* The Bangles became the 9th and final act to see their first 2 hits top the charts.
Written by: Leam Sternberg Produced by: David Kahne South African record label (unless otherwise stated): CBS
Hit number for artist
2
Peak position
1
Weeks
21
Biggest climber awards
1
Star rater climbs
2
Biggest faller awards
2
Top 20 points
270
Overall Top 20 points ranking
=140
Top 20 points ranking for the artist
2
Top 30 Points
465
Overall Top 30 points ranking
=151
Top 30 points ranking for the artist
2
Annual ranking:
1986
86
1987
22
Other chart success:
Australia
1
Austria
6
Belgium
1
Canada
1
Finland
11
France
15
Germany
1
Ireland
2
Japan
83
Netherlands
1
New Zealand
2
Spain
1
Switzerland
8
UK
3
US
1
Zimbabwe
2
SA Radio charts:
Capital 604
1
Radio 5
1
Radio 702
1
The inspiration for the song apparently came when songwriter, Liam Sternberg, was crossing the English Channel on a ferry. The water was choppy and the passengers were walking in a strange way to keep their balance. This reminded Sternberg of the paintings of human figures in the ancient Egyptian tombs. He would first offer the song to Toni Basil, who turned it down. Lene Lovich was the first to record a version, but this was not released. It was then offered to The Bangles. The song was re-released in 1990 to help promote the band’s ‘Greatest Hits’ album and it would go to 73 in the UK that year. It would be the 47th of 72 hits that would top all 3 of the local radio charts mentioned above and the 17th of 24 that would also top the main SA chart.
Written by: Prince (going under the pseudonym Christopher) Produced by: David Kahne South African record label (unless otherwise stated): CBS
Hit number for artist
1
Peak position
1
Weeks
26
Biggest climber awards
2
Star rater climbs
4
Biggest faller awards
0
Top 20 points
320
Overall Top 20 points ranking
=52
Top 20 points ranking for the artist
1
Top 30 Points
571
Overall Top 30 points ranking
43
Top 30 points ranking for the artist
1
Annual ranking:
1986
1
Other chart success:
Australia
3
Austria
2
Belgium
19
Canada
2
Germany
2
Ireland
2
Japan
56
Netherlands
22
New Zealand
5
Norway
4
Switzerland
4
UK
2
US
2
Zimbabwe
2
SA Radio charts:
Capital 604
7
Radio 5
4
Radio 702
1
The song was written for the band Apollonia 6 and Prince (who penned the track under the pseudonym Christopher) would record a version with them but did not release it at the time. It would appear on a 2001 bootleg called ‘The Work – Volume 1’ and then got an official release in 2019 on his posthumous album ‘Originals’. The Bangles’ version of the song would be 1 of 13 that made our charts which would peak at 2 on both sides of the Atlantic. In the US it was kept off the top spot by Prince’s hit ‘Kiss’ and it was Diana Ross’ ‘Chain Reaction’ that denied it in the UK. It would be 1 of 18 songs to see 4 star raters with no biggest climber (2 of the 18 managed a record 5).
Written by: Paul Simon Produced by: Rick Rubin South African record label (unless otherwise stated): CBS
Hit number for artist
3
Peak position
28
Weeks
2
Biggest climber awards
0
Star rater climbs
0
Biggest faller awards
0
Top 20 points
N/A
Overall Top 20 points ranking
N/A
Top 20 points ranking for the artist
N/A
Top 30 Points
5
Overall Top 30 points ranking
=2511
Top 30 points ranking for the artist
3
Annual ranking:
1988
=119
Other chart success:
Australia
7
Belgium
17
Canada
3
Germany
52
Ireland
8
Netherlands
14
New Zealand
14
UK
11
US
2
Zimbabwe
20
SA Radio charts:
Capital 604
11
The song was a cover of a 1966 Simon & Garfunkel track. Their version would get to 13 in the US. The Bangles chose to record the cover when they were approached to contribute to the soundtrack to the film ‘Less Than Zero’ which starred Andrew McCarthy and Jami Gertz.
The Bangles were an all-girl American band from Los Angles and consisted of Susanna Hoffs, Annette Zilinskas, Micki Steele and sisters Vicki and Debbi Peterson. Steele had been in the band The Runaways alongside a pre-Blackhearts’ Joan Jett. The 5 of them got together in 1980 and originally called themselves The Colours. They then changed their name to The Bangs and were signed to a record label run by Miles Copeland, the brother of The Police drummer Stewart Copeland. Just as they were about to release their first EP, they discovered there was already a band called The Bangs, so changed their name to The Bangles. One of the tracks on the EP was a cover of a Katrina & The Waves song called ‘Going Down To Liverpool’ and the video for it featured Leonard Nimoy (who played Spock in Star Trek) as the Nimoy family were friends with Susanna Hoffs’ family. They had minor UK hits with their early releases (‘Hero Takes A Fall’ got to 96 and the original version of ‘Going Down To Liverpool’ got to 79) before cracking the big time when their 1985 hit, ‘Manic Monday’, got to number 2 on both sides of the Atlantic. The song was written by Prince, and it was his hit, ‘Kiss’ which was at number 1 in the US the week ‘Manic Monday’ peaked at 2. They would go on to have 8 US hits (including the chart toppers ‘Walk Like An Egyptian’ and ‘Eternal Flame’) and 16 UK hits where ‘Eternal Flame’ would be their only chart topper.
Date of entry
Song
Peak (weeks at 1)
Weeks
11-May-1986
Manic Monday
1
26
07-Dec-1986
Walk Like An Egyptian
1
21
05-May-1988
Hazy Shade Of Winter
28
2
Total hits
3
Total weeks
49
Biggest climber awards
3
Star rater climbs
6
Biggest fallers
2
Weeks with oldest in the charts
7
Longest run in the charts (weeks)
26
Weeks with more than 1 in the charts
0
Biggest gap between hits (weeks)
53
Top 30 points ranking
122
Top 20 points ranking
99
Top 30 points
1041
Top 20 points
590
The Bangles were 1 of 9 acts to see their first 2 SA chart hits go to number 1.
The Bangles’ ‘Walk Like An Egyptian’ spent a 3rd straight week at 1 and, adding in its 1 week at 1 before being interrupted by Chris de Burgh’s ‘The Lady In Red’, it had now managed a total of 4 weeks at the top of the charts. Last week it beat their previous chart topper for total weeks at 1 as ‘Manic Monday’ had managed 2 weeks at the top of the charts. This week it beat their previous best for consecutive weeks at 1. Wang Chung’s ‘Everybody Have Fun Tonight’ lurked at 2 for a second week.
Modern Talking’s ‘Geronimo’s Cadillac’ made a massive 15 place leap from 29 to 14 to take the climber of the week award. This was only the 4th time we had seen a song climb 15 or more in a week. The previous ones to manage this were The Monkees’ ‘I’m A Believer’ and the Mike Curb Congregation’s ‘Burning Bridges’ which managed a 16 place climb and The Sweet’s ‘Co-Co’ which held the record, managing a 17 place climb. Modern Talking’s effort would be the all time record for a song by an act from a non-big 3 nation and it was the best we had seen in the 80’s. However, they had the 2nd highest weeks count for an act picking up their 6th biggest climber award. They were on 115 weeks which was 9 less than record holder Cliff Richard.
Sandra’s ‘Hi! Hi! Hi!’ set a new record for number of places climbed without being the biggest climber as it moved up 14 from 25 to 11. Alphaville’s ‘Forever Young’, Madonna’s ‘Like A Virgin’ and Agnetha Faltskog’s ‘Wrap Your Arms Around Me’ had been the previous record holders all managing 12 place climbs. Europe’s ‘The Final Countdown’ and Julian Cope’s ‘World Shut Your Mouth’ were the other star raters with the former climbing 5 from 12 to 7 and the latter moving up 6 from 18 to 12 making it the climber within the top 20.
Duran Duran’s ‘Notorious’ dropped 10 from 16 to 26 to take the faller of the week award while it was Paul Simon’s ‘You Can Call Me Al’ which took the award inside the top 20 with a 7 place drop from 11 to 18. Duran Duran were the second act after Starship to see 2 falls of 10 or more in a week. They had previously seen a drop of 10 with ‘A View To A Kill’.
