Over and Over Again Chords Freda Battle
A s the coronavirus lockdown continues, the Guardian's music desk-bound idea you might be in need of a distraction – something to send you down memory lane, or to divert the badgerer at your housemates or children on to us. Nosotros present to you a ranking of the 100 greatest UK No 1 singles since the charts began in 1952.
The rules
We'll be counting this down over six weeks – for the offset ii weeks, nosotros'll spend Mon to Thursday counting downwards 10 at a time. That takes us upward to the Top 20, and from Monday to Friday for 4 weeks nosotros'll have standalone celebrations of each remaining song past our team of critics.
This list, and the songs' guild, was compiled via a politely raging video telephone call between me, master rock and pop critic Alexis Petridis and deputy music editor Laura Snapes. The ranking isn't based on sales or longevity, information technology's the fruit of that discussion: what we as critics, fans and lifetime listeners retrieve are the near vivid songs to top the UK charts, and, of those, which are more than brilliant than others. The only rule was that an creative person could just feature once.
As such, information technology is very much open up to word, which we heartily encourage in the comments section. We'd love to hear what you think of our choices – whether in understanding or outrage – and hear your fond or not-so-addicted memories of these singles. Later we've reached No ane, we'll ask what you retrieve we unforgivably missed out from the overall list, and then publish highlights from your selections. Also, note that dates listed are the dates the songs reached No one.
Relish!
Ben Beaumont-Thomas, music editor
100
Bill Haley and His Comets – Rock Effectually the Clock (1955)
You lot could spend years arguing about what constitutes the first rock'n'roll record. Rock Around the Clock patently isn't it, but it was, incontrovertibly, the record that brought stone'due north'roll to mainstream attending in the UK: 2 minutes of music that sounded infinitely more feral than its avuncular creative person looked and that changed pop music for ever. AP
99
Lorde – Royals (2013)
By disavowing the hollow opulence and bloated scale of popular's reigning class, Lorde accidentally ushered in a brand new 1: there would be no Billie Eilish if not for her conspiratorial incantations. While she weathered accusations of cribbing for disavowing hip-hop cliches in her apparently rap-influenced delivery, she ultimately echoed the genre's ain motion towards unvarnished portrayals of teenage disaffection instigated by a parallel wave of SoundCloud upstarts. As much a generational bellwether as a pop classic. LS
98
Lieutenant Pigeon – Mouldy Old Dough (1972)
Recorded in a Coventry front room, Mouldy Old Dough sounds like pop music made by people who take never really heard pop music, but have had it described to them by someone who didn't really know what they were talking nearly: pub pianoforte, growled vocals, a beat that recalls a drunkard adamantly staggering dwelling house. The weirdness of 70s Britain in musical form. AP
97
Dave and Ansell Collins – Double Butt (1971)
If you wanted bear witness of how far out, how unbound by the usual rules reggae was, you lot could discover information technology at the tiptop of the charts in early 1971: a piano line taken – sampled if you like – from Ramsey Lewis; a vocalist who largely grunted and bellowed incomprehensibly in the manner of a Jamaican deejay: "I am the magnificent Westward-O-O-O!" It still sounds fantastic. AP
96
Roy Orbison – It's Over (1964)
The pinnacle of Roy Orbison's career as rock's great tragedian: 3 astonishing, inconsolable minutes during which stars cry, rainbows cry, golden days are sorrowfully recalled and drums crush a leaden funeral march, before it all reaches a terrible climax, Orbison badly repeating the title as if misery is a kind of catharsis. AP
95
The Buggles – Video Killed the Radio Star (1979)
It won't exist also much of a spoiler to reveal that this is the merely No i single in this list that concerns how the brutally uncaring nature of new technology can paradoxically deepen nostalgia while rendering the by irrelevant. Trevor Horn and co turned this material into postmodern gold, building jingles, prog, orchestral pop and more into a screwball fantasy. That common cold steady boot drum, meanwhile, is similar techno boot the door downwardly to take over pop culture. BBT
94
Dua Lipa – New Rules (2017)
After a fitfully successful kickoff, this was the song to turn the Kosovan-British pop singer into a global star. You can well-nigh feel her clench a manus on your shoulder equally she adopts a stern, schoolmarmish tone to manipulate those rules for breakdown survival: don't respond your ex's calls, allow them pop circular or even exist their friend. She'south not telling the states or her mates, though, simply rather herself, making for a powerful popular psychodrama. BBT
93
Del Shannon – Runaway (1961)
Behind the unproblematic, perky stone'due north'roll facade – "the ultimate fairground anthem", equally author Bob Stanley put it – at that place's something agonizing most Del Shannon's biggest striking: an eeriness nearly the rumble of the opening guitar chords and the echoing keyboard solo, a sense the song is slightly too impassioned and pained. The consequence is equally compelling a single as 1961 produced. AP
92
Nancy Sinatra – These Boots Are Fabricated for Walkin' (1966)
Had These Boots Are Made for Walkin' been sung by a human being, every bit its author, Lee Hazlewood, had intended, information technology would just have been nasty. Sung with insouciant cool by the recently divorced Nancy Sinatra, nevertheless, information technology became something else entirely: army camp just tough, funny but violent, completely irresistible. AP
91
Whigfield – Saturday Dark (1994)
Sabbatum Night just pipped Gina G's Ooh Aah … Just a Niggling Scrap to our 90s Eurobanger slot. Kickoff off, information technology'south an actual Eurobanger (not an Aussie impersonator), and similar the Village People's YMCA, it has a trip the light fantastic toe routine invented by fans that came to ascertain the song. It'south got an immediately iconic tag ("dee dee da da da!"), plus it was the victor in one of pop's funniest plagiarism cases: I want some of whatever the person who thinks this sounds like Lindisfarne'southward Fog on the Tyne was having. LS
