Well, Ed Sheeran’s got an album out, and it’s a reasonably big deal, but not as big a deal as it used to be.

1. HUNTR/X – “Golden” 

“Golden” gets a seventh non-consecutive week at number one, but it is past its peak and Olivia Dean’s “Man I Need” came very close this week. If “Golden” manages another week, it will be a surprise.

16. Ed Sheeran – “Camera”

This is the release week single from his album “Play”, which predictably becomes his ninth consecutive number 1 album. “Camera” is the album’s token epic ballad, and it becomes the fifth top 40 track from the album. Most people can only dream of getting that many hit singles off an album.

On the other hand, we’re some way off the chart-swamping of earlier years, which was a big contributor to the current three-song rule being introduced. He does have two other singles on the top 40 – “Sapphire” rebounds to 28 and “A Little More” re-enters at 32 – but it’s not quite the dominance of past years. Similarly, “Play” is number 1 by an absolute mile, beating Sabrina Carpenter by nearly 175%… but it’s the lowest opening week for what you might call his core studio albums. “Autumn Variations” did lower, but it was positioned as something of a side project (and still reached number 1). It’s only the third biggest opening week of the year, behind Sam Fender and Sabrina Carpenter. It’s not in the same league as his very biggest albums, which had first week numbers approaching ten times as much.

Basically, this feels like an imperial phase drawing to a close after 14 years. However, if Sheeran is to be believed, this is meant to be the first in a new cycle of six albums – having worked his way through the maths symbols, we’re now on to “Play”, “Pause”, “Fast Forward”, “Rewind”, “Stop” and “Eject”.

33. Kehlani – “Folded”

Well, that’s from the Tate McRae school of video-making, isn’t it? This is the lead single from Kehlani’s fifth album, and it’s taken seven weeks to climb into the top 40. She’s never had the same success in the UK as in the USA, but she does have a couple of previous credits: she was on a Stormzy single that reached number 30 in 2017, and her own single “Nights Like These” reached number 25 in 2019. Ironically, Jordan Adetunji’s track “Kehlani”, which was referencing her, reached number 8 – she showed up on a remix of that track but didn’t get a chart credit for it.

39. Katseye – “Gabriela” 

Katseye are the product of a collaboration between Geffen Records and the K-pop company Hybe, taking the K-pop management formula international. They were formed in a talent show called Dream Academy in 2023, and have a rather hazy “global girl group” theme, based on the fact that the members come from the USA, South Korea, Switzerland and the Philippines. Up to now, the result seems to have been a fanbase which is large enough on a global level to keep them a going concern, but which could only get them national hit singles in the Philippines and Singapore. (The American member is half Singaporean.)

Could “Gabriela” be their turning point? Well, it’s been a moderate hit in Australia and New Zealand, and now it gets them into the UK top 40 for the first time. It’s a tale of persistence: it landed at number 42 on release week at the end of June, then fell all the way out of the top 100, before slowly clawing its way back up here. It’s a perfectly decent song, though since it’s basically the same idea as “Jolene”, it might have been more suited to a solo act. Did Dua Lipa turn this down? Is Gabriela pursuing six different men at once? Or just one very exhausted man? The video director solves this problem by ignoring the premise of the song entirely and doing a telenovela pastiche instead.

Charli XCX has a co-writer’s credit on this, which presumably explains why it rhymes “Hands off, Gabriela” with “Back off from my fella”.

This week’s climbers:

• “Your Idol” by the Saja Boys climbs 7-5, which is a new peak. “Soda Pop” also returns to its previous peak of 3, and both Twice singles are still in the top 40
• “Nice to Each Other” by Olivia Dean climbs 8-6, and “Dive” climbs 21-17. She also has “Man I Need” a non-mover at 2, and “Rein Me In” with Sam Fender rebounding to 10.
• “12 to 12” by Sombr climbs 10-7, which matches the peak of “Back to Friends”. (That track rebounds to 18 this week.) “Undressed” got to 4 and remains his biggest hit for now. (It’s still around too, at number 30.)
• “Breakin’ Dishes” by Rihanna climbs 30-21. At least this is an album track which never got a chance to be a hit first time round.
• “Feel Good Inc” by Gorillaz climbs 27-22. Yes, I know. Gorillaz actually have a new single out this week – “The Happy Dictator”, featuring Sparks – but that lands at number 73.

There’s also a re-entry at number 40 for Lola Young’s “Messy”, so there are four tracks leaving the top 40:

• “Victory Lap” by Fred Again, Skepta and PlaqueBoyMax spent two weeks at number 40 as a re-entry.
• “Ocean” by Calvin Harris & Jessie Reyez had a single week at number 34.
• “Yukon” by Justin Bieber has nine weeks in the top 40, peaking at 12.
• “High On Me” by Rossi & Jazzy managed 12 weeks, peaking at 18.

On the album chart:

1. Ed Sheeran – “Play”

We’ve covered that above.

3. Jade – “That’s Showbiz Baby”

Debut solo album from the Little Mix member. A string of singles from this album mostly failed to make the top 40, but “Angel of My Dreams” reached 7 and “FUFN” got to 25. Perrie Edwards also has a single out at the moment, which missed the top 40 – the attempt to launch Little Mix into multiple solo careers hasn’t really worked commercialy.

4. Twenty One Pilots – “Breach” 

Their eighth album lands slightly below the positions of the last few, but it’s close, and this is a busy week. One of the singles, “The Contract”, made the top 40 (at number 33).

5. Sophie Ellis-Bextor – “Perimenopop” 

Well, you can’t say she doesn’t know her demographic. It’s her eighth album and her highest placing since 2014, when “Wanderlust” reached number 4. That’s a bit misleading, though – the last two albums also made the top 10.

16. Led Zeppelin – “Live” 

Finally, this is something of a completist release, meant to mark the 50th anniversary of their “Physical Graffiti” album. It consists of four tracks taken from two gigs in 1979 and has a running time of 34 minutes – all have been released before on DVD.