‘Notorious’ was joined by Berlin’s ‘Take My Breath Away’ and Huey Lewis & The News’ ‘Stuck With You’ in dropping out the top 20. ‘Hi! Hi! Hi!’ and ‘Geronimo’s Cadillac’ as mentioned above, moved into the top 20 and they were joined by Dead Or Alive’s ‘Brand New Lover’.
‘Take My Breath Away’ had been the oldest in the top 20 and that honour now fell to Chris de Burgh’s ‘The Lady In Red’ which had been in that part of the chart for 18 weeks.
‘Stuck With You’ not only left the top 20 but also left the top 30. It was the 13th and [spoiler alert] would be the last to leave the top 30 from inside the top 20. It had spent 18 weeks in the charts and peaked at 5 which was 1 place lower than their only other hit to date, ‘The Power Of Love’. They still had a couple more hits to come.
Also going was Boys Don’t Cry’s ‘I Wanna Be A Cowboy’ which managed 16 weeks and a peak of 11. They too would return to the charts at a later date.
Peter Cetera’s ‘Glory Of Love’ manged 27 weeks and a peak of 3. This would be his only solo hit to make the charts. He did, however, manage 1 more week with this one solo hit than with the 3 hits he had as a member of Chicago. Chicago did manage to top the charts with ‘If You Leave Me Now’ which beat Cetera’s solo peak. In total he managed 53 weeks adding his solo career to his career as a member of the band.
‘Glory Of Love’ had been the oldest on last week’s chart and we now had to look to Bananarama’s ‘Venus’ as the granddaddy (or should that be grandmommy?) of the top 30 as it stood on 25 weeks, but had dropped 8 places to 30 so it was unlikely be the oldest for very long.
Erasure had the honour of being the 100th act to see more than 1 hit in the chart in the same week as their ‘Sometimes’ joined ‘Oh L’Amour’ which sat at 8 this week. ‘Sometimes’ would be the song that gave them their first major UK hit as it went to 2 on the charts there. Their previous 3 singles had only managed a best peak of 55 (‘Who Needs Love Like That’). ‘Sometimes’ would top the charts in Spain and also fare well in Belgium (#2), Denmark (#9), Finland (#5), Germany (#2), Ireland (#3), The Netherlands (#2) and Switzerland (#3). To date it remains their only hit to make the French charts where it made it to 39. ‘Sometimes’ was the 33rd title to belong to at least 2 different songs to make our charts. We had seen Caroline du Preez and Tommy Dell chart as a duet with a different song called ‘Sometimes’. Erasure’s song would get to 4 on the Radio 702 charts, and peak at 3 on both the Capital 604 and Radio 5 ones.
15 weeks back we had seen Boris Gardiner set a new record gap between hits as we had to wait 856 weeks between his ‘Elizabethan Reggae’ and ‘I Want To Wake Up With You’. This week we saw that record being broken by Aretha Franklin who was last seen on our charts 949 weeks earlier with ‘I Say A Little Prayer’ which spent its last week on the chart on 6 December 1968. This week she returned with her duet with George Michael, ‘I Knew You Were Waiting’. It was Aretha’s 2nd SA chart hit and Michael’s 3rd. Michael had been approached to write and produce a song with Aretha but was busy with Wham! at the time and also considered himself unworthy of writing something for Aretha to sing. Consequently, ‘I Knew You Were Waiting’ was the first single featuring him that he did not have a hand in writing. Instead it was written by Simon Climie and Dennis Morgan who penned the track. Climie was not too far away from seeing hits as part of Climie Fisher. ‘I Knew You Were Waiting’ would top the charts for 2 weeks on both sides of the Atlantic and would also get to number 1 in Australia, Belgium, Ireland, The Netherlands and Zimbabwe. It would have a clean sweep of number 1s across the Radio 5, Radio 702 and Capital 604 charts. In charting as part of a duet George Michael became the 8th person to chart as part of a group, as a solo act and as part of a duet. The previous people to manage this were Diana Ross (this counts her credit as ‘Diana Ross & The Supremes as being in a group), Glenys Lynne, Paul McCartney (who had charted in 2 different groups), Lionel Richie, Stevie Nicks, Phil Collins and Stevie Wonder (who had been in Dionne & Friends, you may not wish to count that). These stats ignore acts who were part of the conglomeration of acts who participated in the Band Aid and USA For Africa projects.
Huey Lewis & The News became the 31st act to replace themselves on the charts as their new one, ‘Hip To Be Square’ was a new entry coming in in the place of the departing ‘Stuck With You’. ‘Hip To Be Square’ would feature in the film ‘American Psycho’ and would initially appear on the soundtrack album, but this was quickly pulled as those releasing the soundtrack had only secured the rights to include it in the film, but not the soundtrack. A few copies containing the song were, however, sold. ‘Hip To Be Square’ would make it to number 3 in the US while elsewhere it made top 20 in Australia (#17), Canada (#14), Finland (#12), New Zealand (#9). On the local radio charts it made it to 3 on Radio 5, 7 on 702 and 8 on Capital 604.
We had now had at least 1 hit by a female act on the charts for 200 consecutive weeks. This was only the second such run the women had managed so far. The previous run had gone on to last 323 before we went one week with no solo female act. The current run started just after that 1 week.
The ding-dong battle between the Brits and the Americans for most hits in the charts continued as it swayed back in favour of the Brits who had 12 in this week’s charts as opposed to the American’s 11. It had been the other way round last week.
‘The Lady In Red’ became the 164th song to reach 20 weeks in the charts. Just over 7% of the songs that had charted so far had made it to 20 weeks. It also became the 72nd song to reach 300 top 20 points as it moved on to 305.
George Michael’s new one moved him on to 50 weeks in the charts. 114 acts so far had reached this milestone. Billy Joel reached 108 weeks and now equalled Leo Sayer’s record for weeks in the charts without ever seeing a number 1. Modern Talking moved into 18th place on the weeks count list. They were on 116 and with 2 in the charts they leapfrogged The Sweet and The Troggs who dropped into tied 19th place.
Madonna had now featured in our charts for 30 weeks running and she was second act to manage 2 runs of 30 weeks in the charts. Modern Talking had seen their second such run just 2 weeks earlier.
‘Don’t Leave Me With Way’ had now clocked up 34 weeks between the 2 different versions of the song that had charted and this now moved it into tied 5th place on the list of weeks by songs charting in more than 1 version. It shared 5th place with ‘Master Jack’ which had charted for Four Jacks and A Jill and Trini Lopez and the parody thereof by Al Debbo called ‘Baas Jack’.
After 4 weeks with the record to date 13 UK/US chart toppers in the charts we dropped to 12 with ‘Glory Of Love’ and ‘Stuck With You’ dropping out of the charts and ‘I Knew You Were Waiting’ being the only new entry that had got to number 1 on those charts. We also dropped from the record to date 12 UK/US chart toppers in the top 20 to 10.
This week was the 4th most turbulent we had seen to date. This is based on adding the number of places songs climbed to the number of places they fell. This total was 106 which was 1 less than the 3rd highest we had seen but a little way off the record to date of 144.
Having regained the top spot last week, The Bangles’ ‘Walk Like An Egyptian’ held on to it this time unlike its first run at number 1 which lasted just 1 week. Chris de Burgh’s ‘The Lady In Red’ was dancing at 3 while Wang Chung’s ‘Everybody Have Fun Tonight’ moved up from 7 to take second spot which the former had just vacated.
Julian Cope picked up the climber of the week award as his ‘World Shut Your Mouth’ moved up 9 from 27 to 18. The other star raters this week were ‘Everybody Have Fun Tonight’ (mentioned above), Europe’s ‘The Final Countdown’ (up 7 from 19 to 12), Toto’s ‘I’ll Be Over You’ (up 5 from 24 to 19) and The Pretenders’ ‘Don’t Get Me Wrong’ (up 5 from 21 to 26).
‘World Shut Your Mouth’ and ‘I’ll Be Over You’ were the new entries into the top 20 this week and they replaced Bananarama’s ‘Venus’ and Peter Cetera’s ‘Glory Of Love’. The latter was the faller of the week, dropping 9 from 17 to 26.
