I got a gal named Daisy - she almost drives me crazy

Continuing my trip up the list of the most streamed songs for each year.  

1955 : Tutti Frutti - Little Richard

I am, of course, aware of this song and from what I remember there's not a lot to it - both in terms of length and lyrics.  But what there is is pretty ground-breaking.

And yeah, coming in at 2:23, it's our shortest track so far.  And there's not exactly masses of content but it's very fresh and urgent - Little Richard is not messing around with this track.  And ,as with the previous track, you can see how this shook things up and fed into several genres over the years.  And who's going to argue with "A-wop-bop-a-loo-mop-a-lop-bam-boom"?!?  Or his haircut.

Wikipedia has quite a lot on the track, a surprising amount of which debate whether the original lyrics related to anal sex or not.  It seems reasonably clear that whatever the original lyrics were, someone decided they needed toning down and so, for no clear reason, they called on Dorothy LaBostrie, a waitress, to do so - she received handsome royalty cheques for the rest of her life as a result.  It was covered almost immediately by Pat Boone (who rarely gets mentioned these days, but was second only to Elvis for record sales in the late 50s) who got to #12 in the US charts (with Little Richard only making it to #21).  Like the previous song, it has also been covered by Elvis and played live by The Beatles - a version also exists featuring George Harrison and Eric Clapton and another one with Ringo Starr, Elton John and Marc Bolan.  The mind boggles!  

Further research tells us that versions also exist by MC5, Sting, Cliff Richard, Fleetwood Mac, Queen and The Chipmunks - I bet most of those are bloody awful, although I imagine Queen give it a good go.  I appreciate that it's an historic and influential track (The Chipmunks only cover classic tracks after all) but I'm quite surprised that it's the most streamed track from the year - I wonder how many people sit down and think "you know what I need to listen to right now?  Tutti Frutti!".

One track somewhat stands out as potential competition for the top spot in this year - Bill Haley's "Rock Around The Clock", although there is potential confusion as to whether it counts towards 1954 (US release) or 1955 (UK release).  Two other potential tracks "Stranger In Paradise" and "Unchained Melody" hurt their chances by having three versions make the top ten during the year - covering recent tracks was really quite the thing back then.  A Wikipedia sidetrack which I'd never considered - why is "Unchained Melody" so named?  Because (and it makes perfect sense when you think about it) it was the theme for the film Unchained.  Doh!  Another somewhat surprising fact about the song is that the version that did best in 1995 (reaching #1) was by Jimmy Young (the Radio 2 DJ - and it was one of two #1s he had this year).  And apparently the biggest selling track in the UK this year was Slim Whitman's "Rose Marie" - which is a 1924 original, so can't quite be accused of being a recent cover.

Overall, I like the energy in this track and I'm happy for Little Richard to take the year but I can understand if Bill Haley asks for a recount - they're both very influential tracks in the history of modern music.

1954 - The first proper music
1956 - Because you're mine...