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PaulEschen
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Although not listed by Pat, this song did make it to #36 in Billboard, and
was #100 for 1977's Top 100 singles in Billboard. I just bought a CD
single of this (with "We Got Our Own Thing") from Europe that was
released for dance DJ use. It's copyrighted from Westbound Records, and
does not sound as though it came from a vinyl source. I bought it to edit
it down to the 45 version, and found that you can't. The 45 version starts
out with a short drum roll not found on the LP version, and there is added
tympani in the intro. It IS nice to have a good copy of this song, though,
as it was one of my few favorites from the Disco Era. Now, to find the 45
version someday.
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The Hits Man
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I have the 45 and made a needle drop of it many years ago.
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Moderator
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It doesn't seem possible that a song could only reach #36 on the weekly Billboard charts but end up as the #100 song for the entire year! It looks like chart positions could be bought up through 1977 anyway.
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Paul Haney
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Moderator wrote:
| It doesn't seem possible that a song could only reach #36 on the weekly Billboard charts but end up as the #100 song for the entire year! It looks like chart positions could be bought up through 1977 anyway. |
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Well, it was on the Hot 100 for 29 weeks, which was 2 to 3 times longer than the average for #36 songs during that era. In fact, it placed #3 in longevity for the entire year of 1977!
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MCT1
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Paul Haney wrote:
Moderator wrote:
| It doesn't seem possible that a song could only reach #36 on the weekly Billboard charts but end up as the #100 song for the entire year! It looks like chart positions could be bought up through 1977 anyway. |
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Well, it was on the Hot 100 for 29 weeks, which was 2 to 3 times longer than the average for #36 songs during that era. In fact, it placed #3 in longevity for the entire year of 1977! |
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In some Billboard rankings that I've seen over the years, it's seemed to me like they gave an inordinate amount of credit for spending a long time on the chart, with less regard than might be intuitive for where on the chart those weeks were spent. One example that comes to mind is "I Miss You" by Klymaxx -- IIRC, it was ranked as something like the #5 song of the year on the 1986 Hot 100 year-end chart, even though it had only peaked at #3. The explanation apparently was that, in a period of relatively high turnover on the pop charts, it had a very long chart run. At the time, it was unusual to see a single spend much more than about 15 weeks in the Top 40 or 20 weeks in the Hot 100, but "I Miss You" did something like 17 weeks in the Top 40 and 29 weeks on the Hot 100.
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torcan
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MCT1 wrote:
In some Billboard rankings that I've seen over the years, it's seemed to me like they gave an inordinate amount of credit for spending a long time on the chart, with less regard than might be intuitive for where on the chart those weeks were spent. One example that comes to mind is "I Miss You" by Klymaxx -- IIRC, it was ranked as something like the #5 song of the year on the 1986 Hot 100 year-end chart, even though it had only peaked at #3. The explanation apparently was that, in a period of relatively high turnover on the pop charts, it had a very long chart run. |
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To me, it makes perfect sense that a song with a longer run would finish higher on the charts. After all, it's ranking up sales and airplay for that much longer than the average hit and it makes sense when all is said and done that it would be a bigger hit.
During the mid-80s, the charts seemed to turn over quite quickly...but there were a few "stragglers" that seemed to run forever. REO Speedwagon's great "In My Dreams" is another one - only a No. 19 peak but a 30-week Hot 100 run. It easily finished in the top 100 for that year.
