Sounds Of The Sixties Rewound Part 41 Quiz

Answer: Edwin Starr

In 1969, Edwin Starr had a US number six with "Twenty Five Miles". It reached number 36 in the UK.

Starr co-wrote the song with Harvey Fuqua and Johnny Bristol, however "Twenty-Five Miles" bore such a strong resemblance to a 1967 Wilson Pickett song "Mojo Mama" that its writers, Bert Berns and Jerry Wexler, were also credited on "Twenty Five Miles".

Answer: Diana Ross & The Supremes

"Love Child" was a 1968 US hit for Diana Ross and the Supremes and was noteworthy as their first chart-topper not written by Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier and Eddie Holland, who had left Motown in a dispute over royalties.

Neither Mary Wilson nor Cindy Birdsong sang on the recording, instead backing Diana Ross were The Adantes.

Just as the Wrecking Crew provided the music behind so many hits, The Adantes - Louvain Demps, Jackie Hicks, and Marlene Barrow, added their harmonies to an estimated 20,000 recordings between 1962 and 1972. They sang uncredited on about seven Billboard number ones.

Answer: Harpers Bizarre

"Anything Goes" was a Cole Porter song written for the 1934 musical of the same name. The first recording came that same year.

A long list of top talent recorded the song over the years. In 1967, Harpers Bizarre took it to number 16 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart.

Answer: Louis Armstrong

Louis Armstrong began his recording career in 1923 and 45 years later took "What A Wonderful World" to the top of the UK charts.

Maybe the uplifting sentiments passed North Americans by: it did not chart on its first release. It featured in the 1987 movie "Good Morning, Vietnam", peaking at number 82 on the Canadian pop charts in 1988 and at number 32 in the USA.

Answer: The Platters

Formed in Los Angeles in 1952, The Platters were to have 40 singles reach the charts between 1955 and 1967. Among them were four number ones on the Hot 100.

"With This Ring" was not one of those; it managed only number 14 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.

The Platters stayed around for a long time, with personnel changes. The songkick website noted the group appeared in Las Vegas over 1,100 times - often sharing the billing with The Marvelettes.

In 2026, they were part of a worldwide tour with The Four Tops and The Temptations. Sadly, none of the original Platters were still around for that tour; indeed, depending on whichever source you look at, anything between 50 and 125 singers have been in the band.

The band almost did not survive a scandal in 1959 when four of the male singers - all black - were found in an Ohio hotel room with four women, three of whom were white. At that time, it was illegal in Ohio for black men to have white women in their hotel rooms. Those charged were later cleared, but the stigma affected their career in the USA and they were afterwards more popular in Europe.

Answer: Richard Harris

Jimmy Webb had a true songwriter's talent of coming up with something based on something he saw - like the telephone engineer on an overhead line that inspired 'Wichita Lineman", so "MacArthur Park" was a personal thing - it was about a girl that Webb loved, but who left him. The setting for the unrequited romance was the very real MacArthur Park in Los Angeles.

Colin McCourt, who worked for the song's publisher, claimed in a newspaper interview Webb told him the story behind the song. "Jim was in love with a girl who left him. Months later, he heard she was getting married - in the park. Broken hearted, he went to the wedding and, not wanting to be seen, hid in a gardener's shed."

In 1968, actor Richard Harris took the song to number two in the US and number four in the Uk.

A story of cakes getting left out in the rain may be absurd, but other singers liked it. Waylon Jennings had a US County number 23 and Donna Summer took a disco version to number one on the Hot 100.

Answer: The Four Seasons

In 1966, "Working My Way Back To You" was a US number nine and UK number 50. It reached number 26 in Canada.

Answer: The Everly Brothers

"Cathy's Clown" was the first single by Phil and Don for Warner Brothers, who reportedly paid $1m to sign them. The song reached number one on both sides of the Atlantic in 1960.

The influence of the Everlys has probably been acknowledged by many artists. The Beatles were fans, so were Simon and Garfunkel and The Beach Boys. Bob Dylan was quoted as saying "We owe these guys everything. They started it all."

In a late night conversation with this quiz author, "Harry" Alford, one half of pop duo The Allisons said: "We wanted to be the British Everly Brothers."

