If you’re reading this, then I’ll just bet:
Since you were about, let’s say, three years old, or so…
… you remember the magic of hearing music come out of the magic little box called “the radio.”
And if you are one of those weird and wonderful ones who subsequently morphed from casual listener to certified chart geek? Then you have earned the right to tell the world: you have great ears.
Go ahead. Brag. Take out an ad. You know your stuff. All these these years later, you can cite, within a reasonable margin of error, exactly how your faves did on the charts.
Until the day that you get fooled. Tricked. Owned.
It’s true for even the most knowledgeable of listeners: Sometimes, you’ll be bopping along to a favorite, and try to recall its top chart position. Lessee… that was a Top 10? Top 5? Hmm… Did it sputter at a soul-crushing #2?
Because you strive for accuracy, you do your research.
And then you learn that your beloved tune didn’t make it anywhere near the Top Twenty – in fact, it never saw the light of day on the Top 40.
Keep your feet on the ground, and…
..oh, forget it.”
I don’t know if it’s due to my rapidly aging brain, or some other unexplainable anomaly: But I have to admit it: I have been shocked, shocked, over the past couple of years on several occasions when I learn:
Records that I could have sworn were bigger hits than our friends at Billboard had tabulated as such, are – while great pieces of music – chart floppers.
I should be an expert at this by now. The only consolation – maybe – is that misery loves company?
Let’s have a look at twenty tortuous examples of this phenomenon, ranked by increasing incredulity.
Is anyone else surprised at the numbers below?
1979:
#86
Don’t Stop Me Now
Queen
If you remember this as a Top 10 hit, then you were a UK radio listener. Like many songs from the Queen discography, TV and movie placement have made this recognizable in the States – but it wasn’t a hit like it was across the pond.
1986: #81
Graceland
Paul Simon
An 80’s standout by Paul Simon. It may not have been a Top-40 hit, but the Grammys thought it was worthy of recognition, and honored it as Record Of The Year. But as a single, it came up short: running out of gas in the lower 20% of the Hot 100.
1992: #79:
Jeremy
Pearl Jam
The typical Pearl Jam fan was likely an album buyer. But it still seems that this classic would have done better on the singles charts.
1983: #78, 1990: #76
I Melt With You
Modern English
Oh, for goodness sakes. A song that was:
- – a mainstay during the MTV imperial phase
- – popular on radio, and in dance clubs
- – featured in the movie Valley Girl
…stalled at #78? It seems impossible. Even when Modern English re-recorded the record in 1990, it still never cracked the Top 40.
1977: #68, 1983: #84
Solsbury Hill
Peter Gabriel
Released as a single from his debut solo album, it managed to get all the way up to #13 – but only in the UK. The live version released a few years later fared even worse.
1983: #66
Freak-A-Zoid
Midnight Star
OK, we admit that this one was not as big a record as No Parking On The Dance Floor. But… this one was everywhere in 1983. A #66 peak seems weirdly inaccurate.
1982: #65
Goodbye To You
Scandal Featuring Patty Smyth
Maybe it’s because I liked The Warrior so much, that I remembered this to be a stronger follow-up song than it was. In any event, Goodbye To You feels at least 40 positions in the wrong direction.
1982: #62
I Want Candy
Bow Wow Wow
Top 10 in London; engine failure in the States. And why? Bow Wow Wow had the look, the sound, and that snappy little guitar hook. This record deserved more than #62.
1983: #56
Sharp Dressed Man
ZZ Top
#56? Impossible. Sure, Legs was the bigger hit for the band, but not even cracking the Top 40 seems way off. Especially considering that this song was the followup to the perhaps lesser Gimme All Your Lovin’. Go figure.
1983: #53
New Year’s Day
U2
Well, now: it’s getting personal. I know; they were just beginning to break in the US. But with the best dank-and-bleak piano sound of all time, New Year’s Day is just about my favorite U2 record. I humbly request a recount.
I was shocked enough to see that this record goes all the way back to 1989. Good grief. And then – to see that this beautiful and unique anthem only made it to #52? It defies logic; it’s one of the best guitar-duo records of the past 40 years.
1982: #45 – 1983: #50
Should I Stay or Should I Go
The Clash
When this record failed to make Top 40, the record company decided to try again a year later. It still failed, actually doing a bit worse. Oddly, it sort of hit #1 in the UK eight years later, as the flip side to Big Audio Dynamite’s Rush. A victory of sorts, albeit on a technicality.
1991: #49
There She Goes
The La’s
So catchy, with just the right amount of circa-1965-throwback, Beatlesque guitar work. But apparently, it wasn’t enough to make it it a big hit. But you can’t keep a good song down: Eight years later, a version by Sixpence None The Richer made it to #14.
1981: #49
Tempted
Squeeze
Seriously? Who doesn’t know this record? Another crazy-good songwriting example of many by Difford and Tilbrook. And Paul Carrack is singing lead? How could this not be a Top 10 record? Maybe we can blame an inexperienced producer. Oh, sorry – that would be Elvis Costello. Yikes!