90
Justin Bieber – What Do You Mean? (2015)
There volition be howls of protest at Bieber being on this list, a man routinely cited equally everything that is facile about pop and celebrity. Well, he's had his moments, but this is i of his equally frequent triumphs. Taking the Insta-filtered aesthetic of the then-popular tropical business firm sound and marrying it to a melody that flits similar a bird of paradise e'er coming back to its perch, it has the melancholically fleeting beauty of a package vacation sunset. BBT
89
Sugababes – Freak Like Me (2002)
Producer Richard 10 gets a lot of credit for the shuddering magnitude of invention behind the Sugababes' debut UK No 1 – the first legit single of the 2000s bootleg wave, bringing together Adina Howard and Tubeway Regular army – just not all of it. The newly minted trio of Mutya, Keisha and Heidi pull off a more convincing "I'm grown now" transition than whatever of their American pop peers, cheers to the terrifying nonchalance innate to British teenage girls. It'due south got a classic belting "may-ee!" (that's "me" in millennial pop terms) and without it, you wouldn't have Audio of the Underground – or, even, maybe, whisper it, Toxic. LS
88
Craig David – vii Days (2000)
Like the Onetime Testament God, Craig chills on a Sunday, but dissimilar the Old Testament God, he spends Monday and Tuesday engineering sex activity and spends the rest of the days until the sabbath having it. Nosotros looked upon his cosmos and saw that it was skillful: his vocals, drilled in the dexterity of the garage rave, twine around fragile acoustic guitar lines like two lovers in Eden. BBT
87
Adamski – Killer (feat Seal) (1990)
Every part of Adamski'due south product is perfectly designed: the deplorable chords, the funkily interrupted alien transmission of the synths, the prodding bassline with its edges well-nigh imperceptibly corroded by acid. Most cute of all is Seal: half activist, one-half oracle. BBT
86
The Tornados – Telstar (1962)
The product of producer Joe Meek's twin obsessions – infinite travel and the recording studio as an instrument in itself – Telstar is otherworldly and breathlessly exciting, piling on layer afterwards layer of sounds so dumbo with effects it is impossible to work out what instrument is making them. It's like nothing else, before or since. AP
85
Estelle – American Boy (feat Kanye West) (2008)
This will get you lot thinking, "I miss the erstwhile Kanye" – the rapper's touristic whirl through Ribena, wags and the epithet "rubbish" is full of wit with but a touch of his incoming megalomania. Estelle is even meliorate, perfectly capturing the mood of uncertain excitement at a potential American lover: "Like the way he speaking, his confidence is peaking / Don't like his baggy jeans but I might like what'south underneath them." The bump of will.i.am'southward cosmic funk production launches information technology into the transatlantic skies. BBT
84
Gloria Gaynor – I Will Survive (1979)
Decades of ubiquity have dulled the touch of I Will Survive, but the vocal simply became ubiquitous in the first place because it connected with so many people so directly. The strings soar, the lyrics projection defiance in the face of a controlling ex-partner, who's tried chancing his arm over again: "I'm not that chained up picayune person still in love with yous." AP
83
Cher – Believe (1998)
I Will Survive recast in hi-tech 90s dance-popular, complete with that notorious Machine-Tune wiggle to Cher's voice. The effect is really used sparingly, and the vocal's wild success – 11m copies sold worldwide – is not down to anything contemporary. Rather, it's all very old-fashioned stuff that ensures Believe will be hollered in cheese nights for evermore: a powerhouse melody Cher uses to manipulate a kind of den-mother wisdom. BBT
82
Robyn – With Every Heartbeat (feat Kleerup) (2007)
"But I don't look back," Robyn insists over and over on her only UK nautical chart-topper, though the racing arpeggiated synths, never resolving to the home fundamental, tell a different story: one of someone doomed to the purgatory of heartbreak, or worse, revelling in it (a Greek chorus of strings charged with Kate Bush'due south DNA outlines the tragedy). "And – it – hurts – with – ev – er – y – heart – beat," Robyn pants, and yous feel it, each syllable landing like a tombstone. LS
81
Elton John – Are Yous Set up for Love? (2003)
For someone who admits how hopeless he was at romance, Elton John couldn't half-sell a honey song. Are You Ready for Love? runs the gamut of emotions as he tries to win someone over: he'south casually cool about devotion yet awed past it; grandiose in his overtures, and then virtually manically overcome by fright that this person might not, in fact, be prepare for love. The Thom Bell-assisted Philly soul production festoons John with strings, paw percussion, wah-wah guitar, key changes – in a sense perfectly echoing the maximalist, hasty approach to seduction that John has said he practised at the top of his career. It'due south extraordinary that information technology took 24 years and a football advert to make it a hit. LS
80
Dave – Funky Fri (feat Fredo) (2018)
This wasn't the stuff of high-speed swerving crud bars. Instead, Dave and Fredo apply steady, perfectly calibrated flows to set themselves apart from the London MCs 1 generation in a higher place them, set to minimalist trap. The effect is of being told something actress clearly, as if yous haven't understood: a brilliantly withering technique. Rap'due south status every bit a core part of British pop culture was consolidated. BBT
79
Jackie Trent – Where Are You At present (My Love) (1965)
The pop charts were peculiarly dominated by sweeping, sentimental ballads until the mid-1960s, and there are PhDs to exist written on the effect on pop music of a sexually repressed culture of manners. Anyway, many such ballads are suffocatingly schmaltzy, just this ane is sublime. It was written by Trent with Tony Hatch, a somewhat forgotten genius of this period who shared Burt Bacharach's knack for orchestral drama. The pair had an affair, with Hatch leaving his wife and marrying Trent – this collaboration is full of that impetuous, untameable ardour. BBT
