Stars on 45
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Stars on 45 (known in some countries as Starsound) were a Dutch novelty pop act that was briefly very popular in the UK, Europe and the U.S. in the very early 1980s. The band, which consisted solely of studio session musicians under the direction of Jaap Eggermont, formerly of Golden Earring, popularised the medley, by recreating hit songs as faithfully as possible and stringing them together, with a common tempo and relentless underlying drum track. The point was to provide a danceable disco record which used familiar tunes.
Apart from the recreated songs, an original chorus and hook was added at intervals to help string differing sections together. The lyrics and a MIDI rendition of the most successful single can be read/heard here.
The first such release, "Stars on 45 Medley", featuring songs from The Beatles, went to Number 1 in the US, and Number 2 in the UK, and several follow up records did well too. Another album followed, featuring medleys using the songs of ABBA and Motown. A third album featured medleys of The Rolling Stones and Stevie Wonder. The single "Stars on 45 III A Tribute to Stevie Wonder", peaked at US# 28 in 1982.
There was a touring company also called Stars on 45 that promoted their albums (although not using the same studio session musicians as on the record). One of their shows was released on video in 1983 by MCA Home Video.
The '45' in the title refers to the playback speed of a vinyl record single — 45 rpm. Such singles were often simply called "45s".
Their first album was Stars on Long Play. Followups included Stars on Long Play II, Stars on Long Play III, and Soul Revue, the latter paying tribute to Sam and Dave and James Brown.
Track list for the "Stars on 45 Medley" was the name of the songs that make up the medley:
Intro Venus / Sugar Sugar / No Reply / I'll Be Back / Drive My Car / Do You Want to Know a Secret / We Can Work It Out / I Should Have Known Better / You're Going to Lose That Girl / Stars on 45
This single continues to hold the record for a #1 single with the longest name on the Billboard charts, due to the legalities requiring each song title be listed.
Other similar acts
With the development of recording technology, similar subsequent efforts have used the actual recordings combined together rather than re-recordings with session musicians. The most well-known example was probably Jive Bunny and the Mastermixers, as well as a series of "Hit Mix" albums (e.g. "Hit Mix 86", a medley of many hits from that year).
The albums (as well as singles) called Hooked on Classics and Hooked on Swing used the formula to much success.
"Weird Al" Yankovic's song "Polkas on 45" parodies the Stars on 45 format, except that the entire song is done in the style of a polka. "Polkas on 45" was included in Weird Al's second album, and a similar polka compilation has been included in each of his albums since, except for Even Worse.