* Sets a new record for weeks in the chart before making the top 20 for the first time.
Written by: Eddy Grant Produced by: Eddy Grant South African record label (unless otherwise stated): Ice
Hit number for artist
4
Peak position
17
Weeks
15
Biggest climber awards
0
Star rater climbs
1
Biggest faller awards
0
Top 20 points
19
Overall Top 20 points ranking
=2008
Top 20 points ranking for the artist
4
Top 30 Points
121
Overall Top 30 points ranking
=1679
Top 30 points ranking for the artist
4
Annual ranking:
1983
129
1984
75
Other chart success:
Australia
94
Belgium
37
Germany
26
Switzerland
14
UK
42
SA Radio charts:
Capital 604
3
Radio 702
9
This would be Grant’s 2nd last hit to make the top 50 in the UK. He would see 7 further UK hits with only ‘Gimme Hope Jo’anna’ making the top 50 as it peaked at 7. Grant saw 5 hits on our charts as a solo artist, 3 as a member of The Equals and 1 producing his brother Rudy’s ‘hit ‘Lately’. ‘Till I Can’t Take Love No More’ would rank 5th out of these 9 hits for top 30 points.
Written by: Eddy Grant Produced by: Eddy Grant South African record label (unless otherwise stated): Ice
Hit number for artist
5
Peak position
20
Weeks
8
Biggest climber awards
1
Star rater climbs
2
Biggest faller awards
0
Top 20 points
2
Overall Top 20 points ranking
=2312
Top 20 points ranking for the artist
5
Top 30 Points
60
Overall Top 30 points ranking
=2089
Top 30 points ranking for the artist
5
Annual ranking:
1984
=90
Other chart success:
Canada
7
Germany
42
New Zealand
28
UK
52
US
26
SA Radio charts:
Capital 604
11
Radio 702
16
The song was intended to be the theme tune to the film of the same name which starred Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner and Danny DeVito, but ultimately only made a very brief appearance in the film. Billy Ocean’s ‘When The Going Gets Tough, The Tough Get Going’ was used in ‘The Jewel Of The Nile’, the sequel to the film and that would prove to be a far more successful song. ‘Romancing The Stone’ would feature on Grant’s ‘Going For Broke’ album.
Written by: Eddy Grant Produced by: Eddy Grant South African record label (unless otherwise stated): Ice
Hit number for artist
2
Peak position
1
Weeks
19
Biggest climber awards
1
Star rater climbs
1
Biggest faller awards
0
Top 20 points
330
Overall Top 20 points ranking
42
Top 20 points ranking for the artist
1
Top 30 Points
520
Overall Top 30 points ranking
=79
Top 30 points ranking for the artist
1
Annual ranking:
1982
66
1983
10
Other chart success:
Australia
21
Austria
2
Belgium
1
Canada
15
Germany
7
Ireland
1
Netherlands
2
New Zealand
1
Sweden
18
Switzerland
1
UK
1
US
53
Zimbabwe
1
SA Radio charts:
Capital 604
1
Radio 5
5
Radio 702
1
This was 1 of 5 number 1’s by acts from the Caribbean Islands. Apart from this, we had seen 3 by Boney M and 1 by Bob Marley & The Wailers. Only Boney M’s ‘Rivers Of Babylon’ spent more weeks at 1 managing 11 compared to ‘I Don’t Wanna Dance’s 7.
Note: The song entered the charts in the top 20 era but ended its run after they were extended to a top 30.
Written by: Eddy Grant Produced by: Eddy Grant South African record label (unless otherwise stated): Ice
Hit number for artist
3
Peak position
9
Weeks
14
Biggest climber awards
0
Star rater climbs
0
Biggest faller awards
0
Top 20 points
93
Overall Top 20 points ranking
=1168
Top 20 points ranking for the artist
3
Top 30 Points
220
Overall Top 30 points ranking
=1062
Top 30 points ranking for the artist
3
Annual ranking:
1983
49
Other chart success:
Australia
2
Austria
6
Belgium
3
Canada
1
France
37
Germany
9
Ireland
3
Netherlands
8
New Zealand
32
Sweden
9
Switzerland
6
UK
2
US
2
Zimbabwe
11
SA Radio charts:
Capital 604
1
Radio 5
4
Radio 702
11
The song refers to a market street in Brixton, an area of South London which was known as a popular place for immigrants from the Caribbean to live. It was apparently the first market street to get electric lights. The song was Eddy Grant‘s response to the 1981 Brixton Riots.
