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One Hit Wonder


Navy Vet.

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19 minutes ago, rct said:

Yup, it was fun and cool and I think I might have gotten a couple hundred bucks out of it.  Just lucky though, no more.  We all got guitar stuff here, no need to pal around with famous people to have any cred here.

rct

Reminds me of a conversation that an acquaintance laid on me way back in the early seventies.  He told me that I don't need to play 50 chords and 50 notes in a song. Keep it simple, you will get your point across. I was a 20 year old kid, didn't know anything, trying to find my way. I said I don't want some cat in the audience to think he's a better player than me. The fellow looked at me and said, he might be, but he paid to get in that club and you're gonna' get paid when you leave that club. And that's all that count's.

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5 hours ago, zigzag said:

Sorry, guys, but Maurice Williams and Arthur Conley were not one hit wonders in my neck of the woods.

Yes, there certainly can be regional differences, but to my knowledge these two artists only had one major charting hit.  I grew up in the LA area, and never heard anything else from either of them.  I do know that Maurice Williams had a long & successful career, and Arthur Conley was an Otis Redding protégé, but I'm not aware of either artist recording another high charting "hit" that received widespread airplay.

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:-k

Enjoying this thread.

Does "MacArthur Park" count?  Sung by actor Richard Harris,  written by Jimmy Webb. Both had plenty more successes in their respective fields but Harris - though he cut an LP or 2 - never had another hit song.

"Eloise" - Barry Ryan.  This is 5+ minutes of kitsch'n pomp at the end of which Ryan has worked himself into a magnificently silly, overwrought vocal frenzy.

Plus.......The Foundations ("Baby Now That I've Found You"), Thunderclap Newman, Los Bravos, whoever sang "Build Me Up Buttercup", that German bloke who sang "Da Da Da", Twinkle, Reparata and the Delrons, The Toys, Fiddlers Dram  - and many more. 

Then there are the one-off novelty records  (Napoleon XIV, Lieutenant Pigeon etc)....plenty of those too. 

We all have different audio-libraries of memories and associations,  and the songs of these and many more one-hit wonders are still embedded in there somewhere for all of us, I should think.  Look at a Top Thirty chart for any week of the 1960s or 70s  and they'll be there.

👍

Edited by jdgm
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10 minutes ago, jdgm said:

:-k

Enjoying this thread.

Does "MacArthur Park" count?  Sung by actor Richard Harris,  written by Jimmy Webb. Both had plenty more successes in their respective fields but Harris - though he cut an LP or 2 - never had another hit song.

"Eloise" - Barry Ryan.  This is 5+ minutes of kitsch'n pomp at the end of which Ryan has worked himself into a magnificently silly, overwrought vocal frenzy.

Plus.......The Foundations ("Baby Now That I've Found You"), Thunderclap Newman, Los Bravos, whoever sang "Build Me Up Buttercup", that German bloke who sang "Da Da Da", Twinkle, Reparata and the Delrons, The Toys, Fiddlers Dram  - and many more. 

Then there are the one-off novelty records  (Napoleon XIV, Lieutenant Pigeon etc)....plenty of those too. 

We all have different audio-libraries of memories and associations,  and the songs of these and many more one-hit wonders are still embedded in there somewhere for all of us, I should think.  Look at a Top Thirty chart for any week of the 1960s or 70s  and they'll be there.

👍

MacArthur Park counts as one of the worst songs of all time in my book. But that’s just my opinion.

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29 minutes ago, jdgm said:

 

[laugh]

Now that's a whole other thread!

You have a point. When the song was released and I heard it a few times I couldn’t believe a grown man would carry on about a damn cake and he lost the recipe. As a teenager I thought it was lame. As a full grown man I think it’s lame.

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9 hours ago, 01GT eibach said:

Anyone remember "Lunatic Fringe" by Red Rider  in the early 1980s?   Great track...

 

Yeah, but they were no one hit wonders.  They were pretty big early MTV darlings.

rct

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8 hours ago, Tman said:

Ride Captain Ride - Blues Image. I know I’ve posted before. Love the first solo.

 

One of our drummers for a few years in the late 90s/early 2000's was in that band,  long after Ride Captain Ride.  He was fun.  We did that one once in a while.  He long ago moved to FL, don't know what became of him.

rct

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9 minutes ago, rct said:

 

One of our drummers for a few years in the late 90s/early 2000's was in that band,  long after Ride Captain Ride.  He was fun.  We did that one once in a while.  He long ago moved to FL, don't know what became of him.

rct

I've got one for you. Brandy by Looking Glass. I dig this song. Never heard much from Looking Glass after this song.

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8 minutes ago, Notes_Norton said:

Also one of the worst all-time records:

"Surfin' Bird" by The Trashmen

And did I mention this great song

"Vehicle" - Ides of March

"Some Kind Of Wonderful" - Soul Brothers Six (covered by Grand Funk Railroad)

"Double Shot Of My Baby's Love" - Swinging Medallions

Surfin’ Bird I don’t remember.  Vehicle is a great song as is Double Shot . Some Kind of Wonderful by Grand Funk is my favorite version.

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2 minutes ago, Navy Vet. said:

Surfin’ Bird I don’t remember.  Vehicle is a great song as is Double Shot . Some Kind of Wonderful by Grand Funk is my favorite version.

You owe it to yourself to check this out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GizTr6QLfc

Sorry I don't know how to get it to show up in the window but you should check it out. It's so bad that it's funny.

Notes

 

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18 minutes ago, 01GT eibach said:

To me, they were a one-hit wonder.  I don't remember anything else.  

quote-of-course-that-s-just-my-opinion-i

That's because you do not know the facts. Lunatic Fringe was not even their biggest hit.

They actually had a hit with a song called Big League which peaked at #9 on the US Billboard chart.

Lunatic Fringe only reached #11.

So yes, you're wrong. Sorry. [sad]
 

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On 8/7/2019 at 12:15 AM, Tman said:

Ride Captain Ride - Blues Image. I know I’ve posted before. Love the first solo.

 

The entire production of this is great. The instruments practically come in one at a time and the drums even increase in participation until the first chorus.

Very tasty song, an unknown gem indeed.

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On 8/7/2019 at 8:27 PM, brad1 said:

That's because you do not know the facts. Lunatic Fringe was not even their biggest hit.

They actually had a hit with a song called Big League which peaked at #9 on the US Billboard chart.

Lunatic Fringe only reached #11.

So yes, you're wrong. Sorry. [sad]
 

Bro ... Maybe you missed the pic I posted that said "Of course, I could be wrong ".   A little less caffeine for you, dude...

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