Extended Project Qualification (EPQ)
Rick Anderson
Content pages
Abstract
1. Introduction
2. Research – Literature review
2.1 Radio Station poll
2.1.1 Smooth
2.1.2 Absolute and Virgin
2.1.3 BBC Radio
2.1.4 Greatest Hits Radio
3. Music magazine lists
3.1 New Musical Express
3.2. Rolling Stone
3.3 Q magazine
3.4 Telegraph Music Section
4. Books
4.1. The People’s Songs
4.2. This is Uncool: The 500 Greatest Singles since Punk and Disco
4.3. Yeah Yeah Yeah
4.4 The Top 100 songs of the rock era 1954-99
4.5. Singles – Six decades of Hot Hits & Classic Cuts
5.1. Every Hit
5.2. Dave Whitaker DMDB
5.3. Rick Anderson
5.4 The digital age
6.1. A canon of work ; four consecutive classic singles
6.2. Blind rankings
6.3 AI and Algorithms
7.1. Popular Culture – Adverts, TV, Film, Sport
7.2.Best-of compilations on records
7.3 Live performance and tribute bands
7.4 Cover versions
7.5 Spotify’s inclusion of “legacy” records
8.1 Methodology
8.1.1 Scope of what genres and time periods to include in the lists
8.1.2 Who are the best judges
8.1.3 What methods are used to compile lists
8.2 . Comparisons
8.2.1 Between different sources
8.2.2 Same sources different updates – time comparisons, eminence and longevity
8.2.3 Between different Continents
Appendix 1 . Evaluation of a selection of sources
Abstract
This paper identifies and compares multiple source examples from Radio, Books, Magazines, Charts and more which try to determine the “best-ever” popular music single records. Influences on the type of record deemed “best”, changes with time, and the continuing popularity of older music, are explored. In doing so it leads to a conclusion not necessarily of what the best record ever actually is, rather to home-in in what “best” actually means, and what are the most valid assessment methods with a view to generating consistency and removing bias. To that end, some academic paper extracts have also been included. Recommendations are made around which genres to include, over which time periods, and how to present results – in numerical or chronological order. The paper attempts to bridge the “rock era” and “digital age”. Although overall patterns and methods are the focus, they are amplified with individual records often nominated as best, such as The Beatles’ Hey Jude and Aretha Franklin’s Respect.
Introduction
Since its inception in the mid 20th century “pop” music has evolved from being merely trivial “cheap music” as Noel Coward described it (Stanley, 2023) for Anglo-Americans on vinyl to become a worldwide booming industry at the forefront of digital technology. With that comes a natural desire to identify the major influences on the advance, particularly the “best” songs. Ultimately it is about the music. But that subjective word “best” poses so many questions. Who gets to decide, what is their motivation and background, over what time period, what factors are important, what is included in pop music, how are lists compiled and presented- in numerical or quantitative order. This project aims to answer those questions before recommending the most valid approaches.
Although I will not include a single, definitive list of the best records, the project will include links to many secondary research sources and authors which offer their view of what is the best. Also your author’s own primary research – a well structured list published 10 years ago and updated recently. What the project will do is identify what in my opinion are the most appropriate, well argued, valid approaches to the task, especially those which minimize bias by using a wide-ranging balance of inputs. This is important because as time moves on the temptation might be to ignore the great music of the past in favour of newly released material by high profile artists. In fact I will demonstrate that “older music” is still well represented in “best-ever” lists.
My own objectives are firstly, as a Maths and Science Tutor who has supervised or marked numerous student EPQ’s (Extended Project Qualification, a minimum 5000 word dissertation – taken in UK 6th form ) I like to keep my hand in by writing some myself. This is my second EPQ after “Charles Babbage – more than a computer pioneer?”
My second aim is to explore both well-known chart-compiling methods, and uncover little known ones. Of course, I have a great personal interest and expertise in pop music research, having been born almost at the birth of rock’n’roll in 1956, then first owned a record in 1962 (Big Dee Irwin and Little Eva’s Swinging on a Star), then while at infant school started buying the first Beatles records as soon as released, and graduated to Punk and New Wave at University and subsequently widening to Metal on one hand and soul disco and reggae of the other. Then ten years ago I designed my own method for identifying the best records each year, and placed the consequent list on the web, just now updated And, right up to date in September 2026, I am not only delighted by Sam Fender and Olvia Dean’s Don’t Rein Me In, but also fascinated by the statistical records it has broken (23 non-consecutive weeks at U.K. No.1)
Is this topic too trivial for an academic project? I would argue no, because its’ study involves the statistical issues of lists such as ranking formulae and avoidance of bias, the sociology of the genres, advanced technology and a multi-billion dollar industry. My own research techniques involved scouring multiple sources – books, magazines databases and more – in some cases understanding how the authors themselves did their own research and how they created their lists of the best records. I will draw out the importance of when the surveys were conducted, because tastes can change and longevity is important, and undertake comparisons of same source, initial and updated list, as well as contrasting entirely different source lists. I will also draw in some examples from Classical Music and Business scorecards to illustrate some points.
2. Research – Literature review
In a sense, the simplest (but as we’ll see too simple) way to judge “the best” record ever is to use the pop charts. In the USA this is the Billboard Hot 100, and they publish a cumulative ranking based on weighted points for No.1, top ten, then any other position. Blinding Lights by the Weeknd – a fairly recent streaming sensation – is currently at the top, so let us call it the most successful record in history. In the UK, the Guiness Book of British Hit Singles used to be bible of the genre, publishing the official UK Charts data, but now this company also accumulates – but in their case on sales. Elton John’s tribute to Princess Diana is No. 1.
Although these charts are a statistician’s spreadsheet dream, already we can see the problems – which chart to choose and are these records really the “best-ever”. The sources below cover a selection of the myriad of alternatives – listeners polls, books, magazines, websites and others which have attempted definitive ranked “best record ever” lists; or which in some cases include essays about all of the great records, genres or eras, without specifying which is the best, but which can inform our project.
Most radio station polls are fairly simple – they ask listeners to vote for their favourite record. There is little attempt to remove bias – in fact by definition there can’t be because if a listener is motivated to vote it is likely they favour the type of music that station plays anyway. Further, the more recent is the record, the more likely they are to remember the record. Let us examine a few examples.
2.1.1 Smooth Radio 2026 Top 500 2025 Top 500 See Fig 1. Below for Top 10 extracts.
As befitting the title, this UK based radio station focuses on easy-listening pop, corporate rock and soul, with little or no inclusion of punk, indie or hip-hop. In annually updated polls, listeners simply vote for their favourites of all-time. Here are some highlights:
The higher reaches of the 2026 chart (see Fig 1. Below) are dominated by George Michael (mostly solo, such as Careless Whisper); Michael Jackson (solo, such as Man in the Mirror, and unaffected by controversy, but not Jackson 5); and Queen. With Elton John, Phil Collins (solo), and Elvis (ballads) in the next tiers. Combinations of these often score well (George Michael and Elton John’s Sun Go Down on Me for instance). Note also that Smooth runs a top “icons” poll, and not surprisingly George Michael, Michael Jackson and Queen are top 3 in 2026.
The poll is re-run most years and there is a great deal of consistency at the top end, indicating some reliability in the data (Bohemian Rhapsody, Carless Whisper, Different Corner as a top 3, and Bridge Over Troubled Water and Man In the Mirror as a 4 to 5 – have been there three years running
Almost all the top 500 entries are from the last century, in particular 70’s, 80’s 90’s. Only a little bit of, for instance, Take That, Ed Sheeran Adele and Lewis Capaldi interrupt this. Note though that Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill has risen sharply to the Top Ten after its recent Stranger Things TV appearance. Whitney Houston is the dominant soul artist, followed by Luther Vandross
Despite the relatively specific listener base, there are still plenty of records which would also be found in the “hipper” Music Press “best-of” lists – for instance Hotel California, Billie Jean, Winner Takes It All, American Pie, Dock of the Bay, Like a Prayer, Son of a Preacher Man, Don’t You Want Me, Brown Eyed Girl, West End Girls. But interestingly, almost no Beatles (and Let it Be and Imagine are both dropping fast)
2.1.2 Absolute Radio and Virgin Radio
In the early 2000’s, Absolute Radio (which was originally Virgin Radio but rebranded to Absolute in 2008) used to run a top 500, voted for by listeners, and played back from 500-No.1 between Christmas and New Year. The Absolute poll is discontinued and not listed any more on the web, but I recall that Let It Be, Imagine, Hey Jude by the Beatles, and Robbie Williams’ Angels, and George Michael’s Careless Whisper were almost always near the top. But I recall also that from left field alternative rock icons Goo Goo Dolls’ Iris and Snow Patrol’s Chasing Cars suddenly stormed the top spots. The Station’s focus is pop, rock and indie. The Station eventually stopped running the poll, indicating that they no longer believed it was possible to tun a single all embracing “best of” survey covering all decades and genres. Instead they run narrower polls to match their numerous radio station Apps such as Absolute Britpop (Pulp’s Common People was the favourite in the Britpop Anthem poll) ; Absolute 90’s (Oasis’s Don’t Look Back in Anger the favourite); and Absolute 2000’s (Sam Fender’s Seventeen Going Under the favourite of the last 15 years). Listeners are often prompted with a list of options but allowed also to nominate their own choice. It is clear that Absolute and Smooth’s votes go to very different types of artists, though there is some cross over in the lower reaches with Bryan Adams, Adele and Robbie Williams songs. See Fig. 2 below for Top Ten Extracts from Absolute posted on Rayo.
Meanwhile Virgin Radio, which relaunched separately from its offshoot Absolute in 2016, ran a top 500 listener’s poll in 2023 with a combination of their suggestions and a free-choice option of three additional records. The songs are essentially pop, rock and alternative rock and the make up looks quite similar to the original Absolute radio top 500 referred to above. For instance the 2023 Virgin poll also contains Iris and Chasing Cars in high positions. The number 1 is Bon Jovi’s Livin’ on a Prayer, (see Fig.3) 
and in general soft metal acts such as Aerosmith and Survivor are well represented.
Queen are there too in the top ten but not as you might expect with Bohemian Rhapsody, but in fact with Don’t Stop Me Now and We Are the Champions, with the former especially perhaps indicating the Station’s Drive Time speciality. Familiar songs like Wonderwall and Purple Rain are just outside the top 10. Only a very few recent records (for instance Adele’s Rolling in the Deep, Lewis Capoldi’s Someone You Loved, Florence and the Machine’s You Got the Love and Ed Sheeran’s Shape of You) are in the top 50. Equally very few from the 60’s either – little or no Beatles or Stones. And little Soul either.
2. 1.3 BBC Radio
BBC Radio consists of many different pop music stations such as Radio 1 (which has transitioned from “pop for everyone” to “the latest pop just for the young”) and Radio 2 (which has transitioned from Easy Listening to “classic rock pop and soul for the not so young” and Radio 6 which pioneers alternate rock, indie and hip-hop aimed at young adults. The stations have issued various polls over the years and Dave Whitaker (see below) has done a great job in collating them to an overall BBC list, the top ten of which (Fig.4) shows Classic Rock (Stairway to Heaven) and Pop (Imagine) well to the fore. Also in the overall BBC 200 are Britpop (Wonderwall), Punk (Anarchy in the U.K.), Indie (How Soon is Now), Alternative (Teen Spirit), 
Hip-Hop (Fight the Power) and Soul (Stand By Me).
But two unusual aspects stand out in the overall 200.. First, Massive Attack’s Unfinished Sympathy (UK Trip Hop from the 90’s) is a standalone of that UK genre and if you look at the inputs that can only be from the Radio 1 list where it was actually ranked Number 1 i.e. best ever single by anyone. Second, the overall list contains some records going back to the 1920’s to 1930’s and 1940’s such as Over the Rainbow, Stardust, Singing in the Rain and White Christmas, almost certainly from Radio 2. Arctic Monkeys come next to Fred Astaire, Radiohead next to Judy Garland (!). Note also, not much soul – some Marvin Gaye such as Grapevine, and Aretha’s Say a Little Prayer, but Respect nowhere to be seen.
2.1.4 Greatest Hits Radio
Founded about six years old, this station is populated by several former BBC Radio 2 disc jockeys and reflects their tastes. They survey UK listeners every year – around 20,000 respondents – for their Top 500 of All Time, and the 2024 list in Spotify Form is shown here and the updated 2025 list here
The surveys show good consistency with each other – Bohemian Rhapsody has been No.1 seven years in a row – and the lower reaches have an excellent, very varied selection of genres from the New Wave (Jam, Going Underground and Clash, London Calling) through Classic Rock (Free, Alright Now), to country (Dolly Parton, Jolene) to Pop (Abba, Dancing Queen, Michael Jackson, Billie Jean), 80’s Synth (Eurythmics, Sweet Dreams) and Indie (Oasis, Wonderwall). There is one problem though; there is a bit of Soul (Stevie Wonder, Superstition) but surely not enough, though this may be because the time period is limited to 70’s, 80’s and 90’s – thereby eliminating classic Stax like Aretha, and Motown like the Supremes and Four Tops (as well as almost all the Beatles of course, except for Let It Be).