Born: 5 March 1948 Real name: Edmond Montague Grant
Grant was born in the village of Plaisance in Guyana (known as British Guiana at the time). His father was a trumpet player who was in the band Nello & The Luckies. His parents moved to London while he was still at school and it was only when he was 12 that he moved across to join them. When he was about 17 years old he helped form The Equals who would have 9 UK chart hits, including a number 1 with ‘Baby Come Back’. Then in 1971 Grant suffered a heart attack and a collapsed lung. He left The Equals and set up a recording studio and started the Ice Record label. In 1975 he released his first solo album, simply entitled ‘Eddy Grant’ but it wasn’t until a few album’s later when he hit the UK charts for the first time as a solo artist with ‘Living On The Frontline’ from his album ‘Walking On Sunshine’. The song went to number 11. Grant hit his peak with 1982’s ‘Killer On The Rampage’ with the lead single, ‘I Don’t Wanna Dance’, hitting number 1 in at least 6 countries, including the UK. The album would also produce his only major US hit in the form of ‘Electric Avenue’ which peaked at 2 on the Hot 100. He would manage a total of 15 UK chart hits (this includes 2 remixes of ‘Walking On Sunshine’ and 1 remix of ‘Electric Avenue’). He would not see any other number 1’s other than ‘I Don’t Wanna Dance’. In the US he saw 2 other hits, but neither made the top 20.
Date of entry
Song
Peak (weeks at 1)
Weeks
29-May-1981
Do You Feel My Love
6
13
10-Dec-1982
I Don’t Wanna Dance
1 (8)
19
22-Apr-1983
Electric Avenue
9
14
23-Dec-1983
Till I Can’t Take Love No More
17
15
20-Jul-1984
Romancing The Stone
20
8
Total hits
5
Total weeks
69
Biggest climber awards
3
Star rater climbs
5
Biggest fallers
2
Weeks with oldest in the charts
4
Longest run in the charts (weeks)
33
Weeks with more than 1 in the charts
0
Biggest gap between hits (weeks)
67
Top 30 points ranking
102
Top 20 points ranking
109
Top 30 points
1157
Top 20 points
550
Hits written by Eddy Grant in addition to his 5 hits mentioned above:
Eddy Grant’s ‘I Don’t Wanna Dance’ became the 16th song to clock up at least 8 weeks at 1 as it held on to the top spot, but for the first week since it took over at the top of the charts, it did not have F.R. David’s ‘Words’ at number 2 as the latter, which had occupied the number 2 spot since conceding the top spot to Eddy Grant’s hit, dropped to 4 allowing Talk Talk’s ‘Talk Talk’ to move up from 4 to 2.
Last week a local collaboration (between Hotline, P.J. Powers and Steve Kekana) took the climber award. This week it was another collaboration that took the award, but it was a duet between a Brit and an American as Joe Cocker & Jennifer Warnes’ ‘Up Where We Belong’ climbed 7 from 17 to 10 to scoop up the award. There was 1 other star rater and that was Culture Club’s ‘Do You really Want To Hurt Me’ which moved up 4 from 15 to11.
Yazoo’s ‘Don’t Go’ was the faller of the week with a 7 place drop from 13 to 20. It was their first time with the award.
F.R. David’s ‘Words’ became the 60th song to spend at least 20 weeks in the charts. It was the oldest in the top 20 and had now been so for 7 weeks. The song had amassed 342 points and that moved it into the top 20 for all time top points. It now sat 16th overall.
The Belle Stars’ ‘The Clapping Song’ was the only song to depart the chart this week. It had been with us for 16 weeks and had peaked at 2, sitting there for 3 weeks while F.R. David’s ‘Words’ occupied the top spot. This would be their only SA chart hit. In the UK they would have 8 hits chart, the best performing of those would be ‘Sign Of The Times’ which got to number 3.
