The AT40 Blog/April 22, 1978: Johnny Mathis' long-awaited return

True fact: Legendary crooner Johnny Mathis turned down a chance to go to the 1956 Summer Olympics as a high jumper to become a singer.

As he would explain for years, it was his father's advice to pursue music as a career.

Good advice, pops! In the 1950s and early 1960s, the San Francisco native was one of the greatest singers of the early rock era, scoring memorable hits such as "Chances Are," "It's Not For Me To Say," "Misty," "Gina," "What Will Mary Say" and "The Twelfth Of Never." He was a superstar, but also accomplished two chart records that seemed unreachable when he attained them in the pre-Beatles era.

The first of those records was with his 1958 album "Johnny's Greatest Hits." This No. 1 album of three weeks had memorable staying power. By the time the album finally fell off the Billboard Top 200 chart, it had accumulated 491 weeks. The second of those records was with his 1957 hit smash "Wonderful! Wonderful!" Though the Sherman Edwards-Ben Raleigh composition never made the Top 10, it had incredible staying power, too, spending 39 weeks on the Billboard Top 100 chart, one of three charts used to track the hits of the day before Billboard came up with its official Hot 100 chart the next year. Nonetheless, Casey Kasem would always tell his AT40 listeners that the record for the longest-charting song on the chart was that Mathis classic.

However, one thing that didn't have staying power was Mathis' career on the pop singles charts. Between 1957-63, Mathis score 18 Top 40 smashes, but when 1963 turned to 1964, he and a bunch of artists could not survive the onslaught of the Beatles and the British Invasion. For the next 14 years, Mathis' biggest chart singles were 1964's "Bye, Bye Barbara," which got to No. 53 and 1973's "Life Is A Song Worth Singing," which got to No. 54. Mathis found a niche on the adult contemporary chart for older listeners turned off by the sounds of rock 'n roll and scored a No. 1 hit on that chart in 1973 called "I'm Coming Home," a song written by Thom Bell and the late Linda Creed and re-recorded into a Top 40 hit in 1974 by the Spinners.

Mathis was 42 years old as 1977 was nearing its end and seemed content to be a crooner in a time when music was continually evolving, just like Frank Sinatra. He continued to sell out arenas from coast to coast and all over Europe. He was content to do remakes of other artists' songs. Even if he may have been a little "square" for a younger audience, his older fans continued to buy his albums. Still, his pop music career was all but seemingly over.

But an amazing thing happened at that time -- a pair of songwriters, John Vallins and Nate Kipner brought Columbia Records a song they wrote. It was "Too Much, Too Little, Too Late." Producer Jack Gold saw potential in the song, especially since this was an original. He turned to Mathis and felt he and a duet partner would perfect on the song. Willing to give the song a try, Mathis agreed and Gold recruited fellow Columbia Records artist Deniece Williams, who one year earlier had a Top 25 pop hit "Free," which went to No. 2 on the soul chart and No. 1 in England. The pair laid the track down and the song was included on Mathis' album, "You Light Up My Life," named for the Debby Boone monster No. 1 hit that Mathis did a remake of for the new album. Also on that album were three songs that had been recent Top 40 hits that Mathis remade -- Ronnie Milsap's "It Was Almost Like A Song," the Bee Gees' "How Deep Is Your Love" and Samantha Sang's "Emotion," written by Barry and Robin Gibb of Bee Gees fame.

Columbia Records released "Too Much, Too Little, Too Late" in February 1978 and immediately hit the R&B chart. Within a few weeks, it had gone to No. 1 -- a large feat for Mathis considering that he had just three Top 40 R&B hits in his entire career! He had one Top 10 R&B hit -- in 1959, "Misty" hit No. 10. That was it.

A month after the song started soaring to No. 1 on the R&B chart, ready to spend four weeks at No. 1 there, "Too Much, Too Little, Too Late" made its Hot 100 debut on April 1. Two weeks later, it was at No. 41, ready to become Mathis' first Top 40 hit since 1963's "Every Step Of The Way" peaked at No. 30.