Note that TV polls are more rare, but we will cover one in the “Popular Culture” section 7.1 below, a huge Channel 4/HMV ” Millennium” poll with similar results to Greatest Hits Radio poll.
3. Music Magazines
3.1 The New Musical Express
NME readers 1976
Link to Readers poll many years results for best single , best album, best act etc
I religiously ordered a weekly copy of the NME for about 25 years of my young adult life from about 1975 to 2000. Initially it was required reading for any serious music fan, and even the writers were famous on the music scene, Charles Shaar Murray, Paul Morley, Nick Kent, Julie Burchill, Tony Parsons, Danny Baker, Danny Kelly, Stuart Maconie – many of whom became famous radio presenters, band managers or newspaper journalists. The NME fairly regularly produced “best ever” polls and generally were compiled by the writers themselves. So even if the writers could be a little eccentric (their reviews of singles became famous for often, bizarrely, saying nothing about the record itself), you took great notice of their “best of” choices, genres and ranks because they were giants of music journalism
The NME started in 1952 with the first ever sales based pop chart in the UK, which became the basis for the official BBC British Market Bureau chart, and often ran Readers poll for best group, single and so on: they were an early indication of the Beatles popularity. The NME were pioneers of the pub rock, punk and new wave eras, and later the hip hop genre. The NME generally had a reputation for favouring rock and alternate rock, which made their writer’s polls perhaps surprising, to me anyway.
Namely (Fig. 6), though the 1976 NME writers’ poll was about 2/3 traditional rock e.g. Beatles, Stones, Dylan it was also 1/3 soul, including both Motown e.g. Miracles, Supremes and Atlantic/Stax such as Aretha and Wilson Picket. I personally remember this well and even while still at a boys’ rock-oriented college thought I should try out soul music, and bought the “This is Soul“ sampler at a second hand shop. Note that in contrast the 1976 readers (not writers) poll was 95% rock, but only 5% soul.
The 1987 writers poll was highly eclectic. Soul had risen to almost 50%. I distinctly remember the observation that the top ten were all by black artists (with Aretha’s Say a Little Prayer at No.1), with the first white artist being Kate Bush at 13 with Running Up That Hill. The other 50% was classic rock, punk, new wave, Indie, and Roots Reggae. Although writers-only polls can be biased, the 1987 poll choices showed this superb collection of music journalists at their peak.
By 2002 however, soul was much reduced in the Writers’ poll and punk, Indie and Britpop were taking over along with classic rock. Top 3 were Love Will Tear Us Apart, Teen Spirit, and Anarchy.
By 2014 although the top ten were still Indie-oriented the lower reaches were featuring Rap (Jay Z, Grandmaster Flash) and Hip Hop ( Public Enemy, Massive Attack).
We can see that as writers change and tastes change, the NME’s view of history changes too.
The many years of readers polls, as opposed to writers, is highly revealing of NME readers’ tastes. See Fig. 7 for the list of readers’ best ever singles in 1976 and 1977 polls – a dramatic change from historic classic rock to current Punk. I personally remember well the turning point of 1976 (classic rock choices of best ever – Layla/best of year – Boys Are Back in Town); and after that everything changed: 1977 The Pistol’s God Save the Queen and Pretty Vacant, 1978 The Clash, White Man in Hammersmith Palais, 1979 The Specials, Gangsters, 1980 The Jam’s Going Underground. In other words, the readers were agreeing with the writers about the excitement that Punk brought. At that time the very production of “best of year” and “best ever” polls was inextricably part of the overall process of the Punk/New Wave revolution. Note however, hardly ever did the readers seem to agree with the Writers’ attachment to Soul.
Also, it is (now) surprising to see that the NME readers’ favourite Disc Jockey most of the way through the 1960’s, up to 1971, was the now disgraced Jimmy Saville. From 1972 for the rest of the decade and beyond, the NME readers’ favourite DJ was John Peel, who every Christmas played the “festive fifty” chart. The attached describes how Peel let the listeners choose their favourite records of the year and it provides evidence of almost the exact year 1976/1977 when his listeners’ tastes turned from heavy rock (Led Zeppelin) to Punk (Clash and the Sex Pistols) and continued through the New Wave (the Jam) and Indie (Joy Division) years. It also reveals how a Disc Jockey, through the records he plays on his show, can influence the listeners’ poll results. For instance, The Fall have multiple poll entries in multiple years – because they were a Peel favourite – even though their commercial success and airplay on other shows was minimal. The Undertones’ Teenage Kicks was said to be Peel’s all-time favourite and it appeared in the listeners top ten of 1978. However there is a limit to a DJ’s influence – he pioneered Roots Reggae (such as Steel Pulse) but the listeners never nominated the genre’s records.
3.2 Rolling Stone Magazine
The Rolling Stone magazine is an American magazine and was traditionally featured rock’ n’ roll, classic rock and Motown/Atlantic soul as can be seen in its “top 500 songs of all time” conducted in 2004. Initially. The 5-4-3-2-1 were Respect, What’s Going On, Imagine, Satisfaction, and at No.1 (a coincidence I am sure) Like a Rolling Stone. (See Fig.8)
The magazine is not purely musical and features social, cultural and political issues, mostly from a progressive stance. So when the top 500 was re-issued and updated in 2021, with minor updates till 2024, we saw quite a different list to reflect not just recent musical changes but also societal developments. The method of compilation was extremely methodical and tried to avoid bias by using a range of industry experts, producers, musicians from many genres. In this account it describes that “more than 250 artists, journalists, and industry figures — from Megan Thee Stallion to U2’s the Edge to Yaya Bey — helped determine the all-new list”. “Voters were asked to submit ranked ballots listing their 50 favourite songs of all time. Votes were tabulated, with the highest-ranked song on each list receiving 300 points, the second highest 290 points, and so on down to 44 points for number 50. More than 4,000 songs received at least one vote”.
The 2021(2024) poll top twenty shown below displays a highly eclectic mix of Dance, Pop, Rock, Classic Rock, Soul, Rap, Indie, Hip-Hop. The date range is in a sense wide but there is no pre 1960 rock’n’roll, or nothing from the most recent 10 years even though that period was available. (Though further down the chart such records do appear).
There is some consistency between the 2004 and 2021 lists (for instance Like a Rolling Stone, Teen Spirit, Imagine, Respect, What’s Going On, Want To Hold Your Hand all maintained high positions) but the principal “winners” were Aretha (Respect, a feminist civil rights anthem, leaps to No. 1) and Rap (Jay-Z) and Hip Hop (Public Enemy, Missy Elliot); but the “losers” were traditional guitar based classic rock like the Who and Hendrix. Newsweek (an American News magazine) thinks the 2004/2021 comparison important enough to include a detailed article on the poll-on-poll trends. There were major changes – for instance, incredibly the Righteous Brothers’ classic Lovin Feeling dropped out of the 500 altogether. My Generation dropped Down 221 places from 11 to 232 and Hotel California dropped down 262 (from 49 to 311). Elvis Presley’s Hound Dog was a high No. 19 in the 2004 chart but was dropped entirely from the 2021 update, replaced in the 500 by the original “roots of rock‘n’roll ” version by R&B singer Big Mama Thornton.
3.3 Q magazine
A UK music magazine – now defunct but at one time popular and influential – lay somewhere between the NME readers’ tastes and Rolling Stone’s forays into popular culture i.e. not just the records. In 2006 it ran an open – no restrictions – readers’ poll and the results show some classic aspects of voter “bias”. It includes essentially male teenage genre likes : in the top twenty are these examples; pop (Day in the Life, Beatles); classic rock (U2, One), punk (Clash, London Calling), Britpop (Oasis Numbers 1 Live Forever and 2 Wonderwall) and indie (Nirvana, No. 3 Teen Spirit) i.e. guitar bands with almost no soul or dance. The majority from the UK. Almost all from the narrow decades of 1960’s to 1990’s – note however, with almost none from the 2000’s so the readers did not simply vote for what they heard most recently.
3.4 Telegraph Music Section (Neil McCormick)
This Top 100 songs of all time list from 2018 relies on the respected journalist’s personal choice as a “fan, musician and critic”. The Telegraph is from the opposite end of the political spectrum from the NME but this particular critic is so steeped in all aspects of popular music that he can be trusted to create a valid list. Many of the songs are what you’d expect (Lola, Life on Mars, Let it Be, Hallelujah, One, Hey Jude) but some are un-obvious choices from established artists (Dylan’s Tangled Up in Blue, and Visions of Johanna, not Like a Rolling Stone); and historic songs (like Billie Holiday’s Strange Fruit and Louis Armstrong’s St James Infirmary). Probably 2/3 of the songs appear in other Polls above but about 1/3 don’t, though to be fair he nominates pre-rock era songs more than most polls and emphasizes it is songs, not necessarily records, he lists.
As I write, in 2026, McCormick is writing a new series – the music of the decades – leading to an overall top 50 after nominating 30 tracks for each decade (around 150 in all). He starts in the 1950’s confirming the emerging view that modern pop music began around 1950. As above he chooses the songs himself – “The choices (and biases) are mine, a music critic in my mid-60s.” And so, while as expected Heartbreak Hotel, I Walk the Line and Tuti Fruiti make his 1950’s top 5, surprisingly Cry Me A River (Julie London) and First Time I Ever Saw Your Face (Peggy Seger’s version of Pete Seeger’s original) also do. Although, like for all his choices, McCormick writes a beautifully crafted justification, these are surely two personal choices that would not appear often in most polls. Intriguingly , he also allows an on line interactive vote “Would you also choose this in your top five”. Further, he later writes a whole article explaining why “Rock Around the Clock” is excluded. “Insubstantial, fluffy novelty hit” he calls it, although he agrees, as a strong point, that although it wasn’t a great song, “it changed everything”. And that gets to the heart of my whole essay, which is more important, the quality of the song or its cultural impact?
His sixties top 30 follow a similar patten with the large majority being ubiquitous poll entrants, songs few would argue with (plenty of Beatles, Beachboys, Stones, Dylan, Aretha, Marvin Gaye, Simon and Garfunkel) but again some very personal choices – Moon River as a song rather than a specific version – and Bobbie Gentry’s delightful and intriguing Ode to Billie Joe, a rare hint of country, along with Glen Campbell and Dolly Parton, in these lists. His number 1, the Beatles’ Day in the Life, is a ground-breaking song, but not a single.
The purpose of McCormick’s exercise, beautifully put, is “to answer that fascinating, frivolous yet momentous question, on which every music lover surely has an opinion. What are the songs that have touched the whole world, changed popular culture, resonated deepest within our own hearts and minds, and contain an innate power to linger on past the short shelf life of the hit parade?”
Later, in section 3, you’ll see how Neil’s top 30 for the 1960’s compares to other sixties lists.
4. Books
4.1 The People’s Songs
| Author | Roles | Time period | Principal Genres | Secondary genres | Selection Method |
| Stuart Maconie | Respected music journalist and Disc Jockey | 1942 – 2012 | All: Calypso, Punk, New Wave, Indie, Madchester, Britpop, Hip Hop, Reggae, R&B | Pop, 80’s New Romantic | Own choice of 50 songs listed approximately chronologically (but not necessarily one per year). Criteria is that they influenced popular culture (or vice versa) and struck a chord with a large or important section of the UK population. |
Maconie’s 50 records are not strictly meant to be the “best” but to tell “the story of modern Britain” via pop. It relies on his opinion of records which illustrate a particular moment in British social history and have a significant impact on the wider British culture. He wants to tell the story of everyday British citizens and their relationship to pop music. He chooses only British records for this reason and indeed argues the Britain invented popular music while acknowledging that of course America took it forward. He defines pop music as a ”mongrel hybrid of rock, vaudeville, folk ballad, dance music, classroom hymns, street corner soul and classical music”.
The categories of records he chooses include pre rock’n’roll – going back to Vera Lynn; British rock’n’roll era records (Lonnie Donegan, Cliff Richard, Tornadoes); genres neglected by mainstream music press (folk, calypso, progressive, heavy metal, teenybop, eurodisco, X-factor); and political issues (Trade Unions, Irish Nationalism, Anarchists, Falklands); Christmas (Band Aid and Slade) and football (World in Motion) But he also includes the high selling and airplay records you would find in most “best-ever” lists such as She Loves You, Whiter Shade of Pale, the Pistols’ God Save the Queen; Another Brick In the Wall, Our House, Can’t Get You Out of My Head, Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor. These to Maconie are highly illustrative of social history which just happen to be high sellers.
