Every day of the year there is some kind of holiday or something recognized, so if you ever need a reason to celebrate or take up a cause you won’t have a shortage of reasons.
Today is September 25th and National One-Hit Wonder Day, so let me give you the run down of some of the special things that are remembered and recognized on this day:
- Ataxia Awareness Day
- Family Day – A Day to Eat Dinner With Your Kids (4th Monday)
- Math Story Telling Day
- World School Milk Day (last Wednesday)
- National Comic Book Day
- National Day of Remembrance for Murder Victims
- National Women’s Health & Fitness Day (Last Wednesday)
- National Food Service Workers Day
- National One-Hit Wonder Day
Did you see the last one in the list? That’s the one I want to tell you about today.
National One-Hit Wonder Day
What is a one-hit wonder?
one-hit wonder: (noun)
– a group or singer that has only one hit record before returning to obscurity.
– a person or thing that has an unrepeated success of some kind
– a singer, composer or group that only ever has one successful piece such as a hit song, bestselling book, etc.
Usually when the term one-hit wonder is used it is referring to musical artists that only have one memorable song/hit. So September 25th is set aside to recognize the one-hit musical artists that had a catchy tune we still remember and maybe sometimes sing!
Here are a few one-hit wonders who reached the Top 40 with just one single in the decade or lifetime:
(1955) The Penguins – “Earth Angel”
(1958) Laurie London – “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands”
(1958) The Elegants – “Little Star”
(1958) The Teddy Bears – “To Know Him Is to Love Him”
(1959) The Tempos – “See You in September”
(1961) Barry Mann – “Who Put the Bomp (In the Bomp, Bomp, Bomp)”
(1961) The Capris – “There’s a Moon Out Tonight”
(1963) Norman Greenbaum – “Spirit in the Sky”
(1964) Astrud Gilberto – “The Girl from Ipanema”
(1968) Hugo Montenegro – “The Good, The Bad and the Ugly”
(1969) Norman Greenbaum – “Spirit In The Sky”
(1970) Edison Lighthouse – “Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)”
(1970) The Ides of March – “Vehicle”
(1971) Brewer & Shipley – “One Toke Over the Line”
(1972) Looking Glass – “Brandy”
(1973) Rick Derringer – “Rock & Roll Hoochie Koo”
(1974) Carl Douglas – “Kung Fu Fighting”
(1974) Blue Swede – “Hooked On A Feeling”
(1976) Rick Dees – “Disco Duck”
(1977) David Soul – “Don’t Give Up on Us”
(1979) Patrick Hernandez – “Born to Be Alive”
(1980) The Vapors – “Turning Japanese”
(1980) Devo – “Whip It”
(1980) Benny Mardones – “Into the Night”
(1980) The SOS Band – “Take Your Time (Do It Right)”
(1981) Soft Cell — “Tainted Love”
(1981) Terri Gibbs – “Somebody’s Knockin”
(1982) Toni Basil — “Mickey”
(1982) Naked Eyes – “Always Something There To Remind Me”
(1983) Men Without Hats – “The Safety Dance”
(1983) Dexys Midnight Runners – “Come On Eileen”
(1984) Nena — “99 Luftballons”
(1984) Murray Head -“One Night in Bangkok”
(1985) a-ha — “Take On Me” (In the United States they are considered one-hit wonders because they are usually only remembered by the general public for the number one hit single, “Take on Me”)
(1988) Patrick Swayze – “She’s Like the Wind”
(1990) Vanilla Ice — “Ice Ice Baby”
(1990) Gerardo — “Rico Suave”
(1990) The Archies – “Sugar, Sugar”
(1991) Forced Entry – “Never A Know, But The No”
(1991) Monty Python – “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life”
(1992) Right Said Fred — “I’m Too Sexy”
(1994) The Tractors – “Baby Likes To Rock It”
(1995) Perfect Stranger – “You Have The Right to Remain Silent”
(1996) James Bonamy’s – “I Don’t Think I Will”
(1996) Kevin Sharp – “Nobody Knows”
(1996) Los del Rio – “Macarena”
(1999) New Radicals – “You Get What You Give”
(2000) Baha Men — “Who Let the Dogs Out?”
(2000) Tim Rushlow – “She Misses Him”
(2001) Afroman – “Because I Got High”
(2001) Cyndi Thompson – “What I Really Meant to Say”
(2002) The Mock Turtles – “Can You Dig It?”
(2002) Rebecca Lynn Howard – “Forgive”
(2002) Kellie Coffey – “When You Lie Next To Me”
(2003) A Flock Of Seagulls -“I Ran”
(2006) Heartland – “I Loved Her First”
I’m sure you recognized many of the one-hit wonders listed above. I sure did!
Fond memories.
Wow, I had no idea I loved so many of those songs like Brandy. Of course I knew, “You are like the Wind” was his only hit song. I would have loved to have had just one hit, lol. They may have had only one hit, but they made a big impact to never be forgotten. Thank you for sharing
I’m glad you enjoyed the post Mom. 🙂 Thanks for reading it and taking the time to comment.
I too loved the flashback/ memory jog…The only thing I caught as being incorrect was in the year 2003 .
The band A Flock Of Seagulls from The U.K. had the hit “I ran” in 1983 not 2003…The band also had several other top 40 hits ‘Space-age Love song” being one…Just thought I’d add my two bits…Again, though many thanks for the compilation…
K.J. Stevens
P.S. I once was a D.J. in both major-market radio and as well as a private mobile D.J., just to add some perspective…Cheers
Thank you for the correction!
Cool about being a D.J. – so fun!