With Steps looking likely to chart on Friday with their first new hit since 2001. How many artists can we find who have had a chart comeback with a new recording after at least approx. 10 years away from the singles chart?

Edited March 16, 20178 yr by fiesta

Take That are obvious ones to think of when they came back with Patience in 2006 which made #1 10 years after How Deep Is Your Love made #1 in 1996.

Craig David

 

I wouldn't say Steps is that much of a hit, they'll barely scrape the top 40 and it'll peak there.

 

 

Blondie came back with a #1 single in 1999 after releasing nothing for 17 years!

 

Arguably you could also count The Beatles who made a "comeback" after more than 20 years in 1995 with two Top 10 hits. Technically they were new recordings.

Edited March 16, 20178 yr by M4NG0

Arguably you could also count The Beatles who made a "comeback" after more than 20 years in 1995 with two Top 10 hits. Technically they were new recordings.

 

In that case you could count the Hollies 'He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother'

Robyn had a gap of 9 years between her initial hits as a teenager in 1998 and With Every Heartbeat in 2007.

 

Train's 9 year gap between Drops Of Jupiter in 2001 and Hey Soul Sister in 2010 was another recent-ish one.

 

And Boyzone had 9 years between Everyday I Love You in 1999 and Love You Anyway in 2008.

 

 

The Spice Girls came back *almost* ten years later eith one of their best ever songs and biggest ever smashes, Headlines (Loud and True)

Christina Aguilera.

Not very high charting but Disturbed's two top 40 hits are 12 years apart.

Santana's last chart hit before Smooth was 20 years beforehand.

The Spice Girls came back *almost* ten years later eith one of their best ever songs and biggest ever smashes, Headlines (Loud and True)

And by biggest ever smashes, you mean lowest charting single, right? :unsure:

As the thread is about Singles comebacks I guess one of the most impressive was Pink Floyd in 1979 with "Another Brick In The Wall (Part II)", got to number 1 after about 12 years of not releasing Singles!

Cher had hits as a solo artist and as half of Sonny and Cher from 1965-74. She was then absent from the chart until 1987 when she returned and continued to have hits until 2001. Her next (and, so far, final) hit was in 2013.

I Hope You Find It <3 I love the fact that that went top 30 here. The 'sales era' could still pull off some surprises even as late as 2013. She ought to have been credited on Meatloaf's 1981 hit Dead Ringer For Love in that huge gap between 1974-1987.

 

I feel like this Steps song is very much a last gasp from the sales era actually, possibly the last ever song to go top 40 that deduces as much as 90% of its sales from paid for purchases. Streaming is just too big to overcome now. When an iTunes #1 of this ilk can only scrape the top 40 officially it's a sign that this is unlikely to happen again for any future sales-dominant hits.

 

Unless of course Taylor is still abandoning Spotify with her new era, but seeing as she'll never have another major hit again if she does that, it seems highly unlikely!

Edited March 16, 20178 yr by gooddelta

And by biggest ever smashes, you mean lowest charting single, right? :unsure:

 

It was a turntable hit!

Boris Gardiner charted in 1970 with the instrumental Elizabethan Reggae then did not chart again for another 16 years, when he reached #1 with I Want To Wake Up With You.

In that case you could count the Hollies 'He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother'

 

The difference is that that was a re-release of a single that had previously been a hit. Whereas the Beatles T40 comeback 'Baby It's You' had not previously been a single, although it was of course recorded in the 1960s.

 

Kate Bush returned to the chart in 2005 for the first time since 1994.

David Bowie's comeback hit 'Where Are We Now?' in 2013 was his first Top 40 since 2002.

His old mate Lou Reed did it twice: from 'Walk On The Wild Side' to that version of 'Soul Man' with Sam Moore in 1987, and then from that to the remix of 'Satellite Of Love' in 2004... and both those solo hits originated from the same album too.

 

I think quite a few acts have done it with Christmas songs.

Sia had a top 10 hit in 2000 with Taken For Granted. Nothing else until Chandelier in 2014. Even if you include being a featured singer,there's still a gap of 10 years between Destiny in 2001 and Titanium in 2011.

I've just noticed on the same page as Sia in my book of hit singles,Paul Simon had a gap of nine years from 1977 to 1986 and then a gap of 16 years from 1990 to 2006.