78
Thunderclap Newman – Something in the Air (1969)
It'due south unclear whether Thunderclap Newman thought they were making a kind of eulogy for 60s counterculture, but that's how Something in the Air turned out. Its music is ineffably melancholy, its insistence that "the revolution's here", a year later on the hippy dream had curdled, sounds drastic and hopeless. Intentional or non, information technology's actually moving. AP
77
Enya – Orinoco Menstruum (1988)
Perhaps it takes not having lived through the 80s heyday of new age, then its subsequent ubiquity and mockery to appreciate Orinoco Flow as the compositional marvel it is. Yes, the lyrics are incredibly silly – but the layered pizzicato shimmer transforms Enya'south dippy travelogue into a true pop mirage, stoking its allure as her siren vocal constantly slips further out of accomplish. LS
76
Baby D – Allow Me Be Your Fantasy (1994)
The lyrics are essentially a QVC infomercial for the eroto-psychedelic effects of ecstasy – "Lotions of dear flow through your easily / Meet visions, colours every solar day" – and the music is shamelessly designed to intensify drug experiences. The junglist breakbeats keep the energy loftier, while the large piano chords and yearning vocals are similar a head massage from some bloke you just met merely still now experience a deeper kinship with than your immediate family. BBT
75
Procol Harum – A Whiter Shade of Pale (1967)
Channelling Bach and the Beats, the trippy imagery of this 10m seller made it a fave of those turning on and tuning in during the Summer of Love. Only the Hammond organ creates a valedictory mood equally the drug epiphanies betray their lies – "Although my eyes were open up / They might have just equally well've been closed" – and the entitlement and rapacity of the at present widely hated Worst Generation becomes articulate: "I was feeling kinda seasick / But the crowd called out for more." A funeral hymn, then, but no less beautiful for it. BBT
74
Will Immature – Leave Right At present (2003)
You tin can imagine an older relative calling this "a proper vocal" – unfussy and instantly archetype, where the quality of Eg White's limerick gives information technology automatic promotion to a different league. Young negotiates the middle eight'southward key changes with the same sad certainty he negotiates his emotions, choosing self-preservation over a second take chances at dear. BBT
73
Chicago – If You lot Leave Me At present (1976)
The softest of soft rock, If Y'all Get out Me Now doesn't seem to play then much as glide forth, wrapped in a coating of French horns and strings, the drummer borer and so gently it sounds equally if he's trying not to wake someone up. It'south impossibly lush and beautifully written, but its sadness is pervasive and affecting. AP
72
Rage Against the Auto – Killing in the Proper name (2009)
The heaviest, sweariest No 1 in UK history – with one of the all-time riffs, as well – only reached No 25 when it was first released in 1992, but reached the peak in 2009 afterwards a grassroots campaign from people angry at a run of Ten Factor contestants dominating the Christmas No ane race. Its "Fuck yous, I won't do what you tell me" climax, aimed at dominance figures from the law to parents for years, was gleefully beamed at Simon Cowell in a bang-up moment for British commonwealth. BBT
71
Spice Girls – Wannabe (1996)
Most 25 years down the line, Wannabe sounds so rinky-dink and innocent (salve the "zig-a-zig-ah", which continues upward a lineage of sexy popular nonsense started by Fiddling Richard'southward "a-wop-bop-a-loo-bop-a-lop-bam-boom!" nearly four decades prior) that it'south almost inconceivable information technology was considered such a threat at the time. But it was: in two minutes, 53 seconds, these five women undid tween pop's raison d'etre – seducing girls into a life of domesticity via parades of harmless male crushes – and rewrote information technology in their ain cluttered, girls-first spirit. LS
70
Rui Da Silva – Touch Me (feat Cassandra) (2001)
Dance music No 1s most ever bang, but this one pumps: a deep-house anthem of huge subtlety and power. The way the rhythm-guitar line insinuates itself, only to be subsumed by those cut-upwardly strings, mirrors Cassandra'south audible bafflement at being taken over by a beloved she doesn't understand. The confusing rush of ecstasy, in every sense, has never been and then beautifully evoked. BBT
69
Snap! – Rhythm Is a Dancer (1992)
Dance-pop in the 90s often traded in profound melancholy – Haddaway'southward What Is Dearest and Corona'due south Rhythm of the Nighttime existence other classic examples – and Rhythm Is a Dancer is ane of the saddest of all. With its gospel vocals and cathedral-ready chords, it makes raving feel like a serious spiritual quest rather than something to do on a Fri. BBT
68
Dexys Midnight Runners – Come on Eileen (1982)
Pop holds few greater pleasures than seeing a pop vocal about the power of pop songs have on that kind of lure itself. In Come on Eileen, Kevin Rowland reflects on the sad songs love by a downtrodden generation and promises his crush they'll hum a different tune. Come on Eileen became that song: a romp through wistfulness, bonhomie and knees-upwardly antics that distils the riotous emotional arc of a nighttime in an Irish pub into three-and-a-half perfect minutes. LS
67
Blackness Box – Ride on Time (1989)
Matching disco diva Loleatta Holloway for lung power is near incommunicable but G People'south Heather Small – working incognito afterwards Italian producers Black Box were refused a Holloway sample – blows the business firm down, and her "let me tell yous, what you do to me" is so sexily intense. This is a Terminator of a song, unstoppably delivering a payload of pure euphoria as Chicago business firm is spliced with Italo disco to create perfect popular. BBT
66
Eminem – Stan (feat Dido) (2000)
Information technology'south testament to time'due south steady erosion that a vocal virtually an obsessive fan who murdered his meaning girlfriend and killed himself because his favourite rapper didn't find him has go a casual byword for effusive devotion. Coming full circle, Stan is worthy of it. Information technology'due south the pinnacle of Eminem'due south storytelling skill and – in spite of the clear misanthropy of the titular fan – greatly compassionate, as Eminem tempers Stan'southward violence by understanding the desperation fuels it. LS
