Forever #1 - Tito Jackson (Jackson 5)

[rockgolf]

Sept 30, 2020 12:20:04 GMT -5 Nick said:

I didn't know Delta Dawn by Helen Reddy, but I remember hearing the Tanya Tucker version before.

Tucker had the original hit that went to #1 on Country charts, but Reddy covered it in a pop-format within months and went to #1 on the Hot 100.

[Gary]

Mac Davis' Biggest Billboard Hits: His Hot 100 No. 1 'Baby Don't Get Hooked on Me' & More
9/30/2020 by Xander Zellner


He also scored 30 Hot Country Songs hits.
From writing hits for Elvis Presley to scoring a No. 1 hit of his own on the Billboard Hot 100 to roles in front of the camera, Mac Davis could seemingly do it all.

The singer, songwriter and actor died Tuesday (Sept. 29) in Nashville at age 78 after undergoing heart surgery. His longtime manager Jim Morey confirmed Davis' passing in a press release.

Before he stood alone in the spotlight, Davis launched his career as a behind-the-scenes songwriter for Columbia Records. He penned Presley's "A Little Less Conversation," a No. 69 hit on the Hot 100 in 1968, while a remix, billed as by Presley vs. JXL, reached No. 50 in 2003. He also wrote Presley's "In the Ghetto" (No. 3, 1969) and "Memories" (No. 35, 1969), as well as hits for First Edition, Gallery and Bobby Goldsboro, before taking his talents to the stage, starring in his own TV variety show and on Broadway, among other film and TV credits.

Davis tallied 15 entries on the Hot 100, between 1970 and 1981. He first appeared on the chart dated May 16, 1970, with "Whoever Finds This, I Love You." He made his major solo breakthrough two years later with "Baby Don't Get Hooked on Me." The single proved to be a crossover smash, topping both the Hot 100 and Adult Contemporary charts in 1972 and reaching No. 26 on Hot Country Songs.



Of Davis' 15 career Hot 100 entries, two soared to the top 10. Here's a look at his biggest Hot 100 hits:

Rank, Title, Peak Position, Peak Date
1. "Baby Don't Get Hooked on Me," No. 1, Sept. 23, 1972
2. "One Hell of a Woman," No. 11, July 13, 1974
3. "Stop and Smell the Roses," No. 9, Oct. 26, 1974
4. "Rock 'N' Roll (I Gave You the Best Years of My Life)," No. 15, Feb. 1, 1975
5. "It's Hard to Be Humble," No. 43, May 3, 1980
6. "Texas in My Rear View Mirror," No. 51, Nov. 22, 1980
7. "Whoever Finds This, I Love You," No. 53, June 13, 1970
8. "Burnin' Thing," No. 53, July 12, 1975
9. "Everybody Loves a Love Song," No. 63, Dec. 30, 1972
10. "(If You Add) All the Love in the World," No. 54, April 19, 1975

Mac Davis' biggest Billboard Hot 100 hits are based on actual performance on the weekly Billboard Hot 100 through the chart dated Oct. 3, 2020. Songs are ranked based on an inverse point system, with weeks at No. 1 earning the greatest value and weeks at No. 100 earning the least. Due to changes in chart methodology over the years, certain eras are weighted to account for different chart turnover rates over various periods.


Davis also notched 30 career entries on the Hot Country Songs chart, including six top 10s. "Hooked on Music" rose highest, to No. 2 in 1981.

He also enjoyed success on Billboard's Adult Contemporary airplay chart, scoring three top 10s among 17 total entries.

Looking at his history on Billboard's album charts, Davis made 11 visits to the Billboard 200 and 15 to Top Country Albums, with four sets reaching the top 10 on the latter list, where Stop and Smell the Roses climbed the highest, peaking at No. 2 in 1974. His albums have earned a combined 218,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. since Nielsen Music/MRC Data began tracking consumption in 1991.

[Nick]

[rockgolf]

Have to add a 2014 song to the Mac Davis list. Had no idea he was involved with it!

Rank	Year	High	Artist	Track	Adjusted score
1	1972	1	Mac Davis	Baby Don't Get Hooked On Me	663,744
2	1969	3	Elvis Presley	In The Ghetto	377,808
3	1974	11	Mac Davis	One Hell Of A Woman	264,960
4	1974	9	Mac Davis	Stop And Smell The Roses	241,760
5	1970	11	Kenny Rogers	Something's Burning	167,328
6	1971	11	Bobby Goldsboro	Watching Scotty Grow	141,024
7	1975	15	Mac Davis	Rock N' Roll (I Gave You The Best Years Of My Life)*	134,320
8	1972	22	Gallery	I Believe In Music	102,976
9	1969	35	Elvis Presley	Clean Up Your Own Back Yard	44,030
10	1969	35	Elvis Presley	Memories (Live)	41,446
11	1969	34	O.C. Smith	Daddy's Little Man	41,208
12	1972	48	Candi Staton	In The Ghetto	41,184
13	2014	32	Bruno Mars	Young Girls	36,125
14	1969	47	O.C. Smith	Friend, Lover, Woman, Wife	35,156
15	1980	43	Mac Davis	It's Hard To Be Humble	33,120
16	1970	47	Lettermen, The	Traces/Memories "Medley"	31,892
17	1980	51	Mac Davis	Texas In My Rear View Mirror	25,952
18	1970	52	Glen Campbell	Everything A Man Could Ever Need	25,632
19	1970	53	Mac Davis	Whoever Finds This, I Love You	24,640
20	1975	53	Mac Davis	Burning Thing	23,080
21	2002	50	Elvis Presley vs JXL	A Little Less Conversation	19,100
22	1972	63	Mac Davis	Everybody Loves A Love Song	16,576
23	1975	54	Mac Davis	(If You Add) All The Love In The World*	15,320
24	1973	73	Mac Davis	Dream Me Home	14,920
25	1973	88	Mac Davis	Your Side Of The Bed	9,360
26	1968	65	Nancy Sinatra	Good Time Girl	9,010
27	1968	69	Elvis Presley	A Little Less Conversation	8,466
28	1971	80	Mark Lindsay	Problem Child	5,856
29	1969	97	Nancy Sinatra	God Knows I Love You	3,162

[Gary]

Forever No. 1: Helen Reddy's 'Delta Dawn'
by Paul Grein September 30, 2020, 6:29pm EDT

Forever No. 1 is a Billboard series that pays special tribute to the recently deceased artists who achieved the highest honor our charts have to offer -- a Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 single -- by taking an extended look back at the chart-topping songs that made them part of this exclusive club. Here, we honor the late Helen Reddy by diving into the second of her three Hot 100-toppers, the rousing character study "Delta Dawn."

In September 1973, nine months and one week after “I Am Woman” became Helen Reddy’s first No. 1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100, “Delta Dawn” became her second. That was the shortest gap between No. 1 hits by a female solo artist in more than a decade -- since Connie Francis and Brenda Lee each had multiple No. 1 hits less than three months apart in 1960.

It’s not like there was little competition at the time: “Delta Dawn” knocked off Marvin Gaye’s smoldering smash “Let’s Get It On,” though not for long. After the one-week interruption, Gaye returned to the top spot the following week.




Alex Harvey and Larry Collins co-wrote “Delta Dawn,” a character study of a delusional woman who never got over a man who jilted her. One vivid line in the song says it all about her sad case: “She’s 41 and her daddy still calls her baby.”

Reddy’s was one of three notable versions of the song in 1972-73, along with recordings by Tanya Tucker and Bette Midler. All three are unique in their own way. Tucker sings the song as a country ballad. Midler emphasized the woman’s torment in her highly dramatic version, which is almost like an arty performance piece. Reddy downplayed that aspect and put the emphasis on the song’s dynamic rhythm. She also shaved two minutes and 10 seconds off Midler’s album version. Reddy’s single ran a brisk 3:08 – perfect for pop radio at the time.


Many people who heard Reddy’s version on hit radio stations every hour on the hour in the summer of ’73 probably never guessed the lyrics were so dark. A backing choir gave the recording a gospel-ish quality. The band sounded like she was singing in a honkytonk. An upward modulation meant that Reddy sang with more gusto and volume as the record progressed.

Tucker released the song in April 1972, when she was all of 13. Her version, produced by the legendary Billy Sherrill, reached No. 6 on Hot Country Songs. It also made No. 72 on the Hot 100 in August 1972. It received Grammy nominations for best country vocal performance, female and best country song. In addition, the song’s success helped Tucker win the 1972 Academy of Country Music Award for most promising female vocalist.




It’s hard to know why Tucker’s excellent version didn’t become a bigger pop hit. Pop radio was receptive to country hits in the early ‘70s. Such country hits as Lynn Anderson’s “Rose Garden,” Sammi Smith’s “Help Me Make It Through the Night” and Jerry Reed’s back-to-back hits “Amos Moses” and “When You’re Hot, You’re Hot” all made the top 10 on the Hot 100. The fact that Tucker was so young and singing about adult subjects may have made some pop radio programmers uncomfortable.

Midler included the song on her 1972 debut album The Divine Miss M. According to lore, Midler’s version was intended to be the second single from her album, following her sultry version of Bobby Freeman’s “Do You Want to Dance?” But when Reddy’s version was released as a single in June 1973, Midler’s camp flipped the planned single over and instead pushed the B side, Midler’s spunky version of the Andrews Sisters’ 1940s classic “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy.”

