Most Played Record In UK Named
The most played record in the United Kingdom of the past 70 years has just been named by Phonographic Performance Ltd. And despite what you may think, it’s not ‘Seven Nation Army’ by The White Stripes.
The chart was compiled by the British performing rights group PPL (the Phonographic Performance Ltd) who took in data from 70 years of radio, club, shop and jukebox plays to find out which song got the most airing (from its original release through to recent exposure) from 1957 until 1994.
Surprisingly Procol Harum's 1967 single ‘A Whiter Shade of Pale’ hit the top spot, beating Queen's ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ into second place.
"When poor old Freddie Mercury died, it gave a huge boost to 'Bohemian Rhapsody’,” Procol Harum bandmember Gary Brooker told Billboard in a statement of breathtaking tactlessness, “But 'Whiter Shade' has never been the subject of a lot of hype, and it wasn't when it came out."
At time of writing, no representative for Freddie Mercury has come forward to defend the Queen singer’s blatant and unreasonable attempt to hype his song into the top ten by dropping dead of AIDS.
The earlier recording in the top 70 is Glenn Miller’s Orchestra with ‘In The Mood’ from 1939, at No. 35, while showing the power of the seasonal single, ‘White Christmas’ (1942) and ‘Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town’ (1943) by Bing Crosby got the No. 16 and No. 58 slots respectively.
The top ten list is:
- Procul Harum ‘A Whiter Shade Of Pale’
- Queen ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’
- Wet Wet Wet ‘Love Is All Around’
- The Everly Brothers ‘All I Have To Do Is Dream’/’Claudette’
- Bryan Adams ‘(Everything I Do) I Do It For You’
- Abba ‘Dancing Queen’
- Elvis Presley ‘All Shook Up’
- Rod Stewart ‘Maggie May’
- The Beatles ‘Hello Goodbye’
- The Beatles ‘Get Back’
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