20+ Biggest Pop Hits That Narrowly Got Released

When we hear a hit song on the radio, at a party or on our favorite playlist, we can’t even imagine what happened until that hit reached our ears. Many songs that thrilled or made crowds dance almost never made it to the public.

There could be several reasons: the owner of the record company didn’t like it, the film’s producer wanted to remove it from the soundtrack, the music was censored, a composer almost didn’t deliver the work on time, or the artist himself was in doubt about his quality.

O awesome.club made a list of great hits that almost didn’t reach the public’s ears, considering a period of 80 years of world popular music.

not just the song shake it offbut the whole album 1989, by Taylor Swift, ran the risk of not seeing the light of day. The singer wanted to completely change her style, from country to pop, but her label didn’t believe in that boldness. Taylor was radical, won the fight and reached the top of the American chart with shake it off, silencing those who did not put faith in its power. The clip has already reached over 2.7 billion views on YouTube.

Blurred Lines It’s a song that gets everyone dancing. But Robin Thicke’s label executives didn’t think so when the artist suggested they invest in producing a clip to promote the work. He was only able to release the video with the support of the Rémy Martin brand of cognacs. The video is very simple, with Robin dancing in the white background of a studio alongside three models and artists Pharrell and TI, but it was enough to make Blurred Lines an immediate success. Ultimately, the song was considered plagiarism from Got To Give Upa hit by Marvin Gaye, taking the authors, Robin and Pharrell, to a loss of more than 5 million dollars.

It was Lady Gaga herself who wanted to leave Applause out. She wasn’t particularly happy with the result of the recording, she thought she already had much better material for a new album, but was convinced by her producer to include it on the album. artpop and releasing it as a single. Was he right: Applause it reached the top ten on the charts in several countries — Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Scotland and England.

The music got money it was composed for rapper Pitbull, who was not enthusiastic and ended up not recording it. The composers tried to have it interpreted by several other artists, who had the same impression of Pitbull. Until Lil Wayne decided to release it, turning it into a worldwide hit.

James Hetfield, lead singer and guitarist of Metallica, did not intend to record Nothing Else Matters, considering it a very personal song. He sang the song on the phone to his girlfriend during the band’s tours. Drummer Lars Ulrich smelled success there and convinced James to record it. The rest of the band also piled on. “I’m grateful to the guys who pushed me to make the song a Metallica hit,” said James.

Kurt Cobain showed some chords of what would become Smells Like Teen Spirit to his bandmates Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic. The two didn’t like what they heard and wanted to eliminate the song from Nirvana’s repertoire. They thought the song was too similar in style to the band Pixies—which indeed Kurt had intended. But Nirvana’s leader insisted on the idea, the song was worked on for weeks and it came to fruition: a rock classic that made Nirvana known all over the world overnight.

U2 had the beginning and end of the song defined, but the middle was missing. The work to find the right words and chords took a lot of time and even irritated producer Brian Eno. He suggested that U2 erase all recordings of the song and start over from scratch. It is believed that Eno’s hope, in fact, was that the band would give up on that song, which was delaying the recording of the album. The Joshua Tree🇧🇷 But she won and ended up becoming one of the many hits of the band led by Bono Vox.

when the sexy kiss plays at a party, nobody stands still. But that wasn’t the opinion of Warner label executives when Prince introduced her to them. They found the song too “raw” and didn’t believe it could be released as a single. Prince stomped his foot and kiss it was her third song to reach number one on the US charts.

Michael Jackson, when writing the song Billie Jean, he was sure he had a big hit on his hands. But the record producer thriller, Quincy Jones, did not think so. He didn’t like the song and wanted to find a way to leave it off the record. As Michael was adamant, Quincy proposed some changes, such as cutting the intro of the song (just that beat that makes us start dancing right away!). Michael didn’t give in and Billie Jean became one of his biggest hits. AND thrilleron the best-selling album in music history.

