Throwing back to the week of November 19, 1983, we find Lionel Richie on top of Billboard’s Hot 100 with ‘All Night Long (All Night).’
I’ve featured that song already, however, so I’m moving on to #2, a hit duet between Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson. ‘Say Say Say’ was the first collaboration the duo recorded, but the second they released. ‘The Girl is Mine’ showed up on Jackson’s Thriller the year before.
The week of November 17, 1973, saw former Temptations member Eddie Kendricks in his second week at #1 with ‘Keep On Truckin’ (Part 1),’ an abbreviated version of an 8-minute album track.
Kendricks had left The Temptations on bad terms two years earlier, and received some musical shade from his former band through a song called ‘Superstar (Remember How You Got Where You Are).’ This song, his only solo #1, gave him some measure of revenge. Kendricks even name-drops his former band during the song’s final verses.
Throwing back to the week of November 16, 1963, we find Nino Temple and April Stevens atop the Billboard Hot 100 with their recording of ‘Deep Purple.’
The original version of this song was composed by pianist Peter DeRose in the 1920s. It was recorded as an instrumental by many artists in subsequent decades (here’s a version with DeRose himself on piano). In 1938, lyricist Mitchell Parish added words to the composition, and it was reimagined as a doo-wop track.
The 2013 installment of Throwback Weekends continues to annoy, as once again the majority of the top ten has been featured on the blog before. This is due to a combination of my having written about some of these songs at the time and the fact that the Billboard Top Ten was remarkably static that year.
I won’t list the songs in the top seven spots as I have in previous weeks. It’s the same roundup of Lorde, Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Miley Cyrus, Drake, Jay-Z and friends. All decent enough songs, but apparently the only songs worth hearing during the back half of that year.
Throwing back to the week of November 8, 2003, we find Beyoncé and Sean Paul holding on to the top spot with ‘Baby Boy,’ in the middle of a nine-week run for the song at #1.
Sitting just behind it, a month away from its own #1 berth, is Ludacris’ ‘Stand Up.’ This is the second single from the rapper’s fourth album Chicken-n-Beer, and would become his first to top the Hot 100.
Meet Me In Montauk 