[Gary]

Forever No. 1: Helen Reddy's 'I Am Woman'
by Joe Lynch September 30, 2020, 3:56pm EDT

Forever No. 1 is a Billboard series that pays special tribute to the recently deceased artists who achieved the highest honor our charts have to offer -- a Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 single -- by taking an extended look back at the chart-topping songs that made them part of this exclusive club. Here, we honor the late Helen Reddy by diving into the first of her three Hot 100-toppers, the female empowerment anthem "I Am Woman."

When a modern ear catches Helen Reddy's soft-rock feminist anthem "I Am Woman," it may sound quaint, even obvious: "I am woman, hear me roar/ In number too big to ignore"; "I am strong/ I am invincible/ I am woman." But when it topped the Billboard Hot 100 in December of 1972, gender equality -- which the country, not to mention the world, still hasn't truly achieved -- wasn't even the commonly agreed upon value it is today.

In the early 1970s, mentions of the women's liberation movement in media and public discourse were accompanied by eyerolls and dismissive sneers. Not rebuttals or outright admissions of misogyny, but obvious mockery -- which any playground bully knows is an effective smokescreen for a topic that makes you uncomfortable, cf. the presidential debate on the day Reddy passed away at age 78.

And sure enough, the first No. 1 hit from Australian singer Helen Reddy – the earnest, gentle-yet-firm "I Am Woman" -- was greeted by a sea of mostly male gripes when it became the No. 1 song in the country. Sure, it's hardly edgy in its production or melody, but that never seems to bother those who place similarly gooey chart-topping fare from Johnny Nash ("I Can See Clearly Now") and Neil Diamond ("Song Sung Blue") in the 'guilty pleasure' bin. (Anyway, a ferocious garage-punk rocker with a similar message wasn't gonna sweep Nixon's America).

Yes, it's obvious. Hell, this was a world where it was entirely acceptable to espouse the view that women shouldn't even have careers beyond the kitchen. You're demanding subtlety in a decade where one advertising slogan quite literally extolled the virtues of "keep[ing] her where she belongs"? Good luck with that.

It might not be Anne Koedt set to music, but "I A Woman" was the feminist anthem that America in the '70s needed: A solid, straightforward statement of purpose paired with an accessible, irresistible melody (courtesy guitarist Ray Burton, a fellow Aussie who co-wrote the song with Reddy). Even the sneering patriarchy couldn't ignore the immediacy of the chorus or the staggering self-assurance of the lyrics. "I am woman, hear me roar" became a defining rallying cry for equality, one that continued to resonate among the generations that followed.

Fitting for the song's subject matter, its climb to the top spot wasn't easy. "I Am Woman" entered the Hot 100 at No. 99 in the summer of '72, peaking at No. 97 before dropping off entirely. But Reddy's tireless performances of the song on various TV shows (despite being heavily pregnant with a son from her then-husband/manager Jeff Wald) and its inclusion in a long-forgotten comedy about women's liberation called Stand Up and Be Counted helped raise its profile; according to Reddy in her 2005 memoir The Woman I Am, women began calling in to radio stations after seeing it on TV, boosting airplay.




Eventually, it re-entered the Hot 100 in fall and finally topped the chart Dec. 9, 1972. Arriving after the Temptations' deeply funky tale of familial discord "Papa Was a Rolling Stone" and holding the spot for one week before Billy Paul's lush ode to adultery "Me and Mrs. Jones" took over, "I Am Woman" was a rarity for any decade, present one included – a No. 1 song from a woman that had nothing to do with being in love with a man. And in its direct, stark simplicity, it served as a refrain for pavement-pounding activists as well as those still under the thumb of societal gender norms.

"I couldn't find any songs that said what I thought being woman was about. I thought about all these strong women in my family who had gotten through the Depression and world wars and drunken, abusive husbands. But there was nothing in music that reflected that," Reddy said in a 2003 interview. "I certainly never thought of myself as a songwriter, but it came down to having to do it."

For a non-songwriter, the lyrics pack a hell of a wallop. Born out of the exhaustion of being perpetually underestimated but with a rousing, determined strength, Reddy delivers the chorus with a bottomless spirit, as if she's been told "no" a hundred times but hasn't lost an ounce of hope (that spirit helped her nab the female pop vocal performance Grammy in 1973). And for as blunt as the chorus is, there's a hard-learned logic and depth to the verses that's often overlooked: "Oh yes, I am wise/ But it's wisdom born of pain/ Yes, I've paid the price/ But look how much I gained."

And what of the chorus? It might seem a touch kitschy five decades later, but put cynicism to the side and listen to the relish in Reddy's voice as she delivers her mission statement. She declares "I am strong" and "I am invincible" with a joyous clarity and undeniable conviction. And when those backing vocals chime in to emphasize the words "strong" and "invincible," it's a reminder that sometimes you need to bring along your own cheerleading squad, because the world might not be ready just yet.

"I Am Woman" is a celebration, a rallying cry, a statement of purpose and a fortifying tonic all wrapped into one three-and-a-half-minute pop song. It's one of the few songs whose impact extends well beyond music, inspiring countless people to effect real change in their lives and worlds. It's a roar that is still reverberating.

[Gary]

Forever No. 1: Helen Reddy's 'Angie Baby'
by Andrew Unterberger October 01, 2020, 8:31am EDT

Forever No. 1 is a Billboard series that pays special tribute to the recently deceased artists who achieved the highest honor our charts have to offer -- a Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 single -- by taking an extended look back at the chart-topping songs that made them part of this exclusive club. Here, we honor the late Helen Reddy by diving into the third of her three Hot 100-toppers, the surreal story song "Angie Baby."

The mid-'70s marked a golden age for the story song. Whether murder mysteries like Vicki Lawrence's "The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia," first-person historical fiction like Paper Lace's "The Night Chicago Died," or role-playing tales like Cher's "Half-Breed," richly plotted and detailed musical narratives enraptured top 40 listeners and shot to the top of the Billboard Hot 100 in the heart of the Me Decade. But no other story song was quite like Helen Reddy's "Angie Baby."



Written by California singer-songwriter Alan O'Day, "Angie Baby" tells the tale of the title character, a friendless and "touched" young girl who spends her life listening obsessively to rock and roll radio, imagining a life of excitement and romance through the songs she hears. In the second verse, a neighbor boy "with evil on his mind" stalks and threatens Angie, menacingly promising to "show [her] how to have a good time." So she traps the boy in her radio, keeping him as her "secret lover" inside the FM dial while everyone in the neighborhood assumes he's dead.

Wait, what? The late-song twist in "Angie Baby," unveiled over its bridge and third verse, left a lot of listeners understandably confused, and neither singer nor writer were much interested in providing further explanation. "That's everybody's question," Reddy told Fred Bronson in The Billboard Book of Number One Hits when asked to dish on the song's unusual climax. "I'll never tell you." O'Day said in the same book that he actually felt the whole thing was pretty straightforward: "I thought I spelled out what happened. It's a fantasy trip but it's real clear... I never intended it to be ."

But whatever mystery fans found in it certainly added to the intrigue around the song, which debuted at No. 60 on the Hot 100 on the chart dated October 19, 1974. It shot up from there, and replaced Harry Chapin's "Cat's in the Cradle" atop the listing on December 27th of that year -- the fastest of Reddy's three trips to No. 1 on the chart. Listener debate about the fates of Angie and her would-be tormentor certainly helped the song's acceleration: "The very thing that made the song a hit was what happened to the guy in the song," O'Day claimed.

Of course, "Angie Baby" had a pretty good chance of being a smash regardless, based solely on the chart pedigree of the artists involved. O'Day had become a reliable top 40 scribe, penning hits for Bobby Sherman ("The Drum"), Cher ("Train of Thought") and the Righteous Brothers ("Rock and Roll Heaven"), the latter of which had taken him to No. 3 on the Hot 100 in July of that year. And of course, Reddy was among the most consistently successful hitmakers of the decade's first half, with two chart-toppers already to her credit in 1972's "I Am Woman" and 1973's "Delta Dawn." In the year following the latter's ascendance, she had yet to return to the chart's top, but had still notched a number of major hits, including the swaggering character study "Leave Me Alone (Ruby Red Dress)" (No. 3) and the touching mother-and-daughter ballad "You and Me Against the World" (No. 9).

[Gary]

[Nick]

R.I.P. rock legend.

[Gary]

Eddie Van Halen, grinning guitar god for a rock generation, dies at 65

OCT. 6, 202012:39 PM
Eddie Van Halen, the all-American guitar hero who, with his namesake hard-rock band Van Halen, redefined the sound and possibilities of the electric guitar in the 1970s and ’80s, died on Tuesday at age 65. The cause was throat cancer.

His death was first reported by TMZ.

“I can’t believe I’m having to write this, but my father, Edward Lodewijk Van Halen, has lost his long and arduous battle with cancer this morning,” wrote his son Wolfgang Van Halen via Twitter.

“He was the best father I could ever ask for. Every moment I’ve shared with him on and off stage was a gift... I love you so much, Pop.”


