Music History Today: January 30, 2021

January 30, 1988: INXS land their first and only US Number 1 with "Need You Tonight" for one week.

Need You Tonight basically a musical booty call, with lines that could work if you're Michael Hutchence but would get the rest of us laughed out of the room.  

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It's not clear how his night ends, but he takes his best shot at the end:

I've got to let you know
You're one of my kind 

Hutchence didn't overthink it - he wrote the lyric in one night. 

Read more: Songfacts

January 30, 1961: The Shirelles became the first girl group to have the Number 1 song on the Billboard Hot 100 when "Will You Love Me Tomorrow" reached the top for the first of two weeks. 

“Will You Love Me Tomorrow” was the first song from what would become the early-’60s girl-group boom to hit #1. All the ingredients of those classic girl-group songs were there from the beginning: the yearning-but-poised lead vocal, the fun little intricacies in the backing harmonies, the grand but stately backbeat, the strings playfully flitting all through it. 

The Shirelles

It’s a perfect pop sound, a sound that took universal teenage emotions and made them sound regal and sophisticated. Before too long, producers would be turning singles like this into mini-radio plays, with teeming casts and echoing sound-effects. But with “Will You Love Me Tomorrow,” it’s a just a girl asking for affirmation, hoping that nothing will change once limbs disentangle themselves in the morning. 

Read more: Stereogum

January 30, 1970: Edison Lighthouse began a five-week run at Number 1 in the U.K. with "Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)."

"Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)" is by any definition, a classic. But it was far from the only classic ‘go-to’ singer Tony Burrows crooned. 

Tony Burrows

There were the Beach Boys-esque harmonies he added to the soaring “Let’s Go to San Francisco” by The Flower Pot Men, the co-lead vocals he blasted with The Brotherhood of Man, not to mention his rendition of “Gimme Dat Ding,” by the Pipkins, and tailor-made by Albert Hammond.  He was “The Man Of 1000 Voices,” a moniker that aptly described the many ways in which he could tackle a tune.

Read more: Cultural Sonar

January 30, 1965: Shirley Ellis reaches Number 3 on the Billboard Pop chart with a novelty tune called "The Name Game."

"The Name Game" is an American popular music song co-written and performed first by Shirley Ellis as a rhyming game that creates variations on a person's name. It was released during late 1964 as "The Name Game". The record scored number 3 on the Billboard Hot 100, and number 4 on the magazine's R&B charts during 1965. The record was re-released in 1966 and again in 1973. 

Read more: Wikipedia

January 30, 1982: Daryl Hall and John Oates took the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for one week with their hit "I Can't Go for That (No Can Do)."

Daryll Hall and John Oates, or Hall and Oates, is probably one of the most successful musical duos in history. Dabbling with their very own sound of pop and soft rock, the duo was a landmark attraction in the late 70s and early 80s. 

Daryl Hall & John Oates

One of their most successful singles was the chart-topping “I Can’t Go For That (No Can Do)” from 1981. The title was a phrase that Hall often used when peer pressure often had him in an awkward spot. 

Read more: I Love Classic Rock

 

Need You Tonight
INXS