Billboard Archives - Ramblin' with Roger

Country hits of 1975, part 2

Tanya Tucker, Merle Haggard

Of the Country hits of 1975, most topped the chart for one week, including all of the songs listed here. Some also topped the pop charts as well, and will be designated as such.

Roll On Big Mama – Joe Stampley (Epic). Background Vocal: The Jordanaires!

She’s Actin’ Single (I’m Drinkin’ Doubles) -Gary Stewart (RCA Victor). Background Vocal: The Jordanaires! There are a lot of songs on this list with apostrophes standing in for letters.

(Hey Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song – B.J. Thomas (ABC), one week #1 pop, also AC #1

I’m Not Lisa – Jessi Colter (Capitol). Co-produced by her husband, Waylon Jennings. Pop Chart Peaks: Billboard 4, Cash Box 5, Record World 6 – A/C Peak: 16

Thank God I’m A Country Boy – John Denver (RCA Victor). Pop Chart Peaks: #1 on Billboard, Cash Box & Record World; AC Peak: 5. One of six Top 10 Billboard country songs.

Window Up Above – Mickey Gilley (Playboy)

Been mistreated

When Will I Be Loved – Linda Ronstadt (Capitol). Harmony vocals by Andrew Gold and Kenny Edwards. Pop Chart Peaks: Cash Box 1, Billboard 2, Record World 4; A/C Peak: 3. One of nine Top 10 Billboard country songs.

You’re My Best Friend – Don Williams (ABC/Dot)

Tryin’ To Beat The Morning Home – T. G. Sheppard (Melodyland)

Lizzie And The Rainman – Tanya Tucker (MCA)

Movin’ On – Merle Haggard (Capitol Records Nashville). I heard this trucking song on the radio, I suspect, because of the popularity of C.W. McCall’s Convoy, though it didn’t reach the pop charts.

Just Get Up And Close The Door– Johnny Rodriguez (Mercury)

Feelins’ – Loretta Lynn and Conway Twitty (MCA)

Hope You’re Feelin’ Me (Like I’m Feelin’ You) -Charlie Pride (RCA)

San Antonio Stroll – Tanya Tucker (MCA)

(Turn Out The Lights And) Love Me Tonight – Don Williams (ABC/Dot)

I’m Sorry – John Denver (RCA Victor), also #1 pop and AC

Are You Sure Hank Done It This Way – Waylon Jennings (RCA)

Rocky – Dickie Lee (RCA Victor)

It’s All In The Movies – Merle Haggard (Capitol)

Secret Love—Freddy Fender (ABC/Dot). This standard, written by Sammy Fain and Paul Francis Webster, has been covered by the Moonglows, Billy Stewart (#29 pop), Frankie Avalon, Johnny Mathis, Duane Eddy, Andy Williams, Connie Francis, Frank Sinatra, Jerry Vale, and many more.

Love Put A Song In My Heart – Johnny Rodriguez (Mercury)

More Billboard Christmas Charts

Cheech & Chong

Here are more Billboard Christmas Charts, the songs that did very well in the limited seasonal charts. They were calculated from 1963 through 1972 and 1983 through 1985.

The majority of these songs I do not know; I’ll note the ones that I do.

Here are the songs that reached #2

Merry Christmas, Baby – Charles Brown (1968). I know the song, but it is not from that time period.

Little Drummer Boy – Lou Rawls (1967). Another song I first heard much later.

Santa Looked A Lot Like Daddy– Buck Owens (1965). Co-written by Owens.

If Every Day Was Like Christmas – Elvis Presley (1966). If every day WAS like Christmas, would it really be a wonderful world? (Asking for my id.)

Do You Hear What I See – Bing Crosby (1963). I have a whole album of Bing, plus some songs on an Andrews Sisters collection.

Little Becky’s Christmas Wish – Becky Lamb (1967). “Probably the most well-known (and most commercially successful) of the 60s child spoken-word records, the song (Warner Bros. Records # 7154) by the 6-year-old girl took the form of a letter to Santa Claus asking him to bring her big brother Tommy home for Christmas. However, he died in Vietnam.” I never even heard of this. Oh, my.

