Bon Jovi - Livin On A Prayer

In the United-States, only a week after having reached the top, Madonna has to leave her place to Bon Jovi and their hit "Livin on a Prayer". Don't laugh when you'll watch the video, at that time it was very "rock'n roll" to have long hair with "permanent wave"! Remember, the same kind of look was also the one used by Europe and their "Final Countdown"... :-))

"Permanent waves" or not, this song was a huge succes that stayed 4 weeks at number one position and also reachhed the 4th place in the U.K. charts...

For your information, Jon Bon Jovi (lead singer), didn't like that song and it's Richie Sambora (lead guitarist) that convinced him that the song was pretty good and deserved to be part of their second album "Slippery when wet"! Finally, that song became and still is one of their biggest hits, if not THE biggest... Well done Jon ! ;-)

In 2006, on VH1's website, people voted for the "100 biggest hits from the 80's", and guess who what? "Livin on a Prayer" reached the first place!

Ben E. King - Stand By Me

It's no surprise that on Valentine's Day's week, it's a great love song that reached the top of the U.K. music charts! What might be a bit more amazing, is that it's not a new song but a pretty old one as its original release dates from 1961 or more than 25 years sooner! This song is Ben E. King's "Stand by Me".

So, how this song that already reached the U.S. top 10 in 1961, did to reach the top back in 1986 ?!? "Simply" because it was chosen as the theme song for Rob Reiner's movie "Stand by Me"... But it's also because that song has become a "classic" and is now part of our collective memory. Many covers of this song have been released (though King's stays the best one!), in 1975 for instance, John Lennon released his cover. Others like U2 performed the song in their tour, once, for their show in Philadelphia, they even sang it in duet with the boss itself: Bruce Springsteen!

In 1999, BMI named it as the 4th most performed song of the 20th century, with about 7 million performances!!!...

Madonna - Open Your Heart

First week of february in 1987, in the U.S., it's Madonna that reached the top of the charts with her song "Open Your Heart" that entered the charts end of '86. This song is the third realeased as a single from her album "True Blue" right after "Papa don't preach" and "True Blue". The video, filmed by the famous french director Jean-Baptiste Mondino, was nominated 3 times at the MTV Video Music Awards, so, you guess this one deserves to be watch again...

Nevertheless, as with a lot of Madonna's videos, not everybody was pleased... Some people were outraged at seeing a kid entering a strip-club and being kissed by Madonna at the end!

20 years later, I'm afraid those kind of people died since then, just by viewing all that we can see on videos today! :-))

Aretha Franklin & George Michael - I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)

What's happening when a popstar sings a duet with a soul music living legend? Well, that produces a legendary hit for sure! That's what happened in UK first week of february 1987 with Aretha Franklin and George Michael's "I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)" .

Though Aretha Franklin seems to be a bigger music legend than George Michael (everyone probably knows her biggest hit "Respect"), this duet was the first and only one time that Aretha reached the first place in the UK charts.

On the other hand, after "Careless Whisper" in 1984 and "A Different Corner" in 1986, this was already the third number one in a row from George Michael , and he'll have several others later on...

That song already reached the top of the US charts but a bit later... It entered the charts at place 59th then it needed 9 weeks to reach the top on 18th april 1987.

For your information only, that song was co-written by Dennis Morgan and Simon Climie who'll also know his hour of success in 1988 with his band Climie Fisher and their breakthrough hit "Rise to the Occasion".