4.2 This is Uncool: The 500 Greatest Singles since Punk and Disco
| Author | Roles | Time period | Principal Genres | Secondary genres | Selection Method |
| Gary Mullholland | Respected music journalist, Guardian, Observer. | 1976-2000 | Punk, New Wave, Indie, Madchester, Britpop, Hip Hop, Reggae, R&B | Pop, 80’s New Romantic | Own choice of 500 singles grouped by Year chronologically listed on average 20 songs per annum |
Gary started this list in the year his teenage began, and ended it end of century partly because he felt the era of great singles was coming to a close. Although not an NME journalist, it is written in an NME style from an NME perspective – Each year it is essentially his choice of the greatest records based around significance – often political – lyrical and musical appeal which he describes in typically half page essays. A champion of Punk, he starts with the first four Sex Pistols Singles (see below for “blocks of four”) and includes many from the Clash , the Jam, the Stranglers. Well known and oft included songs in “best of” lists. But he also includes long since forgotten groups like the Slits. He continues with many from Ska, (Madness, Specials) and the Manchester scene (Joy Division with the ubiquitous Love Will Tear Us Apart, New Order, the Smiths) and Britpop (Oasis Blur, Pulp). On the other hand there is the closing of the Disco scene (Bee Gees, Earth Wind and Fire) and into Hip Hop with Grandmaster Flash and Public Enemy. Also included is Abba – he admits they have transformed from uncool to cool – and many from the rock soul crossover of Prince. What is excluded is interesting – no corporate Rock such as U2 or Eagles, almost no Metal, no Whitney Houston from commercial soul. By the end of the 90’s he can barely find 20 records to include and has no idea what is No.1. But interestingly he includes an appendix for 2001 and 2002 where he does actually put 20 records in order of his favourite with Eminem’s Stan as No.1 .
4.3. Yeah Yeah Yeah
| Author | Roles | Time period | Principal Genres | Secondary genres | Selection Method |
| Bob Stanley | Respected music journalist leading to this well cited book on the definitive history of Popular Music | 1952-1999 | All – pop rock and soul | Not a list of best but chronological chapters each telling a story or a theme each describing around 30 records making approximately 2000 records mentioned. |
Though not an attempt to identify the “best” there are many aspects in this book relevant to our project. First, he attempts to define what pop music is (which informs us what genres of records should and shouldn’t be included in “best” lists) “Pop includes rock, R&B, soul, hip-hop, house, techno, metal and country. …and anything that gets in the charts is Pop”.
Note that Jazz and (more surprisingly) Folk are not included. Note also that he highlights the difficulty of pinning down what the USA Billboard R&B chart actually covers: in the UK we would essentially say “Soul” but in the USA this particular chart has been called in chronological order : the Harlem Hit Parade, Race, Rhythm and Blues, Soul, Black, R&B, R&/Hip Hop. A recurring difficulty for “best of” compilers is whether the two fundamentals of rock and soul can be combined in one list.
Bob has an encyclopaedic knowledge of chart positions and almost always quotes a records’ UK and USA peak chart position, and proposes that anything that gets in the charts counts as pop, but notes that, of course, conversely, not all pop music gets in the charts, and indeed not all great pop music gets in the charts (for instance Velvet Underground’s releases, now thought to be ground-breaking). But what creates “great” pop? Stanley says “the tension, opposition, progress and fear of progress”
Bob decides to start the modern pop era in 1952, the year of the first UK pop chart (but note his book is as much about American as British music) and essentially the switch from 78rpm to 45 rpm. He feels that the end comes naturally at the end of the century with the demise of the Vinyl single in favour of CD then Digital download, with the reduced significance of the Chart, with the end of Top of the Pops, and with the essential end of the Music Press (for instance Smash Hots disappeared, the NME went on-line only : personally, for about 20 years I had the NME paper copy delivered each week). He argues that the 21s century version of pop is not necessarily bad (though he bemoans the “sameiness” of records in the charts) , but it is certainly a different era. Tellingly his follow-up book is pre-1952 prequel rather than a post 2000 sequel. He calls 1945-1952 the “dark age of rock ‘n’ roll” which he wants to explore further.
Bob uses certain records to define what great pop music is. He singles out Bob Dylan’s 20 page poem which became the classic “Like a Rolling Stone”, which to me has some essential characteristics about great pop – fascinating lyrics – even if not fully understandable – and a bonus a significant social comment (about homelessness); and the transition to something new (from acoustic folk to electric guitar); and simply a great musical commercial sound ( the combination of the guitar and organ) .
He also cites the Beachboys Good Vibrations as still being in a field of only two records which still after all these years “sound like the future” (the other is I Feel Love by Donna Summer and your author smugly states that these two and Rolling Stone were already in his top ten of all time. An important point is that being first to a new genre dramatically improves a record’s chance of everlasting longevity in “best-ever” polls.).
Bob feels that reaching No.1 is (or was) an indicator of something special (and indeed gets extra points in the Billboard compilation method). For instance, when the Jam came straight in at No.1 with Going Underground it was a very rare event. (and note that 6 reissued singles followed it into the chart, and when the group split, 13 of their records appeared in the chart simultaneously). It is much easier for a record in the digital age to reach number one and often drops away quickly. Not so the current Number 1; as I write, Sam Fender and Olivia Dean’ s Rein Me In. Such is the lack of news these days about the charts is that the first time I realised it was number one was when its 18 week run at the top equalled the Frankie Lane “I Believe” record. It is difficult to over estimate how important the charts were last century in public conversation and both the music and general media – and to artists themselves, Bob recalls that John Entwistle of the Who bemoaned the fact that twice the Who were denied No.1 s by in his view inferior records by Jim Reeves and Ken Dodd. And many still recall that one of the greatest of all records, the Beatles Penny Lane / Strawberry Fields was denied No,1 by the unlikely Englebert Humperdink.
To become a “best” record it has to be heard. Through radio , TV, live performances as well purchase or download. So Stanley emphasises the role of the role of manager / producer, such as Brian Epstein/George Martin for the Beatles, Chas Chandler the manager for Jimi Hendrix and Slade, for Phil Spector for the Wall of Sound, and Stock Aitken and Waterman as producers for Kylie, and for Simon Cowell for One Direction; they were brilliant publicists/career guides/singles pickers for their artists and part of the reason some of their artists’ records are seen as the “best ever”. Note that some modern genre’s lyrics prevent them being heard on family oriented radio – and in doing so condemn them to never being seen as “best-ever”.
Bob Stanley proposes that pop music runs in periods of a decade – starting mid decade. So 1954 Rock ‘n’ Roll, 1964 Pop and the Beatles, 1974 Rock and Disco, 1984 Electronic and Indie and so on – but also points out that half way or more through those periods the genres run out of steam.
Bob Stanley does not shy away from praising “uncool” records, such as the rock Ballads like Bryan Adams Everything I Do, or Nilson’s Without You; and he admires, indeed praises, most parts of Cliff Richard’s multi decade recording career.
4.4. The Top 100 songs of the rock era 1954 – 1999
| Author | Roles | Time period | Principal Genres | Secondary genres | Selection Method |
| Dave Whitaker | An amateur researcher and record collector with an unrelated day job who became the supreme accumulator of pop music lists including “best ofs” | 1954-1999 | Pop. Rock. R&B and soul | Easy listening, country, indie. | Listed from 1-100 using many collections from his database using cumulative mathematical rankings (see Website below for more details) . |
Dave Whitaker has evolved from enthusiastic amateur pop music researcher to the doyen of pop data collectors and list-makers, including perhaps the most thorough, well thought-through, unbiased “best of” list of all. The book is the product of his databases (highlights are shown in the Database section) which accumulate and average multi-sources. The book starts with No.1 (Hey Jude) and ends with No.100 (Great Balls of Fire); the accumulation method ensures that even No.100 really indicates significance. There’s a one page mini-essay on each of the 100 and, for each, his estimate of three quantifiable statistics : Chart Position, Sales, and Airplay; then he also lists Awards; and finally builds in other polls to fully justify the position. The book ends with a superb bibliography of his sources and links. It is a very simple but compelling book. Some highlights of the chart and essays include;
– the democratic construction of the chart enables you to realise what the “wisdom of crowds” believes to the best of pop , and indeed the best of an artist for instance the Four Tops highest is Reach Out (No. 56) and Aretha Franklin’s is Respect (No.13)
– the importance of, and his fascination with, No.1’s; for instance he spots that Jailhouse Rock (No.51), My Sweet Lord (No. 99) and Bohemian Rhapsody (No. 17) were number 1 twice, separated by many years.
Then he reveals that some entries to best-ever lists happened almost by accident:
– his observation that some entries in his top 100 started life as B-sides (such as Chubby Checker’s the Twist (No. 55, started life as someone elses’ flips side), while Maggie May (No.53) was released as the B – side of Reason to Believe, which although an outstanding song, could not compete with the realization by disc jockeys and listeners alike that Maggie May was the true A-side.
– the surprising fact that sometimes the biggest hits were throwaways or given by a major artists to a relative unknown (Prince’s No. 57 Nothing Compares given to Sinead O’Connor )
– many hits were written in a short time on tour (the Beatles’ No. 79 She Loves You in a Newcastle Hotel Room, the Rolling Stones’ No. 61 Honkey Tonk Woman at their South American holiday ranch)
Note that Whitaker has also issued corresponding books for the pre-rock era and also the post-rock digital age 21st century records.
4.5. Singles – Six decades of Hot Hits & Classic Cuts
| Authors | Roles | Time period | Principal Genres | Secondary genres | Selection Method |
| Black, Brend, Burton, Egan Jerome, McIver, Morrish, Palmer | Musicians, producers, music journalists and authors i.e. music industry experts | 1954-2006
Published 2006 |
Pop, Rock’n’Roll Rock, Indie, Punk, R&B, Soul, Disco, Electronica, Rap and Hip Hop | Reggae, Glam Rock. | 750 records spread across six decades, 50 years. Approximately 15 records included per year chronological order. No method is explained for choosing records but likely to be the combined expert view of the authors. |
A magnificent book created by eight music industry experts – journalists and musicians from the UK, America and Norway. A very tall and wide book (greater than A3) enabling an outstanding series of often huge colour photos, generally of performers recording in the studio (some of the best and most atmospheric photos being of Simon and Garfunkel, Aretha Franklin, Sam Cooke, Barry White, John Lennon/Yoko Ono at white piano, Bob Dylan); or performing on stage (Nat King Cole, Bill Haley, James Brown, Destiny’s Child, featuring Beyonce, Elton John at Princess Diana’s funeral, Bruce Springsteen, Abba, Roxy Music, Prince, Britney Spears, Madonna). Plus of course ubiquitous Beatles, Elvis, Stones, Michael Jackson. The significance of the photos, especially the large ones, is that they indicate (in my interpretation) which artists the authors think are the most important.
Typically there are five records per page, with a short essay for each, but again, the most important records seem to get a full page – for instance Rock Around the Clock, She Loves You, Like a Rolling Stone, Imagine, Bohemian Rhapsody, Billie Jean, Smells Like Teen Spirit, Le Freak, God Save The Queen,
So the authors have used chronological years and their views to create their list of what I believe really is a truly valid list of “Hot Hits & Classic Cuts”; and then without using a numbering system, literally use the size of the photos and essays to convey their view of how to signpost the most important artists and records. Of the 750 records, almost all would be recognizable to the average music fan, cover a full range of genres, and share a common factor of high quality and chart success. Without actually intending to, they created a valid top 750 of all time (up to 2006).
5. Websites and databases
5.1. Everyhit.com
The basis of this was in 2002 to systematically compile the results of 6 sources; (radio stations BBC 1 and 2 and Virgin ; two magazines Q and Mojo ; and Guinness Book of Hit Singles readers’ opinion Poll) and use purely the records’ ranking positions in those polls as a means of combining to an overall Every-hit ranking from 1 to 100. . This is the beginning of an attempt to eliminate bias (see below, Dave Whitaker’s DMDB took it much further). Every-hit’s website fully and articulately describes their ranking process and why they used it. For instance, “by using this methodology we have largely eliminated any idiosyncrasies caused by ‘fad’ voting (favouring very recent releases), skewing resulting from a restrictive demographic (most radio stations/magazines aim at a relatively narrow age-band) and attempts by artist fan clubs to influence voting”.
