I vote for this one, it could have been a Beach Boys release (co-written and produced by Brian Wilson), but the band (i.e. Mike Love) rejected it. Would have fit right in on the 2nd side of Today or Pet Sounds with a Brian or Carl vocal. Temporary Beach Boys member Campbell nevertheless does magnificently and this is one of the great lost singles of all time (but has featured on some compilations)
Greatest Flop Single Ever
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Here’s a belter from Anneline Kriel, released in 1981. She was a South African actress, model and beauty queen who became Miss World in 1974. In 1980 she married Sol Kerzner, an entertainment and casino magnate responsible for developing Sun City, but they divorced five years later.
Is number 50 a flop? Johnny Boy, produced by James Dean Bradfield, directed by Don Letts:
That was, is, and always will be a glorious song. Never seen the video so thanks for that.
In a similar vein I’ve always felt (see what I did there) is Lawrence’s Denim’s Middle of the Road from 1992. If he’d waited 2 to 3 years he might have had a minor top 40 hit during Britpop. If he’d waited a decade or more he might have scaled the dizzy heights of number 50 alongside Johnny Boy. As it was he scaled the mildly tipsy heights of number 78 and I’m pretty sure that’s the best he’s ever done.
You’ll have to skip the first 30 seconds or so of Gary Crowley intro as this seems to be the best version available on Youtube. Very Lawrence. But I do think it’s a great song, even more so given what the average Felt fan (were there any apart from the two or three of us?) might have expected next from Lawrence.
Gary Crowley was always good value. I enjoyed seeing his intro.
I like Denim a lot but I if he hadn’t been listening to Roadrunner before I worte that, I’ll eat my hat. It’s still great though.
See also Summer Smash which was due to be released then cancelled the week of Lady Diana’s, er, summer smash.
Summer Smash is of course the great lost hit in Lawrence mythology. Which is a great story apart from it’s complete crap!
To paraphrase Tony Wilson, when faced with the truth and the myth, print the myth.
Arf!
The Johnny Boy track is brilliant – a genuine lost classic.
this was the track I came here to post. I bloomin love it and wish more people knew about it
I think these all flopped, despite my liking them. Which is odd.
David Sylvian – Let The Happiness In
Marc Bolan – The Wizard
Frank Ocean, Mick Jones, Paul Simonon and Diplo – Hero
The Durutti Column – Otis
Page & Plant – Most High
The Larks – Billy Graham’s Going To Heaven
Patrik Fitzgerald – Safety Pin Stuck In My Heart
TV Smith’s Explorers – Tomahawk Cruise
Elton John – Ego
Al Stewart – On The Border
Nils Lofgren – Shine Silently
Sniff ‘n’ the Tears – Poison Pen Mail
However my choice for the greatest flop single ever would be David Sylvian – I Surrender closely followed by John Otway – Geneve
Geneve is possibly one of the greatest songs ever written
(but my Otway-bias may be showing at this point)
Also from the same catalogue:
Green Green Grass Of Home
DK50/80 (later re-engineered as OK Father Christmas, but still no hit)
The New Jerusalem
Body Talk was boosted by appearing in an episode of The Young Ones, and got to … nowhere
Tomahawk Cruise – Great track
Al Stewart’s On the Border made the Top 30 in the US, so it wasn’t that much of a flop!
I wasn’t sure about a few of them, but only checked UK placings. I do remember hearing that one on the radio a fair bit at the time. Ditto Ego and Poison Pen Mail.
I’m biased because I put up 25% of the money to press 1000 copies of this single on the band’s Airebeat label in 1980. It flopped then an also in 1981 when reissued on the Hype Records label.
The previous 1979 single of this Leeds band was released by Sire Records and they toured with the Undertones.
A wonderful single which should’ve been massive but wasn’t.
Oh, yes indeed!
Seconded. I saw them support (and arguably blow off) Del Amitri.
If this comment doesn’t get Moose back on board, nothing will.
Liam has such an amazing voice and it sounds great live
River Deep Mountain High
Hit No 88 on the Billboard chart, it’s failure caused Phil Spector to withdraw from music for 2 years.
No. 3 in the UK
Heroes only got to 24 when released. Retrospectively seems a flop considering the all-time classic it is now. Bowie saw himself as a bit of a relative cult at the time despite earlier hits including Sound and Vision. I think he missed that freedom to experiment and be a bit less in the limelight once things changed but then there were bills to pay.
The Gents – Revenge.
They tried twice, but no luck with either attempt
(kicking off at the fag-end of the Mod Revival, and being on an indie label with no great distribution probably didn’t help matters)
I’ll nominate “I Can’t Help Myself”, by Orange Juice. So much better than Rip It Up a year later but it failed to dent the top 40. It still makes me happy to listen to it.
Although he appeared on Top of the Pops performing New England and Pan’s People (or Legs & Co) pantomimed to Egyptian Reggae and Roadrunner, my favourite singles by Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers – the original version of That Summer Feeling and Abdul and Cleopatra never troubled the charts at all.
