Hit Parade | Music History and Music Trivia - Second-Chance Hits Edition Part 1
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3.9 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 16 December 2023
⏱️ 57 minutes
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Summary
In 2023, several hits from years ago—sometimes decades—made it to No. 1 on Billboard’s pop charts after falling short the first time: Taylor Swift’s “Cruel Summer.” The Weeknd’s “Die for You.” Miguel’s “Sure Thing.” And, most improbably but delightfully, Brenda Lee’s 65-year-old holiday bop “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.”
What’s going on here? A lot of it has to do with the ways streaming, YouTube and TikTok have changed the charts. But the truth is, the second-chance hit is as old as the charts themselves
From David Bowie to Prince, Sonny and Cher to Guns n’ Roses, the Miracles to the Moody Blues, there are certain songs the music biz won’t give up on. To say nothing of all those holiday perennials, from “Monster Mash” to “Last Christmas.”
Join Chris Molanphy as he explains why certain songs keep coming back and counts down a dozen favorite second-chance hits. If it first they don’t succeed, chart, chart again.
Podcast production by Kevin Bendis.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You're listening Ad-Free on Amazon Music. |
| 0:03.8 | Hey there, hit parade listeners. |
| 0:06.5 | What you're about to hear is part one of this episode. |
| 0:10.4 | Part two will arrive in your podcast feed at the end of the month. |
| 0:14.2 | Would you like to hear this episode all at once the day it drops? |
| 0:18.0 | Sign up for Slate Plus. |
| 0:19.5 | It supports not only this show, but all of Slate's |
| 0:23.0 | acclaimed journalism and podcasts. Just go to slate.com slash hitparade plus. You'll get to hear |
| 0:30.7 | every hit parade episode in full the day it arrives. Plus, hit parade The The Bridge are bonus episodes, with guest interviews, |
| 0:39.9 | deeper dives on our episode topics, and pop chart trivia. Once again, to join, that's Slate.com |
| 0:47.3 | slash Hit Parade Plus. Thanks. And now, please enjoy part one of this Hit Parade episode. |
| 1:00.0 | Welcome to Hit Parade, a podcast of Pop Chart History from Slate magazine about the hits |
| 1:10.3 | from coast to coast. I'm Chris Malanfi, |
| 1:13.1 | chart analyst, pop critic, and writer of Slate's Why is the song number one series? On today's show, |
| 1:19.7 | for most of the last two months, this has been the most played song in America. The song is called |
| 1:27.0 | Cruel Summer, despite the fact that we've been deep into the fall. |
| 1:32.3 | Unsurprisingly, because this is 2023, this smash hit is by Imperial Pop Deity and Time |
| 1:41.0 | Magazine's Person of the Year, Taylor Swift. |
| 1:44.4 | Taylor can make anything a hit these days. |
| 1:48.4 | But the most surprising thing about Cruel Summer is that it isn't a 2023 recording. It isn't from her 22 album Midnights, |
| 2:05.8 | either. Cruel Summer was recorded and first released way back in 2019, before the COVID pandemic, |
| 2:14.2 | and four Taylor Swift albums ago. |
... |
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