Looking only at the top 20, then the climber was ‘The Final Countdown’ (mentioned above with star raters) and the faller Huey Lewis & The News’ ‘Stuck With You’ which dropped 6 from 14 to 20. Huey & Co would have been grateful to ‘Glory Of Love’ for having a bigger top 30 fall as they had now clocked up 40 weeks in the charts and had done so without ever having the overall biggest faller in a week. They were only the 11th act to manage such a run.
‘Glory Of Love’ was still the oldest in the top 30 sitting on 27 weeks, but we now had to look to Berlin’s ‘Take My Breath Away’ for oldest in the top 20. It had spent 18 weeks in that part of the chart.
Kenny Loggins’ ‘Danger Zone’ and Level 42’s ‘Lessons In Love’ were the songs that left the charts this week. ‘Danger Zone’ had been with us for 21 weeks and managed to get to 3 during that time. This would herald the end of the SA chart road for Loggins. He had managed 3 hits, spent 53 weeks in the charts and managed 2 weeks at 1 with ‘Footloose’. In addition to his 3 hits, he also had a song writing credit on The Doobie Brothers’ ‘What A Fool Believes’ which if added to the above would give him 4 hits and 66 weeks.
‘Lessons In Love’ spent 26 weeks in the charts, 4 of which were at number 1. This would be the sum total of Level 42’s time in our charts.
Sandra returned to the charts with her 4th hit to make our charts, ‘Hi! Hi! Hi!’. The song writing team of Michael Cretu, Hubert Kemmler and Klaus Hirschburger were once again used and the song would give Sandra a number 7 hit in her native Germany. It would perform particularly well in Greece where it got to number 2. It had some success elsewhere in Europe going to 12 in Austria, 13 in France, 47 in The Netherlands, 36 in Spain and 20 in Switzerland. Sandra was the 4th German act to manage 4 hits with Modern Talking, Michael Holm and Alphaville being the other to manage this.
And talking of Modern Talking, they took the overall lead for number of hits by a German act. They had been sitting tied first with Michael Holm on 5 hits, but now moved on to 6 hits with the arrival of their ‘Geronimo’s Cadillac’. ‘Atlantis Is Calling’ was still in the charts and Modern Talking became the 3rd act to see at least 4 different pairings of hits in the charts. Only Madonna and The Bee Gees had previously managed this and both of them sat on 5 at the moment. ‘Geronimo’s Cadillac’ has the distinction of being the first Modern Talking single not to reach the number 1 spot in Germany. It peaked at 3 where it sat for 2 weeks with Europe’s ‘The Final Countdown’ and Falco’s ‘Coming Home’ at 1 and 2 for the first week then at 2 and 1 respectively for the second week. ‘Geronimo’s Cadillac’ would also go top 10 in Austria (#3), Belgium (#4), Norway (#7), Spain (#1), Sweden (#6) and Switzerland (#6). Having 2 hits in the charts moved Modern Talking’s weeks count total on to 114 which meant they now entered the top 20 of the total weeks count list. This knocked Diana Ross and local lad, Billy Forrest into tied 21st place.
With the 2 new entries being by German acts, this was the only time we would see 2 new entries in the same week from the same non-big 3 nation. We had now seen a total of 48 hits by German acts and they extended their lead for hits by a non-big 3 nation, now 8 ahead of second placed Canada.
This week was the 4th in a row with a record to date 13 UK/US chart toppers in the charts, but we ended the 4 week run of a record 12 of these being in the top 20 as ‘Venus’ and ‘Glory Of Love’ fell out of that part of the chart.
After just 1 additional week at 1, Chris de Burgh’s ‘The Lady In Red’ dropped to 2 and let The Bangles’ ‘Walk Like An Egyptian’ back into the number 1 spot. This was the 35th time a song had regained the top spot and the 7th time we had seen an A-B-A-B sequence of number 1’s (hope that makes sense).
The climber of the week award was shared between Stacey Q’s ‘Two Of Hearts’ and Duran Duran’s ‘Notorious’ which both climbed 4 to land at 13 and 16 respectively. There were the climbers both within the top 20 and the top 30 and would be the only star raters this week.
Bruce Hornsby & The Range’s ‘The Way It Is’ was the faller of the week as it dropped 8 places from 13 to 21. It was the only song leaving the top 20 and it was replaced by Cyndi Lauper’s ‘True Colours’ which became the 68th song to re-enter the top 20. The faller within the top 20 was Paul Simon’s ‘You Can Call Me Al’ which fell 4 from 4 to 8.
Peter Cetera’s ‘Glory Of Love’ moved on to 24 top 20 weeks and enjoyed its 5th week as the oldest in that part of the chart. It shared the oldest in the top 30 title with Level 42’s ‘Lessons In Love’. Both songs had been in the charts for 26 weeks and this was their 2nd week as the oldest.
There was only one song leaving the charts this week and that was Margaret Singana’s ‘We Are Growing’ which had managed 6 weeks and peaked at 26. This ended Singana’s SA chart career. She had managed 3 hits and spent a total of 41 weeks in the charts. She got to number 2 (her best peak) with ‘I’ll Never Love A Man (The Way I Love You)’. Sadly this was also the last we would see of any local female acts on the charts. Interestingly the 40 local lasses who charted had seen 88 hits and spent exactly 888 weeks on the charts. Of the 888 weeks they had managed, 189 had been as part of a duet and 35 had been spent at number 1. They managed a total of 10 chart toppers. We were now without a local hit in the charts and this was the start of the 13th such run.
Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark (or OMD as those who have to type out the name like to refer to them) saw their 3rd SA chart hit this week as their ‘Forever Live And Die’ was the new entry. Although it was only their 3rd SA chart hit, it was only their second to come from one of their studio albums as their previous hit, ‘If You Leave’ was from the soundtrack to ‘Pretty In Pink’ and did not appear on an OMD album except for greatest hits compilations. This story was echoed on the album charts in SA where 1982’s ‘Architecture And Morality’, which featured their first single success in SA, ‘Joan Of Arc (Maid Of Orleans)’, was only followed up on our album charts in 1987 with ‘The Pacific Age’, which featured ‘Forever Live And Die’. In between they had released the albums ‘Dazzle Ships’, ‘Junk Culture’ and ‘Crush’, none of which produced a single to make our charts. ‘Forever Live And Die’ would give them a number 11 hit in the UK and a number 19 hit in the US. It also made the top 10 in Austria (#5), Belgium (#6), Canada (#10), The Netherlands (#3), Germany (#8) and Switzerland (#9). It would top the Radio 5 charts and go to 8 on the 702 charts and 12 on the Capital 604 ones.
We now had 19 of the top 30 hits being by groups and this was just 1 off the record of 20. There were 8 hits by solo males and 3 by solo female acts.
Berlin’s ‘Take My Breath Away’ became the 163rd song to reach 20 weeks in the charts and as it was the band’s first hit, they also reached that milestone. 19 of these 20 weeks helped the US acts to reach a total of 8,500 weeks, but it was ‘Glory Of Love’, a few places higher this week, that saw the Americans to this total. ‘Take My Breath Away’ gave them their 8,502nd week.
Modern Talking had now had at least 1 song on the charts for 30 straight weeks and they were the first act to see 2 runs of at least 30 weeks in the charts.
The Bangles became the 9th act to see their first 2 SA chart hits make it all the way to number 1 as their ‘Walk Like An Egyptian’ knocked ‘The Lady In Red’ off the top spot after the latter had been there for 8 weeks. The Bangles’ previous chart topper had been ‘Manic Monday’. ‘The Lady In Red’ dropped to number 2.
Billy Joel’s ‘A Matter Of Trust’ picked up the climber of the week award for a second week running as it moved up a further 7 places from 18 to 11. It was the climber both within the top 20 and the top 30. After last week’s flurry of 8 star raters we only had 2 this week, ‘A Matter Of Trust’ and Modern Talking’s ‘Atlantis Is Calling’ which moved up 4 from 20 to 16. Joel became the 20th act to see 14 star raters while Modern Talking were just 1 off joining them as this was their 13th.