The new entry was last week’s official bubble, Phil Collins’ ‘You Can’t Hurry Love’ and it was his 2nd to make the charts (his previous one being ‘In the Air Tonight’). The song was a cover of a 1966 hit for the Supremes which had topped the US charts. Collins’ version would get to the top of the charts in Belgium, The Netherlands, Ireland and the UK where it spent 2 weeks at 1 before being ousted by Men At Work’s ‘Down Under’. ‘You Can’t Hurry Love’ was the opening track on the very first ‘Now That’s What I Call Music’ compilation in the UK (in SA the series of the same name would have different track listings). It would be very successful on the local radio charts, topping the Capital 604 and Radio 702 ones and just missing out on the Radio 5 ones, peaking at 2 (behind Supertramp’s ‘My Kinda Lady’).
This week we saw the groups’ number of hits in the top 20 drop below 10 for the first time in 11 weeks. The groups had seen 10 or more in the charts on 509 occasions, which was just under 55% of the time.
The arrival of ‘You Can’t Hurry Love’ onto the charts meant we now had 8 songs in the top 20 that had topped the US and/or UK charts. The previous time this count was this high was back on 18 January 1982, 63 weeks earlier.
The Official Bubble this week was David Christie’s ‘Saddle Up’.
The top 3 songs were unchanged this week with Eddy Grant’s ‘I Don’t Wanna Dance’ clocking up its 7th week at 1, F.R. David’ ‘Words’ moving into tied 2nd place for consecutive weeks at 2, its 7 equalling the effort of Ballyhoo’s ‘Man On The Moon’ and Hall & Oates’ ‘Maneater’ spending a 2nd week at 3. ‘I Don’t Wanna Dance’ was the 32nd song to spend at least 7 weeks at 1 and with the top 2 having been the same for 7 consecutive weeks, this equalled the record to date run for an unchanged top 2, the previous times we had seen this was when Barbra Streisand’s ‘Woman In Love’ was at 1 and Ballyhoo’s ‘Man On The Moon’ at 2 and when Richard Jon Smith’s ‘Michael Row The Boat Ashore’ was at 1 and Gloria Gaynor’s ‘I Will Survive’ was at 2.
The climber of the week was ‘Feel So Strong’ by Hotline with P.J. Powers and Steve Kekana which moved up 3 from 14 to 11. It was Hotline’s second time with the award but a first time for Steve Kekana and P.J. Powers and (spoiler alert) this would be the last time we would see a local woman credited on the climber of the week. As the biggest climb was only 3 places, there were no star raters this week.
The faller award went to The Belle Stars’ ‘The Clapping Song’ which fell 7 from 13 to 20.
F.R. David’s ‘Words’ enjoyed a 6th week as the oldest in the charts as it was on 19, just 1 away from the 20 weeks in the charts milestone and, sitting at 2, it was highly likely that it would reach this mark.
Supertramp’s ‘It’s Raining Again’ was the first of 2 songs to leave the charts. It had seen a run of 12 weeks and a peak of 6 and its departure heralded the end of their SA chart career. They had seen 4 hits chart, spent a total of 50 weeks in the top 20 and had a best peak of 3 with ‘The Logical Song’.
Also going was Lionel Richie’s ‘Truly’ which lasted 9 weeks and peaked at 9. This had been his first solo hit, but it had not performed as well as his duet with Diana Ross, ‘Endless Love’ which had topped the charts, neither had it outperformed ‘Three Times A Lady’, a hit he had as a member of the Commodores. In fact even the other song that he had seen a song writing credit on, Kenny Roger’s ‘Lady’, had done better as that peaked at 3. The good news for Lionel was that we were still some way off seeing the last of him on our charts.
