Goodness, we really are behind here, aren’t we?

So – let’s cover last week’s chart, and then we’ll do two weeks of comics tomorrow.  Then all will be right with the world.

1.  Gotye ft Kimbra – “Somebody That I Used To Know”

Yes, it’s still there.  That’s a total of five weeks, but with several major releases this week, it seems pretty much certain that this will be the end of the line – the midweeks have a trio of new entries shouldering it down to 4.  Five weeks is a very good run, mind you.

3.  Alexandra Burke feat. Erick Morillo – “Elephant”

The 2008 X-Factor winner starts the promotion of her second album – the first one came out way back in 2009, but boy, she milked it for singles for as long as she could.  Even so, she’s had nothing out in over a year.  “Elephant” is a bit of a change in direction, as she lurches off in the direction of dance music, embracing that annoying autotune effect that everyone else seems to have given up on.  (How long has this album been in the pipeline, exactly?)

It’s actually not such a bad record if you can live with the production, which does get a little more tolerable when it’s not being used on every second track.  Although you’ll note that the video director seems to have had no idea what to do with the thing, and has resorted to the old favourite “party in a warehouse”, despite the total lack of connection to the lyrics.  The reaction to the track has been a bit divided, and the midweeks show it swan diving straight out of the top 10.

This is the first hit for Colombian producer Erick Morillo under his own name, but he’s been around for years under various pseudonyms.  While he’d thank you to forget it, given the work he’s done since to rebuild his credibility in dance music circles, he remains best known for his mid-90s run under the name Reel 2 Real.  Surprisingly, this is actually his biggest UK hit – 1994’s “I Like To Move It” peaked at number 5.

Bizarrely, “I Like To Move It” was previously his joint-biggest hit, if you count his production work on “Them Girls Them Girls” by Zig & Zag.  Yes, that was him too.  If you’re too young or too foreign to remember Zig & Zag – well, this probably won’t shed much light on them.  (Basically, they were puppets from Irish TV, and the joke at this point was that they had inexplicably convinced themselves that they were a dancehall act.  Hence the tortured Irish/Jamaican accents.)

Simon Cowell also had a hand in this track, and for some reason it seems to be the officially sanctioned song that other judges on his UK shows are allowed to tease him about – even though it’s actually no worse than a lot of regular dance records of the time.  In the same way, you’ll note that Ant & Dec are always mocked about the perfectly harmless novelty single “Let’s Get Ready to Rhumble” and not, say, their failed third album where they were trying to be serious artists.)

13.  Swedish House Mafia – “Greyhound”

This is an advert for Absolut vodka.  Seriously.  It’s not just product placement – the video is literally intended as a three-and-a-half minute Absolut advert, and “Greyhound” is its soundtrack.  We saw something similar to this with “Louder” by DJ Fresh (the video for which was essentially a Lucozade advert with the product shots taken out), and if you’ve got an audience who don’t object to an advert connection, it’s kind of mutually beneficial for both parties.

16.  Jason Mraz – “I Won’t Give Up”

You may remember Jason Mraz from his 2008 single “I’m Yours”, which only reached number 11, but hung around on the chart forever (more than half a year in the top 40).  He released three other singles from that album, but they all sank without trace.  This is the lead track from his fourth album, and he finally shakes the one-hit-wonder tag.  The midweeks show it climbing slightly.

24.  Azealia Banks featuring Lazy Jay – “212”

Ooh, minimal video-making.  This is the debut UK single from a New York rapper who crops up on a lot of those “ones to watch in 2012” lists, though the video’s actually been around for six months.  The backing track is sampled from Belgian producer Lazy Jay’s “Float My Boat” (though frankly, it wouldn’t be too far off to say that she’s just rapping over the top of it), hence his co-credit.

30.  LMFAO – “Sorry for Party Rocking”

The fourth single from the current album, or at least it will be in April.  It’s charting at the moment as an album track download on the strength of advance radio play.  The video is, naturally, another of their seven minute epics – the actual song starts at around 2:20.

40.  Tyga – “Rack City”

This made the top ten in America, but it’s pretty much stiffed here in Britain – it’s taken eight weeks to climb to number 40, and it’s nowhere to be seen on the midweeks.  This may be because it’s dreadful.