Philip Bailey needs a loud caveat. As a lead singer of Earth, Wind & Fire, with his soaring falsetto on a string of timeless classics, he is one of the great voices in soul and funk. To call him a one-hit wonder ignores one of the most celebrated careers in popular music.
But our measure looks at songs credited to him as a solo artist, and there one duet stands far above the rest. "Easy Lover", his 1984 collaboration with Phil Collins, was a punchy, irresistible pop-rock hit that became a transatlantic smash, and on streams it dwarfs everything else under his own name.
His solo catalogue trails far behind it, even as his work with Earth, Wind & Fire lives on elsewhere. Dividing the hit by his second biggest solo track gives a ratio above 79, many times our 5.0 line.
So by our strict, numbers-only measure, and counting only his solo releases, Philip Bailey registers as a certified one-hit wonder. We flag the caveat as firmly as possible: this is a member of one of the greatest bands ever, whose single biggest solo song, a duet with another star, has merely, on streams, outrun the rest of his solo work.