Not a big-selling week, but quite a busy one anyway.

1. Kenya Grace – “Strangers”

Two weeks. It was very close over “Prada” at number 2 – the equivalent of 800 sales, or roughly a 2% margin. It’s also one of the lowest-scoring number ones in a while, so I don’t fancy her chances of staying at the top for long. And while there aren’t any new entries in the top ten, there are a bunch of climbers. But we’ll come to that.

16. Fred Again & Jozzy – “Ten”

Perfectly timed, as the previous single “Adore U” hits its tenth week on chart, encounters the downweighting rule, and dives from number 8 straight out of the top 20. So that’s a second consecutive top 20 hit, and it’s not one of his more commercial tracks, either.

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Well, Drake’s got an album out. And although it would have swamped the chart if it weren’t for the three song rule, it doesn’t touch the top three. Instead, Doja Cat’s “Paint the Town Red” gets whacked by the downweighting rule in its tenth week out and drops straight out of the top 10, leaving the way clear for…

1. Kenya Grace – “Strangers”

This entered at number 20 last month and it’s been stuck in the top 3 for the last three weeks. It now adds Kenya Grace to the one-hit wonders club – one number one hit and nothing else, ever. Of course, that only really counts once you’ve missed with your follow-up, and her YouTube account is already on to promoting her next single.

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Well, Ed Sheeran’s got a new album out. But…

1. Doja Cat – “Paint the Town Red”

That’s five weeks. It’s very, very unlikely to make six, because it’s way past its peak and so it’s due to be hit by the downweighting rule next week.

5. Jung Kook featuring Jack Harlow – “3D”

A second solo hit for BTS’s Jung Kook, following “Seven”, which reached number 3 earlier in the year. “Seven” had Latto on it, and this has Jack Harlow – they’re clearly aiming for the international audience here, and it’s working. K-pop tracks tend to be heavily frontloaded, with a lot of actual first-week sales to the fanbase. Still, “Seven” had enough wider appeal to stick around in the top 40 for ten weeks, so while I’d be surprised if “3D” climbed, I don’t expect it to plummet either.

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We’ve got some unexpected new entries in the singles chart this week.

1. Doja Cat – “Paint the Town Red”
29. Doja Cat – “Agora Hills”

Doja Cat gets a fourth week at number 1, but her album “Scarlet” is also out this week, and lands at number 5. That’s actually two places below her 2021 album “Planet Her”, but as we’ll see, it’s a busy week at the top end of the album chart. The somewhat less instant release week single “Agora Hills” also charts – her third track on the top 100 is the promotional single “Demons”, which only got to number 53 on release, and re-enters at 87 on the strength of the album.

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This is one of the busier weeks we’ve had in the singles chart for a while.

1. Doja Cat – “Paint the Town Red”

Three weeks, over Olivia Rodrigo at 2. Doja Cat’s album is out this week, and as you’d expect, the midweeks expect her to get a fourth week.

8. Tate McRae – “Greedy”

This is the lead single from her next album. Tate McRae had her first UK hit during the pandemic, when “You Broke Me First” reached number 3. With hindsight, that track now looks out wildly out of character, as she seems to have shifted into a dance pop artist. She’s had a couple of minor solo hits since, and got a second top 10 hit last year along with Tiesto on “10:35”. This finally gives her a second major hit of her own.

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At last, stability.

1. Doja Cat – “Paint the Town Red”

After three tracks that only lasted a week at number 1, Doja Cat makes it to two. Apparently the margin is fairly comfortable.

7. Olivia Rodrigo – “Get Him Back”

This is the release week single from “Guts”, which becomes her second number one album and outsells the first. Admittedly, part of that is because she now has the sort of fanbase who buy the physical formats in week one. The She has her maximum three singles all in the top 10 – “Vampire”, one of the one-week number ones, rebounds to 2, and “Bad Idea Right” leaps back from 12 to 3 (having previously peaked at 6 a month ago).

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Continuing the rapid turnover, here’s the fourth new number one in as many weeks.

1. Doja Cat – “Paint the Town Red”

The last few number ones were all tracks that had been stuck behind “Sprinter” for ages. “Paint the Town Red” isn’t exactly new – it entered at number 20 four weeks ago – but it’s newer, and might have a reasonable shot of lasting longer.  It’s Doja Cat’s first number one; her previous best was number 2 for her debut hit “Say So” in 2020. The original sample, Dionne Warwick’s “Walk On By”, only got to number 9 in 1964.

For the highest new entry, we have to go down to the bottom end of the top 20.

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After the epic ten-week run of Dave & Central Cee’s “Sprinter”, we seem to be in a phase of the records it held off taking their turn at number one. Two weeks ago we had Billie Eilish. Last week it was Dua Lipa. And now, a record that wasn’t even number 1 in the midweeks…

1. Olivia Rodrigo – “Vampire”

This is the third number one for Olivia Rodrigo, following “Drivers Licence” and “Good 4 U” from her previous album. It’s not even the current single – that’s “Bad Idea Right”, which is a non-mover at 11 this week. “Vampire” is on its ninth week, and it spent the first four stuck at number 2 behind “Sprinter”. It’s never dropped before 5, but it’s still impressive for it to fight its way back to number 1.

The record at number 1 in the midweeks was “Paint the Town Red” by Doja Cat, which winds up at number 2. It must still be in with a shot next week. And if you’re wondering what happened to Dua Lipa, she gets hammered by the downweighting rule this week and drops straight to number 15.

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As anticipated, Billie Eilish only manages a single week – which means she’s now had two 1-week number ones. We’re still in Barbie territory, though.

1. Dua Lipa – “Dance the Night (From Barbie the Album)”

Climbing to number 1 in its thirteenth week on chart. This has grown on me somewhat, but it still strikes me as something of a generic Dua Lipa track. It’s her fourth number 1, following “New Rules” (2017), “One Kiss” (2018) and “Cold Heart” (2021). The Billie Eilish track is at number 2, and we’ve also got “Barbie World” at 9, “Speed Drive” at 15, and “I’m Just Ken” at 22. Overall, the Barbie wave seems to have crested, and given how long it took Dua Lipa to get here in the first place, I suspect she won’t be here too long.

In an absurdly quiet week for new singles, there is just a single new entry on the top 40. There’s also a slightly baffling re-entry for “Dog Days are Over” by Florence & The Machine at number 27, which appears to have had its downweighting reset on the very tenuous basis that it’s in a film soundtrack on Disney+ – but it already reached number 21 earlier in the year.

But what about that new entry? Ah. Well.

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At long last, “Sprinter” by Dave & Central Cee is comfortably past its peak and gets hit by the downweighting rule – with the result that it drops straight to number 10 after a ten-week run at number 1. Thanks to that, our new number one is…

1. Billie Eilish – “What Was I Made For”

Not by a huge margin, admittedly. Dua Lipa is number 2, and the midweeks have her taking the slot next week. But it’s Billie Eilish’s second number one, and a very good record, too. The other one was “No Time To Die”, which had a single week at number one in 2020, so she’s in the odd position that her two biggest hits both come from film soundtracks. This one is more characteristic of her normal work, though. And hey, she’s had another 7 top ten hits to go with them both.

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