Berlin’s ‘Take My Breath Away’ was the faller of the week in both the top 20 and the top 30 as it dropped 6 from 9 to 15.
Modern Talking’s ‘Brother Louie’ continued its run as the oldest in the charts as it moved on to 28 weeks. It was the 14th song to spend at least 10 weeks as the oldest in the charts. There were no songs leaving the top 20 so Peter Cetera’s ‘Glory Of Love’ continued its run as the oldest in that part of the chart. It was on 22 top 20 weeks.
It was different for the top 30 where we saw 3 songs leaving the charts. The first of these was Depeche Mode’s ‘A Question Of Time’ which had seen 2 runs in the charts. The first lasted 4 weeks where the song peaked at 26, then it returned after a 2 week absence to sit at 30 for 3 weeks, giving it a total weeks count of 7. They still had a couple of hits to come.
Dead Or Alive‘s ‘Brand New Lover’ left the charts after just 2 weeks, both spent at 28. They would be back.
The last of the leavers was Talking Heads’ ‘Wild Wild Life’ which managed a run of 11 weeks and a peak of 19. This saw the end of their SA chart career with just 2 hits to their name and a total of 34 weeks. Their other hit, ‘Road To Nowhere’ would give them their best peak as it went to number 6.
The Pretenders brought us the first new entry in the form of ‘Don’t Get Me Wrong’. They had last been seen on our charts 333 week previously with ‘Brass In Pocket’ and this was the 56th biggest gap between hits that we had seen. The band’s lead singer, Chrissie Hynde, has said that she wrote the song for her friend John McEnroe the tennis player and it would give them a number 10 hit on both sides of the Atlantic. It would also fare well in Australia where it got to number 8 and Belgium where it also peaked at 8. On the local radio charts it would top the Radio 5 ones, get to 3 on 702 and 6 on Capital 604.
We had seen 20 hits on our charts so far by Swedish acts, only 2 of which were not by Abba. However 1 of the non-Abba hits was by Abba’s Agnetha Faltskog so the only non-Abba related Swedish hit before this week was Blue Swede’s ‘Hooked On A Feeling’. This week we saw the second non-Abba Swedish act make our charts in the form of Europe and their hit ‘The Final Countdown’. It was written by the band’s lead singer Joey Tempest who took inspiration from David Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’ for the lyrics. The band were not overly keen on the song at first, not wanting to release it as a single, but Joey and the band’s record label persuaded the rest of them and they ended up with a gigantic global smash hit. According to Wikipedia, the song would top the charts in 25 countries which would include Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Ireland, Italy, The Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, The UK and Germany. It would just miss out in Zimbabwe where it peaked at 2. It would top all 3 of the local radio charts. In 1999 (presumable in preparation for seeing in the new millennium), a remixed version of the song called ‘The Final Countdown 2000’ was released and it got to 6 in Sweden and made the top 40 in a number of European countries. A band called Deep Sunshine covered the track and that version has been labelled the worst cover ever.
The final new entry saw Toto return to the charts exactly 200 weeks after they had last been seen on them. Their last hit on our charts had been ‘Africa’ but they were back this week with ‘I’ll Be Over You’. It was the first single off their ‘Farenheit’ album and it was written by their lead singer at that time, Steve Lukather, along with a guy called Randy Goodrum. Goodrum had seen 2 of his compositions on our chart before and they were Anne Murray’s ‘I Needed You’ and Steve Perry’s ‘Oh Sherrie’ (the latter as a co-writer). ‘I’ll Be Over You’ would peak at 11 in the US and 13 in Canada. It would match its US peak on the Radio 5 charts and would go 6 better on the Capital 604 ones where it peaked at 5.
The ding-dong battle between the Americans and the Brits for most hits in the charts continued with the leaders changing for the 5th time in the space of 16 weeks. We now had 13 hits by Americans and 11 by Brits.
Both The Human League and Margaret Singana reached 40 weeks in the charts. The Human League had managed this without ever experiencing the biggest fall and they were the 10th act to clock up 40 weeks without a faller. Modern Talking were knocking on the top 20 for total weeks on the charts as they ticked over to 100. They were now 3 behind Billy Forrest and Diana Ross who shared 20th position.
‘Venus’ took the outright lead for weeks in the charts by songs charting in different versions. The 3 versions of the song had amassed 41 weeks and this moved it ahead of ‘Love Is Blue’ and ‘Lara’s Theme (From Dr Zhivago)’. ‘Don’t Leave Me With Way’ moved on to 30 weeks between the 2 versions that had charted and this meant it took 6th place for itself, moving 1 ahead of ‘Goodbye My Love’, ‘Never Ending Song Of Love’ and ‘Sunday, Monday, Tuesday’.
Last week saw a new record for UK/US chart toppers in the top 20 and we still had this record of 12, however this week we also saw the top 30 record being broken as we added ‘The Final Countdown’ (a UK chart topper) to the 12 that were listed as being in the top 20 in last week’s entry, giving us a new high of 13 in the top 30.
1986 saw the space shuttle Challenger blow up soon after lift off and the close visit of Halley’s comet as well as the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster Diego Maradonna scored his famous ‘hand of God’ goal against England in the football World Cup in Mexico, ‘Out Of Africa’ won the best picture Oscar and Prince Andrew married Sarah Ferguson. Closer to home Desmond Tutu was made South Africa’s first black Anglican Bishop and Mozambiquan leader, Samora Machel, died in a plane crash just inside South Africa’s border. On the technology front, the first commercially available 3D printer was sold. Lady Gaga, Usain Bolt, Drake, Ellie Goulding, Oscar Pistorius and Thandeka Mdeliswa (who played Khanya in the SA TV series ‘iKhani’) were among those being born while Thin Lizzy’s Phil Lynott, Benny Goodman, James Cagney, Cary Grant and Frank Herbert (who wrote the Sci Fi novel ‘Dune’) shuffled off their mortal coils.
We saw 136 different songs spend time in the charts during the year, 2 less than 1985. Exactly 100 made it to the top 20 which was the same as we had seen in 1985. The 136 was the 2nd highest total we had seen in the 4 full years of top 30s we had heard so far. The 100 in the top 20 was the tied 3rd lowest total for the top 20 with only the 97 in 1984 and the 79 in the half year of 1965, when the charts started, being lower. 110 acts brought us the 136 hits and 83 act brought us the 100 top 20 hits which was again the exact same number we had seen in 1985, giving us a hits per act ratio of 1.2 once again. The following table shows the number of hits and acts over the years:
Year
No Of Hits (Top 20)
No Of Hits (Top 30)
No Of acts (Top 20)
No Of acts (Top 30)
Hits/Act (Top 20)
1965
79
55
1.436
1966
136
97
1.402
1967
146
98
1.490
1968
142
97
1.464
1969
153
112
1.366
1970
141
114
1.237
1971
135
114
1.184
1972
117
97
1.206
1973
103
87
1.184
1974
115
100
1.150
1975
128
111
1.153
1976
123
110
1.118
1977
119
94
1.266
1978
114
91
1.253
1979
113
91
1.242
1980
119
97
1.227
1981
126
108
1.167
1982
109
98
1.112
1983
102
134
86
112
1.186
1984
97
125
85
108
1.141
1985
100
138
83
111
1.205
1986
100
136
83
110
1.205
There was a slight improvement in the number of local hits over the record to date lowest of 4 which we had seen in 1985 as this figure moved up to 6 with 4 of the 6 reaching the top 20. As happened in 1985, the local acts weren’t even 3rd for number of hits with the Germans once again outdoing them (more on that later).