On the week of April 22, 1978, "Too Much, Too Little, Too Late" made another hefty climb on the Hot 100, jumping from No. 41 to debut all the way up at No. 20, the highest of six Top 40 debuts, which also included Andy Gibb's future third straight No. 1 hit, "Shadow Dancing."

Mathis was back in and having a singing partner in Williams certainly didn't hurt one bit.

One week later on April 29, the song jumped another 10 notches to land at No. 10, the first Top 10 hit for Mathis since "What Will Mary Say" peaked at No. 9. After getting to No. 6 the next week, "Too Much, Too Little, Too Late" jumped to No. 4 for the week of May 13, 1978, the first Top 5 hit for Mathis since "Chances Are" in 1957.

On May 20, the song jumped up to No. 3, then on May 27, 1978, it was at No. 2. Finally, the week of June 3, it was Mathis' revenge on any one of the Beatles as "Too Much, Too Little, Too Late" jumped from No. 2 to No. 1, displacing Paul McCartney and Wings' "With A Little Luck" at the top. It was Mathis' first No. 1 hit in the Hot 100 era ("Chances Are" was a No. 1 hit in the pre-Hot 100 era).

As if he had just gotten a spring in his step, Mathis was revived. his remake of the Marvin Gaye-Tammi Terrell 1960s classic, "You're All I Need To Get By," another duet with Williams, climbed the Hot 100, but could only get to No. 47. In 1982, Mathis hit the Top 40 for the 20th and last time in his career when his duet with Dionne Warwick, "Friends In Love," got as high as No. 38. Later in 1978, he recorded the beautiful "The Last Time I Fell In Love" with singer Jane Olivor for the movie Same Time, Next Year. The song was nominated for an Oscar, but lost out to Donna Summer's Top 5 summer smash "Last Dance" from the movie Thank God It's Friay.

These days, Mathis records the occasional CD, but mainly Christmas material, including 2013's "Sending You A Little Christmas," which included the Top 5 adult contemporary title track hit. Williams' career flourished into the 1980s with 1982's Top 10 hit "It's Gonna Take A Miracle" and her 1984 No. 1 hit from the Footloose soundtrack, "Let's Hear It For The Boy," her second chart-topper.

But for Mathis, that whole thing about "staying power" records he held disintegrated. When "Too Much, Too Little, Too Late" debuted at No. 20 on April 22, 1978, one of the six songs that fell out of the Top 40 was Paul Davis' "I Go Crazy," which spent 25 weeks in the Top 40, peaking at No. 7. "I Go Crazy" was in its 35th week on the Billboard Hot 100. Five weeks later as Mathis was at No. 2 on May 27, 1978, "Wonderful! Wonderful!" got pushed to the side by "I Go Crazy," which at No. 99 was still holding on in the Hot 100 in its now-record 40th week.

And as for his "Johnny's Greatest Hits" mark of 491 weeks on the album chart? Yeah, that record got busted, too, when in October 1983, Pink Floyd's classic 1973 album, "The Dark Side Of The Moon" spent its 492nd week on the chart and has registered well over 900 weeks on the chart in various Top 200 incarnations since.

The record those records made are gone, but the records Johnny Mathis made remain. He's still a favorite of the older generation. But to a younger generation in 1978, he made one more major impact and hit No. 1 in the process.

For Johnny Mathis, it literally wasn't too little and too late.

The AT40 Blog/April 19, 1975: Bringing the World War II Era Back To The Top 40

Fans of American Top 40 must have thought their ears were failing them when listening to the show for April 19, 1975.

How, you may ask? There were six debut songs in the Top 40, among those debuts songs were new ones by Grand Funk ("Bad Time"), David Bowie ("Young Americans") and the Temptations ("Shaky Ground").

But two of those debuts were, well, let's just say they were not in the category of "the normal."

Coming in at No. 38 was "Shaving Cream" by a man named Benny Bell. This song was recorded in 1946 -- some of the acts in the Top 40 this particular week weren't born then. And the song sounds every bit like a record put together in 1946 on a 78-rpm vinyl record, complete with record hisses and far from sounding as stereo as the records of 1975 and beyond sounded.