The song that had been the official bubble for the last 2 weeks, Joe Cocker & Jennifer Warnes’ ‘Up Where We Belong’, was the first of the new entries this week. It was Cocker’s first SA chart hit while Warnes had seen a number 8 hit in 1979 with ‘Don’t Make Me Over’. ‘Up Where We belong’ was taken from the soundtrack to the film ‘An Officer And A Gentleman’ which starred Richard Gere and Debra Winger. The track was written by Jack Nitzshe, Buffy Saint-Marie and Will Jennings and was a second song writing credit for both Nitzsche and Jennings who had scored hits with Smokie’s ‘Needle And Pins’ and Dionne Warwick’s ‘I’ll Never Love This Way Again’ respectively. It was Saint-Marie’s first song writing credit on our charts. ‘Up Where We Belong’ would top the charts in Australia (2 weeks), Canada (2 weeks) and the US (3 weeks) and would win the Grammy for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals. Locally it would top the Radio 5 and 702 charts and peak at 2 on the Capital 604 ones.
Despite their US success, The Eagles had not fared well on our charts with just ‘Take It Easy’ having made the top 20 and it only peaked at 16. However band member Don Henley was hoping to put in a better showing as a solo artist as his ‘Dirty Laundry’ was the other new entry this week. Henley co-wrote the song with session musician Danny Kortchmar and it would feature Timothy B. Schmidt and Joe Walsh, both of who had performed with the Eagles. Also listed as a musician on the track was Toto’s Jeff Porcaro. The song would top the Canadian charts and get to number 3 in the US and like its fellow new entry, it would top both the Radio 5 and 702 charts, but would not perform as well on the Capital 604 ones where it peaked at 6.
Eddy Grant’s presence on the charts drew Guyana level with Switzerland for weeks on the charts by acts from a nation with both sitting on 32 and being tied 16th overall.
Paul McCartney saw his weeks count reach the 50 mark. This only counts those where we was listed as a solo artist or, in the case of his current hit, was part of a duet but excludes those he accumulated as part of Wings which was sometimes noted as Paul McCartney & Wings. He had 65 under his belt under the latter guise. Including the 42 he managed as a Beatle, his overall count was 157. On the points front McCartney (again as solo or part of a duet) saw his total pass the 500 milestone as it moved on to 511.
This week set a new record for the number of different letter the top 20 song titles started with (excluding the word ‘The’) as there were 17 different letters that started the song titles with 3 songs starting with ‘D’ and 2 starting with ‘M’ and all the rest having unique starting letters. We had seen 16 different letters on 9 previous occasions.
The official bubble this week was Phil Collins’ cover of an old Supreme’s number, ‘You Can’t Hurry Love’.
It was now 6 weeks at 1 for Eddy Grant’s ‘I Don’t Wanna Dance’ while F.R. David’s ‘Word’s became the 3rd song to spend 6 straight weeks at 2. The first to do this had been Gloria Gaynor’s ‘I Will Survive’ which went on to manage 9 straight weeks there while the second song to manage it, Ballyhoo’s ‘Man On The Moon’, managed 7 weeks. ‘Words’ and ‘Man On The Moon’ had both managed this after vacating the top spot while ‘I Will Survive’ never managed to make it to number 1.
Tears For Fears’ ‘Mad World’ took the climber of the week award with a 6 place jump from 16 to 10. It would be the only star rater this week.
Supertramp’s ‘It’s Raining Again’ took the faller of the week award for a second week running (one could say of the song that it’s reigning again – sorry). It dropped a further 6 from 14 to 20 meaning it had dropped a total of 14 places in 2 weeks. They became the 27th act to see at least 7 biggest fallers. There was some good news for the group though as they saw their weeks total hit the 50 mark. They were the 77th act to reach this milestone.
F.R. David’s ‘Words’ ticked over to 18 weeks in the charts and enjoyed its 5th week as the oldest in the top 20. This was a new record for weeks as the oldest by a song by a French act, beating the 4 that Colombus’ ‘Milky Ways’ managed. ‘Words’ was also celebrating a points milestone as it became the 43rd song to get to 300 points or more. It had now accumulated 306 points and sat tied 32nd overall.
There were no songs leaving the charts this week and subsequently no new entries. This was the 21st time we had seen no movement on or off the charts.
After 15 weeks with the average number of weeks the top 20 songs had been with us being below 8, we saw it jump up to 8.55. This was the 115th time it had been 8 or more which represented just under 12.5% of the time that it was this high.
