Today’s SOTD is the second straight Throwback Weekend selection that is entirely new to me. I have never heard ‘Oh Sheila’ and I have never heard of Ready for the World, the R&B band behind it.
This was the third single and biggest hit by the Michigan-based group, though they reached the top ten again the following year with ‘Love You Down.’
Throwing back to the week of October 11, 1975, we find Neil Sedaka atop the Billboard Hot 100 with ‘Bad Blood,’ a song I’m certain I’ve never heard before.
This was Sedaka’s third #1 hit, following 1962’s ‘Breaking Up is Hard to Do’ and 1974’s ‘Laughter in the Rain.’ This song remained at #1 for three weeks, becoming the biggest hit of the singer-songwriter’s career.
The #1 song on the Hot 100 the week of October 5, 1965, was a little tune called ‘Yesterday’ by a little band known as The Beatles. The track was not released as a single in the UK because the band felt it was more of a Paul McCartney tune than a proper Beatles release, but in the U.S. it topped the charts for four weeks.
Considering I wrote 40 Beatles Weekend posts back in 2009/10, I was sure I had already featured ‘Yesterday.’ But alas, I made it to Song of the Day #6,300 without posting one of the most beloved, famous, and oft-covered songs of all time.
Throwing back to the week of October 4, 1955, we find the usual crowd of repeat offenders atop the chart (I won’t bother listing them… they’ve all been shouted out repeatedly by now).
At the #5 spot that week, on its way to a peak at #2, was ‘Moments to Remember,’ a sleepy pop ballad by Canadian quartet The Four Lads. This song is tied with 1956’s ‘No, Not Much!’ as the foursome’s top-charting single.
Topping the charts the week of September 28, 1985, was the Dire Straits classic ‘Money For Nothing,’ the second single from their album Brothers in Arms.
The song spent three weeks at #1 and gave the band their only chart-topping hit in either the U.S. or their native UK (where it peaked at #4).
Mark Knopfler got the idea for the song while shopping at a New York City appliance store. He overheard one of the workers commenting on televisions tuned to MTV. Several of the song’s lyrics are the man’s direct quotes.
Meet Me In Montauk 