65
Kraftwerk – The Model (1982)
A depressing economy of sex and ability, observed with simmering beta-male jealousy, is sketched in just 12 lines over a melody that has the perfect symmetry of a model'south face. Reckoner Love, the exquisite other half of this double A-side, is some other portrait of loneliness but couldn't exist more dissimilar: it is tender and naively yearning. BBT
64
Nena – 99 Red Balloons (1984)
Likewise oftentimes discarded as a novelty striking, 99 Red Balloons is the best popular vocal about cold war anxiety in a field full of try-hard duds, and a chart-topping coronation for the tough, peppy new wave sound beingness pioneered past the Go-Get'due south, the Bangles and the Waitresses. (The original German version is all the same the best, even so.) LS
63
Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel – Make Me Smile (Come up Up and Come across Me) (1975)
A fabulously bitchy kiss-off to the three members of Cockney Rebel who left the band later on their 1974 album The Psychomodo, the genius of Make Me Smile (Come Up and Run across Me) is to couch its spiral-you message in the sunniest, most charming, irresistibly hook-laden music imaginable. AP
62
Elvis Presley – Jailhouse Rock (1958)
Jailhouse Rock was intended as a joke by writers Leiber and Stoller, consummate with a nudging reference to gay sexual practice. Elvis, yet, ignored the comic undercurrent, and sang it with such blazing intensity that the performance well-nigh collapses at one:14. If you want a No 1 that captures his early, feral ability, this is it. AP
61
Arctic Monkeys – I Bet You lot Look Good on the Dancefloor (2005)
Most mid-00s indie nostalgia is tinged with shame: the polka dots, bad fringes and herky-jerky dancing have non dated well. But Arctic Monkeys' debut single proper is something to wait back on with pride – not considering, as the NME of the era would have it, it represented any kind of jingoistic "victory" for indie over pop, but considering its rattling potency and Alex Turner's lyrics distil the pleasures of that era worth remembering: "Merely bangin' tunes and DJ sets and / Dirty dancefloors and dreams of naughtiness." LS
sixty
Ariana Grande – Thank U, Adjacent (2018)
After all that Ariana Grande had been through – the Manchester Arena bombing, the expiry of a beloved ex, a broken engagement – she could have released ten minutes of primal screaming and nonetheless left critics maxim: yeah, fair plenty. Instead, she inverse the game: subsequently the more stateswomanly Sweetener album released earlier that year, surprise render Thank U, Next accelerated popular'southward processing speed (particularly liberating female popular stars in the process) and quashed the idea that empowerment is contingent on taking someone else down. Its nimbleness is the sound of Grande'south freedom. LS
59
The Walker Brothers – Make Information technology Easy on Yourself (1965)
"Breaking up is and then very hard to practise" – this Burt Bacharach-penned ballad opens with a wry bit of understatement from Scott Walker, and he deals with things very magnanimously from here on out: a stiff upper lip in song. The style the choir, timpani, strings, horns, guitars and more than all stay meringue-fluffy is arranger Ivor Raymonde just showing off, really. BBT
58
Rihanna – Umbrella (feat Jay-Z) (2007)
Originally written for Britney Spears, although it's inconceivable to imagine her doing it. Umbrella needs swagger and Rihanna had information technology in spades, turning a stunted beat and a lyric that'southward pretty dorky on newspaper into one of popular'due south not bad come up-ons. It's a skill that earned Rihanna a deserved place in the pantheon of pop icons. LS
57
10cc – I'm Non in Dear (1975)
Eric Stewart wrote I'k Not in Dearest after his wife, Gloria, complained that he didn't say "I dear y'all" often enough – non out of petulance, just to express his depth of feeling for her beyond the cliche. Later a labour-intensive recording process featuring endless harmonising and dozens of feet of tape loops, 10cc came away with this work of stubborn dazzler: a sublime, shimmering evocation of the ineffable bond betwixt two lovers. Information technology endures in every sense: Stewart and Gloria have been married for more 50 years. LS
56
Aaliyah – More than Than a Adult female (2002)
A posthumous chart-topper after her death in a plane crash when she was 22, More Than a Adult female is one of the trio of masterpiece singles she fabricated with Timbaland, forth with We Need a Resolution and Endeavour Over again. Into the producer's serpentine frameworks stepped a woman whose calm, exacting poise let you come to her rather than she to y'all. Information technology never gets less wrenching to think what else she might accept done. BBT
55
Daft Punk – Get Lucky (feat Pharrell Williams) (2013)
Ah, the vocal of the summer. Its lustre has been dulled by it existence played by every wedding band in the western hemisphere (and by Limmy's eternally funny tweet), simply Get Lucky still shines underneath it all. Take it off the alcopop-splashed CDJs and dorsum into headphones and you lot can newly capeesh its mastery, with the liveness of Nile Rodgers' guitar and Pharrell'southward conversational amuse. BBT
54
tATu – All the Things She Said (2003)
On one paw, All the Things She Said is the ne plus ultra of queerbaiting: ii straight Russian teenagers cajoled into lesbian cosplay by some dodgy-sounding svengalis. Merely as ersatz as their ardour was, the duo's debut United kingdom of great britain and northern ireland single was charged with a perfect evocation of the frantic emotional tumult that rages in every closeted, yearning teenager's head. An industrial cri de cœur with a brilliantly drastic synth climax, information technology was the greatest Trevor Horn banger since his mid-80s sugariness spot. LS
53
Take That – Back for Skilful (1995)
