One hit wonder groups that had some other decent songs

Cafe Society
1

Do you have any groups who are “one-hit wonders” but you really enjoy other things they did?

There are a lot out there who are rightly famous for their body of work, despite only one big hit, such as Jimi Hendrix, Warren Zevon, Grateful Dead, Frank Zappa, etc.

But I’m thinking of less well known artists.

My personal fave is Looking Glass. They are famous for their #1 hit Brandy, but I’ve become quite fond of a few of their other singles.

Sweet Something
Jimmy loves Mary Anne
Golden Rainbow
From Stanton Station

Who’s your fave group who only made it big once but whose other tunes you feel should be more reknown?

2

The Texas rock group Bloodrock only had a single hit, I think, the disturbing dark song “DOA”, but they put out a lot of nice rocking songs on a string of nice albums that most people haven’t ever heard.

3

I understand that a-ha is considered a one hit wonder in the US for “Take On Me”. In Europe though, they had a constant stream of hits from that song on well into the 2000s, and you miss out on some great pop songs if you’ve never heard them.

4

If you weren’t into alt rock you might think Faith No More were a one hit wonder with their cover of Easy. But they were and are one of the greatest rock bands of the last few decades. It’s a similar story with The Black Crowes who had success with a cover of Hard To Handle.

And just like @EinsteinsHund’s Ah-ha example, Blur had a single hit in the US for Song 2, but they are one of the most celebrated alternative bands in the UK. And they have maybe three or four truly great albums - Song 2 doesn’t rank amongst their top 10 best songs IMHO.

5

Which reminds me of Golden Earring. They’re a “two-hit wonder” here in the U.S. (“Radar Love” in 1973, and “Twilight Zone” in 1982), but they formed in the 1960s, and had the same lineup from 1970 until this year, when they finally broke up, due to a member being diagnosed with ALS. They were an excellent rock band, but were much more visible in Europe than they were in the U.S. I’ve listened to a few of their other albums, and liked their stuff quite a bit.

6

Fountains of Wayne only had one big hit with ‘Stacy’s Mom’, but had a large catalog of truly great songs.

The Jayhawks only had one top-20 song, but have multiple critically acclaimed albums full of great songs.

7

I’m a big Jayhawks fan, and I didn’t even know that they had a top 20 hit. Was it “Waiting For The Sun”? I like all their albums, with or without Mark Olson. Great American band.

8

Yup, Waiting for the Sun. Not the song I woild have thought, which would uave been something like ‘Bad Time’ or ‘I’m Gonna Make You Love Me’, which felt like it should have charted.

9

Similarly, Madness just had the one hit in the US with “Our House”.

10

To help jog my memory, I went looking for lists of one-hit wonders.

From those lists, here are some that I can vouch for:
Men Without Hats - found a couple of their albums in the discount bins, back in the day, and quite liked them, though more in a “guilty pleasure” way than a “these guys should have been way bigger” way.

The Proclaimers - ditto

Semisonic - I like them a lot, and I love the earlier band whose ashes they arose from (Trip Shakespeare).

Fountains of Wayne - As @Sam_Stone said, a large catalog of truly great songs. Their Utopia Parkway was on my list of great power pop albums before I ever heard of “Stacy’s Mom.”

Eddy Grant - his most successful album was the one with “Electric Avenue,” but I enjoyed the followup, Going For Broke.

Madness - I’m not sure they even count as a one-hit wonder in the U.S., but they’re way more than that in the U.K. Lots of wonderful songs.

Timbuk 3 - Eden Alley is an interesting album.

Chris DeBurgh - Like many artists here, I know more than just his one hit thanks to my habit of browsing the discount bins during the 80s and 90s. Flying Colours is a good solid album.

Til Tuesday - Their third album, Everything’s Different Now, is a pop gem.

XTC - Do they really count as a one-hit wonder? I wouldn’t have thought so. They’re a great band, at any rate.

General Public - Hand To Mouth was another good album I serendipitously found in a discount bin.

Midnight Oil - Yet another band whose one-hit wonder status is US-centric. Earth and Sun and Moon is my favorite album of theirs.

11

They made many excellent albums, but most of all I like their singles collection “Fossil Fuel: The XTC Singles 1977-1992”. That’s a breathtaking string of 31 pop gems from start to finish. Not one bad song, not even a little weaker one.

12

The Dutch band Shocking Blue was known in the US for one song, “Venus”, released in 1969. But they were extremely popular in Europe in the late 60s and early 70s; in fact, they released something like 11 albums in 7-8 years.

13

Natalie Imbruglia had a hit with “Torn” but I really liked that whole album.

14

My top pick in this category is Los Lobos, which had only one real hit (their '87 cover of “La Bamba” from the movie soundtrack), but has recorded a ton of excellent music.

Also there’s the Kursaal Flyers, little known in the U.S., which had one chart hit in the U.K. in 1976 (“Little Does She Know”) but released several other songs which are a blast, like “Revolver”, “Pre-Madonna” and “Television Generation”, my pick for best stuttering song ever.

15

Weirdly, A-ha had another song chart in the us as high as #20 - “The Sun Always Shines on TV”, which I cannot recall having heard.

They also did the theme song for “The Living Daylights”, which was the first Timothy Dalton James Bond movie from 1987.

So a bit more than a one-hit wonder, but not by much.

16

Concrete Blonde only really had a hit with “Joey,” but I really like some of their other stuff.
God is a Bullet, for example.

17

I think Oingo Boingo only ever really got national airplay for the “Weird Science” theme song. But I love everything by them. Danny Elfman was the lead singer and went on to be a major force in movie soundtracks.

18

Alien Ant Farm is a damned good band. They were most known for their alt rock cover of Smooth Criminal and then they had some success with the original song Movies, but both of their albums TruANT (1999) and ANThology (2001) are full of great songs. I can see how their music doesn’t quite translate commercially, but it’s still cool.

19

And actually the “Weird Science” theme song was one of my least favorite songs, but their biggest commercial hit.

20

Incidentally, Danny Elfman released his first solo album ever just the other day.