Based on a points system of 30 points for a number 1 position, 29 for number 2 etc down to 1 for position 30, the following are the top 40 chart performers for the year (Note: this does not necessarily reflect sales):
Pos
Song
Artist
Points
1
Manic Monday
Bangles
571
2
Say You, Say Me
Lionel Richie
558
3
Rock Me Amadeus
Falco
539
4
Brother Louie
Modern Talking
512
5
A Different Corner
George Michael
475
6
Lessons in Love
Level 42
474
7
A Good Heart
Feargal Sharkey
473
8
When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Get Going
Billy Ocean
470
9
Walk of Life
Dire Straits
460
10
(I’ll Never Be) Maria Magdalena
Sandra
453
11
They Say it’s Gonna Rain
Hazell Dean
450
12
Nikita
Elton John
444
13
Dancing on the Ceiling
Lionel Richie
432
14
We Built This City
Starship
431
15
Glory of Love
Peter Cetera
424
16
West End Girls
Pet Shop Boys
417
17
A Love Bizarre
Sheila E
399
=18
Venus
Bananarama
371
=18
That’s What Friends are For
Dionne & Friends
371
20
Conga
Miami Sound Machine
368
=21
Dance with Me
Alphaville
357
=21
Sledgehammer
Peter Gabriel
357
23
Love Missile F1-11
Sigue Sigue Sputnik
343
24
On My Own
Patti LaBelle & Michael McDonald
342
25
St Elmo’s Fire (Man in Motion)
John Parr
330
26
Papa Don’t Preach
Madonna
328
27
Take My Breath Away
Berlin
322
28
Road to Nowhere
Talking Heads
320
29
I Engineer
Animotion
319
30
Danger Zone
Kenny Loggins
304
31
Here Comes the Man
Boom Boom Room
303
32
The Power of Love
Jennifer Rush
301
33
Love Theme From St Elmo’s Fire
David Foster
299
34
The Lady in Red
Chris de Burgh
296
35
Hit That Perfect Beat
Bronski Beat
289
36
Chain Reaction
Diana Ross
284
37
Trapped
Colonel Abrams
278
38
You Can Call Me Al
Paul Simon
270
39
Addicted to Love
Robert Palmer
268
40
The Whole of the Moon
Waterboys
264
You can compare this to the list published in Top 40 magazine in 1989 which can be found here:
‘Manic Monday’ was the top hit based on a top 30 basis, but this year was another of those funny ones where you get a different top hit if you only look at the top 20 as Lionel Richie’s ‘Say You Say Me’ managed 334 top 20 points to ‘Manic Monday’s 320, but given that the whole year was covered by a top 30, it is fair to say that ‘Manic Monday’ had the best performance for the year. This was the 8th time a US act had topped the list and the Americans now sat 3 ahead of the Brit and local acts who had both managed the top song 5 times. The 334 top 20 points that ‘Say You Say Me’ managed was the 11th best (out of 22 years) for the top top 20 hit so far.
The cumulative points to date using a top 20 basis gave the following top 10:
Pos
Song
Artist
Points
1
I Need Someone
Alan Garrity
464
2
The Power Of Love
Jennifer Rush
454
3
I Can See Clearly Now
Johnny Nash
448
4
Cry to Me
Staccatos
447
5
Say You Say Me
Lionel Richie
420
6
You
Peter Maffay
399
7
Words
F.R. David
392
8
Sunday, Monday, Tuesday
Jessica Jones
391
9
I Just Called To Say I Love You
Stevie Wonder
390
10
Baby Makes Her Blue Jeans Talk
Dr Hook
387
This list saw both ‘The Power Of Love’ and ‘Say You Say Me’ as new entries since the end of 1985.
Pointswise the 6 local hits for 1986 using a top 30 basis looked like this:
Pos
Song
Artist
Points
1
DestinedTo Win
Tom Inglis
197
2
What Have We Done To The Song
Tom Inglis
169
3
This Boy
Sweatband
136
4
It Was The Wind
Petit Cheval
25
5
Champions Of Love
Tom Inglis
22
6
We Are Growing
Margaret Singana
9
Tom Inglis’ ‘Destined To Win’ only managed 69 top 20 points and this was the lowest this total had ever been for the top SA hit.
Cumulatively from the start of the charts in 1965, the top 10 local songs on a top 20 basis were:
Pos
Song
Artist
Points
1
I Need Someone
Alan Garrity
464
2
Cry to Me
Staccatos
447
3
Sunday, Monday, Tuesday
Jessica Jones
391
4
Mammy Blue
Charisma
347
5
I Don’t Wanna Play House
Barbara Ray
336
6
Substitute
Clout
321
7
Timothy
Four Jacks & A Jill
312
8
She’s A Woman
Neil Herbert
304
9
It’s Too Late Now
Lauren Copley
303
10
Clap Your Hands And Stamp Your Feet
Maria
302
This list had not changed since the end of 1978.
NUMBER OF HITS
For a second year running Madonna topped the list for number of hits spending time in the charts during the year as she managed 4. In 1985 she had shared the top spot with Bruce Springsteen. This year she shared top honours with Modern Talking who also managed 4. Lionel Richie, Tom Inglis and Sandra all managed 3, making Inglis the top South African. Five hits in a year was still the best we had seen and that happened in 1968, 1969, 1971 and 1972.
In terms of total number hits, the top acts were unchanged with Cliff Richard leading the way on 24 and Tom Jones and Abba in tied second place on 18. The Rolling Stones moved up from 13 to 14 hits while Elton John increased his total from 12 to 13. ELO, Diana Ross and Queen all joined the elite club of those who had managed 10 or more.
The list of those who had seen at least 10 hits so far now looked like this:
Pos
Last Year
Artist
No Of Hits
1
(1)
Cliff Richard
24
=2
(2)
Abba
18
=2
(2)
Tom Jones
18
4
(4)
Bee Gees
17
5
(5)
Hollies
15
=6
(6)
Elvis Presley
14
=6
(6)
Neil Diamond
14
=6
(6)
Billy Forrest
14
=6
(9)
Rolling Stones
14
10
(10)
Elton John
13
=11
(10)
Percy Sledge
12
=11
(10)
Olivia Newton-John
12
=11
(10)
Leo Sayer
12
=11
(10)
Barbara Ray
12
=15
(14)
Petula Clark
11
=15
(14)
Herman’s Hermits
11
=15
(14)
Creedence Clearwater Revival
11
=18
(17)
Gene Rockwell
10
=18
(17)
Troggs
10
=18
(17)
Jody Wayne
10
=18
(New)
Electric Light Orchestra
10
=18
(New)
Diana Ross
10
=18
(New)
Queen
10
Billy Forrest was still the leader on the local front with 14 hits, followed by Barbara Ray on 12 and Jody Wayne and Gene Rockwell on 10.
WEEKS ON THE CHARTS
Modern Talking took top honours for most weeks spent on the charts as they managed 59 (2 in the chart in the same week counting as 2). They were followed by Lionel Richie and Sandra who both managed 46. Starship on 37 were the next best. Modern Talking’s 59 equalled the record for a calendar year with both Madonna and Middle Of The Road having managed this, but only Middle Of The Road managed it in the top 20 era. Madonna spent 46 of her 59 weeks in the top 20 while Modern Talking spent 45 making the latter’s effort the 6th best for the top act in the top 20.
The overall cumulative position for weeks in the charts looked like this:
Pos
Last Year
Artist
No Of Weeks
1
(1)
Abba
237
2
(2)
Bee Gees
203
3
(3)
Tom Jones
185
4
(4)
Cliff Richard
172
5
(5)
Elton John
169
6
(6)
Neil Diamond
141
=7
(7)
Hollies
137
=7
(8)
Rolling Stones
137
9
(8)
Barbara Ray
136
10
(14)
Queen
135
11
(10)
Elvis Presley
131
12
(11)
Boney M
130
13
(12)
Olivia Newton-John
127
14
(13)
Michael Jackson
126
15
(14)
Joe Dolan
123
16
(N)
Lionel Richie
119
17
(16)
Creedence Clearwater Revival
118
=18
(17)
Troggs
115
=18
(17)
Sweet
115
=20
(19)
Billy Forrest
113
=20
(N)
Diana Ross
113
And the local list was as follows:
Pos
Last Year
Artist
No Of Weeks
1
(1)
Barbara Ray
136
2
(2)
Billy Forrest
113
3
(3)
Alan Garrity
98
4
(4)
Staccatos
83
5
(5)
Four Jacks & A Jill
78
=6
(6)
Richard Jon Smith
76
=6
(6)
Bobby Angel
76
8
(8)
Gene Rockwell
75
9
(9)
Dave Mills
73
10
(10)
Jody Wayne
72
11
(11)
John Edmond
70
12
(12)
Lionel Petersen
68
13
(13)
Tommy Dell
67
14
(14)
Maria
55
15
(15)
Lauren Copley
54
16
(16)
Dealians
50
=17
(17)
Jessica Jones
48
=17
(17)
Peanutbutter Conspiracy
48
19
(N)
Tom Inglis
46
20
(19)
Bats
45
This list saw Tom Inglis enter the top 20, the only change from the end of 1985.