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MCT1
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MCT1 wrote:
| In some Billboard rankings that I've seen over the years, it's seemed to me like they gave an inordinate amount of credit for spending a long time on the chart, with less regard than might be intuitive for where on the chart those weeks were spent. One example that comes to mind is "I Miss You" by Klymaxx -- IIRC, it was ranked as something like the #5 song of the year on the 1986 Hot 100 year-end chart, even though it had only peaked at #3. The explanation apparently was that, in a period of relatively high turnover on the pop charts, it had a very long chart run. |
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I had this backwards – it peaked at #5, but was the #3 song of the year.
torcan wrote:
| To me, it makes perfect sense that a song with a longer run would finish higher on the charts. After all, it's ranking up sales and airplay for that much longer than the average hit and it makes sense when all is said and done that it would be a bigger hit. |
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It certainly deserves credit for continuing to rack up sales and airplay, and I understand that this may push it higher in the year-end rankings than other songs with similar chart peaks. But all other things being equal, looking at songs like “Devil’s Gun” and “I Miss You”, it doesn’t seem like the additional sales and airplay attained by a song that lingers in the lower reaches of the chart ought to be enough to push its cumulative totals past those of so many songs that charted so much higher. Any system which results in a song that peaked at #5 being the #3 song of the year seems like it’s giving too much credit for simply being on the chart somewhere, and not enough credit for battling it out for the prime positions on the chart.
torcan wrote:
| During the mid-80s, the charts seemed to turn over quite quickly...but there were a few "stragglers" that seemed to run forever. REO Speedwagon's great "In My Dreams" is another one - only a No. 19 peak but a 30-week Hot 100 run. It easily finished in the top 100 for that year. |
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I’ve often wondered what the story was with that song. Here’s the chronology that I’m finding (I have info on its week of debut in the Hot 100 and its week-by-week positions within the Top 40, but no info on its week-by-week positions when it was below the Top 40. I am also assuming that the 30 weeks it spent in the Top 100 were consecutive, though I don’t know this for a fact):
--Debuted on the Hot 100 the week of 7/18/87
--Entered the Top 40 on 9/19/87, which was its 10th week on the chart
--Reached its peak of #19 on 10/24/87, which was its 15th week on the chart
--Last week in the Top 40 was 11/7/87, which was its 17th week on the chart
--Assuming no gaps, its 30th week in the Hot 100 would have been 2/6/88
Looking at the above, I’m struck by two things. First, it took a somewhat long time for “In My Dreams” to break into the Top 40. The underwhelming performance of the group’s previous single “Variety Tonight” (which only reached #60), and the fact that this was the third single from an album that had proven to be a mediocre seller (even its lead single, “In My Dreams”, had only hit #16), probably contributed to that. In addition, REO just wasn’t as hot of an act at this point as they had once been. I would imagine that this was not seen as a major new release by Top 40 radio when it first came out. Second, the song seems to have spent a very long time dropping down the chart. It remained in the Hot 100 for 13 weeks after the point where it fell out of the Top 40. Does anyone know the backstory behind all this?
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JMD1961
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MCT1 wrote:
It certainly deserves credit for continuing to rack up sales and airplay, and I understand that this may push it higher in the year-end rankings than other songs with similar chart peaks. But all other things being equal, looking at songs like “Devil’s Gun” and “I Miss You”, it doesn’t seem like the additional sales and airplay attained by a song that lingers in the lower reaches of the chart ought to be enough to push its cumulative totals past those of so many songs that charted so much higher. Any system which results in a song that peaked at #5 being the #3 song of the year seems like it’s giving too much credit for simply being on the chart somewhere, and not enough credit for battling it out for the prime positions on the chart.
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At the time these year-end charts were being compiled, Billboard used an inverse point system based on weekly chart positions to generate positions on the year-end charts. (#1=100 pts., #2=99 pts., etc. down to #100=1 pt.) A three-tier system of bonus points was given for each week a song was in the Top Ten (#1=100 bonus pts, #2-#5=50 bonus pts., #6-#10=25 bonus pts.) Using this system a song generate points based on both chart position and weeks on the chart.
So, a song that spent only a few weeks on the chart, even if it went to a high position on the chart, would only generate a relatively short points total. While a song that was around much longer could rack of quite a score and thus chart very high on the year-end chart. In the case of "I Miss You", it was a combination of the two (a high chart position and a long chart run) that allowed it to finish at #3 for the year.