Ney Matogrosso recorded Man with H, by composer Antônio Barros, but was in doubt about including it on his 1981 album. Not because of the lyrics, full of malice and ambiguity. But because of the rhythm: he had never sung a forró and he felt insecure. The composer Gonzaguinha convinced him that only he was capable of giving meaning to that music as an interpreter. It is one of Ney’s biggest hits to date.

The censorship of the time, in Brazil, left this samba by Adoniran Barbosa for 7 years in a drawer. The song was banned in 1973 because of the author’s wrong speech, which reproduced the São Paulo accent of the time, in words like “tauba”, “artomove” and “revorve”. “The lack of taste prevents the release of the lyrics,” wrote a censorship official in the document. Shooting Alvaro he saved himself from oblivion with the recording of Elis Regina, in 1980, when it was finally released and was a resounding success on the radio.

Rita Lee also had problems with censorship and several of her songs were banned, as revealed in the book FavoRita (2018). Perfume Launcher, one of his biggest hits, almost could not be recorded. The censor wasn’t shocked because the lyrics spoke of a narcotic substance used in Carnival, but because of the expression “me desquarte in the act”, which he considered daring. Rita appealed and managed to release Perfume Launcher🇧🇷

Producer Tom Moulton had created a modern arrangement of Edith Piaf’s French classic, and a singer named Teresa Waiter had already recorded the song. Teresa, however, did not want to launch it, as she feared being associated with the disco wave, the great phenomenon of the time. A copy of the recording ended up in the hands of Grace Jones, with whom Moulton also worked. Grace wanted to include it on her debut album, although the producer tried to dissuade her from the idea, as the arrangement belonged to another artist. There was no way: the pop version of La Vie En Rose it was a success and launched the career of the Jamaican artist.

Carioca composer Luhli put lyrics full of magic, fairies, sacis and fireflies in a melody with a Portuguese rhythm created by João Ricardo, leader of Secos & Molhados. Only João didn’t like the song, he thought it was simple and didn’t want to release it on the band’s debut album. It was the singer Ney Matogrosso who insisted on the song, claiming that, as he was not a composer, he had the right to choose a song. the turn it was a blast!

When the singer Elis Regina received the Behind the door, by composer and pianist Francis Hime, the lyrics were not ready, some final verses were missing. She had to ask Chico Buarque, author of the lyrics, to finish the work in order to include the song on her 1972 album. Chico completed the task at the last minute and, almost, Elis was left without the song.

What’s Going On is one of Marvin Gaye’s biggest hits, no one argues. But the singer had a hard time convincing Tamla-Motown label owner Berry Gordy Jr that he was right. Berry disliked songs with political themes, in case What’s Going On, which commented on police brutality against civil rights activists in the United States. Marvin played hardball: he threatened to break his record deal if the song wasn’t released.

Columbia’s sales team almost shelved Bob Dylan’s classic. They thought the song was too long, with its six minutes and ten seconds. But a record company executive, contrary to colleagues, took a copy of the song to play at a New York nightclub, where the recording was immediately well received. Influential radio professionals in the United States also approved the song immediately and demanded that the record be edited. It is Dylan’s biggest hit to date.

Satisfaction is the defining song of the English band the Rolling Stones. However, if it depended only on guitarist Keith Richards, it would not get off the ground. Richards thought its guitar riff was too similar to the song’s Dancing In The Street, hit by Martha & The Vandellas. In fact, he didn’t think Satisfaction a silly song. But Mick Jagger, his songwriting partner, was excited and pumped the band into recording it.

The song moon riverplayed by Audrey Hepburn in a beautiful scene from the film luxury doll 🇧🇷Breakfast at Tiffany’s), was nearly cut from the story. After a preview, the president of Paramount Pictures ordered the song deleted. Audrey herself firmly defended her stay: “Only over my dead body!”, she said, luckily for composer Henry Mancini, author of the song. And from all of us.

Over The Rainbow, written by Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg, it is one of the great songs of the 20th century, interpreted by hundreds of singers and musicians of the most diverse styles. But almost missed out on The Wizard of Oz 🇧🇷The Wizard of Oz), film in which it was released….