Ah. This wasn’t in the script.

1. Calvin Harris & Ellie Goulding – “Miracle”

So, last week, “Flowers” by Miley Cyrus was finally knocked off number 1 after ten weeks by Ed Sheeran’s new single “Eyes Closed”. I did flag that it had only made it to number one thanks to the boost from first-week pre-orders of the CD single, which is very much a fanbase product, but as it turns out, it drops to number three this week. Threading their way to the top instead are Calvin Harris and Ellie Goulding, with a single that’s been out for four weeks.

This is Calvin Harris’s eleventh number one single, counting guest appearances. The others are Dizzee Rascal’s “Dance Wiv Me” (2008), “I’m Not Alone” (2009), Rihanna’s “We Found Love” (2011), “Sweet Nothing” (2012), “Under Control” (2013), “Summer” (2014), “Blame” (2017), “Feels” (2017), “One Kiss” (2018) and “Promises” (2018). So it’s been five years, and he now has number 1s spanning a period of 15 years.

Ellie Goulding gets her fourth number one – the others are “Burn” (2013), “Love Me Like You Do” (2015) and “River” (2019). And “River” only sneaked a week in the dead period after Christmas, so it’s been eight years since she had a normal number one.

It’s fortunate that we have such excitement at the top, because nothing is happening on the rest of the top 40. Look, here’s the highest new entry!

38. Jisoo – “Flower”

This is the solo chart debut for Kim Ji-soo, but she’s a member of Blackpink, who have been a regular presence in the bottom half of the top 40 for a few years now. Their all time peak is number 17 with “Sour Candy”, but that was a collaboration with Lady GaGa; their own singles typically get a week in the high twenties before tailing off rapidly.

39. Tyler, the Creator – “Dogtooth”

He’s more of an albums act in the UK – his last three albums all made the top 10 – but this is his fourth hit single since 2019. His singles places are very erratic, though. This is a single from the deluxe edition of his 2021 album “Call Me If You Get Lost”, which re-enters at 18 (it got to 4 on first release).

This week’s climbers:

• “If We Ever Broke Up” by Mae Stephens climbs 16-13.
• “Whistle” by Jax Jones & Calum Scott climbs 22-14.
• “React” by Switch Disco & Ella Henderson climbs 26-15.
• “Mother” by Meghan Trainor climbs 27-22, which baffles me.
• “Can’t Tame Her” by Zara Larsson climbs 36-27.
• “Hell N Back” by Bakar climbs 35-28.
• “Here” by Tom Grennan climbs 37-31.

There are two new entries this week plus a couple of minor re-entries right at the bottom of the top 40 (from tracks which had only marginally dropped out to begin with). The four songs dropping out:

• “10:35” by Tiesto & Tate McRae eventually made it to number 8 with 14 weeks on the top 40, despite a very slow start.
• “Fly Girl” by Flo featuring Missy Elliott got a single week at number 38. I don’t think people are buying the next big thing hype.
• “River” by Miley Cyrus made it to number 16.
• “Trustfall” by Pink reached number 14.

On the album chart…

1.  boygenius – “The Record”

boygenius is a collaboration between Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus. While they’re sometimes described as an indie supergroup, Bridgers is the only one of the three who’s placed on the UK album chart before, when her 2020 album “Punisher’ reached the top 10. At any rate, it’s a good album and worth a play.

2. Melanie Martinez – “Portals”

Melanie Martinez seems to release albums on a 4-year cycle. 2015’s “Cry Baby” reached 32, 2019’s “K-12” reached 2019, and now she’s at number 2. She’s got a weird personal mythology thing going on, which apparently the video plays into somehow.

3. DMA’s – “How Many Dreams”

Australian MOR guitar band. Their previous album got to number 4, so this is in similar territory.

9. De La Soul – “3 Feet High and Rising”

We had this album a month ago when it hit streaming services and got to number 12, which was already a (marginal) all time peak for it. It’s back now because of the physical release, which gets it into the top ten for the first time. De La Soul’s highest placing album remains the 1991 follow-up, “De La Soul Is Dead”, which reached number 7.

10. Davido – “Timeless”

More Nigerian music, which is having a really good year commercially. Davido was actually born in Atlanta, but he was raised in Lagos. This is his fourth album, and the first to make the album top 40 – its predecessor only got to number 88.

35. Bury Tomorrow – “The Seventh Sun”

Their previous album, 2020’s “Cannibal”, reached number 10. This is a return to the sort of places they were getting in  the mid 2010s, however. There’s been a line-up change since the last album, with the departure of the original singer.

37. The Who & The Isobel Griffiths Orchestra – “The Who With Orchestra – Live At Wembley”

Don’t worry, it’s not one of those “whack an orchestra behind an old vocal track” albums – it is indeed a proper live album from 2019 with the remaining members of the Who and an orchestra.