NO 1’s
Only 1 act saw more than 1 number 1 in the year and that was Lionel Richie who topped the charts with both ‘Say You Say Me’ and ‘Dancing On The Ceiling’. Only 13 acts had seen more than 1 chart topper in a year with Tom Jones and Abba managing it in 2 separate years and Chris Andrews being the only act so far to see 3 number 1s in a year. We had to go back to 1977 to see the last time a male act had managed 2 chart toppers and it was Joe Dolan who managed it that year. Falco’s ‘Rock Me Amadeus’ spent 9 weeks at 1 which was the most any hit managed in the year. Billy Ocean’s ‘When The Going Gets Tough, The Tough Get Going’ and Chris de Burgh’s ‘The Lady In Red’ were tied second, both managing 6 weeks.
The songs that spent time at 1 during 1986 were as follows:
Pos
Song
Act
Weeks
1
Rock Me Amadeus
Falco
9
=2
When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Get Going
Billy Ocean
6
=2
The Lady in Red
Chris de Burgh
6
4
Say You, Say Me
Lionel Richie
5
=5
Nikita
Elton John
4
=5
A Different Corner
George Michael
4
=5
Dancing on the Ceiling
Lionel Richie
4
=5
Lessons in Love
Level 42
4
9
Venus
Bananarama
3
=10
We Built This City
Starship
2
=10
Manic Monday
Bangles
2
=12
Around My Dream
Silver Pozzoli
1
=12
They Say it’s Gonna Rain
Hazell Dean
1
=12
Brother Louie
Modern Talking
1
To date the following songs had managed 8 or more weeks at 1:
Pos
Song
Act
Weeks
1
I Can See Clearly Now
Johnny Nash
13
=2
Mammy Blue
Charisma
12
=2
Red Red Wine
UB40
12
=4
Rivers Of Babylon
Boney M
11
=4
Loverboy
Billy Ocean
11
=6
Beautiful Sunday
Daniel Boone
10
=6
The Safety Dance
Men Without Hats
10
=8
Michael Row The Boat Ashore
Richard Jon Smith
9
=8
Paradise Road
Joy
9
=8
Shaddap You Face
Joe Dolce Music Theatre
9
=8
I Just Called To Say I Love You
Stevie Wonder
9
=8
The Power Of Love
Jennifer Rush
9
=8
Rock Me Amadeus
Falco
9
=14
Mississippi
Pussycat
8
=14
Substitute
Clout
8
=14
Kiss You All Over
Exile
8
=14
Why Me
Kris Kristofferson
8
=14
Stayin’ Alive
Bee Gees
8
=14
Baker Street
Gerry Rafferty
8
=14
Co-Co
The Sweet
8
=14
Woman In Love
Barbra Streisand
8
=14
I Don’t Wanna Dance
Eddy Grant
8
‘Rock Me Amadeus’ was the only new entry into this otherwise unchanged list.
In terms of the overall picture for weeks spent at 1 by an act the table looked like this:
Position
Act
Weeks
1
Bee Gees
29
2
Abba
21
3
Sweet
19
=4
Tom Jones
18
=4
Joe Dolan
18
=6
Lionel Richie
17
=6
Billy Ocean
17
8
Boney M
16
=9
Johnny Nash
13
=9
Chris Andrews
13
=9
Dr Hook
13
=12
Charisma
12
=12
UB40
12
14
Jennifer Rush
11
=15
Elvis Presley
10
=15
Troggs
10
=15
Tremeloes
10
=15
Dawn
10
=15
Daniel Boone
10
=15
Pussycat
10
=15
Men Without Hats
10
LET’S HEAR IT FOR THE GIRLS
We saw 22 hits by solo female acts make the top 30, of which only 13 made it into the top 20. This was the worst showing for women since 1976 when they also managed 13. There were 3 hits that made the top 30 which featured a woman as part of a duet and adding this in, the women managed 25 hits. 15 women brought us the 22 top 30 hits (18 bringing us the 25 if you add in the duets). Madonna, as noted above, was the top female with 4 hits to her name. Sandra managed 3 while Jennifer Rush and Tina Turner saw 2 hits. All 4 of those who managed more than 1 hit had seen 1 of their hits straddle the 1985/86 year end. Madonna’s 4 equalled the record to date which she had managed in 1985 and Petula Clark had managed in 1967. If Margaret Singana hadn’t sneaked into the charts in the second last week of the year, then we would have seen a second year with no hits by local women, instead we had 1.
The top hits by woman this year (based on a top 30) were:
Pos
Song
Artist
Points
1
(I’ll Never Be) Maria Magdalena
Sandra
453
2
They Say it’s Gonna Rain
Hazell Dean
450
3
A Love Bizarre
Sheila E
399
4
Papa Don’t Preach
Madonna
328
5
The Power of Love
Jennifer Rush
301
This excludes ‘On My Own’ where Patti LaBelle was one half of a duet with Michael McDonald. It would have featured at 3 if it had been included.
And cumulatively (based on a top 20) this list read:
Pos
Song
Artist
Points
1
The Power Of Love
Jennifer Rush
454
2
Sunday, Monday, Tuesday
Jessica Jones
391
3
Manuel Goodbye
Audrey Landers
372
4
I Don’t Wanna Play House
Barbara Ray
336
5
Self Control
Laura Branigan
323
‘The Power Of Love’ had straddle the 85/86 year change and was now the top hit for a song by a female act and second overall (see overall cumulative top hits above).
The list below shows those women who had manged 5 or more hits in total so far. Diana Ross added 1 to her total but was stuck in 4th place while Madonna moved on to 7 and was the new entry onto the list (remember she had 1 hit straddle the year change from 85 to 86, hence seeing 4 hits in both years, but a total of 7).
Pos
Act
No Of Hits
=1
Barbara Ray
12
=1
Olivia Newton-John
12
3
Petula Clark
11
4
Diana Ross
10
5
Dolly Parton
9
=6
Nancy Sinatra
7
=6
Madonna
7
=8
Virginia Lee
6
=8
Suzi Quatro
6
=8
Donna Summer
6
=11
Sandie Shaw
5
=11
Lucille Starr
5
=11
Gloria Gaynor
5
=11
Bonnie Tyler
5
=11
Barbra Streisand
5
Sandra was the top woman for weeks in the charts during 1986 having clocked up 46. She was followed by the 1985 top woman, Madonna, who managed 33 with Jennifer Rush on 30 coming in 3rd. The cumulative top 5 for weeks in the charts saw Barbara Ray and Olivia Newton-John unchanged at 1 and 2 with Diana Ross still at 3 despite adding 18 to her total. Dolly Parton added 21 to her total, but now had to share 4th place with Madonna who moved on to 92 weeks. The list looked like this:
Pos
Act
Weeks
1
Barbara Ray
136
2
Olivia Newton-John
127
3
Diana Ross
113
=4
Dolly Parton
92
=4
Madonna
92
In terms of number 1’s there was only 1 chart topper by a woman and that was Hazell Dean’s ‘They Say It’s Gonna Rain’ which spent just 1 week at 1.
WE ARE THE WORLD
Aside from artists from the UK and US (who tend to dominate most charts worldwide), and local acts the following are the top hits from other nationalities:
Pos
Song
Artist
Points
Nationality
1
Rock Me Amadeus
Falco
539
Austria
2
Brother Louie
Modern Talking
512
German
3
(I’ll Never Be) Maria Magdalena
Sandra
453
German
4
Dance with Me
Alphaville
357
German
5
The Lady in Red
Chris de Burgh
296
Irish
This year we saw the first occasion where the top hit for the year by an act from a non-big 3 nation was by an Austrian as Falco’s ‘Rock Me Amadeus’ took top honours. It was followed by 3 hits all by German acts. This was the 3rd year where a nation had accounted for 3 of the top 5, and this equalled the record to date. The previous times were in 1967 when we had 3 hits by an Australian act (all 3 were by The Seekers) and then we saw it again in 1970 when acts from The Netherlands (Tee-Set, The Shuffles and Shocking Blue) were in the top 5. The list had been topped 4 times by German acts and 4 times by Canadians and they led the way.
