Best Song: Del Shannon - Two Kinds Of Teardrops
Well Del Shannon seems to be the artist of the early 60s so far having had the best song in 2 of the 4 charts I've looked at so far. This was his 8th Top 40 hit and 7th to make the Top 10. I guess it follows that same formula as "Runaway" where he repeats a word in a high pitched voice in the chorus which again is probably why I like it.
Worst Song: Wink Martindale - Deck Of Cards
This first charted in 1959 but was back in the charts in 1963. It's a spoken song about someone having a deck of cards in church instead of a prayer book, but they associate cards with religious things. It really is as bad as it sounds.
Top 40 Review
The Beatles have now made their debut and are is this particular Top 40 with their first number one "From Me To You". We also have a Beatles cover in "Do You Want To Know A Secret?" by Billy J Kramer And The Dakotas.
The first chart topper from the beat scene, "How Do You Do It?" by Gerry & the Pacemakers is just about in this Top 40 sitting at number 40. Their follow up "I Like It" is at number one. We also have the chart debut and future number one "Sweets For My Sweet" by fellow Liverpudlians The Searchers.
From Manchester we have the debuts of Freddie And The Dreamers with "If You Gotta Make A Fool Of Somebody" and The Hollies with "Just Like Me". Collectively these seven records add up to a score of 4.5, add the Del Shannon record and we have 5.5 so we've already beaten 1962.
The Beatles and co are yet to kill off the more old fashioned music though. Before The Searchers would get to number one, Frank Ifield would top the charts with "Confessin", as would Elvis Presley with "Devil In Disguise" which are both in this particular Top 40.
Instrumental music still has quite a presence with The Shadows at number two. I'm not a fan of The Shadows sound, but "Atlantis" the record they have in this chart is actually not bad. Then there's "Ice Cream Man" by Tornados which I like.
American acts have a big presence in the Top 40 accounting for 18 of the records. At this point in time The Beatles were still unknown over there. Although there are some good ones such as "Da Doo Ron Ron" by The Crystals and "It's Been Nice" by The Everly Brothers, I think it's fair to say this music sounds more dated than the new British acts of the time.
I think we've definitely seen an improvement on what's gone before, but clearly looks like the swinging sixties is still in its infancy.
Score: 13
Table
No surprise to see 1963 at the top of the table. I fully expect it to be knocked off the top before the decade is out though:
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