The boy band – well, Gary Barlow – had already shown they could do serious and affecting balladry with A Meg Beloved Songs, and and so they perfectly honed that skill for this classic breakup song. At that place'southward real poetry in the verses, which gives way to the devastating plainness of the chorus, similar 100 red roses left at a doorstep. Barlow goes for total abasement, though – "Whenever I'k wrong / Just tell me the song and I'll sing it" – so yous don't really fancy his chances. BBT
52
Soft Cell – Tainted Beloved (1981)
You might remember using crisp pulsate machines and eerie synths to cover a northern soul canticle would make information technology more brittle, only Soft Cell's version of Gloria Jones's 1964 vocal actually has more swing and sensuality. There'southward something portentous about those insistent, fateful synth stabs, and Marc Almond adds to the sense of doom with his innate flair for drama. BBT
51
Due south-Express – Theme from Due south-Limited (1988)
To watch Top of the Pops as 1987 gives mode to 1988 is to watch the freaks taking over the asylum: after MARRS and Flop the Bass'southward earlier acid house hits, South-Limited's sample-heavy rail affirmed the sound's chart coronation, making the Stock Aitken Waterman stable look fifty-fifty more square, and stuck 1 in the centre of London'southward throttlingly cool club scene with its euphoric, queer collage. LS
50
Steve "Silk" Hurley – Jack Your Body (1987)
It's difficult to imagine now how strange and conflicting Jack Your Body sounded in 1987. Other early firm hits had at to the lowest degree come up with a song or a hook attached, but this had neither: it may be the well-nigh minimal No ane of all fourth dimension. It isn't past whatever stretch of the imagination the best Chicago had to offer in 1987: every bit a indicate of a vast shift in the style pop music sounded, information technology's unbeatable. AP
49
Chemical Brothers – Setting Lord's day (feat Noel Gallagher) (1996)
A one-half-cover of the Beatles' Tomorrow Never Knows but with that band's LSD juiced upwardly with some kind of experimental steroid, Setting Sunday still sounds extreme. Lighting up that breakbeat and demonically heaving harmonium riffs are rockets and catherine wheels of wild audio, with Noel Gallagher sounding every bit if he'south being dragged out of sanity. BBT
48
Then Solid Crew – 21 Seconds (2001)
A new high-water mark of commercial success for British rap was ready by this incandescently brilliant wave of London MCs, each given 21 seconds of time on the mic. The energy stays permanently loftier, but is filtered through such distinct characters: Harvey's rave MC, Romeo'south lascivious loverman, Kaish's jabbing boxer, Face up's bug-eyed vampire and more. BBT
47
Suzi Quatro – Tin the Can (1973)
The first attempt to make Suzi Quatro a star, with the lite pop of Rolling Rock, brutal flat: second fourth dimension around, with writers/producers Chinn and Chapman in control, everything clicked. From its opening wall of drums to Quatro'southward scream of "scratch out her optics" to its lyrically baffling just enduring chorus, Can the Can is glam-pop perfection. AP
46
Queen – Bohemian Rhapsody (1975)
Everyone with fifty-fifty a glancing interest in pop knows Bohemian Rhapsody, which means its sheer audacity is like shooting fish in a barrel to overlook. Information technology'southward a completely inexplicable, extraordinary single, a joke that got out of hand co-ordinate to producer Roy Thomas Bakery, a preposterous exercise in high camp with demented lyrics, that somehow notwithstanding exerts a huge emotional pull. AP
45
Simon and Garfunkel – Bridge Over Troubled Water (1970)
The charts in 1970 were rich with hymn-similar songs solemnly marking the passing of the 60s – not to the lowest degree the Beatles' Permit It Exist – but Bridge Over Troubled Water was the blockbuster take: five minutes of booming, Phil Spector-inspired white gospel with a choirboy vocal and a simple, universal bulletin below the sturm und drang. AP
44
Rick Astley – Never Gonna Requite You Upwardly (1987)
More fool the person who thought up Rickrolling, believing chance exposure to Never Gonna Requite You Upward to be some kind of penalty: the Stock Aitken Waterman tea male child'southward star-making moment couldn't exist less cool or more glorious, his proficient-male child Redcoat brogue the cheese to SAW's soulful, acid pickle. And, hey, if it was good enough for Larry Levan … LS
43
Tubeway Army – Are "Friends" Electrical? (1979)
The 80s began in British pop when the stately, ballsy Are "Friends" Electric? arrived on Top of the Pops in June 1979: two synth players, Gary Numan looking puzzled, every bit if he didn't empathize how a song with no chorus had become a hit. He was six months early on, merely Numan was ever ahead of his time: often-mocked, his alienated-suburbanite-in-a-world-of-applied science schtick now seems remarkably prescient. AP
42
Lady Gaga – Bad Romance (2009)
Gaga's tertiary UK No 1 outshines earlier hits Just Dance and Poker Face as the apex of her tectonic, Teutonic kickoff-phase battering rams. While it'southward heavily indebted to Depeche Way and Madonna, Gaga'due south weapons-grade persona turns a homage into a conquest, tagging everything in her wake with a brawny "Gaga, ooh la la." LS
41
East 17 – Stay Some other Solar day (1994)
1 of the greatest Christmas No 1s of all time is a triumph of emotional candour. It resembles a breakdown song with its talk of final kisses, but was written by Tony Mortimer later his brother killed himself. The hurting of those sudden calls of "stay at present" is so astute, voicing the suddenness of loss. BBT
twoscore
The Four Tops – Reach Out (I'll Be In that location) (1966)
Soaring to a higher place Reach Out's dramatic system – which smashed through the boundaries of Motown's signature way, inspired past the Rolling Stones' Pigment Information technology Black, not that you lot'd know – pb vocalist Levi Stubbs sounds equally if he's close to tears, delivering the lyrics equally if they're a thing of life or decease. Information technology remains an astonishingly intense way to spend three minutes. AP
39
The Jam – Going Surreptitious (1980)
A song in which disgust at Thatcher'due south United kingdom seems to meld with Paul Weller's increasing unease over the modernistic revival he'd single-handedly started, Going Underground was also the perfect demonstration of what its author had learned studying taut, potent mid-60s pop: grab the listener from the start, don't permit your grip slacken or a second become to waste. AP
