Don't know that Glen Campbell one but like his earlier stuff. His 20 Golden Greats album was huge, UK No.1 at Christmas 1976.

Intriguing choice of Calvin track to do so well, it's not what I can recall at all to be honest!

 

It seemed like a new track when I replayed it for this - I don't think I've heard it in over 5 years anywhere, despite it topping the UK charts! Bizarre! :o

Don't know that Glen Campbell one but like his earlier stuff. His 20 Golden Greats album was huge, UK No.1 at Christmas 1976.

 

Yes, I was one of the many buyers of that GC album in 1976, so many great tracks on it! :wub: :)

Yes, I was one of the many buyers of that GC album in 1976, so many great tracks on it! :wub: :)

 

 

I bought it too then the CD years later.

572. TRUE BLUE - Madonna (1986) 1,116,250

 

Madonna's 2nd chart-topper, and 2nd track off the True Blue album. I'd loved Holiday, Into The Groove, Like A Virgin and Live To Tell in particular, but it was that album that made me a fan, she was dominating the pop world, changing the face of pop to focus on women, and flag-waving the idea that women can be in control of their own music career without being traditional singer-songwriters. rather odd, then, that Madonna excluded this UK chart-topper from her first Greatest Hits in favour of lesser pop gems. I still don't own the single remix as I'd bought the album and didn't want to pay twice, and the only place it's been available since is on a maxi-CD of Holiday in the 90's I think. Madonna not a fan of it. I'm guessing her bust-up with Sean Penn rather changed her attitude towards it's 50's-retro-pop girlie-charms....

 

571. VIDEO KILLED THE RADIO STAR - Buggles (1979) 1,118,100

 

Well, this is a key classic ahead-of-its-time pop gem! Trevor Horn starting his career as a music maestro-producer with an anthem stating intent for the 80's and beyond - promo videos for records became not only essentially, but they changed the whole way you reacted to music: a great promo can make a hit, and not having one can be a death-knell. The video is whimsical, the song is cheerful synthpop, and it was a sign of the future: MTV started with this track. It's made the UK and my personal charts in subsequent decades - and yet it's never topped my charts! 1979 was one of the greatest pop years of all-time, so even great tracks like this got held off the top. Both Trevor Horn and Geoff Downes morphed after a few hits as Buggles into the new line-up of Prog-Rockers Yes as they went all 80's stadium rock with flawless-Horn-production-values. Owner Of A Lonely Heart and Leave It were fab, the follow-up's to this track (The Plastic Age, Clean Clean) were great, and Trev loaned his skills to pop acts galore, some in the listings, and some not (Dollar had a string of quality pop singles that failed to top my charts). This is what the boys will be remembered for as artists though.

 

570. POP MUZIK - M (1979) 1,119,550

 

Talking of 1979 synth-pop leaders, here's another one that didn't top my charts that year (it peaked at 2) though it has made up for it on re-issue since. Robin Scott never really achieved much more success, give or take the nice follow-up Moonlight And Muzak, which is a shame. I liked the global view the song had, and the Top Of The Pops backing singer in Hindu dress-up was fab, anything that pushed Asian music and culture was something I was in favour of, what with my nostalgia for living in multi-cultural Singapore at full-swing in those days. It even became a US number one, not something that was as frequent as you might think - and sort of setting the scene for the MTV-led Brit-invasion of the stodgy, dull American charts in the early 80's. The UK New Wave scene was vital and lively and fresh, the US scene by this time still living in the early 70's, bar disco which had already been intentionally killed-off in a successful media-backlash, and a few US New Wave-inspired acts that broke through. This track is still great fun...

 

love True Blue both single and album

569. MY GUY - Mary Wells (1964) 1,119,900

 

Essentially a Smokey Robinson hit (but sung my Motown up-and-coming Mary Wells), both written and produced by Smokey as a companion-piece to his My Girl for The Temptations, and a US chart-topper that I still knew when it recharted in the UK in 1972, and still was a fan of the 60's oldies even though they sounded dated by that time. Subsequent reissues pushed it over the million in my charts, though it's never topped my chart. Mary Wells had some duets with a young Marvin Gaye for Motown - and then that was it! Her husband persuaded her to leave Motown after she hit 21, as per the clause in her Motown contract, and sign with another label. Huge mistake. This is still a decent 60's single, but I wouldn't rate it high enough to make my all-time top 1000 these days. My Girl is much better. Smokey will feature again in the list though.

 

 

 

568. JESUS TO A CHILD - George Michael (1996) 1,1119,950

 

The 5th George Michael or Wham! tracks so far, with another 9 still to come, this understated gem previewed his new melancholy-mood 1996 album, Older, and topped my chart, as well as the UK's. Slow, sad, and affecting, the song dealt with the loss of his lover to HIV-related-illness. Royalties were quietly donated to Childline by George, who never publicised his generosity, a troubled man with a social conscience who never seemed to find lasting personal happiness. His work, in hindsight, speaks more than we knew at the time. I still love this track, though it tends to get overlooked by more high-profile hits.

 

567. CLOUDBUSTING - Kate Bush (1985) 1,120,700

 

 

This Kate track is largely here by virtue of extra sales donated from the significant sampling of Utah Saints 1992 Something Good which topped my charts where Cloudbusting only went top 10, but hey it's Kate, it's a great video, Donald Sutherland features, and the song is about err a relationship between a psychiatrist and his son. You can't say Kate ever follows cliches in her work....! From her best album, Hounds Of Love - and there are still 2 more to come from it, including the previous lead single. Since Wuthering Heights hit 2 in my charts (and made this list) she'd come close with other singles, such as the fab Sat In Your Lap, Wow, The Man With The Child In His Eyes, Babooshka, Army Dreamers and Them Heavy People but never quite got that chart-topper. Stay-tuned...

