# Successful artists whose greatest chart success came from someone else's cover **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** music\ **Created:** [April 21, 2022, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185 "2022-04-21T17:22:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![whitetho](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whitetho/32/1059_2.png) [@whitetho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whitetho)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/21 "2022-04-21T21:16:30Z")
B. W. Stevenson had four U.S. Hot 100 songs, the highest being 1973’s _My Maria_ , which peaked at #9. Earlier that year he had released _Shambala_ which, to his dismay, Three Dog Night quickly covered and took to #3. (Stevenson’s version stalled at #66). ---
**Author:** ![74westy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/74westy/32/3950_2.png) [@74westy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/74westy)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/22 "2022-04-21T21:46:54Z")
> [@whitetho](#): > > Earlier that year he had released _Shambala_ which, to his dismay, Three Dog Night quickly covered and took to #3. Why was he dismayed? ---
**Author:** ![whitetho](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whitetho/32/1059_2.png) [@whitetho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whitetho)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/23 "2022-04-21T22:05:50Z")
> [@74westy](#): > > Why was he dismayed? Three Dog Night, which was hugely popular at the time, had rushed their release, which cut into Stevenson’s sales. ---
**Author:** ![wguy123](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wguy123/32/3161_2.png) [@wguy123](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wguy123)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/24 "2022-04-21T22:10:14Z")
What about Leonard Cohen’s _Hallelujah_ ? Seems like there are a half dozen covers which are more famous than his original. ---
**Author:** ![74westy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/74westy/32/3950_2.png) [@74westy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/74westy)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/25 "2022-04-21T22:27:14Z")
> [@whitetho](#): > > Three Dog Night, which was hugely popular at the time, had rushed their release, which cut into Stevenson’s sales. Fair enough. If Three Dog Night had a #3 hit with my song I’d be dismayed all the way to the bank. ---
**Author:** ![74westy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/74westy/32/3950_2.png) [@74westy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/74westy)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/26 "2022-04-21T22:35:04Z")
Speaking of Three Dog Night, Hoyt Axton Wrote a number 1 and number 3 hits for them. Joy to The World and Never Been to Spain. ---
**Author:** ![JeffB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jeffb/32/188_2.png) [@JeffB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JeffB)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/27 "2022-04-21T22:38:49Z")
> [@ZipperJJ](#): > > Whitney Houston’s cover of “I Will Always Love You” not only beat out writer Dolly Parton’s 1973 release, but its 14 weeks at the top of the charts was a record in itself at the time. Even though she had a lot of hits, this was Whitney’s biggest song. But Dolly had a #1 hit with “9 to 5”. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/28 "2022-04-21T22:49:39Z")
Jimi Hendrix cover of Bob Dylan’s All Along the Watchtower was the first thing that came to mind. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/29 "2022-04-21T22:52:31Z")
Bob Dylan got to #2 twice (Like a Rolling Stone and Rainy Day Woman #12 and 35)\* The Byrds took Mr. Tambourine Man to #1 \*Dylan did hit #1 with a couple of songs on category charts, but not the Billboard Top 100. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/30 "2022-04-21T22:52:54Z")
> [@JeffB](#): > > But Dolly had a #1 hit with “9 to 5”. Yeah, the thread seems to have started to drift from the OP’s original question, to “examples of a cover song that was a bigger hit than the original.” ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2022, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/31 "2022-04-22T03:50:13Z")
My bad. I interpreted the OP incorrectly. I was looking for a big artist that covered another big artist and got the song higher than the writer did. I missed the part where the OP stipulated that the writer would not have ANY song higher than the big cover. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2022, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/32 "2022-04-22T04:00:53Z")
Prince wrote “Nothing Compares 2 U”. Sinead O’Connor’s cover of it went to number one. Prince’s version didn’t. Reading kenobi’s post, I see this isn’t an example of what the OP asked for. Prince had other songs that reached number one. ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2022, 10:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185/33 "2022-04-22T10:31:15Z")
Boris Fomin was a highly successful Soviet songwriter, popular and much beloved in his home country (well, except in the 1930s when his style fell out of favour politically). But his domestic success pales in comparison to the international sales figures for various Western covers of his “Dorogoy Dlinnoyo”. The most famous of these was Mary Hopkin’s “Those Were the Days”, a number-one hit in 1968. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/successful-artists-whose-greatest-chart-success-came-from-someone-elses-cover/963185.md?page=1)