| TW | LW | Weeks | Song | Artist | |
| 1 | 2 | 6 | Hak Hom Blokkies | – | David Kramer |
| 2 | 1 | 7 | Chequered Love | – | Kim Wilde |
| 3 | 4 | 5 | Chariots of Fire (Titles) | – | Vangelis |
| 4 | 6 | 6 | One Day in Your Life | – | Michael Jackson |
| 5 | 11 | 3 | You Drive Me Crazy | – | Shakin’ Stevens |
| 6 | 5 | 8 | Tequila Sheila | – | Mac Davis |
| 7 | 10 | 6 | Being with You | – | Smokey Robinson |
| 8 | 9 | 10 | Hands Up (Give Me Your Heart) | – | Ottawan |
| 9 | 3 | 13 | Bette Davis Eyes | – | Kim Carnes |
| 10 | 8 | 14 | More and More | – | Joe Dolan |
| 11 | 7 | 13 | Kids in America | – | Kim Wilde |
| 12 | New | 1 | Amour | – | Baron Longfellow |
| 13 | 17 | 4 | It’s Hard to be Humble | – | Mac Davis |
| 14 | 15 | 2 | Winning | – | Santana |
| 15 | 13 | 7 | For Your Eyes Only | – | Sheena Easton |
| 16 | 16 | 2 | Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around | – | Stevie Nicks & Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers |
| 17 | 19 | 3 | Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain | – | Maria Tyl |
| 18 | 12 | 10 | Louise (We Get It Right) | – | Jona Lewie |
| 19 | 18 | 9 | Hey You | – | Hey You |
| 20 | New | 1 | How ’bout Us | – | Champaign |
Bubbling under (thanks to Kevin Farquhason for the info):
| Ray Parker Jr. & Raydio | A Woman Needs Love (Just Like You Do) (Official bubble) |
| The Specials | Ghost Town |
| REO Speedwagon | Take It On The Run |
| Goombay Dance Band | Seven Tears |
| Juice Newton | Queen Of Hearts |
| Bernie Paul | Oh No No |
| Jim Steinman | Rock ‘n Roll Dreams Come Through |
David Kramer gave us the 34th song by a local act to top the charts as his ‘Hak Hom Blokkies’ took over the top spot from Kim Wilde’s ‘Chequered Love’. Wilde’s first 2 hits, ‘Kids In America’ and ‘Chequered Love’ had both only topped the charts for 1 week. ‘Hak Hom Blokkies’ was the 3rd Afrikaans song to reach number 1 with the previous 2 being Des Lindberg’s ‘Die Gezoem Van Die Bye’ and Glenys Lynne’s ‘Ramaja’ although it should be noted that of the 3, ‘Ramaja’ was the only pure Afrikaans song with Lindberg and Kramer’s hits being a mix of English and Afrikaans.
Shakin’ Stevens’ ‘You Dive Me Crazy’ picked up the climber of the week award for the second week running as it jumped up a further 6 from 11 to 5. The only other star rater was Mac Davis’ ‘It’s Hard To be Humble’ which moved up 4 from 17 to 13 after having dropped 3 places last week.
Falling honours went to Kim Carnes’ ‘Bette Davis Eyes’ and Jona Lewie’s ‘Louise (We Get It Right)’ which both fell 6, landing at 9 and 18 respectively. Lewie had picked up 2 star raters with his first 2 hits and then ‘Louise (We Get It Right)’ had gone 1 better by managing 3. Similarly, his 2 previous hits had managed 1 biggest fall each, but ‘Louise (We Get It Right)’ once more went 1 better as this was its second time with the award.
‘More And More’ by Joe Dolan was picking up more and more weeks. It now had 14 to its name and was enjoying its 3rd week as the oldest in the chart.
Roy Bulkin’s ‘How I Feel Inside’ was the first of 2 songs to depart the chart. It had been with us for 8 weeks and peaked at 15. It was the 4th song that had seen a run of 8 week to peak as low as 15 with only 2 others, Matchbox’s ‘Buzz Buzz A Diddle It’ and Clive Risko’s ‘Bluest Heartache Of The Year’ having lower peaks with both only managing to get to 16. This brought an end to Bulkin’s SA Chart career with 6 hits to his name, 41 weeks and a best peak of 6 which both ‘The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore’ and ‘Make Her An Angel’ managed.
We also said goodbye to Adam & The Ants’ ‘Stand And Deliver;’ which managed a run of 10 weeks and peaked at 2. They became the 4th and final act to see their first 2 hits peak at 2 as ‘Antmusic’ had also just failed to top the charts. The previous 3 acts to see this were Mary Hopkins, Perry Como and Boney M. Of these only Boney M had so far managed to get a chart topper.
The first new entry was by someone who had been on our charts before but had undergone a name change since he was last on the charts. ‘Amour’ was credited to Baron Longfellow who was in fact Andy Kim going under a different name. This was his 4th hit to make our charts and the 36th by a Canadian act, putting Canada back ahead of The Netherlands and in 4th place on its own for number of hits by acts from a nation. Kim wrote the song himself and this was his 9th song writing credit on a top 20 hit as he had been part of the song writing team for The Archies who had seen a number of hits make our charts. ‘Amour’ would make it to number 1 on the Radio 5 charts, but wouldn’t make the UK, US or any of the major European charts. It had been 349 weeks since Andy Kim was last on the charts and this would be the biggest gap between hits for a Canadian act, beating the 335 weeks Paul Anka had seen. It was the 22nd biggest gap overall to date.
The other new entry was ‘How ‘Bout Us’, an SA Chart debut hit for US band, Champaign. Before they became Champaign, the band went under the name The Water Brothers Band and had in fact recorded a version of this song back in 1975 which was the b-side of their single ‘Have You Ever Been Lonely’. With a changed line-up and changing their name to Champaign, the band re-recorded the song and this version gave them a number 12 hit in the US. It would top the charts in Belgium and The Netherlands as well as going to 32 in New Zealand, 5 in the UK and 42 in Germany. Locally it would make number 4 on the Radio 5 charts.
On the weeks by acts from a nation list we saw Ireland pull level 7th with Sweden with acts from both nations having spent 235 weeks in the charts. France moved ahead of Jamaica as they moved on to 199 weeks and took 10th place for themselves.
Kim Wilde saw her weeks count total move on to 20. There had been 3 acts that had taken 11 weeks to get to a total of 20 weeks as 2 in the chart in a week counts for 2 weeks. These 3 were The Rolling Stones, Tom Jones and Murray Campbell. Kim Wilde joined Herman’s Hermits, George Harrison and Pussycat in taking 12 weeks to get their weeks total to 20.
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SA Singles Charts 