Songs Written in 5 Minutes That Became Hits

About These Songs Written in 5 Minutes

Songs written in 5 minutes, or close to it, remind us that a hit does not always need months of polishing. Some of the tunes in this episode began as a studio joke, a B-side, or a quick fix to fill out an album.

Of course, "five minutes" is a story musicians love to tell, and memories differ. Below, we keep to what the record books and the people involved have actually said.

The Countdown: 10 Quick Songs That Became Worldwide Hits

#10: Crazy Little Thing Called Love — Queen (1979)

Freddie Mercury wrote this as a nod to his early heroes, Elvis Presley and Cliff Richard. He said he wrote it on a guitar he could barely play, in "five or ten minutes." Drummer Roger Taylor recalled that Freddie finished the words in a bath at the Hotel Bayerischer Hof in Munich.

Accounts of the recording vary. It was reportedly done in under half an hour, though producer Reinhold Mack later remembered about six hours. At Mack's suggestion, Brian May played his solo on a Fender Esquire instead of his homemade Red Special.

The single reached No. 2 in Britain and spent four weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in early 1980, Queen's first U.S. chart-topper.

#9: I'm Too Sexy — Right Said Fred (1991)

Brothers Fred and Richard Fairbrass ran a gym in London, a place Richard remembered as full of posing. The song started when he began joking about his own vanity in front of a mirror.

They first cut it as an indie rock track, and several record companies passed. Radio promoter Guy Holmes suggested a dance version. Producer TommyD built electronic backing around the vocal, and guitarist Rob Manzoli added a riff borrowed from Jimi Hendrix's "Third Stone from the Sun."

It spent six weeks at No. 2 in Britain, then reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. Taylor Swift later worked part of it into "Look What You Made Me Do" (2017), and Drake's "Way 2 Sexy" (2021) sampled it.

#8: Macarena — Los del Río (1993)

At a private party in Venezuela in 1992, Antonio Romero Monge of Los del Río watched a flamenco teacher named Diana Patricia dance and made up a few lines in her honor. When he finished the song, he renamed it after his daughter, Esperanza Macarena.

The original, from the duo's 1993 album A mí me gusta, had a flamenco rhythm. A production team called the Bayside Boys later gave it an electronic beat and English lyrics.

That remix spent 14 weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1996. According to Los del Río, the famous dance grew out of their own improvised arm movements on stage, which audiences copied.

#7: Kung Fu Fighting — Carl Douglas (1974)

Carl Douglas was in the studio with producer Biddu to cut a different song, and they still lacked something for the other side of the record. Douglas had a few lyrics of his own, and Biddu chose the kung fu one.

With roughly ten minutes left on the studio clock, they managed just two takes. Then Robin Blanchflower at Pye Records heard both songs and made the kung fu number the A-side.

It went to No. 1 in Britain in September 1974, then topped the Billboard Hot 100. It has been reported to have sold about eleven million copies worldwide.

#6: What'd I Say — Ray Charles (1959)

Late in 1958, Ray Charles and his band ran out of songs after midnight with about 12 minutes still to fill. Charles began improvising at the piano and told everyone to follow him. One biographer placed the show in Brownsville, Pennsylvania.

Atlantic recorded it on February 18, 1959. It ran far too long for radio, so it was split into Part 1 and Part 2 on the two sides of the single.

Some stations found the call-and-response with the Raelettes too suggestive and refused to play it. It still reached No. 1 on the R&B chart and No. 6 on the Hot 100, and it is often counted among the first soul records.

#5: Paranoid — Black Sabbath (1970)

Black Sabbath recorded their second album in about two or three days. Bassist Geezer Butler later said they needed a three-minute filler, and guitarist Tony Iommi came up with the riff while the others were out at lunch.

Drummer Bill Ward remembered the song coming together in roughly half an hour once they returned. Iommi's solo was run through a ring modulator, which gives it that strange, buzzing tone.

The single reached No. 4 in Britain and No. 61 on the Billboard Hot 100. The band wanted to call the album War Pigs, but the record company persuaded them to use Paranoid instead.

#4: Wannabe — Spice Girls (1996)

The five Spice Girls wrote "Wannabe" with Matt Rowe and Richard "Biff" Stannard. It was finished in about 30 minutes, partly because the group had sketched pieces of it beforehand. Mel C said they simply made up the word "zigazig-ah."

Virgin Records preferred "Say You'll Be There" or "Love Thing" as a first single, but the group insisted on "Wannabe."

It topped the charts in 37 countries by the end of 1997 and became the best-selling single by a girl group. In America, it spent four weeks at No. 1 in 1997.

#3: Supersonic — Oasis (1994)

Oasis wrote and recorded "Supersonic" in a single day, December 19, 1993, at the Pink Museum studio in Liverpool. While the others went for Chinese takeout, Noel Gallagher stayed behind with a guitar riff. He has said it took about half an hour, and in a 2008 interview, ten minutes.

The line about Elsa and Alka-Seltzer refers to a nine-year-old Rottweiler that belonged to engineer Dave Scott. The recording was meant as a demo but was never redone.

It reached No. 31 in Britain and No. 11 on Billboard's Modern Rock chart, the band's first U.S. chart entry.

#2: Tequila — The Champs (1958)

On December 23, 1957, a group of Hollywood musicians ended their session with a loose Latin-flavored jam. The tune came from sax man Danny Flores, credited as Chuck Rio, and it is his voice that calls out the one-word title, three times in all.

Challenge Records tucked it onto the back of a single called "Train to Nowhere" that winter. Sales were slow until, by most accounts, a Cleveland disc jockey turned the record over.

It reached No. 1 on Billboard's pop charts in March 1958, months before the Hot 100 began, and won Best Rhythm & Blues Performance at the first Grammy Awards. Pee-wee Herman's dance in Pee-wee's Big Adventure (1985) gave it a new audience.

#1: Song 2 — Blur (1997)

Damon Albarn first wrote "Song 2" as a slower acoustic demo. Guitarist Graham Coxon suggested playing it faster and louder with a deliberately rough guitar sound, meant, he said, as a joke on the record company.

The label liked it anyway. "Song 2" was only a working title for its place on the track list, but the name stuck. It runs just two minutes and two seconds.

It reached No. 2 in Britain and No. 6 on Billboard's Modern Rock chart, and that loud "woo-hoo" became a fixture at sports stadiums.

Why Quick Songs Sometimes Last the Longest

Several of these songs were B-sides or fillers, so nobody felt pressure to make them perfect. That freedom let humor and looseness slip through.

Speed was not the whole story, though. The writers had spent years learning their craft, and producers, programmers and disc jockeys all helped these records get heard.

How We Checked These Stories

The episode repeated several popular legends we could not confirm, so we left them out. Where the people involved remember things differently, as with Queen and Oasis, we give both versions.

Which of these quick little songs still gets you tapping your foot, and who was with you the first time it came on the radio?

Sources and Further Reading

• "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" — Wikipedia
• "Kung Fu Fighting" — Wikipedia
• "What'd I Say" — Wikipedia
• "Tequila" (The Champs song) — Wikipedia
• "Supersonic" (Oasis song) — Wikipedia