THE 100 GREATEST No.1 SINGLES

1950s & 60s   1970s   1980s   1990s & 2000

30. Another Brick in the Wall Part II - Pink Floyd.
    Album band Pink Floyd's only UK single throughout the seventies and their only chart topping 45
31. Bohemian Rhapsody - Queen.
    Seven minutes of rock opera, a pioneering pop video featuring space age mid-70s special effects and ("Bismillah! NO!") the most overblown lyrics in rock history.
32. Brass In Pocket - Pretenders.
    First number one of the eighties for iconic rock front-woman Chrissie Hynde, it was on the chart for ten weeks before it finally hit top spot.
33. Bridge Over Troubled Water - Simon & Garfunkel.
    Paul Simon took his love of gospel music, Art Garfunkel's silver tonsils and an in-joke about his then girl friend discovering a few grey hairs ("Sail on Silver Girl") and turned them into what has become a standard.
34. Dancing Queen - ABBA.
    The perfect pop single from the opening piano glissando to the final fadeout, it was performed by the band at King Gustaf 's wedding, where the new Swedish Queen was mainduced to the world.
35. Get It On - T-Rex.
    The biggest selling of Marc Bolan's four UK number ones and his only US hit (where it was renamed Bang a Gong).
36. Heart of Glass - Blondie.
    Crossover hit for the New York new wavers who won over a new audience with this disco flavoured track which started out life as a tongue-in-cheek send up and went on to become their first chart topper.
37. Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick - Ian Dury & the Blockheads.
    Irresistible. One million people bought it in a single week in 1979 - and from young punks to their grannies, what they were singing along to was a joyous hymn to world unity through music, dance and sex! "From Milan to Yakatan, Every woman's, Every man……."
38. I Feel Love - Donna Summer.
    Pioneering electro-pop single produced by studio legend Giorgio Moroder that made Donna Summer the dancefloor diva of the late 70s.
39. Imagine - John Lennon.
    Beginner's piano part, utopian sentiments, simple tune, basic arrangement…….How can it be that simple?
40. I'm Not in Love - 10CC.
    Graham Gouldman and Eric Stewart's ironic love song explaining just how and why the singer isn't in love (and in the process giving all the reasons that he is). Most of the "instruments" on the track are actually synthesised samples of the group's singing voices.
41. I Will Survive - Gloria Gaynor.
    Adopted as a feminist and gay anthem worldwide (and always a winner at the office party), Gloria recorded the song in a back brace after a nasty fall from the stage left her temporarily paralysed.
42. Maggie May - Rod Stewart.
    This started as a B side to a song called "Reason to Believe." It had just scraped into the UK top twenty when a DJ in Cleveland, Ohio started playing the flipside - a tale of a schoolboy losing his virginity. Within a month the gravel-voiced bog-brush coifed Stewart was a world star.
43. Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me) - Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel.
    Scathing lyrics, needle-sharp arrangement and the finest pregnant pause in recorded music ("…………………………………There ain't no more, you've taken everything")
44. Merry Xmas Everybody - Slade.
    Everybody's Christmas favourite sold over 300,000 copies on the day of its release and has been a seasonal favourite ever since.
45. Mull of Kintyre/Girls School - Wings.
    McCartney's tribute to his Scottish hideaway ( 21 bagpipers and all) was the first single to sell more than two million copies in the UK.
46. Night Fever - Bee Gees.
    Manager Robert Stigwood was producing Saturday Night - a film about the New York disco scene and needed a soundtrack and title track. The Bee Gees gave him some songs they'd just recorded including Night Fever. The movie became Saturday Night Fever, the songs became the best selling soundtrack album ever. The Bee Gees became superstars.
47. Rivers of Babylon / Brown Girl In The Ring - Boney M.
    The single which almost hit number one twice in the same year. Rivers of Babylon had sunk from one to twenty, when DJs started playing the b-side, Brown Girl in the Ring. It gave the record a new lease of life taking it back up to number two before it finally exited the charts after a 40 week stay.
48. Space Oddity - David Bowie.
    Featuring the Rolf Harris-endorsed stylophone and pre-cape Rick Wakeman on keyboard, this was originally released to tie in with the 1969 moon landings. The "lost in space" ending didn't really match the space age mood of optimism and it would be six years before the song hit number one.
49. The Tears of a Clown - Smokey Robinson and the Miracles.
    A collaboration between Smokey Robinson and Stevie Wonder who joined forces on the song after a quick chat at the Motown Christmas party. The result was this killer combination of cheerful (Wonder) tune belying a heartfelt (Robinson) lyric. It lay buried on an album for two years before it's successful single release in 1970.
50. Video Killed The Radio Star - Buggles.
    The first video ever on MTV was of this 1979 hit by Trevor Horn and Geoff Downes. The pair would subsequently go on to join pomp-rockers Yes for a while, and Horn later became one of the most successful record producers of the 1980s.
51. Voodoo Chile - Jimi Hendrix Experience.
    Posthumous (and only) number one for possibly the greatest, probably the most influential and certainly the most theatrical guitarist ever.
52. Without You - Nilsson.
    Written by Badfinger's Peter Ham and Tommy Evans, both of whom took their own lives in disillusionment with the music industry. Harry Nilsson took their Beatles sound-a-like album track and turned it into the world beating hit that has been covered more than a hundred times since.
53. Wuthering Heights - Kate Bush.
    Debut single inspired by the final pages of the Emily Bronte novel where Cathy takes to the moors. Kate's take on the story involved a white Victorian nightie, hands-free head mike to aid expressive dance moves and the vocal gymnastics which made her an overnight star when this topped the charts.
54. YMCA - Village People.
    One Cowboy, one Indian ,one biker, one cop, one builder (with hard hat), several big 'taches, very big tune, crowd pleasing dance moves………Number one hit.
55. You're The One That I Want - John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John.
    Travolta was already a world star in the wake of Saturday Night Fever. Olivia Newton-John was familiar here, but not huge in the US, when they joined together as star-crossed teenagers in the hit movie Grease. This was the first of the six hits from the film.