Just before disco fever peaked and a rock radio station’s “Disco Demolition” promotion gave rise to a disco backlash, there emerged a certain type of dance record: the bandwagon-jumping song from an artist dramatically outside the genre. Think of it as the era of “disco dilettantism.” Not all those acts were in search of the career reinvention that had made the Bee Gees stars again. Many were just following the music, soon to wander off as pop changed again. Gloria Gaynor and Sister Sledge saw lasting career downturns; Rod Stewart, Paul McCartney, ELO, and Barbra Streisand kept making hits.

But more than 40 years later, there is a lot of pop disco among the top 15 songs of 1979 with the highest “lost factor” — our calculation of the distance between a song’s success at the time and its availability on broadcast radio now. We’ve been taking the top 100 hits of each year between 1978 and 1989 (so far), assigning them points based on their year-end chart placing (starting with 100 points for the No. 1 song of the year) and dividing them by the number of spins a song received in the previous week on U.S. and Canadian radio, according to Nielsen/BDS.

It won’t surprise those who read this series’ first article about the “Lost Factor” and 1982’s hit songs that an MOR ballad tops the list. But a lot of late ‘70s disco was an extension of ‘60s MOR and ‘70s soft pop, which is why many of them populate our top 15 as well. Teen idols have typically had high lost factors, and Leif Garrett’s one-song disco career (as well as TV star David Naughton’s sole foray to radio) are now scarce on the radio as well. Then-TV movie star Rex Smith’s MOR ballad also put him in double jeopardy and in our top 15. 

When calculating the hits of 1978, I was generally surprised by the relative endurance (at least at some small level) of so many of them. The “lost factor” is higher for 1979. There are 51 songs that have a 1.0 or higher vs. 10 in 1978. In 1980, it would go higher still (58 songs). There are also 21 songs from 1979 that received fewer than 10 spins a week, compared to only 10 from the year before.

Throughout our “lost factor” series, reader response has generally been to declare that 80% of the songs on our list remain lost for a reason. That there is no consensus on the “good” 20% is why you don’t hear any of them on the radio much now. As with 1978, I find myself wanting to write a brief for Olivia Newton-John, again spurned with “A Little More Love,” or what I consider other perfectly good hit records. Ian Matthews’ “Shake It” and Roger Voudouris’ “Get Used to It” are songs I always enjoy on specialty programming. Some of the songs a little further down — John Stewart’s “Gold” and Suzi Quatro & Chris Norman’s “Stumblin’ In” — I could probably hear more regularly. But did I mention I graduated high school that spring?

If you’ve seen the Top 100 Lost Songs of the ‘80s, you know that I decided not to include Streisand & Donna Summer’s “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)” on that chart. While every year has some chart-cutoff holdover from the previous, that song peaked in early December and just felt like a ‘70s relic. That’s why it’s among our top 15 for 1979. It’s also why I’m showing 16 songs, in case you’re a purist and wonder what song was displaced.

Here are the top “lost factor” hits of 1979, based on points for their standing for the year divided by the number of plays they receive now. In parenthesis is the “lost factor,” followed by the number of spins the songs received in the U.S. and Canada according to NielsenBDS in the week prior to my calculations.

1. Melissa Manchester, “Don’t Cry Out Loud” (lost factor 38, spins last week 2)
2. Roger Voudouris, “Get Used to It” (18, 0)
3. Leif Garrett, “I Was Made for Dancin’” (16, 4)
4. Barbra Streisand & Donna Summer, “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)” (16, 4)
5. Cher, “Take Me Home” (15, 3)
6. David Naughton, “Makin’ It” (15, 6)
7. Alice Cooper, “How You Gonna See Me Now” (14, 0)
8. Barbra Streisand, “The Main Event/Fight” (13, 5)
9. Olivia Newton-John, “A Little More Love” (11, 8)
10. Donna Summer, “MacArthur Park” (10, 9)
11. Ian Matthews, “Shake It” (9, 3)
12. Neil Diamond & Barbra Streisand, “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers” (9, 9)
13. Maxine Nightingale, “Lead Me On” (7, 11)
14. Randy Vanwarmer, “Just When I Needed You Most” (6, 12)
15. Village People, “In the Navy” (5, 10)
16. Rex Smith, “You Take My Breath Away” (5, 3)

And here are the songs that now get the most monitored spins at broadcast radio, compared to their year-end placing for 1979. It’s worth noting that while these songs have almost always been pop/rock — songs that can play not just on Classic Hits and AC, but also Classic Rock and Adult Hits formats — two are disco-era R&B classics. If we had continued down the list, we would have found “I Will Survive” at No. 18, “Got to Be Real” at No. 20, and “We Are Family” at No. 21.

1. Michael Jackson, “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough”
2. Van Halen, “Dance the Night Away” (the title was bandwagon jumping, even if the song wasn’t)
3. Robert Palmer, “Bad Case of Loving You (Doctor, Doctor)”
4. Electric Light Orchestra, “Don’t Bring Me Down” (the more overtly disco “Shine a Little Light” has a 3.0 “lost factor” — which would have put it at No. 26 on the above list
5. Earth, Wind & Fire, “September”

We’ve now calculated the “Lost Factor” for every year between 1978 and 1989. Thus far, I’ve avoided going earlier. The ‘80s have clear winners and losers in the endurance test. For the ‘70s, and certainly for a ‘60s universe of music that has been reduced by Classic Hits radio to “Brown Eyed Girl,” “Respect,” and “Come Together” (if those), there’s less opportunity to look at the contrast between what lasted and didn’t. But I have come up with a way to identify the decades’ most extreme cases. Look for those and my first forays into CHR’s near-obliteration in the early ‘90s next.