As the second hour begins, Casey tells us that the #30 tune is the hottest song on the countdown, advancing ten positions. Since this is future #1 hit "Total Eclipse of the Heart," it meant that Bonnie Tyler would eventually be going from pole to pole on AT40, both debuting at #40 and climbing all the way to the top. This reminded me this morning that I'd heard a listener question on a show toward the end of 1976 about the number of #1 songs that year which had begun humbly, at the very start of the show (answer: 3--"December 1963," "Boogie Fever," and "A Fifth of Beethoven"). This got me wondering about how often such a thing had occurred on the Hot 100 during the '80s; about an hour of research later, I had my answer. Yes, this is esoteric, ultimately meaningless chart trivia. That doesn't mean that I don't find the results curious and semi-worthy of sharing. I'll break it into two five-year periods, reporting the week the song debuted at #40.
1980-84:
"Escape (The Piña Colada Song)" (11/10/79)
"I Love a Rainy Night" (12/6/80)
"Total Eclipse of the Heart" (8/13/83)
It occurred only three times over the first half of the decade, and the first of those was both the last #1 song of the 70s and the second of the 80s. I get that all the long-lasting (and hence fewer) #1s in '81 and '82 made the feat somewhat less likely over this period, but regardless I was no in way prepared for what happened beginning in the last third of 1985.
1985-89:
"We Built This City" (9/28/85)
"Say You Say Me" (11/9/85)
"Rock Me Amadeus" (2/22/86)
"West End Girls" (3/15/86)
"Greatest Love of All" (4/5/86)
"Holding Back the Years" (5/10/86)
"Glory of Love" (6/21/86)
"Higher Love" (7/5/86)
"True Colors" (9/13/86)
"The Way It Is" (10/18/86)
"Shake You Down" (11/8/86)
"Jacob's Ladder" (1/17/87)
"Head to Toe" (5/2/87)
"Didn't We Almost Have It All" (8/8/87)
"Bad" (9/19/87)
"Heaven Is a Place on Earth" (10/10/87)
"Wishing Well" (2/27/88)
"One More Try" (4/16/88)
"Dirty Diana" (5/14/88)
"Don't Worry Be Happy" (8/13/88)
"Kokomo" (9/24/88)
"Eternal Flame" (2/11/89)
"If You Don't Know Me By Now" (5/27/89)
"We Didn't Start the Fire" (10/21/89)
Twenty-four songs in just over four years, after one across almost five. Two each from Whitney, MJ, and Simply Red, the last doing it with their only two chart-toppers. While I have to think this is mostly if not totally due to randomness, it's still a striking difference.
--
Tyler first made a big splash with the international smash "It's a Heartache" in 1977-8. It took five years, but "Eclipse" did even better, getting to #1 in eight countries. The song almost hit the top again here in the States in 1995, in a cover by Nicki French (I had largely tuned out of the pop scene by then, and don't remember French's version at all). Sure, it's completely over the top, but I'll easily take it over the other Steinman excesses of the era.
While "Total Eclipse of the Heart" absolutely takes me back to that not-entirely-great fall of my sophomore year of college, I do have another strong memory associated with it. My sense now is that pop hits from 70s and 80s didn't really resurface on the radio for quite a while, maybe until my generation moved into some more coveted advertising cohort--I mean, there are plenty of stations today playing "the greatest hits of the 80s, 90s, and today," right? Anyway, it's July 1992, I'm in the wilds of Canada between Toronto and Montreal, at a campground by a river with grad school and bridge friend Jay--we've been eliminated from our event at the Summer Nationals in Toronto and have a couple of days to kill before going to see a Blue Jays game. I've jumped into the car, maybe to make a quick run for supplies, when I hear "Turn around..." for the first time since, well, maybe my days at Transy. I didn't mind it all.
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