Eddie Van Halen was an immigrant kid who emerged from Pasadena with an ear for hard-rock hooks and wild guitar flash in the Jimi Hendrix tradition. His speed and innovations along the fretboard inspired a generation of imitators, as the band bearing his name rose to MTV stardom and multiplatinum sales over 10 consecutive albums.

In contrast to the shadowy gothic blues of Black Sabbath, or the pagan thunder of Led Zeppelin, the band Van Halen delivered muscular hard rock in Technicolor. The group’s sound and image were vivid reflections of its Southern California home, with a lead guitarist in bright colors and a welcoming, good-time grin.

“Ed’s a once- or twice-in-a-century kind of guy. There’s Hendrix and there’s Eddie Van Halen,” friend and guitarist Jerry Cantrell of Alice in Chains said during Grammy weekend in January 2019. “Those two guys tilted the world on its axis.”

His iconic, road-battered guitar, named Frankenstein, was pieced together to his personal specifications in 1975 from the components of other instruments — a $50 body, a $75 neck, a single Humbucker pickup and crucial tremolo bar. With a red surface crisscrossed frantically with black and white stripes (and traffic reflectors stuck to the back), it remains one of the most recognizable guitars in rock ’n’ roll.

The idea was to stretch out and get loud, he once said, as he referenced the fictional metal act Spinal Tap, whose members bragged on camera that their amplifiers went all the way up to 11. “While they’re going to 11,” Van Halen joked during a 2015 appearance at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C., “I was already going to 15.”

As a band, Van Halen made other contributions to the era’s resplendent rock star lore: demanding that no brown M&Ms appear anywhere backstage, drummer Alex Van Halen crescendoing at concerts with a flaming gong and singer David Lee Roth high-kicking in leather chaps with a bare backside.

If older brother Alex was the guitarist’s closest musical partner throughout Eddie Van Halen’s life, in Roth he found a key collaborator and sometime nemesis, who brought a showbiz flourish to the guitarist’s virtuosic, mad-scientist metal. Until Roth’s exit at the peak of the original band’s popularity in 1985, the duo epitomized the eternal struggle between guitar hero and lead singer, each fueled on hyperkinetic energy, if not always in sync.


After Roth was replaced by singer-guitarist Sammy Hagar, the platinum-selling hit singles and albums kept coming for another decade. Its winning streak made Van Halen one of the most successful bands in rock history, including two albums with Roth that reached diamond status of 10 million copies sold: 1978’s debut “Van Halen” and 1984’s “1984.”

At age 25, Van Halen married popular TV actress Valerie Bertinelli, 21, in a 1981 wedding swarmed by paparazzi. A decade later, they had a son, Wolfgang, who grew up to join the family business as bass player in the band. The couple separated in 2001 (and divorced in 2007), in part because of the guitarist’s worsening drug and alcohol abuse, which eventually also helped destabilize the band.

Edward Lodewijk Van Halen was born Jan. 26, 1955, in Amsterdam to a Dutch father and an Indonesian mother. His father, Jan, was a classically trained clarinet and saxophone player who traveled the world playing music and passed his obsession onto his sons, Eddie and Alex.

Their parents hoped the boys would become classical musicians, and the two were given piano lessons as children. Eddie was 7 when the family left the Netherlands in 1962 for America, and his father performed with the ship band during the nine-day trip. Alex and Eddie played piano at intermission for tips.


Settling in Pasadena, the foursome shared a single room in a house with two other families. Van Halen’s mother, Eugenia, initially worked as a maid, while his father washed dishes and worked as a janitor, playing live gigs on weekends. Later, Jan’s rekindled music career in the U.S. kept him on the road for weeks at a time.

As elementary school kids with uncertain English-speaking skills, the Van Halen brothers performed during assemblies and lunch in a band they called the Broken Combs. Eddie bought a drum kit with money from a newspaper route but soon switched to guitar, beginning with a low-budget beginners model: a Sears Teisco Del Rey six-string.

An early rock inspiration was the Dave Clark Five, British Invasion hit-makers from the mid-1960s, and Van Halen learned as a teen to play along to favorite records by slowing down the turntable. In later years, he claimed to rarely listen to contemporary music other than his own but acknowledged the lasting influence of U.K. guitar hero Eric Clapton, in particular his years in the superheavy blues-rock trio Cream.

“I realize I don’t sound like him,” Van Halen told Guitar Player magazine in 1978, “but I know every solo he’s ever played, note-for-note.”

The Van Halen brothers attended Pasadena City College and formed a band called Mammoth, in which Eddie both played guitar and (briefly) sang. “I couldn’t stand it,” he told an interviewer later. “I’d rather just play.”

From rival bands, they recruited bassist Michael Anthony and Roth, the latter in part because the singer owned a PA system. The musicians agreed to name their group Van Halen, and they played backyard parties and high schools, graduating to the Sunset Strip clubs Gazzarri’s and the Whisky a Go Go.

A typical 1975 live set in Pasadena might include cover songs by the Rolling Stones, Robin Trower, Bad Company and David Bowie, each stretched out in strange new ways on Van Halen’s hot-rod guitar. Even more exciting were the band’s original tunes, which were explosive but melodic.

One night at the Starwood nightclub in West Hollywood in 1976, Kiss singer-bassist Gene Simmons happened to catch the unknown band onstage and its grinning guitar phenom at stage left.

“This band comes on, and all of a sudden, I forget about everybody around me. I go, ‘What’s that?’” Simmons recalls. “Even though the band was a three-piece, there was a big sound coming out of them and Eddie was tapping the neck — which I’d never seen done on guitar before — with speed and accuracy in the melody. They simply didn’t sound like anybody else. There was a kind of fury.”


Simmons signed them to a contract and produced a 15-song demo recording at Electric Lady Studios in New York. Kiss management didn’t get behind Simmons’ discovery, so the bassist let them out of their contract.

Van Halen was signed to Warner Bros. Records after label President Mo Ostin and producer Ted Templeman watched a performance at the Starwood on a rainy Monday night. Tempelman told Rolling Stone years later: “There were like 11 people in the audience, and they were playing like they were at the Forum.”

The guitarist was 22 when his band recorded a debut album, “Van Halen,” released Feb. 10, 1978. “Van Halen” soon hit the top 20.

The band’s first single was “You Really Got Me,” a snarling cover of the Kinks’ early proto-metal hit. The guitarist latched onto the original riff and sent his fingers dancing over the fretboard. Other tracks on the debut now read like a Van Halen greatest hits package: “Runnin’ With the Devil,” “Eruption,” “Ain’t Talkin’ ’Bout Love,” “Jamie’s Cryin’” and more.

“The way the first record starts, Eddie’s guitar sounds like a siren coming in at the end of the world, and then that pulse of boom, boom, and they’re running with the devil,” Tool guitarist Adam Jones said after finally meeting his guitar hero backstage in Los Angeles after a Tool concert in October. “If anyone is playing from his heart, it’s that guy.”

Van Halen was on the road in Aberdeen, Scotland, when the players heard their first album had gone gold in the U.S. They partied in celebration and trashed their hotel room.

On subsequent albums, the guitarist continued to evolve as a player. During the making of 1981’s “Fair Warning,” he secretly returned to the studio in the early morning hours to refine his solos alone with a recording engineer.

In his upcoming memoir, “A Platinum Producer’s Life in Music,” Templeman writes: “He had profound things to say on the instrument. Guys tried to copy him, and none of them came close. He was like Charlie Parker or Errol Garner... generational talents.”

Van Halen’s father was recruited to play clarinet on “Big Bad Bill (Is Sweet William Now)” from the 1982 album “Diver Down,” the only time the jazz player and his sons recorded together on an album. “The beauty of it was that we were all just equals in the studio playing,” Eddie told Rolling Stone’s David Wild in 1995, adding that his father, who died in 1986, “would get tears in his eyes every time he saw us play. He loved it. He lived through us because he never really made it.”

The guitarist never learned to read music (not atypical for a rocker of his generation), but before the ‘70s were over, Eddie Van Halen had become as influential as any rock guitarist who came before. The thrash-metal guitarists of Metallica and Slayer latched onto his speed and precision, while a tidal wave of imitators flooded the Sunset Strip hair-metal scene. Few added much to Van Halen’s innovations.

“When I used the stuff I invented, I was telling a story, while I felt that the people who were imitating me were telling a joke,” he told Smashing Pumpkins leader Billy Corgan in a 1996 interview for Guitar World.

In 1982, producer Quincy Jones asked the guitarist to solo on Michael Jackson’s rock-leaning pop smash “Beat It.” Van Halen’s own crossover into the broader pop landscape was just ahead.

With a baby cupid having a smoke on its cover, “1984” surprised fans with its very first single, as the grinning guitar hero leaned into a keyboard riff for “Jump,” which became the band’s only No. 1 pop hit.

At 34 minutes, the album was the first recorded at his studio, 5150, built on his seven-acre home property in the hills of Studio City.
Amid the rock riffs and dive-bombing guitar asides on “Panama,” Van Halen forged a layered instrumental breakdown that mingled metal aggression with jazzy restraint, plus the sound of his 1972 Lamborghini revving up.