1979: #47
Highway to Hell
AC/DC
Here’s how obvious a hit this record is: Springsteen has covered it in concert. And probably Paul Anka, too. The next time we see folks nodding their heads and singing along, we’ll not mention that it stopped moving at #47.
1984: #46
Rebel Yell
Billy Idol
Another sorta silly – but ubiquitous MTV staple. For the “more, more, mores” alone, this should have fared better, better, better on the charts.
1990: #45
Handle with Care
Traveling Wilburys
One of the biggest supergroups ever assembled had a terrific hit single from their first album. They likely didn’t care, but it seems a little odd that this one wasn’t at least a Top 20 record.
1985: #44
Centerfield
John Fogerty
For the joyous Americana feel and the fun handclaps alone? This had to be a Top 10 record, anyway. Right? Nope. Yer out! For what many would say was one of Fogerty’s career best, it’s a surprise at #45.
1975: #41
Changes
David Bowie
You learn something new all the time. Prior to last year, I had been living my life not knowing that David Bowie’s Changes was not a top 5 record. This can’t possibly be. (I’ll still show off and casually tell folks that his real name is David Jones. I need to keep up some appearance of knowingness.)
1996: #41
That Thing You Do!
The Wonders
I don’t care if The Wonders weren’t a real band – this is a great record. And it deserved to be in the Top 10 (preferably landing at Number 7, for you fans of the film.) Mike Viola’s vocal and the late Adam Schlesinger’s perfect-pop songwriting make this “fake” record better than many “real” records of 1996.
OK, any surprises? What sure-fire big hits do you know of that failed to dent the Top 40?
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I always think of this ubiquitous 1984 song that didn’t make the Hot 100 thanks to Billboard’s stuffy rules
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bke7L0E8hu4
Stone cold classic!
Great article, mt. Atta webmaster. This just solidifies my position that if a great song makes the top 40 (or a chart’s upper echelon of your choice) the best stuff usually never rises above, say #30 or #35.
Happy New Year, TNOCS!
You did a GREAT job here, mt58! A lot of these were befuddling. “Freak-a-Zoid”? “Centerfield”?? “Goodbye to You”??? I would have bet money that these all made the Top 40.
.
And it’s good that somebody likes “New Year’s Day”. But when we’re listening to tunes together (a situation I’d love to be in), I’ll let you veto one of my choices if I can veto that one. 🙂
Speaking of faulty memory, “Goodbye To You” wasn’t the follow up to “The Warrior”. It came out almost two years earlier. It was in heavy rotation on MTV, which made it seem much bigger than it was. ‘Mexican Radio” by Wall of Voodoo falls in the same category.
yesterday there was a conversation in the gum discord about ‘Teenage Dirtbag’ by Wheatus that was exponentially less popular stateside than it was here, where it was a staple of the early 00s primary school disco. She [the US single-buying public] doesn’t know what she’s missing.
It’s always bugged me that this gem stalled at #71 on the Hot 100. Even without the video it should’ve gotten more traction at radio.
https://youtu.be/GHhD4PD75zY?si=lA6g4ACzzojVaUZI
Oh, my. SNL, back in the day when I knew who every musical guest was. “Graceland”. Seeing Ladysmith Black Mambazo duet with Paul Simon on “Homeless” was an out-of-body experience. I was transfixed. I liked “Graceland”, too. My esteem for the title track grew when I learned that the song was about Carrie Fisher. It’s also a part of Orlando Bloom’s sonic map to Kirsten Dunst’s heart in Cameron Crowe’s unfairly panned Elizabethtown. That film turned the auteur Crowe into a director for hire. It’s time for a reappraisal.
“Jeremy”: #79? Wow. That music video is iconic. And speculative.
Fun fact: Mark Pellington directed a film called I Melt With You.
My favorite underperforming song is Lone Justice’s “Shelter”. It stalled at #67. Wrong production? I have no idea. “Shelter” sounds glorious live. Maria McKee, in my opinion, should’ve been a contender. Her band just missed the alt-country wave. But then again, nobody paid any attention to her self-titled album either. Certain Brandi Carlisle songs remind me of McKee.
All bets are off with early 90s alternative and the Hot 100. Even if a song was all over alt rock radio, it may not have been released as a single and if it had, no guarantee it would fare well on the Hot 100. Today by Smashing Pumpkins is one of the most iconic 90s songs, period, and it doesn’t appear to have cracked the Hot 100.
I am genuinely surprised by some of these. I remember some of them as huge. “Changes” not in the top 40? Say it isn’t so.
What a great start to 2024!!!
A few thoughts…
Other songs I’m sure have been mentioned before:
“Roxanne” – The Police: hit #32 on its re-release, but was easily their most widely known song until EBYT.
