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Feb 10

Charts – 10 February 2017

Posted on Saturday, February 10, 2018 by Paul in Music

Looks like we’re going through another quiet phase on the singles chart.  I’ll warn you now, the better stuff is mostly down in the middle reaches of the album chart this week.

1.  Drake – “God’s Plan”

Three weeks.  I still think it’s a bit of a dirge.  But the partner track “Diplomatic Immunity” drops out of the top 40 entirely this week, so evidently it’s not just Drake’s name selling this.

15.  The Weeknd & Kendrick Lamar – “Pray For Me”

Moving on to the new entries, this is the Weeknd’s first new material since his last album came out at the tail end of 2016 (leaving aside a guest appearance on a Lana Del Rey track).  It’s from the soundtrack to Black Panther, but it certainly deserves to be here on its merits as a Weeknd track.  Soundtrack singles can often sound like random cast-offs, but the “lonely burden of the heroic leader” stuff here certainly seems fitting enough for the character.  It’s pitched a bit more angsty than I’d normally imagine Black Panther, but you can certainly imagine this being written specifically for his film.

As fro Kendrick Lamar, he was on the chart already with “All The Stars”.  That jumps 37-28 this week, but I don’t imagine there’s a connection.

27.  B Young – “Jumanji”

Your random UK rap single of the week.  He’s from Hackney, and the song is by the numbers, but it’s a pleasantly summery track, I guess.

33.  Kojo Funds featuring Raye – “Check”

After appearing on Mabel’s “Finders Keepers”, Kojo Funds get a hit of his own.  Not a million miles from the track above, actually, except this makes heavy use of a sample from Craig David’s “7 Days”.  That was a number one hit eighteen years ago – meanwhile, his current single “I Know You” drops back to 12.  As for this track, it probably works better if the sample is less familiar.

39.  Hailee Steinfeld & Alesso featuring Florida Georgia Line & Watt – “Let Me Go”

This came out in November and it’s been hovering just outside the top 40 for ages.  Alesso hasn’t had a hit since 2015, Steinfeld has struggled to follow up her top 5 hit “Starving” from 2016, and this sounds a bit last year.  It does form an unlikely vehicle for the top 40 debut of country duo Florida Georgia Line.

This week’s climbers:

  • “These Days” by Rudimental featuring Jess Glynne, Macklemore & Dan Caplen climbs 11-2, so this is taking off much more than I expected.  Rudimental haven’t been this high up since 2015 (nor has Glynne, but then she hasn’t released anything since 2015), and Macklemore hasn’t been inside the top 10 since 2013.
  • “This Is Me” by Keala Settle & The Greatest Showman Ensemble climbs 8-6.
  • “Feel it Still” by Portugal. The Man climbs 13-9 as months of persistence finally seem to have reached a tipping point and caught the attention of new listeners.
  • “My Lover” by Not3s moves 16-14.
  • “Rewrite the Stars” by Zac Efron & Zendaya, another Greatest Showman track, moves 19-16.
  • “Fine Line” by Mabel featuring Not3s climbs 22-17.
  • “Him & I” by G-Eazy & Halsey climbs 25-22 – I keep forgetting this exists, but it’s been on the chart for six weeks now and it’s still climbing.
  • “Bouff Daddy” by J Hus moves 27-26.
  • “All The Stars” by Kendrick Lamar & SZA moves 37-28, which we’ve mentioned.
  • “Bad” by Steel Banglez featuring Yungen, Mostack, Mr Eazi & Not3s moves 30-29.

Over on the album chart, the Greatest Showman soundtrack gets a fifth week at number one.  “Man of the Woods” by Justin Timberlake enters at 2 on the back of middling reviews.  It’s been over four years since the last Justin Timberlake album, “The 20/20 Experience Part 2”, which also got to number 2.  Of course, the album market has collapsed since then – a number 2 placing on the album chart takes less than 20,000 copies these days.

4.  Simple Minds – “Walk Between Worlds”

This is their eighteenth studio album and, with legacy acts seemingly less affected by the decline of the album format, it’s their highest charting since 1995.  Mind you, the single above is a lot better than I was expecting from a 2018 Simple Minds album.

5.  Don Broco – “Technology”

Don Broco are a rock band from Bedfordshire, and they are suspicious about technology.  The video above has had a surprising amount of effort thrown at it for a band who don’t have hit singles, but the track settles into a rut quickly.

18.  Hookworms – “Microshift”

Now there’s a band name, particularly considering that they started off as more of a psychedelic noise act.  With their third album (and the first to chart), they’ve dumped the distortion and made a turn towards accessibility.  The track above takes a while to get going, but it’s really good when it gets there.

20.  Rae Morris – “Someone Out There”

The follow-up to “Unguarded”, which reached the top 10 in 2015 – making a number 20 placing a little disappointing.  Perhaps this falls between the two stools of the singles and album markets, but I’d have thought the track above could have been a hit with the right promotion (and a bit of luck).  It’s worth a play.

29.  Saxon – “Thunderbolt”

Of course Saxon have made an album called “Thunderbolt”.  They’re Saxon.  It’s amazing they haven’t made an album called “Thunderbolt” before.  Previous albums include “Wheels of Steel”, “Crusader” and “Battering Ram”.  Saxon had an initial run from 1980 to 1988, and started release new albums again in 2013 – but this is the first time they’ve made the album top 40 since then.  For better or worse, they still sound like an 80s metal band, and why would you want them to sound like anything else?

30.  Field Music – “Open Here”

Their second album to make the chart, and a slight step up from the previous one (it got to 36).  I really need to listen to these guys more often, as I always suspect they’d repay a bit more effort on my part.

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