Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Hey, Jude, You Won't Believe This Twist

According to Billboard Magazine, the pop music news magazine, of all the many, many songs that have been No. 1 on Billboard's Top 100 over the past 50 years, The Number One Single, the most popular, was... (I'm not ready for this, are you?

The Twist
And Elvis and the Beatles didn't even make the Top Five.

Well, here they are- the top 10 of the past 50 years according to Billboard...
#10 UN-BREAK MY HEART
Toni Braxton

#9 WE BELONG TOGETHER
Mariah Carey

#8 HEY JUDE
The Beatles

#7 YOU LIGHT UP MY LIFE
Debby Boone

#6 PHYSICAL
Olivia Newton-John

#5 MACARENA (BAYSIDE BOYS MIX)
Los Del Rio

#4 HOW DO I LIVE
LeAnn Rimes

#3 MACK THE KNIFE
Bobby Darin

#2 SMOOTH
Santana Featuring Rob Thomas

#1 THE TWIST
Chubby Checker
Note that this is based on length of time on the charts (which is also determined by radio airplay) not by total sales of a single. Still....

Elvis has had 108 hits on the Top 100 over the years, the Beatles 72. In between them are James Brown, Aretha Franklin and Ray Charles. Now I know everyone- and every era- has its Big Artists. But I think this may show what we always thought, even back in the 60s, that the Billboard Top 100 was not as good a measure of these things as they tried to make us believe.

--Link

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