Wednesday, May 19, 2004

THE MOST PLAYED SONG IN THE COUNTRY OF ALL TIME: If you do pub quizzes, you might want to make a note of this on the inside of your sleeve - the PPL rights collection agency have done their sums, and calculated that, if you add together radio, club, shop and jukebox plays, Procul Harum's A Whiter Shade of Pale is the most-heard song of the last seventy years. (My stubborn constant repeat playing of Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now on the Butlins', Filey, jukebox one summer doesn't seem to have a had an impact on the figures. Bohemian Rhapsody is at number two - although if you strip out plays to illustrate 'Listener's All-Time Top 100' charts, it'd probably wind up much lower.

That top ten in full:

1. Procul Harum ‘A Whiter Shade Of Pale’
2. Queen ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’
3. Wet Wet Wet ‘Love Is All Around’
4. The Everly Brothers ‘All I Have To Do Is Dream’/’Claudette’
5. Bryan Adams ‘(Everything I Do) I Do It For You’
6. Abba ‘Dancing Queen’
7. Elvis Presley ‘All Shook Up’
8. Rod Stewart ‘Maggie May’
9. The Beatles ‘Hello Goodbye’
10. The Beatles ‘Get Back’

Jesus wept - it's a wonder we don't have more people charging round shooting people at random in the streets. But is it only me who finds the presence of Hello Goodbye and Get back - rather than, say Twist and Shout - slightly odd?


3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Butlin's Filey closed in 1983, but Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now came out in 1984. So I'm afraid you are sadly mistaken.

Simon Hayes Budgen said...

Paul, you're actually right. It was Skegness Butlins. We went to Butlins two years running, and they merge into one in my mind. But Skegness was the one built on two sides of the main road, wasn't it?

Anonymous said...

I agree, it's so hard to remember. I have few specific memories of Filey - the cable car, the path down to the beach, the windows between the bar and the pool - but I know I was there in 1982. Wish I could remember more.

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