Last year, in the midst of compiling my “Worst Number One Songs of the Rock Era” series, I began contemplating the sad, sorry fate of those records that have come up just short of the top slot on Billboard’s pop charts. After all, nobody celebrates even the greatest, or biggest-selling, #2 hit as a colossal achievement, the same way even the worst #1 hit ever (“Honey”?) is honored. You don’t see Fred Bronson compiling five editions of The Billboard Book of Number 2 Hits, do you?

Put it this way: “Waiting for a Girl like You” sat at #2 for 10 weeks in 1981, behind a bunch of fat guys doing aerobics. “I Want to Know What Love Is” got to #1 for two weeks in 1985. A quarter-century later, which song is considered Foreigner’s biggest hit?

So, beginning this week we honor some of those great songs that, for whatever reason, never got that Casey Kasem drumroll on American Top 40. And when I say “for whatever reason,” I mean it: Sure, many times a single has simply been blocked by a bigger, better rival, but heaven knows there have been plenty of payola/cocaine/label/radio shenanigans through the years that have kept a deserving song from ascending to glory. As I explored last year, the Top 40 has never been a perfect beast; who knows how many times a single has gotten stuck at #2 because some program director’s girlfriend just adored those cute Osmond boys?

Today we start with five singles that never reached the top during the post-“Rock Around the Clock” 1950s. But first, a brief explanation of my methodology for including records in this survey. Initial choices were based on quality; if one’s first response to a song title is “I can’t believe that didn’t make it to #1,” or if a #2 single seems (in retrospect) infinitely better than the song that screwed it out of the top spot, it’s here. Beyond that, over the course of the survey I’ll feature some singles that topped out at #2 during the latter stages of another song’s extended run in the top spot, figuring things might have been different if it weren’t for some amount of programming inertia at radio. After I identify my picks for each decade, I’ll list some other #2s and open the comments section for debate on who got shafted the worst.

Here we go! (more…)