1964 plays like a radio log book of changing pop music in the raw. It begins on familiar note but ends up somewhere entirely different. One hears the door slam shut on early sixties crooning and the squeaking hinge as the British guitar, Motown finesse and pop innovations from America pour in.
It belongs to Bobby Vinton. There I’ve said it again tops the chart during the first four weeks of the year. It is an easy, string swept ballad that is like the final silent snowfall of the winter. The singing is elegant and refined and it has the serener confidence of an economy that had dominated since the late fifties. In those first weeks you might have thought the old regime was going on.
February’s first day disagrees. The Beatles interrupt the summit with the likes of I Want to Hold Your Hand and the nation leans. Seven consecutive weeks the record sits atop the throne and the radio is a flurry of handclaps and harmonies. The single is lean and electric and it reorders what the most enjoyable hit will be. You get the feeling teenagers are embracing an alternate personality while the parent’s question is what happened. The excitement is unavoidable and the stats verify. Week by week the hold is fed.
The late march brings us a new twist. In replaces the sibling’s she loves you for two weeks on the top. The yeah yeah hook is global and the set moves by the pace of sprint. It is the same group but under the new perspective and it keeps the flame burning. By this time the British Invasion is not news. It is weekly routine. Import labels are frantic. The A and R teams from America are giving an ear to the sound of the snare as well as the vocal mixture so they are hunting for bands capable of equaling that spark.
April becomes a declarative month. The Beatles are back with Cant Buy Me Love and retain number one for five weeks to the end of the month into May. The song is gutsy and assured. The Beatles take rock and roll back to the happy root from where it all originally came and buff it up with trendy finish. Three Beatles singles have now dominated the spring. The signal is indubitable. The pop gravity shifted.
And out comes the legend from another time with a smile. May ninth Louis Armstrong brings Hello Dolly to the top. It is a wonderful moment. The arrangement swings the vocal is all personality. Satchmo is shoulder to shoulder with the new vanguard for one week reminding all that charisma is never passé. It is the era by way of passing the baton with the wink.
Motown steals its first big headline of the summer soon afterward. Mary Wells tops the chart with My Guy for two weeks. The rhythm is lean on its foot and the Smokey Robinson-penned composition creates an earwiggy melody. The Motown formula is audible. Sugar-coated hooks. Neat rhythm sections. Smiley voices through the speakers. The presence of the label within the national dialogue becomes impossible to refute.
At the tail end of May the tide of Beatlemania washes an early single to the fore. Love Me Do tops the pile for one week. It is the reminder that this phenomenon is deep. Even an comparatively underwhelming early track booms away when the fever is most raging. By June something new comes to the party. The Dixie Cups waft Chapel of Love to the fore for three weeks. New Orleans beat and girl group ferness merge into wedding day anthem that grips like confetti. It is delicate and uncomplicated and you can hear church bells ringing at the back of your head.
End of June, first week of July bring the British duo with the soft focus harmonies. Peter and Gordon sing A World Without Love for one week. The tune is sorrowful but beautiful. It connects the Merseybeat flavor with the sweet folk pop sensibility. Independence Day weekend spins the knob to the west coast. The Beach Boys blast to the top with I Get Around and remain there for a fortnight. The record is full of movement. The stacked vocals. The rubber band bass. The drums that are like skateboard wheels on the boardwalk. west coast pop engineering comes to an art form and everyone is taking copious notes.
Mid July hosts The Four Seasons hitting paydirt with Rag Doll for two weeks. The show is big and the lyric paints the scene of the street with pathos. Frankie Valli’s falsetto rises like the flare atop the street lamps. August brings on the second Beatles win.
A Hard Days Night spends one week atop the chart but comes through the test by showing the group is able to compose according to picture mandate and still come up with an all-proof single. The chord which begins the album is the flare atop the clouds.
Dean Martin replaces him the following week with Everybody Loves Somebody for one week. The suavity is Gallic and the crooner school gets one final champagne corking for prime time. Then the Motown machine comes to life.
The Supremes take Where Did Our Love Go to the top for two weeks over late August. The beat is inconspicuously uncomplicated. The hooks are one-hits. Diana Ross soothes above the track with icy accuracy. A dynasty is heard going.
September is the month of the Animals for three weeks. The House of the Rising Sun makes an organ driven epic out of the folk classic by broadening the dramatic scope. It is ghastlier compared to most chart leaders of the year and it pushes the boundaries as far as what the mainstream will accept.