The key component of the song is its bawdiness -- the narrator of the song sings the first lines of the song and the last word ends with the letters "-it." Then he sings the second line -- something that has some kind of woe and misfortune to it -- and finishes it out by starting to sing "sh- ... aaaaaaaaaaving cream, be nice and clean, shave everyday and you'll always look keen." 

For 1946 standards, the song was pretty risque. The song was released in early 1947, but couldn't make any dent on the national charts. But in the mid-1970s, a unique man with an even more unique record collection who called himself Dr. Dimento (born Barrett "Barry" Hansen on April 2, 1941, in Minneapolis) had a copy of the Cocktail Party Records song "Shaving Cream" in his record collection, and began playing it on his nationally syndicated show on a weekly basis.

Suddenly, fans began asking where they can find this little piece of obscure pop heaven. Unfortunately for them, unless you went to a novelty record shop, you couldn't find it. And the more Dr. Dimento played the song, the more the interest was for the song. Vanguard Records, which owned the rights to the song, decided on releasing "Shaving Cream" to the public. And as bizarre as it sounds, "Shaving Cream" hit the Hot 100 and swiftly moved up the Hot 100 and on the week of April 19, 1975, it debuted at No. 38, peaking at No. 30 a few weeks later.

It took 29 years, but Benny Bell had his Top 40 hit -- or did he?

Bell wrote and produced "Shaving Cream," but the vocals on the song were recorded by a man named Phil Winston, who went by the pseudonym Paul Wynn. The song, though, credited Bell as the main artist. After controversy involving the artists involved, Vanguard got the right name on the record singing the song (Wynn) in subsequent pressings of "Shaving Cream." However, Bell gets forever Top 40 credit for "Shaving Cream," the song he wrote and produced ... but didn't sing.

While Bell/Wynn were having their only Top 40 hit success with a song that was recorded in 1946 (Bell would pass away in 1999 at the age of 93), a man who was now embracing his  new moniker as "The Polish Prince" was coming in with the highest debuting song of the week at No. 33.

But was Bobby Vinton taking his new image a bit too far? He introduced that image to his fans in late 1974 when "My Melody Of Love," which featured the song in part Polish, hit No. 3 in November 1974. Now he was hitting the Top 40 with a song that had all the makings of an Oktoberfest party.

The music for "Beer Barrel Polka," or "Roll Out The Barrel" as most people recognize the tune, was written by Czech musician Jaromir Vejvoda in 1927 and refined by Eduard Ingris, writing the first arrangement of the piece. In 1934, the first words for the song were written in Germany by Vaclav Zeman as "Skoda Iasky" or "Wasted Love." An accordion player named Will Grahe recorded the song that was now put into a polka melody. The song became a favorite in the middle of Europe, especially in Czechoslovakia where German music was becoming a major way of life in the time of Adolf Hitler's reign as leader.

Sensing that things weren't going to go well in their native country, Czech natives left their home country for the United States and in the process, some brought the music they were listening to on those 78-rpm records with them. And it seemed Grahe's version of "Rosamunde" was the most popular version. Shapiro Bernstein, a popular music publishing company, bought the rights to the song as well as the original Grahe version in the U.S. The song hit No. 1 on the Hit Parade chart in 1939 and soon after, English lyrics were written to the song by Lew Brown and Wladimir Timm and American artists such as the Andrews Sisters, Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, Billie Holliday and the man who made it most famous in the U.S., Joe Patek, soon took a crack at what was now "The Beer Barrel Polka." And no matter who recorded the song, it became a favorite during World War II among the soldiers.

Meanwhile, in Canonsburg, Pa., the home of crooner Perry Como, a young boy named Bobby Vinton (born Stanley Robert Vinton Jr. on April 16, 1935) was listening to the song on the radio. In 1962, Vinton became a star with "Roses Are Red (My Love)" and followed that up over the years with numerous hits like "Blue On Blue," "Blue Velvet," "There! I Said It Again" and "Mr. Lonely." His last Top 40 hit in 1972 was his remake of Brian Hyland's 1962 classic "Sealed With A Kiss." It had been two years since he was on the chart ... and then came the rousing Polish anthem "My Melody Of Love," sung partially in Polish. It hit No. 3 and introduced Vinton, now 39, to a new audience.

