Charts – 1 August 2025
Just one week for Justin Bieber, then.
1. HUNTR/X, EJAE, Audrey Nuna, Rei Ami & The KPop Demon Hunters Cast – “Golden”
Climbing to number 1 in its fifth week on the top 40, and with two other soundtrack songs not so far behind – “Your Idol” is at 10 and “Soda Pop” at 11, though both of those are Saja Boys tracks. As I’ve explained before, the convoluted chart credit is actually listing the same people three times: the fictional band, the real singers (on this track, mostly EJAE), and a generic cast credit because that’s how the overall album is credited.
“Golden” really is very good – it works as a regular pop song, but fits the plot requirement of being unreasonably difficult to sing. This thing requires a two and a half octave range, and the top end is really high.
You can maybe argue about whether this really qualifies as true KPop, given that it was made for an American-backed film. But it’s written and performed by people working in KPop, and it certainly qualifies as only the second UK number 1 by a South Korean artist. The first, obviously, was Psy’s “Gangnam Style”. By the way, if you’re wondering how Psy’s career is doing these days, here’s Rosé making a guest appearance on his current tour.
So I think he’s doing okay.
HUNTR/X’s credit also puts them on the curious list of number 1 hits by fictional artists, but most of those are novelty records credited to TV characters like Bob the Builder or the Teletubbies. Number 1 records credited to explicitly fictional musicians are much rarer, though there’s always this, from 1969.
I feel obliged to attach the caveat that, if it wasn’t for the downweighting rule, Alex Warren’s “Ordinary” would still be number 1, and by a margin of over 15%, at that. “Ordinary” is still in the top 10 despite its streams effectively being halved by the chart rules. The new Alex Warren track, “Eternity”, entered at number 3 last week but drops straight to 14, which took me by surprise.
4. Drake & Central Cee – “Which One”
Oh, Drake’s still doing his dance music dirges, is he? To be honest, Central Cee may be the bigger draw here for a UK audience – he’s had two top 10 hits already this year, and a number 3 record last year. Still, this is Drake’s biggest hit since 2023, so he’s clearly alive and kicking despite coming off worse against Kendrick Lamar.
25. Ozzy Osbourne – “Crazy Train”
The Ozzy Osbourne tribute streams are holding up better than you might have expected. Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid” climbs from 32 to 20 this week, while his debut solo single from 1980 makes the top 40 for the time. (It got to number 49 on release.) It wasn’t a particular surprise to see “Paranoid” chart, but that’s a timeless record. “Crazy Time” is much more a period piece – let’s be honest, it’s an example of a commercially defunct genre – and so it’s interesting to see it show up here.
Black Sabbath’s “Ultimate Collection” compilation is at 14 on the album chart (up from 22 last week), which is the highest it’s ever been – it got to 20 on release in 2016. His 2014 solo album “Memoirs of a Madman” also re-enters the album chart at 32; it got to 23 on release.
31. Sombr – “12 to 12”
A fourth top 40 hit for Sombr – “Undressed” and “Back to Friends” happen to be placed at 32 and 33, giving him a run of three straight chart positions. He’s disco this time!
34. Lola Young – “Dealer”
Lola Young remains in the awkward position of not being a one hit wonder, but having a big gap between her number 1, “Messy”, and everything else. That track finally leaves the top 40 this week, after a 34 week run. The immediate followup “Conceited” didn’t make the top 40. “One Thing” has had a respectable 11 week run on the chart, but it peaked at 18. It also entered higher than this, though it did climb a bit from its starting point.
For some reason, the version on YouTube seems to be the radio edit. Removing the word “drugs” from a song called “Dealer” is, um, a choice.
This week’s climbers:
- Well, “Golden”, obviously.
- “No Broke Boys” by Disco Lines & Tinashe climbs 12-8, giving Tinashe a second top 10 hit, a decade after the first one.
- “Your Idol” and “Soda Pop” by Saja Boys climbs 14-10 and 17-11.
- “Paranoid” by Black Sabbath climbs 32-20.
There are four new entries, plus “Sparks” by Coldplay re-entering at 39. The five tracks leaving the top 40 are:
- “Messy” by Lola Young, as previously mentioned.
- “The Glen” by Levi Heron, with 8 weeks in the top 40 and a peak of 24.
- “Cops & Robbers” by Sammy Virji & Skepta, which was a re-entry at 39 last week.
- “APT” by Rosé & Bruno Mars, which re-entered at 40 last week.
