This week’s number 1 is still Cee Lo Green, for the second week.  I covered that single in the previous post, if you haven’t read it yet.  It’s an odd race for the top, with the number 2 slot going to Bruno Mars’ “Just the Way You Are” – another former number one, and according to the midweeks, currently likely to return to the top on Sunday.

This is also the first chart to come with something of an asterisk attached.  We are now into the X Factor live finals, and this year, the performances are available for download on iTunes.  But the record company has opted to exclude from the chart.  (More accurately, you need to register a single with the Official Chart Company to opt in.  But same difference.)  From Simon Cowell’s point of view, there are good reasons for this.  If it becomes clear that somebody’s a runaway leader, there’s no tension going into the final.

But we know that songs can re-enter the charts on the strength of X Factor performances; and we know that even Sky One’s Must Be The Music was able to propel three singles into the top ten, with a much lower audience.  The chances are good, then, that if the X Factor downloads were eligible for the charts, several of them would have made it in – even with the first week giving audiences sixteen tracks to choose from.  (They’re doing double eliminations in the first few weeks to get the numbers down to a more sensible level.)

Would any of these tracks have made number 1?  My guess is, probably not.  X Factor winners inevitably get to number 1 (Joe McElderry made it on his second week of release), but their singles are part of a grand narrative.  These ones aren’t.  The audience is split between sixteen acts.  They’re released on Saturday nights, so the sales will be split between two chart weeks.  And as we’ll see shortly, there’s a limit to the promotional power of a single performance on the show.

Meanwhile, this week’s highest new entry…

(more…)

And I had such high hopes of staying up to date.  Ah well.  At least this number one managed two weeks at the top, so we’re kind-of-sort-of still current.  And it’s a slightly unexpected number one, because the same week saw the release of “Shame” by Robbie Williams and Gary Barlow.  That single was generally assumed to have a clear run at the top, if only for the gimmick factor of having them both appear on the same track.

But no.  The new number one is Cee Lo Green‘s viral YouTube hit, which the Official Chart Company is electing to call “Forget You.” That’s the name of the radio edit – and to be fair, judging from the iTunes chart, people are actually buying that version too, in pretty substantial numbers.  But, understandably enough, most people are going for the original.

The song does have a proper video now, but here’s the original animated-typography version.

Caution: there will be swearing once we get past the cut.

(more…)

Right – this time I really, really will bring things up to date!

This week’s number 1 is “Written in the Stars” by Tinie Tempah.  It’s on EMI, so the YouTube video isn’t embeddable, but hey, hop over there if you want to see the man himself standing on a rooftop in New York looking moody.  Or, if it works in your jurisdiction, here’s the Daily Motion version, which is also uploaded by EMI and is embeddable, because they can’t make up their bloody minds.

While we’ve had a huge turnover of number one singles this year, “Written in the Stars” is one of the top sellers, shifting 115K in its first week.

(more…)