Here are the songs that were #1 pop but not on Billboard in 1975. This means they were #1 on Record World, Cash Box, or both. Some of the songs are great, and at least one is awful.
The number after the RW and CB designation is the number of weeks at #1. The * indicates the songs I positively own in some physical form, though I likely also possess the Barry White and Janis Ian tracks.
*Boogie On Reggae Woman – Stevie Wonder (Tamla), CB 1, RW 1, produced, arranged, and written by Wonder
*No No Song – Ringo Starr (Apple), CB 1, the last Starr single release to top any U.S. pop charts. Written by Hoyt Axton and David Jackson, produced by Richard Perry
*How Long – Ace (Anchor), CB 1. Written by lead singer Paul Carrack.
*When Will I Be Loved – Linda Ronstadt (Capitol), CB #1. Written by Phil Everly; produced by Peter Asher.
If at first…
*Please Mr. Please – Olivia Newton-John (MCA), CB #1. Co-written and previously sung by Bruce Welch, a long-time member of The Shadows, who “also wrote several hit singles for the group and Cliff Richard.” He was once engaged to ON-J
*Someone Saved My Life Tonight – Elton John (MCA), CB 1, RW 1 from the Captain Fantastic And The Brown Dirt Cowboy album that went to #1 in its first week of release
At Seventeen – Janis Ian (Columbia), CB 1. Written by Ian when she was 23.
Run Joey Run – David Geddes (Big Tree Records), CB 1. How did I miss this throwback from the 1950s?
Mr. Jaws – Dickie Goodman (Cash), CB 1, RW 1. One of those break-in novelties like his “The Flying Saucer” (1956)
*They Just Can’t Stop It, The (Games People Play) – The Spinners (Atlantic), RW1. Produced, arranged, and conducted by Thom Bell. I never understood why Games People Play was the info in the parentheses.
How to champion libraries in Congress: a free virtual event on Tuesday, September 9 at 5 PM ET / 4 PM CT / 2 PM PT, where ALA policy experts and special guests will share updates, inspiring stories, and how you can pitch in at the start of this school year.
Mike Lindell & MyStore: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver
Marvel v. DC: The 25-Cent War from Tales From My Spinner Rack! by Gary Sassaman
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ICE Raids and DC Occupation
Make democracy work part of ordinary life, not an add-on (ht/Paul Tonko). Lauren DesRosiers quoted Audre Lorde: “Every day of your lives is practice in becoming the person you want to be. No instantaneous miracle is suddenly going to occur and make you brave and courageous and true. And every day that you sit back silent, refusing to use your power, terrible things are being done in our name.”
DHS is using the Bible to promote ICE, claiming ‘righteous’ fight against immigrants. The agency refers to Scripture, including Micah 6:8, as it seeks to recruit agents.
New York State has seen a surge in ICE arrests, with totals four times the number seen during the same June-July period last year.
Don’t Let ICE’s Legal Abuses Stop You From Asserting Your Rights
My Congressperson, US Rep. Paul Tonko: “I traveled to the Buffalo Federal Detention Facility in Batavia… This visit was even more urgent given the results of a report from ICE’s Office of the Inspector General from an unannounced facility inspection earlier this summer. The report found the facility and ICE staff were not in compliance with federal law and used excessive, inappropriate force, including striking detainees and spraying them with pepper spray.
“Despite the pressing need for oversight and in violation of federal law that grants me and all Members of Congress access to these facilities, I was denied at the gate. The facility guards blocking my entry went so far as to confirm that they knew they were in violation of the law. If they are fine ignoring the legal rights of a Member of Congress, what does that mean for our own communities and individuals who are detained?”
You may or may not be able to read my state senator, Pat Fahy’s, newest op-ed in the Times Union, “about the paramilitary-type tactics taking over our streets.
“No visible identification, no judicial warrants, no due process – these are setting a dangerous precedent for Americans and normalizing paramilitary secret police style tactics on our streets. That’s why I introduced legislation to prohibit ICE agents from wearing masks or face coverings during civil immigration enforcement in New York.
“Security and humanity can both exist, and instilling fear will not create the immigration reforms we need to enrich America and honor its legacy.”
Kudos to them both.
MUSIC
Not Me No Way – Rebecca Jade ℗ 2025 Ultimate Vibe Recordings, Released on: 2025-08-18
Coverville 1545: Cover Stories for Steve Martin and Modest Mouse and 1546: The Mamas & The Papas Cover Story
The Mamas & The Papas cover Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart songs: My Heart Stood Still (from One Dam’ Thing after Another, 1927); Glad To Be Unhappy (from On Your Toes, 1936); Sing For Your Supper (from The Boys from Syracuse, 1938). They sang those three songs and Here In My Heart (from Dearest Enemy, 1925) for Rodgers and Hart Today, a salute to the composers, which aired March 2, 1967, on ABC TV, then reworked it as No Salt On Her Tail.
Welcome to Sunday Stealing. Here we will steal all types of questions from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent questions. Cheers to all of us thieves!
Dr. Medusa is an associate professor who stole this meme from her friend Clare. Since Clare no longer blogs, it’s unknown whether she originated it or stole it. But that doesn’t matter. What’s important now is how you answer these questions.
The 2×4 Meme
TWO foods you can’t stand
Peanut butter: What’s odd is that, as a kid, I LOVED peanut butter. But I must have ODed on it because the smell now makes me nauseous.
2. Black olives
FOUR foods you love
Lasanga, possibly the only thing I make using the oven
2. Strawberry ice cream
3. Carrot cake
4. Deviled eggs
Location
TWO places you never want to see again
A truly awful motel in Ashtabula, OH, where we stayed for the 2016 Olin Family reunion.
