A pretty quiet week, to be honest, but there are a few points of interest in here.

30.  The Stereophonics – “Indian Summer”

Hey, these guys are still going!  I always regarded the Stereophonics as meat-and-potatoes indie-rock plodders at the best of times, but they’ve been around since 1997, so they must be doing something right.  This is the lead single from their new album “Graffiti on the Train”, which enters the album chart this week at 3.  It seems to show them mutating into a lower-impact Bon Jovi.  Is this what they call “growing old gracefully”?

Their biggest UK hit was “Dakota”, a number 1 from 2005 – and ironically also the last of their 11 top ten hits, showing how wonky the singles chart was in the immediate pre-download era.

24.  The 1975 – “Chocolate”

The chart debut for a critically lauded indie band, and it’s not just a case of the fanbase propelling it into the chart – this has climbed 71-54-42-24, no doubt helped by Radio 1’s support.  The midweeks show it going a little further (but not much).

It’s catchy enough, I guess, but I can’t say it blows me away or anything.  There’s not a great deal to it lyrically either, not that it’s really aspiring to much in that department.

15.  Fleetwood Mac – “Everywhere”

Advert power!  The legendary 70s-80s rock-for-want-of-a-better-term band were last in the chart in 1988 when they reached number 4 with, well, with this.  It’s back now because it’s being used in an advert by the mobile phone company 3, featuring a dancing pony.  Everyone likes a dancing pony!  And from an advertising standpoint it’s a good choice of song, because it’s a great song, but if you’re under 25 it’s probably going to be new to you.  And now you will associate it forever more with the dancing pony!  And whatever the dancing pony was advertising.  Butter, was it?

The original Fleetwood Mac video is an adaptation of the Alfred Noyes poem The Highwayman, which was still a standard school text in my day, but for all I know is equally unknown to The Young Folk Nowadays.

Their biggest UK hit was the atypical proto-ambient instrumental “Albatross”, a surprise number 1 in 1968.  In America, where radio play was essential to chart success, it made number 104.

7.  Bridgit Mendler – “Ready or Not”

This week’s highest entry goes to another escapee from the Disney Channel, though given the competition, you’ve got to figure that’s more by default than anything else.  I suspect the hand of fandom in her Wikipedia entry, which assures me that critics have “praised heavily Mendler’s rapping skills, which have been compared to Cher Lloyd.”

The song is okay, but I don’t see it establishing her beyond that audience.  Comic book connection: Mendler played the voice of Thorn in the Bone: The Great Cow Race video game.

1.  Justin Timberlake – “Mirrors”

It’s… still… too… long…

Still, the public clearly disagree with me.  That’s two weeks at number one, breaking the turnover at the top.  Will it make a third?  It’s possible.  The midweeks have “Boomerang” by Nicole Scherzinger at number 1, but that must have involved some hugely frontloaded sales, since as of right now she’s already dropped to 7 on iTunes.  That doesn’t bode well for her being number 1 on Sunday, in which case Justin’s endless trudge has a good shot of hanging on for three weeks.

On the album chart:-

• “Bad Blood” by Bastille is at number 1 – unsurprising after the success of the single “Pompeii” (which is still at 3).  Straight to the top with a debut album.
• “Graffiti on the Train” by the Stereophonics at number 3, as already noted.  The Stereophonics had five straight number 1 albums during 1999-2007, and then the next album missed the top ten.  So, return to form.
• “Girl Who Got Away” by Dido at 5.  Her first album in five years.
• “Sing To The Moon” by Laura Mvula at 9.  Another debut release.  The single “Green Garden” climbs to 31 this week.
• “People, Hell & Angels” by Jimi Hendrix at 39.  A surprisingly low entry considering this is new material, albeit offcuts from the incomplete follow-up to “Electric Ladyland”.