Most unique sounding songs to be chart hits?

[iHype.]

What are the most unique songs to be hits to you? In terms of not sounding radio friendly or like a standard hit at the time?

The obvious one/biggest example: Bohemian Rhapsody.

But some other ones I can't believe were hits:


"Batdance" actually reached #1, and just may be the most unique sounding #1 hit ever to me. It doesn't even work as an individual song honestly. It's just an incoherent mashup that was spit up. 




"Sowing The Seeds of Love" actually reached #,2 and to me, this song sounds like an audio equivalent of what I would think an acid trip or something would be. 

[312999]

Gangnam Style

[Verisimilitude]

[Amnesiac]

My favorite examples of this are the very early electronic songs that became hits. Most famously, there's this classic from Kraftwerk. Edited down to single length, it was a surprise #25 hit in 1975.

[Devil Marlena Nylund]

That “Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)” was a top 20 pop radio hit in 1999 is really weird in hindsight as it’s a spoken word recording with a light beat in the background.

[Au$tin]

[Glass Joe]

It was mentioned in the other post, but should also be mentioned here: “Three Little Pigs” by Green Jelly. It’s not often that you get a children’s story turned into a heavy metal song.

Also not many who sound like Erasure. “Always” is pretty unique.

“Barbie Girl” by Aqua could fit here too.

[dremolus - solarpunk]

[The Black Bird]

I'm not sure if it sounded common in 1990 (someone could tell us more about it), but Madonna's Justify My Love becoming such a big hit has always puzzled me. The video is great but the song sounds so not mainstream to me. Maybe that's a statement of how BIG Madonna was at the time.

[Ｓｏｕｎｄｃｌ🕤ｃｋ]

[Glove Slap]

[JukeboxJacob]

Bad Guy

[rainie]

in terms of recent stuff, happier then ever and take me to church come to mind.

also what are we defining as chart hit ? if we're just counting anything that made the top 40, then i think system of the down's byob + nine inch nails' the day the world went away at least deserve a mention

[garrettlen]

Feb 23, 2022 9:11:27 GMT -5 Glove Slap said:

#1 on the Hot 100 for 4 weeks in December 1963.

[mrmike855]

[SPRΞΞ]

Paula Cole's "Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?"

[Private Dancer]

Love Hangover by Diana Ross. Did the radio version just have her sing one verse/chorus and the rest just music....and it went to #1...that puzzles me

[johnm1120]

#13 Pop, #18 Hot 100

[Amnesiac]

White Town's "Your Woman" was a big cross-format hit in 1997: #23 Hot 100, #5 Mainstream Top 40/pop airplay, #5 alternative, #16 Adult Top 40, #26 dance club play. Also a UK #1.

[nak]

Stay Awhile by the Bells. The singer is whispering the whole time
They reached #7 on the Hot 100, and the single went to #1 in Canada

The Lord's Prayer by Sister Janet Mead. 
Reached #4 on the Hot 100 in 1974

[kcdawg13]

Only Madonna could get a song like "Frozen" to #4 on Pop.

[Devil Marlena Nylund]

Primitive Radio Gods - Standing Outside A Broken Phone Booth With Money In My Hand

A Top 10 hit on pop radio in 1996 and (I think) a #1 on Alternative. It made sense at the time but looking back, what an odd song, and even in a sense for Alternative radio, I don't think it had any guitar in it.

[Ｓｏｕｎｄｃｌ🕤ｃｋ]

[🇯🇲 lucy88 🇯🇲]

[irvine22]

youtu.be/DyDfgMOUjCI

[leonagwen]

youtu.be/x4maoo4A3x4

[sadchild]

Metallica's "one" is probably the heaviest/most-metal song to ever reach the top 40. It starts somewhat mellow but the end is blistering trash metal.



Here's a rather unique sounding song that hit #1



Another unique chart-topper

[rainie]

so i was just reminded this song exists and i genuinely believe it blows most of this thread out of the water (especially if we're only talking semi modern examples since the pre mtv era was such a different ballgame)


it's one thing for a song to have an unconventional structure or to be a mashup of specific genres not rly duplicated before or since. but like. at least they're almost always melodic and / or pleasant to the ear in one way or another ?? meanwhile, this *#22 hit* is dissonant in a way that you usually hear on a grindcore or experimental pc music song. like the closest comparison i can think of for this is farrah abraham's my teenage dream has ended, except that was a botched vanity project by someone with no musical experience that unintentionally turned into a piece of post modern music critic bait. this was again, need i remind you, an actual hit. and it's not even like it got that high off name recognition either -- it was jim jones's second biggest hit AND it stuck around long enough to make the year end list its respective year. honesty i kind of love it

[jdanton2]

one of the first new wave songs to hit #1 from 1979 and even some rap influences before Rappers Delight.

[rnb]

harlem shake