John Denver - "Calypso"

More than anything, this post is simply to "poll the brain cells" of my
fellow T4MOC-ers.

#2 has always seemed to me to be *way* too high a BB peak position for
this song in 1975. This is nothing personal - I like the record. All of the
CT Top 40 stations exclusively played the originally-intended A-side of
the 45, "I'm Sorry", and did very well with it. None of them ever officially
added "Calypso." (I never even heard them "spike it" on-air.) I first
discovered that I thought what was simply a great B-side was becoming a
hit in its own right, was when Casey Kasem played it on AT40.

If I recall correctly, "Calypso" shared its entire Hot 100 chart run with "I'm
Sorry." And, checking the chart sites, there were surely 8-10 US markets
where "Calypso" was a big hit, and charted Top 10 on their survey. But, in
total, "I'm Sorry" has appeared on over 150 surveys, while "Calypso" shows
up on just 52. That jives with my overall gut feeling about the song - that
it should probably show as a Top 10 to 20 peaking song. But #2?

I am curious how "the chart powers that be" ended up arriving at the
"Calypso" ultimate chart position? Was there human judgement involved
on this, after the fact? The RR volume I use the most (due to numerous
pencil notations I have in it) has "I'm Sorry" as the #32 biggest hit for
1975, with "Calypso" right behind, at #36. I was listening to Top 40 quite
a bit back then, and I was certainly aware that "Calypso" was getting solid
Top 40 airplay. But, like with all double-sided hits, how do you know
which side the buyer is buying it for? An individual 45 side's Top 40 radio
airplay was far easier to observe/document.

Although I know our buddy Paul Haney had nothing to do with compiling
the Hot 100 charts back in 1975 (or ever), perhaps he can chime in on
how RR arrived at its ultimate 1975 Pop Annual placing for "Calypso", and
how they've determined it to be 99% as big a hit as "I'm Sorry" was. I'm
positive there are legitimate reasons for it - I just don't happen to know
what they are!

No hurry, Paul. Whenever you get time.    :)

Any other opinions?

Edited by jimct

To Jim:

"Calypso" received a #2 position in Joel Whitburn's books because of Record Research's current policy of assigning a peak position to a nominally tag-along b-side if there was a time when Billboard switched its A-side position.

"I'm Sorry" (alone) debuted on the Hot 10 August 16, 1975; made it to #1 without a bullet September 27. Radio stations began to play "Calypso" & RCA began to push it (very similar to "Undun" by the Guess Who).

"I'm Sorry" dropped to #2 the following week. By the week of October 11, 1975 Billboard apparently decided that the promotion on "Calypso" was so strong they listed the record as "Calypso/I'm Sorry" where it remained at #2 for four more weeks!

Competing chart 'Cashbox' was charting double-sided hits separately at the time and took "Calypso" up to #26.

It's always been hard to assign a chart position to a double-sided hit because each side sells the exact same amount of copies!

"Calypso" did receive a very decent amount of airplay, as a matter of fact on the 1975 Radio & Records year-end Pop/75 of '75 chart it was listed as "Calypso/I'm Sorry" instead of the other way around.

Andy

Edited by AndrewChouffi

jimct wrote: In my experiences, buying quality reference books about music is always a good thing!

Quoting you from a George Harrison thread just a couple days ago, but I, too, have always subscribed to that same reasoning. And in this case, I feel that Christopher G. Feldman covered your question quite well in his 2000 softcover book, The Billboard Book of No. 2 Singles (Billboard Books; ISBN no. 0-8230-7695-4). Half a page is devoted to this two-sided hit from '75, and in fact AndrewChouffi's post above almost reads like a more condensed version of Feldman's explanation. Unfortunately, the book is now out-of-print; I obtained mine brand new, directly from Feldman himself on eBay about five years ago. (He also signed it before shipping it out to me, lol.) Definitely a fun read; recommended...

And while I lived in Northern California at the time, I definitely concur w/ the first four sentences of EdisonLite's post above...

I first heard the record in the early 90's when I was a kid. By that, I mean, Calypso. It was on some radio show on NPR, I think..... that side really grabbed me immediately and later when I found the 45, I played I'm Sorry once, and that was it.... I didn't like that side as much, if at all.

However, in all of my years hunting down promo 45s, I've never seen a promo 45 with Calypso on it. I've only come across mono/stereo promos of I'm Sorry, and I might even have one of those in my collection even though I don't care for the song....

I can remember hearing "Calypso" for the first time on the radio sometime in the early '80s when I was a kid and quickly fell in love with the song. Funny story... I was a fan of the Smurfs cartoon series at the time and I could swear I thought John Denver was singing "Azraeeeel dooooo doo-doo-doo-doo" during the song's chorus. Azrael of course was the feline nemesis of the Smurfs! :-)

Edited by Todd Ireland