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maciav
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JMD1961 wrote:
MCT1 wrote:
It certainly deserves credit for continuing to rack up sales and airplay, and I understand that this may push it higher in the year-end rankings than other songs with similar chart peaks. But all other things being equal, looking at songs like “Devil’s Gun” and “I Miss You”, it doesn’t seem like the additional sales and airplay attained by a song that lingers in the lower reaches of the chart ought to be enough to push its cumulative totals past those of so many songs that charted so much higher. Any system which results in a song that peaked at #5 being the #3 song of the year seems like it’s giving too much credit for simply being on the chart somewhere, and not enough credit for battling it out for the prime positions on the chart.
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At the time these year-end charts were being compiled, Billboard used an inverse point system based on weekly chart positions to generate positions on the year-end charts. (#1=100 pts., #2=99 pts., etc. down to #100=1 pt.) A three-tier system of bonus points was given for each week a song was in the Top Ten (#1=100 bonus pts, #2-#5=50 bonus pts., #6-#10=25 bonus pts.) Using this system a song generate points based on both chart position and weeks on the chart.
So, a song that spent only a few weeks on the chart, even if it went to a high position on the chart, would only generate a relatively short points total. While a song that was around much longer could rack of quite a score and thus chart very high on the year-end chart. In the case of "I Miss You", it was a combination of the two (a high chart position and a long chart run) that allowed it to finish at #3 for the year.
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maciav
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JMD (I am sorry I don't know your first name as I have not posted often) is 100% correct! And this methodology along with another nuance of the Billboard Year End Ranking system brought to light another irony in 1977 that rolled into 1978. On the Top 100 of the year, Casey Kasem used to say that our rankings are based on the Billboard Hot 100 Charts that run from November 1, of the prior year to November 1, of the current year. Therefore, in 1977 the Top 100 of the year was based on the Billboard Charts from November 1, 1976 (actually November 6th in that year) to November 1, 1977 (actually November 5th in that year). This led to the irony that I mentioned earlier. Debby Boone's "You Light Up My Life" was #1 for 10 weeks in 1977 from 10/15 to 12/17. However, for the year it didn't even make the Top 100 of 1977 because it didn't have much chart life based on the November cut-off dates. And the irony continued into 1978. Again, because of the November cut-off dates, this same single ended up as the #3 single for 1978 when in fact when 1978 started, the song had already started its chart descension. And of course the ultimate irony came at the end of the decade when it was the #1 single of the entire decade. Therefore, the calendar and the Billboard cut-off dates also skewed the Top 100 for the Year at times too.
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MCT1
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JMD1961 wrote:
| At the time these year-end charts were being compiled, Billboard used an inverse point system based on weekly chart positions to generate positions on the year-end charts. (#1=100 pts., #2=99 pts., etc. down to #100=1 pt.) A three-tier system of bonus points was given for each week a song was in the Top Ten (#1=100 bonus pts, #2-#5=50 bonus pts., #6-#10=25 bonus pts.) Using this system a song generate points based on both chart position and weeks on the chart. |
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That bonus system was kind of what I was thinking of as a way to "reward" songs that charted high. I'm surprised that, even with such a system in place, "Devil's Gun" and "I Miss You" were able to place so high in the year-end chart.
JMD1961 wrote:
| So, a song that spent only a few weeks on the chart, even if it went to a high position on the chart, would only generate a relatively short points total. While a song that was around much longer could rack of quite a score and thus chart very high on the year-end chart. In the case of "I Miss You", it was a combination of the two (a high chart position and a long chart run) that allowed it to finish at #3 for the year. |
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Understood that "I Miss You"'s chart longevity probably made it a bigger hit than your average run-of-the-mill #5 hit, but #3 song of the entire year seems a bit much. I'd hazard a guess that there were at least 30 to 40 songs with higher chart peaks than "I Miss You" that year. That "I Miss You"'s longevity made it a bigger hit than some of them, even many of them, seems plausible. That it was a bigger hit than all but two of them seems incredible.