Cashing in on his new-found fame, Vinton recorded "The Beer Barrel Polka" with the whole oom-pah-pah feel to it, as if he were entertaining fans at the yearly Oktoberfest festival in Bavaria. And though Vinton hit the Top 40 with this version (the B-side to the 45 single being "Dick And Jane"), it died right there at No. 33, spending two weeks at that spot before falling off.

Unfortunately for Vinton, "The Beer Barrel Polka" would be his last Top 40 hit. His highest-charting single after that was the follow-up song, a remake of Joe Dowell's 1961 hit "Wooden Heart," also recorded by Elvis Presley, which included German lyrics. But it was after his comeback that Vinton was offered his own television variety show on CBS (produced by legendary game-show producer/host Chuck Barris and distributed by Canadian-based CTV), which he hosted from 1975-78. These days, Vinton, who turned 80 in 2015, remains active on the road, working the casino, retirement and small-stage circuit.

The music of the 1970s was very different at times. But on April 19, 1975, it was really different thanks to two songs that dated back to after World War II ... and before that.

As for the top of the chart for April 19, 1975, the Elton John Band (with John singing lead, of course) ended a run of 12 straight No. 1 songs that were at the top for just one week when "Philadelphia Freedom" held the top spot for the second straight week. B.J. Thomas' "(Hey Won't You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song" moved up one notch from No. 3 to No. 2 and was poised to become the next No. 1 hit. But right behind that song was the biggest mover of the week -- Tony Orlando & Dawn's remake of Jerry Butler's "He Will Break Your Heart" re-titled "He Don't Love You (Like I Love You)," which moved up 17 places from No. 22 to No. 5.

The AT40 Blog/April 9, 1983: Overkill Vs. Let's Dance -- The Battle Begins

One artist was coming off a great run on the album chart that featured two of the songs from that album hitting No. 1. Another was hitting the Top 40 for the first time since 1976, but had built a reputation as rock's favorite chameleons.

And on the weekend of April 9, 1983, both acts made very high debuts within the Top 40.

In one corner was the Australian band Men At Work. In 1982, they stormed the American charts with the album "Business As Usual," one of the biggest and most revered albums of the early 1980s. From that album came a memorable album track called "Be Good, Johnnie." But the album was better known for two No. 1 hits that established the band: "Who Can It Be Now?" hit No. 1 for the week of October 30, 1982, and the follow-up, "Down Under," hit the top on January 15, 1983 and stayed there for four non-consecutive weeks.

But "Business As Usual" was a latecomer to the U.S. That album had been recorded through most of 1981 for the band, still starving for success anywhere let alone this country or their own. So by 1983, Men At Work's record company were clamoring for a new release. And Colin Hay, Ron Stryker, Greg Ham, Jerry Speiser and John Rees obliged, working with producer Peter McIan on an album that would be called "Cargo." The album was supposed to be released in 1982, the year the band had finished work on it, but the record company, CBS worldwide, put the brakes on the release because of how late "Business As Usual" became a hit in the U.S.

And on April 29, 1983, "Cargo" made its worldwide debut. And though the album lacked a "wow" single like the two No. 1 hits from "Business As Usual," the overall effort may have been better than the previous album. The record company banked on continued success with the band on the first release, "Overkill," a song that tells the dark tale of paranoia, but in a much darker tale than "Who Can It Be Now?" as lead singer Hay "can't get no sleep" and lives out his inner nightmare in real life every night.

While "Overkill" looked like it was going to dominate the chart just like the band's two previous hits did, along came the man first known as Ziggy Stardust, then the Thin White Duke back to the Top 40 since "Golden Years" hit No. 9 in early 1976.

It wasn't as if David Bowie went anywhere. He still released a number of albums in that seven-year period, but the avant garde music he was doing wasn't appealing to pop radio, even if songs like "Heroes," "Ashes To Ashes" and "Fashion" sounded good to the ears.

