“Darlin'” by The Beach Boys

Brian Wilson and Mike Love wrote "Darlin'" with singer Danny Hutton in mind, a man who leaned on the title word constantly, and they first earmarked it for an early version of Three Dog Night. Instead it wound up on the Beach Boys' own 1967 album Wild Honey, with Carl Wilson stepping up to sing lead and Bill Halverson and Jim Lockert as engineers.

Capitol sent it out as the album's second single, and it went to 19 in the US and 11 in the UK. It has lived on in other hands, too: David Cassidy, Paul Davis, Yipes!, Tatsuro Yamashita and Sweet Trip have all covered it, and so did Darlin', the outfit that eventually became Daft Punk.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.