Jimmy Gilmer and the Fireballs: "Sugar Shack"

October 14, 1963 (6 weeks)

I am old enough to remember a time when a single being at number one for more than five weeks was a pretty big deal. A single week on the top spot practically felt like an insult and two weeks, not a whole lot better. It was only with three weeks that I would begin to think of it as a major hit record. Four weeks and you're just shy of a month. Five, a seriously strong chart topper. But any longer than that and you're entering 'I'm fed up with this shit!' territory.

There ought to be something special when it comes to hits that manage to stay at number one for lengthy amounts of time - or, rather, there used to be back when it was the exception rather than the norm. That's not to say that every single to rack up eight, nine or ten weeks on top has been outstanding but at the very least there should be something to it that captures people. In the nineties, pop songs from big motion pictures — "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You", "I Will Always Love You" — managed to stick around because the public refused to get sick of them but you can always count on a great big love song to get the people to sit up and take notice.

I should say that I don't think "Sugar Shack" is so bad. It's a lot of fun, it has a good beat and that whistling sound played on some kind of organ still sounds great. It even manages to just about transcend novelty pop. Yet, six weeks is a major stretch. Three weeks seems like plenty. Yet, interest was high enough that it managed to stick around for twice that amount of time. And while the charts weren't exactly overflowing with sublime pop, it was able to hold off The Ronettes' superlative "Be My Baby" which got stuck in the runner-up spot for four weeks.

Jimmy Gilmer's 'awe shucks' style of singing may be cringe worthy but I think it suits what is deep down a pretty stupid song. The lyrics are slapdash, as though songwriter Keith McCormack and his aunt Fay Voss just went with whatever they happened to jot down. The Danish sleeve pictured above implies that this sugar shack cafe is on some remote island paradise and some of the words seem to go along with this. The girl Jimmy is besotted with wears a black leotard and "her feet are bare". Uh, okay. "Make that girl love me when I put on some trash". Dressing down does seem to be the popular thing to do in the twenty-first century but I'm not so sure how it would've flown back in North America's pre-Beatlemania era — unless, of course, you happen to be in the third world I guess.

The novelty didn't wear off perhaps as soon as it should have but there were worse things that could have been clogging up the top spot on the CHUM hit parade. In fact, a pair of relative duds were up on deck. Fortunately, the Canadian charts were about to get good again — and with some songs that you're not as likely to get absolutely sick and tired of.

Score: 6