Welcome back to my ongoing countdown of the highest-selling artists never to have enjoyed a British singles chart #1!

This is based on a Wikipedia list of history’s highest sellers, around which there’s some controversy over reported sales vs. recorded sales and yadda yadda yadda… I explained it quite well in Part 1, if I do say so myself, so please follow this link to catch up. Here also is Part 2, which I published in November. Those two parts counted down the 40th to the 31st non-charttopping highest sellers, and included the illustrious likes of Bob Marley, Van Halen, Barry Manilow and Nirvana.

Let’s get on with the acts placed 30th to 26th in this list, then…

30. R.E.M.

Biggest hit: ‘The Great Beyond’ (#3, in 2000)

R.E.M. are one of those bands I have somehow never found the time to get into, beyond the big hits. By that I mean ‘Shiny, Happy People’ and ‘Everybody Hurts’. Neither of which were the band’s biggest UK hit. That’s ‘The Great Beyond’, from the soundtrack to the Andy Kaufman biopic ‘Man on the Moon’, and I was aware of its chorus, with the line about pushing an elephant up the stairs. For a band that released their first single in 1981, to have their biggest hit almost two decades later is impressive. In fact, their total of ten UK Top 10s is way beyond what I would have expected, from a band that never felt that big.

29. Johnny Cash

Biggest hits: ‘A Boy Named Sue’ (#4 in 1969) and ‘A Thing Called Love’ (#4 in 1972)

‘What’s the best song ever written?’ is an impossible question. Anyone who says they can answer it definitively is wrong. And yet, the answer is actually quite simple. It’s ‘A Boy Named Sue’ by Johnny Cash (and written by Shel Silverstein). Country music is all about story-telling, and boy is this a masterclass in painting an entire life story in under four minutes. From the epic opening line – Well my daddy left home when I was three, And he didn’t leave much to ma and me, Just this old guitar and an empty bottle of booze… – to the drama of son and father finally meeting in a dusty saloon, the plot twist of why his dad gave him a girl’s name, and the punchline of If I ever have a son, I think I’m gonna name him… Bill or George, Any damn thing but Sue! Add to this the fact that there are actual convicted prisoners whoopin’ at the end of every line of this song, live from San Quentin, with the man in black growling his way through this tale of men being men despite the world’s myriad cruelties… And yet, and maybe this is just me and the fact I first heard this song at a young and impressionable age, there’s a strongly queer element to this song. It’s a song about a big tough macho man… named Sue. My name is Sue! How do you do! he hollers upon entering the saloon. Alright honey, we all heard you. I love it. Layers upon layers upon layers.

Like R.E.M, Johnny Cash had a career spanning several decades, and it took him a long time to even make the UK charts. In fact, the two songs featured here are his only British Top 10s. The second was this cute country-gospel ditty about the power of love. It’s alright, but it’s sadly lacking in men with women’s names.

28. Alicia Keys

Biggest hit: ‘Empire State of Mind’ with Jay-Z (#2, in 2009)

Despite having a healthy chart career of her own throughout the ’00s, Alicia Keys’ biggest hit came when she sang a chorus for Jay-Z, on his 2009 smash ‘Empire State of Mind’. But what a chorus. Few if any cities have been eulogised in song as often as the Big Apple, and this record was a worthy 21st Century addition to the canon, to stand alongside Sinatra and Billy Joel, although it does stray into worn clichés about dreams being made and big lights inspiring you.

27. Linda Ronstadt

Biggest hit: ‘Don’t Know Much’ with Aaron Neville (#2, in 1989)

Like Johnny Cash, for all Linda Ronstadt’s wide-reaching success, across pop, rock, country, and folk, she only ever enjoyed two UK Top 10s, both of which were duets. This ballad was the second, and the bigger of the two. It features soul singer Aaron Neville, who like Ronstadt had been around since the sixties. So, on the one hand its impressive that these artists could score such a big hit two or more decades into their careers… On the other this song is pure late-eighties sludge, and does nothing for me.

26. James Taylor

Biggest Hit: ‘You’ve Got a Friend’ (#4 in 1971)

Even more short on big hits is James Taylor, whose one and only UK Top 10 is this beautiful ode to friendship. It was written by Carole King, but it was her friend Taylor who enjoyed a big hit with the song, although King does feature as a backing vocalist on this version. It’s a simple song – some might claim the lyrics are bordering on trite – but there’s beauty in simplicity. Plus, the melody is gorgeous. I sang this in my primary school choir, and am now thinking of all the friends I once had that I haven’t seen in decades… Actually, there’s a chart-topping version of ‘You’ve Got a Friend’ coming up soon, so perhaps we can discuss it in more detail then.

I hope you found something to enjoy in this latest installment. Once again the artists are very US-heavy, which is perhaps understandable given that that is the biggest music market in the world. In fact, looking back, all fifteen acts featured so far have been American! In the next installment, though, we’ll meet our first high-selling-but-not-chart-topping British acts.