70s Soul Songs: 195 Hits You Can Play in One List

By Charlie · Published July 29, 2026 · Updated November 10, 2026

▶ Listen to the Whole Soul List

The biggest 70s soul songs on the Billboard charts are The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face by Roberta Flack, the top song of the 1972 Year-End Hot 100 with 6 weeks at No. 1, and her Killing Me Softly with His Song, with 5 more weeks on top in 1973.

Soul's biggest chart year was 1970, when 29 soul records made the Year-End Hot 100.

This page lists all 195, from the Jackson 5 to Earth, Wind & Fire, and 195 of them play right here in one continuous list.

Marvin Gaye at the Forum in Inglewood, California, May 20, 1974.

Image credit: Los Angeles Times / UCLA Library, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

The Full List: Press Play Once

Every song here is tagged soul in this site's chart data and placed on a Billboard Year-End Hot 100 from 1970 to 1979.

Press Play on any row and the list keeps going, song after song, until you press Stop.

Tap a column heading to sort by year, year-end rank or weeks at No. 1.

Year is the year-end list the song appears on, and Year-End Rank is its place on that list.

Weeks at No. 1 counts the song's weeks on top of the weekly Hot 100, from this site's chart data (how the data was built).

Linked titles open the full story of that song on this site.

Ten More Soul Hits the Year-End Lists Left Out

The year-end chart keeps only each year's 100 biggest songs.

These ten soul records were weekly Hot 100 hits that never made a 1970 to 1979 year-end top 100.

Three of them come from Marvin Gaye, including Inner City Blues, the closing track of What's Going On.

Each weekly peak comes from the song's own linked Wikipedia article.

What Makes a 70s Song Soul

Most of the records in the list share a few things:

• A lead voice that preaches, pleads or testifies, straight out of church.
• Call-and-response between the lead and the backing singers.
• A live rhythm section, usually bass, drums, guitar and keys.
• Horns, and on many records, sweeping strings.
• Songs about love, and more and more about the world outside.

The tag in this site's data marks where a record sits, not every song with a soulful singer.

Sara Smile by Daryl Hall & John Oates and Mama Can't Buy You Love by Elton John both carry the soul tag here.

Funk and disco records have their own tags, so James Brown and Donna Summer sit on other pages.

Soul on the Charts, Year by Year

Soul placed more songs on the year-end lists in the early 70s than at any other point of the decade.

The 1970 to 1974 lists hold 128 of the 185 songs.

1973 had the most weekly No. 1s, with 7.

By 1979 the count was down to 5, the same year disco placed 34 songs on the year-end list.

The Weekly No. 1s, by Year-End List

• 1970: I'll Be There, War, Ain't No Mountain High Enough, ABC, The Love You Save, and 1 more.
• 1971: Just My Imagination (Running Away with Me), and Want Ads.
• 1972: The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face, Lean on Me, Let's Stay Together, Oh Girl, and I'll Take You There.
• 1973: Killing Me Softly with His Song, Me and Mrs. Jones, Let's Get It On, Midnight Train to Georgia, You Are the Sunshine of My Life, and 2 more.
• 1974: Show and Tell, Feel Like Makin' Love, Nothing from Nothing, and Then Came You.
• 1975: Lady Marmalade.
• 1976: Kiss and Say Goodbye, Love Machine, Theme from Mahogany (Do You Know Where You're Going To), and Let's Do It Again.
• 1977: Sir Duke, Got to Give It Up, and You Don't Have to Be a Star (To Be in My Show).
• 1978: Three Times a Lady, and Too Much, Too Little, Too Late.
• 1979: Reunited.

Each year's full chart story sits on its own page, from Top Songs of 1970 to Top Songs of 1973.

Every weekly chart-topper of the decade, soul or not, is in 70s Number One Hits.

The Acts With the Most Songs Here

Ten acts placed five or more 70s soul songs on the year-end lists.

Duet credits count for both singers, so Then Came You with Dionne Warwick counts for The Spinners.

Roberta Flack's five include two duets with Donny Hathaway, and Marvin Gaye's five include My Mistake with Diana Ross.

