"Stars on 45" is a song medley issued in January 1981 by Dutch studio group Stars on 45. In some countries, including the UK, Ireland, and New Zealand, the band was credited as 'Starsound' and only the medley itself was named "Stars on 45".
The song's origin comes from an underground 12" that was big in clubs in the late 1970s. It used the actual songs, rather than the re-recorded cover versions, with a drum backing. At the end of the underground 12", was the track "Doing It to Death" by the J.B.'s featuring James Brown.
It reached number 1 in the Netherlands on February 21, 1981; number 2 in the UK on May 9, 1981; and number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 on June 20, 1981. In the US, the single also peaked at number 18 on the dance chart.[3] In the US, the song's one-week stay at the top of the Hot 100 interrupted "Bette Davis Eyes"'s run as the number 1 single at five weeks. The next week, the Kim Carnes song regained its number 1 status for an additional four weeks.
The origin of the single was the Netherlands where numerous bootlegdisco singles were floating around, most importantly Alto Passion's "Let's Do It in the 80's Great Hits". Willem van Kooten, the owner of one of the copyrights, decided to make a similar, legitimate record of a 12" single titled "Let's Do It in the 80s Great Hits" credited to a Canadian group called Passion (though the snippets of songs were taken from the original recordings).[4] He found singers who sounded similar to John Lennon and Paul McCartney, including Smyle's Bas Muys and Sandy Coast's Okkie Huysdens, and decided to make the single focus on the Beatles. The Beatles medley was later extended to a full 16-minute album side. It appeared on the Stars on 45's first full-length release, Long Play Album (US title: Stars on Long Play; UK title: Stars on 45 — The Album).
The album version of the song moved "Venus" and "Sugar, Sugar" to Side Two into a different medley, and added several more Beatles songs as well as a 32-second instrumental extract from George Harrison's "My Sweet Lord" and even a fleeting reference to new wave band Sparks' "Beat the Clock", for a total length of about 15 minutes. The album version was released as Long Play Album in the Netherlands, and retitled to Stars on Long Play in the US and Stars on 45 — The Album in the UK. A detailed listing of the source material can be found in the Long Play Album article.
The song also became a huge success in the UK where it kicked off a craze for medleys, with a large number of records in the Stars on 45 mould reaching the UK Top 40 in 1981. For example, The Hollies recorded "Holliedaze", a medley of some of their previous hits, which reached 28 on the UK charts with Graham Nash and Eric Haydock briefly rejoining the group in September 1981 to promote the record. Likewise, in the US, the song started a medley craze that lasted for about a year and introduced not only other medleys by Stars on 45, but medleys by the Beatles themselves, the Beach Boys, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Meco, and Larry Elgart and His Manhattan Swing Orchestra.
The Beatles medley was remixed and re-released in a house music version in Europe in 1989 under the title "Stars on '89 Remix", then featuring an alternate selection of Beatles tracks taken from the album version of the medley, coupled with a new "Stars on 45" theme called "Rock the House". The single was remixed and reproduced by Danny van Passel and Rutti Kroese and released on the Red Bullet label as a 7", 12", and CD singles, all formats backed with an extended version of the "Rock the House" theme.
In 2006, the Global Deejays released an updated version of "Stars on 45", but the medleys were not included.
In 2011, "Stars on 45" was given the house treatment, with the single released as "45". This version also leaves out the medleys.
Parodies
A parody of "Stars on 45," entitled "Stars Over 45," was done by Chas & Dave. It was a hit in the UK, where it reached No. 21 in early 1982.[44]
Scottish band Orange Juice, recorded a medley of their own songs, set to a rhythm similar to that of Stars On 45, for a radio session in 1981 for John Peel, called "Blokes On 45".
"Maoris on 45" (1982), a song inspired by the "Stars on 45" concept but instead featuring popular traditional Māori music set to guitar, was a hit in New Zealand.[45]
^ abBreihan, Tom (November 15, 2022). "The Beatles - "I Want To Hold Your Hand". The Number Ones: Twenty Chart-Topping Hits That Reveal the History of Pop Music. New York: Hachette Book Group. p. 47.
^Kent, David (1993). Australian Chart Book 1970–1992 (Illustrated ed.). St. Ives, N.S.W.: Australian Chart Book. ISBN0-646-11917-6. N.B. The Kent Report chart was licensed by ARIA between mid 1983 and 19 June 1988.
^Scaping, Peter, ed. (1982). "The Top 200 Singles: January–December 1981". BPI Year Book 1982 (5th ed.). London, England: The British Phonographic Industry Ltd. pp. 46–49. ISBN0-906154-03-0.
^Jones, Alan; Lazell, Barry; Rees, Dafydd (1982). "The Top 200 Singles (UK)". Chart File 1982. London, England: Virgin Books. pp. 74–77. ISBN0-907080-49-9.
^"Top 100 Pop Singles". Billboard. December 26, 1981. p. YE-9. ("Billboard's 1981 Year-End Charts" supplement)