In 1984 acts from the rest of the world saw a record 33 hits, but this nosedived in 1985 as it dropped to just 18. There was a bit of a recovery in 1986 as it moved up to 23 this year, the 7th best total so far. 1985 was the only time the total had dipped below 20 since 1974.
There were 13 different nations represented in the charts this year, 1 better than 1985. Last year the Americans just outdid the British, seeing 1 more hit, but this year it was the other way round with the Brits scoring 54 hits, 2 more than the Americans who managed 52.
As mentioned above, the Germans once again were in 3rd place, beating the local acts. There were 8 hits by Germans that spent time in the charts while the locals only managed 6. The rest of the hits were made up of 3 by Italians, 2 by Australians, Austrians, Norwegians and Swiss acts while Canada, Ireland, Jamaica and The Netherlands all gave us 1. And for those of you who like to reconcile things, there was 1 hit by a duet between a British and an American act (Phil Collins & Marilyn Martin) which gets us up the 136 hits in total mentioned above.
The Americans had been leading the way for total number of hits since 15 June 1973 and this run had been going for 707 weeks now as they ended the year 6 ahead of the Brits with 793 hits to the Brits 787. However, during the year the UK acts had come close to ending that run as for 3 weeks they were just 1 behind. The gap of 6 was 11 down on the gap of 17 at the start of the year and the gap averaged out at around 9.2 for the year. Looking at top 20 hits, the gap was wider with the Americans ending the year on 764 which was 23 more than the Brits’ 741, but it was an improvement on the gap of 31 at the start of the year.
Local acts had managed 410 hits so far and they were followed by the Germans on 46, the Canadians on 40 and the Dutch on 38. There had been 29 different nations represented in our charts so far with 15 hits being by duets made up of people from different nations. No new nations featured in 1986. Germany had pulled ahead of the Canadians during 1986. They had been equal on 40 hits at the end of 1985.
The cumulative best hits for ‘rest of the world’ artists were as follows:
Pos
Song
Artist
Points
Nationality
1
You
Peter Maffay
399
Germany
2
Words
F.R. David
392
France
3
Clap Clap Sound
Klaxons
381
Belgium
4
We Believe in Tomorrow
Freddy Breck
376
Germany
5
The Safety Dance
Men Without Hats
362
Canada
WHAT DIDN’T CHART
Apart from the same number of hits charting in 1986 as there had been in 1985, we also saw the same number of US/UK chart toppers not make our charts as, for a second year running, 15 of the songs that made it to number 1 in those 2 countries did not make our charts. However, 4 of the 15 in 1985 subsequently made our charts while only 2 of those that didn’t make it in 1986 would ultimately feature in our top 30. So far we had been averaging 18.5 UK/US chart toppers not making our charts with that figure dropping to 15.9 if we account for those that made it in a different year.
The UK/US number 1’s of 1986 that did make our charts in the year were as follows:
Song
Artist
Caravan Of Love
Housemartins
Every Loser Wins
Nick Berry
Holding Back The Years
Simply Red
How Will I Know
Whitney Houston
Living Doll
Cliff Richard And The Young Ones
Merry Christmas Everyone
Shakin’ Stevens
Reet Petite (The Sweetest Girl In Town)
Jackie Wilson
Spirit In The Sky
Doctor And The Medics
The Chicken Song
Spitting Image
The Final Countdown*
Europe
The Greatest Love Of All
Whitney Houston
The Next Time I Fall
Peter Cetera & Amy Grant
These Dreams
Heart
When I Think Of You*
Janet Jackson
You Give Love A Bad Name
Bon Jovi
* Would chart in later years
I WRITE THE SONGS
The song writing royalties were being spread out to a greater number of people as we saw a record to date 229 names appear in the song writing slot on the singles that made our charts this year. The previous highest had been 223 song writers in 1983 and that included ‘Traditional’ which 1986 did not see. 1986 also saw a new record songs per songwriter ratio as this was 2.29 beating the record set in 1985 of 2.19. Modern Talking’s Dieter Bohlen and Madonna were responsible for 4 hits each which was the most any songwriter managed. Terry Dempsey’s 9 in 1971 was still the record for a calendar year. Despite having 1 less hit than Dieter and Madonna, Prince, who managed 3 hits, was the top songwriter for weeks as his compositions managed a total of 62 weeks. His 3 hits were his own hit ‘Kiss’, The Bangles ‘Manic Monday’ (where he was credited as ‘Christopher’) and Sheila E’s ‘A Love Bizarre’ which he co-wrote with Sheila. This was the 5th best weeks count for the top songwriter in a year (Barry Gibb’s 76 weeks in 1978 being the best effort so far). Bernie Taupin was second with 60 weeks having had a hand in Elton John’s ‘Nikita’, Starship’s ‘We Built This City’ and Animotion’s ‘I Engineer’. Dieter Bohlen on 59 weeks was 3rd.
During the year Mike Chapman had caught up to Terry Dempsey for number of hits and the 2 led the way with 28 song writing credits each. Barry Gibb added 1 to his total to move on to 27 and sat 2nd on his own as he moved 1 ahead of Nicky Chinn who was next on the list with 26 weeks.
Both Lionel Richie and Bernie Taupin saw 2 number 1 hits as song writers during the year. Richie managed it with his ‘Say You Say Me’ and ‘Dancing On The Ceiling’ while Tapuin’s were with Starship’s ‘We Built This City’ and Elton John’s ‘Nikita’. Chris Andrews, Mike Chapman and Nicky Chinn were the only ones to ever have 3 number 1’s in a year.
There was no change to the top songwriters in terms of number 1 hits as Abba’s Benny and Bjorn still led the way for number of number 1’s as songwriters. They had seen 9 compositions top the charts. The 3 Gibbs brothers (Barry, Robin and Maurice) were all next on 7 followed by Neil Diamond and Stig Anderson (who helped co-write some of Abba’s hits with Benny and Bjorn) who were both on 6.
CONSECUTIVE YEARS
Of the acts who spent at least 1 week in the charts in 1986, only Diana Ross could claim to have featuring in the charts every year going back to 1980, a run of 7 years. Ross was the 5th act to manage a run this long with The Bee Gees having seen a 7 year run, Tom Jones and Cliff Richard managing 8 year runs and Abba holding the record by seeing a 10 year run. Lionel Richie and David Bowie could both boast 6 year runs up to 1986 while Duran Duran, Elton John and Laura Branigan had featured every year for 5 years running. Elton John had missed out on 1981 otherwise he would have been celebrating an 8 year run.
The only local act who had any sort of a run was Tom Inglis who had charted in 1985 and 1986, a fair way off the record for a local act of 6 years which The Staccatos had managed.
THANKS
Well that’s your lot for 1986. But before we head off into the wonderful world of 1987 a few words of thanks. A number of people have sent in comments and corrections for which I am grateful. I would also like to single out Peet van Staaden, Kevin Farquharson and Ian McLean for supplying valuable information as well as Chris Kimberly, Brian Currin, Stephen Segerman and Tertius Louw for helping out answering the questions that come our way.
‘Manic Monday’ by The Bangles spent a second week at 1 with George Michael’s ‘A Different Corner’ breathing down its neck as the latter sat at 2 for a second week. George’s first hit, ‘Careless Whisper’ had topped our charts and both the UK and US charts. ‘A Different Corner’ had topped the UK charts but only made it to 7 in the US, so would it make number 1 in SA? Stay tuned.
