The 20th of February 1975
Official U.K. Singles Chart results from Sunday the 16th to Saturday the 22nd of February 1975
Cut-off for sales figures was up to the end of Saturday the 15th of February
Results counted from Sunday the 16th,
published on Tuesday the 18th,
and broadcast on B.B.C. Radio 1 on Sunday the 23rd of February 1974.
Sylvia
Y Viva Espana
At No.50, on the “The Top 50 U.K. Singles Chart”, the week of my 3rd Birthday, is Sylvia with Y Viva Espana.
We kick off this chart…
…with a million-seller song. One that had been re-interpreted into many different languages from its initial Dutch version (sung by a Belgian), then into French, German, Greek, Norwegian, Arabic, Danish, Finnish, before it even got to the Spanish version it was singing about; and I haven’t even got to the English version.
Weirdly, my Auntie Vi and Uncle Bill owned this record. I say it’s odd because their version had the Spanish sleeve from the original singer of the song, Samantha, and yet the single itself was this one by Sylvia.
The Dutch original…
…had been a mish-mash of words from the beginning. Entitled “E Viva Espana”, for a start, there isn’t a Spanish word “E Viva”. That comes from Italy (and even then it’s spelt differently as “Evviva”, which, over there means “Long Live”.
By the time the Spaniards themselves managed to grab hold of it, they changed it to finally make sense for their own country, and that’s how we in the UK got this version which correctly interprets as “And Long Live Spain”.
This hit…
…timed itself perfectly with the first huge wave of package holidaymakers jetting off over to the far sunnier shores and new complexes springing up all over the coastlines there. If my memory serves me correctly, I do believe my Auntie and Uncle were in with one of those plane-loads of tourists.
For me personally, I hated the bloody song. It’s probably the first of many novelties in the charts which eventually got to me.
However, I know there are a lot of people out there who love it, and over the years it has taken on a life of its own, even threatening to become a surrogate national anthem of La Piel de Toro.
So for those who do love it, just forgive me if, when I travel to that beautiful hot climb, I will be making sure I’m listening to something else instead of a song about Spain, first recorded in Dutch, by a Belgian, before being rewritten by the Spanish themselves so it actually made sense, and then interpreted into English, and sung to us by a Swede.
The single…
…had first invaded the UK charts, way back in the summer, when it entered at No.46 on the 4th of August 1974, It climbed steadily over the whole of that package holiday season, until finally breaching the Top 10 during the final week of that summer month.
As holidaymakers returning back home to Blighty didn’t want to let go of their sunkissed memories just yet, the following week the single was pushed into the Top 5; and by the second week of September, it reached its peak of No.4.
It stayed for most of that month in the Top 10, before slipping back, but managed to stick around long after most tans had faded, sitting comfortably in the mid-chart positions throughout most of the autumn, before dropping back further once British Summer Time finally ended, eventually leaving the chart after the 14th of December.
However, just before this New Year of 1975 dawned, it snuck back inside like a stowaway and hovered around the bottom end of the chart, which is where I find it this week.
From here,..
…the single will creep back up four places to No.46, before it finally flies off altogether, having achieved an astonishing run of 28 weeks (19 of those consecutive in its initial run) on the UK chart overall.
The “A” Side
The “B” Side
Top of the Pops Performance (introduced by Wayne Osmond) 15th August 1974
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