Popularity
The song was the #1 hit in the U.S. for the five weeks encompassing March 1966, the #1 hit on the Hot 100's end of the year chart for 1966, and the No. 21 song of 1960s, despite the later unpopularity of the Vietnam War and the competing "California Dreaming", sharply dividing the popular music market. It has sold over nine million singles and albums and was the top single of a year in which the British Invasion, led by the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, continued to dominate the U.S. charts. The Beatles' top hit was We Can Work It Out (#16), while the Stones' top hit was Paint It, Black (#21). See Billboard charts.
It is currently used as one of the four primary marching tunes of the Fightin' Texas Aggie Band.
Read more about this topic: Ballad Of The Green Berets
Famous quotes containing the word popularity:
“A more problematic example is the parallel between the increasingly abstract and insubstantial picture of the physical universe which modern physics has given us and the popularity of abstract and non-representational forms of art and poetry. In each case the representation of reality is increasingly removed from the picture which is immediately presented to us by our senses.”
—Harvey Brooks (b. 1915)
“There are few cases in which mere popularity should be considered a proper test of merit; but the case of song-writing is, I think, one of the few.”
—Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1845)
“A large part of the popularity and persuasiveness of psychology comes from its being a sublimated spiritualism: a secular, ostensibly scientific way of affirming the primacy of “spirit” over matter.”
—Susan Sontag (b. 1933)