The result is No. 1 Bohemian Rhapsody, followed by Imagine, Angels, Hey Jude, Teen Spirit and Live Forever. It is a terrific mix of genres such as rock, alternate rock, punk, indie, Britpop and sixties pop. However, Soul is under-represented – indicating some bias in choosing the six sources – but the main Soul choices are spot on – Tracks of My Tears and Heard It Through the Grapevine. The table below gives some examples of genre-records all of which have high ranking places.
| Rock | Pop | Alt-rock | Punk/New Wave | Trip Hop/Rap | Britpop | Soul/Reggae | Sixties | Electronic Dance |
| U2’s One
Stairway to Heaven Layla |
Dancing Queen,
Like a Prayer, Billie Jean |
Losing My Religion
Radiohead’s Creep Love Will tear Us Apart Killers Mr. Brightside |
London Calling
Going Underground God Save the Queen |
Massive Attack’s Unfinished Symphony
Eminem’s Stan |
Wonderwall, Bitter Sweet Symphony, Song 2 |
Puff Daddy ‘s I’ll Be Missing You
No Woman No Cry Tracks of My Tears Dock of the Bay |
Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields
Like a Rolling Stone Good Vibrations |
Blue Monday Don’t You Want Me |
A short time later the Guinness Survey was combined with a Radio 2 survey to produce an overall 188,000 votes with a similar set of results to the above.
5.2. DMDB : Dave (Whitaker)’s Music Database
The basis of the book above (top 100 songs of the Rock Era 1954 – 1999). Whitaker creates his top 100 list (first issued in 2011 and updated in 2021 with accompanied podcast) very methodically. Although he doesn’t reveal his exact methodology (just as Coca Cola won’t release their exact recipe) it is likely to incorporate three types of ingredients. First, the data published in his book, namely Chart Position, Sales, Airplay and Awards received. Second, Whitaker’s essays themselves are the combination of many reviews. And third, a collection of many other databases and lists, as shown by the Joy Division example.
In adopting this “wisdom of the crowds” method he hopes to avoid the bias of a particular genre and indeed his own potential bias. To prove this lack of bias he use the examples of Celine Dion (an easy listening singer) that he wishes was not in the list, but if the data says Yes, then he stays with the data; and he wishes one of his personal favourite , the Stones’ I Can’t get no Satisfaction, was No.1, but the data says it is Hey Jude, so he leaves it just so. In a separate list of his own personal favourites, Marillion’s Kayleigh is very high but absent from the overall top 100.
Whitaker uses 9 specific charts, principally UK and American such as general BBC and Billboard but also specialist Country, R&B and Rock. The 140 other lists include both factual, for instance the now famous Joel Whitburns’ account of effectively every single ever released, and which apparently Whitburn physically collected them all; and also “best of” opinions from for example the USA’s Rolling Stone Magazine and Radio Stations like WNBC, and the UK’s New Musical Express and both BBC Radio 1 and Radio 2 listener’s polls; and newspaper polls ranging from left of political centre the Observer and right of centre Telegraph; and Halls of Fame across Rock, Country and R&B. In his book (above) he evaluates sources where possible for instance detailing which criteria were used to compile lists, or if no criteria were found, he says so (implying less reliability of source).
So how does he convert the raw data into his top 100 lists. My guess is that he enters every record to be found in the 140 sources and assigns them a ranked points total based on the very strict factual criteria mentioned above – sales, airplay, chart position, awards – but overlays that with rankings from the “opinion” lists, and by including as many and diverse of these as possible, he hopes to avoid bias.
He may attribute different “weightings” to different criteria. An formula or algorithm will then accumulate the results into his rank order. It could include statistical techniques such as Spearman’s Rank correlation which measures correlation of ranks awarded by different list-makers. The database will enable easy updates – when a variable changes value, for instance when a record gets new sales data, its ranking will be automatically updated. He will keep as many of the “rules” as possible fixed between updates, for consistency, such as the identity of nine Charts used.
His Rock Era charts include, not surprisingly, Rock as its principal constituent along with pop and soul/R&B. But Dave has also published Pre-rock and Digital Age (first two decades, 2000-2019) lists. Essentially the same basis as above.
The Digital Age top 100 includes some classic rock such as Coldplay and Green Day but time has moved on and it is now pop acts like UK origin Adele (Rolling in the Deep), Ed Sheeran (Shape of You), and Harry Styles (As It Was); and American dance/pop Bruno Mars (Uptown Funk), Pharrell (Happy), Beyonce (Crazy In Love) and Outkast (Hey Ya); and Rap , Eminem (Lose Yourself) and Rhianna (Umbrella). Guitar bands are still hugely popular, but rarely through newly released singles – rather, albums, and touring their greatest hits.
5.3 Rick Anderson (your author)
In 2016 I produced a “best-ever” list of my own for my 60th birthday without the aid of almost any of the research above and published on the internet. I am pleased to say my choices were very similar to many of the professional polls. I updated it this year in 2026 for my 70th, and even after reflection almost all my choices remained the same. My update changed in one respect though – the time period covered.
The first attempt was from 1956 – my year of birth and the year of what I considered the birth of modern music with Elvis’s Heartbreak Hotel – and up to the then present, 2016. The second attempt brought the start back to 1950 and the end back to 2000. The reasons for this are important. The period 1950-1955 , I concluded, was the real birth of rock’n’roll and included many memorable transition records from soul R&B to rock’n’roll such as Rocket 88 by Jackie Branston and Ike Turner; from country and rockabilly such as Elvis’s That’s All Right; and of course Bill Haley’s Rock Around the Clock. I ended at 2000 for a couple of reasons, first like a number of professional compilers, 2000 seems a break point from the rock era into the digital age, and second to restrict the number of records to a manageable 150.
150 over 50 years is no coincidence. My methodology in both original and updated lists was to restrict each and every year to 3 records only (I believe a unique approach), in order to reduce bias for a particular year or genre, and restrict the total number of records and focus the mind (also to enable every record to played at my party using Offtrack’s ingenious merging software linked to Spotify, in effect recreating the Mix Tape).
The five criteria I used were as follows for inclusion:
- Commercial worldwide chart positions
- Moving the genre forward, initiating a music style, summing up a musical period
- Memorable lyrics, great poetry or wider impact on society
- Critical acclaim, and awards
- Readers’ and Listeners’ polls.
(An informal criteria was that if an artist had two or more records in the list then they should be recognized as one of the all time greats, such as Elvis, the Beatles, the Stones, Abba and Michael Jackson).
My five main criteria are nearest to the Dave Whitaker DMDB approach, and despite my “3 per year” framework, my 150 are fairly close to Dave’s top 100 even though I was at the time unaware of the DMDB. 17 of his top 20 are in my list. Both of us included many different genres and included records not to our personal taste but which our criteria demanded inclusion.
5.4 The digital age – Pitchfork and Rate Your Music
Although the websites above of course use the internet, they feel like old-school which has transitioned to the new age; whereas websites like Pitchfork and Rate Your Music feel like they were never old at all, they simply were born in the digital age.
Pitchfork began with a few American amateur music critics creating a website to review new releases much quicker than print magazines like Rolling Stone. They were principally focusing on the Indie/Radical angle, and the reviews were sometimes obtuse and bizarre a la NME. For albums they devised a unique scoring system namely decimal point accuracy from 0.0 to 10.0. For singles however, the rating was qualitative not quantitative. They had a cult following, but gradually as they expanded they became a more traditional and mainstream business until they sold out by issuing an old school coffee table book, and being taken over by GQ magazine. But still one of the go-to’s for quotes on new releases, with their famous “best new track” label.
For singles, Pitchfork now publish on their website the best 200 songs per decade, chosen by staff-writers, with well written (no longer bizarre) mini-essays. You will see for instance from their 1960’s list that it is a very recognizable, delightful list. In order from No. 5 up to No. 1 : a Day In The Life, Like a Rolling Stone, a Change is Gonna Come, I Want You Back, God Only Knows. The rest is a mixture of Rock, Girl Group, Stax and Motown Soul, almost all recognizable to the average fan. As the lists move through the decades it is noticeable that despite their American base, UK music is hugely represented. For instance, the 1980’s top ten contains the Smiths, New Order, Joy Division and Kate Bush (along with Prince, and American Rap). Sadly, the lists from more recent decades contain what to me are obscure artists, and sometimes un-obvious choices from mainstream artists.
On-line democratisation of polling has been taken further by “Rate Your Music” RYM, an extensive community based website collection of music blogs, databases, lists, in which users can continually vote for whatever single (or album) they like, with no restrictions. This works to a certain extent in that as expected Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields, Heroes and Running Up That Hill fare very well, but peculiarities like a plethora of King Crimson and Radiohead records do too. It is noticeable that RYM has an international audience, with many genres such as jazz, as well as rock, represented.
6. Other ranking methods
In this section we consider some alternative ranking methods.
6.1 A canon of work: four consecutive great singles.
Suppose we drew up a ranking not of best singles, or best album, but somewhere in between?
“Best of” album lists often refer to the groups of four consecutive superlative albums meaning an emblem of greatness. Examples include the late sixties/early 70’s “imperial phase” of Rolling Stones Albums, namely Beggars Banquet, Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers, and Exile on Main Street. According to Reddit “Everyone knows that the four-album run….is the considered to be the heyday of the band and is the darling of critics and music magazines”. Or Stevie Wonder’s early seventies quartet of Talking Book, Inner Visions, Fulfillingness First Finale and Songs in the Key of Life; or the Beatles Help, Rubber Soul, Revolver, Sergeant Pepper.
What if we applied a similar idea to singles? I believe an untapped way of judging the best is through groups of four consecutive classic singles, signifying an artist’s “imperial phase”, to avoid the “one-off and disappear” problem with some records. So Gary Mulholland highlights just four Sex Pistols singles – as it happens the first four namely Anarchy, God Save the Queen, Pretty Vacant and Holidays in the Sun. For Jimi Hendrix – Hey Joe, Purple Haze, Wind Cries Mary and All Along the Watchtower. The Beatles have several such as the mid-period quartet of Ticket to Ride, Help, Day Tripper/We can Work it Out, Paperback Writer. Aretha’s Atlantic high point of Never Loved a Man, Respect, Baby I Love You, You Make Me Feel, followed a little later by another classic quartet of Chain of Fools, Think, Since You’ve Been Gone and Say a Little Prayer. And the Jam with When You’re Young, Strange Town, Eton Rifles and Going Underground.
Others could include the original Fleetwood Mac’s Albatross, Man of the World, Oh Well and Green Manalishe; few or none of these singles appear in critics “best” lists, but as a group of four they are hard to beat; then the newer Mac line up with Go Your Own Way, Dreams, Don’t Stop, You Make Lovin Fun, – admittedly all from the same album (Rumours), so is it just the mark of a great album? Some primary research of my own confirms these: I have twice recently attended gigs by Peter Green era Fleetwood Mac tribute bands, and saw one of the last ever real Fleetwood Mac concerts before singer Christine McVie sadly passed. The records I’ve listed did indeed feature as hugely popular encores. Interestingly, Dreams has shot up the most recent Rolling Stone Magazine “best-ever” chart – a good song or great? Its’ appearance in TV series and a viral TikTok video must have helped.
6.2 . Blind ranking and first impressions.
I remember in the mid 1990’s listening to a radio show in which the DJ played an anonymous record and asked listeners to guess the group. The record sounded very good to me, but a very different sounding song, so I couldn’t place the singer. When he told us the name I thought it was more than good , it was great. But I did not think that that 30 years later the record would often be listed in “best-ever” lists and the group would be conducting a hugely popular greatest hits tour. The record was Oasis’s Wonderwall and the rest is history (it is often the case that when an established artist releases an unusual – for them – record it can be a big hit – think Bohemian Rhapsody, or Everything I Do, I Do For You.)
David Jacob’s Juke Box Jury used to ask its panel to judge “hit or miss” on first hearing. BBC Radio 6 for instance has run a Blind Ranking exercise where listeners are given without warning each entry from a list of Indie groups such as the Stone Roses; and then have to assign a ranking position which they are not allowed to change even when they hear the next option. This is believed to encourage gut-feel spontaneity. When medical tests are done, a “control” is offered to participants which is a “nothing” option, to really find out if a pharamceutical works.
The above examples assume that “first impressions” are best. But is that the best way to judge “best-ever” records. I would argue no, because it may take several years to know if first impressions, whether good, bad or indifferent, are lasting.
6.7. AI and algorithms.
If you ask AI to nominate the best ever pop single the usual suspects emerge: Billie Jean, Hey Jude, Like a Prayer. If you then ask “how to decide”, it includes the expected categories – which agree with Dave Whitaker and your author’s approach – such as commercial success, critical acclaim and cultural impact – and also technical innovation. AI also identifies three “paths” namely a “data centric” path – sales and chart position; the “expert” path – musicologist acclaim and consensus; and the “emotional” path – culture and feeling. Naturally AI then asks if the questioner wishes to narrow the choice by genre or time period. (Note also that AI can now generate records itself in such a way that Streamers feel obliged to alert listeners to “real” versus “manufactured” music. We will see later examples of Streamers like Spotify compiling “most ever streams” lists – of real records!)
In a sense when AI judges best ever it is just using its Large Language Models to scour the internet and summarise, in the same way that some of the “averaging” databases discussed previously do. But for me it still lacks the human touch.
