Back then, they wrote the songs

Barry Manilow (above) has landed on the top of the charts with a just-released album for the first time in 29 years.

Manilow’s “The Greatest Songs of the Fifties” debuted at No. 1 on this week’s Billboard 200 chart.

The album – featuring 13 standards such as “Are You Lonesome Tonight?” and “Unchained Melody” – has sold more than 156,000 copies since its release Jan. 31.

His previous debut chart-topper was the 1977 concert recording, “Live.” His last album, “Scores: Songs From Copacabana and Harmony,” had a weak debut in 2004, peaking at No. 47.

Manilow, 62, said he feels the 1950s pop classics deserve more attention.

“The reason I connected with it is when I looked at the list of songs that came out of the ‘50s, it seemed to me that they had been neglected,” he says.

“Nobody seems to have done ‘Unchained Melody’ or ‘It’s Not for Me to Say’ or ‘Beyond the Sea,’ any of these songs that were wonderfully written that came out of the ‘50s. So that turned me on. I dove in.”