Entertainment For Lively Minds
20 Best Number Ones - what were you (not) thinking of?
Posted by Stan Halen on 11 March 2008 - 2:44am.
The new issue thunks on the doormat. Thumb thumb thumb. Ah yes, 20 Worst Number Ones, good idea. Check; check; take your word for it (never knowingly heard James Blunt); ooh, harsh; etc.
Turn page - 20 Best Number Ones. Check; check; take your word for it (never knowingly heard Beyonce or that Kylie one); Kate Bush? - you must be joking; etc.
In summary, mostly fair. But one omission from the 20 best really is a shocker. This first pleasured my ears 37 summers ago and I still remember how it sounded like nothing else that went before. The most fuzztastic one-hit wonder ever. An inspired choice for the opening credits of the undeservedly forgotten Miami Blues. And it still sounds ace.
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Number 22 in the top 20
Hit me with your rhythm stick I'm pretty sure was a number one (can't find my Guiness book of Hit Singles, must be in the loft) and should be on any list. Then again I don't know which one it'd replace. The 20 listed would make a great compilation CD. By the way in these paper free times does anyone know of a website that does what the book of Hit singles does? Save me crawling about in the loft.
British Number Ones
Try this one Michael:
http://www.onlineweb.com/theones/
Brilliant
Thanks Stephen
1970: a decent year, all right? Noddarf!
In there among the heaving, hurling, upchucking weight of the Danas, Yellow Rivers and Clive Dunn's Grandad, it turns out that "Spirit In The Sky" was in pretty good company up there at the top of the chart that year:
Simon & Garfunkel - Bridge Over Troubled Water
Mungo Jerry - In The Summertime
Smokey Robinson & The Miracles - Tears Of A Clown
Matthews Southern Comfort - Woodstock
Jimi Hendrix - Voodoo Chile
Dave Edmunds - I Hear You Knockin'
Incidentally, "SITS" (as it's known to its friends) is apparently on some kind of 16-to-17-year cycle, rather like a lesser but fondly awaited comet. [Ask Neil Spencer; he'll know - Ed.] Cover versions of it also made it to No. 1 in 1986 and 2002.
Agreed, although...
I've long thought 1970 a great year for number ones, although you've missed the greatest of them all - Freda Payne's Band of Gold.
Yikes
How did that one slip through the Net trawl?
Ace reminder Stan
79p lighter and happy
My work is done
You're welcome, Kev