- “Can’t Decide” by Max Dean, Locky & Luke Dean, with nine weeks, peaking at 13.
On the album chart:
1. The K’s – “Pretty On The Internet”
Indie guitar pop. It’s their second album – the first one reached number 3. It’s here overwhelmingly on physical sales, with streaming accounting for less than 4% of its chart posts – which doesn’t bode well for it sticking around.
5. Paul Weller – “Find El Dorado”
Covers album, although he’s not exactly going for the obvious candidates here. “Lawdy Rolla” by the Guerillas? (Here’s the original – they were a French band, apparently.)
9. Alice Cooper – “The Revenge of Alice Cooper”
That’s Alice Cooper the band, not Alice Cooper the stage name for the front man of Alice Cooper the band. Got that? So if you’re just counting albums by the band, it’s only their eighth album.
11. Tim Minchin – “Time Machine”
Yes, the Australian comedian. He had a previous album hit in 2020 with “Apart Together”, which reached number 27.
23. Madonna – “Veronica Electronica”
Don’t get too excited by the chart position – “Veronica Electronica” is a shelved remix album from the “Ray of Light” period, with this unreleased demo added to get it above 40 minutes. So something of a release for the hardcore fans.
28. Freddie Gibbs & The Alchemist – “Alfredo 2”
Their third collaborative album, the first to chart in the UK. Neither of them has charted individually, either.
34. Gary Numan – “A Perfect Circle”
His studio albums still get near the top, but this is a live album, recorded in London in 2022.
Like I said a few weeks, there has been Significant Discourse in K-pop spaces about why the Kpop Demon Hunters soundtrack – and, in particular, “Golden” – have broken through to a big global audience when other K-pop hits* have tended to be confined to a K-pop audience. And, in the nature of discourse, most commentators have used this to promote their own solutions for what ails K-pop – including “this proves that K-pop needs to stop pandering to Western audiences and double down on Korean content”, which is an odd takeaway from “Golden”.
Part of the answer, of course, is “Golden is very good”, as you’ve noted. But it’s not necessarily the COMPLETE answer – it’s a well-above-average K-pop song but the nature of being well-above-average is that you get outliers. In sound, message and quality I don’t think it’s a million miles from “I AM”, but with the obvious exception of being 90% English rather than 50%:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZUIwj3FgUY&pp=ygUESSBBbQ%3D%3D
Do you think this is just a perfect storm of being on a hit movie AND very good AND mostly in English? Or are there things K-pop can learn and try to replicate from “Golden” and the soundtrack’s success?
* With obvious exceptions, like “APT”.
As a fellow West Aussie, I should by happy for Tim Minchin’s success. Only, much like Sam Worthington, I just don’t enjoy his stuff.
We can still claim Heath Ledger and Gigi Edgely from Farscape, though.
As someone who knows next to nothing about Kpop. But enjoyed the movie on a Scott Pilgrim / Mitchells vs The Machines level, what surprises me is that “What It Sounds Like” isn’t the breakout hit. All the songs are good but that was the standout for me.
Be careful what you wish for when you ask chart watchers for advice on how to chart.
Because if charting is all you care about, it’s probably optimal to die for the free publicity.
There is nothing to be learnt from Kpop Demom Hunters that goes much further than the implicit recognition that anything presented by Netflix will have a ridiculous ammount of exposure compared to Kpop companies, regardless of the scale of their achievements.
That, and that pop music that is sung by cartoon characters is still a million times more attractive to international – and honestly: white, western audiences than anything featuring East Asian faces, creators, and musicians.
The fact that there is nothing specific to K-Pop culture going in in the movie just reinforces that:
It’s a standoff against a vague, diabolical evil with no particular cultural specificity, and characters that move and act in a way that has nothing to do with the (rather grim) realities of the industry.
It’s the kind of movie an American fan would make, and has next to nothing to say about the direction of industry – especially as Blackpink’s faux AAE “bad gir” aesthetics continues to produce the numbers it does.
And Douglas, I think the exception you point out us pretty much perfect in that regard: it’s a pop punkish number with a slight degree of retro flare, sung entirely in English, and featuring Bruno Nars, of all people.
Sometimes Korean people performing pop music are just Korean people performing pop music
Crazy Train was the last song Ozzy performed solo, before the Black Sabbath set at his final concert. I know it’s the one I’ve seen linked to a few times. I suspect that explains, at least in part, why it’s getting the attention.