The Jackson 5 turned four of their six songs here into No. 1 hits, all of them in 1970.

Roberta Flack spent 12 weeks at No. 1, more than any other act in the list.

Al Green on The Mike Douglas Show, February 25, 1973.

Image credit: courtesy of The Mike Douglas Show, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

More Soul Acts With Their Own Pages

• Diana Ross, with Ain't No Mountain High Enough and Love Hangover.
• Earth, Wind & Fire, with Sing a Song and After the Love Has Gone.
• 70s Female Singers covers Aretha Franklin, Roberta Flack and Natalie Cole.

For every group of the decade in one place, see 70s Bands.

Motown Lets Its Stars Write

Motown spent the 60s turning out hits from staff writers and producers, with the singers following the plan.

In the 70s its two biggest male stars took the controls.

What's Going On

Marvin Gaye's What's Going On album came out on May 21, 1971.

It was the first Gaye album to credit him as producer.

Berry Gordy held back the title song at first, worried that a political record would cost Gaye his pop audience.

Motown staff shipped it to stores without his go-ahead, and it reached No. 2 on the Hot 100.

Its next two singles, Mercy Mercy Me and Inner City Blues, also made the top 10.

Stevie Wonder's Run

Stevie Wonder placed six songs on the year-end lists in the 70s, and two of them reached No. 1.

You Are the Sunshine of My Life topped the chart in 1973, and Sir Duke followed in 1977.

Living for the City and Don't You Worry 'bout a Thing both made the 1974 year-end list.

Stevie Wonder in a Los Angeles recording studio, August 1975.

Image credit: UCLA Library, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Philadelphia Builds a Sound

Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff founded Philadelphia International Records in 1971, with their longtime partner Thom Bell.

The Philly sound put lush strings and horns over a driving rhythm section.

The label's roster included The O'Jays, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes, Billy Paul, MFSB and Lou Rawls.

From 1971 to the early 1980s it released more than 170 gold and platinum records.

TSOP and Soul Train

Gamble and Huff wrote TSOP (The Sound of Philadelphia) as the theme for the TV show Soul Train.

MFSB recorded it with the Three Degrees on vocals, and in 1974 it became the first TV theme song to reach No. 1 on the Hot 100.

The sound did not stop at Philadelphia's own acts.

Its strings and steady beat set up much of what disco would do a few years later.

Memphis: Hi Records and Shaft

Al Green and Willie Mitchell

Producer Willie Mitchell began working with Al Green at Hi Records in 1968.

Their records ran on horns, a tight groove and gospel organ, with Green's voice kept soft and close.

The early 70s run of hits included Tired of Being Alone, I'm Still in Love with You and Call Me.

The biggest was Let's Stay Together, a No. 1 in 1972.

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inducted Green in 1995.

Theme from Shaft

Isaac Hayes recorded Theme from Shaft for Stax Records' Enterprise label.

It reached No. 1 on the Hot 100 in November 1971.

The next year it won the Academy Award for Best Original Song.

Hayes became the first African American to win an Oscar in a category other than acting.

Disco, Quiet Storm and the Late 70s

Soul did not disappear at the end of the decade, it changed shape and changed names.

Its dance side moved onto the disco charts, and Southern soul lost much of its audience as disco took over.

Quiet Storm

Its slow side found a home on late-night radio.

In 1976 Melvin Lindsey, a Howard University student at WHUR-FM in Washington, D.C., started a show of slow, romantic soul records.

The format, called quiet storm, spread to Black radio stations across the country within a few years.

Songs like After the Love Has Gone and The Closer I Get to You show where the sound was heading as the 80s began.

Keep the Soul Going

Soul sits right next to two other genres with their own playable lists here.

• 70s Funk covers the groove side, from James Brown to Parliament.
• 70s Disco Songs picks up where soul hit the dance floor.
• The 70s songs list ranks the decade's 100 biggest hits across every genre.
• The Random 70s Song Generator picks a track for you.

For hours of soul mixed with the rest of the decade, tune in to Listen Now, the site's 70s radio.

Every genre on the site is collected on the 70s Genres page.

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