| abstract | - This list highlights significant milestones and achievements based upon Billboard magazine's singles charts, most notably the Billboard Hot 100. This list spans from the issue dated January 1, 1955 to the present. The Billboard Hot 100 began with the issue dated August 9, 1958, and is currently the standard music popularity chart in the United States. Prior to its creation, Billboard published four singles charts: "Best Sellers in Stores", "Most Played by Jockeys", "Most Played in Jukeboxes" and "The Top 100" (an early version of the Hot 100). These charts, which ranged from 20 to 100 slots, were phased out at different times during 1957 and 1958. Though technically not part of the "Hot 100" chart history, their data is included by Billboard for computational purposes, and to avoid unenlightening discrepancies (i.e. "Buddy Holly's debut single in the Top 40 was released posthumously" or "Elvis Presley has seven Hot 100 number-ones"). There are chart discrepancies. In a prominent example of the magazine's retroactive methodology, Elvis Presley's "Don't Be Cruel"/"Hound Dog" single is credited with an 11-week run atop the Billboard chart in 1956, because the double-sided release topped the "Best Sellers in Stores" and "Most Played in Jukeboxes" lists for that length of time (though the specific weeks differed). Presley's run lasted just eight weeks atop the "Most Played by Jockeys" chart, and seven weeks in "The Top 100"'s number one slot, but artists are credited with their most favorable placements on any of the four charts. This is why Billboard and its official statistician Joel Whitburn lists 17 number one singles, for a total of 71 weeks, in 1956. However, Billboard and Whitburn are not in complete statistical agreement. Originally, each side of the aforementioned Presley single had a separate turn topping the sales chart, with the titles "flipping" during its 11-week run. The Best Sellers in Stores chart specified that in the case of such double-sided releases, the "leading side" would be listed first. But Billboard has since decertified all two-sided hit singles retroactively for computational purposes, by voiding the matching status of whichever songs were deemed to have been the lesser sides. Because "Hound Dog" was the lead side during the single's number-one chart run for a shorter period than "Don't Be Cruel," it is thus no longer counted as a separate number-one hit by Billboard magazine. Whitburn continues to rely on preexisting research. All items listed below are from the Hot 100 era, unless otherwise noted (pre-Hot 100 charts).
|
