This would be a quiet week if it wasn’t for Justin Bieber.

1.  MK featuring Chrystal – “Dior”

Two weeks. Here’s some chart trivia I skipped over last week: MK’s first credited top 40 hit was “Always” in February 1995. Since he didn’t have an artist credit on the Storm Queen track that he remixed – which is fair enough, because it really was just a conventional remix – he had a wait of 30 years and 6 months from his first chart entry to his first number 1.

There are only three artists with longer gaps than that, and they all had slightly freak circumstances. The all time record holder is Tony Christie at 34 years, but that’s on the strength of the charity reissue of his back catalogue track “Show Me The Way to Amarillo”. Number 2 is Ozzy Osbourne, if you measure from Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid” in 1970, rather than his own first solo credit in 1980. Oh, and the number 1 was his duet with daughter Kelly.

And number 3 is Michael Ball, who has co-credit with Captain Tom Moore and the NHS Voices of Care Choir on a Covid-era charity version of “You’ll Never Walk Alone” which, shall we say, did not reach number 1 on purely musical criteria. While Michael Ball was a regular presence on the album charts (and still is), he hadn’t had a hit single since the 1990s.

So there are asterisks against all three of those. But not for MK – he just kept releasing records for 30 years with intermittent mainstream success and eventually had a number one single.

4. Justin Bieber – “Daisies”
32. Justin Bieber – “Yukon”
33. Justin Bieber – “All I Can Take”

This is the lead single from the album “Swag”, which enters at number 4, with a couple of album tracks bringing up the rear – in fact, it’s the start of the album, which is probably not a coincidence. The two album tracks are nothing to write home about, but “Daisies” is pretty respectable – practically lo-fi, by Justin Bieber standards. “Swag” is his seventh studio album and technically his lowest placing for a regular studio album (the acoustic alternative version of “Believe” got to 5, and his 2011 Christmas album got to 13). But it’s marginal, and the top end of the album chart is jammed with Oasis right now.

18. Blackpink – “Jump”

It’s been three years snce the last Blackpink single – they got a couple of tracks into the high 20s in 2022, and in both cases they dropped out of the chart very quickly. This does slightly better in its first week, though I suspect it’s the sort of track (and certainly the sort of video) that only really works if you already buy into the idea that Blackpink are megastars, which in the UK market, isn’t exactly the case. Still, they’ve only had one track go higher than this – “Sour Candy” reached number 17 in 2020, and Lady Gaga had top billing on that one.

This week’s climbers:

• “Blessings” by Calvin Harris & Clementine Douglas climbs 6-3. This has spent the last nine weeks hovering between 6 and 8.
• “Sapphire” by Ed Sheeran climbs 9-5. This entered at 9 five weeks ago and didn’t advance any further until now.
• “Golden” by HUNTR/X, Ejae, Audrey Nuna & Rei Ami climbs 20-9 as the KPop Demon Hunters soundtrack continue to progress up the charts – this one is breaking from the pack, though. That’s possibly because it functions best outside the film.
• “Nice to Each Other” by Olivia Dean climbs 14-10 to become her first top 10 hit.
• “No Broke Boys” by Disco Lines & Tinashe climbs 25-16.
• “Don’t Look Back in Anger” by Oasis climbs 18-17. (The other two tracks from last week fall slightly.)
• “High on Me” by Rossi & Jazzy climbs 28-19.
• “Your Idol” by the Saja Boys, Andrew Choi, Neckwav, Danny Chung, Kevin Woo and samUIL Lee climbs 26-23.
• “How It’s Done” by HUNTR/X, Ejae, Audrey Nuna & Rei Ami climbs 32-29.

The four tracks leaving the top 40 are:

• “Azizam” by Ed Sheeran, after 14 weeks and a peak of number 3 – it gets hit by the downweighting rule this week.
• “Fame is a Gun” by Addison Rae, which peaked at 23 but hung around for a respectable six weeks.
• “Shake it to the Max (Fly)” by Moliy & Silent Addy, which peaked at 12 and had three months in the top 40.
• “Party 4 U” by Charli XCX reached number 19 and had 11 weeks on chart.

On the album chart:

1. Wet Leg – “Moisturizer”

Their second album, their second number one. The first one dropped out of the top 40 after 4 weeks, but that’s better than a lot of bands. This one probably won’t make it that long – its chart points are overwhelmingly from first week physical sales, which isn’t the sort of thing you can sustain.

Number 4 is the Justin Bieber album, which we’ve already cover. Three Oasis albums make up the rest of the top 5.

6. Burna Boy – “No Sign of Weakness”

The last Burna Boy album was a number 1, and the one before that got to 2, so there’s a tailing off here. Can you spot the really subtle product placement in the video above?

8. Amy MacDonald – “Is This What You’ve Been Waiting For”

Her sixth album, after a five-year break. She’s yet to miss the top 10.

10. Barry Can’t Swim – “Loner”

Scottish dance producer. It’s his second album; the first one got to 12 two years ago.

16. Clipse, Pusha T & Malice – “Let God Sort Em Out”

I’m not quite sure what’s going on with the credit here, because Clipse are Pusha T and Malice, but that’s how it’s listed. It’s the first Clipse album to chart in the UK, though Pusha T has charted higher than this with solo albums.

38. Giveon – “Beloved” 

His second album – the first one got to number 37, so no real change.