Alright, it’s December, bring on the flood.

1. Taylor Swift – “The Fate of Ophelia” 

Seven weeks total, which means it overtakes “Anti-Hero” as her longest-running UK number one. Although “Anti-Hero” did it in six consecutive weeks, while “Fate of Ophelia” had a two week interruption by Olivia Dean. One odd thing about Taylor Swift is that despite her juggernaut status, she’s only actually had five number 1s, and none of the others stayed there for very long: “Look What You Made Me Do” had two weeks in 2017, “Is It Over Now (Taylor’s Version)” had a single week in 2023, and “Fortnight” had a single week last year.

“Fate of Ophelia” peaked a while back, and goes onto ACR downweighting next week, so barring a miracle, this will be its final week at number one. Raye’s “Where is my Husband” is number 2, so the question is whether it can sneak a week at number 1 before getting Whammed. My money’s on “no”.

18. Laufey – “Winter Wonderland”

This was a Spotify exclusive two years ago, and since it’s still less than three years old, it isn’t on permanent downweighting. In other words, it’s not competing on a level playing field with the other Christmas records, but next year it will be.

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Okay, well, at least we’re less than a month out from Christmas. I guess.

1. Taylor Swift – “The Fate of Ophelia”

Six weeks at number 1, and the same deal as last week: it’s past its peak, and it’s only number 1 Olivia Dean’s “Man I Need” has been out long enough to be downweighted under the ACR rule. It’s basically marking time until the Christmas records come along to replace it.

14. Cynthia Erivo & Ariana Grande – “For Good”
17. Cynthia Erivo – “No Good Deed”
29. Cynthia Erivo & Jonathan Bailey – “As Long As You’re Mine”

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Oh god, already? Really?

1. Taylor Swift – “The Fate of Ophelia” 

Five weeks total. Its streams are down, and it’s not that far ahead of “Golden” at number 2 (about 6%), but the bigger point is that it’s now number 1 with an asterisk – if we didn’t have the downweighting rule, this week’s number one would be “Man I Need” by Olivia Dean, and by a comfortable margin at that.

19. Wham! – “Last Christmas”

What the hell is wrong with you people? This is the chart measuring the period 14-20 November. That’s more than a month before Christmas. And yet even with permanent downweighting against it, “Last Christmas” is already at number 19. God help us.

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This week, drama! But first…

1. Taylor Swift – “The Fate of Ophelia”

This again? Yes, this again. It had a three week run at the top before, and then got knocked off for two weeks by “Golden” on its third run. “Golden” looks to finally be tailing off properly, and so “Fate of Ophelia” returns to number 1 with a 7% lead. It heads a rather stale-looking top 10, with Swift at 1, 6 and 9, HUNTR/X at 2 and 9, and Olivia Dean at 4, 5 and 8. (Raye and Dave round out the chart.) In fact, there aren’t any new entries in the top 20.

Well… officially.

…?  HAVEN. – “I Run”

Okay, so this is a weird story. “I Run” was number 9 in the midweeks  and clearly on course to make the top 10. It’s a UK garage track based around what appears to be a sampled female vocal. It’s actually quite good. The name HAVEN. hasn’t been used before, but the credited writer is a guy called Harrison Walker – presumably this one.

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Um… happy Hallowe’en?

1. HUNTR/X – “Golden” 

Ten weeks at number 1, albeit spread over a total of fifteen weeks. It’s still a little short of Alex Warren’s “Ordinary”, which had a total of 13 weeks earlier in the year. Its lead over Taylor Swift is very tight (just under 3%) so I wouldn’t be entirely shocked if they swap places again. The top four are all non-movers, so we’re much in need of something new to break up the logjam.

17. Ray Parker Jr – “Ghostbusters”

The chart week runs from Friday to Thursday, and so this chart covers Hallowe’en. Hallowe’en has a rather intermittent impact on the chart – we had a similar influx in 2023, but it wasn’t in evidence last year. This may be a side effect of continued meddling with the rules about when a record comes off ACR (downweighting) as a result of a week-on-week sales increase. Christmas tracks are excluded from those rules, but as I understand it, Hallowe’en tracks are not, and so… well, you’ll see.

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This again?