Then again, maybe "I Miss You" was just some kind of anomaly. Debbie Gibson's 1987 hit "Only In My Dreams" had chart stats very similar to "I Miss You", run up in the same era under conditions with the same relatively high chart turnover. "Only In My Dreams" peaked one position higher (#4), and spent one less week in both the Top 40 (16) and Hot 100 (28). On the 1987 year-end rankings, it finished higher than a number of songs with higher chart peaks, including some songs that were #1 hits, an apparent testament to its chart longevity. But it didn't end up as the #3 song of the year; it was #26. What made "I Miss You" so much higher the year before? I suppose that we'd need to go through each song week-by-week, as well as those of the other big hits of those two years, to know for certain.
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JMD1961
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MCT1 wrote:
Understood that "I Miss You"'s chart longevity probably made it a bigger hit than your average run-of-the-mill #5 hit, but #3 song of the entire year seems a bit much. I'd hazard a guess that there were at least 30 to 40 songs with higher chart peaks than "I Miss You" that year. That "I Miss You"'s longevity made it a bigger hit than some of them, even many of them, seems plausible. That it was a bigger hit than all but two of them seems incredible.
Then again, maybe "I Miss You" was just some kind of anomaly. Debbie Gibson's 1987 hit "Only In My Dreams" had chart stats very similar to "I Miss You", run up in the same era under conditions with the same relatively high chart turnover. "Only In My Dreams" peaked one position higher (#4), and spent one less week in both the Top 40 (16) and Hot 100 (28). On the 1987 year-end rankings, it finished higher than a number of songs with higher chart peaks, including some songs that were #1 hits, an apparent testament to its chart longevity. But it didn't end up as the #3 song of the year; it was #26. What made "I Miss You" so much higher the year before? I suppose that we'd need to go through each song week-by-week, as well as those of the other big hits of those two years, to know for certain. |
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Well, I didn't do all songs, but I pull out my Whitburn Pop Annual and ran the numbers for "I Miss You" and the song listed as #1 for that year in the Annual -- "Say You, Say Me" by Lionel Richie. Here's the totals I came up with:
Say You, Say Me -- 2226 pts.
I Miss You -- 2147 pts.
That's just a 79 point difference.
This information is, of course, very subjective. There will always be a debate on how to determine what hits are "bigger".
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torcan
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MCT1 wrote:
| I suppose that we'd need to go through each song week-by-week, as well as those of the other big hits of those two years, to know for certain. |
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One song we haven't touched upon in this thread is Soft Cell's "Tainted Love/Where Did our Love Go". That song only peaked at No. 8 in 1982, but (IIRC) finished the year at No. 11. It had a 43-week chart run - a record at the time. The last 9 weeks of its chart life were spent in the '90s; the last 5 of which at No. 97, just barely clinging on. There were also two weeks earlier in its run where it was right at No. 100.
I've often wondered how many sales/airplay reports it takes to keep a song in the low '90s week after week, but racking up sales and airplay over 43 weeks definately vaulted this song up the year-end charts.
There was another example just a few years ago where the year's No. 1 song didn't even hit No. 1 on the Hot 100. Lifehouse's "Hanging by a Moment" only peaked at No. 2, but had a run I believe close to a year. It finished at the No. 1 song of that year.
I guess it takes more than peak positions and weeks on the chart to determine a song's ultimate popularity. Ranking it based on all the other songs that charted during a particular year can sometimes distort where we thought a song should place.
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MCT1
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torcan wrote:
One song we haven't touched upon in this thread is Soft Cell's "Tainted Love/Where Did our Love Go". That song only peaked at No. 8 in 1982, but (IIRC) finished the year at No. 11. It had a 43-week chart run - a record at the time. The last 9 weeks of its chart life were spent in the '90s; the last 5 of which at No. 97, just barely clinging on. There were also two weeks earlier in its run where it was right at No. 100.