After Roth’s exit in 1985, the guitarist considered recording a solo album, but he decided there was no need. “All Van Halen records are solo records to me, because I have the creative freedom to do whatever I want,” he told Rolling Stone in 1995. “I don’t know what else I’d do.”

With journeyman rocker Hagar (formerly of the band Montrose and an established solo artist), Van Halen in 1986 released “5150,” their first album to hit No. 1 on Billboard’s Top 200 chart. There were significant shifts in the band’s sound — with more ballads and no instrumentals — but it was a rare case of a major rock band changing lead vocalists and maintaining its popularity.

Nicknamed “Van Hagar” by both fans and detractors, the Hagar-fronted band continued as a dependable hit-maker into the grunge era. For the anthem “Right Now” (from 1991’s “For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge” album), the band even dabbled in socio-political commentary. In 1995, the ballad-heavy “Balance” was the band’s fourth consecutive No. 1 album in the U.S. with Hagar, but tension with the Van Halens led to his exit the following year.

“Eddie and I hit when I walked in that room — he played me a riff and I started singing, and wow, man,” Hagar said in January of their creative partnership. “We did that for seven or eight years and then the head-butt came.”

After a decade of trading insults in the media, Van Halen’s relationship with Roth took an unexpected turn when the singer was asked to sing two new songs for a 1996 hits collection, “Best of — Volume I.” The reunited quartet made its first joint appearance at the MTV Video Music Awards and had another meltdown backstage. Roth was out again.

“There was never any talk of anything permanent,” the guitarist insisted to The Times that year.

Fan confusion contributed to a third version of the band with singer Gary Cherone failing to connect in 1998, releasing “Van Halen III,” the band’s worst-selling album to that point. But it did include Eddie Van Halen’s first-ever lead vocal, the solemn six-minute piano ballad “How Many Say I.”

Hagar returned for an 80-date North American tour in 2004 that ended amid more acrimony. “The reunion we had was a horrible thing, and it was a bad way to end,” Hagar said. “That’s why I wish him so well because he was unhealthy then. We fought. That was a great band, but I don’t know what happened.”

The son of an alcoholic father, Van Halen began drinking and smoking at age 12 and struggled for decades with alcohol and cocaine. Several attempts at sobriety included a stop at the Betty Ford Center in Rancho Mirage, and by 2008, he declared himself sober for good.

Roth returned that year for a full tour for the first time since 1985. By now, the guitarist’s son, Wolfgang, was playing bass in the band. They released a new album in 2012, “A Different Kind of Truth,” built largely from song ideas resurrected from unused demos dating to the 1970s. It hit No. 2 on Billboard’s Top 200.

The band performed its final shows over two nights at the Hollywood Bowl in 2015. That same year, Van Halen donated a replica of his Frankenstein guitar to the Smithsonian, while the original appeared behind glass at the Metropolitan Museum in New York.


Aside from drug and alcohol issues, Van Halen faced a variety of health crises. He underwent a hip replacement in 1999 and lost a third of his tongue to cancer. Though he was declared free of the disease in 2002, recent reports suggested the cancer had returned. In a January interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Roth said of the guitarist, “Ed’s not doing well.”

Van Halen’s name came up in surprising ways in 2019. He attended a Tool concert in Los Angeles and a young fan in the audience randomly asked Van Halen to take his snapshot near the stage, not recognizing the platinum-selling guitarist. Wolfgang captured the moment for Instagram and called it “my favorite moment from the @tool show last night.”

Weeks later, 17-year-old pop sensation Billie Eilish was teased by late-night TV host Jimmy Kimmel for not knowing of the band Van Halen. Wolfgang calmed outraged VH fans: “Listen to what you want and don’t shame others for not knowing what you like.”

In October, Michael Jackson’s daughter, Paris, 21, tweeted affectionately: “Get yourself a partner that’ll slowdance to Van Halen with you.”

The guitar master at the center of the band had no comment at the time. Van Halen was never fully comfortable with fame anyway, often preferring the hours alone experimenting with his guitar to the big moments onstage.

Music was a family tradition, regardless of who’s listening.

“Listen, my dad played until he died. I think it’s something you’re born with,” he said in a ’90s interview. “You’re either rock ’n’ roll or you’re not.”

Van Halen is survived by his second wife, Janie Van Halen , whom he married in 2009; son, Wolfgang; and brother, Alex.

[Gary]

RIP Eddie Van Halen: These Are the Rock Icon's Biggest Chart Hits
By Keith Caulfield
10/6/2020
.

The late Eddie Van Halen left behind some of rock music’s most memorable hit songs over a Billboard chart career that spanned five decades.

The multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and singer rode the top of the charts alongside his namesake band Van Halen, scoring five No. 1 albums on the Billboard 200 chart and more than 20 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 songs chart, including the 1984 smash single “Jump.”

“Jump” is Van Halen’s biggest hit ever on the Hot 100, having spent five weeks at No. 1 on the list. It leads the act’s top 10 biggest singles on the chart (see list below). “Jump,” driven by Eddie’s instantly recognizable synthesizer hook that runs through the song, hit No. 1 on the weekly Hot 100 dated Feb. 25, 1984. Its success came less than a year after Eddie was heard on another No. 1 hit, Michael Jackson’s “Beat It.” The track topped the chart on April 30, 1983, and features a searing guitar solo from Eddie. “Beat It” racked up three weeks at No. 1.


Here is a look at Van Halen’s top 10 biggest hits on the Hot 100 songs chart:

Rank, Title, Peak Position, Peak Year

“Jump,” No. 1 (for five weeks), 1984
“Why Can’t This Be Love,” No. 3, 1986
“When It’s Love,” No. 5, 1988
“Finish What Ya Started,” No. 13, 1988
“(Oh) Pretty Woman,” No. 12, 1982
“I’ll Wait,” No. 13, 1984
“Panama,” No. 13, 1984
“Love Walks In,” No. 22, 1986
“Dance the Night Away,” No. 15, 1979
“Dreams,” No. 22, 1986
On Van Halen’s all-time top 10 biggest Hot 100 hits list, “Jump” is followed by “Why Can’t This Be Love,” which was the band’s first single with singer Sammy Hagar, after former singer David Lee Roth departed the group in 1984. Van Halen’s top 10 biggest hits are split evenly between Roth and Hagar. The former sings on Nos. 1, 5, 6, 7 and 9, while Hagar is heard on the remaining cuts.

The band had a famously complicated history with its lead singers. Hagar left the group in 1996, and Roth returned briefly that same year, only to be replaced by Gary Cherone. The latter would stay with the group until 1999. Eventually, Hagar came back to the act for a stint from 2003 to 2005, with Roth returning in 2007. Roth stayed with the band this time, and was on board for the group’s final studio album together, A Different Kind of Truth, in 2012.

The only two constants in Van Halen from the group’s proper launch in 1974 was Eddie and his brother Alex, the group’s drummer. (Michael Anthony was the band’s bassist from 1974 to 2007, replaced by Eddie’s son Wolfgang.) “Jump” was lifted from Van Halen’s hugely successful album titled 1984, which became the group’s then-highest charting album, spending five non-consecutive weeks at No. 2 in 1984. (Three of those runner-up weeks were behind Jackson’s Thriller album, which included “Beat It.”)

1984 is one of Van Halen’s 16 charting albums on the Billboard 200, and all 16 of those sets reached the top 20. Further, every one of Van Halen’s 14 charting albums between 1979 and 2012 reached the top 10 — from Van Halen II in 1979 through A Different Kind of Truth in 2012. The only Van Halen albums that missed the top 10 were the act’s self-titled debut, peaking at No. 19 in 1978, and the live album Tokyo Dome Live in Concert in 2015 (No. 20).

The arrival of Hagar to the band also brought the act its first No. 1 album on the Billboard 200, with Hagar’s first studio set with the act, 1986’s 5150. The set spent three weeks at No. 1 that year. All four of the studio albums Hagar recorded with the band reached No. 1: 5150, OU812 (No. 1 for four weeks in 1988), For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge (No. 1 for three weeks in 1991) and Balance (No. 1 for one week in 1995). The band yielded one more No. 1 album, with the greatest hits set Best of Volume 1 in 1996. The album spent one week at No. 1, and included hits from both the Hagar and Roth eras, and boasted two new recordings with Roth (who had briefly reunited with the band in 1996).


On Billboard’s Mainstream Rock Songs airplay chart, which ranks the week’s most-played songs on mainstream rock radio, Van Halen has quite the blockbuster catalog of hits. The band first reached the chart in May of 1981, just two months after that chart itself launched in March of that year. (Van Halen got its first hit single on any Billboard chart in 1978 with its cover of The Kinks’ “You Really Got Me,” reaching No. 36 that year on the Hot 100.)

On Mainstream Rock Songs, the group has racked up 47 hits, with 26 of those reaching the top 10, and 13 of them hitting No. 1. Among their No. 1s: “Jump,” “When It’s Love,” “Poundcake,” “Humans Being” and “Me Wise Magic.” Van Halen also holds the record for the most No. 1s on the Mainstream Rock Songs chart in 1990s, with eight leaders that decade. (Van Halen has the second-most No. 1s in the entire history of the chart, trailing only Shinedown and Three Days Grace, with 15 leaders each.)

