This Iconic Love Song Held The No. 1 Spot The Longest In 1969

1969 may have been the year of the infamous Woodstock festival and the arrival of proto-punk maniacs The Stooges, but for many music fans the world over, the sweet tones of bubblegum pop were still alluring enough to make them part with their hard-earned money at the record store. And the most successful ditty of the year was undoubtedly The Archies' "Sugar, Sugar."

Decades before Damon Albarn's Gorillaz reinvented the idea of a virtual band for the 21st century, there were The Archies, the animated popstars created by Archie Comics and tied to "The Archie Show," which launched in 1968. The band was the brainchild of legendary promoter Don Kirshner, who had enjoyed major success as the creator of the manufactured band The Monkees, which, like The Archies, arrived with a TV show in tow. He hired session musician Ron Dante to be The Archies' lead vocalist, with CBS expecting the Saturday morning cartoon to feature one new song every week. On its launch in 1968, the show was an instant smash, and in turn, it proved, like "The Monkees," to be an ideal platform to promote music. The first Archies' single, "Bang Shang-a-Lang," landed just outside the Top 20 of the Billboard Hot 100.

The Archies did pretty well with their debut song, but nothing would compare to the enormous international success of "Sugar, Sugar" the following year. The song debuted in July 1969 at No. 91, and climbed the Billboard chart to hit No. 1 in September, staying there for an astonishing four weeks. The single spent a total of 22 weeks on the chart, 12 of which were spent in the Top 10. The song was also a smash in the U.K., where it spent eight weeks at the top of the singles chart. In total, the record sold more than 6 million copies worldwide, and was the biggest selling pop single of 1969 in both countries.

The song may sound corny and simplistic now — indeed, it likely did so to many listeners at the time — but commentators have had little trouble explaining the appeal of "Sugar, Sugar," given the late '60s context in which it was released. 

Pop music has come on in leaps and bounds over the course of the decade, a fact you can hear for yourself simply by listening to the enormous difference in the music created by The Beatles in 1962 and 1967. However, whereas the music of many rock acts was becoming darker to reflect the troubling political landscape and social upheaval created by the Vietnam War, as well as the ongoing fight for Civil Rights, listeners understandably were also keen for the occasional piece of unalloyed escapism. As All Music's Jason Ankeny points out, The Archies' "Sugar, Sugar" is exactly that, a devotional love song as sweet and sickly as its title suggests, but which nevertheless gave enough of a sugar hit to prove addictive to the music-buying public.