This week: X Factor alumni fall slightly short of expectations, Voice contestant does rather better.  It’s Reality TV Show Tales!

39.  The Goo-Goo Dolls – “Iris” 
38.  John Legend – “Ordinary People”
37.  Disclosure featuring Sam Smith – “Latch”

Two of the now familiar perennials from reality TV, plus Disclosure, presumably because of the spillover effect from their album release.  This has become a routine phenomenon at the bottom end of the top 40, though with Britain’s Got Talent over for another year, things should quieten down.

22.  Kodaline – “Love Like This”

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Just a quick note to say that this week’s podcast and reviews are going to be delayed for a few days, for assorted reasons.  Watch this space, we’ll get back to you.

Right!  Back to business as usual!

And after a couple of quiet weeks, this time it’s the inevitable deluge…

Age of Apocalypse #12 – Just another two issues to go, and those are both part of the X-Termination crossover.  As I recall, the previous issue seemed to make the pacing work for it, at the cost of de-emphasising some of the individual cast members’ storylines.  With this issue, though, David Lapham appears to be back to trying to get through loads of outstanding plots in the time available.  Logan has been defeated, at least in the sense that he no longer has Apocalypse’s power and he’s sane again.  But of course that doesn’t just lead to his military apparatus vanishing, so the government is still pretty much in control.  So what we get is an issue that reads like it started life as the idea for a second year of stories, with Monet emerging as the rival leader figure now that she’s got some chance of coming out on top.  At around the same time, we’ve also got Graydon Creed confronting his father, Goodnight being exposed within the Hellfire Club (the actual role of which has never really been made terribly clear), and the scientists wondering what they’re going to do with the power of Apocalypse that they’ve managed to harness with their Big Machine.  There are a lot of threads being drawn together here, as is inevitable when a series with longer term plans is being wrapped up, and in one sense Lapham is handling them all well – but it’s hard to shake the feeling that these are storylines which were intended to play out at a much, much more leisurely pace.

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Okay, so let’s take stock… I’ve still got several of last week’s books to do, which I didn’t get around to reviewing during the week.  And as for this week’s books, so far I’ve only read the ones that I’m buying digitally.  (That leaves X-Men #40 and X-Factor #250 to be picked up later, basically.)  Still plenty to cover right now, though…

Age of Apocalypse #11 – Marvel have confirmed that the book is officially being cancelled with the “X-Termination” crossover, and while “cancellation” is a relative concept these days – another run of X-Men? Really? – a quick glance at the sales figures, not to mention the sudden haste with which it’s moving to wrap up its storylines, rather suggests that the book is genuinely being put to sleep.

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Folks, we’re really sorry, but the episode of HtA which we recorded yesterday is a complete audio disaster. We’re going to have to re-record the entire episode, which means it won’t be until next week some time. We’ll keep you up to date with when we’re going to be going live.

The regular music industry is already shutting down for Christmas.  Coming up: Christmas records, a charity record, stuff promoted on X Factor, and a handful of actual regular releases.

40.  Athlete – “Wires” 

Covered on X Factor last weekend, and since it’s not that well known to the general public, it’s the sort of record that sees real benefits from that.  “Wires” was Athlete’s only top 10 hit, making number 4 in 2005.  The group are still together, but haven’t released any new material since 2010.

You may have noticed that X Factor hasn’t had quite the same impact on the charts this year, though it’s cropped up here and there.  They also mercifully spared us the annual charity single.  With the producers keen to avoid another unedifying squabble over the Christmas number 1 slot, the final is actually next week, so that the winners’ single will be on sale on 9 December to (they hope) be number 1 on 16 December.  Much of the media coverage is centred on whether a chap called Christopher Maloney who has been panned by the judges since day one might actually win, which would apparently be some sort of disaster – though bear in mind that most stories of this sort actually emanate from the producers working their own angle.

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And the turnover of number 1 hits continues.

39.  David Guetta featuring Sia – “Titanium” 

Back again, for the obvious reason at this time of year – somebody did it on X Factor.  Specifically, it was Lucy Spraggan, though since she wrote completely new verses for it, it’s more a kind of sampling job.

37.  Usher – “Scream” 

That’s because he performed it on Graham Norton’s show last week.  It made number 5 in June.

36.  Swedish House Mafia – “Save The World” 

Originally a number 10 hit last year.  Kye Sones did it on X Factor (and nearly got eliminated for his troubles).  Meanwhile, current single “Don’t You Worry Child” is holding up well at number 2.

23.  The Lumineers – “Ho Hey”

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We’re back in the routine of having new entries at number 1 every week, it seems, with Swedish House Mafia slipping to 2.  Tons of new entries this week, and we kick off with something you probably weren’t expecting to see here.

38.  John Denver – “Annie’s Song” 

But of course, Britain.

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Just so you know, we’ll be recording the next podcast on Monday, most likely.  Al’s out of town, and besides, I’ve got a cold, so it’d be an hour of intermittent coughing anyway.