Van Halen’s top 10 Biggest Hot 100 hits list is based on actual performance on the weekly Hot 100 chart, through the Oct. 10, 2020, rankings. Songs are ranked based on an inverse point system, with weeks at No. 1 earning the greatest value and weeks at lower ranks earning lesser values. Due to changes in chart methodology over the years, certain eras are weighted to account for different chart turnover rates over various periods.

[Nick]

Johnny Nash has passed away. Here's his #1 classic "I can see clearly now". 

[Gary]

"I Can See Clearly Now" singer-songwriter Johnny Nash dies at 80
By Carolina SanchezPublished 1 hour agoEntertainmentFOX 26 Houston

American pop and reggae musician Johnny Nash poses for a portrait, 1970s. (Photo by Helmut Reiss/United Archives via Getty Images)
HOUSTON - Singer-songwriter Johnny Nash has died at the age of 80.

Nash, a Houston-native, had been in declining health in recent months.

He is best known for his hit "I Can See Clearly Now," which he wrote and recorded. The record is a Billboard Hot 100 Chart #1 hit song.


Singer Johnny Nash records in the studio in circa 1958 in New York. (Photo by PoPsie Randolph/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)


Nash is also known for his reggae music. He was one of the first non-Jamaican singers to record reggae music in Kingston, Jamaica, according to his website.

Nash died Tuesday afternoon at his home in Houston.

He is survived by his wife Carli and son Johnny.

[Gary]

Johnny Nash Top 40 songs


1968 "Hold Me Tight" #5
1970 "Cupid" #39
1972 "I Can See Clearly Now" #1
1973 "Stir It Up" #12

[Gary]

Johnny Nash, Singer of ‘I Can See Clearly Now,’ Dies at 80
By Associated Press
10/6/2020

www.billboard.com/articles/news/obituary/9461529/johnny-nash-i-can-see-clearly-now-singer-dead/



Johnny Nash, a singer-songwriter, actor and producer who rose from pop crooner to early reggae star to the creator and performer of the million-selling anthem “I Can See Clearly Now,” died Tuesday, his son said.

Nash, who had been in declining health, died of natural causes at home in Houston, the city of his birth, his son, Johnny Nash Jr., told The Associated Press. He was 80.

Nash was in his early 30s when “I Can See Clearly Now” topped the charts in 1972 and he had lived several show business lives. In the mid-1950s, he was a teenager covering “Darn That Dream” and other standards, his light tenor likened to the voice of Johnny Mathis. A decade later, he was co-running a record company, had become a rare American-born singer of reggae and helped launch the career of his friend Bob Marley.


Nash praised “the vibes of this little island” when speaking of Jamaica, and he was among the first artists to bring reggae to U.S. audiences. He peaked commercially in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when he had hits with “Hold Me Tight,” “You Got Soul,” an early version of Marley’s “Stir It Up” and “I Can See Clearly Now,” still his signature song.

Reportedly written by Nash while recovering from cataract surgery, “I Can See Clearly Now” was a story of overcoming hard times that itself raised the spirits of countless listeners, with its swelling pop-reggae groove, promise of a “bright, bright sunshiny day” and Nash’s gospel-styled exclamation midway, “Look straight ahead, nothing but blue skies!”, a backing chorus lifting the words into the heavens.

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The rock critic Robert Christgau would call the song, which Nash also produced, “2 minutes and 48 seconds of undiluted inspiration.”

He charted 11 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, including a pair of top 10s: “Hold Me Tight” in 1968 and the No. 1 “I Can See Clearly Now” in 1972. The latter spent four weeks atop the list. “Clearly” also led the Adult Contemporary Songs airplay chart for a month. He also claimed nine hits on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart, one of which reached the top 10: “Let’s Move & Groove (Together),” a No. 9-peaking hit in 1965.

Although overlooked by Grammys judges, “I Can See Clearly Now” was covered by artists ranging from Ray Charles and Donny Osmond to Soul Asylum and Jimmy Cliff, whose version was featured in the 1993 movie “Cool Runnings.” It also turned up everywhere from “Thelma and Louise” to a Windex commercial, and in recent years was often referred to on websites about cataract procedures.

“I feel that music is universal. Music is for the ears and not the age,” Nash told Cameron Crowe, then writing for Zoo World Magazine, in 1973. “There are some people who say that they hate music. I’ve run into a few, but I’m not sure I believe them.”

The fame of “I Can See Clearly Now” outlasted Nash’s own. He rarely made the charts in the years following, even as he released such albums as “Tears On My Pillow” and “Celebrate Life,” and by the 1990s had essentially left the business. His last album, “Here Again,” came out in 1986, although in recent years he was reportedly digitizing his old work, some of which was lost in a 2008 fire at Universal Studios in Los Angeles.

Nash was married three times, and had two children. He had loved riding horses since childhood and as an adult lived with his family on a ranch in Houston, where for years he also managed rodeo shows at the Johnny Nash Indoor Arena.

In addition to his son, he is survived by daughter Monica and wife Carli Nash.

John Lester Nash Jr., whose father was a chauffeur, grew up singing in church and by age 13 had his own show on Houston television. Within a few years, he had a national following through his appearances on “The Arthur Godfrey Show,” his hit cover of Doris Day’s “A Very Special Love” and a collaboration with peers Paul Anka and George Hamilton IV on the wholesome “The Teen Commandments (of Love).” He also had roles in the films “Take a Giant Step,” in which he starred as a high school student rebelling against how the Civil War is taught, and “Key Witness,” a crime drama starring Dennis Hopper and Jeffrey Hunter.

His career faded during the first half of the 1960s, but he found a new sound, and renewed success, in the mid-60s after having a rhythm and blues hit with “Let’s Move and Groove Together” and meeting Marley and fellow Wailers Peter Tosh and Bunny Livingston during a visit to Jamaica. Over the next few years their careers would be closely aligned.

Nash convinced his manager and business partner Danny Sims, with whom he formed JAD Records, to sign up Marley and the Wailers, who recorded “Reggae On Broadway” and dozens of other songs for JAD. Nash brought Marley to London in the early 1970s when Nash was the bigger star internationally and with Marley gave an impromptu concert at a local boys school. Nash’s covers of “Stir It Up” and “Guava Jelly” helped expose Marley’s writing to a general audience. The two also collaborated on the ballad “You Poured Sugar On Me,” which appeared on the “I Can See Clearly Now” album.

After the 1980s, Nash became a mystery to fans and former colleagues as he stopped recording and performing and rarely spoke to the press or anyone in the music industry. In 1973, he told Crowe that he anticipated years of hard work: “What I want to do is be a part of this business and to express myself and get some kind of acceptance by making people happy.”

A quarter century later, he explained to The Gleaner during a visit to Jamaica that it was “difficult to develop major music projects” without touring and promoting and that he preferred to be with his family.

“I think I’ve achieved gratification in terms of the people I’ve had the chance to meet. I never won the Grammy, but I don’t put my faith in things of that nature,” he added. “A lifetime body of work I can be proud of is more important to me. And the special folksy blend to the music I make, that’s what it is all about.”

Additional reporting by Keith Caulfield.

[Gary]

Forever No. 1: Van Halen's 'Jump'
By Andrew Unterberger
10/7/2020

www.billboard.com/articles/business/chart-beat/9461337/forever-no-1-van-halens-jump/


Forever No. 1 is a Billboard series that pays special tribute to the recently deceased artists who achieved the highest honor our charts have to offer -- a Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 single -- by taking an extended look back at the chart-topping songs that made them part of this exclusive club. Here, we honor the late Eddie Van Halen, who died this Tuesday (Oct. 6), by diving into his eponymous group's lone No. 1: the eternally triumphant "Jump."

By 1984, Van Halen weren't just one of the biggest rock bands in the world, they were already a cultural institution. Their epochal self-titled 1978 debut album and subsequent tour opening for (and by many accounts, showing up) metal gods Black Sabbath had set new standards for harder, faster and uh, limber-er in American hard rock. Each of their first five albums peaked as high or higher on the Billboard 200 albums chart than the one that preceded it, and the most recent of those albums (1982's Diver Down) had also produced their biggest Billboard Hot 100 hit to date in the No. 12-peaking "(Oh) Pretty Woman," thanks in large part to heavy airplay of its naughty and surreal music video on a then-nascent MTV.




Still, whether or not the band realized it at the time, the stakes would be raised in 1984. It was the year when MTV's impact on popular music would most profoundly be felt, with the channel's galactic pop stars like Madonna, Prince and George Michael (with Wham!) and new wave imports like Culture Club and Duran Duran all scoring their first Hot 100 No. 1s. But it was also a year for MTV-assisted veteran breakthroughs: Thanks largely to the channel's added exposure, '70s rock survivors The Cars, Bruce Springsteen and ZZ Top also scored the biggest pop hits of their career and were elevated to new levels of sales and stardom. If Van Halen were going to continue to compete in a field this crowded -- saying nothing of the band's countless spandex-wearing, fret-shredding acolytes, who would soon flood MTV to take their party-rock-turned-to-11 example to its logical extreme -- they were going to need to step it up.

