Totally! Useless! Chart! Trivia!

[rockgolf]

Because to true Chartaholics there's no such thing as chart trivia that is too insignificant, I decided to start this thread.

The genesis of this idea was noticing that Lie by NF on this week's Hot 100 contains a grand total of 5 characters between the title of the song and the name of the artist. I wondered if that was a record for the smallest total length of artist and song.

Well it didn't set the record but it was in a tie. One by U2 also shares the brevity record. And if you exclude punctuation 24's by T.I. also fits the category.

So here's the list of Hot 100 entries where both the artist name and song title are 4 characters each or less:

Please feel free to add your own pointless trivia here.

[rockgolf]

If this is intended to be a list of all the shortest artist/title combinations, then I should also include

• If by Bread (7 characters)
  
  

Any others?

[renfield75]

"Creep" by TLC has 8 total characters, and technically Prince's 1995 #88 hit "Gold" is only 5 total characters, since at that time he was using (and credited on the Hot 100 with) his symbol ("O(+>"). If he had been using the symbol when he released "7" he would be the brevity champ!

[Gary]

Way back when I had a thread along the same lines as this one

There might be some fun stuff in there, lots of it though is probably outdated


pulsemusic.proboards.com/thread/53338/billboard-chart-trivia?page=51

[onebuffalo]

Nov 5, 2018 10:21:12 GMT -5 renfield75 said:

"Creep" by TLC has 8 total characters, and technically Prince's 1995 #88 hit "Gold" is only 5 total characters, since at that time he was using (and credited on the Hot 100 with) his symbol ("O(+>"). If he had been using the symbol when he released "7" he would be the brevity champ!

Don't forget, Prince's 7 single peaked at #7 on the Hot 100. Should have called it 1.

[renfield75]

Nov 5, 2018 10:34:28 GMT -5 onebuffalo said:

Nov 5, 2018 10:21:12 GMT -5 renfield75 said:

"Creep" by TLC has 8 total characters, and technically Prince's 1995 #88 hit "Gold" is only 5 total characters, since at that time he was using (and credited on the Hot 100 with) his symbol ("O(+>"). If he had been using the symbol when he released "7" he would be the brevity champ!

Don't forget, Prince's 7 single peaked at #7 on the Hot 100. Should have called it 1.

I remember watching that chart run...it stalled at number 8 for three weeks, which would have been really annoying if it couldn't have made it that one more step up.

[rockgolf]

Remind me to tell you that I think in the 1969 top 100 of the year, I'm reasonably confident Billboard accidentally replaced a song that should have made the list with a similarly titled song that didn't deserve to be there...

Anyone know what I'm talking about?  ;)

[Gary]

Year end charts from that era full of inconsistencies. For example the Partridge Family in 1970 went to #1 and was not on the 1979 or 1971 chart but yet made the decade top 50

[rockgolf]

Same with I Am Woman.

Both peaked late in the year,  around late November / early December. 

But I'm not talking about songs that were cut off by the year-end limits. The 1969 wrong song looks like they accidentally replaced a top ten song with a song that didn't even make the top twenty but had a very similar name.

Additional hint: Both acts had a Canadian connection.

[jebsib]

??????

Now I'm curious!

Old Billboards (particularly from the late 60s and 70s) were rife with errors.

[rockgolf]

jebsib : Another additional hint. On the Jimmy's Charts website, the wrong artist is credited for the song that actually did make the Billboard top 100 of 1969. The artist Jimmy incorrectly attributes the song to is also Canadian. And both of these acts were legitimate one-hit wonders. The missing act was definitely not.

ETA: I was wrong. Jimmy did in fact list the correct artist.

[renfield75]

Nov 7, 2018 9:48:46 GMT -5 rockgolf said:

jebsib : Another additional hint. On the Jimmy's Charts website, the wrong artist is credited for the song that actually did make the Billboard top 100 of 1969. The artist Jimmy incorrectly attributes the song to is also Canadian. And both of these acts were legitimate one-hit wonders. The missing act was definitely not.

I think I've got it! How is Motherlode's "When I Die" in the top 100 of 1969 but Blood, Sweat, & Tears' #2 smash "And When I Die" not listed at all???