I've often wondered how many sales/airplay reports it takes to keep a song in the low '90s week after week, but racking up sales and airplay over 43 weeks definately vaulted this song up the year-end charts. |
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All those weeks that it spent down in the lower reaches of the chart would seem to have contributed significantly to its year-end ranking, because it only spent 15 weeks in the Top 40. That was certainly a decent run, but nothing spectacular for the early '80s, when the amount of turnover on the charts was noticeably lower than it would be just a few years later (i.e., in the time of "I Miss You" and "Only In My Dreams"), and 20-week Top 40 runs were not unheard of for big hits.
Where did Paul Davis' "I Go Crazy" finish in 1977? IIRC, that song set the Top 100 weeks record that "Tainted Love" broke, and I think it may have held the Top 40 weeks record at the time as well.
torcan wrote:
| There was another example just a few years ago where the year's No. 1 song didn't even hit No. 1 on the Hot 100. Lifehouse's "Hanging by a Moment" only peaked at No. 2, but had a run I believe close to a year. It finished at the No. 1 song of that year. |
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To me, the idea of a song that peaked at #2, but had a very long chart run, finishing as the #1 song of the year is not implausible; if nothing else, it seems more plausible than "I Miss You" doing what it did under mid '80s chart conditions. In recent eras, where songs have racked up weeks-on-chart totals that would have been considered ridiculously high in the past, and recurrent rules ensured that most of those weeks were spent fairly high on the chart, I can understand how this could happen.
Didn't this actually also happen one year back in the '60s? Maybe that was a matter of a #2 song with a really long chart run during a period of high chart turnover where no #1 song was really dominant over all else, though it would be harder to see it happening under those conditions.
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JMD1961
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MCT1 wrote:
| Where did Paul Davis' "I Go Crazy" finish in 1977? IIRC, that song set the Top 100 weeks record that "Tainted Love" broke, and I think it may have held the Top 40 weeks record at the time as well. |
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Actually, "I Go Crazy" charted in 1978, though it started it's run in 1977. It finished #12 for 1978, relatively low for a song that spent 40 weeks on the chart. However, it had the misfortune of charting in the same year as "You Light Up My Life", "Night Fever", "Shadow Dancing", "Stayin' Alive", and "How Deep Is Your Love" which all enjoyed either long chart runs, or big week counts at #1. In fact, "How Deep Is Your Love" even topped "I Go Crazy"'s 25 week Top 40 run by a week.
MCT1 wrote:
| Didn't this actually also happen one year back in the '60s? Maybe that was a matter of a #2 song with a really long chart run during a period of high chart turnover where no #1 song was really dominant over all else, though it would be harder to see it happening under those conditions. |
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Yes. In 1965, "Wooly Bully" was the #1 song of the year though it only went to #2 on the weekly survey. However, this was a year with extremely short chart runs, with some #1 hits only spending 10 or 11 weeks on the Hot 100. So, with it's 9 weeks in the Top 10, 14 weeks in the Top 40, and 18 weeks in the Hot 100, "Wooly Bully" was able to come out on top.
BTW, I found a website with all the official Billboard Year-End Pop Charts:
http://longboredsurfer.com/charts.php
Enjoy.
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80smusicfreak
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torcan wrote:
| I guess it takes more than peak positions and weeks on the chart to determine a song's ultimate popularity. Ranking it based on all the other songs that charted during a particular year can sometimes distort where we thought a song should place. |
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Most definitely!
JMD1961 wrote:
| This information is, of course, very subjective. There will always be a debate on how to determine what hits are "bigger". |
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Or maybe not...
Pat/MCT1/torcan/JMD1961/maciav:
Since I first brought it up here on this chat board nearly three years ago, after seeing this thread recently take off on the subject of "Billboard" chart methodology and yearly rankings, I feel I'd be remiss if I didn't remind you folks (and newcomers) about the paperback book titled "Rock 100" by Jim Quirin & Barry Cohen...