7. “Older music is better”
Some argue that “older music is better”, as explored in “Retromania” (Reynolds, 2010), and if so is it and should it still be, included in “best-ever” lists? We discuss informal factors which shape and influence what choices the fans and experts make in their “best-ever” lists, and which build and maintain the reputation of an older record. For a valid list, the older as well as newer records need to be acknowledged, even though as Reynolds argues, too much looking back can prevent music looking forward.
7.1. In Popular culture: TV, Film, Adverts, Football Songs and Pop Quizzes
Sometimes an older record can be hugely elevated in sales and reputation by entering public consciousness through popular culture. Use of Marvin Gaye’s I Heard It Through the Grapevine in a Levis’ Ad merely cemented the record’s place in “best-ever” lists; whereas “In the Air Tonight” by Phil Collins in the Cadbury’s “ape-drum” advert arguably elevated it to iconic status. Boys Are Back In Town in Toy Story, and especially Bohemian Rhapsody in Wayne’s World, elevated these songs to worldwide legendary status (UK acts in American films).
Not just old records though. Bryan Adams with Everything I Do as an afterthought at the end of the Robin Hood film, and Whitney Houston’s version of Dolly Parton’s I Will Always Love You in the Bodyguard film, made them ten-plus weeks at Number 1 smash hits, and propelled these through Sales alone into some “best-ever” lists.
Another angle on use of pop songs in adverts is the type of song, the genre and decade of release. Many products feature rock songs from decades before the target audiences were born, such as She’s A Rainbow by the Rolling Stones in Dior commercials, and Venus in Furs by the Velvet Underground in a Dunlop Tyre commercial. These are not candidates for “best-ever” but illustrate that many rock songs are timeless and that songs from that era are still popular today.
The obvious, default option is not always right for the advert’s story (Zappi, 2026); sometimes obscure songs or low profile artists are better fitted to the story and emotion. So Nick Drake’s Pink Moon for VW helped transform the late artist from obscurity to cult status to stardom; and the late Sophie’s Lemonade for McDonalds was a brave choice. Similarly one of the People’s Songs (Stuart Maconie, 2011) is folk group Pentangle’s Light Flight, the enduring theme song from the 1970 BBC series Take Three Girls. When John Lewis chose Ellie Goulding’s cover of Elton John’s Your Song to accompany its Christmas advert, it launched her career
Two Clash songs’ inclusion in media which helped propelled them to wider audiences are London Calling in the James Bond Film Die Another Day, as Bond flew into London; and Should I Stay or Should I Go in a Levis’ advert. London Calling was already acknowledged as a classic Punk/New wave song but this placed it on the radar of “best-ever” compilers. However, this does not always work out; Rod Stewart’s Sailing received an enormous boost as the theme tune to a BBC series on the Royal Navy; but is rarely played now
Sport such as Football Terrace songs often create, prolong or enhance a song’s iconic status, such as at Sunderland with Elvis’s I Can’t Help Lovin You, and at various times England fans singing Oasis’ Wonderwall, the White Stripes’ Seven Nation Army, the Beatles’ Hey Jude and Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline. Fleetwood Mac’s The Chain, with John McVie’s memorable base solo, is now synonymous with Formula 1 Motor Racing. Elbow’s One Day Like This was a standout crowd singalong at the 2012 London Olympics ceremony.
Half time at the USA Superbowl has cemented or created iconic songs. Get Ur Freak On by Missy Elliot, and Purple Rain by Prince were performed long after release and helped maintain these songs in “best-ever” lists. Bad Bunny’s DtMF surged to No.1 on the Billboard chart following the 2026 Superbowl performance and won critical acclaim.
Café mix tapes and pop quizzes – whether in pubs or on the radio – helps keep older records in the public consciousness. TV quizzes like Never Mind the Buzzcocks may have fallen out of fashion, like Top of the Pops, but the radio quizzes like Ken Bruce’s Pop Master are more popular than ever, especially with older audiences. Meanwhile pop quizzes on Tik Tok and Spotify attract younger audiences.
Even the dance anthems played in today’s clubs, while of course featuring 21st century artists like Calvin Harris and Daft Punk, also feature older tracks from our best-ever lists like New Order’s Blue Monday, Robin S.‘s Show Me Love, and Donna Summer’s I Feel Love. Popular wedding songs include the Police’s Every Breath, Whitney’s Wanna Dance with Somebody and Abba’s Dancing Queen.
TV – Top of the Pops, and Channel 4’s Music of the Millennium.
Note that although Top of the Pops disappeared, as did its relaunch, BBC4 features reruns of 80’s and 90’s TOTP episodes. Interestingly not much of the 60’s or 70’s TOTP – do they think it is already too far in the past (or are there too many out-of-favour DJ’s to cut out?). There was a 50’s and rock’n’roll revival in the early 1970’s, (Showaddywaddy and Mud) and Drifters re-releases, but that soon died away. At what stage will 80’s and 90’s nostalgia fade – if at all?
TOTP never produced a best-ever list, but in every end of year Christmas special it ran the best of the year, including of course some Christmas songs, often Slade’s Merry Christmas. Such songs are rarely included in best-ever lists, but note that Stuart Maconie closed his 50 “People Songs” book with Slade’s record, effectively the “ultimate” people’s song.
Channel 4 with HMV ran an extensive 600,000 voter “Music of the Millennium ” poll at the end of the last century and while it did confirm Bohemian Rhapsody, Imagine, Strawberry Fields, and Teen Spirit as expected at the top, there were some surprises. Two Robbie Williams songs in the top ten – Angels and, well, Millennium, confirming the potential for fans’ most recent bias; Elvis’s American Trilogy, and Massive Attack’s Unfinished Sympathy. There was not much Soul, but importantly it confirmed that Respect, Superstition, Dock of the Bay, and Grapevine, and Reggae’s No Woman No Cry (Live) were among the most popular. The mechanism for getting such a large voter base was to distribute paper-forms and shopping bags in HMV stores, accompanied by on-line and telephone. The results became the subject of a major TV series. The HMV marketing manager said he wanted to create a “national talking point”. “We’ll be using our stores as polling stations. It’s real ‘state of the nation’ stuff where we’re going to make a social statement and see what effect music has had on people.” It is difficult to imagine a similar event like this now.
7.2. Best-of compilations on records.
In the 1970’s especially, compilation LP’s were issued with “best of”’ collections such as Woolworth’s Embassy and Hallmark’s Top of the Pops which, bizarrely, featured re-recordings by session singers (to save money on costs and enabled reduced prices). Then TV- advertised K-Tel and Ronco packed in 20 tracks per LP but at first included just a few well know original tracks and the rest fillers; but “Now That’s What I Call Music” came along in 1983 with original big Hits only, and multiple updates were issued every few months – and by 2026 version number 124 was released. Label-specific compilations like Tamla Motown issued several “best of Motown” albums and for instance the “silver cover” version was well received and became famous in itself. Spotify digital playlists, however, have essentially replaced the compilation record medium.
7.3. Live performances and tribute bands.
Long standing bands might gradually realise which of their hits gets the most crowd reaction. For the Rolling Stones they generally close their shows in encores with Satisfaction – an obvious crowd pleaser and frequent entrant to top-ten Polls – and also Gimme Shelter – less obvious at first and a slow burner, now recognised as one of their best. Festival Bookers like Glastonbury identify headline acts, but also Legend Stage artists whose best records live on often after their peak.
As classic rock bands split up, retire, or sadly pass, tribute bands take their place. The Australian Pink Floyd were one of the first tribute bands – in fact forming while the real Pink Floyd were still performing – and the Bootleg Beatles and Counterfeit Stones followed . Super Diamond have covered Neil Diamond for decades, and in fact another Neil Diamond tribute act became the subject of a popular film, Song Sung Blue, with Hugh Jackman as Diamond. The relevance to our topic is that most of the tribute bands are classic rock and pop, and that indicates the genres which will tend to continue to appear in best-of polls in the future, and the songs demanded by the audiences will identify which of a multi-hit band’s songs are most popular (for instance Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline is ever-growing in popularity). All of the above tributes are still going – touring extensively – long after the real bands ceased. This is how rock will survive. Further, many “original” rock bands are still touring long after the original members have all passed or left; and example is Dr Feelgood, which indeed has spawned a theatre play in which singer Lee Brilleaux tells guitarist Wilko Johnson that actually they were more popular after he left.
Another popular ongoing tribute band is Bjorn Again (Abba) and in fact the Abba Hologram show in London is yet another route for a Band’s longevity. The cost of creating a show like this can only be justified by a plethora of hits by one of the world’s best ever bands. Whoever is next to attempt this will point the way to continued super-stardom. Theatre-based “Juke Box” musicals like Abba’s Mama Mia and Queen’s We Will Rock You further identify the best bands and their most popular hits, as do biographical films like Bohemian Rhapsody, essentially the Freddie Mercury story.
It would be wrong to say that todays’ stars completely lag behind 20th century artists – after all Coldplay, Taylor Swift, Bruno Mars and Harry Styles have undertaken record breaking tours relatively recently – but it is noticeable that the major rock acts like the Stones, Elton John, Iron Maiden, U2 seem to keep going long after their “imperial phase” of hits, and tribute bands seem to be mostly built around the rock and pop of last century. It is possible that the i-Phone generation of stars of electronic dance music and talent show artists lack the stage presence and experience of earlier generations.
7.4 Cover versions.
An indication of a memorable pop record is the propensity for other artists to cover it. So. Yesterday by the Beatles, though never a classic single, is one of the most covered records (1600 versions according to then Guinness Book of World Records), as is My Way by Frank Sinatra. A less obvious one is Hallelujah, originally by Leonard Cohen, which might explain its appearance in many “best-ever” charts. However, it should be noted that several pre rock era songs like Bing Crosby’s White Christmas, and George Gershwin’s Summertime, and Hoagy Carmichael’s Stardust all out-covered Yesterday. White Christmas is judged to be the best selling single ever (50 million copies, (Guinness) and has won many Academy Awards.
7.5 Spotify’s inclusion of “legacy” records
An aspect of the Digital Age is the extraordinary ability to accurately measure and report the number of Streams. So the Weeknd’s Blinding Lights is the most streamed song on Spotify with over 5 billion streams – a very modern synth-pop record closely followed by more traditional artists such as Ed Sheeran (The Shape of You), Harry Styles (As It Was), and Lewis Capaldi (Someone You Loved). Taylor Swift is the most streamed artist of all time, but she has only one lowly single on the most-streamed top 100 track list; sometimes an artist can have too many hits for one to stand out.
These are all 21st century artists, as are the well represented Coldplay and Arctic Monkeys, but classic 20th century rock tracks like Bohemian Rhapsody, Every Breath You Take and Sweet Child of Mine, and the classic pop/soul of Billie Jean are not far behind in the “most-streamed ever” list with around 3 billion streams each.
What is perhaps surprising is that the highest streamed Beatles/Stones songs are not Hey Jude or Satisfaction – rather, Here Comes the Sun and Paint It Black.
These 20th century classic songs are now often referred to a “legacy” (as if from a different age!) It reinforces the idea of “longevity” and confirms which songs are truly enduring and must surely add important evidence for their inclusion in “best-ever” lists. An emerging measure is the “billion-stream song” – a thousand songs have achieved this, including many from the 1960’s, sometimes with surprising results – Credence’s Fortunate Son and Bad Moon Rising, the Animals House of the Rising Sun, and Marvin Gaye’s duet with Tami Terrel of Ain’t No Mountain High Enough (not Diana Ross’s) are among them (Spotify, 2026)
Sometimes – not always – a TV show/film is the reason: Paint It Black received a real boost from the Netflix series “Wednesday” and Ain’t No Mountain High Enough from the Disney/marvel film Guardians of the Galaxy.
What Spotify (the dominant Streamer) can enable is the ultimate “wisdom of the crowds” democratic vote. One can argue “most streams” does not necessarily mean “best-ever”, and that a stream is more casual than purchasing a vinyl 45 with hard cash at a shop, but who can argue with 5 billion votes?
All of this “nostalgia” provides evidence that best-of polls will continue to feature older records.
8. Discussion
Comment on the Literature Review and Introduction to the Discussion.
The Literature review gave us a comprehensive sample of the approach and results of polls for “best” or “top” songs from the popular music era, covering most of the main sources such as radio, and magazines. We will now use this to discuss the implications for our question about the most valid “best of” compilation method, including how to avoid bias, and as part of that cover comparisons within and between the various polls, and offer some alternative or supporting methods. Although for our purposes “approach” to compiling is the main priority we will also begin to identify some common factors in the “results” such as most popular genres and nationality.