38
Blondie – Eye of Glass (1979)
There are plenty of arguments for Center of Glass non really qualifying as the simply United kingdom No i punk unmarried. While Blondie came from the genre's outset wave in New York, their 1979 hit mainlined European electronic pioneers Kraftwerk and Heart of Drinking glass in its vivid, cycling riff, while Debbie Harry's rhapsodic vocals owed more to Donna Summer (whose I Feel Dear the group had been covering), with a twist of downtown irony. It pissed off the punk purists back home – which is, incidentally, pretty much the virtually punk affair you lot could exercise past 1979. LS
37
Slade – Merry Xmas Everybody (1973)
The production on Merry Xmas Everybody is fuzzy as tinsel (the result of recording in an echoey corridor), potent as plum pudding doused in brandy and accordingly poignant, straddling that late-December divide between nostalgia and optimism. Which is what, information technology's easy to imagine, gave information technology the edge over Wizzard'due south dementedly cheery I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday, the loser in what'southward now considered the original festive chart boxing, though information technology cemented glam every bit the official sound of Christmas. LS
36
David Bowie – Let's Dance (1983)
That opening crescendo, giving way to the Nile Rodgers-penned guitar funk riff, is ane of the most breathtakingly exciting moments in Bowie's catalogue, and the cracked croon of "put on your red shoes and trip the light fantastic toe the blues" a few seconds later is one of the coolest. Let'due south Dance remains an irresistible control. BBT
35
The Pretenders – Brass in Pocket (1980)
"We all only thought she was a groupie," noted the Damned's Rat Scabies of Chrissie Hynde when the Pretenders made it big, the kind of dismissive remark you suspect fuelled Brass in Pocket'due south surfeit of attitude: "I'thou special." Brilliantly, information technology sets its narcissistic swagger to music that'southward languid and sensual rather than ambitious: perfect popular ensues. AP
34
Rod Stewart – Da Ya Think I'm Sexy? (1978)
Conduct in listen Rod was request this question when his hair'southward book had been turned style across xi, and when he was giving an aural crotch-thrust at the opening of each chorus line. And yet, even though this vocal is utterly ridiculous, information technology is too utterly brilliant – the way the synth melody steps up before pirouetting downward is eternally replayable, and Rod's charisma is, sorry, a bit sexy. BBT
33
Tom Jones – Information technology's Not Unusual (1965)
On his quantum single, Tom Jones exhibits the kind of determined perkiness that tin only accompany truly desperate heartbreak. That double negative gives his defoliation away as he tries to come to terms with seeing his girl out with another guy, but it's no utilize: "I wanna die." In a Top 100 total of savagely unhappy yet upbeat songs, this is the well-nigh emotionally anomalous of all. BBT
32
Britney Spears – … Baby 1 More than Time (1999)
… Infant 1 More Time wasn't the first hit from Denniz Pop and Max Martin's Cheiron Studios – Backstreet Boys and Robyn predated Britney. But the Louisiana 16-year-old was to Cheiron what Kylie was to Stock Aitken Waterman: the first human action with the personality to overwhelm the blueprint (Euro melodies, metal's impact and social club-popular's sparkle) and make information technology her own. Rockists accuse Britney Spears of being an empty vessel, but it's her vocal Dna that shapes every single word of this song into a pop landmark. LS
31
Althea and Donna – Uptown Top Ranking (1977)
"Nah popular nah way," sang Althea and Donna, and they had a point. What's striking about the greatest reggae No ane of all is how unvarnished its repurposing of an old Alton Ellis information technology is, the lack of concession to white ears as Althea and Donna riff on the lyrics of Trinity'south Three Piece Suit with bare-eyed teenage insouciance. AP
30
Madonna – Vogue (1990)
Of Madonna'southward 13 No 1s, Faddy is her nearly poised, agile and sexually intoxicating. It is a portal into a earth of glamour – the litany of archetype Hollywood in the middle eight, but also the world of peacocking ballroom culture it was borne from – where you find Madonna herself presiding over the decadence with her commands and observations. Get up on the dancefloor, indeed. BBT
29
Whitney Houston – I Wanna Dance With Somebody (1987)
A masterpiece of constructed production: the gorgeously wrong approximations of horns, bass guitar and pianoforte have their own delirious beauty. But, of course, information technology'southward Whitney who seals information technology. That final chorus line, "with somebody who loves me", is so emphatic in knowing she deserves happiness, creating a paradoxically euphoric vocal nigh being lonely. BBT
28
The Kinks – You Really Got Me (1964)
The arrival of You Really Got Me amid the however relatively mild No 1s of the time must have been startling – it even makes the Beatles sound similar squares. One of the all fourth dimension groovy riffs, made from only two notes, powers the garage-ring energy equally the group's lust builds to a ferocious head. BBT
27
George Michael – Careless Whisper (1984)
Merely imagine this being the 3rd vocal you'd e'er written equally a band, turning a litany of featherbrained teenage crushes into one of the all-fourth dimension great ballads (and home to the most absorbing sax solo since Gerry Rafferty's Bakery Street). It wasn't Wham!'southward 3rd unmarried – George Michael astutely parcelled information technology out after, asserting his soulful, songwriterly bona fides after a raft of more cartoonish hits, and paving the way for a unlike shade of solo career. LS
26
The Rolling Stones – (I Can't Become No) Satisfaction (1965)
Sneering attitude and glowering negativity – provoked past everything from radio DJs to Tv set advertizing to a lady declining to take sex with Mick Jagger because she'southward on her period – aligned to the most famous guitar riff in history. Satisfaction is pissed off, provocative, dirty, thrilling; everything dandy about the mid-60s Rolling Stones condensed into 3 minutes and 45 seconds. AP