"Rock 100" ranks the top 100 singles for each year in the U.S. from 1954-91, based on "Billboard"'s "Hot 100" chart, similar to Joel Whitburn's "Pop Annual". However, Quirin & Cohen developed THEIR OWN high-tech methodology to determine the rankings, thus making their work/rankings much more definitive than the year-end charts published annually in "Billboard" or the system used by Whitburn in his "Pop Annual"...
The first edition of "Rock 100" came out in 1975, and ended w/ the fifth edition being published in 1992 (which runs through 1991). Unfortunately, unlike Whitburn's, the book was pretty obscure (I used to see & flip through it in the book dept. at the now-defunct Tower Records chain in the '90s) and is long out-of-print! I've long regretted not buying a copy of the book myself at the time; about the only thing that made me pass was that it only ranked the top 100 songs for each year, as opposed to every song that made the "Hot 100", like Whitburn's "Pop Annual" (which I have several editions of, including the latest)...
Anyway, after inquiring about the book here in 2005 (couldn't remember the title or authors' names), and getting a correct i.d. on it (thanks again to mike sparrow!), I searched the 'net, and it turned out that Quirin & Cohen did indeed have their own web site, which details their various music-related books, and from where you could place orders: www.chartmasters.biz. You can also use the search engine on their "Find A Hit" page to learn the top 50 hits of any given year from 1954-1991, as published in their book. Unfortunately, the web site hasn't been updated since 2003, so I don't know if it's still active; I just sent out an e-mail to them, and will post here if I get any response...
At any rate, I HIGHLY recommend "Rock 100" for folks who love to analyze the numbers & rankings of the biggest hit songs during the rock era - Quirin & Cohen's methodology will help put most of the above arguments to rest! (MCT1 and JMD1961, this post is aimed at you two in particular - buy their book, and you guys may just become converts yet, lol...)
To cover the songs being discussed here:
C.J. & Co.'s 1977 hit, "Devil's Gun", ranks #195 for that year in Whitburn's "Pop Annual" and #100 in "Billboard"'s own year-end rankings - but all of those extra weeks on the "Hot 100" weren't enough to get it into the top 100 for '77 using Quirin & Cohen's methodology, but I guarantee you it must've come close (i.e., definitely higher than Whitburn's ranking)!
Klymaxx's 1985 hit, "I Miss You"??? #57 according to Whitburn, didn't rank at all in "Billboard"'s own year-end listing (but later appeared at #3 for 1986), and #3 in Quirin & Cohen's book...
REO Speedwagon's 1987 hit, "In My Dreams"??? #152 according to Whitburn, didn't rank at all in "Billboard"'s own year-end listing for either 1987 or '88 (sorry, torcan!), but jumps to #91 in Quirin & Cohen's book...
Debby Boone's 1977 hit, "You Light Up My Life"??? #1 according to Whitburn, didn't rank at all in "Billboard"'s own year-end listing (but later appeared at #3 for 1978), and #1 in Quirin & Cohen's book. (Oh, and maciav: Quirin & Cohen's book eliminates the "nuance" you brought up regarding "Billboard"'s own year-end rankings, which you correctly note were based on roughly a Nov. 1 - Oct. 31 time frame; as noted above, Klymaxx's "I Miss You" was also a victim, pushing it to '86. Q&C used Jan. 1 - Dec. 31. And of course, Whitburn's rankings are actually skewed by the peak dates, although Whitburn & Q&C are still in agreement here...)
Debbie Gibson's 1987 hit, "Only in My Dreams"??? #56 according to Whitburn, moved up to #26 in "Billboard"'s own year-end rankings, but actually jumps all the way to #8 in Quirin & Cohen's book...
Soft Cell's 1982 hit, "Tainted Love"??? #55 according to Whitburn, moved up to #11 in "Billboard"'s own year-end rankings, and sits at #20 in Quirin & Cohen's book...
Lifehouse's 2001 hit, "Hanging By a Moment"??? #16 according to Whitburn, but moved up all the way to #1 in "Billboard"'s own year-end rankings (Q&C have yet to cover 2001, as far as I know)...