Answer: The Searchers

Jackie DeShannon was first to record "Needles and Pins", in 1963, but her release flopped.

Meanwhile, The Searchers heard the song while performing in Hamburg and released it as a single in 1964. It topped the UK charts and reached number 13 in the US.
The band, contemporaries of The Beatles and also hailing from Liverpool, took their name from the 1956 John Ford western "The Searchers".

Sonny Bono, in his record-producing years, co-wrote this with Jack Nitzsche.

Answer: The Bachelors

"Diane" was a song written in 1927 by Erno Rapee and Lew Pollack for the silent film "7th Heaven". Slim Whitman, Jim Reeves and Vic Damone all covered it.

The Bachelors were an Irish trio and in 1964 "Diane" helped them become the first band from the Emerald Isles to top the UK charts. But The Bachelors got stuck in a time warp. In the mid 1960s when the emphasis was on new music, The Bachelors seemed trapped on songs of previous eras, although they did score eight top-ten UK singles between 1963 and 1966.

Formed in the late 1950s, they kept going until the mid 1980s when their career was ended by an internal and acrimonious split.

Answer: Traffic

In 1967, Traffic took "Hole In My Shoe" to number two in the UK.

Traffic's guitarist Dave Mason wrote the song and later said in an interview: "That's the first song I ever wrote. It was my first attempt at songwriting. I mean, that stuff I did back then, when I listen to it, I cringe and realize I need to work on writing. But writing comes out of living. You have to have something".

Mason left the band soon after and had a distinguished career in solo work and recording with other artists. He toured with Fleetwood Mac and also recorded an album with Cass Elliott.

Answer: Engelbert Humperdinck

"Quando, Quando, Quando" first appeared in the early 1960s as an Italian song. Translated the title means "When, When, When".

The American crooner Pat Boone was the first with an English-language version. It barely slipped into the Hot 100 in 1962.

In 1968, Engelbert Humperdinck picked up the song and put it on the album "A Man Without Love". The title track was originally ""Quando m'innamoro". That single reached number two in the UK.

In 1999, "Quando, Quando, Quando" was released as a single and made number 40 on the Official UK Singles Chart.

You may, of course, know this song from the stand-out version sung by Homer Simpson, Marge Simpson and Fat Tony in "The Simpsons" Season 22 episode "The Real Housewives of Fat Tony".

Answer: Roy Orbison

"Blue Bayou" was co-written by Roy Orbison and in 1963 he took it to number 29 on the hot 100, number 14 in Canada and number three in the UK. It topped the charts in Australia and in Ireland.

In 1977, Linda Ronstadt had a US number five hit with the song.

Nicknamed "The Big O", Orbison recorded steadily from 1961 but it's fair to say he appeared to be more popular in the UK than in his homeland. He had six albums (excluding compilations) reach the top ten in the UK and nine singles in his lifetime reached the top ten.

Answer: Frank Sinatra

Marion Montgomery was first to record "That's Life", releasing a jazz version in 1963. Sinatra heard another version and wanted to record it.

Sinatra put this on his 1966 album of the same name and it became one of his staples. The single reached number four on the Hot 100 and number 44 in the UK.

'Old Blue Eyes' is listed as having released 59 studio albums during his lifetime and his estate has released a further 35. He released almost 300 singles.

Incidentally, at the time this quiz was written, the artist noted for releasing the most albums - over 800 - was American guitarist Buckethead (nope, me neither.)

Of those people you may have heard of, 'musicmagpie' in the UK lists The Fall, Johnny Cash, Frank Zappa, and Elvis Presley among those to have released more than 100 albums.

Answer: The Velvelettes

"He Was Really Saying Something" reached number 64 for the Velvelettes in 1964

In the UK in 1982 the girl group Bananarama joined with the boy band Fun Boy Three to make "Really Saying Something" a number five.

The Velvelettes first recorded in 1963, but it is fair to say they hardly set the charts alight. One problem was that Motown did not release Velvelettes singles on their main imprint and the company seemed to focus on other acts. As Ben Forest opined in 'Far Out' magazine in August 2025: "Had they been given the same level of attention and support as, for instance, The Supremes, The Velvelettes could have been one of the biggest pop sensations of the 1960s, but, alas, they are just another case of a Motown artist fading into obscurity."