25
Bee Gees – Night Fever (1978)
Fortysomething years on, the opprobrium occasioned past the late-70s Bee Gees seems utterly baffling: the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack sounds like a masterclass in pop songwriting, as evidenced by Nighttime Fever'due south perfect evocation of pre-club anticipation: "On the waves of the air / There is dancing out there … We can steal information technology." AP
24
Freda Payne – Ring of Gold (1970)
Written by Motown brains trust Holland-Dozier-Holland, Band of Gold sees Payne sitting in a lonely sleeping accommodation, her wedding ceremony night gone disastrously unconsummated after some kind of freak-out by the groom. Although the verbal details are tactfully veiled by Payne, it's an unforgettably specific scenario, its horror hammered into your listen with that unyielding snare rhythm and told via a wondrous song line. BBT
23
The KLF – 3am Eternal (1991)
Jimmy Cauty and Beak Drummond had already written a volume on how to have a No 1 tape, The Transmission, after their novelty chart-topper Doctorin' the Tardis. As the KLF, they brought every one of their tricks to bear on this titanic piece of rave: hip-house rapping, gospel choirs, chants about an ancient race of people and a huge synthetic guitar riff. What on earth was information technology on about? The mystery was the terminal key to its success. BBT
22
George McCrae – Rock Your Babe (1974)
Ostensibly the outset disco No one and the product of songwriters Harry Casey and Richard Finch observing what worked on the dancefloors of Miami'south clubs, in truth, Rock Your Baby carved out a shimmering, supple musical space entirely of its own: organ-led, Hi Records-esque Memphis soul, complete with imploring falsetto vocal, over the hissy ticking of a primitive drum auto. AP
21
T Male monarch – Get Information technology On (1971)
Whatever of T Rex's magisterial run of No 1 singles could be in this list, but Get Information technology On just shades it, by dint of existence the about imperious sounding of the lot: the earthy R&B of Chuck Drupe recast into a defiantly modernistic shape, sexually charged in a style no teen pop had previously been. AP
20
Carly Rae Jepsen – Telephone call Me Peradventure (2012)
On first listen, the song seemed deceptively featherweight. The strings sound like ringtones; the guitar parts as though they were lifted from a PlayStation 2 game. Merely even the nigh synthetic production can't backbite from songwriting this ironclad. It is telling that Call Me Mayhap was intended every bit a folk song; it would be catchy played on a kazoo, or underwater. Read our full review here. Elle Hunt
19
Lil Nas 10 – One-time Town Road (remix feat Billy Ray Cyrus) (2019)
Old Town Road was unstoppable, with no apparent end to its appeal. Children rioted in their love for it. Its vast stable of remixes made it a genre-splicing Rosetta stone. Only as much as the song is an urtext in how to go viral (until the rules alter again), Old Town's Road'south magic lies in its affirming faith that a sunnier future is just around the adjacent bend, designer Stetson optional. Read our full review here. Owen Myers
18
Ian Dury & the Blockheads – Striking Me With Your Rhythm Stick (1979)
Dury told chatshow host Michael Parkinson that he wanted his success to dispel society'southward discomfort with and patronising attitudes to disability and provide hope to those for whom things hadn't turned out so well. Today, his all-time-known tune still sounds fresh and wonderfully off-kilter, a beacon of pop's ability to embrace oddity and celebrate the other. Read our full review here. Dave Simpson
17
Kylie Minogue – Can't Become You lot Out of My Head (2001)
This was ever a Kylie archetype in the making. Blest with the perfect pop voice, she delivers each line with merely enough bare space for the listener'southward own interpretations. Is it about a crush? A recent heartbreak? Does the person Minogue is singing well-nigh know about the obsession? What is the dark secret she is harbouring? Even those famous "la, la, las" accept on several functions, catalysing an irresistible earworm, a delirious, dancefloor-ready singalong moment and a distraction machinery for the recently brokenhearted. Read our full review here. Michael Cragg
16
Beyoncé – Crazy in Love (2003)
The announcement of her inflow via those unforgettable clarion horns, sampled from the Chi-Lites' 1970 hit Are You My Adult female? (Tell Me So), erred on regal fanfare, inspiring endless struts across makeshift dancefloors-turned-catwalks to this solar day. Beyoncé was auditioning for the function of popular's new reigning diva, a role she knew she had already secured. Read our total review hither. Yomi Adegoke
15
Jerry Lee Lewis – Great Assurance of Burn down (1957)
Jerry Lee yet sounds more lascivious than almost anyone. The sensations simply spill out of him – not but his phonation simply as well his piano playing, too, his right hand sliding down the keys in exhalations of delight. It was the devil's music, simply Great Balls of Fire still sounds like an act of God. Read our full review here. Michael Hann
14
Kate Bush – Wuthering Heights (1978)
The piano gently heralds the arrival of this haunted tale of lost love and longing, then that tight, high melody reels you in. It loops and lilts, ascending, descending, as Bush's vocal urges the story on, like Catherine striding across the moors. Wuthering Heights turned Bush-league into a popular star, the rules of which she continues to curve to her ain will: her individuality was set in stone from the very starting time. Read our full review hither. Rebecca Nicholson
thirteen
Frankie Goes to Hollywood – Relax (1984)
With not only its flagrant innuendo, but its wide-open synths, and swooning, psychedelic disco construction, the song was a complete wildcard – and the band performing it even more than then. At a pivotal, deeply conservative time in Britain's history, their crowning glory was what they brought out of the shadows and thrust into the light. Read our full review here. Aimee Cliff
12
Sinéad O'Connor – Goose egg Compares 2 U (1990)