Long-time producer Tony Visconti was set to go into the studio to lay down another album with Bowie in 1982, but a funny thing happened on the way to the studio -- Bowie never called his friend. Citing a change in direction, Bowie called up Nile Rodgers to see if he was interested in doing his next album. Rodgers would admit years later that the reason he was chosen by Bowie was because Bowie "wanted to have hit singles" and that Bowie had just signed a $17 million record label for EMI America after years as a hit maker at RCA Records.

Unlike with previous albums, Bowie showed up with "songs" ready to make into demos, which he spent three days doing for Rodgers. On previous albums, Bowie showed up with little more than "ideas" and turned those ideas into songs. It took two and a half weeks to record what would be the album "Let's Dance." The coup de grace for the album came in 1982 when at the Montreux Jazz Festival, Bowie fell in love with a guitarist he saw on stage named Stevie Ray Vaughn. Said he hadn't been blown away by a guitarist since seeing Jeff Beck in the 1960s. Vaughn, who admitted to not being familiar with anything Bowie recorded, said he and the singer spent hours talking music, but not pop music -- good ol' blues music, especially Texas blues which the guitarist specialized in. Months after that  performance in Switzerland, Vaughn was in the studio with Bowie and Rodgers cutting tracks for "Let's Dance."

And for the album to get a proper release, EMI decided on releasing the title track, a funky, danceable song featuring Vaughn's amazing guitar work, to most people the introduction into the Texan's amazing work. It also didn't hurt that the music video featuring the "new blonde-haired" Bowie in the Australian outback was released. It featured Aborigines going about their business when they see a pair of red shoes (which is sung about in "Let's Dance") and a young woman putting the shoes on and starting to dance when an atomic bomb flash blinds them from behind, a scary thought of the day back in 1983 with the threat of nuclear war hanging over all our heads. The video made a pretty huge impression.

As did the Men At Work video for "Overkill" in which Hay plays the paranoid lad who has trouble sleeping and finds himself walking the Australian streets looking for solace while running into his bandmates throughout. The music video was filmed in a dark manner and was filmed mainly at night with little light background.

Still, both songs were ready for a major battle on the chart. On the week of April 9, 1983, they both made their Top 40 debuts. Bowie jumped up into the Top 40 at No. 29 with "Let's Dance," but Men At Work one-upped Bowie, debuting at No. 28 on the entire Hot 100! 

From that, Men At Work should have won this battle, right? Well, surprise, surprise, the week of April 16, "Let's Dance" jumped 14 places to No. 15, while "Overkill" made a more modest nine-notch climb to No. 19. On April 23, 1983,  "Let's Dance" leaped six more places to land at No. 9, while "Overkill" moved up four places from No. 19 to No. 15.

Bowie had delivered the knockdown punch instead of Men At Work, getting to the Top 10 first, but by April 30, both songs were in the Top 10 as "Overkill" moved up six places from No. 15 to No. 9, the same move "Let's Dance" had done the week before. "Let's Dance" moved up three places to No. 6. On May 7, both songs climbed three places, "Let's Dance" to No. 3, "Overkill" to No. 6. The next week, "Let's Dance" jumped to No. 2, while "Overkill" moved up two places to No. 4.

Then on May 21, Bowie made the move that he hadn't made since "Fame" in 1975 -- to No. 1, where the song would only spend one week at the top. "Overkill," however, held at No. 4. As a matter of fact, "Overkill" spent three straight weeks at No. 4, before pushing forward one more notch up to No. 3 the week of June 4, 1983, while "Let's Dance" spent a second straight week at No. 2 after that one week at the top.

"Overkill" and "Let's Dance" would spend two more weeks together in the Top 5 as "Overkill" dropped back to No. 4 on June 11 and then No. 5 on June 18, 1983. "Let's Dance" would spend three straight weeks at No. 2 after hitting the top, then drop to No. 3 on June 18 and No. 5 on June 25.