8.1 Methodology
8.1.1 Scope of what genres and time periods to include in the lists
Though there are many surveys restricted to a genre such as soul or even a label such as Motown, the polls we have included in detail above are all deliberately and broadly “no restrictions on genre”. This means that the principal genres, with examples, are Rock’n’Roll (Elvis), Pop (Beatles), Rock (The Who), Heavy Metal (Black Sabbath), Indie (Nirvana), Britpop (Oasis), Electronic (Gary Numan), Synthesizer (Human League), Country (Patsy Cline), Soul (Aretha Franklin), Disco (Gloria Gaynor), Reggae (Bob Marley), Rap (Run DMC), Hip Hop (Public Enemy), EDM/Techno (Calvin Harris), Trip hop (Massive Attack). As to which genre takes preference in a particular survey, it depends somewhat on the Radio Station or Magazine which organises it, where it is based, who are the listeners/readers, and even the year in which the poll was made. So while the Rolling Stone magazine poll includes the widest range of genres, there was a shift towards the African-American genres in its second survey in the 2020’s. Meanwhile Q magazine and the NME’s later polls, while in theory promoting all genres, moved towards a narrower band of mainly guitar-band Indie, Britpop and Rock.
Some popular genres which are almost absent from Best Of polls are Progressive Rock, Folk and Jazz. Folk is present to a minor extent with folk-rock (Simon and Garfunkel, Bob Dylan), and the jazz of Miles Davis and John Coltrane occasionally represented with All Blues and Love Supreme – this is partly because Jazz is not singles based and partly because it is seen by many as a separate genre altogether from popular music. Folk is seen by some as not universal, too niche. There is some Country, but less than American sales might suggest. Progressive rock is perhaps seen as too complicated, or mocked by music critics. Phil Collins the solo artist is often included in best-ever lists, as is Peter Gabriel, whereas their Band, Genesis, are not, even though they became a singles band (an exception, because many classic progressive rock tracks are long album-based such as Yes’s Yours is No Disgrace and And You and I
The fundamental split of genres has been between white, male guitar bands, and African origin Soul/R&B but as time went by the distinction blurred, particularly with Dance Music, for instance New Order, a guitar based band, produced the ultimate electronic club classic, Blue Monday. Guitar band Aerosmith and rappers Run-DMC joined forces for Walk This Way, and Eminem and the Beastie Boys were white boys singing black rap. However, post the 2020 Black Lives Matter movement, it is possible the genres may again diverge.
It is surely right to include Tamla Motown and Stax Soul classics in best-ever lists along side pop and rock, but the problem is the lists get so long – multi hundred becomes difficult to comprehend.
Or if, like myself, you restrict to three per year it means some great records are sadly excluded.
For instance, a recognized peak year was 1967 and inclusion of Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields (peak Beatles Double A-side), and Aretha’s Respect (feminist and civil rights soul anthem voted by Rolling Stone Magazine best record ever of any kind) will create little argument. But what of the third slot? Many candidates – so why was Cream’s Sunshine of Your Love ahead of, for instance, Procul Harum’s Whiter Shade of Pale which missed out in my list? Because although the latter was more successful commercially, the musical style was something of a dead-end, but arguably Sunshine of Your Love was one of the first great heavy metal rock records, a genre which lives to this day.
Being the first to create or reflect a genre is important and why the Beatles were and still are so successful (actually, or nearly, the first to create three genres: pop, sophisticated studio output, and psychedelia)
Some of the polls have no restrictions on time period such as the Rolling Stone magazine surveys which go back even to the Billie Holiday heyday of the 1930’s and forward to the 2020’s Hip Hop. But others, like Dave Whitakers’ 1954-1999 survey, is specifically designed for his “Rock Era”. He does have similar surveys, perhaps less well known, for pre-rock, and the post rock “Digital era” but he clearly believes that the three eras are so different that they cannot be combined. Similarly I identified 1950 – 2000 as the “Golden Age of Rock’n’Roll.” I personally wish that Dave would attempt to combine all his eras into an overall “best-ever” list even if it means expanding from his 100 to, say, 250 records.
At time of writing, records from the Rock Era’s half century still seem to dominate polls but in 25 years time will the Digital Era’s own first half century from 2000 – 2050 be more prevalent? After all, the 21st century has still produced some classic rock tracks – for instance by the Foo Fighters, Coldplay, and Arctic Monkeys, and perhaps the last great New Wave single, I Predict a Riot by the Kaiser Chiefs. And we are beginning to see tracks from the 2000’s such as R&B genre Beyonce’s Crazy In Love and Bruno Mars’ Uptown Funk, and pop acts like Taylor Swift and Ed Sheeran, now regularly near the top of best-ever lists.
However a trend is clearly emerging: the current pop singles charts in UK and USA are increasingly dominated by pop, dance and hip-hop; new rock singles are a rarity. 21st century rock acts like Kasabian have had no less than 8 No.1 hit albums but very few top ten singles (Fire at No.3 is their highest UK, with almost no USA impact). Can rock singles survive in the upper reaches of “best-ever” on past glories alone? The Rolling Stones have had a renaissance with No.1 albums, but few new hit singles. There is an argument that they should release a “best-of” the 2000”s compilation of greatest tracks that should have been hits.
We are now 75 years on from the essential beginning of modern music in 1950. The list of potential “best-ever” singles grows ever longer. So either we split the lists into genres or time periods, or accept that to keep the numbers manageable in the low-mid 100’s, some classic records miss out.
8.1.2 Who are the best judges?
There are five main schools of thought in the surveys we reviewed. First, a selection of music industry experts such as journalists, producers, artists (the Rolling Stone Magazine ); second, only the magazine’s own writers (NME); third, the listeners or readers (Q magazine, Radio 2, Smooth Radio); fourth, a personal choice by a single respected critic (Neil McCormick, Stuart Maconie); and fifth, an database algorithm creator like Dave Whitaker who combines the results of the above lists.
Inevitably bias is introduced as soon as the compilers are restricted. For instance, Smooth Radio’s listeners will vote for the type of easier-listening tracks they hear and like on Smooth Radio. Younger audiences may fall into the trap of favouring only recently issued tracks. The NME’s writers will favour R&B and Rap, but their readers will favour Indie. The single personal choice relies on the person’s credibility. The Rolling Stone Magazine approach of 250 experts seems the least biased, but even then it seems an “insider” view as opposed to incorporating fans votes, and even then, how are the admittedly hundreds of professional nominated? Are some artists viewed as “cool” and others not – the Carpenters and Slade in their own different ways have immense cannons of high quality singles but rarely appear on best-ever lists. So ultimately the Whitaker poll of polls may be the most representative, and most likely to give a wholly recognizable, “can’t argue with that” list.
8.1.3 What methods are used to compile lists
Early votes would be gathered by post and telephone but use of the internet has transformed collection methods. Some polls offer voters a completely free choice, for instance Rolling Stone magazine asked 250 experts and “they each sent in a ranked list of their top 50 songs, and we tabulated the results”. Others might give a restricted list from which to choose, perhaps allowing one extra free choice, or perhaps restricting by time-period.
The results can be simply a Table from No.1 downwards, based on most votes or an amalgam of other polls and criteria; or a certain number of records, in no particular order, by year or time period.
The criteria such as sales, plays, awards, other polls can be viewed as a “Balanced Scorecard”. This is a Business term invented by Kaplan and Norton (2006) , and used by your author in designing performance indicator frameworks for major companies. The idea is that a single measure of success (like Profit in Business or Sales in Music) may not be sufficient. The Balanced Scorecard advocates measures in four main perspective, Finance, Customer Service, Human Resource, and Innovation and to develop plans to optimize all these areas. For compiling best-ever single lists, the criteria and framework suggested by Whitaker, myself and others could be summarized as below:
| Criteria | Commercial Success (data driven path) | Critical Acclaim (experts path) | Cultural Impact (emotional path) |
| Measure | Sales (units sold)
Streams (measure of “sounds good” on the iPhone Chart position (peak and longevity) Airplay (measure of “sounds good” on the radio Other poll results |
Music industry Awards
Evidence of: Technical Innovation, First to create a genre. |
Evidence of : Public consciousness (number of books, films etc featured in)
Memorable lyrics |
Evidence to support the above approach comes from an unusual source; classical music. In the published article “Eminence in Pop Music” (North and Hargreaves, 2008) they describe how Farnsworth had studied the eminence in classical music composers (Farnsworth, 1966) with “a series of measures from public polling and musical archives”, including number of broadcasts and concert performances leading to correlation with the ranking views of experts. They felt that there was not much research at that time into eminence in pop music or whether consensus existed as to what pop music was “good” or “ bad” but felt that Farnsworth’s views were relevant as we will see later in the “Longevity” discussion. However, we must raise the possibility of “confirmation bias”, and question which is cause and which is effect. Are performances booked simply because experts nominate favourite composers, or do experts revere them because of their true inherent genius?
To a certain extent, the balanced scorecard of “eminence” suggest ways of creating a “best-ever” record. When the Elbow made “One Day Like This” and the Beatles recorded “Hey Jude“, in both cases they said they wanted to create an “anthemic” chorus. When Black Sabbath completed the album to become Paranoid, they needed a single quickly and came up with the title track classic single. But on the whole, it is difficult to manufacture a classic single, partly because it may , well , sound manufactured.
8.2 . Comparisons
8.2.1 Comparisons between sources
I have identified three ways to compare sources. First, I have created a matrix of Method (from Fair to Biased) versus Inclusion (from Conventional to Radical). At the Fair end are widespread surveys trying to eliminate personal or narrow reader/listener preference. At the Inclusive end are polls including as wide a range of genres and time periods as possible. So you will see that the Whitaker DMDB data base scores highly on fairness because of its method of consolidating multiple polls, but is not quite at the top of inclusivity because it splits the rock era from the digital era. The Rolling Stone Magazine scores highly on fairness (250 experts) and inclusivity (complete range of time periods and genres) but note its 2024 update moves it towards the Radical choices as social mores changed. Similarly the NME in the 1970’s and 1980’s had a superb range of genres – both radical and conventional – but later updates tended towards the obscure, too radical.
Of the single-journalists I studied, Neil McCormick comes closest to eliminating personal bias and producing lists that seem for the most part to chime with the “average” of many of the other sources.
Fig 12. Inclusion (radical to conventional) vs. Method (Biased to Fair)
Secondly, I have used an EveryHit analysis from 2006 (pre digital age) of its own consolidated top 30 showing the countdowns from several of the contributing sources, to which I have added in the DMDB and Rolling Stone equivalents, my own 3 per year, and Hot Hits’ Six Decades. This shows a reasonable consistency across many sources, but note for instance that British Indie fails to cross over to DMDB and Rolling Stone magazine.
Fig 13. Comparison of rankings of specific records in EveryHit list.
Third, I have chosen some charts with time-based segregation and focused on one decade as an example: the sixties only as seen by Rick Anderson, Neil McCormick and Pitchfork.
First, author Rick Anderson’s view of the three best records per year through the sixties decade
Next the Telegraph’s music journalist Neil McCormick’s top 30 of the sixties No.1-30
Then the Pitchfork website’s top 30 of the sixties No.1-30
They demonstrate three aspects of “best-of” list compilation. The Rick Anderson list is compiled by one amateur but with a balanced scorecard approach of Chart/Impact/New Genre/Awards, and limiting numbers with the three Singles per year method, in no particular order. Resulting in a conventional, recognizable list. The Neil McCormick list is compiled by one hugely respected professional, again producing a very recognizable table, this time with order 1-30, quite similar in content to the first list, but with a couple of slightly unusual personal preferences coming in. The Pitchfork table is compiled by a group of its’ website staff writers, with many fine conventional choice records included, but with several less obvious choices, including some album tracks or low sales/high impact songs.
8.2.2 Comparisons across time including same source, updated: longevity
How does longevity affect polls taken at different times? Let us take three examples. Michael Jackson’s Billie Jean, Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill and the Killers’ Mr Brightside.
Billie Jean continues to be hugely popular almost 45 years after release including with teenagers. This may be because of the recent MJ the Musical and Bio-Pic release, but on the other hand Michael Jackson’s personal life controversies might have dented his popularity (but not much it seems). It could be that it is simply a deservedly frequent best ever nominee because of the famous base-line introduction pointing to its danceability, the fascinating lyrics, memorable chorus, ground-breaking video launching MTV, superb Quincy Jones production, Jackson’s epic, iconic live moonwalking performance of the song at the 1983 Motown TV special, and all round influence on modern pop and soul.
