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Why are big hits "lost?"

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Kent said:
Most of the others have already said what I'm about to say, but I'd like to ask if you really want to hear "Honey" by Bobby Goldsboro? Do you know anyone who wants to hear it? It hit #1 in 1968 and stayed there for roughly a month, but the people I know who were around when it was a hit don't like it. Most of them say they didn't like it when it was new either. Enough people, of course, liked it at the time to keep it at #1 for several weeks, but they don't like it today.

Something else to keep in mind is that having a #1 hit doesn't mean your song is popular or that you're going to endure as an act. Approximately 1 in 7 artists who hit #1 never have another hit, and they're not always flash in the pan acts either. Sammy Davis, Jr. hit #1 with "Candy Man" in 1972. He never hit the charts again, and you never heard much of "Candy Man" either after it worked its way back down.
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A lot of the songs that are "forgotten" show up on America's Best Music and other adult standards formats.

I don't like "Honey" because of the lyrics but it's good music.
 
michael hagerty said:
My first wife wanted to name our daughter Natasha. I broke out the DVD of Rocky and Bullwinkle and Amy is now 31 years old.
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But what America really wants to know: Now that In-N-Out Burger is expanding to the South and East, is everyone excited?
Okay, actually I just wanted to completely hijack this thread altogether once vchimp started to reminisce about his love for the Bee Gees. Just couldn't take it.
 
Kent said:
Keep in mind also that popular songs are relative. A bad song can be a hit when its competition is weak. When it's competing with decades worth of other songs, that it was a bad song becomes more obvious. Go back and look at the year "Honey" spent a handful of weeks at #1. Take a look at the competition it had in 1968. It outperformed songs that are considered better today, but it was, overall, a fairly weak year in music. The Beatles only had two songs that made the Top-100 for the year, and, of the songs I recognize on that list, I'd only willingly listen to about half of them.
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I'll start by repeating something I used to say a lot here about ten years ago:

Number One is not an award, it is a statistic. The only thing it means is that it sold at least one more copy than whatever was number two that week.

Now here comes a "yeah, but..."

"Honey" was an out of the box smash. The Billboard chart trajectory was first week #64, second week #23, third week #1. It leapfrogged Gary Puckett & The Union Gap's "Young Girl". It knocked "Dock of the Bay" out of #1. It blew past the Beatles' "Lady Madonna", Simon and Garfunkel's "Scarborough Fair" and Sly and the Family Stone's "Dance to the Music".

I hate "Honey". There are songs I'll make excuses for that would surprise you. "Honey" isn't one of them. But it was a hit---probably with the 24-year-old housewives who dug "Last Kiss" when they were 16.
 
Kelly A said:
But what America really wants to know: Now that In-N-Out Burger is expanding to the South and East, is everyone excited?
Okay, actually I just wanted to completely hijack this thread altogether once vchimp started to reminisce about his love for the Bee Gees. Just couldn't take it.
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Actually, Kelly, I'm still processing that he's HEARD "Disco Inferno", much less LIKES it.
 
michael hagerty said:
"Honey" was an out of the box smash. The Billboard chart trajectory was first week #64, second week #23, third week #1. It leapfrogged Gary Puckett & The Union Gap's "Young Girl". It knocked "Dock of the Bay" out of #1. It blew past the Beatles' "Lady Madonna", Simon and Garfunkel's "Scarborough Fair" and Sly and the Family Stone's "Dance to the Music".

I hate "Honey". There are songs I'll make excuses for that would surprise you. "Honey" isn't one of them. But it was a hit---probably with the 24-year-old housewives who dug "Last Kiss" when they were 16.
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I like all these except "Lady Madonna", although I mentioned not liking the lyrics to "Honey".
 
michael hagerty said:
Actually, Kelly, I'm still processing that he's HEARD "Disco Inferno", much less LIKES it.
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I'm sure I had heard it before this, but what has happened is my America's Best Music station switched to oldies, and I've had to develop a taste for a lot of songs I didn't think I liked.

But I've always liked a lot of disco.

I was able to listen to a borderline standards station today in the car but I have to be closer to Charlotte to hear it.
 
Daryl Lynn L.A. said:
Ummmm, No. :confused: No, I don't. That is probably my least favorite song of 50 years of listening to Top 40 or CHR formats. I have no idea how that song ever received airplay.
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I was 22 and the owner and manager and PD of a top 40 station. We took "Honey" and I made a pseudo-poetic translation to Spanish and our OM, who had recorded several albums of poems (very popular then in Latin America) did the voiceover witht he original in the background. It was our most requested song for several weeks, and then it died very fast... like most novelty songs.
 
vchimpanzee said:
It gets played every Veterans Day and on other patriotic occasions.
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I don't know where.

I haven't heard this played on the air in about 50+ years........even on Patriotic holidays.

It brings back bad memories from the Vietnam era.

Greg Goodfellow said:
The station I volunteer at played “Ballad” on our “Veteran’s Day” show-usually at no other time, unless it is requested.
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What kind of a station would do this? Non-Comm? Community? College? Live365? Make believe radio? ;-)
 
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DavidEduardo said:
I was 22 and the owner and manager and PD of a top 40 station. We took "Honey" and I made a pseudo-poetic translation to Spanish and our OM, who had recorded several albums of poems (very popular then in Latin America) did the voiceover witht he original in the background. It was our most requested song for several weeks, and then it died very fast... like most novelty songs.
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With al the mentions of "Honey", it's amazing that it just happens Bobby Goldsboro is 82 today.
 
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