We missed last week’s chart, so a bit of catching up to do here…

1. Olivia Rodrigo – “Good 4 U”

Three weeks, and doing nicely – it had 11.2 million streams last week. While it was only to be expected that her album “Sour” would get the maximum three tracks into the singles chart in its first week, they’re still there – “Deja Vu” is at 4, and “Traitor” is at a peak position of 5. And that means she has three singles in the top 5 – not unheard of, but very much A-lister territory.

The number two single is former number 1 “Body”, so it’s not facing an immediate challenge either. Once again, she has three singles in the top 10 – “Deja Vu” is at 5, and “Drivers Licence” re-enters at 6. “Re-enters” because of the three-song rule; evidently it was her fourth placed song last week, and the positions are reversed this time. When we last saw it, two weeks ago, it was at number 35, so the release of the parent album has really catapulted it back up the charts – this is its highest position since March, when its nine-week run at number 1 ended. “Sour” also spends a second week at number 1 on the album chart.

7. Arrdee – “Oliver Twist”

He’s a teenage rapper from Brighton, and he featured prominently on the multi-guest remix of “Body” – but he didn’t get a chart credit for that. So this is technically his first hit. The midweeks have it sticking around in the top 10.

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Well, that didn’t take long.

1. Olivia Rodrigo – “Good 4 U”
4. Olivia Rodrigo – “Deja Vu”
7. Olivia Rodrigo – “Traitor”

Yes, it’s the release of Olivia Rodrigo’s album “Sour”, which enters at number 1 on the album chart, and promptly places the maximum three tracks in the single chart. Demonstrating her ability to write about her break-up in any musical genre, “Good 4 U” is the Paramore version, and climbs to number 1 on its second week out. It’s her second number 1 single and, if you care about such things, she’s the youngest artist to have had simultaneous number 1s on the single and album chart. To be honest, having simultaneous number 1s isn’t that unusual – it happened four times in 2020 – but while the list is lengthy, it’s also mainly made up of A-listers. And Olly Murs.

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J Cole has an album out, then.

1. Tion Wayne & Russ Millions – “Body”

Three weeks, and still with a comfortable lead – it’s about 25% ahead of the number 2 single.

2. Olivia Rodrigo – “Good 4 U”

A final single from her album before its release today. She’s now released three singles complaining about her ex’s new girlfriend, but there’s certainly a range of genre – this time, she’s Paramore. “Deja Vu” climbs to a new peak of number 11 this week as well, and “Drivers Licence” is at number 35.

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This was the week of the Brit Awards, and since performing your song on primetime TV to an audience who don’t necessarily care all that much about music tends to bring in new listeners, there are a couple of unlikely rebounds further down the chart. But it makes no difference to…

1. Tion Wayne & Russ Millions – “Body”

…which gets a second week at number 1, and continues to grow. It has twice the streams of the number 2 single (which is “Montero”, a record on its way down). So it looks set to be here for a while.

12. Coldplay – “Higher Power”

Produced by Max Martin, and it sounds it. This is the lead single for their ninth album, somewhat bizarrely promoted with a video livestream from the International Space Station. Coldplay’s last hit single was “Orphans” in 2019, but they haven’t been this high up the chart since 2017 (when they got to number 2 in a collaboration with the Chainsmokers).

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Well, here’s a track I didn’t expect to get to number 1. “Montero” drops to 2 after five weeks, and…

1. Tion Wayne & Russ Millions – “Body”

That’s the remix video above, which isn’t officially the lead version – but it’s the version that’s largely responsible for pushing it up to number 1. This has climbed 21-12-11-14-4-1, with the remix coming out over the last couple of weeks. It’s being billed as the first drill number one, and fair enough, I guess – though it’s at the radio friendly end of the genre, as you might imagine. Tion Wayne has had three previous top ten hits, but this is his first time in the top 5. Russ’s previous best was number 7.

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Uneventful, really.

