Top Songs of 1970: The Billboard Year-End Hot 100 Countdown

The top songs of 1970 capture a music industry mid-handover, folk-rock elder statesmen and British Invasion holdovers sharing chart space with a teenage soul group about to reshape pop radio.

Billboard's Year-End Hot 100 for 1970 was tabulated from chart performance collected between January 3 and November 28 of that year, and it crowned Simon & Garfunkel's "Bridge Over Troubled Water" as the number one song of 1970.

But the real story of the list isn't the top spot, it's Motown's Jackson 5, who placed four separate singles into the year-end rankings, more than any other act.

Here's the full top 20, the genre breakdown behind it, and why 1970's chart matters.

Chart data: Billboard Year-End Hot 100, 1970.

The Top Songs of 1970: Full Countdown

Billboard's year-end top five for 1970 told two different stories at once, one about a departing folk-rock institution, one about the sounds that would define the decade ahead:

1. "Bridge Over Troubled Water": Simon & Garfunkel.

   The number one song of 1970, and the title track from what would become the duo's fifth and final studio album together.

   It was one of only two songs Simon & Garfunkel placed on the year-end chart that year.

2. "(They Long to Be) Close to You": The Carpenters.

   Landed at #2, announcing The Carpenters as one of the era's major new pop forces.

3. "American Woman": The Guess Who.

   The year's highest-charting rock single, finishing at #3 in a year otherwise dominated by the sheer volume of Jackson 5 hits.

4. "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head": B.J. Thomas.

   A crossover smash that closed out the top five at #4.

5. "War": Edwin Starr.

   The soul protest anthem held the #5 spot despite stiff competition from legendary acts like The Beatles, making it one of the highest year-end placements a protest song has ever achieved.

That top five alone shows how wide-open 1970 pop radio was: folk-rock, soft pop, hard rock, and protest soul all occupying the same top tier at once.

Curious what song topped the chart on your own birthday?

Try the Birthday #1 Song Finder to find out.

The Top 20 Songs of 1970

Beyond the top five, the rest of the top 20 fills in the picture of what listeners actually had on rotation in 1970:

6. "Ain't No Mountain High Enough": Diana Ross
7. "I'll Be There": The Jackson 5
8. "Get Ready": Rare Earth
9. "Let It Be": The Beatles
10. "Band of Gold": Freda Payne
11. "Mama Told Me (Not to Come)": Three Dog Night
12. "Everything Is Beautiful": Ray Stevens
13. "Make It with You": Bread
14. "Hitchin' a Ride": Vanity Fare
15. "ABC": The Jackson 5
16. "The Love You Save": The Jackson 5
17. "Cracklin' Rosie": Neil Diamond
18. "Candida": Dawn
19. "Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)": Sly and the Family Stone
20. "Spill the Wine": Eric Burdon and War

Three of the Jackson 5's four year-end hits fall inside this top 20 alone, alongside Motown labelmate Rare Earth and solo Motown star Diana Ross, a strong early signal of where the sound of pop was heading as the decade turned over.

The Jackson 5's Record-Breaking Year

While Simon & Garfunkel held the #1 spot, they placed only two songs on the entire year-end list.

The Jackson 5, by contrast, dominated the chart by volume, landing four separate singles on the 1970 Year-End Hot 100, more than any other artist:

• "I'll Be There": #7
• "ABC": #15
• "The Love You Save": #16
• "I Want You Back": #28

No other act came close to that output in a single year.

It's a clear signal of where pop music was headed next: toward a younger, more soul-driven sound built for a new decade.

Artists With Multiple Hits on the 1970 Chart

The Jackson 5's four songs were the high-water mark, but several other acts also landed more than one single on the 1970 year-end list, a sign of just how much chart real estate a handful of artists controlled that year.

Creedence Clearwater Revival placed three songs on the year-end list:

• "Lookin' Out My Back Door": #36
• "Up Around the Bend": #73
• "Travelin' Band": #89

A number of other acts placed two songs apiece:

• Simon & Garfunkel: "Bridge Over Troubled Water" and "Cecilia"
• The Beatles: "Let It Be" and "The Long and Winding Road"
• The Carpenters: "Close to You" and "We've Only Just Begun"
• The Guess Who: "American Woman" and "No Time"
• Rare Earth: "Get Ready" and "(I Know) I'm Losing You"
• B.J. Thomas: "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head" and "I Just Can't Help Believing"
• The Temptations: "Ball of Confusion" and "Psychedelic Shack"

Genre Breakdown: Pop and Soul Ruled 1970

Looking at the top 20 as a whole, pop and soul were the two genres that defined the biggest 1970 hits.

Pop singles occupied seven of the top 20 spots, with soul close behind at six entries, together accounting for more than half of the year's biggest hits.

Rock, folk-rock, and easy listening filled out most of the rest, which is exactly why a single top-20 stretch could hold "American Woman," "War," and "Everything Is Beautiful" side by side without feeling incoherent.

1970 radio simply hadn't settled into the more genre-segmented format that later years of the decade would bring.

The Old Guard Makes Its Exit

1970 was the year The Beatles officially broke up, and their year-end chart presence reflected a band on its way out even as it still charted strong.

"Let It Be" reached #9 and "The Long and Winding Road" hit #41, securing two spots in the top 50 in the group's final year together.

John Lennon, meanwhile, was already building a solo career in parallel: his single "Instant Karma!" reached #34 for the year, an early sign of what was coming from him individually.

At the other end of the list, Aretha Franklin's "Call Me" closed out the Year-End Hot 100 at the very last spot, #100.

How the 1970 Year-End Chart Was Calculated

Billboard's Year-End Hot 100 isn't a straight ranking of calendar-year record sales, it's a cumulative measure of chart performance across a defined tracking window.

For 1970, that window ran from January 3 to November 28, meaning the ranking reflects roughly eleven months of chart activity rather than the full twelve.

That's worth keeping in mind when a song released late in the year, or one still climbing as the tracking period closed, doesn't appear as high on the year-end list of the best songs of 1970 as its later chart peak might suggest.

Why 1970 Marked a Turning Point in Music

Taken as a whole, the 1970 Year-End Hot 100 plays less like a single year's playlist and more like a changing of the guard for music of 1970 as a whole.

Simon & Garfunkel and The Beatles, two of the defining acts of the previous decade, still commanded the top of the chart, but the limited number of year-end entries each act placed stood in sharp contrast to the volume put up by newer acts.

The Jackson 5's four hits in a single year pushed pop toward a younger, more soul-influenced sound, a shift that would define much of the decade ahead.

At the same time, the top 20's near-even split between pop and soul, sitting alongside rock entries like "American Woman" and protest soul like "War," shows just how loose genre boundaries still were at the start of the decade.

Folk-rock, soft pop, hard rock, and protest soul weren't competing lanes on the 1970 chart, they shared the same top tier of the same list, a level of genre integration that says a lot about why 1970 in music sounds the way it does when you look back on it now.

Want to explore how the rest of the decade sounded?

Spin the 70s Decade Wheel to jump to any year.