Luckily, they had a song with such a next-level leap built into its very DNA. If it was unclear from the band literally titling their new album 1984 that they were ready to take on all comers for the year in question, it would certainly be obvious from its lead single: "Jump," a song as upwardly aspirational as any character from Wall Street. The song's sense of buoyancy and lift are head-smacking from its opening chords, and simply float higher and higher throughout the song's relentlessly chugging four-minute runtime. Even if it didn't quite explicitly shout "JUMP!" at you a couple dozen times, the intent was unmistakable.


Which isn't to say "Jump" was necessarily conceived of as a motivational anthem. In fact, the hook was ironically inspired by a cruel chuckle frontman David Lee Roth had with himself at watching a recent news story of a man contemplating suicide at the edge of a high building and imagining the onlookers below shouting the title command at him. (Band roadie Larry Hostler, who Roth used as a sounding board, helped shape the lyric into something less cruel or despairing.) The song's eventual go-for-it message ("I get up, and nothing gets me down," "You won't know until you begin") had some unlikely roots of its own: David Lee Roth had been a student of martial arts instructor-to-the-stars Benny "The Jet" Urquidez, and he credited Urquidez's teachings as inspiration for "Jump."

Really though, the true spirit of "Jump" isn't found in its words, but rather in an element entirely new to Van Halen's band alchemy: synths. By the mid-'80s the synthesizer was established (along with the drum machine) as the defining instrument of the era, and Eddie Van Halen -- the guitarist for Van Halen, as well as its primary sonic architect -- was excited to explore their potential. In fact, he composed the signature Oberheim OBX-a riff for "Jump," with its earth-rumbling low end and shooting-star major chord streaks, all the way back in 1981. But the band (Roth in particular) held firm against adding the instrument to their mix -- according to Eddie, out of concern for what adding keys to his repertoire might mean for his "guitar hero" status -- until producer Ted Templeman finally came around to the "Jump" riff, their Warner label agreed, and the band relented to recording the track.

Eddie Van Halen Was 'The Greatest of Our Generation': Joe Satriani Pays Tribute
They needn't have worried: Rather than overwhelm or undermine Van Halen's (or its guitarist's) arena-rock largesse, the majesty of the "Jump" synth hook highlights it in blindingly bright magic marker. It's a riff as immediately iconic to rock history as any Eddie Van Halen (or really any other guitarist) ever performed on guitar, a "Satisfaction" for the mid-'80s. And if worries lingered that his new fascination with tickling the fake-ivories had robbed EVH of his six-string virtuosity, the group even throws in a quick mid-song intermission for Eddie to tear off a jagged eight-measure guitar solo, one that casually jumps across octaves and time signatures with look-Ma-two-fingers bravado before settling into a triumphant final passage.

That closing run dissolves back into a swirling synth climax, one which quickly accelerates and then decelerates into a gorgeously woozy haze, ultimately bringing the band to a lurching halt. And that might have been enough for old-school Van Halen, but 1984 Van Halen had to bring it back one more time following the fake-out faux-ending. So they wind up a reprise of the song's intro, and head straight from there to a final half-minute of chorus high-kicking, Eddie sprinkling in some new rhythm guitar patterns to keep the repeat-to-fade from getting stale, as the band digs further and further into the groove and rides out on an impossible high.

Remembering Rock Legend & Guitar Hero Eddie Van Halen | Billboard News
It didn't take long for that high to translate to the charts. The song debuted at No. 47 on the Hot 100 in Jan. 1984 and bound to No. 1 on the chart dated Feb. 25 just six weeks later, an unusually quick ascent for the time, holding at the top spot for five weeks. The 1984 album would peak at No. 2 on the Billboard 200, held off by Michael Jackson's still-unsinkable juggernaut Thriller -- which, of course, contained a guest solo from Eddie Van Halen on its Hot 100-topping hit "Beat It." But it still went on to be the group's second album (following the '78 debut) to be certified Diamond by the RIAA, as its videos dominated MTV for the entire calendar year and two more of its singles ("Panama" and "I'll Wait") followed "Jump" to the Hot 100's top 20, reaffirming Van Halen as the biggest rock band in America.

The victory was short-lived, as the group would split acrimoniously from their original frontman the next year. After replacing Roth with solo star Sammy Hagar, they would quickly return to rock and pop relevance, scoring another seven Hot 100 top 40 hits across the decade's remainder -- many led by the thick synth sound the majority of the band once abhorred. They never again reached the top spot, though, leaving "Jump" the unquestioned mainstream peak in Van Halen's catalogue. In truth, it was a peak for all of '80s popular music; a classic we're-not-so-different-you-and-I moment between the decade's most chest-beating rock and most glimmering pop, coalesced into an anthem that hurdled over most of the best and brightest that even 1984 had to offer, and still elevates pulse rates and spirits nearly four decades later.

[rockgolf]

The Eddie Van Halen list provided by Billboard missed a track that - although Eddie Van Halen wasn't credited - was a critical highpoint in both his own discography and in pop music history. Below, is the revised and complete Eddie Van Halen greatest hits.

Rank	Year	High	Total score	Artist	Track
1	1984	1	840,608	Van Halen	Jump
2	1983	1	809,760	Michael Jackson	Beat It
3	1986	3	473,520	Van Halen	Why Can't This Be Love
4	1988	5	347,120	Van Halen	When It's Love
5	1988	13	192,720	Van Halen	Finish What Ya Started
6	1982	12	144,096	Van Halen	Pretty Woman
7	1984	13	136,768	Van Halen	I'll Wait
8	1984	13	130,784	Van Halen	Panama
9	1986	22	129,240	Van Halen	Love Walks In
10	1979	15	121,888	Van Halen	Dance The Night Away
11	1986	22	111,720	Van Halen	Dreams
12	1991	27	80,460	Van Halen	Top Of The World
13	1989	35	69,920	Van Halen	Feels So Good
14	1995	30	64,860	Van Halen	Can't Stop Lovin' You
15	1988	34	51,360	Van Halen	Black And Blue
16	1982	38	48,480	Van Halen	Dancing In The Street
17	1978	36	46,272	Van Halen	You Really Got Me
18	1992	55	19,580	Van Halen	Right Now
19	1980	55	18,848	Van Halen	And The Cradle Will Rock
20	1984	56	17,120	Van Halen	Hot For Teacher
21	1979	84	5,632	Van Halen	Beautiful Girls
22	1978	84	5,024	Van Halen	Runnin' With The Devil
23	1995	97	1,920	Van Halen	Not Enough
24	2012	67	1,580	Van Halen	Tattoo

Van Halen performed his guitar solo on Beat It in one take, and didn't even charge for it. But it made the track palatable to MTV, which to that point largely ignored videos by Black acts. Truly a milestone.

All three of Van Halen's covers to chart - Pretty Woman (Roy Orbison), You Really Got Me (The Kinks) and Dancing In the Street (Martha and the Vandellas) - were originally hits in 1964. Coincidence or conspiracy?

[Gary]

Forever No. 1: Johnny Nash's 'I Can See Clearly Now'
By Andrew Unterberger
10/7/2020

www.billboard.com/articles/business/chart-beat/9461837/johnny-nash-i-can-see-clearly-now-forever-number-one/
Forever No. 1 is a Billboard series that pays special tribute to the recently deceased artists who achieved the highest honor our charts have to offer -- a Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 single -- by taking an extended look back at the chart-topping songs that made them part of this exclusive club. Here, we honor the late Johnny Nash by diving into his lone No. 1, the defiantly optimistic "I Can See Clearly Now."

By 1972, reggae had become an international phenomenon. After picking up steam in Jamaica over the course of the '60s, due to artists like Toots & the Maytalls, Desmond Dekker and The Wailers, the rhythmically offbeat genre crossed over to U.K. shores around the turn of the '70s. Then, thanks to Island Records star Jimmy Cliff and the Cliff-led, all-reggae soundtrack to 1972's Jamaican crime drama The Harder They Come, it began to make stateside inroads as well. But it wasn't any of these figures -- or even Wailers frontman Bob Marley, soon to become the genre's signature star -- who first brought reggae's influence to the top of the Billboard Hot 100. Rather, that fell to an ex-teen idol from Houston, who found himself at the right place at the right time to become America's first-ever reggae crossover star.

Johnny Nash, Singer & Writer of ‘I Can See Clearly Now,’ Dies at 80
Johnny Nash, who died this Tuesday (Oct. 6) at age 80, started early in the music business, singing on local radio as a young teenager. He scored his first national hit at age 17, with a 1957 cover of Doris Day's "A Very Special Love." Nash continued to crank out soft pop balladry for a number of years, even teaming up with fellow teen idols Paul Anka and George Hamilton for the waltzing "The Teen Commandments" in 1958. But with the rise of Motown and then the British Invasion in the early '60s, the hits dried up for Nash, and he was forced to adapt. By that point, Nash had also begun working behind the scenes in the industry, writing the No. 18-peaking Hot 100 hit "What Kind of Love Is This" for Joey Dee and the Starliters, and co-founding JoDa Records with manager Danny Sims. Noting that the Jamaican market was an efficient one for American artists to attempt to break, due to the low cost of recording on the island nation, Nash and Sims moved their families there in the mid-'60s.