Roy Orbison follows with Oh Pretty Woman for three weeks to mid October. The riff is classic and Orbison’s voice surfs the groove with unfazed dominance. The song struts and grins and sounds like it owns the pavement.
Manfred Mann’s Do Wah Diddy Diddy follows for two weeks straight. It is unabashed singalong euphoria and yet another designate that British bands are an intrinsic part of quotidian American broadcast. The later October to November belongs to The Supremes yet again.
Baby Love keeps the Number One slot for four weeks. The disc is streamlined and undeniably catchy. Motown is an im tudemention movement with the flagship group leader.
After that run the fall turns eclectic. The Shangri Las crash in for one week with Leader of the Pack. It is a teenage tragedy opera revving on a motorcycle engine and it captures a slice of youth culture with cinematic flair. Lorne Greene’s Ringo spends a week at the top in early December.
It is a country spoken word novelty that proves the charts still have room for surprises. Bobby Vinton returns with Mr Lonely for one week and reminds us where the year began. The voice is tender and the melody aches.
The Supremes answer again with Come See About Me for a week. They are the model of consistency. The year closes with The Beatles at number one with I Feel Fine across the last week of December. The feedback lick at the start is a playful flex. It announces that innovation is not slowing down.
Taken week by week nineteen sixty four tells a clear story. The British Invasion rewires the marketplace. Motown perfects a new American pop craft. Legacy voices still find room to shine. The variety is striking and the pace is thrilling. By New Year’s Eve the guard has changed and the charts have never looked livelier.
What each column means
- Week (Issue Date): The chart’s published issue date for that week (typically reflecting tracking from the prior Friday–Thursday or equivalent).
- Song Title: The exact title as it appears on the official chart.
- Artist Name: Credited performing artist(s). If a remix or featured act is specifically credited on the chart for that week, it appears here.
- Label: The commercial label/imprint credited by the chart compiler.
- Peak: The highest position the song reached on the main singles chart (for titles listed here, that’s usually No. 1, but we retain the field for completeness and comparability with other lists).
- Total Weeks (on Chart): The cumulative number of weeks the song has appeared anywhere on the main singles chart, not just at No. 1.
- Weeks at No. 1: The number of weeks the song has spent at the top during 2025. If a No. 1 streak began in late 2024 or continued into early 2026, only the weeks that fall within 2025 are counted here, unless you note otherwise.
Method notes
- We list every weekly No. 1, so a multi-week leader will repeat across consecutive issue dates.
- Where labels use multiple imprints (e.g., major + imprint), we present the primary pairing as printed on the chart source.
- Issue dates are kept in chronological order from early January to late December, covering all 52 weekly issues in 2025.
Chart-Topper #1 Songs of 1964
| Week (Issue Date) | Song Title | Artist(s) | Lebel | Peak | Total Week | Weeks at #1 |
| 4th January, 1964 | THERE! I’VE SAID IT AGAIN | Bobby Vinton | Epic | 1 | 6 | 1 |
| 11th January, 1964 | THERE! I’VE SAID IT AGAIN | Bobby Vinton | Epic | 1 | 7 | 2 |
| 18th January, 1964 | THERE! I’VE SAID IT AGAIN | Bobby Vinton | Epic | 1 | 8 | 3 |
| 25th January, 1964 | THERE! I’VE SAID IT AGAIN | Bobby Vinton | Epic | 1 | 9 | 4 |
| 1st February, 1964 | I WANT TO HOLD YOUR HAND | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 3 | 1 |
| 8th February, 1964 | I WANT TO HOLD YOUR HAND | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 4 | 2 |