Billie Jean also illustrates another factor. It is currently 43 years old and adored by a young audience. It is the oldest song to reach No. 1 on the Spotify Global Chart (Reddit, 2026) with 6 million streams in one 24 hour period and 3 billion streams in all. Yet 43 years before Billie Jean takes us back to 1940. But almost no-one in 1983 was listening to Fred Astaire and Glenn Miller. The post-WW2, origins of rock’n’roll era was clearly a turning point. Partly because of the invention of the 45 rpm single and its successors, partly the styles of music and the people who made it and listened to it (much younger)
Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill at the time of its 1980’s release did indeed appear in “best-of” polls – famously the only “white artist” song in an NME writer’s poll top 15 at the time – but bubbled under for the next few decades until it gained enormous renewed popularity in the 2020’s, including a younger audience, after its inclusion in the Stranger Things streaming show, and once more it is appearing in best-ever polls. As the Stranger Things bounce fades – will the song’s popularity fade? Or again, is it simply a superb song with its ethereal quality, prophetic 21st century-relevant lyrics and Kate Bush’s ongoing popularity?
Mr. Brightside is an unusual song in that it rarely appears in “best-of” polls – and if so, not at the top – but has been in the UK singles charts (top 100) for an astonishing 10 continuous years, over 500 weeks. It has had no special bounce. It only peaked at No. 10. It is arguably not the Killers’ best (All the Things I have Done with its epic “I’ve got Soul but I’m Not a Soldier” chorus is a more obvious favourite). The reason is a combination of digital downloads and cross generational popularity at festivals and weddings alike. on account of its uplifting spirit and easy singalong lyrics.
The most accessible overall poll comparisons compiled at different times are Rolling Stone Magazine’s two versions and DMDB two versions. The RS comparison is well made in the opening paragraphs of their 2024 versus 2004 top 500 lists; “Where the 2004 version of the list was dominated by early rock and soul, the new edition contains more hip-hop, modern country, indie rock, Latin pop, reggae, and R&B. More than half the songs here weren’t present on the old list, including a third of the Top 100. The result is a more expansive, inclusive vision of pop, music”
However, the Whitaker DMDB 2011 and 2021updates are much more consistent, with only “17 new songs” in the 100, and with the composition of the top twenties (if not the order) very similar. For instance, the only three records which drop out of the top ten (Hotel California, Bridge Over Troubled Water and Grapevine) simply move from 1-10 to 10-20. I believe this ability to look back again, and retain almost the same view of history, demonstrates the validity of the method.
In Some Exploratory Findings on the Development of Musical Tastes (Holbrook and Schinfler, 1989) suggest tastes get set in late teenage/early adulthood (age 24 years in fact) because of social pressures and sensitivities to peer groups. This suggests that the records you like at that age will always be amongst your favourites, your personal longevity driver. It is true for me, in 1980 I liked punk and new wave and always will. The recent triumphant Oasis reunion concerts suggests their music has longevity. We can say this must be due to original 1990 fans (perhaps aged 24 at the time) but surely also to new fans picked up since, who may not have been born during Oasis’s imperial phase.
In Musicology Attitudes in Eminnce (Farnsworth, 1966) he recalls conducting separate polling with Musicologist experts in four different decades from the 1930’s to 1960’s and found the very top classical tier of Bach, Beethoven and Mozart remained unchanged; the next high eminence tier of Brahms, Schubert, Wagner and Hayden remained solid; but other composers “came and went”
In Trends in Western Popular Music (Vuorinen, 2024), a highly structured data drive exercise using Billboard for popularity and RYM for ratings, there is strong evidence that rock music has declined dramatically in terms of chart position compared with pop and hip-hop, but perversely user ratings from RYM were higher for older records than new. Also that older music is increasingly found on streaming platforms, partly because it is seen as “better” but also because platforms are finding ways of promoting older records as they can be easily cheaply and retrospectively monetised. The study shows that from 2008 onwards the % of records (admittedly albums, not singles) appearing on the Billboard charts which were first released more than 10 years previously has increased from almost zero to 15% of total, and more than 2 years previously even more dramatically to 35%
Longevity is a crucial under-rated factor not yet fully understood in the pop and rock era. We know that the crucial century for classical music was 1750 – 1850, and specific pieces from Mozart, Beethoven, and Bach and many more, such as their numbered symphonies and concertos, are still revered and played two centuries later. We know the Golden Age of Rock’n’ Roll – namely 1950 – 2000 has been followed by the Digital era, and we are reasonably sure which are the stand-out tracks of these eras– but we can’t be entirely sure until the records and their makers have stood the test of time. Will the Beatles still be as popular in the 22nd century? If so which of their songs? Perhaps we have reached the end of the possibility of brand-new pop genres, and so today’s records will become stuck in time as the “greatest”?
When I browsed the website Pitchfork’s “best of the 1960’s” almost all the 200 were recognizable classics. But in the later decades the entries became somewhat less recognizable. That could be because of my age, or because it takes many years to even recognize a classic, or simply (as I believe and evidence above supports) the older records are simply more memorable and will stand the test of time. Whereas many of the recent entries will simply disappear.
A longevity top tier of eminence as we know it now at least, might be, for artists, by decade:
1950’s – Elvis, Bill Haley, Chuck Berry, Ray Charles, Little Richard, Buddy Holly, Everleys
1960’s – Beatles, Stones, Aretha Franklin, Sam Cooke, Bob Dylan, Beachboys, Supremes
1970’s – Michael Jackson, Marvin Gaye, Abba, David Bowie, Stevie Wonder, Bob Marley
1980’s – Police, Prince, U2, Whitney Houston, Elton John, Springsteen
1990’s – Nirvana, Oasis, Madonna, REM, George Michael
2000’s – Coldplay, Taylor Swift, Beyonce, Jay-Z, Eminem, Rhianna
2010’s – Ed Sheeran, Adele, Bruno Mars, The Weeknd, Drake, Miley Cyrus
Note that I have listed in this case artists, not their specific records, and assigned one of many decades in which they were popular. In all cases they are singles artists (as well as producing best selling albums); they have produced multiple stand-out singles, often four or more consecutive; their eminence has lasted, they are still hugely popular and influential; that is what cements their ongoing presence in successive “best-ever” polls.
My view is that the truly heavyweight artists will have at least two entries in any “best ever” singles chart. Note that Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and AC DC among others have that longevity and have some signature standouts, including singles, nevertheless are essentially album bands.
To provide evidence for the above, note that Reddit points out that they and Billboard offer a formula based consolidation of their own data, offering maximum points for a No.1, less for a top ten entry, points for longevity, and a point for others. This leads not to “greatest track” but a “greatest artist” list, based on chart positions only. Then result is that Billboard says The Beatles are top, Reddit says Drake. Even data driven factual analysis can give different answers!
However, returning to the “confirmation bias” possibility, do these artists listed above get nominated in the “best-ever” singles polls simply because of who they are. Having reached top-tier status, will they always stay there, deserving or not, in the same way that perhaps the ice skating elite might score extra points with judges simply because of who they are? My belief is that they will stay at the top, and will actually deserve it; talent will always win out, they have “inherent genius”. Ultimately it is about the music, but combined also perhaps with huge cultural, or social, status and significance, such as they were first to a genre and hence more authentic , they are the subject of films, have a media presence, or continue to tour and make music long after their “imperial phase”.
8.2.3 Comparison between different continents
How does the location of source, for instance the principal magazine base, influence the choice of records in their best of lists? I compared three magazines namely Rolling Stone from the USA; and New Musical Express and Q magazine from the UK And a neutral database DMDB albeit, unlike the others, a restriction only to year 2000. I counted the origin of the records’ artists as follows:
| % American Records | % UK records | % Rest of World | |
| (US) Rolling Stone Industry Experts 2004 | 73% | 22% | 5% |
| (US) Rolling Stone Industry Experts 2021with 2024 updates | 80% | 15% | 5% |
| (UK) NME Writers 1987 | 68% | 28% | 4% |
| (UK) NME Writers 2014 | 47% | 50% | 3% |
| (UK) Q magazine (Readers) 2006 | 43% | 54% | 3% |
| Dave Whitakers DMDB (US but average of UK and US polls) | 70% | 26% | 4% |
| Average of above | 64% | 32% | 4% |
The figures reveal that the main location of the poll compiler does influence and correlate to the choice of records. The overall average shows that American records are twice as likely to appear as UK.
The rest of the world are very small percentages and include mainly Jamaica (Bob Marley) , Australia (Kylie and AC/DC) and European (Kraftwerk, Daft Punk). Note however that the 2024 Rolling Stone poll includes for the first time K pop records from South Korea (BTS – who have very recently become one of the most downloaded artists in history including the in the USA). It is acknowledged that this dissertation does not include music polls from the rest of the world – because for most of the history of popular music the Anglo/American axis has been the most important. So, no attempt has been made to include polls from continental Europe – the expectation would be that records with English speaking origin would be well represented but not as much as the table above; and that South Asian polls would surely be dominated by K Pop.
9. Conclusion
In determining “what is the most valid method of compiling a list of the best ever pop singles” the definitions of the words are important. “Valid” generally means fair, reliable, accurate. “Best” depends on who judges, and how, but “achieved and retained eminence” is a useful descriptor. “Ever” implies going back from the present to the beginning of recorded music. “Pop” suggests anything that’s popular, multiple genres. “Singles” implies a record released as one track.
Let us examine these aspects in more detail. The optimal way of ensuring a “valid” list is to ensure the judges. their methods and scope are as fair, as unbiased as possible. Radio stations almost by definition will be biased towards their core listener base, and magazines influenced by their readership. Although the Rolling Stone magazine’s use of 250 industry experts seems a good balancing method, it still depends who chooses the experts.
The records in a best-ever list should be recognizable to the average music fan. Neither too radical or faddish, on the other hand not too conventional, too easy-listening- so perhaps a few surprises but not too many. Their purpose is to create media excitement, perhaps a national talking point; also to reflect and confirm, and to a certain extent form, listeners’ tastes.
I believe that overall, the “Whitaker” Database approach of a balanced scorecard of sales, chart position, airplay, awards and amalgamation of other polls gives the best chance at fairness, objectivity and wide-inclusion – combining the “data”, “expert” and “emotional” paths. Likewise, Six Decades of Hot Hits and Classic Cuts, of the books I researched, and Rolling Stone of the magazines. Of the lone, respected journalists, Neil McCormick stands out. Among TV polls, Channel 4’s Music of the Millennium was the biggest and largely confirmed other polls results, though as with many was somewhat “rockist“, with not much Soul.
Ideally there should be no restriction on genres or time period. Fundamentally “pop” music encompasses two broad strands, on the one hand guitar band rock, on the other soul – African origin R&B. It would be a great shame if we needed separate lists for these. Likewise, no restriction on time period is ideal. However, we are now around 100 years into the recorded music era (and growing) and so if all genres and time periods are included our list potentially becomes huge. I believe that anything over Rolling Stone’s top 500 becomes an un-managable, slightly ridiculous number (the 599th best of all time!?).
There is an argument that if time periods are segregated, then 1950 – 2000 (the Golden Age of Rock’n’Roll) is a good starting point because the vinyl single, and published pop charts, started around 1950, as did the amalgam of country, blues, and R&B to produce rock’n’roll. And the year 2000 is a good marker for the end of that era and the start of the digital age, with downloads then streaming overtaking vinyl and CD, fundamentally changing the way we consume music. Which makes perhaps 2000 – 2050 the next segregation.
Rock singles are still at the top of many best-ever lists. This encourages belief that the great rock era singles will retain popularity. However it should be noted that almost new rock singles make the charts these days, rather, pop and hip-hop dominate. Rock is still hugely popular through other means – albums, touring, classic rock radio – but has rock run out of memorable tunes? It could fade away, or on the other hand be the new “classical” music – it will last for ever without the need for much reinvention. There is an argument that rock groups old and new should make more effort at producing stand-out singles. It can be done – but Sam Fender is a rare rock singles artists.
I believe it is important to only include singles – as opposed to album tracks – even Stairway to Heaven was a promotional single. Some writers (McCormick, Maconie) make the distinction between “song” and “record”. My belief is that it important to focus on recorded music because the song plus the production, marketing, and sales represents the whole package. One exception to this is the Beatles’ A Day in the Life – never a single but near or at the top in many lists.
The No.1 in any poll is important for cache and credibility over and above simply top sales, but beneath that the order is fairly fluid with anything in the top 30 or so being important. The importance of these polls is not only to indicate the best of all types, but also the best – sometimes unexpected – of a particular artist (Gimme Shelter, Day In the Life, Wanna Hold Your Hand and Tiny Dancer have gradually gained in stature over the years for the Stones, Beatles, and Elton) – and also to identify great genres with longevity (the experts remind listeners how great Stax soul was).
The surveys are a marker at a particular point in history which sometimes change with social and musical tastes but the true “greats” are always there. Even when the Rolling Stone poll was very recently updated to include more R&B, its’ top twenty was still exclusively “older” records.
There is a symbiotic, positive feedback loop relationship such that the voters determine the positions in the charts, which then feedback to bolster their choice (for instance some of the above polls are enshrined in Spotify).