1. HUNTR/X – “Golden”

“Golden” gets a ninth week at number one after a four week interruption by Olivia Dean and Taylor Swift. There are still two other HUNTR/X tracks in the chart, with “How It’s Done” at 10 and “What It Sounds Like” at 13. Streaming of the soundtrack album is up again (possibly because of the school half term), so “Golden” still hasn’t been hit by the downweighting ACR rule, even though it’s been in the chart since July. The Olivia Dean track has been hit by ACR at this point, but “Golden” would have beaten it anyway.

Taylor Swift still has tracks at 2, 4 and 8. We also have three by Olivia Dean (6, 7 and 22), three by Sabrina Carpenter (15, 21 and 29), two by Sam Fender (14 and 38), and two by Sombr (24 and 35). In fact, there are only five different lead artists in the top 10, and eleven in the top 20. This doesn’t feel entirely healthy. If you confined each lead artist to one track, the number 40 song this week would be “Come Find Me” by MK & Clementine Douglas, which is the official number 60. Except… that version of the top 40 would also include “Iris” by the Goo Goo Dolls (official number 48), “Mr Brightside” by the Killers (number 51), and “Dreams” by Fleetwood Mac (number 58). Hmm.

5. Dave & Tems – “Raindance”
10. Dave & James Blake – “History”
11. Dave & Kano – “Chapter 16”

These are the top three tracks from Dave’s third album “The Boy Who Played The Harp”, which enters the album chart as his third number 1. It has hefty first-week physical sales but it would have placed high on streams alone. It’s all wildly out of place on the singles chart, and on that level, it’s very welcome.

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A couple of interesting tracks at the lower end of the top 40, and a busy album chart.

1. Taylor Swift – “The Fate of Ophelia”

Three weeks. It’s the same on the album chart, with “The Life of a Showgirl” celebrating its third week at number one there. The same two album tracks round out her three-song limit on the singles chart, with “Opalite” at 5 and “Elizabeth Taylor”. But the margins are getting closer, particularly on the singles chart, where she leads Olivia Dean by a relatively managable 7%.

13. HUNTR/X – “What It Sounds Like”

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Well, she’s slightly less dominant this week.

1. Taylor Swift – “The Fate of Ophelia”

Two weeks. The album “The Life of a Showgirl” also gets a second week at number 1. There’s a significant second week drop in streaming, but that still leaves her with a very comfortable lead on both charts. Obviously, the enormous physical album sales from her first week aren’t repeated, and she’s now working mainly on streaming numbers. But that’s still enough to beat the number 2, 3 and 4 albums combined.

On the singles chart, the other tracks from the album do tail off a little bit more. Last week she locked up the top three, but this time “Opalite” is at 4 and “Elizabeth Taylor” at 6. She’d still be swamping the chart if it wasn’t for the three-song rule.

12. HUNTR/X – “How It’s Done”

This had three weeks on the chart in July, and got as far as number 29 before getting overtaken by “Soda Pop” and disqualified under the three song rule. “Soda Pop” gets hit by the downweighting rule this week, and so “How It’s Done” escapes disqualification and re-enters.

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Behold domination.

1. Taylor Swift – “The Fate of Ophelia”
2. Taylor Swift – “Opalite”
3. Taylor Swift – “Elizabeth Taylor” 

In 2017, Ed Sheeran managed to get sixteen tracks into the top 20 simultaneously, because his fans were hammering the entirety of his album. The chart company responded by introducing the three-song rule, which limits each artist to three tracks (not counting features on other people’s records). Although the rule applies more broadly, its original justification was actually pretty reasonable: there’s a singles chart, and there’s an album chart, and if people are listening to the whole album then that ought to be reflected on the album chart, instead of counting as sixteen singles.

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Olivia Dean finally gets her week at number one.

1. Olivia Dean – “Man I Need”
9. Olivia Dean – “So Easy (To Fall In Love)”

This has had a long wait for “Golden” to run out of steam – it entered at number 8 in August, and then spent the next five weeks waiting at number 2 while its figures kept growing. After marginally missing out last week, it wins handily this week, with a margin of over 15%. The release of her second album “The Art of Loving” obviously helps – it enters the album chart at number 1. Its predecessor reached number 4 in 2023 but didn’t stick around for a second week. Then again, its total sales are a fraction of “Art of Loving”‘s first week numbers, so I expect this one to show more staying power.

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