Whilst thinking of what I could choose for a new theme for this series I happened to be reading another blog which posted a song with a number in its title. That got me thinking about how many I knew, and I decided to go with it. I made a quick list  and it already stands at thirty five, so this may be a series that I run with for a bit!

For my first selection I’m going with songs that I expect will be familiar to most – I’ll save the more obscure ones for later! I think I’ve only played a couple of these before, and this is one of the repeats to get us off to a rousing start:

As David ‘Kid’ Jensen obligingly tells us at the beginning of that clip, before the band drown him out, that was the Tom Robinson Band’s debut single, 2-4-6-8 Motorway, which peaked at #5 on the UK singles chart in October 1977. As far as I can tell it wasn’t a hit anywhere else, and the band had a couple of smaller UK hits before they split in 1979. Tom has established a long career as a broadcaster, and has continued making albums under his own name, but he has never enjoyed the same success as that debut. That’s a pity, as that was a guaranteed floor filler at the discos of the time.

The band that I have probably played more than any other is up next. I’m sure I’ve played this before but can’t work out when, but you already know the song anyway, don’t you:

The Beatles released Eight Days A Week in December 1964 as a track on their fourth UK album, Beatles For Sale. It went to #1 in the UK, Australia and several European countries, and later sold a million copies in the US after a re-release in 1987. Due to their record companies mucking around it wasn’t included on the American version of the album released at that time, Beatles ’65. That was a common thing, and we often got more tracks than they did! It did appear in June 1965 on their next US release, Beatles VI (their seventh US album, go figure), which also went to #1. The track wasn’t released as a single in the UK, but it was in the US, in February 1965, and of course it was a #1.

This next one is making its first appearance here. It was a one-off hit back in 1995 and I always liked it:

The Connells released 74-75 on their album Ring in September 1993. They had very little success with it in the US, where it only reached #199, but it became a sleeper hit across much of Europe in 1995, during which it got to #36 in the UK. This followed a similar story for this track as a single: it was released to coincide with the album but wasn’t a hit, but then enjoyed massive success throughout Europe in 1995, including a #14 placing in the UK (with a further brief stay at #21 in March 1996), though it made the top ten in fourteen countries and was actually #1 in both Norway and Sweden. The video is based on real people, sharing their class yearbook of 1975 with videos of how they looked twenty years on. It’s a gentle song and, as I said, I’ve always liked it.

Funnily enough, I played a version of this next one – by Ry Cooder – in the same post as Tom Robinson back in 2020. That one is copyright banned in loads of countries so I thought I’d go back to the guy who first recorded the song – Wilson Pickett – with added Blues Brothers. This one is only banned in Germany, for some unfathomable reason:

634-5789 (Soulsville, USA) – to give its full title – was written by Steve Cropper and Eddie Floyd, and Wilson Pickett’s version was released as a single in January 1966, reaching #13 in the US and #36 in the UK. It did make #1 on the US R&B Chart, though. The song has since been recorded many times, including by Tina Turner as well as Ry Cooder, but sometimes it is good to revisit the original singer, albeit in a much later version. He still exuded style, though, didn’t he! This clip is from the movie Blues Brothers 2000, which of course came out in 1998, though sadly several of the cast members of the original 1980 movie were no longer with us. It is still fun, though.

I’m closing this first set of numbers songs with anther favourite of mine:

1999 was the title track of Prince’s fifth album, released in October 1982, a double album which became his first to reach the US top ten, peaking at #9, and making #30 in the UK. The song had been released the previous month as a single, and got to #12 in the US and #25 in the UK. The album was re-released in 2016 after Prince’s death, and fared slightly better second time around: #7 in the US and #28 in the UK. 1999 had also been re-released in January 1995 in the UK as a double A-side single with another track from the album, Little Red Corvette, and this peaked at #2 here. It’s a good one to close this set, I think.

So, there you have it, my first set of tunes with numbers in their titles. As I said at the beginning I have loads more of these so you’ll be getting some others next week. All suggestions gratefully received in the comments – and I’ll tell you if they are already on my list or not!

Have a good week and keep well 😊