At last, a big new release to liberate us from Sam Fender and Olivia Dean.

1. Olivia Rodrigo – “Drop Dead”

This is the lead single from the upcoming album “You Seem Pretty Sad for a Girl So In Love”.  It has a fairly substantial margin over “Rein Me In” at number 2, though that comes mostly from first-week physical sales. Without them, “Drop Dead” would still have been number 1 but it would have been a lot closer. It’s her fourth UK number 1 single after “Drivers Licence” (2021), “Good 4 U” (2021) and “Vampire” (2023).

I’m not sure about the video, which fixes on a passing reference to Versailles in the lyrics, and pretty much just decides that getting permission to film there is enough, without actually doing anything much on arrival. There’s an alternative video based on a passing reference to the Eurostar, although the one above is the “official”. I like the song, though – she’s still obsessed with relationship songs, but she seems in a better mood about them this time.

14. Taylor Swift – “Elizabeth Taylor”

This is supposed to be the third single from “The Life of a Showgirl”, but it already reached number 3 and spent seven weeks in the top 10 last autumn, and the UK public haven’t shown much interest in going back to it just because it happens to have a video now. Not least because that video actually consists of clips from Elizabeth Taylor films. What’s actually put it in the top 40 is a 7-inch glitter vinyl edition that was released for Record Store Day, and sold over 15,000 copies. It wouldn’t be anywhere close to the top 40 without those sales, and so we can be fairly sure that it’ll be gone next week.

31. Sombr – “Potential”

That’s a surprisingly low debut, given that “Homewrecker” debuted at 14. The trouble is that it’s still at number 7 – in its tenth week in the top 10 – and “Potential” is struggling to make headway against it. I expect it’ll climb, though.

32. Sean Kingston & Justin Bieber – “Eenie Meenie” 

Originally a number 9 hit in 2010. Has there ever been a worse opening lyric than “She’s indecisive / She can’t decide”?

Anyway, this is another Justin Bieber back catalogue track reactivated thanks to Coachella. There’s a chart technicality here, because for the purposes of the three-song rule it’s classed as a Sean Kingston song. As such, it allows him a fourth track in the top 40. He also has “Beauty and a Beat” at 3, “Daisies” at 5, and “Baby” at 17. I’m not sure quite what it says about Justin Bieber that – aside from “Daisies” – it’s the really early bubblegum pop that’s getting the plays, not the material he actually performed at Coachella.

40. Tyla & Zara Larsson – “She Did It Again” 

Zara Larsson has been around for over a decade but her career outside Scandinavia has really seen a resurgence over the last year. She still has her 2016 single “Lush Life” in the top 10 – where it’s been almost without interruption since the start of the year – and “Midnight Sun” remains inside the top 20.

This week’s climbers:

• “Beauty and a Beat” by Justin Bieber featuring Nicki Minaj climbs 11-3. As a result, it belatedly becomes Justin Bieber’s 29th top 10 hit, fourteen years after  release – it only got to number 16 the first time around.
• “Daisies” by Justin Bieber climbs 15-5. In contrast, this one has been a number 1 before.
• “Earrings” by Malcolm Todd climbs 37-29.
• “Free Your Mind” by Prospa & Cloonee climbs 39-30.

The five tracks leaving the top 40 are:

• “12 to 12” by Sombr, which has been around as a re-entry since the start of the year, and aside from a few weeks over Christmas has been with us since last August. It peaked at number 7 last year.
• “Porch Light” by Noah Kahan, which re-entered at 40 last week.
• “End of Beginning” by Djo, which had two weeks at number 1 at the start of the year and has been around ever since.
• “Ready, Steady, Go!” by Harry Styles, an album track which entered at 5 and lasted six weeks.
• “Runway” by Lady Gaga & Doechii, which got a single week at number 32 and drops straight to number 91. Told you it wasn’t their best work.

On the album chart:

1. Skindred- “You Got This”

Welsh metal fusion act. It’s their ninth album and their first number 1, though its predecessor came within a razor thin margin (the equivalent of less than 150 sales). As you’d expect, it’s number 1 almost entirely on the strength of physical sales – its streaming only added the equivalent of 355 sales – so it’ll be gone next week.

2. Jessie Ware – “Superbloom”

Her sixth album – all six have made the top 10, and the last two made number 3, but this is her highest position to date.

4. Zayn – “Konnakol”

Konnakol is a type of vocal percussion from South Indian music. This is Zayn’s fifth solo album, coming in one place lower than its predecessor. Still pretty respectable, although his albums are consistently first-week fanbase affairs – he’s yet to release an album that managed a second week in the top 100. The single’s really not bad, but he doesn’t seem to attract the same interest as other One Direction alumni; obviously Harry Styles has graduated to A-lister territory, but Niall Horan and Louis Tomlinson have no trouble picking up airplay for their singles.

16. Tomora – “Come Closer” 

Debut album, sort of – it’s their first release as a duo, but Tomora consists of the Norwegian singer Aurora and Tom Rowlands from the Chemical Brothers. The name is simply a mix of “Tom” and “Aurora”, and has nothing to do with the area of Mali of the same name.