"Let's Dance" began another renaissance for Bowie as two more hit singles -- "China Girl" and "Modern Love" -- were primed to go Top 15. Men At Work had a successful Top 10 follow-up to "Overkill" with "It's A Mistake," which went to No. 6. But after the next single, "Dr. Heckyll & Mr. Jive," the band's Top 40 well dried up and it would never have another huge hit or album again.

In one manner, Rock 'n Roll's most famous chameleon, always changing to find a style of music fans loved, had slayed pop music's biggest band on the charts thanks to his belief in "having hits again" with "Let's Dance." David Bowie proved why he was a Rock 'n Roll Hall of Famer. And he introduced the world to Vaughn, who would have a dynamic career as a blues musician/guitarist/singer with numerous albums/CDs throughout the 1980s until his untimely death in a helicopter crash on August 27, 1990, at the age of 35. In April 2015, Vaughn and his group, Double Trouble, were inducted into the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame alongside Bowie, already there since 1996. Men At Work, unfortunately, never had that kind of day in the sun, though Hay continues to tour feverishly throughout the world as a solo performer.

Men At Work's mark in music will always be there for history to record.

But when Bowie beat Men At Work to the top with "Let's Dance," it was a lesson that change was always good.

Especially when it sounded this good.

The AT40 Blog/April 6, 1985: Madonna rules the pop world

In December 1983, a 25-year-old who had paid her dues for years at dance clubs and who worked as a backup singer for Frenchman Patrick Hernandez finally cracked the Top 40 with "Holiday."

Little did anyone know that the career of one Madonna Louise Ciccone would skyrocket in the way that it did.

Then again, when she told Dick Clark on American Bandstand one month after her Top 40 debut that her goal for 1984 and beyond was "to rule the world" and said it in a confident manner, were we to doubt her?

By June she had her first Top 10 hit with "Borderline." By October, she had her first Top 5 hit smash with "Lucky Star" and two months later, she had her first No. 1 smash with "Like A Virgin," the title hit and debut song from her latest release.

And that meant there were more smash hits from the album behind the No. 1 title song. Soon after "Like A Virgin" began falling down from No. 1, Sire Records released the song that would become Madonna's moniker for years to come, "Material Girl." Co-written by Peter Brown, the same man who hit in the 1970s with "Do You Wanna Get Funky With Me?" and his Top 10 "Dance With Me," "Material Girl" would zoom up the Top 40 and get to No. 2 by the week of March 23, 1985, but just as it was ready to blast to No. 1 the week of March 30, established superstar Phil Collins leaped over Madonna from No. 3 to No. 1 to get to the top with his first single from his Grammy-Award winning album "No Jacket Required," "One More Night." That song would spend two weeks at No. 1.

A chart setback for Madonna, but a song that had some staying power because of radio airplay and the music video that featured the singer in a Marilyn Monroe persona performing the song in the manner of "Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend" from the 1953 movie Gentlemen Prefer Blondes while singing around of tuxedo-dressed males and co-starring in director Mary Lambert's work with actor Keith Carradine.

But while "Material Girl" was nearing the top of the chart, yet another release, her sixth Top 40 hit in 16 months was debuting at No. 32. This song, "Crazy For You," was not from the "Like A Virgin" album. Instead, it was from the movie soundtrack of Vision Quest starring young actors Matthew Modine and Linda Fiorentino in a wrestling-crazy town about a high school senior wrestler having the goal of taking down the state's best wrestler at his weight class and the trials and tribulations he goes through on and off the mats presented to him when a beautiful young drifter heading to the west coast comes into his life.

And creating "Crazy For You" was more than a process. Setting up the soundtrack for the movie in early 1984, veteran music producer and soundtrack director Phil Ramone was in charge of getting the talent to sing songs from various songwriters hired for Vision Quest. Madonna was on the radar of not only Ramone, but movie producers Jon Peters and Peter Gruber and Ramone wanted to meet the up-and-coming star. So Ramone invited her to dinner at his record studio and she brought him some music videos she had done for the songs that would wind up on her debut "Madonna" album.