While the original plan had been to ignore the local music scene and continue to crank out American-sounding pop music, reggae (and its precursor genre, rocksteady) eventually rubbed off on Nash, and its influence could be felt on his first Jamaican-recorded album, 1968's Hold Me Tight. That set's clearly reggae-indebted title track, with its light offbeat bounce and sweet harmonies, became Nash's first true international smash, hitting No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100 and even topping the charts in Canada. As Nash dove deeper into reggae music and Rastafarian culture, he also befriended Bob and Rita Marley, enlisting Bob as a writer for several of his own songs, and scoring a U.K. hit with a cover of the Wailers' "Stir It Up."

That Marley cover eventually appeared on Nash's 1972 album I Can See Clearly Now, recorded with reggae group the Fabulous Five Inc. as his backing band. The set's second single was its title track, which like Paul Simon's top 5 hit "Mother and Child Reunion" from earlier in the year, integrated a light but unmistakeable Jamaican influence into a pop-soul groove easily understood by American audiences. The song's jaunty, off-beat drums and hiccuping accordion hook suggested reggae, but the bubbling bass line was straight ought of Detroit, and the late-arriving keyboards (likely courtesy of a then-cutting edge Moog synthesizer) gave the song a near-prog sort of futurism.



The biggest Island influence on Nash for "I Can See Clearly Now" might have been his hard-earned sense of optimism and hopefulness. After bouncing around the industry for a decade, Nash had seemingly found his sound and his place -- and whether or not that's what the song is directly inspired by, the song's ultimate impression is of a man who has finally achieved a clarity of vision after a long and cloudy journey. His thin, piercing vocal doesn't sound boastful or overpowering on the verses as he sings about how "it's gonna be a bright sunshine-y day," but rather just kinda unburdened -- the feeling of making it through a particularly gloomy and weighty night and having everything feel that much simpler and lighter the next morning as a result.

Actually, the song's most powerful moments come not in Nash's summery weather reportage, but in the suggestion of the darkness he's since escaped. "I think I can make it now, the pain is gone," he mentions on the second verse, not dwelling on the bad times but still making clear their memory is a recent one. Then at the end of the song's unexpectedly stormy bridge -- the one moment of the song where Nash really lets loose, bursting into "Look ahead, there's nothing but blue skies!" -- the clouds seem to swirl back into place for a moment, in a fog of Moog and wordless minor-chord harmonies. It's a downright frightening moment of musical doubt, but one that is quickly (and thankfully) ushered away by a major-chord resolution to the passage, and a return to the song's sunny main hook.

[Gary]

Mary Wilson, Original Supremes Member, Dies at 76
By Lars Brandle
2/9/2021
Click to copy
www.billboard.com/articles/news/9523505/mary-wilson-supremes-obit/


Mary Wilson, the legendary diva and founding member of The Supremes, who served with the soul group longer than any other singer, passed away suddenly at her Las Vegas home on Monday night (Feb. 8). She was 76.

Wilson was always at the core of The Supremes, a steady force in the all-girl supergroup as members rotated out. The Motown icons earned 12 No. 1 singles on the Billboard Hot 100 chart -- the record for the most No. 1s among American groups. Five of those No. 1s were consecutive: “Where Did Our Love Go”, “Baby Love”, “Come See About Me”, “Stop! In the Name of Love” and “Back in My Arms Again.” It was a hot streak few artists will ever touch.

Formed in Detroit in 1959, then a quartet of 15-year-olds called The Primettes, The Supremes and Wilson were more than performers. They were unifiers and pioneers, whose music and style triggered social, racial, and gender barriers to come crashing down.


The Supremes at 60: Mary Wilson Says Reunion 'Up to Diana Ross'
Mary was with the Supremes until their final album, Mary, Scherrie & Susaye, in 1976 and through 1977 when they disbanded. Afterwards, Wilson continued on as a solo artist. She was rarely far from the spotlight, and in recent months had teased a new album, due out in 2021.

In 2019, she competed in Dancing With The Stars and published Supreme Glamour, her fourth book. Outside of music, she threw her energies into numerous social and civic causes, from ending hunger and continuing the conversation on HIV/AIDS. And she was an advocate behind the Music Modernization Act, which extends copyright protection to her fellow recording artists and was signed into law in October 2018.

Motown founder Berry Gordy was heartbroken by news of her passing. "Mary Wilson was extremely special to me," he says in a statement. "She was a trailblazer, a diva and will be deeply missed."

Wilson was honored in 1973 with a Mary Wilson Day in Detroit, and The Supremes were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988. On the night, Wilson delivered a speech on behalf of the group.

Jan. 21 of this year marked the 60th anniversary of the day The Supremes signed with Motown in 1961. Wilson was front and center in the celebrations.

The award-winning singer never gave up hope of getting the band back together, in the right circumstances. “Well, let’s put it this way: It’s really up to Diana,” she told THR in January. “I don't think she wants to do that. It doesn’t make sense unless you come together lovingly. Or at least have an understanding. It can be an understanding, that’s fine But I don't think she does want to. So therefore I'm going on with my life.”

'The Supremes A' Go-Go' Reissue: Mary Wilson, Lamont Dozier Look Back on the Landmark Girl Group Album
She is survived by her daughter Turkessa and grandchildren (Mia, Marcanthony, Marina); her son, Pedro Antonio Jr and grandchildren (Isaiah, Ilah, Alexander, Alexandria); her sister Kathryn; her brother, Roosevelt; her adopted son/cousin Willie and grandchildren (Erica (great granddaughter, Lori), Vanessa, Angela).

Services will be private due to COVID restrictions, a rep says, though a celebration of Wilson’s life and career will take place later this year.

The family asks in lieu of flowers, that friends and fans support UNCF.org and the Humpty Dumpty Institute.

[Gary]

Supremes #1's


Where Did Our Love Go

1964-08-22
1964-08-29

Baby Love


1964-10-31
1964-11-07
1964-11-14
1964-11-21

Come See About Me

1964-12-19
1965-01-16

Stop! In The Name Of Love

1965-03-27
1965-04-03

Back In My Arms Again

1965-06-12


I Hear A Symphony


1965-11-20
1965-11-27



You Can't Hurry Love


1966-09-10
1966-09-17


You Keep Me Hangin' On

1966-11-19
1966-11-26



Love Is Here And Now You're Gone


1967-03-11


The Happening


1967-05-13

Love Child

1968-11-30
1968-12-07



Someday We'll Be Together


1969-12-27

[renaboss]

^Missing at least one week there for "Come See About Me".

R.I.P. Mary. Thank you for the music.

[Gary]

thanks

[rockgolf]

The Supremes biggest Hot 100 hits based on the Billboard G.O.A.T. algorithm:

All Time Position	Track	Artist	Total Pts	Year
304	Love Child	Diana Ross and the Supremes	806,820	1968
587	Baby Love	The Supremes	698,020	1964
614	Where Did Our Love Go	The Supremes	692,784	1964
634	Come See About Me	The Supremes	686,868	1964
817	Someday We'll Be Together*	Diana Ross and the Supremes	649,840	1969
1016	Stop! In The Name Of Love	The Supremes	609,790	1965
1105	You Can't Hurry Love	The Supremes	590,818	1966
1470	I'm Gonna Make You Love Me	Diana Ross and the Supremes & the Temptations	525,640	1969
1599	You Keep Me Hangin' On	The Supremes	504,764	1966
1605	I Hear A Symphony	The Supremes	503,710	1965
1744	Love Is Here And Now You're Gone	The Supremes	486,370	1967
1957	Reflections	Diana Ross and the Supremes	458,048	1967
1995	The Happening	The Supremes	453,560	1967
2301	Back In My Arms Again	The Supremes	414,834	1965
2993	Stoned Love	The Supremes	341,984	1970
3634	My World Is Empty Without You	The Supremes	276,046	1966
4930	Up The Ladder To The Roof	The Supremes	171,040	1970
5065	Love Is Like An Itching In My Heart	The Supremes	164,866	1966
5143	In And Out Of Love	Diana Ross and the Supremes	161,840	1967
5637	I'm Livin' In Shame	Diana Ross and the Supremes	140,250	1969
6543	River Deep-Mountain High	The Supremes and Four Tops	113,920	1971
6894	Nothing But Heartaches	The Supremes	105,468	1965
6940	Floy Joy	The Supremes	104,384	1972
7096	Nathan Jones	The Supremes	100,864	1971
7688	Everybody's Got The Right To Love	The Supremes	89,664	1970
8250	When The Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes	The Supremes	79,424	1964
9366	Forever Came Today	Diana Ross and the Supremes	64,600	1968
9525	I'm Gonna Let My Heart Do The Walking	The Supremes	62,920	1976
9602	I'll Try Something New	Diana Ross and the Supremes & The Temptations	62,050	1969

*Mary Wilson performed on all these except Someday We'll Be Together, where Motown listed the track as being by the Diana Ross & the Supremes but only contained vocals by Diana Ross with backgrounds by Maxine & Julia Walters.

[phieaglesfan712]

The Supremes will always be the greatest girl group ever. 12 #1 hits in less than 6 years. Their 4 #1 hits in 1965 has only been matched by a female act once in the 55 years since (Rihanna in 2010).

[nak]

Mary Wilson was such a queen. She really cared about the Supremes' legacy

[nak]

I'm surprised Love Child was their biggest hit? I thought it would be You Can't Hurry Love

[phieaglesfan712]

As a huge Supremes fan, I always felt that Stop! In the Name of Love and I Hear a Symphony were the biggest hits. Then again, you could argue You Keep Me Hanging On and You Can't Hurry Love were the most impactful because they were remade in the 1980s and went to #1 again.