“What I Like About You” – The Romantics. I mentioned this elsewhere, but how was this only a #49 hit? I owned their 2 singles off In Heat, which both went higher, and they were NEVER as popular as this one.
Tom will probably mention Psi, but how “Gangham Style” wasn’t a #1 I’ll never understand…especially since after Tom’s upcoming #1, I do NOT know the rest of 2012’s #1 hits!
Let me go in a different direction for one song – one that hit the Top 40 but I’d NEVER heard it before it appeared on a K-Tel cassette the kid across the hall shared with me in 1989.
“Whirly Girl” – Oxo. It was a Top 30 hit in 1983, but was NEVER played in Philadelphia…at least, not to my knowledge. It never made WCAU’s Top 30, and I can’t recall it making WPST (97.5) or WSTW (93.7) either.
Enjoy:
https://youtu.be/n-atC5XLHlg?si=pPQouT2Cgtq_5U35
I remember hearing “Whirly Girl,” but maybe it was just at Penn State and on MTV. Good one. And I certainly heard “What I Like About You” in Philadelphia.
Justice for “Magic Dance!”
Speaking about this note, “A Little Less Conversation” should have been bigger in the U.S.
https://www.billboard.com/music/chart-beat/elvis-presley-blue-christmas-hot-100-top-20-1235574411/?fbclid=IwAR3KH6ac5X6L-gHroKY8AKMJjKEOZJTCYoq5oDlYrMPxxx3RAgo6HOibCJo_aem_AdOyEqBwhdfF3DdgID2Wx3Ei3S0XUKSJeHyph5EAZhosDjiPf_E1_k4aBhHhmLkvArI
Maybe not quite qualifying for this column per se, but “Who Let the Dogs Out” by Baha Men peaked at #40. That song was everywhere in Y2K, I thought it had to be Top 10.
https://youtu.be/ojULkWEUsPs?si=nuDacOKRfbE0trWu
This one always blows me away – made it to #41:
https://youtu.be/m_zJjwfW58A
This is my favorite #41.
Honorable mention: “Flash”- Queen(Gen X’s “Shaft”), “Strip”- Adam Ant(Catchy as hell. Somebody explained to me that kitsch translates better in the UK. The topic was Sparks.)
I recall being very surprised when I learned that “Changes” wasn’t a top 40 single. It must have caught on as a recurrent track. Incidentally, Chris Molanphy did a variation of this topic on his Hit Parade podcast in September 2022. The description reads “What is a “legacy hit”? A chart flop back in the day that’s now a classic—from “Tiny Dancer” to “What I Like About You.”” Some of the songs he lists are the same as those listed here.
The vast majority of your list are songs that would have been very big on alternative rock radio, or at least rock radio, and I wonder how many of them are simply songs that seem very familiar to rock listeners that simply didn’t get much top 40 airplay. I’m not surprised that “Highway to Hell” wasn’t a top 40 hit. I never heard it on a pop station.
All throughout the 1980s in particular, there were R&B #01 hits that didn’t chart very high on the Hot 100, in many cases not charting at all. I mostly confined myself to pop and rock stations, so I don’t know the answer to this, but I wonder if there are some R&B or dance tracks that people who favor those genres would be very surprised that they didn’t reach the pop top 40. The only one I can think of that might qualify is the Tom Tom Club dance hit “Wordy Rappinghood,” which missed the Hot 100. (The oft-sampled “Genius of Love” made #31, which actually seems right to me; I’m not even positive I heard it around the time of the 1981 release.)
I thought “That Thing You Do” was a great song but I never heard it on the radio and wouldn’t have expected it to make the top 40; #41 is pretty good given the intentionally dated sound. Too bad it couldn’t have made one place higher.
Other way around. “Goodbye to You” was well before “The Warrior.” I remember hearing it when it came out in 1982.
Late to comment but loved this article and the comments! My nerdy, listicle loving self maintains a personal playlist of songs that never made the top 40 that I think are popular/well-known enough to surprise the average person. The list is currently at 370 songs, which may seem a lot but, when you consider that well over 10 thousand songs have reached the top 40, it’s a pretty small slice of the pie. Anyway, proud to say that all but 2 of the songs listed by mt were already on my list. I was only missing Centerfield and There She Goes and a strong case has been made for both. Likely going to add those 2 now! Billboard also recently released their top 100 songs to never make the entire Hot 100. I had 74 of those on my list as well. Added some of the other 26 to my list but they also had some real head scratchers in there (at least for me).
Yikes! How amazing it is to see an old friend!
Good welcome to you, @KingoftunesSF !
You do great stuff, mt! I’ve really been enjoying this site and decided it was finally high time to come back into the world and de-lurk!
Here are the ones that struck me as big surprises not to make the Hot 100 pre-1980, besides those already mentioned:
A few of my favorites from the 80s & early 90s:
Some of these may stick in my mind because they were bigger hits on Rock Radio or MTV than Top 40.