One hit wonder

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One-hit wonder (more rarely one-hit wonder or Einhitwunder ) is from the Anglo-Saxon music industry derived expression for artists that are just a musical work in the hit parade could be placed. The German-language term “ mayfly ” has a wider meaning beyond the field of music, especially in media reporting, and is therefore only a synonym for the English-language term to a limited extent.

General

In the early days of rock 'n' roll from 1955, the American record industry tried to duplicate the success of Elvis Presley with other artists. It was right if spontaneous ideas produced a single hit, but there was no follow-up hit by the same performer. The term “one-hit-wonder” was created at that time and was intended to identify performers who had a big hit and either did not publish another song or other music titles did not achieve hit status. The question arises as to what characterizes a hit. Hit is a track that has reached one of the top positions on a hit parade. Depending on the extent of the placement success, colloquial terms are also used as a “number one hit”, “top hit” or “super hit”.

Demarcation

In the strict demarcation, an artist or a group has only produced one hit and has not added a follow-up single or an LP. All definitions have in common that a high position in a national hit parade is achieved, but this success cannot be repeated afterwards. According to this definition, the number of one-hit wonders is manageable. Ideally, the one-hit wonder is a number one hit that is not followed by another single by the same artist. However, the usual definition is based on performers who have reached the top 40 of the national hit parade with only one song. Wayne Jancik limits his one-hit wonders in the US to the Billboard Top 40 pop charts with a "rest period" of 5 years, during which no further hit by the same artist may make it into the top 40. In addition, he does not take into account those artists who made a name change and had another hit under a new name.

In addition, its evaluation begins in 1955 and ends in 1992. In the narrower sense, only singles may be included in the evaluation, so that LPs cannot be taken into account. If you wanted to include them, placement in the top 40 of the LP charts would be a prerequisite. From this factual and temporal delimitation problem it can be seen that statistical data collection difficulties cannot be ruled out when measuring a one-hit wonder. Evaluations or assessments of a one-hit wonder should be rated accordingly carefully. The classification is even more difficult when it comes to an international comparison of performers. Thus Petite fleur by Chris Barber's Jazz Band (1959) in the US a one-hit wonder, but in no case from a British perspective, because in his home country Barber had another Top 40 hit and three LPs in the LP charts. Hank Locklin, on the other hand, was a one-hit wonder only from the perspective of the US pop hit parade with Please Help Me, I'm Falling (1960); this does not apply to the country charts with 13 top 40 successor hits.

The first one-hit wonder after the Jancik evaluation was Joan Weber's Let Me Go Lover , which was number one for four weeks in January 1955 and sold 500,000 times. Weber had released other singles, but none of them could reach the hit parade. The first real one-hit wonder of rock 'n' roll is therefore Blue Suede Shoes by Carl Perkins , who in May 1956 was able to advance to first place in both the pop, rhythm & blues and country charts.

Sampler

The evaluation of one-hit wonders is the subject of numerous CD samplers as part of secondary exploitation. “A hit - and away from the window again”, this is how Bayern 3 presenter Ulli Wenger loosely defines the musical ephemera that was only once in the spotlight. The songs presented in the radio DJ's broadcast are published on several sampler CDs. A large number of other CD samplers have also appeared on the subject.

Examples

Web links

Wiktionary: One-Hit-Wonder  - Explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Arnold Shaw, Dictionary of American Pop / Rock , 1982, p. 266
  2. ↑ Silke Borgstedt, Der Musik-Star, Comparative Image Analyzes by Alfred Brendel, Stefanie Hertel and Robbie Williams , 2007, p. 106
  3. ↑ Anja Seiffert, Autonomy and Isonomy of Foreign and Indigenous Word Formation Using the Example of Selected Numerative Word Formation Units , 2008, p. 35
  4. ^ Wayne Jancik, The Billboard Book of One Hit Wonders , 1998, p. IX
  5. ^ Wayne Jancik, The Billboard Book of One Hit Wonders , 1998, p. 2
  6. ↑ Bayern 3 of March 30, 2012, musical mayflies ( Memento of September 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive )