Number One Hits

From The Pages Of
The Billboard Book Of Number One Hits

ABBA
Dancing Queen

Winning the Eurovision Song Contest in 1974 with "Waterloo" propelled Sweden's ABBA onto the world stage. They had nine #1 hits in the U.K. but only one on The Billboard Hot 100: "Dancing Queen." The world still loves ABBA after almost 50 years and "Dancing Queen" is a global favorite, appearing in the stage musical and motion picture "Mamma Mia!" and as one of the highlights of their virtual stage show in London, "Voyage."

1977 - April 9 - 1 week
The Fleetwoods
Come Softly To Me

Gretchen Christopher and Barbara Ellis formed a singing duo, the Saturns, when they were in high school in Olympia, Washington. Looking for a blues trumpet player, they found Gary Troxel, who proved to be better at singing than playing the trumpet. Gretchen composed the music and lyrics to her original song "Come Softly" and arranged it in counterpoint to the street corner humming ("dum dum, dum doo dum") of Gary Troxel, as he walked her downtown, after school (for her scholarship dance classes at Olympia Academy of Theatrical Arts, where she also rehearsed as a Soloist with the Olympia Ballet Company). The Fleetwoods were signed to a new label, Dolphin, and were named after a local telephone exchange, FLeetwood. Label owner Bob Reisdorff changed the title to the less-suggestive "Come Softly To Me."

1959 - April 13 - 4 weeks
Carole King
It's Too Late

Being such a big fan of Carole King's songwriting, I interviewed her for my college newspaper, the Daily Sundial. She took a break from recording an album at A&M in Hollywood and we met in an office there. I asked her about the album she was making and she told me she didn't want to be a star, the album was just her way of getting her demos to other artists. A few months later the album was released and it was titled "Tapestry."

1971 - June 19 - 5 weeks

Year 1996
Macarena (Bayside Boys Mix)
Los Del Rio

Antonio Romero and Rafel Ruiz started performing together when they were 14 in the southern Spanish town of Dos Hermanas. They had recorded 31 albums of rumba music by the time they released their own composition, "Macarena." The song was popular in several countries before it spread to Miami's South Beach. A local DJ was asked to come up with an English remix to play on air and he asked his friends Carlos De Yarza and Mike Triay to produce it. They hired singer Patricia Alfaro and recorded the new version at Bayside Studios. The remix debuted on The Billboard Hot 100 but failed to make the top 40. But then WKTU in New York added the song and it returned to the Hot 100 and reached the No. 1 spot in its 33rd week on the chart.

1996 - August 3 - 14 weeks