Paul Davis' 1978 hit, "I Go Crazy"??? #53 according to Whitburn, moved up to #12 in "Billboard"'s own year-end rankings, and jumps all the way to #5 in Quirin & Cohen's book (by their methodology, only "Night Fever", "Shadow Dancing", "How Deep is Your Love", and "Stayin' Alive" topped it, respectively)...
Sam the Sham & the Pharaohs' 1965 hit, "Wooly Bully"??? #27 according to Whitburn, #1 in "Billboard"'s own year-end rankings, but slips to #3 in Quirin & Cohen's book (behind "[I Can't Get No] Satisfaction" and "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'", respectively)...
Yikes! Sorry for the length of this post... :-)
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80smusicfreak
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| Posted: 06 February 2008 at 8:15am | IP Logged
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80smusicfreak wrote:
| C.J. & Co.'s 1977 hit, "Devil's Gun", [didn't get] into the top 100 for '77 using Quirin & Cohen's methodology, but I guarantee you it must've come close (i.e., definitely higher than Whitburn's ranking)! |
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Correction: I should've said top 50; it could very well have ranked somewhere between #51 and #100 for the year in their book...
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jimct
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| Posted: 09 March 2009 at 9:10pm | IP Logged
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Pat, thanks for checking on/adding the late 2008, V/A "Westbound Records: 40th Anniversary" CD to the database, which I'd recently asked about inside the "Funky Worm" thread. Since this is the first commercially-released CD that I know of that features the song "Devil's Gun" on it, FYI, I thought I'd mention that the version of the song on this CD runs (4:59). I don't know if the version on this V/A disc is the same version of the song that Paul Eschen acquired on his "DJs only" disc, mentioned in this topic's opening post. Paul said he could not successfully create the 45 version from his CD, so keep this fact in mind if you are considering a purchase of this V/A piece - you may or may not run into the same problem he did.
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torcan
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| Posted: 11 March 2009 at 9:08am | IP Logged
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Just re-reading this thread and wanted to make one more comment: a lot of the higher over point totals from the mid ‘70s-early ‘80s came from the way Billboard ran their charts at the time. For several years, almost anytime a song moved up the chart – especially in the top 20 portion of it – it earned a “bullet” (or a “star” as Billboard used at the time). Before a song would be allowed to fall down the chart, it first had to “hold” in its peak position and “lose the star”. After a while they introduced “superstars” for the week’s biggest movers, which meant songs had to go from superstar, to holding with a star, then holding without the star, then finally falling. (This practice led to some very big drops when songs were returned to their rightful place on the charts).
Because of the number of weeks songs were forced to stay in their peak position, this led to much higher point totals from weeks in the upper portions of the chart. When they changed chart directors in April 1983, songs were then allowed to move more freely, which led to a more rapid turnover.
One wonders what the charts would have really looked like had songs been allowed to move freely from the beginning.
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Santi Paradoa
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| Posted: 11 March 2009 at 12:32pm | IP Logged
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PaulEschen wrote:
Although not listed by Pat, this song did make it to #36 in Billboard, and
was #100 for 1977's Top 100 singles in Billboard. I just bought a CD
single of this (with "We Got Our Own Thing") from Europe that was
released for dance DJ use. It's copyrighted from Westbound Records, and
does not sound as though it came from a vinyl source. I bought it to edit
it down to the 45 version, and found that you can't. The 45 version starts
out with a short drum roll not found on the LP version, and there is added
tympani in the intro. It IS nice to have a good copy of this song, though,
as it was one of my few favorites from the Disco Era. Now, to find the 45
version someday. |
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Does anyone have the actual run time for this 45? The (4:59) length must be the LP run time. If memory serves me right the listed time on the commercial 45 is (3:17). According to the first entry for this topic you can't edit the longer track to get the 45.
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Santi Paradoa
Miami, Florida
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Top 40 Music on Compact Disc : Chat Board
Topic: C.J. & Co. - Devil’s Gun
