#1: Lightning’s Girl by Nancy Sinatra
City: Lloydminster, AB
Radio Station: CKSA
Peak Month: October 1967
Peak Position in Lloydminster ~ #2
Peak Position in Vancouver ~ #17
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #24
YouTube: “Lighting’s Girl”
Lyrics: “Lightning’s Girl”
Nancy Sinatra is the daughter of crooner Frank Sinatra and was born in New Jersey in 1940. When she was 5 years old he recorded a song about her titled “Nancy, With the Laughing Face”. At the age of twenty she began her career appearing on The Frank Sinatra Timex Show: Welcome Home Elvis. This was a television special on the occasion of Elvis Presley’s discharge from the U.S. Army after being drafted to into the services in 1958. Nancy was sent by her father to meet Elvis at the airport in front of a pack of photographers. In 1960, she also got married to singer and actor, Tommy Sands.
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#12: I’ll Forget Her Tomorrow by Witness Inc.
City: Regina, SK
Radio Station: CJME
Peak Month: August 1967
Peak Position in Regina ~ #3
Peak Position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube: “I’ll Forget Her Tomorrow” (original by Randy and the Rainbows)
YouTube: “I’ll Forget Her Tomorrow” (cover by Tommy Vann and the Echoes)
Lyrics: N/A
Witness Inc. was a band from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. They formed in 1967 and won the Saskatoon Teen-Town Band Battle. They immediately became a touring sensation in the western provinces. They released a series of singles which became increasingly pop after the second. The band finally caught on in Ontario after several years and many personnel changes. The original band consisted of Kenny Shields on lead vocals, Ed Clynton on guitar, Dennis Tremeer on bass guitar, Les Bateman on organ and piano, and Craig Kaleal on drums. The website, Citizen Freak, “was surprised to learn that the band traveled to New Mexico to record their first 45, probably at Norman Petty’s studio in Clovis.” Their first single release was “I’ll Forget Her Tomorrow”.
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#119: Johnny Remember Me by John Leyton
City: Hamilton, ON
Radio Station: CKOC
Peak Month: October 1961
Peak Position in Hamilton ~ #11
Peak Position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube: “Johnny Remember Me”
Lyrics: “Johnny Remember Me”
John Leyton was born in 1936 in the seaside town of Frinton-on-Sea in Essex, England. He served in the Royal Army Service Corps. He studied drama, paying his way through drama school with bit-part roles in films and on television. In 1958 these included bit parts in The Square Peg, Doctor at Sea, and The Devil’s Disciple. In 1959, he appeared as a prisoner in an uncredited role in the British war film Danger Within. Next, he has a minor part as a recruit in the 1959 British comedy film I’m All Right Jack. He also had small roles in The Captain’s Table (where he plays a bystander watching a beauty contest), and film about P.O.W.s in Italy who plan to escape from prison, titled Breakout. Leyton also appeared for one episode of the British TV series The Invisible Man. His first major acting role was his portrayal of Ginger in a 1960 Granada TV adaptation of Biggles. This earned him a large following of young female fans and led to the formation of a John Leyton fan club. Following the success of Biggles, Leyton was persuaded by his manager to audition as a singer for record producer Joe Meek.
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#97: Border Song by Elton John
City: Edmonton, AB
Radio Station: CHED
Peak Month: September 1970
Peak Position in Edmonton ~ #14
Peak Position in Vancouver ~ #21
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #92
YouTube: “Border Song”
Lyrics: “Border Song”
Reginald Kenneth Dwight was born in 1947. When he was three years old he astounded his family when he was able to play The Skater’s Waltz by Émile Waldteufel by ear at the piano. When he was eleven years old he won a scholarship as a Junior Exhibitor at the Royal Academy of Music. Between the ages of 11 and 15 he attended the Academy on Saturday mornings. In 1962, by the age of 15, he was performing with his group, The Corvettes, at the Northwood Hills Hotel (now the Northwood Hills Public House) in a northern borough of London. While he was playing with a band called Bluesology in the mid-60s he adopted the stage name Elton John. His stage name, which became his legal name in 1967, was taken from Bluesology saxophonist Elton Dean, and their lead singer, Long John Baldry.
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#14: Break Away From That Boy by the Newbeats
City: Regina, SK
Radio Station: CJME
Peak Month: February 1965
Peak Position in Regina ~ #1
Peak Position in Vancouver ~ #8
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #40
YouTube: “Break Away (from That Boy)”
Lyrics: “Break Away (from That Boy)”
The Newbeats were a vocal trio formed in 1964 with the lead vocalist Larry Henley. As children, brothers Dean Mathis (born in 1939 in Hahira, Georgia) and Mark Mathis (born in 1942 in Hahira, Georgia), were taught to play guitar by their mother. They subsequently learned to play piano, bass guitar, and drums. They both played in a band at Bremen High School, in Bremen, Georgia. After finishing their public education, they decided on a career in the music industry. At the age of 17, Dean Mathis joined Paul Howard’s Western swing band in 1956 as pianist. Next, Dean joined Dale Hawkins’ band, where brother Mark soon joined as a bass player. They stayed with Dale Hawkins’ band for two years, including on the 1957 Top 30 hit single “Susie Q”.
