Slade — “My Oh My”

Entered Top 40:  August 11, 1984
 3 weeks 
Peaked at: 37

Despite a long string of Top-10 UK hits (including 6 number ones) and kicking off the dubious trend of the UK Christmas Number One race with 1973’s “Merry Xmas Everybody,” Slade could barely get arrested in the United States for their 15 years or so. They even moved to the US for a couple of years in the mid-’70s, but couldn’t catch on.

It took the dopey metal band Quiet Riot to finally get Slade some stateside notice, as their cover of “Cum on Feel the Noize” became a #5 hit in 1983. This new attention got Slade a new US record deal, and their first-ever US Top 40 hit. “Run Runaway’s” hook came from bassist Jim Lea’s electric fiddle was reminiscent of Big Country’s then-recent Celtic vibes; it peaked at #20.

“My Oh My” was “Run Runaway’s” US followup, but it was the other way around in the UK. Slade released “My Oh My” in the UK in November 1983 (around the same time as Quiet Riot’s “Cum on Feel the Noize” was peaking in the States). There, it ended up vying for the Christmas Number One slot, eventually peaking at #2 behind the Flying Pickets’ a capella cover of “Only You.” “Run Runaway” would come out in January in the UK, and ended up at #7.

And then just as Slade was building up some American momentum, things went sideways. Jim Lea came down with hepatitis C at the very start of US tour with Ozzy Osbourne, forcing them to cancel; meanwhile singer/silly-hat wearer Noddy Holder’s marriage was breaking up, and a planned European tour was scrapped as well. The band would only crack the US Hot 100 once more (“Little Sheila” hit #86 in 1985), and “Run Runaway” would end up as their final UK Top 10 hit. Lea and Holder left the band in 1992; Don Powell and Dave Hill kept the band going, first as Slade II, then eventually just as Slade. In 2020 Hill fired Powell, leaving himself as Slade’s only original member.