the pair essentially amounted to one-hit wonders, their commercial reach proved vast, eclipsing even Pulp, Oasis, and Blur amid the Brit-pop surge. That scale of achievement drew sharp scorn from much of the music press, which dismissed the actors’ carefully assembled, glossy takes on pop and rock standards as pure exercises in nostalgia. The criticism carried weight, given that the two men—best known for portraying soldiers in the series Soldier, Soldier—deliberately tapped into the wave of sentiment tied to the fiftieth anniversary of VE Day and added little that was musically fresh. Still, Robson & Jerome supplied sufficient presence and appeal to render their agreeable yet unremarkable recordings both accessible and, for many listeners, likable. As with most one-hit acts, their follow-up album registered only modest sales despite respectable figures and several weeks inside the British Top Ten. Their enduring image nevertheless rests on the period when their polished vocals and unabashed sentimentality dominated the 1995 charts.
The actors would never have crossed from screen to studio without the involvement of Simon Cowell, then an A&R executive at RCA Records. Already known for guiding novelty successes by Zig and Zag, Power Rangers, and World Wrestling Foundation, Cowell became convinced of the duo’s commercial prospects simply by viewing Soldier, Soldier. He had earlier turned down another member of the cast, Denise Welch, as unsuitable for a recording career, yet the growing audience for the series and the warm reaction to Robson & Jerome’s on-screen performance of “Unchained Melody” persuaded him they possessed both star quality and chart potential. When he first contacted the pair, they resisted the idea, fearing it would undermine their standing as serious actors. Only after three months of sustained persuasion did they consent, swayed partly by the project’s substantial sales prospects and partly by the example of Jimmy Nail, who had balanced acting and singing without apparent loss of credibility.
Released in the early summer of 1995, “Unchained Melody”/“White Cliffs of Dover” ascended immediately to the summit of the charts and remained there for an extended run, repelling efforts from Pulp and Michael Jackson among others. By year’s end the single had moved nearly two million copies, confirming its status as the biggest-selling British single of the decade. It was succeeded in the autumn by “I Believe”/“Up on the Roof,” which matched much of that success with multiple weeks at number one. Late in the year the duo’s self-titled debut album also reached the top position. Crafted by producers Mike Stock, Matt Aitken, and Nigel Wright, the collection consisted entirely of covers such as “Danny Boy,” “Daydream Believer,” “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore,” and “Amazing Grace.” The song choices ensured primary appeal to baby boomers while leaving younger listeners unmoved, prompting further critical broadsides in the British music press that nevertheless left sales unaffected.
Robson & Jerome returned with the album Take Two in the autumn of 1996. Like its predecessor, it debuted at number one, though it was soon displaced by the Spice Girls, the dominant U.K. pop act of that year. Even so, the record moved sufficient units to extend the duo’s pop lifespan beyond initial expectations, without dispelling the prevailing view that they remained, at heart, one-hit wonders.