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#6: Graceland by Paul Simon
City: Burnaby, BC
Radio Station: CFML
Peak Month: January 1987
Peak Position in Burnaby ~ #4
Peak Position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #81
Paul Frederic Simon was born in 1941 in Newark, New Jersey, to Hungarian-Jewish parents. His dad was a bandleader who went by the name Lou Sims. When he was eleven years old he met Art Garfunkel and were both part of a sixth grade drama production of Alice In Wonderland. By 1954 Paul and Art were singing at school dances. In 1957, in their mid-teens, they recorded the song “Hey, Schoolgirl” under the name “Tom & Jerry”, a name that was given to them by their label Big Records. The single reached No. 49 on the pop charts.
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#15: Lady Of The 80s by Loverboy
City: Regina, SK
Radio Station: CJME
Peak Month: June 1981
Peak Position in Regina ~ #5
Peak Position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube: “Lady Of The 80s”
Lyrics: “Lady Of The 80s”
Loverboy is a band formed in 1979. It has been stated by Mike Reno that their name was chosen due to a dream by Paul Dean. He had come up with the name after spending the previous night with some of the bandmates, including Reno and their girlfriends, before going to the movies. The girlfriends were browsing through fashion magazines, where the guys in the band saw a Cover Girl advertisement. Cover Girl became Cover Boy, and then became Loverboy in Dean’s dream later that night. After being told by Dean about the dream the next morning, Reno agreed to try it out and it stuck.
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#60: Russians by Sting
City: Saskatoon, SK
Radio Station: CKOM
Peak Month: March 1986
Peak Position in Saskatoon ~ #8
Peak Position in Vancouver ~ #22
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #16
Peak Position on Italian Singles chart ~ #1
Peak Position on French Singles chart ~ #2
Peak Position on West German Singles chart ~ #4
Peak Position on Belgian Singles chart ~ #7
Peak Position on Dutch Singles chart ~ #7
Peak Position on Australian Singles chart ~ #11
Peak Position on Irish Singles chart ~ #11
Peak Position in UK Singles chart ~ #12
Peak Position on Swiss Singles chart ~ #13
Peak Position on Swedish Singles chart ~ #16
YouTube: “Russians”
Lyrics: “Russians”
Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner was born in Wallsend on Tyne, North Tyneside, Northumberland, England, in 1951. His mother was a hairdresser and his father was a milkman and engineer. When he was ten-years-old, young Sumner got introduced to Spanish guitar, when a family friend left it at the Sumner residence. After high school he was variously a bus conductor, building labourer and tax officer. He went to college and from 1974-76 was a public school teacher. Sumner performed jazz in the evening, weekends and during breaks from college and teaching, playing with the Phoenix Jazzmen, Newcastle Big Band, and Last Exit. He gained his nickname, “Sting,” due to his habit of wearing a black and yellow sweater with hooped stripes with the Phoenix Jazzmen. Bandleader Gordon Solomon thought Sumner looked like a bee which prompted the name “Sting.” According to Sting, in an interview with CBS Sunday Morning, “they thought I looked like a wasp, and they’d joke. They called me Sting. They thought it was hilarious…That became my name.”
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#23: Pretty Flamingo by Manfred Mann
City: Regina, SK
Radio Station: CJME
Peak Month: August 1966
Peak Position in Regina ~ #6
Peak Position in Vancouver ~ #8
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #29
Peak Position on Irish Singles chart ~ #1
Peak Position on Rhodesian Singles chart ~ #1
Peak Position on UK Singles chart ~ #1
Peak Position on Norwegian Singles chart ~ #3
Peak Position on Swedish Singles chart ~ #6
YouTube: “Pretty Flamingo”
Lyrics: “Pretty Flamingo”
Manfred Sepse Lubowitz was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 1940. Raised in a Jewish family, Manfred studied music at the University of the Witwatersrand, and formed a rock ‘n roll band called The Vikings in 1959. Lubowitz was against the South African system of Apartheid, first introduced in 1948, and becoming entrenched and expanded under the leadership of Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd. So Manfred Lubowitz moved to Britain. He began to write for Jazz News under the pseudonym, Manfred Manne. In time he shortened his adopted surname to Mann. In 1962 he met Mike Hugg at a holiday camp at Clacton-on-Sea. (Mike Hugg was born in Hampshire, England, in 1940, and had studied jazz growing up). They decided to start a band and named it the Mann-Hugg Blues Brothers. They added Paul Jones and Tom McGuiness to the band, the latter who was with Eric Clapton’s band The Roosters.
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#10: Radar Love by Golden Earring
City: Hamilton, ON
Radio Station: CKOC
Peak Month: August-September 1974
Peak Position Hamilton ~ #2
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #2
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #13
YouTube: “Radar Love”
Lyrics: “Radar Love”
Golden Earring is a Dutch band formed in 1961 in The Hague. Founder George Kooymans was born in The Hague in 1948. Together with Rinus Gerritsen, they originally formed a duo called The Tornados. But changed their name to The Golden Earrings when they learnt of The Tornados, the UK instrumental group who had just had a hit with “Telstar”. The name The Golden Earrings was taken from an instrumental called “Golden Earrings” performed by the British group the Hunters, for whom they served as opening and closing act. Gerritsen was also born in The Hague, in 1946, and learned to play bass guitar. The duo added more musicians to expand to a pop-rock band. The Golden Earrings had a Top Ten Dutch pop hit with their debut single “Please Go”, recorded in 1965. In 1966, “That Day” reached #2 on the Dutch pop singles chart. These singles had some echoes of The Beatles sound in the mid-60s.
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