[rockgolf]

Nov 7, 2018 10:00:32 GMT -5 renfield75 said:

Nov 7, 2018 9:48:46 GMT -5 rockgolf said:

I think I've got it! How is Motherlode's "When I Die" in the top 100 of 1969 but Blood, Sweat, & Tears' #2 smash "And When I Die" not listed at all???

By George, you've got it! 

The BS&T song peaked late in the year, but should have had enough points by the cut-off to make the tail-end of the top 100. Instead, "When I Die" by Motherlode which peaked at #23, got in.

(I was wrong in thinking Jimmy's Charts had the wrong act. I was confusing Motherlode with Dr. Music, another early 1970s Canadian jazz-rock band formed from several members of Motherlode.)

[rockgolf]

Hey, I promised this would be totally useless chart trivia and I'm a man of my word!

I noticed on the Dec 15, 2018 Hot 100, one of the seemingly endless Meek Mill album bombs was a song called "Oodles of Noodles Baby". Got me wondering:

How many songs in Hot 100 history have had the same letter in the first and second position of the title?

I can think of 4 others offhand, 3 reasonably well known, one pretty obscure. The two best known of these start with the same improbable letter.

While I'm getting the complete list, anyone know what those songs would be?

[HeyHeyHey]

Dec 15, 2018 10:28:28 GMT -5 rockgolf said:

Hey, I promised this would be totally useless chart trivia and I'm a man of my word!

I noticed on the Dec 15, 2018 Hot 100, one of the seemingly endless Meek Mill album bombs was a song called "Oodles of Noodles Baby". Got me wondering:

How many songs in Hot 100 history have had the same letter in the first and second position of the title?

I can think of 4 others offhand, 3 reasonably well known, one pretty obscure. The two best known of these start with the same improbable letter.

While I'm getting the complete list, anyone know what those songs would be?

I know Eenie Meenie is one of them!

[rockgolf]

Actually, it's two of them! (But not the ones I thought of offhand.)

And I've found a grand total of 60 songs that qualify. including 7 top tens and a #1 song.

I'll post the full list tomorrow, but how many can you come up with?

[renfield75]

"MmmBop" is the #1 and "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm" by the Crash Test Dummies hit the top 5. There's also "Ooh Baby Baby" by the Miracles and Linda Ronstadt, "Ooh La La" by Perfect Gentlemen and Teena Marie, "Oops! I Didi It Again" by Britney, and a ton of other "Oops" and "Ooh" songs.

[renfield75]

An even shorter list is ARTISTS who start with the same letter. I can only think of a few: Aaliyah, a couple of Aarons (Hall, Carter, Neville, Tippin), BBMak, JJ Cale, XXXTentacion, ZZ Hill, and ZZ Top. If we include numbers then 112 counts too.

[rockgolf]

Good job, renfield75!

Here's the complete list:

[rockgolf]

In today's edition of Totally! Useless! Chart! Trivia!:

Only 3 songs from superhero movies have hit #1 on the Hot 100:

• "Batdance" by Prince from Batman (1989)
• "Kiss From A Rose" by Seal, from Batman Forever
• "Sunflower" by Post Malone and Swae Lee, from Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

Oddly enough, two of the three name a flower!

I'll have to check how many other flowers have appeared in #1 songs.

[rimetm]

Some of these are stretches, but here are all the titles I can tie to plant life and/or their direct bounty:

Peppermint Twist / Joey Dee and the Starliters (1/27/62)
Roses are Red (My Love) / Bobby Velton (7/14/62)
Sugar Shack / Jimmy Glimmer and the Fireballs (10/13/63)
I Can’t Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch) / Four Tops (6/19/65)
Incense and Peppermints / Strawberry Alarm Clock (11/25/67)
Grazing in the Grass / Hugh Masekela (7/20/68)
I Heard it Through the Grapevine / Marvin Gaye (12/14/68)
Crimson and Clover / Tommy James and the Shondells (2/1/69)
Sugar, Sugar / The Archies (9/20/69)
No Sugar Tonight / The Guess Who (5/9/70)
One Bad Apple / The Osmonds (2/13/71)
Brown Sugar / The Rolling Stones (5/29/71)
Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree / Dawn feat. Tony Orlando (4/21/73)
Theme from Mahogany (Do You Know Where You're Going To) / Diana Ross (1/24/76)
You Don't Bring Me Flowers / Barbra Streisand and Neil Diamond (12/2/78)
Knock on Wood / Amii Stewaart (4/21/79)
Escape (The Piña Colada Song) / Rupert Holmes (12/22/79)
Every Rose Has Its Thorn / Poison (12/24/88)
Kiss From a Rose / Seal (8/26/95)
Sunflower / Post Malone & Swae Lee (1/19/19)

