Chart Week: October 27, 1984
\nSong: \u201cPurple Rain\u201d – Prince & The Revolution
\nChart Position: #4, 4th week on the chart. Peaked at #2 for two weeks in November. <\/p>\n
(This ended up being a big coincidence, but not a bad choice for the 50th entry in this series!)<\/p>\n
One of my favorite things about listening to old AT40\u2019s is when they cause me to pour through old charts to examine the movement of various songs. I\u2019m fascinated equally by songs that rocketed up the charts quickly, songs that hung around for months and months and months, and songs that had a brief moment on the charts before disappearing. It\u2019s not just the trivia surrounding those songs I enjoy, but also thinking back to that time and remembering how (sometimes if) those songs penetrated the culture of the moment.<\/p>\n
\u201cPurple Rain\u201d is a great example of a song with a chart history that gets my mental music memory neurons firing.<\/p>\n
\u201cPurple Rain\u201d was the third single Prince released from the Purple Rain<\/em> soundtrack. By then he was pretty much king of the world. Both \u201cWhen Doves Cry\u201d and \u201cLet\u2019s Go Crazy\u201d had topped the charts. Purple Rain<\/em> was, briefly, the number one movie in the country, in a summer that was loaded with great movies. And the Purple Rain<\/em> soundtrack had been the number one album for months. <\/p>\n It seemed like a sure thing that \u201cPurple Rain\u201d would also reach number one and serve as a cherry on the top of a magnificent year for Prince.<\/p>\n Nothing about the song\u2019s chart rise put that into question. In four quick weeks it was already at #4. It was just a matter of time, right?<\/p>\n The song moved up to #3 its fifth week on the chart, sitting behind \u201cI Just Called To Say I Love You,\u201d and \u201cCaribbean Queen.\u201d All three songs held those spots the following week.<\/p>\n The week of November 17, \u201cPurple Rain\u201d climbed one more spot to #2. But it was leapfrogged by the song that ended up blocking it from #1. \u201cPurple Rain\u201d remained at #2 for two weeks before it began a rapid descent. By the last chart of the year, covering the week of December 22, \u201cPurple Rain\u201d had slipped from the Top 40 to #54.<\/p>\n The song that kept it from topping the Billboard Hot 100? Wham\u2019s \u201cWake Me Up Before You Go-Go,\u201d which held the top spot for three weeks. I hated that song when it came out. There was something in its bouncy optimism that seemed fake and forced to me. Perhaps because we were getting into the deep fall, when the sunlight disappears and we start to come to terms with spending months inside \u201cPurple Rain\u201d seemed much more appropriate to the moment. <\/p>\n While I came to eventually like some of Wham\u2019s songs, I still hate that one. The crime of keeping \u201cPurple Rain,\u201d one of the greatest songs ever, out of the top slot is one that can not be forgiven.<\/p>\n There was never an official video for \u201cPurple Rain.\u201d I wonder if that affected its chart success in some, small way? Here is Prince and the Revolution\u2019s performance in Syracuse, NY on March 30, 1985.<\/p>\n