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Post by torcan on Jul 2, 2010 18:52:54 GMT -5
I think Billboard must have had a rule at the time that shoved songs that were on their way down to the bottom of the Hot 100, allowing new songs to debut at least in the top 95. Since random chance would suggest that approximately 50% of #100s would be debuting, it must have been a conscious manipulation. My question is, why? And in what other ways did they deviate from a strict formula? There were certainly human manipulation of the charts back then. It's been mentioned in other posts about the way Billboard ran their charts for many years - if a song moved up with a "star" (or "bullet" as its commonly known) it couldn't fall the following week. If it had a "superstar" (used from fall 1980-spring 1983), quite often it would have to convert its superstar to a star, then lose its star resulting in three weeks or more at its peak position. Usually after that it would take a huge drop down the charts and be off in a few short weeks. This quite frequently created "traffic jams" near the top of the charts resulting in very little movement for weeks at a time. Sometimes it would block out songs which probably should have moved into higher positions. You sometimes wonder about the accuracy of the charts back then - Billboard didn't seem to treat the chart position as a position of popularity back then - as long as the song gained it couldn't drop, even if another song should have jumped over it and pushed it down. In April 1983 Billboard changed chart directors and songs were allowed to move more freely - even dropping down from stars the previous weeks. The chart positions more accurately represented songs popularity rank after that. However, the No. 100 rule stayed in effect until late in the 1980s.
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Post by bigal on Jul 3, 2010 6:59:19 GMT -5
Correct me if I am wrong, but I recall one tune, back when I read Billboard in the newstand, that was moving up with a star, and next week, it fell off the top 40., It was ASHES BY NOW by Rodney Crowell.
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Post by mstgator on Jul 5, 2010 9:37:19 GMT -5
Correct me if I am wrong, but I recall one tune, back when I read Billboard in the newstand, that was moving up with a star, and next week, it fell off the top 40., It was ASHES BY NOW by Rodney Crowell. Well, sort of. "Ashes By Now" was at #39 with a star on 6/28/80. It moved up to #37 with no star on 7/05 and then fell to #48 on 7/12, so it followed the standard chart rule at the time. But... since there was no regular AT40 on 7/05, the song was heard for only one week in the countdown, with a star.
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Post by matt on Sept 11, 2014 15:42:04 GMT -5
OK so I'm bumping this thread way up--last reply was in 2010. But I came across it and some of the questions are asking whether a song ever debuted at #100 and made it to #1. Then Pete B pointed out Maureen McGovern's "The Morning After", which started it's chart run at #120 and made it to #1.
But how about this one: the infamous Zager & Evans hit "In the Year 2525" debuted on the bubbling under chart at #135 on June 14, 1969 - the very lowest position on any of the Billboard singles charts ever. And proceeded to eventually spend 6 weeks at #1 before eventually dropping completely off the chart from #39 in September of that year. An unbreakable record of sorts for the longest climb within the charts from debut to peak (position-wise, not time-wise) - unless someday Billboard decides to expand the Hot 100 to include more than 135 positions.
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Post by briguy52748 on Sept 11, 2014 16:31:43 GMT -5
I seem to remember at least one country song that did this – debuted on the chart at No. 100 and eventually reached No. 1 – on the Hot Country Singles chart during its time as a 100-position chart (July 1973 through January 1990), and that came fairly soon after Billboard started the 100-position chart. I need to do some research to determine what that was, however.
As a point of trivia, Alabama's first-ever chart entry on the Hot Country Singles chart, "I Wanna Be With You Tonight," debuted at No. 100 on July 23, 1977, spent several weeks there and eventually climbed slowly up the chart … to peak at No. 84 in early September. It would be their last chart single for two years, when they reached No. 33 with "I Wanna Come Over." And then "My Home's In Alabama" came out … and then "Tennessee River" and it was no looking back for the boys from Fort Payne, Ala. … and it all started with a song that make its entry at No. 100.
Brian
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Post by briguy52748 on Sept 11, 2014 16:39:08 GMT -5
What'd be more interesting is for someone to compile a list of songs that spent one week on the chart, appearing only at No. 100 on its only week on the Hot 100 chart (or possibly the Hot Soul/R&B Singles or Hot Country Singles chart) … and then the artist or band never appeared on the charts again, ever, in any form or on any of Billboard's charts.
That is, their one week on one of the charts, in the lowest possible position was their one and only week where their name ever appeared in print in an issue of Billboard magazine
Brian
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ds
Junior Member
Posts: 71
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Post by ds on Sept 11, 2014 20:52:25 GMT -5
I only have info on the Hot 100, Country Songs, and (only the top 40) of R&B/HipHop/Soul, but these are the artists who only appeared one week on the Hot 100 at #100 and were not on the country or (top 40 of) the R&B chart. I have no clue about the other charts.