Yep, no mentions of plants, fruits, vegetables, or anything like that in the over 20 years between those two superhero toppers! As to why, I’d say the primary factor is the lower quantity of #1s in that timeframe but also worth chewing on is the idea that as pop modernized, titles tended to invoke more abstract terms and when being grounded would use material or manmade items (e.g. songs like Laffy Taffy or Buy U a Drank in the 00’s)

[leoapp]

I cant believe these Mariah's record breaking achievements (hard to break) are never mentioned...
- Most Hot 100 #100 hits, with 2 (Up Out My Face and Oh Santa!). Honorable mentions for her Memoirs album cut, Betcha Gon'Know to miss it (#101 Bubbling Under Hot 100)
- Most consecutive Hot 100 #100 hits, with 2 (Up Out My Face, followed directly by Oh Santa!)
- Most songs to debut at #100 Hot 100 (I'll Be Lovin U Long Time-later it peaked at #58, Up Out My Face, and Oh Santa!)
- Most consecutive songs to debut at #100 Hot 100, with 2 (Up Out My Face, and Oh Santa!)

And of course, one of (if not, her most) hated single, Loverboy. Peoe called it a flop and it was actually the best selling single of 2001 in US. Only Mariah, a flop and still the best selling!

gurl bye

[rockgolf]

Jan 16, 2019 0:56:29 GMT -5 rimetm said:

Yep, no mentions of plants, fruits, vegetables, or anything like that in the over 20 years between those two superhero toppers! As to why, I’d say the primary factor is the lower quantity of #1s in that timeframe but also worth chewing on is the idea that as pop modernized, titles tended to invoke more abstract terms and when being grounded would use material or manmade items (e.g. songs like Laffy Taffy or Buy U a Drank in the 00’s)

Very astute observation. A lot of "real world" things that used to very frequently be in song titles or subjects of song lyrics have gone by the wayside:
Celestial objects: The sun*, the moon, stars.
Modes of transportation: Trains, cars (even specific models were song subjects), planes.
Communication: Snail mail (including postmen), telephones.

*In 1974 alone, #1 songs included Sunshine on My Shoulders, Sundown and Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me. Is it that people are outside so much less that the sun is no longer a significant factor in their consciousness?

[Mylo13 💜]

This looks fun!

[Taiga]

I've seen you listed song + artist combos with the shortest titles. Do you have a similar list for the longest ones? I imagine Fall Out Boy would be on it, given their knack for long song titles.

[rockgolf]

@ragnar: I think the record for the longest single song title is "Jeremiah Peabody's Polyunsaturated Quick-Dissolving Fast-Acting Pleasant-Tasting Green and Purple Pills" by Ray Stevens which got to #35 in 1961.

The longest full title is the #1 Stars On 45 medley, whose official title is on the Hot 100 was "Medley: Intro 'Venus' / Sugar Sugar / No Reply / I'll Be Back / Drive My Car / Do You Want to Know a Secret / We Can Work It Out / I Should Have Known Better / Nowhere Man / You're Going to Lose That Girl / Stars on 45".

Is that sufficient?

[rockgolf]

As well as producing Totally! Useless! lists like the top 3,000 hits in the history of the Billboard Hot 100, I also create totally useless trivia quizzes on the website Sporcle.

This one may be of interest to Pulse chartwatchers:

Sporcle quiz: One of two: #1 Singles.

A set of music trivia questions of Hot 100 #1 songs where there are only 2 valid answers. Some will be easy, others, maybe not.

[rockgolf]

One I thought would be too tough a question for the general public:

Name one of two #1 song titles to contain a 13-letter word.

[timmierz]

Irreplaceable is one... not sure about the other.

[rockgolf]

Go back over 40 years. (A terrifying thought, since I remember the song coming out.)