It’s not even the most famous Saturdays song IMO - my mind went straight to Ego

Or for that matter, the most famous "All Fired Up" :heehee: (though curiously The Saturdays have a barely over 0.1% margin on Spotify against Pat Benatar :P)

We are all overlooking the obvious answer.

 

Pitchfork certified 2nd best song of 2021…

 

Casserole Jenkins - Hard Drive

 

#casserolejenkins4xmasno1

#casserolerageagainstthesausageroll

In all seriousness though my mind will always go to 'Bohemian Rhapsody' as the archetype for 'famous songs'. It certainly has to at least be up there if not #1 for the song that has maintained an active audience for the longest time (and not only a few months a year like Christmas songs) and it's pretty iconic for numerous reasons beyond that as well. Would say it has successfully transitioned between generations as well, 1.6 billion Spotify streams cannot all be from older people.

I’d agree with Bohemian Rhapsody in terms of the UK, especially if we exclude Christmas songs. It’s also the only song to sell over 2 million physically and 2 million digitally which I think exemplifies it’s cross-over appeal.

also, BH has remained in people's consciousness,

first we got the original release in the 70s when it went to #1

then when Freddie died it was re-released and went back to #1 again

then in the 90s it was featured in that Waynes world movie and was a hit again especially in the US when it peaked at #2 (had been #9 in the 70s)

and then of course there was the movie a couple years ago which put it back into the spotlight again

I agree about Bohemian Rhapsody to an extent, except that nobody can actually hum it!

 

Surprised (I think) nobody has mentioned a big stadium anthem like We Are The Champions.

I was thinking of We Are The Champions as well, and even We Will Rock You seems to have more ubiquity than Bohemian Rhapsody in the public sphere, although not in terms of individual consumption.

Yeh those two are everywhere at sporting events, Freddie and Queen really were great song writers weren’t they!

I suppose a shout out to Wonderwall is deserved. I wouldn't say it was the most famous but it was a significant global hit and certainly in the UK seems to be something that has strong cross-generational appeal.

I mean I guess you can make the argument that 'Bohemian Rhapsody' doesn't have as immediately obvious of a hook as those other two songs but 'nobody can actually hum it' is surely a bit of a stretch.

I would stand by Bohemian Rhapsody been the one to take the title if anything does. I'm sure any Average Joe in the street would be able to respond with the next line to "i see a little silhouetto of a man..."

Also this narrative that Christmas isn't Christmas without Mariah is only relatively new. In the English speaking world it was Michael Bublé for a long while and there's no reason in 10 years it won't be someone else, like Kelly Clarkson.

I don't think this is true, at least not from a UK perspective. All I Want for Christmas Is You had become really popular again by the mid 2000s, well before Michael Buble's Christmas album came along.

 

From my perspective, the All I Want for Christmas Is You obsession in the UK really got going after its inclusion in Love Actually in 2003. Quite suddenly it became regarded as one of the ultimate Christmas songs (which I hadn't really sensed being the case in the late 90s and early on in the 00s).

 

Obviously its success on streaming in recent years has made it feel a lot more inescapable in the charts, but I would argue that its popularity/exposure was solidified many years before the rise of streaming.

 

In the 2000s & most years in the 2010s, Mariah and The Pogues were the two strongest performing Christmas songs. It would often be the case that Mariah would lead the way in November and early December, but then The Pogues would surge ahead as we got closer to Christmas Day.

 

Here's some stats to show how well Mariah did in the 2000s, its highest positions each year:

 

Official Singles Download Chart

26th December 2004 - #5 (The second highest Christmas song of the week, behind Band Aid 20) [this was the first year of the download chart]

11th December 2005 - #3 (The highest Christmas song of the week) [18th Dec: #3 The Pogues / #4 Mariah | 25th Dec: #3 The Pogues / #5 Mariah]

17th December 2006 - #2 (highest Christmas song) [24th Dec: #3 The Pogues / #4 Mariah]

16th December 2007 - #1 [23rd Dec: #2 The Pogues / #3 Mariah]

 

Radio Airplay Chart

23rd December 2007 - #4 (highest Christmas song)

28th December 2008 - #7 (third highest Christmas song; Gabriella Cilmi - Warm This Winter - a new release that year - was #6, The Pogues at #3)

27th December 2009 - #2 (behind The Pogues)

 

TV Airplay Chart

23rd December 2007 - #9 (highest Christmas music video of the week; The Pogues - #15)

28th December 2008 - #7 (highest Christmas music video; Geraldine - #11, Pogues - #16)

27th December 2009 - #5 (highest Christmas music video; The Pogues - #11)

 

In the singles chart, Mariah has almost constantly been within the Top 3 most consumed Christmas songs each week, every year since 2007 (the year that all songs were allowed to chart). 2007 was its best year pre-streaming, reaching #4 on 16th December.

Yeah, I was gonna suggest 'Bohemian Rhapsody' too.

 

Stuff like 'Take On Me', 'I Will Survive', 'Dancing Queen', 'Don't You Want Me' and 'The Best' all seem enduring (inescapable) and hugely known on a cross-generational level.

Again Bohemian Rhapsody springs to mind for me too. The massive soundtrack songs like I Will Always Love You, My Heart Will Go On, You're the One That I Want, Happy, as well as Let it Go could be in contention, and a couple of years ago This is Me was EVERYWHERE!

 

The other song which seems to have taken on a life of its own is Sweet Caroline. Its association with sporting events has taken it to another level.

 

Yeh those two are everywhere at sporting events, Freddie and Queen really were great song writers weren’t they!

 

Those three Queen songs (amongst others) are brillitant.

I am sort of "Meh" with ALWFCIY this year, it came on before and I automatically switched it off..and it's only Dec 9

Wasn't there some statistic published a few years ago that had calculated that the world's most heard, and self-performed - and therefore arguably 'famous' - song is the traditional standard 'Happy Birthday'?! Okay it's not a charted 'hit' recording as such (no clever replies re Stevie Wonder and Altered Images please!) and I don't think the originators of the lyrics and melody could even be traced now (haven't checked any of this out online by the way so maybe my recollections are incorrect), so perhaps many wouldn't consider it to qualify for the purposes of this thread. But in terms of sheer familiarity, cross-cultural, cross-generational and predictable annual relevance to all who celebrate having completed another 12 months of life intact, 'HB' is to my mind a likely contender for 'most famous song ever', if we are generous in our definition of the term 'song'.

 

Apols if someone's already pitched for this but I haven't time to read all the preceding posts!

The writers of ‘Happy Birthday’ are indeed known, it only originated in 1893 and Warner Bros held the copyright until 2015 where that was deemed invalid, and that it should be in the public domain.

Oh I forgot about Angels, at least in the UK