One-hit wonders come and go. But some remain so popular among the masses that they earn new listeners as the decades roll on. I thought that would be the case for the following history-making one-hit wonders from the 1980s. And yet, I was surprised to learn that they pull in fewer than two million monthly listeners nowadays. That just doesn’t make sense to me, because their solitary hits (and their hugely underrated non-hits) are still so good today.
Devo
Believe it or not, the American new wave icons behind the 1980 song “Whip It” earn less than two million monthly streams nowadays on Spotify, per soundcharts.com, at 1.6 million. The band also brings in 1.4 monthly listeners per last.fm.
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“Whip It” was a smash hit on the charts in 1980. The song peaked at No. 14 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 8 on the Hot Dance Club Play chart. Sadly, Devo never made it to the Top 40 of the Hot 100 again.
Gary Numan
Another shocking addition to our list of one-hit wonders with fewer than two million monthly listeners is the icon himself, Gary Numan. Numan was far from a one-hit wonder in the UK and Europe in general. But he did only score major success once on our side of the pond with “Cars”. That synth-pop classic dropped in 1979, but Numan enjoyed a long and successful career through the 1980s. And yet, Numan only pulls in 1.1 million streams monthly on Spotify and 1.1 million monthly listeners on last.fm, per soundcharts.com.
Numan scored hit after hit in the UK well into the 1980s. However, “Cars” was his only song to make it to the Top 40 of the Hot 100 in the US. There, it peaked at No. 9.
Men Without Hats
Men Without Hats make it to this list at 1.9 million streams on Spotify per month and 749,000 monthly listeners on last.fm, according to soundcharts.com. This group of new wave icons is known for their one major hit, the ultra-catchy tune “The Safety Dance” from 1982. That delightful synth-pop gem peaked at No. 3 on the Hot 100 chart in 1982. Sadly, Men Without Hats never made it that far on the Hot 100 again. Their 1987 song “Pop Goes The World” made it to No. 20, and the group never made it to the Top 40 again afterwards.
(Photo by Chris Walter/WireImage)