1. Lil Nas X – “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)”

Five weeks, and still performing strongly. Not that it’s facing much in the way of new challengers – it heads up a static top three, with “Peaches” spending its fourth week at number 2. There are no significant new entries this week at all – for the highest, we have to go all the way down to…

38. Years & Years – “Starstruck”

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Another week with only three new entries on the singles chart.

1. Lil Nas X – “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)”

Four weeks, and miles ahead of the number 2 single (which is Justin Bieber’s “Peaches”, for the third week). I’ll come back to the climbers – let’s tie up the new entries first.

29. AJ Tracey – “Little More Love”

One for the “filmed that during a pandemic, did you?” file. I know there are protocols for this sort of thing, but for the sake of a three minute video… I don’t know. It’s offputting. Anyway, this is the release-week single from his album “Flu Game”, which enters at number 2. His previous self-titled studio album reached number 3 in 2019; he’s also released a couple of mixtapes which placed significantly lower. “Flu Game” has already produced four top 40 singles – “Dinner Guest”, which got to number 5; “West Ten”, which got to number 5; “Bringing It Back”, which got to number 5; and “Anxious”, which got to … er, number 34. Not sure what happened to that one.

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The market for Taylor Swift doing Taylor Swift covers is a healthy one.

1. Lil Nas X – “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)”

Three weeks, which is longer than “Old Town Road” managed – making it his biggest UK hit. Its sales are also continuing to increase, and so it could be here for a while to come. It holds “Peaches” by Justin Bieber at number 2 for a second week.

3. Polo G – “Rapstar”

This isn’t Polo G’s first UK hit, but you’d struggle to say his previous chart record qualified him as a star – he has a technical number 3 hit by guesting on KSI’s hit “Patience”, and he has co-billing with Lil Tjay and Fivio Foreign on “Headshot”, which scraped a week at number 40.

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Because of the death of the Duke of Edinburgh, the BBC is in national mourning mode today, and so it didn’t air the regular chart show. But the chart itself was still published online as usual, and to be honest, it’s such an uneventful week that listeners to Radio 1 didn’t miss a great deal.

1. Lil Nas X – “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)”

Two weeks. Which matches “Old Town Road”, for what that’s worth. Number 2 is “Peaches” by Justin Bieber featuring Daniel Caesar & Giveon, climbing one place; “Bed” by Joel Corry x RAYE x David Guetta climbs 7-6. That is the sum total of excitement in the top 10 this week. Slightly more interestingly, “Body” by Russ Millions & Tion Wayne climbs 21-12. “Astronaut in the Ocean” by Masked Wolf climbs 20-18. “Heat Waves” by Glass Animals climbs 24-21, five weeks after reaching its previous peak of 22. “Ferrari Horses” by D-Block Europe featuring RAYE climbs 28-22 – that is more notable, because it’s been climbing ever since it entered the chart three weeks ago, and D-Block Europe tracks don’t normally do that. And we finally reach the first new entry all the way down at…

27. Olivia Rodrigo – “Deja Vu”

Following up “Drivers Licence” is… a challenge. Technically Olivia Rodrigo is already off the one-hit wonder list, because her Disney song “All I Want” got to number 32 as a spillover when “Drivers Licence” took off. Still, this is the single that has the impossible task of being the actual follow-up.

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We were overdue for a big new entry, and lo.

1. Lil Nas X – “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)”

This is Lil Nas X’s second UK number one, after 2019’s “Old Town Road”. Both his subsequent hits, “Panini” and “Holiday”, landed just outside the top 20 – so while he wasn’t a one hit wonder by any means, he was in some danger of being an artist who had one Really Big Hit as an outlier on an otherwise mid-table career. It’s tempting to ascribe Montero’s success to the video, though really, that’s been more controversial in the USA than in Britain; religion just doesn’t have the same traction in British culture wars. Still, it won’t hurt that the charts count YouTube views. But mainly, “Montero” is just a much better track than “Panini” or “Holiday” – it feels like more of a complete song.

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