The Top Hits of 1969 - Part Two Quiz

Answer: Something

The flip side that hit Number One was "Come Together". Sinatra often sang "Something" in his performances and boldly dubbed it the best love song ever composed. Unfortunately, he often credited Lennon and McCartney as the composers when in fact Harrison wrote it.

It was the highest charting single The Beatles ever had of a Harrison composition. To show how much this song has grown in esteem over the years, the study BMI commissioned in 1999 to determine the most played songs of the 20th Century revealed that this song placed 24th, the second most played Beatles song after "Yesterday" which was third on that list.

Answer: buttercup

"Build Me Up Buttercup" was The Foundations' second big hit, their debut North American release, "Baby, Now That I've Found You", charting at Number 11 in 1968. The group was the beneficiary of the song writing and record-producing talents of Pye Record's Tony Macauley, who did work on both of these hits, but their success would be short-lived.

The group was a multi-race octet and despite possessing talented musicians and vocalists among their number, their cumulative song writing skills were negligible.

When Macauley left the label in late 1969, their fate was sealed. Moreover, the members were splitting up into factions and by 1970, the group formally disbanded as that entity and two Foundations groups evolved out of the debris. However, without suitable material, neither group would ever make an impact on the charts again, although one faction survived into the new millennium and remained active on the British oldies circuit.

Answer: Down On The Corner

John Fogerty created Willy and The Poor Boys, his answer to The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, and "Down On The Corner" was their song. It appeared on the "Willy And The Poor Boys" album and the album cover visually told the story - four guys playing a cheap guitar, tub base, washboard and mouth harp, down on the corner.

"You don't need a penny just to hang around,
But if you've got a nickel, won't you lay your money down?"

Answer: Suspicious Minds

It had indeed been a long dry spell for Elvis in terms of hit records but 1969 marked his return to the charts in a substantial way. Earlier in the year, he scored with a Mac Davis composition,"In The Ghetto", which peaked at Number Three, and he followed it up with this song written by Mark James, a long time Memphis writer/performer. The last Number One hit Elvis had prior to this was seven years earlier with "Good Luck Charm" and his last top ten effort was "Crying In The Chapel" in 1965. In the interim, he did have charting records, normally pap from the "B" grade movies he starred in, but they found favor only with devoted fans and would generally peak in the high teens, at best, on the charts.

James himself released a virtually identical version of the song in 1968 but it went nowhere. When Presley heard it he became infatuated with it and insisted on recording it. It was normal practice in the Presley camp that they would receive publishing royalties for any song that Elvis covered. Record producer Chips Moman owned the copyright for "Suspicious Minds" and adamantly refused such an arrangement but Presley was so keen on recording it that they took the unprecedented step of agreeing to James' terms. With Moman in the producer's chair, Elvis brought to the song the passion that was apparently lacking in James' original and this hit evolved out of the partnership.

Answer: Bad Moon Rising

This was one of those three Number Two hits that Creedence Clearwater Revival had in 1969, noted in Question 3. Besides this song and the aforementioned "Down On The Corner", the other two CCR hits to forge a place in this countdown were "Proud Mary" in 27th place and "Green River" in 33rd.

Their brand of "swamp rock" was clearly one of the defining movements of 1969. They managed five more top 40 hits in 1970 but the momentum waned thereafter. This was first and foremost John Fogerty's group and the other group members were wearying of his tight grip on all CCR matters, from song composition to record production and everything in between.

When John's brother Tom left the group to pursue a solo career in 1971, the die was cast and the group formally disbanded a year later after one more undistinguished album as a trio.

Answer: Johnny Cash

"A Boy Named Sue" would ultimately be the biggest pop song of Johnny Cash's long and illustrious career. He first auditioned for Sun Records in 1955 with Presley, Orbison and Jerry Lee Lewis and while the others shot to prominence primarily in the R&R genre, Cash steadfastly clung to Country and Gospel music throughout his career. Any success he had on the pop charts (and he had a considerable amount - 48 Hot 100 entries) was purely incidental and merely pointed out his ability to find favor with a broad audience.

In comparison, he had an astonishing 126 entries on the Country charts, 14 of which were Number One hits. He passed away in 2003 at the age of 71 and it is unlikely that we will ever see someone of his ilk again, a true one of a kind!

Answer: Touch Me

"Touch Me" was the only hit The Doors would have in 1969 and it was a slick production with violins and horns that made their "underground" hippie devotees shudder in horror. It's notable for a wailing sax solo by session man Curtis Amy that closed the song and at the very end, lead singer Jim Morrison intones a barely audible "stronger than dirt", a catch phrase from an Ajax cleanser advertisement at the time. Why? Who knows but the reference no doubt alienated the group further from a segment of their fan base that believed the group was selling out to commercialism. Perhaps Morrison and the boys did err in judgement.

They failed to hit the top 40 charts at all in 1970. Although they rebounded somewhat with a couple of top 20 hits in 1971, Morrison had by then already left the group and would be dead by August.

The remaining members recorded one more album as a trio that failed to make an impression with fans and critics alike before going their separate ways in 1973.

Answer: Hooked On A Feeling

"Hooked On A Feeling" was written by Mark James, the same chap who composed Presley's hit "Suspicious Minds". Jonathan King, who had a minor splash on the charts in 1965 with "Everyone's Gone To The Moon", covered the song in 1971 and in an early example of "sampling" added a chorus of "ooga chucka's" originally heard on Johnny Preston's 1960 hit "Running Bear". Although his version wasn't overly successful, a cover of it became a Number One smash for Blue Swede in 1974. Third time lucky?