| 15th February, 1964 | I WANT TO HOLD YOUR HAND | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 5 | 3 |
| 22nd February, 1964 | I WANT TO HOLD YOUR HAND | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 6 | 4 |
| 29th February, 1964 | I WANT TO HOLD YOUR HAND | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 7 | 5 |
| 7th March, 1964 | I WANT TO HOLD YOUR HAND | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 8 | 6 |
| 14th March, 1964 | I WANT TO HOLD YOUR HAND | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 9 | 7 |
| 21st March, 1964 | SHE LOVES YOU | The Beatles | Swan | 1 | 9 | 1 |
| 28th March, 1964 | SHE LOVES YOU | The Beatles | Swan | 1 | 10 | 2 |
| 4th April, 1964 | CAN’T BUY ME LOVE | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 2 | 1 |
| 11th April, 1964 | CAN’T BUY ME LOVE | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 3 | 2 |
| 18th April, 1964 | CAN’T BUY ME LOVE | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 4 | 3 |
| 25th April, 1964 | CAN’T BUY ME LOVE | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 5 | 4 |
| Ending 2nd May, 1964 | CAN’T BUY ME LOVE | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 6 | 5 |
| 9th May, 1964 | HELLO, DOLLY! | Louis Armstrong | Kapp | 1 | 13 | 1 |
| 16th May, 1964 | MY GUY | Mary Wells | Motown | 1 | 7 | 1 |
| 23rd May, 1964 | MY GUY | Mary Wells | Motown | 1 | 8 | 2 |
| 30th May, 1964 | LOVE ME DO | The Beatles | Tollie/Capitol Of Canada | 1 | 8 | 1 |
| 6th June, 1964 | CHAPEL OF LOVE | The Dixie Cups | Red Bird | 1 | 6 | 1 |
| 13th June, 1964 | CHAPEL OF LOVE | The Dixie Cups | Red Bird | 1 | 7 | 2 |
| 20th June, 1964 | CHAPEL OF LOVE | The Dixie Cups | Red Bird | 1 | 8 | 3 |
| 27th June, 1964 | A WORLD WITHOUT LOVE | Peter and Gordon | Capitol | 1 | 8 | 1 |
| 4th July, 1964 | I GET AROUND | The Beach Boys | Capitol | 1 | 7 | 1 |
| 11th July, 1964 | I GET AROUND | The Beach Boys | Capitol | 1 | 8 | 2 |
| 18th July, 1964 | RAG DOLL | The Four Seasons | Philips | 1 | 5 | 1 |
| 25th July, 1964 | RAG DOLL | The Four Seasons | Philips | 1 | 6 | 2 |
| 1st August, 1964 | A HARD DAY’S NIGHT | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 3 | 1 |
| 8th August, 1964 | A HARD DAY’S NIGHT | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 4 | 2 |
| 15th August, 1964 | EVERYBODY LOVES SOMEBODY | Dean Martin | Reprise | 1 | 8 | 1 |
| 22nd August, 1964 | WHERE DID OUR LOVE GO | The Supremes | Motown | 1 | 7 | 1 |
| 29th August, 1964 | WHERE DID OUR LOVE GO | The Supremes | Motown | 1 | 8 | 2 |
| 5th September, 1964 | THE HOUSE OF THE RISING SUN | The Animals | MGM | 1 | 5 | 1 |
| 12th September, 1964 | THE HOUSE OF THE RISING SUN | The Animals | MGM | 1 | 6 | 2 |
| 19th September, 1964 | THE HOUSE OF THE RISING SUN | The Animals | MGM | 1 | 7 | 3 |
| 26th September, 1964 | OH, PRETTY WOMAN | Roy Orbison and the Candy Men | Monument | 1 | 5 | 1 |
| 3rd October, 1964 | OH, PRETTY WOMAN | Roy Orbison and the Candy Men | Monument | 1 | 6 | 2 |
| 10th October, 1964 | OH, PRETTY WOMAN | Roy Orbison and the Candy Men | Monument | 1 | 7 | 3 |
| 17th October, 1964 | DO WAH DIDDY DIDDY | Manfred Mann | Ascot | 1 | 7 | 1 |
| 24th October, 1964 | DO WAH DIDDY DIDDY | Manfred Mann | Ascot | 1 | 8 | 2 |
| 31st October, 1964 | BABY LOVE | The Supremes | Motown | 1 | 5 | 1 |
| 7th November, 1964 | BABY LOVE | The Supremes | Motown | 1 | 6 | 2 |
| 14th November, 1964 | BABY LOVE | The Supremes | Motown | 1 | 7 | 3 |
| 21st November, 1964 | BABY LOVE | The Supremes | Motown | 1 | 8 | 4 |
| 28th November, 1964 | LEADER OF THE PACK | The Shangri-Las | Red Bird | 1 | 8 | 1 |
| 5th December, 1964 | RINGO | Lorne Greene | RCA Victor | 1 | 6 | 1 |
| 12th December, 1964 | MR. LONELY | Bobby Vinton | Epic | 1 | 7 | 1 |
| 19th December, 1964 | COME SEE ABOUT ME | The Supremes | Motown | 1 | 6 | 1 |
| 26th December, 1964 | I FEEL FINE | The Beatles | Capitol | 1 | 4 | 1 |