(Click Chart to Enlarge)Some of The Biggest Hits of the Summer were still riding high on the WLS Chart dated 7 - 29 - 66. "Summer In The City" (previously voted as YOUR All-Time Favorite Summer Song in a Forgotten Hits Poll we conducted a few years back) was holding down the #1 spot, a place it would occupy for three out of the next four weeks. (It would be interrupted for one week on August 12th when The Hollies' Hit "Bus Stop" unseated it ... only to return to the top of the chart a week later.) "Summer In The City" had just displaced "Wild Thing" by The Troggs (the only #1 Hit in history to be released on two different labels at the same time!), a spot it had occupied the previous two weeks. By July 29th, "Hanky Panky", the MONSTER Tommy James and the Shondells Hit (#1 in Chicago for four weeks) had already fallen to #15.
Other Summer of '66 Classics near the top of the chart included "I Saw Her Again" by The Mamas and the Papas (in at #3), "The Pied Piper" by Crispian St. Peters (#4), "Little Red Riding Hood" by Sam the Sham and the Pharoahs (#6), "Hungry" by Paul Revere and the Raiders (#7) and "I Couldn't Live Without Your Love" by Petula Clark, which was holding down the #10 spot.
Some of our Local Heroes were making THEIR showing on the chart this week as well ... The Cryan' Shames (mis-spelled on the chart!) held down the #4 Spot with their debut hit "Sugar And Spice", The Del-Vetts (ALSO mis-spelled on the chart!) were in at #30 with "Last Time Around" and The New Colony Six were sitting at #32 with their remake of the Bo Diddley tune "Cadillac".
Forgotten Hits on the chart? How about the Tommy McLain version of the Patsy Cline classic "Sweet Dreams", in at #9. (Tommy was one of the very first Forgotten Hits Interviews we ever did way back in 2001.) You NEVER hear this one on the radio anymore, despite its National Top 15 status. (Actually, it's a GREAT rendition of this song ... so we're featuring it today!) Another "sweet" entry could be found at #11 ... Tommy Roe's "Sweet Pea" was one of Tommy's trademark "Buddy Holly sound-alike" tunes ... and a pretty catchy one at that! Another Forgotten Hits Favorite was in at #31 ... "I Love Onions" by Susan Christie ... who, by the way, was NOT (as has often been reported) Lou Christie's sister!
The British Invasion was still pretty well represented this week, too ... besides the aforementioned hits by The Troggs, The Hollies, Crispian St. Peters and Petula Clark ... The Rolling Stones, Herman's Hermits, The Yardbirds, Dusty Springfield, Manfred Mann, Chad and Jeremy and Cilla Black ALSO had songs on this week's Top 40 Silver Dollar Survey. (Noticeably absent from the chart this week were The Beatles ... their two-sided hit "Paperback Writer" / "Rain" had fallen off the chart after sitting at #17 the previous week ... and "Yellow Submarine" / "Eleanor Rigby" wouldn't debut until two weeks later.