By drawing out the emotional weight that eluded its creator, O'Connor fashioned one of the all-time smashing cover versions. Time has just cemented Nil Compares 2 U'southward place in the popular pantheon – 3 decades on, this haunting, centre-wrenching evocation of the grief of lost dearest remains peerless. Read our full review here. Rachel Aroesti
xi
The Beach Boys – Good Vibrations (1966)
Expert Vibrations was at once the mumbled inarticulacy and heightened feelings of love, only also the audio of a culture changing – almost in existent time. In this collision of sound and sentiment, Wilson and his bandmates succeeded in capturing the moment when everything nosotros thought nosotros knew about pop songs dissolved. Read our total review here. Laura Barton
x
Marvin Gaye – Heard It Through the Grapevine (1968)
Hither, Gaye would found himself as the bad boy of Motown, both a figurehead for rising anti-Vietnam sentiment and archetype of the socially witting songwriter. With I Heard Information technology Through the Grapevine, we notice him stepping out into his independence, all potential buoyed on by the force of his first creation. Read our total review hither. Ammar Kalia
9
Abba – Dancing Queen (1976)
It takes 18 seconds for Dancing Queen to drop into one of the greatest moments in pop. Information technology speaks volumes that the 18 seconds preceding it are pretty wonderful too: that song bursting into life on that impossibly joyous piano glissando, earlier eight bars of sparkling, effortless mid-tempo pop. Dancing Queen reminds u.s.a. that having the time of our lives is something that'due south always there, and that's always possible. Read our total review here. Jude Rogers
8
The Prodigy – Firestarter (1996)
Firestarter proved that the Prodigy was a squirming, sweating, flesh-bound fauna – the very opposite of the futuristic "braindance" coming from the electronic vanguard. It was pure humid animus, doused in petrol and set off to ruin someone'southward birthday party. Read our total review hither. Chal Ravens
7
The Human League – Don't Y'all Desire Me (1981)
Don't You Want Me stands as a shining example of what can happen when a bunch of relative amateurs with a point to prove and a keen aesthetic middle get down to work. And afterward all, role of the amuse of the Homo League and the moment they encapsulated, the experimentalism of post-punk meeting the new possibilities of electronic music engineering science, is that it was so refreshingly carefree, the sound of synth-pop coming in from the common cold. Read our full review here. Luke Turner
6
Michael Jackson – Billie Jean (1983)
Billie Jean reeks with the paranoia that came to dominate Jackson's career. Information technology is a hunted, haunted song about a paternity claim, which forsakes the lushness of his earlier work for stark, neurotic future-funk. While Thriller's title track is cartoonishly scary, Billie Jean is authentically scared. Read our full review here. Dorian Lynskey
5
Expressionless or Alive – Y'all Spin Me Round (Like a Record) (1984)
You Spin Me Circular (Like a Record) was secretly recorded while they were meant to be working on other songs. Past the cease of the 14-day session, the band and producers were reportedly "ready to murder" each other. It took a 36-hour cocaine-fuelled marathon to end the vocal, and 17 weeks for it to journey from No 79 to No 1. But there'southward a merciless, exacting energy to You Spin Me Round that would have got it over the line 1 way or another: it is taut, alien and utterly majestic. Read our full review hither. Ben Beaumont-Thomas
4
Donna Summer – I Feel Love (1977)
Not only has I Feel Dear never gone out of fashion, it has consistently jumped between genres in the intervening decades with incredible ease. In 1977, Brian Eno charged into the studio while David Bowie was recording, brandishing a copy of I Experience Love, and stated excitedly: "This is it, expect no further. This is going to change the audio of gild music for the next 15 years." His only mistake was 1 of gross under-exaggeration. Read our full review here. John Doran
iii
The Beatles – She Loves Yous (1963)
To hear She Loves You bursting out of a radio in the last week of August 1963 was to recognise a shout of triumph. Everything the Beatles had promised through the outset one-half of the twelvemonth institute its focus in their fourth single, an explosion of exuberance that forced the earth, not just their teenage fans, to admit their existence. She Loves Y'all presented an integrated whole, a sound of collective creativity that demolished the supremacy of solo artists, setting a trend that would dominate pop music for a generation. Read our total review hither. Richard Williams
2
The Specials – Ghost Town (1981)
It was the Specials' biggest hit and one of the biggest-selling singles of 1981. Its sound seems to presage a lot of subsequent music – you tin hear its gloomy echoes everywhere from Massive Assail to Burial – merely you lot almost never hear it on the radio or TV. Perhaps information technology's too bleak, too agonizing, its tone also hopeless: a reminder of something we'd rather forget. It sits in the past, brooding and glowering at united states of america, its remarkable, dark power undimmed. Read our total review hither. Alexis Petridis
1
Pet Shop Boys – Due west End Girls
W End Girls is a lens on to a glamorous demimonde. Primped young women and hungry immature men run into in a corner of London that is starting to gentrify, although still seedy enough to expose the transactions backside the amour. You tin nigh hear their egos rattle every bit they use each other for sex and drugs, 2d-mitt absurd and sly oneupmanship. The result is perfect popular equilibrium that nearly made Dusty Springfield crash her car the first time she heard it. Thirty-six years on, their debut unmarried nevertheless pulses with beguiling ambiguity – a heady rush of animalism, naivety, disco and opaque references to Lenin. Read the full review here.Laura Snapes
The playlist
This will be updated each 24-hour interval until the No 1 is announced. Spotify users, employ the playlist beneath or click here. Apple Music users tin click here.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/apr/27/the-100-greatest-uk-no-1s
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