Last week’s official bubble, ‘Up Where We Belong’, the duet between Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes, was still the official bubble this week.
Eddy Grant’s ‘I Don’t Wanna Dance’ continued its run at the top of the charts and had now clocked up 5 weeks at 1. It was the 70th song to spend at least 5 weeks at 1. For those 5 weeks, the previous chart topper, F.R. David’s ‘Words’ had sat at 2 and for 3 of them now, Kool & The Gang’s ‘Ooh La, La, La (Let’s Go Dancin’)’ had been stuck at 3.
Hall & Oates’ ‘Maneater’ took the climber of the week award for a second time as it moved up 8 from 12 to 4. Talk Talk’s ‘Talk Talk’ and Lloyd Ross’ ‘Vyfster’ were also star raters with the former moving up 7 from 13 to 6 and the latter climbing 6 from 14 to 8.
Supertramp’s ‘It’s Raining Again’ took the falling honours. It dropped 8 from 6 to 14 to give the band their 6th time with the award.
F.R. David’s ‘Words’ enjoyed its 17th week in the top 20 and its 4th as the oldest in the charts.
Madness’ Our house’ lasted just 4 weeks in the charts and peaked at 16. Its departure from the top 20 heralded the end of their SA chart career. They had managed 2 hits, spent a total of 19 weeks in the charts and had their best peak with their other hit, ‘It Must be Love’.
We also bid farewell to John Cougar’s ‘Hurt So Good’ which had been in the charts for 15 weeks and peaked at 5. This had been his first SA chart hit, but his run in the charts continued on to 16 weeks as he became the 22nd act to replace themselves on the charts with his second hit, ‘Jack And Diane’ being a new entry this week. Of the 22 acts who had replaced themselves on the charts, only 1 so far had managed it twice and that was Cliff Richard. It had been exactly 100 weeks since the last time we saw an act replace themselves on the charts and that was when John Lennon’s ‘Woman’ was a new entry the week his ‘(Just Like) Starting Over’ left the top 20. ‘Jack And Diane’ featured Mick Ronson on guitar and it would spend 4 weeks at the top of the charts in the US. Ronson had been a guitarist for David Bowie around the time of his Ziggy Stardust album. Apart from its US success, ‘Jack And Diane’ also went to 7 in Australia, 1 in Canada, 32 in The Netherlands and 25 in the UK. It would top the Capital 604 charts, go to 2 on Radio 5 and 4 on the 702 charts.
Toto saw their 3rd SA chart hit make the top 20 this week in the form of ‘Africa’. The song topped the US charts for 1 week and would also get to number 1 in Canada. It also made top 10 in Australia (#5), Austria (#7), Belgium (#8), Ireland (#2), The Netherlands (#4), New Zealand (#5) and Zimbabwe (#7). It topped the Capital 604 charts and got to 2 on Radio 702, but failed to make the Radio 5 charts. The song has had major longevity and in 2017 it was one of the most streamed tracks with over 426 million streams on Spotify. This prompted US band Weezer to release a cover of the song in 2018 and that version got to 51 in the US. In 1990 there was another Africa connection with Toto as South African born Jean-Michel Bryon (full name Jean-Michel Byron Du Plessis) joined the band as lead vocalist for a few years from around 1990.
With both new entries having made the top of the US charts and neither of the 2 leavers having top either the UK or US charts, we now had 7 song in the top 20 that had topped either or both the UK and US charts. These were ‘I Don’t Wanna Dance’ (UK), ‘Maneater’ (US), ‘Pass The Dutchie’ (UK), ‘Truly’ (US), ‘Do You really Want To Hurt Me’ (UK), ‘Jack And Diane’ (US) and ‘Africa’ (US). It had been 36 weeks since we last had this many UK/US chart toppers in the top 20.
The official bubble from last week, Bob Seger’s ‘Shame On The Moon’ didn’t make it onto the top 20 this week, but it still featured on the ‘Bubbling Under’ programme although not as the official bubble. That title went to Joe Cocker & Jennifer Warnes’ ‘Up Where We Belong’.
SA Singles Charts 