John Scott's Top 40 Songs from Jacksonville (Part I)

24. “Quarter to Three” – Gary U.S. Bonds (1961) Bonds (born Gary Anderson in Jacksonville) moved at an early age to Virginia.  “Quarter to Three” became his only number one song, which he received co-writing credit for arranging the vocals. The song made the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 500 Songs That Shaped Rock n Roll.

23. “Soldier Boy” – The Shirelles (1962) Songwriter and Producer Luther Dixon moved to New York at a young age after being born in Jacksonville.  He wrote “16 Candles,” a doo wop standard for The Crests and was given reign of writing and producing a new girl group, the Shirelles. With Dixon producing, the Shirelles scored over a dozen hits with many co-written by Dixon, including this one, which peaked at number one. The Shirelles are in the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame. Their architect, Luther Dixon is not. We got Skynyrd in, let’s work on Luther next. Dixon died in his hometown on Jacksonville in 2009.

22. “Strangers in the Night” – Frank Sinatra (1966) – Jacksonville’s Charlie “Hoss” Singleton wrote the words to Frank Sinatra’s last number one hit. The song is one of the most played songs in radio history. This got docked a few notches on its ranking on this list because, though Singleton wrote the lyrics, the most memorable words in this song are Sinatra’s ad-libbed “do-be-do-be-do”’s at the end.

21. “Spooky” – Classics IV (1968) The song was originally an instrumental by a jazz player in Atlanta,  then J.R. Cobb and Buddy Buie added words and “Spooky” became an international hit for Jacksonville’s Classics IV.  Their most played hit shows up later in the list.

20. “Ocean Avenue” – Yellowcard (2004) The band of Douglas Anderson School of the Arts grads struck gold record status with a song about their hometown. Guitarist Ben Harper said, “"It’s this place where we used to hang out in Jacksonville. Instead of talking about a girl, it’s talking about a scene and a feeling that we want to get back to: hanging out and writing, before we moved to California.” Cherry Street in Riverside is also mentioned.

Part II


Article by John Scott, part of Jacksonville's Big Show
on 99.1 WQIK on from 5:30AM - 10AM.