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Why are big hits "lost?"

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Wimmmex said:
Relevancy. The "Ballad of the Green Beret" was a song that everyone liked, went to number one and was relevant at the time.

Does anyone want to hear it now?

Times change, and the environment surrounding that song changes over time.
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This. "Ballad of the Green Berets" was released in early 1966. In October of 1965, a Gallup Poll showed 65 percent of Americans supported the country's involvement in the Vietnam War.

That was down to 39 percent three years later.

This is called "not aging well."
 
Kelly A said:
I remember back in the 80s', I filled in sometimes at a station who used the line: 'Hot Hits'. One had to be careful to say each word clearly, not running them together. Otherwise it could come out sounding completely different.
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I worked at one that used "Today's Best Hits," and we had the same problem. We had a banner on the wall that said, "Today's Best...Hits!"

I also worked at a "KLIK Country." Try saying "Click Country" too quickly and see what happens!
 
Kelly A said:
I remember back in the 80s', I filled in sometimes at a station who used the line: 'Hot Hits'. One had to be careful to say each word clearly, not running them together. Otherwise it could come out sounding completely different.
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At KFBK, a local supermarket sponsored our traffic reports. There was a two-week period where the lead sale item was "large Haas avocados." Finally, I just went ahead, opened the mic and said "Dana, you might want to hit the "H" a little harder."
 
Kent said:
I worked at one that used "Today's Best Hits," and we had the same problem. We had a banner on the wall that said, "Today's Best...Hits!"

I also worked at a "KLIK Country." Try saying "Click Country" too quickly and see what happens!
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At my first station, KIBS in Bishop, California, we discovered one of our young disc jockeys was dyslexic.

Unfortunately, it happened during a live read for Huck Finn's cafe.

Not joking.

We started pre-recording them after that...
 
michael hagerty said:
At my first station, KIBS in Bishop, California, we discovered one of our young disc jockeys was dyslexic.

Unfortunately, it happened during a live read for Huck Finn's cafe.
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That's called a "spoonerism" or "metathesis!" I once heard about a TV anchor who was fired for suffering a spoonerism while reading the primetime lineup during a newscast. His unfortunate spoonerism happened when he was mentioning a show with actor "Forest Tucker!"
 
Kent said:
That's called a "spoonerism" or "metathesis!" I once heard about a TV anchor who was fired for suffering a spoonerism while reading the primetime lineup during a newscast. His unfortunate spoonerism happened when he was mentioning a show with actor "Forest Tucker!"
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That'll do it...
 
michael hagerty said:
Just looked at the KHJ charts on Ray Randolph's fabulous site 93khj.blogspot.com. Ten-week chart runs were very rare.

"Hey Jude" stayed on the KHJ chart for 11 weeks in 1968.

The record up to that point---Paul Mauriat's "Love Is Blue". It did 12.

That got broken in 1970 by the Supremes' "Someday We'll Be Together". 13 weeks. There were several after that ("Joy to the World", "Imagine", "American Pie"), but 13 was the absolute limit.

It was two years before a record ran longer on the KHJ chart---Harry Nilsson's "Without You" did 15.

I'm just enough of the right kind of geek to keep going, but it'll have to be later.
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Okay---had a few minutes, so back to longest runs on the KHJ Thirty.

Johnny Nash breaks Harry Nilsson's 15 week run with 16 weeks for "I Can See Clearly Now" in early 1973.

Several songs in 1973 got 15 or 16 week runs. Only one got 17.

You're gonna HATE this.....






"Heartbeat-It's a Lovebeat" by the DeFranco Family.

Ray's collection stops at the end of 1973, except for surveys with the first or last appearance of a KHJ jock on the cover. So this isn't complete---there may have been songs that did it first, but, between 1974 and 1980:

Barbra Streisand's "The Way We Were" did 18 weeks.

Terry Jacks' "Seasons in the Sun" did 19.

Billy Joel's "Just The Way You Are" did 20.

Redbone's "Come and Get Your Love" did 21.

There are JOCKS that didn't last as long at KHJ (Roger Christian, Dave Diamond, Chuck Browning, Jimmy Rabbitt and Sonny Fox, just off the top of my head).
 
michael hagerty said:
Meantime, a review of "Honey" that mentions "Ballad of the Green Berets". Tom Breihan does not have a filter, so expect language:

www.stereogum.com

The Number Ones: Bobby Goldsboro’s “Honey”

In The Number Ones, I’m reviewing every single #1 single in the history of the Billboard Hot 100, starting with the chart’s beginning, in 1958, and working my way up into the present.
www.stereogum.com www.stereogum.com
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Actually, Tom's Number Ones series is a great place to find out what a 40-year-old man who has no nostalgic relation to hit records of the past (he's reviewing every number one from the first Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1958 onward) thinks about songs that your first reaction might be "but that was a big hit."

And since Tom's 40, exactly the midpoint of the 25-54 sales demo, that can be very instructive.
 
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