Number One Song

Number One hits are the tunes that have the most popular success in that week. In the UK these are the most listened to songs based on audio and video streams, downloads, CDs and vinyl, as measured by the official Charts Company. Looking back, for a long period of time, (up until 1988), the music paper, NME, compiled their own charts, leading to their being a small handful of unofficial number ones in a year. The Beatles signed a nine year contact with EMI records in 1962. In later years they would go on to top the charts on both sides of the Atlantic: no group has posted more number one hits than the Fab Four. The Beach Boys had their first US Hot 100 single in 1964 with I Get Around, with a couple more successes in the sixties (Help Me Rhonda, Good Vibrations), before a longer wait for their No. 1 song Kokomo in 1988. New Waves bands, The Police and Blondie are also multiple chart toppers, with breakthrough successes in 1979.