DON MCLEAN (US)

Born: 2 October 1945
Full name: Donald McLean III

McLean was born in the New Rochelle, part of the greater New York metropolitan area. He showed a love of music from an early age, particularly folk music and bought his first guitar when he was 16. He began making friends in the folk world, in particular Erik Darling and Fred Hellerman of the band The Weavers. He would play at a number of New York venues and built up a following in folk music circles. His early attempts to get a recording contract proved futile as he was rejected by 72 record labels. Eventually he was signed to a small label called Mediarts and released his debut album, 1969’s ‘Tapestry’ to critical acclaim but little success outside of folk music circles. One of the tracks from the album, ‘And I Love You So’, would be covered by Perry Como in 1973 and would be a hit both in the US and in South Africa. After his first release, Mediarts Records was taken over by United Artists and, with the backing a of a bigger label, McClean saw his second album, ‘American Pie’, top the US album charts and the title track would also go to number 1 on the Hot 100. He would go on to see 9 US Hot 100 hits and 7 UK hits. He would not hit the top spot in the US again, but both ‘Vincent’ and ‘Crying’ would be UK number 1’s for him.

Date of entry	Song	Peak (weeks at 1)	Weeks
21-Jul-1972	Vincent	6	11
30-May-1980	Crying	3	13
		Total hits	2
		Total weeks	24

Biggest climber awards	2
Star rater climbs	2
Biggest fallers	3
Weeks with oldest in the charts	0
Longest run in the charts (weeks)	13
Weeks with more than 1 in the charts	0
Biggest gap between hits (weeks)	399
Top 30 points ranking	330
Top 20 points ranking	340
Top 30 points	485
Top 20 points	245

‘American Pie’ is notable for its absence from the South African charts, possibly because of the reference to the ‘Father, Son and Holy Ghost’ in the lyrics being too much for the censors at the time.

As mentioned above McClean composed the following Perry Como hit:

Date of entry	Song	Peak (weeks at 1)	Weeks
22-Jun-1973	And I Love You So	2	16
		Total hits	1
		Total weeks	16

Total chart involvement:

Number of hits	3
Weeks	40