More Weird Chart Movements

[mstgator]

Apr 25, 2010 23:25:49 GMT -5 canat40fan said:

Apr 20, 2010 21:39:45 GMT -5 mstgator said:

This one really isn't that weird (peaked at #70 and spent 13 weeks on the Hot 100), but the fact that it was chosen as an extra on last week's "AT40: The '70s" makes it somewhat worth noting.

Keith Hampshire, "The First Cut Is The Deepest"
100-85-80-74-70-70-70-83-76-74-74-76-78

Peaking at #70 on the Hot 100 and being chosen as an extra is extremely odd. I'd certainly like to find out the reasoning for the sake of curiousity. Keith Hampshire was based out of Canada and the song hit #1 up here in '73 so it's very familar. Unfortunately I didn't hear it during the AT40 classic re-broadcast as my usual station does not play the extras.

I'm not sure why they picked that song, other than the fact that the composition itself is very well known (in versions by Rod Stewart and Sheryl Crow, as well as the Cat Stevens original). It's certainly refreshing though to hear a song that wasn't a major national hit here stateside; wish they'd do it more often.

[bigal]

DEVILS GUN by CJ and Co. It peaked at #36, but stayed in the hot 100 for 27 weeks! It was also #100 in the Billboard top 100 for 1977.

[bigal]

Also, CONVENTION 72 by the Delegates, enters the top 10 in its second week in the top 40, then drops off the top 10 in its 4th week.

SWEET MARY by Wadworth Mansion, debut in the top 40 at #15 (so Casey was wrong when he said WITH A LITTLE LUCK was the highest debut song in top 40 history at the time!), enters the top ten next week, only to drop off in its 4th week.

[mkarns]

Jun 8, 2010 5:11:27 GMT -5 bigal said:

Also, CONVENTION 72 by the Delegates, enters the top 10 in its second week in the top 40, then drops off the top 10 in its 4th week.

SWEET MARY by Wadworth Mansion, debut in the top 40 at #15 (so Casey was wrong when he said WITH A LITTLE LUCK was the highest debut song in top 40 history at the time!), enters the top ten next week, only to drop off in its 4th week.

In fact, later in 1971 Isaac Hayes' "Theme From 'Shaft'" debuted on AT40 at #9, and spent two weeks at #1. It's one of the show's inexplicable oddities and errors that this fact was overlooked by Casey and the rest of the AT40 staff when "With a Little Luck" debuted at #17 in April 1978 (in fact, IIRC, there had been six songs that had debuted at #17 or higher on AT40 at that point.)

As for lower charting songs that spent a lot of time in the Hot 100, in 1989-90 "If You Leave Me Now" by Jaya was on the chart for 26 weeks and went no higher than #44. The song was thus never actually played on AT40, but I recall Shadoe mentioning that statistic.

[torcan]

I've always been puzzled at how fast songs dropped from their peak positions in the '70s and parts of the '80s.

Sometimes songs would take a long time to peak ("I Love the Nightlife", "Key Largo", "Pleasea Don't Go", etc.) and then drop like a rocket, disappearing off the charts in just a few weeks.

"I Love the Nightlife", for example, was still at No. 5 in its 27th week on the Hot 100 in 1979. Four weeks after that it was off the chart completely. I can understand a song peaking in popularity with sales and airplay declining, but that quickly - and with so many songs?

I was also curious about how the charts in the '60s worked. Quite frequently that decade songs could drop off the Hot 100 from the 20s. Were the songs between 20-100 THAT close in popularity, or did Billboard have an unwritten rule at the time to take off dropping songs in favor of putting new releases on the chart?

[tarobe]

This is not a chart movement, but it is a weird chart fact. After "Something in Common" by Bobby Brown and Whitney Houston peaked at #12 on December 4, 1993, no other song peaked at that position ever again on the original show.

In other words, no song peaked at #12 in 1994!

[80sfreak]

Jul 2, 2010 18:06:52 GMT -5 torcan said:

I've always been puzzled at how fast songs dropped from their peak positions in the '70s and parts of the '80s.

Sometimes songs would take a long time to peak ("I Love the Nightlife", "Key Largo", "Pleasea Don't Go", etc.) and then drop like a rocket, disappearing off the charts in just a few weeks.

"I Love the Nightlife", for example, was still at No. 5 in its 27th week on the Hot 100 in 1979. Four weeks after that it was off the chart completely. I can understand a song peaking in popularity with sales and airplay declining, but that quickly - and with so many songs?

I was also curious about how the charts in the '60s worked. Quite frequently that decade songs could drop off the Hot 100 from the 20s. Were the songs between 20-100 THAT close in popularity, or did Billboard have an unwritten rule at the time to take off dropping songs in favor of putting new releases on the chart?

82 was a weird year. I never saw so many songs hold their positions for as long as they did, and then continue to move up..or on the way down, hold on to the same position.

And then you had songs like Vacation from the GoGos who was burning up the charts, then peaked at 8, fell to 11 and then completely off the Top 40, to 57.