On this day in 1970: Three Dog Night’s “Joy to the World” becomes a No. 1 hit.

Three Dog Night was one of those bands that quickly took off.

Formed in Los Angeles in 1967, they released their self-titled debut album the following year. The song was composed entirely of cover songs and was an instant success, reaching number 11 on the charts. signboard 200. Harry Nilsson’s cover of “One” became a Top 5 hit and was approved by even the harshest critics. three dog night To be an outstanding release.

“No singer writes,” wrote the famously ruthless Robert Christgau. new york times At the time, “the supporting musicians were anonymous and, with one exception, the production and arrangements ranged from tasteful to great. Overall, it was a nice revamp of the groups produced in rock’s early days, applied to serious songs rather than honest jokes.”

Thus began Three Dog Night’s long career covering the works of other songwriters. It may sound simple, but it is a skill in itself.

Then along came a man named Hoyt Axton, a singer-songwriter and sometime actor. Axton was relatively unknown at the time, but his discography would eventually include songs like “The Pusher”, which Steppenwolf recorded for the film. easy riderRingo Starr’s 1975 hit “No No Song,” “Never Been to Spain,” recorded by Elvis Presley, Cher, Ike, Tina Turner, and many more.

He also had a song called “Joy to the World”, but at that point Three Dog Night was pretty popular in that songwriters would submit tracks for cover consideration.

“They had a system in the late ’60s, and it was very popular, and they were getting about 5,000 songs a year,” Axton later recalled. “So they had three guys working eight hours a day with tape recorders and record players. And what they would do is listen to the first four bars of every song, and if they liked it, they would put it in a separate stack for the singer and producer to listen to. If they didn’t like it, it would be thrown in the trash.”

“Joy to the World” was almost never recorded.

And “Joy to the World” almost ended up in the trash. According to singer Chuck Negron, founder of Three Dog Night, the band was not very enthusiastic about the song, even though Axton pitched it multiple times. Negron was not in the studio the first two times.

“Hoyt came in another time and this time I was there,” Negron explained. forbes “He had had a few drinks, and the band started making fun of him. I felt bad for them to treat him like that. But I didn’t know he had been there so many times, so I asked him to play it. As soon as he started playing, I liked it. I thought we could have a little fun with this.”

“So I told him to leave me a demo. Then I had a little free time, so I started jamming ‘Joy’ for fun.” You don’t have to be so cool all the time, right? That opening line had to be screamed. Did that person just say, “Jeremiah was a bullfrog”? I turned the scale up to a pretty high D and just screamed. The band heard that and said, “Oh my god, that’s awesome.” then corey [Wells] and danny [Hutton] [Three Dog Night’s two other vocalists] appeared. Of course, they had turned down the song, so I wasn’t very happy at first. But in the end, I asked them to sing along. ”

Three Dog Night also got all of America to sing along. When “Joy to the World” was released as a single in February 1971, it didn’t take long to climb the charts. It reached number one on April 17th.

Listen to “Joy to the World” by Three Dog Night

Axton was glad that things had turned out well.

“I started writing songs when I was 15,” he said. Oklahoman “All I wanted to be was a songwriter. … If someone likes your work and wants to record it when they have access to millions of songs, that’s great.”

‘Joy to the World’ makes chart history

There was another reason for the good feeling. When “Joy to the World” reached number one, it meant that Axton and his mother Mae Axton became the first (and so far only) father-son duo in history to have a number one hit independently of each other on the singles chart.

Mae Axton was one of the co-writers of Elvis Presley’s No. 1 hit, “Heartbreak Hotel,” which reached No. 1 in the United States in 1956. signboard Stayed in the top 100 for 7 weeks. “I think you’re one of the fastest rising young stars,” Mae Axton said in a 1955 interview with Presley.

In 2022, Negron privately admitted that “Joy to the World” was not “one of my favorites.”

“This song is far from the band’s signature song, but it shows how eclectic we can be. Of course, we all love this song because it changed our lives,” he said. “It was a carefree, joyful song, and its lyrics were ‘Joy to the world, to every boy and girl’ – joy to everyone, even the fish.” [Laughs]. That sentiment shocked every core of America. ”

read more: Top 10 Chuck Negron Three Dog Night Songs

And Axton was more than happy to be the originator behind the scenes.

“I’m a songwriter,” he said in a 1990 interview. “And when you take a song out of your living room and someone makes it a hit, that’s life for a songwriter.”