 

love True Blue both single and album

 

 

Me too but prefer the album version of True Blue to the single.

Me too but prefer the album version of True Blue to the single.

 

Hi Chris :) It's a good album - at least one advantage with neither version being on The Imacculate Collection is Madonna didn't get to muck about with True Blue - I didn't think there was any need or point in remixing a Greatest Hits set, so I didn't buy it till it was on sale in a charity shop. I like to think that's why she didn't do it again... :lol:

Hi Chris :) It's a good album - at least one advantage with neither version being on The Imacculate Collection is Madonna didn't get to muck about with True Blue - I didn't think there was any need or point in remixing a Greatest Hits set, so I didn't buy it till it was on sale in a charity shop. I like to think that's why she didn't do it again... :lol:

 

 

Hiya. Yeah it was done in Q sound too, quadrophonic, except they forgot that most people don't listen through 4 speakers! :P I bought it on release day in Nov.1990 and she knocked The Very Best Of Elton John double album off the top. True Blue was THE glaring omission as it had been a No.1 single.

Edited January 4, 20205 yr by Crazy Chris

567. CLOUDBUSTING - Kate Bush (1985) 1,120,700

This Kate track is largely here by virtue of extra sales donated from the significant sampling of Utah Saints 1992 Something Good which topped my charts where Cloudbusting only went top 10, but hey it's Kate, it's a great video, Donald Sutherland features, and the song is about err a relationship between a psychiatrist and his son. You can't say Kate ever follows cliches in her work....! From her best album, Hounds Of Love - and there are still 2 more to come from it, including the previous lead single. Since Wuthering Heights hit 2 in my charts (and made this list) she'd come close with other singles, such as the fab Sat In Your Lap, Wow, The Man With The Child In His Eyes, Babooshka, Army Dreamers and Them Heavy People but never quite got that chart-topper. Stay-tuned...

 

 

Am not a huge Kate fan but this is a great track. I only own The Whole Story, to my shame and she's long overdue a complete GH album release. Whether we'll ever get one in the download and streaming age is anyone's guess but bet it would sell, especially at Christmas.

Edited January 4, 20205 yr by Crazy Chris

Cloudbusting is absolutely essential, a definite 11/10 moment. Those strings are just wonderful and the way it all pans out to an almost train like rhythm is just stunning.

Cloudbusting is absolutely essential, a definite 11/10 moment. Those strings are just wonderful and the way it all pans out to an almost train like rhythm is just stunning.

 

Thanks dandy* I forgot to mention why it's so fab, and you managed to sum it up in a sentence! :heart:

566. IF I CAN'T HAVE YOU - Yvonne Elliman (1978) 1,121,650

 

I adore Yvonne Elliman. She is Hawaiian by birth, and Japanese-Irish by heritage, gifted with a honey-sweet emotional voice that takes a song and wrings every bit of emotion out of it in a subtle, non-histrionic, style, starting with the songs from Jesus Christ Superstar, which she starred in for 4 years as Mary Magdalene. She also starred in the 1973 film version, I was instantly taken by her versions of I Don't Know How To Love Him, Could We Start Again? in particular, and which would be here in the rundown if I'd allowed film soundtracks in my charts. I played the vinyl album to death back in the 70's. Yvonne's 2 entries in the rundown, though, are both Bee Gees songs, and we start with the later anthem from Saturday Night Fever. There are higher entries still to come from that album/soundtrack, but Yvonne's pumping disco version outdoes the Bee Gees original, and gave her a new disco diva fade-out to her chart career, this and the club choon Love Pains (later covered by Liza Minelli/Pet Shop Boys, among others) in particular. This is her signature song though, most people have no idea who she is these days, but most know the track, cos it's fab.

 

565. FOREVER AUTUMN - Justin Hayward (Jeff Wayne's War Of The Worlds) (1978) 1,123,200

 

Talking of huge albums from 1978, there's this monster hit from a lush sci-fi concept album based on H.G.Wells War Of The Worlds, and eventually a stage musical theatre production that is still running, albeit without Richard Burton as narrator these days. Justin was guesting solo on a break from The Moody Blues (of which more much later in the countdown) and not only sang this gorgeous ballad, my late Aunty Eileen's fave song, he also did the brilliant Eve Of The War to boot, which just missed out on a spot in the rundown. It's fair to say Jeff Wayne never did anything before or since with anywhere near the same scale of artistic and commercial success, but then when you can keep on re-booting, remixing, and touring, who needs to! Justin was the perfect choice for this, I can't imagine anyone else getting the tone right and doing it justice.

 

563. I HEAR YOU KNOCKING - Dave Edmunds (1970) 1,124,500

 

Another long-time fave popstar here, Dave Edmunds first popped up in band Love Sculpture on their 1969 frantic instrumental cover of Sabre Dance, which I loved. Dave is a fab guitar player, you have to hear Sabre Dance at least once in your life and walk away amazed anyone can play that fast. At which point I left the UK until late 1971, and came back to hear Alan Freeman's Pick Of The Pops rundown of Big Hits of 1971 on Radio 1 starting off with this track, which had never made it to Singapore despite being a huge UK chart-topper. I recorded it and loved it right off the bat. I hear You Knocking was a 1955 song first recorded by the namechecked Smiley Lewis, and clearly is Dave's homage to 50's rock'n'roll, but with a 70's modern production-value - something Dave would specialise in when he set up his own recording studio, Rockpile, in his home in Wales (and of which more at a later date). So how did I get this into my charts if I was out the country? I got a hold of the BBC charts in a book a few years later which allowed me to retro-do my late-1969 through late-1971 rundowns based on what I liked during that period - and I included songs that I actually knew during 1971 - so it just qualified, pipping in at the end of the year!