I”m going with Mott The Hoople’s Saturday Gigs. Got to about 41 when they thought it was going to be a smash. Made Ian Hunter realise it was over and quit the band.
The Days of Pearly Spencer by Davd McWilliams – memory says this was extensively plugged on pirate radio, but failed to chart. Apparently the BBC wouldn’t play it because of the pirate radio business connection. I always loved it, and the cover by Marc Almond is terrific too.
It is so familiar, everyone thinks it was huge
Great song.
Inspired, probably, by Eleanor Rigby, but different enough to be a worthy classic of it’s time.
It was very, VERY heavily plugged and played by Radio Caroline, whose founder Ronan O’Rahilly was also the boss of Major Minor records, who released it.
Not a complete and utter flop but certainly not helped by the BBC’s refusal to play it back then.
One thing I learned today – the vocal on the chorus was literally phoned in (from a phone box near the studio).
Big hit in the Eastern states, totally nowhere in Adelaide – such was the nature of local Top 40 charts, before there was a national one. And there was plenty of vice versa.
I’d a-thunk most singles were flops of sorts – when I got involved in university radio in 1979, it was a real education about how many fantastic singles were completely ignored by the commercial stations (there were no other local public stations at the time).
I bought this single. It was then used in a TV ad for McEwans beer. I’m sure they released it at least twice – but it only got to #96.
Win were a great band, i love both albums
The Zombies, “Is This The Dream?” Fantastic, Motown-based pop with Rod Argent vocal and great keyboard break. Didn’t even chart.
Zombies hardly recorded a bad track
Elvis Costello’s “I Want You” – a strange choice for a single, admittedly – only made no. 79 in the UK singles chart.
Really creepy song
Indeed so. None creepier.
Yup, nerve inducing to be sure, and a very fine song.
Although ‘chart flop’ and EC singles are common bedfellows. Other than Oliver’s Army, his big UK singles chart hits can be counted on one finger, and in the US only Veronica did particularly well. Very much an album artist.
Any of the end of the 90s/ turn of the 00s Spice Girls inspired Girl Power stuff. Girl Thing, etc. This I remember getting plugged loads, but it only got to about 16…
They weren’t dropped that long after, which seems a shame.
Love this
And another classic that never troubled the charts
Easy! Talking Heads best single, and therefore one of the greatest ever, never charted.
Love For Sale
You reminded me of this @tiggerlion Almost as good as his best with Talking Heads.
One of their worst actually. I thought Wild Wild Life was your favourite?
Anyway they rarely troubled the charts, only 3 top 40 hits.
Any excuse to post this piece by someone who was once very kind to me:
A record made entirely using voice sounds; many years before samplers existed.
Notwithstanding my jibe about the no-hits – no doubt about to be brought up – this thread alerts me to how ridiculous ‘rarity’ is in pop music.
Take the Zombies… one song that did any kind of business in the U.K., a couple (I think) in the U.S. – frankly if you have the As and Bs collection on Ace then you ‘are’ a world expert on the subject.
Other acts in this field… The Pretty Things, The Action, Them, any David Bowie before Space Oddity, any Marc Bolan before Ride A White Swan (see the reference to the brilliant The Wizard above)… and most ‘serious’ chart acts outside of the Beatles and the Stones had flop 45s in the U.K. – Kinks, Who, Spencer Davis, Small Faces, Dusty, The Pink Floyd, the Move, Jimi (‘Stepping Stone’ if you’re asking)… all of them.
I actually can’t think of one that didn’t, and most Tamla-Motown 45s up to TMG 721 (look it up!) did not chart in the U.K. There was ‘much’ competition.
This is a very well known song in NZ but only got to #43 in the UK.
Neil Young, Doobie Brothers-type vibe. I think a lot of people here would really like this.
I really like Settle Down by them. I think I probably discovered it via a Word CD.
Apparently the theme to The Sopranos never troubled the singles chart in any meaningful way.
never troubled the charts but a beautiful song
Strong candidate for greatest Irish pop single ever, but not a UK hit…
Great call @kdh There are so many candidates, it could be a thread of its own. Parachute by Something Happens, Celebrate by An Emotional Fish, Why Me? by A House, etc.
Agreed @Bamber. – lots of great suggestions on these comps compiled by Tom Dunne himself:
https://www.discogs.com/release/4246076-Various-Tom-Dunnes-30-Best-Irish-Hits?srsltid=AfmBOoqtzSXi-W9Lu8LWFklMafaV3sVDfwdiYHDm7IayPZ3Z8op4NdT_
https://www.discogs.com/release/9456774-Various-Tom-Dunnes-30-Best-Irish-Hits-Vol-2?srsltid=AfmBOooF9sozqZGUclijarlrc3xnJjCEbfdD0V5Ztm2j1XaZLMm3gaKP
I have both of them. Great stuff alright.
Got to a measly #86 despite me & friends po-going away to it until doing exactly what it said for the chorus! Should have definitely been a hit (good video too!)