2. A cockroach-infested apartment I lived in Kingston, NY for two months in late 1972.
FOUR places you’d like to revisit
Toronto, ON, Canada, where we went to just ahead of the Olin Reunion in Peterborough , ON in 2011. It was combined with a stop at Niagara Falls. I can always go to the Falls.
2. Barbados, where we spent our honeymoon in 1999.
3. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, OH. I’ve been there twice, in 1998 (the Carls Perkins and Wilson had recently died) and 2016.
4. Paris, France. We were in France for a few days, but not nearly enough in the capital
TWO musical artists who make you want to change the station
I don’t know a musical act well enough to hate. There are aspects of various music that I don’t enjoy: misogyny, hyperviolence.
Oddly enough, this came up in conversation recently. Trying to get moved from a horrendous office space in August 2017 involved yelling (not just by me), and I needed to leave to cool off, but I was physically blocked. There are more details, but suffice to say: 1) I did get to move, but 2) it took WAY too much effort.
2. One morning in June 2009, I was trying to get back from Charlotte, NC, to Albany, NY. Because of a conversation too inane to repeat, I was late for my plane and had to switch items while in the TSA line.
FOUR moments you’d like to relive. OK, I’m not sure the premise is correct for me. Do I want a rush of nostalgia? No. Do I want to “fix” the past? Maybe, but THEN what? Do I want to re-remember stuff? Well, maybe.
I’m told that, when I was in third grade, I got so angry because some kids were playing keep-away with my hat that I went home. I can totally believe it. I don’t remember this, but my friends tell me I then hopped a Crowley’s milk truck to get home. I’d only want to relive to clarify the narrative.
2. When my maternal grandmother would ramble about relatives, which she called “relations,” I would take notes the next time.
3. I would put my childhood photo album in a safer place.
4. When I took apart the front door lock when I was a kid, I would have taken notes so I could put it back together.
Thank you for playing! Please come back next week.
In a democracy, the people shape their government. But in the long run, the government also shapes its people. What kind of citizens does a democracy need to have, if it will sustain itself? AndAn Authoritarian Economy is a Bad Economy
Maga’s boss class thinks they are immune to American carnage
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Now I Know: Do Not Touch, Eat, or Even Smell The Flowers and Extreme Paint Ball, Literally, and Crashing a Car to Save a Life
Flat earth
Speaking to members of Congress last month, he boasted, “This is something that nobody else can do. We’re gonna get the drug prices down. Not 30 or 40% which would be great, not 50 or 60, no. We’re gonna get ‘em down 1000%, 600%, 500%, 1500%.” Steven Rattner, counselor for the Treasury Secretary in the Obama administration, says he’s “economically illiterate.”
He Orders New Census Excluding Undocumented Immigrants. New York Law School Adjunct Professor and Senior Fellow Jeffrey Wice: “The Congress debated whether or not to count citizens only, and the decision was made back in the 1860s that the reapportionment was to be based on the whole number of persons, regardless of their status.” The old poli major who was a State Center rep for two decades is really ticked.
The Texas plan to hand the GOP five more safe seats is part of the Massive Fraud that’s tearing America apart. It’s all a part of the Regime’s Campaign to Undermine the Next Election.
A Confederate statue toppled during Black Lives Matter protests will be reinstalled, but remembering black and women heroes is DEI. Got it.
WH to Vet Smithsonian Exhibits to Ensure They ‘Align’ With His Interpretation of US History’
FCC Considers Supercharging Corporate TV Consolidation. Media conglomerates are pushing to eliminate rules limiting local TV station consolidation.
‘Utterly Unqualified‘ Project 2025 Economist Named as New Labor Stats Chief
People will die
Pulling the Plug on mRNA Vaccine Development Is ‘Reckless,’ Experts Say. Puts the U.S. at a disadvantage as the H5N1 pandemic threat looms. RFK Jr. does not understand the science. His Impact So Far: ‘The Worst Possible Case’; David Wallace-Wells and Emily Oster argue that the effects of MAHA will be long-lasting. They use fringe science.
EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin moves to rescind the ‘legal foundation for all US greenhouse gas regulations’
Should the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics go forward?
I am ambivalent.
NYT: What Immigration Crackdown Means for the 2028 Olympics.
Axios: A new $250 visa fee could curb World Cup and Olympic travel. The U.S. travel industry is warning that the fee could deter millions of international visitors just as the country gears up to host the 2026 World Cup and 2028 Summer Olympics.
USA Today: Olympics organizers are willing to treat FOTUS like a toddler to protect 2028 LA Games | Opinion. “By letting him think he’s in charge of … something, Games officials could avoid headaches over athlete visas and fan safety while keeping him from meddling elsewhere…
“Before anyone squawks about canceling the Games or moving them, save your breath.”
Democratic reputation
Inside The Game (February 2025): “The [regime] didn’t prioritize visa processing in its first term… So I can’t imagine that there’s going to be some full-court press to get these visas processed in a short amount of time,” David J. Bier, Associate Director for Immigration Studies at the Cato Institute, told The Los Angeles Times last month.
“The fear among organisers and sporting bodies alike is that even stricter immigration policies end up resulting in the worst-case scenario of both fans and athletes being left at the gate, with the ensuing and considerable revenue loss if the situation escalates; not to mention a major hit to the nation’s democratic reputation.”
MUSIC
Eddie Palmieri, Latin Music’s Dynamic Innovator, Dies at 88. He roped salsa into conversation with jazz, rock, funk, and modern classical music. I saw him perform when I was in college.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Here are the songs that were #1 pop but not on Billboard in 1975. This means they were #1 on Record World, Cash Box, or both. Some of the songs are great, and at least one is awful. 
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.