29 February 1980

Pos	LW	Weeks	Song		Artist
1	5	5	Babe	–	Styx
2	1	5	Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)	–	Pink Floyd
3	2	15	Don’t Stop ’til You Get Enough	–	Michael Jackson
4	4	11	Rise	–	Herb Alpert
5	8	3	Do That to Me One More Time	–	Captain & Tennille
6	3	13	The Part of Me That Needs You Most	–	Exile
7	9	4	Tired of Toein’ the Line	–	Rocky Burnette
8	6	6	Video Killed the Radio Star	–	Buggles
9	7	7	Great Balls of Fire	–	Nightmare
10	16	2	Please Don’t Go	–	KC & The Sunshine Band
11	20	2	Ballad of Lucy Jordan	–	Marianne Faithfull
12	11	4	Escape (The Pina Colada Song)	–	Rupert Holmes
13	10	13	Crazy Little Thing Called Love	–	Queen
14	14	6	Ain’t Gonna Stop (Till I Get to the Top)	–	Joy
15	13	18	She’s in Love with You	–	Suzi Quatro
16	18	2	Rapper’s Delight	–	Sugarhill Gang
17	15	11	Caravan Song	–	Barbara Dickson
18	12	12	If I Said You Had a Beautiful Body (Would You Hold it Against Me)	–	Bellamy Brothers
19	New	1	Gloria	–	Umberto Tozzi
20	New	1	Gonna Get Along Without You Now	–	Viola Wills

This week saw the only time that the charts would appear on 29 February. None of the other leap years would see the Friday charts happen on the ‘additional’ day we see in leap years. And to celebrate this, we decided to have a new number 1 in the form of Styx’s ‘Babe’ which became the 7^th song to jump from 5 to 1 and the 22^nd song overall to climb to number 1 from 5 or lower in the charts. Pink Floyd’s ‘Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)’ had spent just 2 weeks at 1 and it dropped into 2^nd place.

Marianne Faithfull’s ‘Ballad of Lucy Jordan’ did something that her only other hit, ‘This Little Bird’, didn’t manage and that was pick up the climber of the week award. It did so with a 9 place jump from 20 to 11. This was the 15^th time a song by a solo female artist had jumped 9 or more in a week. Olivia Newton-John’s 14 place jump with ‘If Not For You’ was still the record for a woman while The Sweet held the overall record with a 17 place jump by ‘Co-Co’.

Styx’s 4 place jump to number 1 mentioned above was the 22^nd time a song had made a star rater climb to the top spot. The only other star rater this week apart from the new number 1 and the biggest climber was KC & The Sunshine Band’s ‘Please Don’t Go’ which moved up 6 from 16 to 10.

The Bellamy Brothers picked up their 4^th biggest faller award but their first with ‘If I Said You Had A Beautiful Body Would You Hold It Against Me’ as it dropped 6 from 12 to 18. They had previously picked up the award once with ‘Let Your Love Flow’ and twice with ‘Crossfire’.

Suzi Quatro’s ‘She’s In Love With You’ edged closer to the magical 20 weeks in the charts mark. It was on 18 weeks and enjoyed its 4^th week as the oldest in the top 20.

Chilly saw their SA chart career come to an end as their hit, ‘Friday on My Mind’, dropped off the top 20 after a 7 week run and a peak of 10. They had managed 1 other hit (‘For your Love’) and between the 2 hits spent a total of 21 weeks in the charts. ‘For You Love’ was their best performer, getting to number 2. To date they were the 4^th best performing German act using the points system. By the time the charts ended they would have slipped to 10^th. If one adjusts the points to give 30 for a number 1 position, 29 for number 2 etc to take into account the extension of the chart to a top 30 later on, then Chilly end up as the 9^th best German act on this far more simple than the Duckworth Lewis method of adjusting for points.

We also bid farewell to Abba’s ‘Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (a Man After Midnight)’ which became only their second song (out of 16 hits so far) not to go top 10 as it stalled at 16 and only lasted 4 weeks in the charts. This was by far their worst performing song to date. The Swedish Fab Four would return to our charts at a later date.

The first new entry was the 7^th song by an act from Italy to make our charts. ‘Gloria’ by Umberto Tozzi would give him a number 2 hit in his native Italy while he would top the charts in Switzerland with it. A version with Spanish lyrics would top the Spanish charts as well. We were treated to the English lyric version where Jonathan King – who had already charted in SA with ‘Everyone’s Gone To The Moon’ and ‘Sugar, Sugar’ under the name Sakkarin – provided the English lyrics. Barry Morgan, the drummer from Blue Mink, who had had a number 3 hit in SA with ‘The Banner Man’, played drums on Tozzi’s hit. In 1982 Laura Branigan would have a worldwide smash with a cover of the song, but as that would make the SA charts I will wait till then to tell you all about that one. Italy moved into 12^th place overall for number of hits by acts from a country moving 1 ahead of Greece and Spain.

The second new entry was a cover of a song that was first published in 1951. ‘Gonna Get Along Without Ya Now’ (sometimes shown as ‘Gonna Get Along Without You Now’ as was the case with our new entry) was originally recorded by Teresa Brewer but gained its first chart success in 1956 with a version by Patience & Prudence which went to 12 in the US and 22 in the UK. In 1964 Tracey Dey and Skeeter Davis revived the song and Dey’s version made it to 51 in the US while Davis’ went 3 places better getting to 48. Trini Lopez 3 years later went to 93 in the US and 41 in the UK with it as well as getting to 12 with it on our charts. When Viola Wills got hold of the song she gave it its best UK chart performance, getting to number 8, but it would not make the US Billboard Hot 100 although it did get to 52 on the US Dance charts. Her version was our new entry this week and it was the 46^th song to chart in more than 1 version with the aforementioned Trini Lopez being the other versions that made or top 20. Wills was discovered by Barry White and worked with him as well as Smokey Robinson and Joe Cocker. Sadly she died in the May of 2009.

Exile and The Bellamy Brothers became the 94^th and 95^th acts to reach 40 weeks in the charts.

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