Patti LaBelle and Michael McDonald’s ‘On My Own’ picked up a second biggest climber award. It moved up 6 from 13 to 7 to add to the climber award it had picked up 3 weeks earlier. It was the biggest climber in both the top 20 and the top 30. There were 4 other star raters and these were Alphaville’s ‘Dance With Me’ (up 4 from 8 to 4), David Bowie’s ‘Absolute Beginners’ (up 4 from 10 to 6), Modern Talking’s ‘Brother Louie’ (up 4 from 20 to 16) and Samantha Fox’s ‘Touch Me (I Want Your Body)’ (up 5 from 29 to 24).
Diana Ross’ ‘Chain Reaction’ took the biggest tumble this week as it dropped 6 from 6 to 12. It was her 8th time with the award. She was the 21st act to accumulate this many faller award and she was now tied top of the list for female acts, sitting alongside Barbara Ray and Olivia Newton-John.
Billy Ocean’s ‘There’ll Be Sad Songs (To Make You Cry)’ lasted just 2 weeks in the top 20 and dropped to 22 this week. Animotion’s ‘I Engineer’ moved up from 22 to 19 to be the new entry into that part of the chart.
Feargal Sharkey’s ‘A Good Heart’ was the oldest in both the top 20 and the top 30. It had been in the former for 20 weeks (the 91st song to get to 20 top 20 weeks) and the latter for 22 weeks and had been the oldest in the top 20 for 4 weeks and for 2 weeks in the top 30.
It had been 86 weeks since we last had as many as 5 songs leave the chart in one go, but this week we saw it again. The first of the leavers was Starship’s ‘Sara’ which had seen a run of 15 weeks and a peak of 10. They would return to the charts at a later date.
An act who would not see further chart action was Culture Club as we said goodbye to their final hit, ‘Move Away’. It lasted just 6 weeks in the charts and peaked at 24. They managed 4 hits, spent a total of 58 weeks in the charts and got to number 1 with ‘Karma Chameleon’ which spent 2 weeks there. The band’s lead singer, Boy George would see further chart action as a solo act.
Also going was The Matterhorn Project’s ‘Moo’ which managed a run of 16 weeks and a peak of 5. This ended the run with a Swiss act in the charts (‘Moo’ had been there at the start of this run and had been joined along the way by Double’s ‘Captain Of Her Heart’). There would only be 1 more hit by a Swiss act to make our charts.
Billy Ocean became the 2nd act to see a song leave the top 20 and another song leave the top 30 as ‘When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Get Going’ dropped off the charts while, as mentioned above, ‘There’ll Be Sad Songs (To Make Us Cry)’ fell out of the top 20. ‘When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Get Going’ had managed a run of 21 weeks and spent 6 of those at number 1.
Last of the leavers was Belouis Some’s ‘Target Practice’ which lasted 11 weeks in the charts and peaked at 16. This ended his SA chart career with 3 hits and 38 weeks to his name. His best peak was 9 which ‘Some People’ managed.
Madonna returned to the charts with her 5th hit to date, ‘Live To Tell’. She was the 97th act to see this many hits and the 15th woman in those 97. The tune was written by a guy called Patrick Leonard for a film called ‘Fire With Fire’ but when Madonna heard it, she added the lyrics and it ended up being used for the film ‘At Close Range’ which starred her then husband Sean Penn. Leonard would play keyboards on the track. It would give Madonna a number 1 hit in Greece, Italy the UK and the US where it spent 1 week. It would peak at 5 on the Capital 604 and Radio 702 charts and reach number 2 on Radio 5.
Hipsway’s ‘The Honeythief’ became the 58th song to re-enter the charts as it bounced back into the top 30 at position 27, 3 places higher than its previous peak of 30 (where it spent 2 weeks during its previous run). It was the 13th song to return after an absence of 3 or more weeks as it was in the charts 4 weeks previously.
Peter Gabriel made his SA chart debut with ‘Sledgehammer’. Part of the song’s success was the creative video that accompanied the song. The video picked up 9 MTV Video Music awards, a record for any video. Part of the video making had Gabriel lying under a sheet of glass for 16 hours. It would give Gabriel his only US chart topper as took over the top spot from his previous band, Genesis, who had been at number 1 with ‘Invisible Touch’. ‘Sledgehammer’ would also top the Canadian and Zimbabwean charts and go top 5 in Australia (#3), Austria (#2), Finland (#4), Ireland (#3), New Zealand (#3), Norway (#3), Switzerland (#4) and the UK (#4). It remains his tied top highest placing in the UK charts, equalling his 1980 hit, ‘Games Without Frontiers’. On the radio charts it would top the Radio 5 and Capital 604 ones but peak at 2 on Radio 702.
We were rapidly approaching seeing our 100th act to manage 2 or more in the charts in the same week, but we still had a couple to go as this week Feargal Sharkey became the 98th act to manage this. His ‘You Little Thief’ was a new entry this week and it joined ‘A Good Heart’ which was sitting at 13 this week. ‘You Little Thief’ was written by Benmont Tench who was a member of Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers and like ‘A Good Heart’, it was produced by the Eurythmics’ David A Stewart. It would give Sharkey a number 5 hit in the UK and would also chart in Australia (#4), The Netherlands (#10), Germany (#30), Ireland (#3), New Zealand (#38) and Switzerland (#27). Like ‘A Good Heart’, it would top the Radio 702 charts. It made it to 17 on Capital 604 but would not make the Radio 5 charts. And with ‘The Honeythief’ re-entering the charts, we had both songs that we would see chart which reference to a ‘thief’ in the title be in the top 30 at the same time. Sharkey was exactly the same age as Cher was when she charted with ‘Dark Lady’ back in 1974 and this 638 week gap was the 10th biggest gap we had seen between acts charting at the same exactly age.
The final new entry was Wham!’s 6th SA chart hit, ‘The Edge Of Heaven’. It would feature Elton John on piano and would give the band their 4th and final UK number 1, spending 2 weeks at the top of the charts there before being ousted by Madonna’s ‘Papa Don’t Preach’. In the US it would reach number 10. It would get to the top of the charts in Belgium, Ireland and The Netherlands and peak at 2 in Australia, Iceland, Norway and Zimbabwe. It would top the Capital 604 charts and get to 3 on Radio 5, but only scraped a peak of 20 on the Radio 702 ones.
With ‘Live To Tell’, ‘Sledgehammer’ and ‘The Edge Of Heaven’ all topping either the US or UK charts, we had the 5th occasion where we had a record to date 3 US/UK chart toppers enter our charts. It would have taken us back to a record 13 UK/US hits in the top 30 in total but 2 of the leavers (‘Sara’ and ‘When The Going Gets Tough, The Tough Get Going’) left the charts so we had to eb content with 11.
Groups dropped below 15 of the top 30 after a run of 5 weeks accounting for half the chart although interestingly they now accounted for 10 of the top 20 and this was the first time they made up half of that part of the chart in 9 weeks.
Sandra’s ‘(I’ll Never Be) Maria Magdalena’ became the 10th song by a German act to clock up 20 weeks in the charts. Also reaching that milestone was Dire Start’s ‘Walk Of Life’ and overall these 2 songs were the 149th and 150th songs to manage this.
We now saw the gap between the number of hits in total by British acts and those by American acts drop to 5. We had to go back to 10 January 1975 (602 weeks earlier) to see the last time that it was this low. The Americans had accounted for 774 hits so far and the Brits 769. In terms of weeks in the charts, the Americans were still a fair way ahead with 8,181 to their name while the Brits were 220 weeks behind them on 7,961.
Billy Ocean became the 40th act to have clocked up at least 80 weeks in the charts. Queen moved into tied 12th place on the weeks count list as they ticked over to 127 weeks and equalled Olivia Newton-John’s effort.
We also saw the 45th time an act had songs sitting in adjacent positions in the charts as Sandra’s ‘In The Heat Of The Night’ sat at 10 and her ‘(I’ll Never Be) Maria Magdalena’ was at 11. She had now spent 13 straight weeks with 2 in the charts and she was the 5th act to manage this. Of these 5 acts, 4 were from non-big 3 nations (Pussycat from The Netherlands, Julio Iglesias from Spain, Modern Talking from Germany and now Sandra from Germany, although it should be noted that Julio Iglesias’ run was managed with 2 duets, both with Americans). The Bee Gees were the only act from the big 3 nations on this list.
SA Singles Charts 