Who Took The Merry Out Of Christmas – The Staple Singers (1973). This shows in a STAX/Volt box set. Besides the vocals, it’s a bit melancholy, which is why I like it.

We’re #3

These songs reached #3 on the Xmas charts

Santa Claus and His Old Lady – Cheech & Chong (1972). Stoned talk.

The Man With All The Toys – The Beach Boys (1964). This I have.

Silver Bells – Earl Grant (1969). This needs more airplay.

Little Saint Nick – The Beach Boys (1963). I also have this

You’re All I Want For Christmas – Brook Benton (1963)

Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer – The Temptations (1971). Several Motown artists released Christmas albums: Supremes, Stevie Wonder, the Jackson Five, and Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, as well as the Tempts. They appeared on a couple of compilations, one of which I own on vinyl.

Happy Xmas (War Is Over) – John Lennon (1971). Of COURSE, I have this song.

No 1964 Billboard Soul charts

Sam Cooke, the Impressions, Dionne Warwick

There were no 1964 Billboard Soul charts. Why is that? Per Joel Whitburn’s Top R&B/Hip-Hop Singles, the magazine didn’t publish a chart from November 30, 1963, through January 23, 1965, because the magazine thought there was so much crossover between the pop and RB charts to create.

For the book, Top 50 In R&B Locations published by Cash Box, a national music trade magazine was used,

Three titles crossed over, hitting #1 on both charts. Unsurprisingly, all were from Motown. My Guy by Mary Wells (seven weeks RB, two weeks pop), Baby Love by the Supremes (four weeks pop, three weeks RB), and the group’s previous hit, Where Did Our Love Go (two weeks each).

Funny – Joe Hinton, four weeks at #1 RB. I always knew this Willie Nelson song as Funny How Time Slips Away. #13 pop.

What Kind Of Fool (Do You Think I Am) – The Tams, three weeks at #1 RB. #9 pop. From Atlanta.

The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s In His Kiss) – Betty Everett, three weeks at #1. #6 pop.

Walk On By – Dionne Warwick, three weeks at #1 RB. #6 pop. I watched Finding Your Roots. They misspelled her name on an earlier record. It should have been Warrick. She was initially furious, but her grandfather suggested that Warwick could be her stage name, and it was so.

Let It Be Me – Betty Everett and Jerry Butler, three weeks at #1 RB. #5 pop.

Let the people say…

Amen – The Impressions, three weeks at #1 RB, #7 pop. Featuring Curtis Mayfield

Hi-Heel Sneakers – Tommy Tucker, three weeks at #1 RB, #11 pop

Under The Boardwalk – The Drifters, three weeks at #1 RB, #4 pop

Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um – Major Lance, two weeks at #1 RB, #5 pop

Good Times – Sam Cooke, two weeks at #1 RB, #11 pop

Keep On Pushing – The Impressions, two weeks at #1 RB, #10 pop

Mercy, Mercy – Don Covay & The Goodtimers, two weeks at #1 RB, #35 pop. Co-written by Covay.

Reach Out For Me – Dionne Warwick – two weeks at #1 RB, #20 pop

Good News – Sam Cooke, one week at #1 RB, #11 pop. Composed by Cooke.

The Way You Do The Things You Do – The Temptations, one week at #1 RB, #11 pop

Hot Country Singles of 1964

Roger Miller

Billboard dropped the W designation, as in Western, from its charts in late 1962. So it was the Hot Country Singles of 1964. These topped the charts but did not cross over to lead the pop, RB, or nascent adult contemporary charts.

Once A Day – Connie Smith, eight weeks at #1. Her name is the only one I don’t recognize from the list.

I Guess I’m Crazy – Jim Reeves, seven weeks at #1

My Heart Skips A Beat – Buck Owens, seven weeks at #1. I never owned any of his music, but I knew he was on Capitol Records because the inner sleeves of my Beatles albums featured him, Nat Cole, Al Martino, and several others.