Although sales and chart position are not the only indicators of “best” they remain vital and must now incorporate streaming data. Encouragingly, this does not mean that only records released in the digital age appear on streaming platforms, in fact the opposite is true , namely that older records, including classic rock and pop, are very well represented, partly because of their genuine altruistic eminence, partly because they are easily monetized.
There are two ways of presenting the results – first in numerical order and second in chronological order. The former has an emotional, competitive appeal – generally announced in reverse order to rise through a top ten to reveal a definitive number 1 such as Hey Jude or Respect, and enables tracking of changing tastes if a poll is updated (for instance Elvis dropped down in Rolling Stone’s most recent poll).
The chronological method relies on a fixed number of entries for each successive chronological year and enables the reader to see the progression of genres, for instance from rock’n’roll (1950’s) to pop (1960’s) to rock (early 1970’s) to punk (later 1970’s) but does not reveal a specific number 1and so lacks a headline, lacks the competitive edge.
The surveys on average reveal around twice as many North American entries as U.K. and this seems reasonable considering the birthplace of rock’n’roll; and only a tiny proportion for Rest of World, reflecting perhaps the universal status of the English language and American culture. However, this may change for instance as K-Pop (South Korean) and Spanish origin records gain traction; and the switch from record sales to digital streams enables universal polls such as in Spotify to be generated automatically.
Inclusion in a quantitative “best-ever” chart is one way of judging a record. There are other, more qualitative ways, such as use in adverts and popular cultural aspects like sports fans’ chants or summing up a social era; propensity to generate recorded cover versions or inclusion in tribute band repertoires; or being seen as part of an artist’s canon of work – a signature album or group of four consecutive classic singles.
Being among the first to create a new musical genre helps guarantee longevity – the continuing appearance in successive best-ever polls. This is an important indicator of “eminence” and will become more important as time goes by and more data i.e. records are available and as tastes change. Even allowing for confirmation bias on the one hand, and changing tastes on the other, we can see emerging a list of eminent artists and their standout tracks which are likely to always be included in “best-ever” polls long into the future.
Although the various polls of course don’t always agree with each other, there is some consistency, with the following records seeming to most frequently crop up. In roughly chronological order, from the birth of rock’n’roll to the present.
Rock Around the Clock, Heartbreak Hotel, Johnny B Goode, Tutti Frutti, What I’d Say, I Want To Hold Your Hand, Like a Rolling Stone, Satisfaction, Good Vibrations, Tracks of My Tears, God Only Knows, Paint It Black, Respect, Reach Out I’ll Be There, Strawberry Fields, Day In The Life, Hey Jude, I Want You Back, Heard It Through the Grapevine, Imagine, What’s Going On, Life On Mars, Superstition, Bohemian Rhapsody, Stairway to Heaven, Anarchy In The UK, Heroes, I Feel Love, London Calling, Le Freak, Billie Jean, Losing My Religion, Unfinished Sympathy, Love Will Tear Us Apart, Wonderwall, Common People, Like a Prayer, One, Teen Spirit, Careless Whisper, The Message, Crazy In Love, Iris, Uptown Funk, Hey Ya, Rolling in the Deep, Shape of You, Blinding Lights, As It Was, Rein Me In.
10. Personal Evaluation of Project (required in EPQ)
This paper achieves three objectives. First, to begin to answer the central question around the most valid method for identifying best-ever records. In my research, I have genuinely found no other similar attempt to pull together and assess so many methods, so I believe this is new research, approaching unique. Second, I have learned many new aspects on a topic I thought I knew well. Third, I have gained more practice at writing in the semi-formal academic paper style required by EPQ. Let us unpick each of these.
I was able to nominate a best of the best methods – the Whitaker DMDB approach of an accumulation of a balance scorecard of measures, minimizing bias, able to be updated, and showing consistency. My research was mostly secondary, Books, Radio, Internet. Magazines, and some academic well cited papers from Google Scholar, though I detected a paucity of papers perhaps reflecting the view that pop music is somewhat trivial. I used some of my own primary research – my life as an informed fan going back almost to the birth of rock’n’roll, leading up to my later-life publication of my “best three records per year” lists whose criteria and results showed a remarkable resemblance to Whitaker (even though at the time I was unaware of him).
A limitation of my scope, which would require further work, is my limited knowledge of records from the recent Digital Age, and understanding of impact of the i-phone and streaming on judgement of “best”. And I have made no technical attempt to identify what drives success – what makes a good lyric, what constitutes a memorable tune, although my examination of the type of records and genres, and specific examples which appear in “best ever” lists, might point the way. Also, although the American Billboard and Rolling Stone Magazine are major sources, and all my sources do include American records, ideally I would have included some American as well as UK radio station polls
The sources which I was already fairly familiar with included Billboard and the New Musical Express but new aspects were the Whitaker Database, the Rate Your Music and Pitchfork websites, the Farnsworth approach to eminence in classical music and several of the books.
The EPQ requires a minimum of 5000 words – some students struggle to reach this. In contrast I struggled – failed completely – to keep within that, clocking up triple the minimum. Nevertheless, the discipline of creating a structured Contents list around the core Literature Review-Discussion-Conclusion framework is a key skill to learn, as is the creation of a Bibliography and Source Review to ensure credibility.
Bibliography
Charts, Websites and Magazines
Billboard Hot 100 Greatest of All Time Songs
Available at: Greatest of All Time https://www.billboard.com/charts/genre/greatest-of-all-time/
UK Charts The UK’s Official best-selling songs of all time
https://www.officialcharts.com/chart-news/the-best-selling-singles-of-all-time-on-the-official-uk-chart__21298/
Smooth Radio 2026 Top 500 https://top500.smoothradio.com/2026/
Absolute Radio : the Britpop Anthem poll https://www.hellorayo.co.uk/absolute-radio/music/news/ultimate-britpop-anthems
Absolute radio best of 1990’s https://www.hellorayo.co.uk/absolute-radio/music/news/greatest-songs-of-the-90s
Virgin Radio top 500 listener’s poll https://virginradio.co.uk/entertainment/102643/virgin-radio-top-500-countdown-top-50-songs-results
BBC BBC radio combined polls top 200 https://davesmusicdatabase.blogspot.com/1999/04/bbc-100-favourite-songs-of-century.html
Greatest Hits Radio Top 100 Spotify 2024 List List 2025
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2vj7RmWST7HzAXO8BsWSXs
https://rateyourmusic.com/list/arnellarsen/uks-greatest-hits-radio-top-500-publ-oct-2025-the-7th-year/1/
Music of the Millennium HMV/Channel 4 poll
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/248309.stm
New Musical Express
1976 Writers Poll https://music.co.uk/rocklist/nme_singles.htm#singles
1987 Writers Poll https://music.co.uk/rocklist/nme_singles.htm#150_1987
2014 Writers Poll https://www.nme.com/photos/the-500-greatest-songs-of-all-time-100-1-1421753
Readers Poll multi years https://music.co.uk/rocklist/poppoll.html
John Peel Festive Fifties https://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/johnpeel/festive50s/
Rolling Stone Magazine Top 500 songs of all time
2004 https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/500-greatest-songs-of-all-time-151127/smokey-robinson-and-the-miracles-the-tracks-of-my-tears-56465/
2024 update https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/best-songs-of-all-time-1224767/daddy-yankee-feat-glory-gasolina-1225288/
Methodology https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/500-greatest-songs-voters-list-1225358/
Newsweek Every Hit Removed from Rolling Stone Magazines top 100 Greatest Songs
https://www.newsweek.com/removed-rolling-stone-top-100-greatest-songs-all-time-500-1636080
Q magazine 2006 Top 100 Readers Poll
Telegraph Music Section (Neil McCormick)
Top 100 songs of all time (2018)
Books – fully read.
Maconie (2014), The People’s Songs, Ebury Press
Mulholland (2002), This is Uncool: The 500 Greatest Singles since Punk and Disco, Octopus
Stanley (2023), Yeah Yeah, Yeah, Faber
Whitaker (2011), The Top 100 songs of the rock era 1954 – 1999, Dave’s Music Database.
Black, Brend, Burton, Egan Jerome, McIver, Morrish, Palmer, Singles (2006) – Six decades of Hot Hits & Classic Cuts, Outline Press Ltd.
Books – consulted
Roberts (2003) Guinness Book of Hit Singles : World Records, Guinness
Reynolds (2010) , Pop Culture’s Addiction to Its Own Past, Faber and Faber
Databases
EveryHit.com 2002 Consolidated Top 100 https://www.everyhit.co.uk/bestever.html
DMDB : Dave (Whitaker)’s Music Database 2021 and 2011
Consolidated Top 100 songs of the rock era https://davesmusicdatabase.blogspot.com/2011/07/top-100-songs-of-rock-era-1954-1999.html#tenth_anniversary
Method of compilation http://whitgunn.freeservers.com/Davemusic/-books/songs-of-rock-era/about-the-book.html
Top 100 2000- 2019 Digital age https://davesmusicdatabase.blogspot.com/2020/02/digital-era-2000-2019-top-100.html
Rick Anderson
Top 3 records each year 1950 – 2000 and 2001 – 2015
Golden Age of Rock’n’roll
https://rickanderson.co.uk/the-best-ever-records-in-the-golden-age-of-rock-n-roll-music
Pitchfork 1960’s list of best songs judged by staff writers
https://pitchfork.com/features/lists-and-guides/6405-the-200-greatest-songs-of-the-1960s/
RYM Rate Your Music Top songs of all time voted by website readers
https://rateyourmusic.com/charts/top/song/all-time/
Other
Zappi, Music in Advertising, 2026
How pop classics, indie singers and underground artists have shaped great ads https://www.zappi.io/web/blog/music-in-advertising-examples https://www.zappi.io/web/blog/music-in-advertising-examples
Top Songs of All Time, 2026 Rate Your Music
https://rateyourmusic.com/charts/top/song/all-time/
Kaplan and Norton 1996, The Balanced Scorecard, HBS Press.
North and Hargreaves, 2008, Eminence In Pop Music https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/03007769508591606
Farnsworth (1966), Musicological Attitudes on Eminence, Sage Journals
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.2307/3343932
Holbrook and Schinfler (1989) Some Exploratory Findings on the Development of Musical Tastes
Journal of Consumer Research https://doi.org/10.1086/209200
Vuorinen (2024), Trends inWestern Popular Music
https://www.utupub.fi/server/api/core/bitstreams/bbc03f54-3f45-429a-8169-9f9d44717614/content University of Turku
Reddit Post 2022 Calculating the most “successful” artist of all time using the Billboard Hot 100 https://www.reddit.com/r/Music/comments/u7osky/calculating_the_most_successful_artist_of_all/?solution=3e6e613aac903dc73e6e613aac903dc7&js_challenge=1&jsc_token=7afd7253fec22262ff1c52b1703fe9ec90eddd30dbdf6bbf4bea1744d28f0eed&jsc_orig_r=
Appendix 1. Evaluation of selection of resources (required for EPQ)
| Resource | Type | Writers | Suitability | Reliability |
| Billboard Hot 100 Greatest of All Time Songs | Chart | Based on chart position so provides baseline for one part of assessment for best ever | Excellent as based on fact of chart position though does then give particular weightings | |
| New Musical Express and Rolling Stone writers’ polls | Music magazines | In NME s case the staff writers and Rolling Stone collection of writers, artists, producers | Excellent well written and researched lists from a wide variety of genres and with updates in later years enabled a comparison of how tastes change. | The NME writers at the time were some of the most famous in the music business and highly influential. Likewise the Rolling Stone used a large number of highly respected figures in the industry |
| Telegraph Music Section Top 100 and Songs of the Decades | Broadsheet music section | Neil McCormick | Beautifully presented and researched showed the two methods of compilation; 1-00 and time based chronological. Well balanced across the genres. | McCormick is a highly regarded music journalist author and broadcaster. Over 30 years as Telegraphs rock critic. Although some choices were personal and unusual, large majority of songs in list were unarguable. |
| The People’s Songs | Book | Stuart Maconie | The list of 50 songs in chronological order which had significant cultural impact. Within its parameters, extremely useful for the “emotional and expert paths” of judging a record, though less so for the data driven sales path. | A very well respected music writer and broadcaster with the BBC. |
| DMDB : Dave (Whitaker)’s Music Databases | Database | Dave Whitaker | The most comprehensive unbiased cleverly formulated amalgamation and averaging of multiple polls I could find covering a key balance of criteria – sales, airplay airplay and chart position; and also awards. | Although Dave Whitaker began as an amateur he has quietly become a doyen of chart databases. |
| Musicological Attitudes on Eminence | Farnsworth | Academic paper | Although not a Pop music paper the lessons learned for judging the eminence and longevity of classical music were transferrable to the modern genres. | Frequently quoted in other articles and papers and a series of impressive metric results are available in the publishing journal for citations, impact factor, influence score. |