Rhino Factoids: The Everly Brothers Give Warner Brothers a #1 Hit

56 years ago today, celebrated siblings Don and Phil Everly were in the midst of a 5-week run at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 with their very first #1 single for their new label, Warner Brothers Records.

By 1960, the Everly Brothers were certainly a well-proven pop music commodity, having already scored two #1 hits (“Wake Up Little Susie” and “All I Have to Do is Dream”) and four additional top-5 hits (“Bye Bye Love,” “Bird Dog,” “Problems,” and “Till I Kissed You”) as well as a top-20 hit (“Take a Message to Mary”) and a top-30 hit (“This Little Girl of Mine”). After making the jump from Cadence Records to Warner Brothers, however, Don and Phil needed to prove themselves to the new label that they called home, and not only did they do it in a big way, they did it with a self-penned track that found them bidding adieu to a girl who’d been treating them bad.

Regrettably, “Cathy’s Clown” was not the start of a trend: the Everly Brothers’ third #1 hit also proved to be their final #1 hit. It was, however, only one of more than a half-dozen top-10 hits that the duo delivered over the course of the next few years, so there would seem to be little doubt that Warner Brothers managed to recoup their investment in Don and Phil, and then some.