Understand Your Man – Johnny Cash, six weeks at #1. I didn’t own this at the time, only in the late 1990s, when I was getting his American Recordings did I purchase the greatest hits of his Columbia recordings.

“Sugar is sweet and so is maple syrple”

Dang Me – Roger Miller, six weeks at #1. When I was a member of the Capitol Record Club, c. 1966, I failed to return the negative option card in time. I received his Golden Hits on Smash Records. It included the 1965 crossover hit King of the Road, but also a bunch of other songs I grew to love. I think it was the Roger thing. BTW, the first two videos I found were versions he rerecorded for stereo; it’s not as good.

I Don’t Care (Just As Long as You Love Me) – Buck Owens, six weeks at #1. Owens was considered one of the most successful artists of the Bakersfield sound, “defined by its influences of rock and roll and honky-tonk style country, and its heavy use of electric instrumentation and backbeat. It was also a reaction against the slickly produced, orchestra-laden Nashville sound, which was becoming popular in the late 1950s.”

Saginaw, Michigan – Lefty Frizzell, four weeks at #1

Begging To You – Marty Robbins, three weeks at #1. I got a Robbins greatest hits CD from my late FIL’s CD collection.

Together Again – Buck Owens, two weeks at #1. The only time I regularly watched the country-laden variety show Hee Haw, which he co-hosted with Roy Clark from 1969 to 1986, was in the spring of 1975 when I was shivering in my grandmother’s old house and had only one channel, WNBF, Channel 12 on the VHF dial.

B.J. the D.J. – Stonewall Jackson, one week at #1

Most awarded songs #10

mondegreen of long duration

More fun with tunes that are among the most awarded songs #10. I own every one of them in some form. Here are some of your Grammy and Oscar winners. They’ve been touted by Rolling Stone magazine, RIAA, ASCAP, CMA, NPR, and others.

60. A Change Is Going To Come – Sam Cooke. If you saw the biopic One Night in Miami, you get a sense of the importance of this song on society at that point. He was inspired by Bob Dylan’s Blowing In The Wind. Cooke chose to share feelings he had from dealing with discrimination, at hotels, e.g., that he experienced. Unfortunately, he was killed on December 12, 1964, two weeks before the song was released as a single.

59. I Only Have Eyes For You – The Flamingoes. Quoting me: “I hear those first three or four chords and I am always surprised how it leads to such a lush tune. My first favorite song, probably for 30 years.”

58. Layla – Derek and the Dominoes. I loved this song when I was in college. My neighbors Howie and Debi had a cat named Layla, who was a sister to our cat Doris. It is, of course, about Clapton’s longing for his friend George Harrison’s wife, Pattie Boyd. Rita Coolidge has claimed credit for co-creating the piano part, a segment that her then-boyfriend Jim Gordon was playing the tune during the album sessions.

57. Losing My Religion – R.E.M. I could always relate to this song.

56. Imagine – John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band. I’m on record of having overdosed on this recording and especially all of the covers. Still, I’m glad that John had a signature song by which he’ll be remembered. His son Julian sang it to support the Ukrainians recently.

“Picket lines and picket signs”

55. What’s Going On – Marvin Gaye. Berry Gordy famously wasn’t a fan at first.

54. You Send Me – Sam Cooke. Cooke took a lot of grief for abandoning the gospel music with the Soul Stirrers. Still, this song is pretty tame for such outrage.

53. I Walk The Line – Johnny Cash. as his first big hit – #1 country, #17 pop in 1957 – it is the song I most associate with him. A biopic about him and June Carter was titled Walk The Line.

52. Brown Eyed Girl – Van Morrison. Apparently, because of signing a bad contract with Bang Records, Morrison never made a cent on his first, and signature hit.

51. California Dreamin’ – The Mamas and The Papas. They were listed as The Mama’s and the Papa’s on their first big single. Here is was one of the mondegreens I lived with for the longest time:
Stopped into a church
I passed along the way
Well, I got down on my knees (got down on my knees)
And I pretend to pray (I pretend to pray)
but I heard
And I began to pray
Moreover, I’ve heard a number of cover versions that made the same mistake.