3 Catchy Songs From 1977 Everyone Knew but Nobody Talks About Anymore

Quite a few pop songs from the late 1970s, particularly in 1977, were known for being absolute earworms. Catchiness was what helped a song catapult up the charts, after all. And while the following catchy pop songs from 1977 were charting bangers upon their release, nobody really talks about them much nowadays. I’d like to change that. Let’s take a look at a few memorable pop songs from 1977 that will get stuck in your head for days!

“Telephone Line” by Electric Light Orchestra from ‘A New World Record’

More than any other ELO song, I remember “Telephone Line” being particularly melodic. I remember it being an enormous hit, too. This orchestral pop masterpiece hit No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100. It also reached the Top 10 in a few other countries. This song gets overshadowed a bit by hits like “Mr. Blue Sky” (also a banger), but I think “Telephone Line” deserves way more retrospective love than it gets.

“I Go Crazy” by Paul Davis from ‘Singer Of Songs: Teller Of Tales’

“I Go Crazy” by Paul Davis is an insanely catchy song. It’s also one that scored quite a bit of success when it dropped in 1977. But, honestly, I don’t think I’ve heard this pop classic on the radio in the last decade or so. Few people seem to remember it.

This Davis-penned soft rock and pop classic was very successful back in the day. It peaked at No. 7 on the Hot 100 and reached No. 4 on the Canadian charts. Tons of musicians would cover it years later, from Barry Manilow to Steve Azar.

“Lonely Boy” by Andrew Gold from ‘What’s Wrong With This Picture?’

“Lonely Boy” by Andrew Gold was one of the most popular power pop songs of 1977, and possibly the whole of the late 1970s. This song was quite influential in that genre, and yet, I rarely hear it out in the wild nowadays. That’s a shame, because not only is this song musically significant, its poignant lyrics about child neglect in favor of a sibling remain incredibly vulnerable and heartwrenching.

Fun fact: The music video for “Lonely Boy” would be the last video of the day to air on MTV’s very first broadcast day on August 1, 1981.

Photo by Richard Creamer/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images