The Beatles Didn’t Have the Biggest Hit Song of the 1960s in the U.S.
The biggest hit of the 1960s in the United Kingdom was a Beatles song. However, in the United States, the biggest song of the 1960s was by another classic rock artist. Notably, the success of that song was preceded by an angelic prophecy.
What were The Beatles’ most popular songs in the United Kingdom and the United States?
The Beatles had many hits in the U.K. According to The Official Charts Company, the biggest was “She Loves You.” The track was the biggest hit of the 1960s in the U.K. The most popular songs in the history of the chart are Elton John’s double A-side “Something About the Way You Look Tonight” and “Candle in the Wind 1997.”
According to a Billboard article published in 2018, The Beatles’ highest-performing single in the U.S. was “Hey Jude.” “Hey Jude” is No. 12 on Billboard’s list of the 600 most popular songs in the history of the chart. Only one song from the 1960s ranked higher on the list.
The most popular song of the 1960s in the United States was the biggest song of all time
The song in question was Chubby Checker’s classic dance hit “The Twist.” Billboard reports “The Twist” hit No. 1 and remained on the chart for 39 weeks. It was Checker’s first No. 1 hit. “Pony Time” was his second. “The Twist” and “Pony Time” both appeared on Billboard’s 2018 list of the 600 biggest songs in the history of the chart.
The connection between Chubby Checker’s biggest song and an angel
During an interview with Forbes, Checker said he didn’t expect to produce a song that successful. He had a minor hit called “The Class,” but then he had a hard time producing more hits. “We had a little success on the charts,” Checker said. ‘I came back and did a few more songs. I’m still in high school. But nothing happened. Nothing. I thought, ‘Oh my god, I’m going to be a has-been at 17 or 18 years old.’
“So I said, ‘Mom, you know, you have a close hook up with the Lord. Why don’t you ask God to help me out? Please, mom. I don’t know what to do,'” he recalled. “So she said, ‘I had a dream about you, Chubby. An angel came to me and told me that you were going to have a song that’s going to cover the whole world. It was not going to be your song. It could be someone else’s song. But it’s gonna change the whole world. You’re gonna be a big singer.'”
After releasing “The Twist,” Checker released a fairly similar song called “Let’s Twist Again.” The dance called the twist will forever be associated with him. The Beatles were huge in the U.S.; however, The Beatles were never able to make a song that was as popular with Americans as “The Twist.”