Lee and Paul - The Chick 3/30/1959
The Texans - Green Grass Of Texas 3/27/1961
The Excels - Can't Help Lovin' That Girl Of Mine 6/5/1961
Helen Shapiro - Walkin' Back To Happiness 12/4/1961
Jimmie Beaumont - Ev'rybody's Cryin' 12/25/1961
The Castle Sisters - Goodbye Dad 7/21/1962
Carroll Brothers - Sweet Georgia Brown 8/18/1962
Pete Antell - Night Time 12/8/1962
A.B. Skhy - Camel Back 12/6/1969
The 21st Century - Remember The Rain? 5/31/1975
1927 - That's When I Think Of You 8/26/1989
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Post by at40petebattistini on Sept 13, 2014 7:55:29 GMT -5
What'd be more interesting is for someone to compile a list of songs that spent one week on the chart, appearing only at No. 100 on its only week on the Hot 100 chart (or possibly the Hot Soul/R&B Singles or Hot Country Singles chart) … and then the artist or band never appeared on the charts again, ever, in any form or on any of Billboard's charts. That is, their one week on one of the charts, in the lowest possible position was their one and only week where their name ever appeared in print in an issue of Billboard magazine Brian Brian, Would *two* weeks count? One-hit wonder Brian Auger & The Trinity (can you call this artist a "one hit" wonder?) spent 2 weeks at #100 with "Listen Here" in October 1970.
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Post by davewollenberg on Sept 13, 2014 11:49:33 GMT -5
Brian, I was looking in Joel Whitburn's country annual. The only 1 that came closest to debuting at #100, and goin' all the way to #1 was, 'Jolene' by Dolly Parton. It came on to the 100 spot chart at #98, 11-3-73.
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Post by countdownmike on Sept 13, 2014 17:28:27 GMT -5
Check me on this but I think "Get Down Tonight" by K.C. & The Sunshine debuted on the Hot Soul Singles chart at #100 in April 1975, then fell off completely about 4-5 weeks later, then reappeared in June and shot to #1.
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Post by saltrek on Sept 13, 2014 21:44:19 GMT -5
I checked Google Books and they don't have any April 1975 issues. They do have the June 14,1975 issue however, and "Get Down Tonight" is listed as a "New Entry" at #93; not a re-entry.
The next issue available on Google Books is 8/9/75 - 9 weeks later - and "Get Down Tonight" is listed as being on the chart for 9 weeks.
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Post by mct1 on Sept 14, 2014 7:47:29 GMT -5
Back during the '80s I recall reading that a song had to have a minimum number of stations playing it (10% of the reporting panel, or something like that) in order to debut. That in itself may have been enough to keep the majority of songs during that period from debuting below a certain chart threshold (with some exceptions). In the early-to-mid '80s, songs seemed to rarely debut below #90, though there were occasional exceptions. The songs below #90 in any given week were almost always droppers, and because few songs debuted below #90, few songs peaked at #90 or below. A rule like the one described above would be a plausible explanation for this. In any event, this made it virtually impossible for a song in that era to go from #100 to #1. Kind of on topic...looking through the Top Pop Hits book, The Group 1927 had a song called "That's When I Think Of You" and it entered at #100 on 8/26/89 and lasted all of 1 week. I'm sure there may be others, but that was an eye-opener!!! The previous one before that to hit #100 for just ONE week was in 1975, "Remember The Rain" by 21st Century. There were a couple to be at #100 for two weeks in between that "Dance Little Lady Dance" by Danny White (I think anyway) and "Discomania" by The Lovers both in 1977. Jody Watley and Seal had a couple of #100 peakers in the '90s "Long Way To Love" by the hair-metal band Britny Fox peaked at #100 in the fall of 1988, spending two weeks there. It wouldn't surprise me if "Long Way To Love" and "That's When I Think Of You" were the only two songs to peak at #100 during the 1980s.
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Post by mstgator on Sept 14, 2014 12:30:23 GMT -5
I checked Google Books and they don't have any April 1975 issues. They do have the June 14,1975 issue however, and "Get Down Tonight" is listed as a "New Entry" at #93; not a re-entry. The next issue available on Google Books is 8/9/75 - 9 weeks later - and "Get Down Tonight" is listed as being on the chart for 9 weeks. Must be a case where Billboard "forgot" to include the first chart run, as Whitburn shows the song first debuting on the Soul chart on 4/12/75 (and would spend a cumulative 23 weeks on).
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Post by countdownmike on Sept 14, 2014 14:43:31 GMT -5
Thanks for checking and confirming my memory of "Get Down Tonight" and its unusual chart run. I was a shortwave enthusiast at the time and heard many of their early, early hits on "The BBC World Service Top 20" around 7:00PM ET on Tuesday nights. I had heard "Get Down Tonight" on that show and was sure it was going to fail stateside because at the time it didn't sound like American Top 40 material. So it's not surprising it languished for an entire three months before hitting the Hot 100 in July 1975.
Thanks again for checking on that for me!
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