A Hit Record
"An Open Letter" became a surprise hit in Michigan and was released nationally by Liberty Records, jumping onto the Billboard Hot 100 at #84 on November 11, 1967. Within three weeks it went #58 - #18 - #10, making it one of the dozen or so fastest-climbing records in Hot 100 history up to that point, and Lundberg made an appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. After another week at #10, the record slipped to #22 for the week ending December 16, 1967, then vanished from the Hot 100 completely, after a total run of just six weeks. Few other records have ever been ranked so high in such a short chart stay on the Hot 100 (Napoleon XIV's "They're Coming To Take Me Away, Ha-Haaa!" peaked at #3 but was only on the Hot 100 for six weeks; Kenny G's "Auld Lang Syne" (The Millennium Mix) peaked at #7 but was only the Hot 100 for five weeks). However, it sold over one million copies within a month of release and was awarded a gold disc. "An Open Letter" also received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Spoken Word Recording.
There were also at least seven "response" records: Keith Gordon's "A Teenager's Answer", released on the Tower label, "A Teenager's Open Letter To His Father" by Robert Tamlin., "Letter From A Teenage Son" by Brandon Wade, "A Letter To Dad" by Every Father's Teenage Son", "Hi, Dad (An Open Letter To Dad)" by Dick Clair and "An Open Letter To My Dad" by Marceline .
Read more about this topic: Victor Lundberg
Famous quotes containing the words hit and/or record:
“The self-consciousness of Pine Ridge manifests itself at the village’s edge in such signs as “Drive Keerful,” “Don’t Hit Our Young ‘uns,” and “You-all Hurry Back”Mlocutions which nearly all Arkansas hill people use daily but would never dream of putting in print.”
—Administration in the State of Arka, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“Not marble nor the gilded monuments
Of princes shall outlive this powerful rime;
But you shall shine more bright in these contents
Than unswept stone, besmeared with sluttish time.
When wasteful war shall statues overturn,
And broils root out the work of masonry,
Nor Mars his sword nor war’s quick fire shall burn
The living record of your memory.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)