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May 4, 2017 · Billboard’s top singles of the ’60s shows the diversity of the decade and its changing tastes, from early dance and instrumental tunes to the rock and soul hits nearer to the 1970s.
Aug 15, 2022 · Arguably one of the most well-known soul songs from the 1960s, “ My Girl ” by The Temptations leads with that iconic first lyric, “I’ve got sunshine on a cloudy day.”. Written by Smokey Robinson, the track was an instant success and the band’s very first #1 song on the charts.
Dec 19, 2023 · Jumping to the latest year-end Hot 100 Songs ranking — which now blends streaming, radio airplay and sales data — Morgan Wallen’s 16-week No. 1 “Last Night” finished as 2023’s top ...
- Xander Zellner
The Billboard Hot 100 is a singles chart published by Billboard which measures the most popular singles in the United States. Prior to the creation of the Hot 100, Billboard published four singles charts: "Best Sellers in Stores", "Most Played by Jockeys", "Most Played in Jukeboxes" and "The Top 100". These charts, which ranged from 20 to 100 ...
- Roger Miller – King of The Road
- Georgie Fame & The Blue Flames – Yeh, Yeh
- Jackie Wilson –
- Roy Orbison – Crying
- Russell Morris – The Real Thing
- Leonard Cohen – Suzanne
- Louis Armstrong – What A Wonderful World
- Tom Jones – It’S Not Unusual
- The Monkees – Daydream Believer
- Del Shannon – Runaway
Roger Miller’s “King of the Road” shines a light on the traveling man. The track, a delightful country-pop crossover, tells the story of a nomadic hobo, untethered from all obligations and material goods. The song’s most famous line, “I’m a man of means, by no means, king of the road” was bitingly cynical, reveling in the freedom of refusing to con...
Georgie Fame and his band, The Blue Flames, found the perfect intersection of pop, jazz, and R&B. Audiences agreed. The group’s version of “Yeh Yeh,” topped the Beatles’ “I Feel Fine” on the UK chart, ending a five-week run from the Liverpool chaps. Shortly after topping the UK charts, “Yeh, Yeh” reached #21 on the Billboard Pop charts, proving tha...
The instrumentation for Jackie Wilson’s “(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher” is as crisp as it gets. The bass sounds like it was recorded in a hermetically sealed vacuum, while the iconic conga groove pops without a crinkle or crack. All Wilson had to do was show up. And show up he did. The instrumental for the 1967 hit was written by G...
Roy Orbison had plenty of 60s hits to choose from, including “Oh, Pretty Woman” But we opted for “Crying,” which begins with a seminal line, familiar to those even who have never heard the song: “I was alright for a while, I could smile for a while.” The song is Orbison at his most vulnerable, admitting that the feelings hidden from a former partne...
Written by Johnny Young and produced by Ian “Molly” Meldrum, “The Real Thing” was initially envisioned as a soft-rock ballad in a similar vein as The Beatles’ “Strawberry Fields Forever.” But the demo was superseded by Meldrum’s expansive vision, and “The Real Thing” became one of the first studio masterpieces of the modern era. Alongside engineer ...
Leonard Cohen drew a throughline straight from poetry to folk music. “Suzanne,” his stirring acoustic track from Songs of Leonard Cohen is one of the most powerful examples of this style, with Cohen’s lyrics first appearing as a poem in 1966. (Cohen ripped the poem for a second use because he was short of material for his forthcoming album.) The so...
“What a Wonderful World” is a lesson in perseverance. It’s also one of the best pop ballads ever recorded. Armstrongfirst started making records in 1923, but it was in February of 1968, when Amstrong was 66, that he released “What A Wonderful World,” which would become the biggest-selling song of his massively influential career. Armstrong made mus...
It’s hard to believe now, but Tom Jones was deemed far too sexy for the BBC when he first arrived in the 60s with this song. As such, it was the efforts of pirate radio station Radio Caroline that drove the initial success of Jones’s “It’s Not Unusual.” The upbeat tale of heartbreak was Jones’s second single for Decca Records and his first No.1. Ru...
John Stewart wrote “Daydream Believer” shortly before he left the Kingston Trio, the third track in a trilogy aimed at capturing the malaise and boredom of suburban life. In that respect, he was an innovator, bringing life to the lifeless suburbs in a cry for help – or, at least, a helicopter back to the city. The song was turned down by both We Fi...
“Runaway” almost never happened. Back in 1960, Charles Westover and keyboard player Max Crook earned a recording contract. The recording contract ended disastrously. Perhaps it was another tale of small-town kids intimidated by the Big Apple, but Crook and Westover (who had recently taken on the stage name Del Shannon) failed to impress the bosses ...
Three Steps to Heaven. Eddie Cochran. Three Steps to Heaven. 52. Jealous of you (Tango della gelosia) Connie Francis. Jealous of you (Tango della gelosia) 53. Please Help Me, I'm Falling.
Year-End Hot 100 singles of 2017. "Shape of You" by Ed Sheeran came in at number one, spending a total of twelve nonconsecutive weeks at the top position of the Billboard Hot 100 during 2017. [1] ". Castle on the Hill" from the same album also made the list, at position 40. The Billboard Hot 100 is a chart that ranks the best-performing singles ...