Thomas would have his biggest hit ever in 1970 with "Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head" and would continue to record similar MOR pop songs with marginal success into the mid-1970s. At that point, a switch in record labels induced him to record songs with a more country orientation and he has focussed his attention on that genre, along with Gospel music, ever since.

Answer: You've Made Me So Very Happy

"You Made Me So Very Happy" was the debut hit for Blood, Sweat and Tears and it earned 846 points to rank 40th for the year. Their next release was "Spinning Wheel" and it ranked 26th with 912 points. Then came the Laura Nyro composition "And When I Die". With 850 points, it ranked 39th for the year. Pretty consistent statistics for 1969 and an auspicious start for the group.

Unfortunately, it was all downhill from there. They would only have three more top 40 hits and none of those could crack the top 10. By 1973, the group was just a shell of its former self, the nucleus having left to pursue other individual projects. Sic Transit Gloria Mundi.

Answer: Smile A Little Smile For Me

Admittedly, this was a tough one. The group really only existed long enough to lay down enough tracks for an album then were sent on their merry way by producer Tony Macauley, a pure one-off effort. However, the song was a nice little number, something of a cross between bubblegum and soft psychedelia.

There were three ways to get this right: 1. You liked it and remembered it, 2. Lucky guess, or 3. Deduction. "Son Of A Preacher Man" was a Dusty Springfield hit so it's eliminated. "That's The Way Love Is" was, along with "Too Busy Thinking About My Baby", Marvin Gaye's follow up hits after "I Heard It Through The Grapevine". "You Showed Me" was a song similar in style but was recorded by The Turtles. All three of these hits also made an appearance in the year end rankings at number 89, 92 and 94 respectively.

Answer: Gitarzan

Stevens, the master of mayhem, strikes again with this clever take on the adventures of a modern Tarzan, his biggest hit since "Ahab The Arab" in 1962. His best was yet to come, however. In 1970 he hit Number One with "Everything Is Beautiful", a far cry from his usual off beat recordings but he was back to normal in 1974 with the biggest hit of his career, "The Streak", another novelty item that topped the charts for three weeks.

Answer: Ruby, Don't Take Your Love To Town

Up to this point in time, Kenny Rogers was just one of The First Edition, albeit the group's lead singer. With this recording, Rogers assumed a starring role with the group and it was reflected in their name - Kenny Rogers and The First Edition. They were a good group, to be sure, but their blend of moderate psychedelia/pop/country left them in sort of a "no man's land" in terms of establishing a consistent fan base.

This was reflected in their following recordings that generally peaked in the mid-ranges of the top 40 charts.

In 1973, Rogers left the group to pursue a solo career, primarily as a country artist. By 1977, he was not only one of the biggest stars of that genre but still managed to score big crossover hits on the pop charts. He was the definitive "adult" pop idol and remained so right through the 1980s. With the new millennium, those days have long passed but he still remains a popular country crooner, both with his recordings and as a concert act.

Answer: The Boxer

"The Boxer", which peaked at Number Seven on the charts that year, was released as a single then later included on Simon and Garfunkel's masterful LP "Bridge Over Troubled Water". Like every other track on that wonderful record, it is beautifully produced and I'm somewhat perplexed as to why this song didn't do better on the charts.

William Ruhlmann, a music critic with AMG, provides an interesting interpretation of the lyric. I include it for your perusal.

"Since its appearance in 1969, "The Boxer" has attracted several interpretations, including one from Bob Dylan scholars that holds the song is about Dylan, a competitor of Simon's, and is a criticism of him. By this reading, the "poor boy" who arrives in New York is Dylan, of course, and the famous "whores on Seventh Avenue" line - prostitution not actually being a noticeable feature of that generally upscale midtown-Manhattan business street - refers to the offices of Columbia Records, for which both Simon and Dylan recorded, located during the 1960s on Seventh Avenue. It is more likely, however, that, as Simon acknowledged in an interview, "The Boxer" is an extrapolation of himself, commenting on his own pugnacious persistence in the music business."

Answer: Where Do You Go To My Lovely

Peter Sarstedt sings, in a bitter, sarcastic way, the story of a young lady, presumably a childhood sweetheart, who, without conscience, wheedled her way into the European jet set. It reminds one of Dylan's scathing attack on someone unknown in "Like A Rolling Stone" or the innuendo featured in Carly Simon's "You're So Vain".

I'm unsure as to why this song didn't reach the same levels of success in America that it did elsewhere. Perhaps it was because of distribution or promotion difficulties but I vividly remember it as being popular in Calgary, Canada at the time as well. There's an Australian website that lists the top hits each year based on a record's performance in three major markets - America, The U.K. and Australia. Even with its abysmal performance in America, this song achieved enough recognition in the other two markets for it to be ranked the NINTH biggest song of the year! Amazing stuff!

Sarstedt was born in India and moved to England with his family as a child in the 1950s. He had a few minor successes following this hit but not in America - this would be his only Billboard chart entry. After living in Denmark for several years, he returned home in the mid-1990s and has been a staple on the British oldies and cabaret circuit ever since.

Answer: Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da

I know why this song never charted in 1969 in America... it was never released as a single there until it popped onto the charts in 1976. It originally appeared on the "White Album" and it was a popular cut from that album right from the get-go in 1968. Marmalade, a pop group from Scotland, certainly saw its potential as witnessed by the fact that their cover single did so well on the British charts but it is curious indeed that The Beatles didn't release the song as a single elsewhere, other than Australia. I certainly remember this song from my university days. Despite its reggae/ska influences, everybody was doing the polka to it at campus parties. I laugh at the thought today!

So, once again I close the doors to the 1960s... my music. Hope you've enjoyed the journey and now the Maddog sets sail into uncharted waters - the 1970s... achhhh! Stay tuned!