They wanted her on board, but it was for something she was not used to doing -- recording ballads. And songwriters John Bettis, a man behind a number of Carpenters songs in the 1970s as well as the Pointer Sisters' 1981 No. 2 hit "Slow Hand," and Jon Lind, were called to do this song in which the two lovers (Modine and Fiorentino) meet in a night club the first time. They bounced ideas off each other and came up with the title of "Crazy For You." When they finished, they sent the song to Ramone, who was blown away.

Madonna was called in to record the song, but not used to singing a slow-tempo ballad, she didn't exactly nail the recording the first time, according to Bettis. They wanted her to do another session, but she was busy promoting and touring. Finally by late spring 1984, Madonna came back to the New York-based studio to cut "Crazy For You" for the second time. But this time, John "Jellybean" Benitez, a club-music producer who, too, like Madonna was not used to a slow-tempo song, called in backup in good friend and composer Rob Mounsey, whose job was to rearrange the backing vocals and original track to make everything sound like it fit in place and this time, had Madonna record the song in "a live setting," unlike having it done with synthesizers and drum machines doing all the work. Though he got no credit for the song, Mounsey, according to Benitez, "really made a hit record out of the song."

Bettis and Lind heard the final recording and were blown away that this dance-music star could nail this beautiful song. So, too, were Peters and Gruber, who had one of their "hit" tracks for their Geffen Records soundtrack.

And the next problem came about. Madonna was on Sire Records and Sire Records president Mo Ostin balked at having "Crazy For You" released as a single as Madonna's star was becoming white-hot with the "Like A Virgin" album. He sent Sire chairman Robert Daly to Geffen offices to request they pull Madonna's appearances from the Vision Quest soundtrack. Now a non-executive advisor to Paramount Pictures, Daly figured throwing his might around and maybe a little understanding would get Madonna extracted from the soundtrack.

Imagine his surprise when he found himself shouted down by Peters, who had fought tooth and nail to get Madonna in on the project, sign her up for it, record the song not once, but twice and believe in the song she was doing for the project because not only was it a hit single, but it was about to help transform this superstar, now 26 and taking off to "rule the world."

Daly cowered. Geffen Records released the song and two weeks after its No. 32 on March 16 Top 40 debut, it zoomed to No. 9. And one week later on April 6, 1985, "Crazy For You" made another bold move from No. 9 to No. 4. One notch above "Crazy For You?" Yup, "Material Girl," which succumbed from the silver-medal spot on the chart for two weeks down to No. 3.

As Casey Kasem would note on AT40, it marked the first time that a woman was in the Top 5 with two songs simultaneously since Donna Summer did it twice in 1979, first in the summer with "Hot Stuff" and "Bad Girls" and then again in November with "Dim All The Lights" and "No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)," her duet with Barbra Streisand.

The next week, Madonna would climb to No. 3 with "Crazy For You," while "Material Girl" dropped from No. 3 to 5. On April 20, "Crazy For You" landed at No. 2, but was stuck in the runners-up position for three frustrating weeks behind the ever-powerful "We Are The World" by USA For Africa for four straight weeks. Didn't stand a chance to make it to No. 1.

Then it happened.

On May 11, "Crazy For You" made that one-notch climb to get to the top of the Top 40 chart, her second No. 1 hit and the one that changed the face of Madonna's meteoric rise. And by 1987, "Who's That Girl" became her sixth No. 1 hit, making her the female solo artist with the most No. 1 songs in history, passing up the five that Diana Ross scored between 1970-80. It took Madonna less than four years for that to happen.

She was "ruling the world." And it didn't hurt her fishnet-wearing, cross-bearing style was hitting home with all the young girls who were idolizing the stunning, green-eye beauty, either.

When looking back at what was her rising career, the week of April 6, 1985 on the Top 40 chart was a big week for Madonna Ciccone.

And who knows what may have happened had Jon Peters not told Robert Daly of Sire Records what he thought of his idea of pulling Madonna from the Vision Quest soundtrack? "Crazy For You" may have been a lost track for years.

Madonna has more to thank than just her "lucky stars."