[Gary]

Forever No. 1: Bay City Rollers' 'Saturday Night'
By Andrew Unterberger
4/23/2021
Click to copy
www.billboard.com/articles/columns/pop/9561705/bay-city-rollers-saturday-night-forever-number-one-leo-mckeown/


Forever No. 1 is a Billboard series that pays special tribute to the recently deceased artists who achieved the highest honor our charts have to offer -- a Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 single -- by taking an extended look back at the chart-topping songs that made them part of this exclusive club. Here, we honor the late Les McKeown with a look at his group the Bay City Rollers' first and only Hot 100 No. 1, the timeless weekend anthem "Saturday Night."

If you read the BBC's news story from Thursday (April 22) about the recent passing of singer Les McKeown -- who died at age 65 on Tuesday, as announced by his family -- you'll find a relatively comprehensive retelling of his history as a musician, from his early days in the relatively unknown band Threshold to mid-'70s superstardom as a member of the Bay City Rollers. You'll also find a brief analysis of his significance to his home country Scotland, as frontman for one of the country's most successful cultural exports of the Me Decade, and even a brief divergence into the harrowing story of the 1975 incident where he accidentally ran over and killed a 76-year-old neighbor with his car. What you won't find, however, is any mention of the song of his that Billboard readers are by far the most likely to actually be familiar with: "Saturday Night."



In the U.S., "Saturday Night" was one of the defining pop songs of its era, the first Hot 100 No. 1 of America's bicentennial year, a sing-and-clap-along AM radio killer that briefly made the Bay City Rollers household names in the U.S. But on the other side of the pond, the group had already scored two years' worth of hits by the time "Saturday Night" took off stateside, including a pair of No. 1s in their cover of the Four Seasons' "Bye Bye Baby" and the ballad "Give a Little Love" -- the former even ending up as the top-selling single in the U.K. for 1975. As "Rollermania" ran rampant throughout Scotland and Great Britain, "Saturday Night" never even charted in the U.K. It was, quite simply, not a major part of their story back home.

It's an appropriate discrepancy for a band who, despite their proud Scottish roots, always had their sights on an American takeover. In their early days, the group -- formed and led by brothers Alan and Derek Longmuir, and then fronted by schoolmate Nobby Clark -- even sought a name that would endear them to U. S. audiences, and ultimately selected one by literally throwing darts at a map of the United States, settling on a target struck near Bay City, Michigan. As the group became the closest thing the '70s had produced to The Beatles in their home country -- with a hysteria-inducing national tour, a signature look in their tartan trousers and scarves, and even their own weekly TV series in 1975 -- breaking America remained a tireless goal of the band's.

Luckily for them, it was also a priority for the head of their U.S. label: a 43-year-old exec named Clive Davis, who had held onto the band through the label's recent transition from Bell Records to Arista. Though the Rollers had failed to even crack the Hot 100 with multiple releases in the U.S., Davis remained determined to find a single that would work for the group stateside. And so he reached back for a song that he thought had more of an America-friendly sound, despite its flopping in the U.K. upon its original release -- the stomping bubble-rock anthem "Saturday Night," co-written and produced by the hitmaking team of Phil Coulter and Bill Martin.

In fact: "Saturday Night" had originally been released in 1973 with Clark, the group's first frontman, still on vocals -- though by the time of the group's 1974 debut album Rollin', he had left due to creative differences, and been replaced both in the group's lineup and on the "Saturday" track itself by McKeown. Listening to the original version, it's easy to see why the song might not have been as commercially impactful with Clark's harsher, flatter delivery barking out the vocals. However, with McKeown's smoother, more limber timbre leading the way -- and the sound of the track's trademark "S... A... T-U-R... D-A-Y... NIGHT!" intro also being transformed from a military marching order to more of a cheerleader chant -- the track's pop potential could be fully realized.


And that potential was considerable, even West of the Atlantic. The song nestled into a happy medium between two other European acts whose sounds had recently taken hold Stateside: ABBA, the Swedish quartet whose take-no-prisoners approach to full-bodied pop music resulted in some of the most infectious and undeniable global hits of the mid-'70s, and Sweet, whose fist-pumping take on gang-vocaled glam rock resulted in nearly every one of their singles sounding like a generational anthem, regardless of subject matter (and whose "Fox on the Run" was also moving up in the top 10 the week "Saturday Night" hit No. 1). There were also hints of a couple acts much longer familiar to American audiences: The Beach Boys, whose preppier hits of a decade earlier provided the model for the song's pep-rally vibe, and once again Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons, whose trademark ay-yi-yi vocal affectations were lifted for one of the song's most memorable vocal hooks.

While the formula proved particularly effective for mid-'70s America, it's sort of hard to believe (even close to a half a century later) that there was ever a time and place where the song wouldn't have proven a smash. Few singles in the history of popular music are able to harness such incredible energy in just its first 15 seconds -- the title chant, accompanied by the most effective pre-Queen musical foot-stomping of the rock era, and a zooming guitar hook (and accompanying bass rumble) that sounds like a fighter jet coming in for a landing -- that the verses have no choice but to immediately pull back on the intensity, lest the whole thing short-circuit less than a minute in.

The Rollers should barely even need more than those 15 seconds to ensure the single's immortality as a ready-for-the-weekend standard. But they also come with about a half-dozen other brain-sticking hooks throughout the song -- most of which are just variations of "Saturday night," which is sung, shouted and stuttered an unthinkable 42 times total across its sub-three-minute runtime. It gets the point across, certainly, and an appropriate Davis-engineered live debut of the song on ABC's Saturday Night Live With Howard Cosell only further helped to drive it home.

And American top 40 audiences were particularly amenable to songs about that time of the week in the mid-'70s. A few years before the Bay City Rollers first hit the Hot 100, Elton John scored a No. 12 hit with his Goodbye Yellow Brick Road scorcher "Saturday Night's Alright For Fighting," then in 1974 Cat Stevens hit No. 6 with a cover of Sam Cooke's melancholy "Another Saturday Night" -- and in August 1975, Lynyrd Skynyrd had gone to No. 27 with the cautionary "Saturday Night Special." The trend continued for the rest of the '70s, with further hits by Earth Wind, & Fire ("Saturday Nite," No. 21, 1977), Thelma Houston ("Saturday Night, Sunday Morning," No. 34, 1979) and Herman Brood ("Saturdaynight," No. 35, 1979). And arguably the biggest musical Saturday Night of the decade wasn't a single, but a soundtrack: Saturday Night Fever, the Bee Gees-led set that became one of the best-selling albums of the '70s. (Studio execs wanted the signature song of that OST, the No. 1 hit "Stayin' Alive," to be retitled "Saturday Night," but the Bee Gees held firm, understandably feeling there had been enough "Saturday Night" songs already.)

Thus, the lone Hot 100-topping "Saturday Night" song of the '70s belonged to the Bay City Rollers, who first ascended to pole position on the listing dated Jan. 3, 1976, replacing the Staple Singers' "Let's Do It Again." The song lasted just a lone week before giving way to C.W. McCall's spoken-word story song "Convoy" -- part of a period of exceedingly high turnover atop the Hot 100, with six one-frame No. 1s reigning back to back before Paul Simon's "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover" finally broke the streak with a three-week run on top. "Saturday Night" would stand as the group's sole Hot 100 No. 1, but Rollermania would last in earnest in the U.S. for the rest of 1976, with the chugging "Money Honey" (No. 9) following it to the top ten a few months later, and the power-poppy "Rock and Roll Love Letter" (No. 28) and the Dusty Springfield cover "I Only Want to Be With You" (No. 12) also hitting the top 40. However, with the emergence of disco and new wave in the late decade, the group's unthreateningly hooky pop-rock quickly fell out of vogue -- though they did manage one club-flavored final major hit, with the sublime No. 10-peaking "You Made Me Believe in Magic" in late 1977.


Though punk and new wave's emergence may have played a large part in the Bay City Rollers' fall being nearly as rapid as their rise -- in the U.K., where punk had a more immediate cultural and commercial impact, "Magic" only hit No. 34, and the group never even grazed the top 40 again -- "Saturday Night" actually played a big part in that scene's genesis. "Blitzkrieg Bop," the debut single for New York punks The Ramones that's often cited as the genre's big bang, used a "Hey! Ho! Let's go!" chant as a launch pad -- one whose decidedly uncool inspiration the group has been forthright about. "At the time we really liked bubblegum music, and we really liked the Bay City Rollers," frontman Joey Ramone admitted in the liner notes to the group's Hey Ho Let's Go box set. "'Blitzkrieg Bop' was our 'Saturday Night'." It was perhaps only fitting that the group's commercial undoing in their home country should come in part from the song that ensured that they'd always have a legacy in the United States.

[Gary]

Bay City Rollers hits/peak


Saturday Night 1
Money Honey 9
You Made Me Believe In Magic 10
I Only Want To Be With You 12
The Way I Feel Tonight 24
Rock And Roll Love Letter 28
Yesterday's Hero 54
Dedication 60

[Gary]