{"id":2846,"date":"2014-12-16T22:30:09","date_gmt":"2014-12-16T22:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=2846"},"modified":"2014-12-16T22:30:09","modified_gmt":"2014-12-16T22:30:09","slug":"charts-14-december-2014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=2846","title":{"rendered":"Charts &#8211; 14 December 2014"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s the week before the Christmas chart,\u00a0and so effectively the last regular chart of the year &#8211; though\u00a0by this time\u00a0the regular music industry has already\u00a0gone into its festive shutdown. \u00a0The result is, with one\u00a0unusual exception, a week\u00a0of comparatively\u00a0niche releases that did well at the start of the week and tailed off badly, and the usual upward march of the Christmas classics.<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/tlYcUqEPN58\" target=\"_blank\">39. \u00a0Ed Sheeran &#8211; &#8220;Sing&#8221;<\/a><br \/>\n<\/strong><a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/tA8AfQaUnXM\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>37. \u00a0Ella Henderson &#8211; &#8220;Ghost&#8221;<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>A couple of long running records, both number 1s in June, re-entering at the bottom end due to lack of competition from new releases. \u00a0&#8220;Sing&#8221; joins &#8220;Thinking Out Loud&#8221; and &#8220;Don&#8217;t&#8221; to give Sheeran three songs in this week&#8217;s chart. \u00a0Henderson&#8217;s current single &#8220;Yours&#8221; drops to 20 this week.<\/p>\n<p><strong>35. \u00a0Wizzard &#8211; &#8220;I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ZoxQ4Ul_DME?rel=0\" width=\"400\" height=\"300\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><!--more-->Another hardy perennial, this has been making regular re-entries\u00a0since 2007. \u00a0The other\u00a0Christmas back catalogue chart entires this year are &#8220;Last Christmas&#8221; at 36, &#8220;All I Want For Christmas Is You&#8221; at 16, and &#8220;Fairytale of New York&#8221; at 11 &#8211;\u00a0its highest position since 2006, albeit marginally.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/6h5urD1fTtM\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>34. \u00a0Union J &#8211; &#8220;You Got It All&#8221;<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I don&#8217;t normally mention fallers,\u00a0but this\u00a0one is pretty spectacular. \u00a0Union J were number 1 in last week&#8217;s midweeks before winding up at 2 on Saturday. \u00a0They now fall 32 places in their second week out. \u00a0Yes, all boy bands have front loaded first week sales, but even the likes of McFly never saw a top 5 new entry tail off quite this fast. \u00a0Union J seem to be an act with literally almost no appeal outside their fan base. \u00a0Which is understandable when the record is this bad.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/MYSVMgRr6pw\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>22. \u00a0Hozier &#8211; &#8220;Take Me To Church&#8221;<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Worth noting also that this one isn&#8217;t going away &#8211; it&#8217;s been floating around the bottom end of the chart for 13 weeks now, and reaches a new peak today.<\/p>\n<p><strong>21. \u00a0Fifth Harmony &#8211; &#8220;Bo$$&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Y4JfPlry-iQ?rel=0\" width=\"400\" height=\"225\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Number 10 in the midweeks, so this must have fallen off a cliff. \u00a0American girl band Fifth Harmony&#8217;s debut UK hit is\u00a0undeniably weird,\u00a0starting with a perfectly decent brass hook, setting up the ever popular &#8220;independent women&#8221; theme, and then\u2026 repeatedly namechecking Michelle Obama. \u00a0&#8220;Michelle Obama \/ Purse so heavy \/ Getting Oprah dollars&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>So, somebody writing this\u00a0song apparently thinks Michelle Obama is\u00a0emblematic of (a) bling, and (b) independent women. \u00a0I don&#8217;t recall her being particularly bling-laden, and you&#8217;d have thought there were better examples of independence than the First Lady, who is, after all, ultimately stuck within the framework of being a professional spouse. \u00a0At any rate, it&#8217;s certainly not a reference point that travels internationally, which might explain why this\u00a0lands up missing the top 20.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s tempting to wonder if this is some sort of dazzling piece of self-aware absurdism, but that seems unlikely,\u00a0because Fifth Harmony are a Simon Cowell project. \u00a0They were the girl group formed from random auditions in the second season of the US\u00a0<em>X Factor<\/em>. \u00a0I kind of like\u00a0the sheer randomness of this track, and the hook is genuinely pretty good, but it&#8217;s a weird, weird record, certainly once it crosses the Atlantic.<\/p>\n<p><strong>17. \u00a0Bring Me The Horizon &#8211; &#8220;Drown&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/TkV5709EG5M?rel=0\" width=\"400\" height=\"225\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>This was at 6 in the midweeks, so again, sales clearly didn&#8217;t hold up.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;What doesn&#8217;t kill you \/ Makes you wish you were dead \/ I&#8217;ve got a hole in my soul growing deeper and deeper\u2026&#8221; &#8211; you couldn&#8217;t call them subtle, could you?\u00a0 Bring Me The Horizon used to be a metal core band but they&#8217;re apparently going commercial, and are duly rewarded with their first hit single &#8211; a surprisingly high one even in their current form, though they have had hit albums before.<\/p>\n<p>According to Wikipedia, this song &#8220;shows a departure from\u00a0the band&#8217;s past heavier sound&#8221;, as there is &#8220;absolutely no screaming or profanity in the entire song&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/syFZfO_wfMQ\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>7. \u00a0One Direction &#8211; &#8220;Night Changes&#8221;<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Climbing 12 as\u00a0the single promotion continues, making it this week&#8217;s highest climber. \u00a0Again, the contrast with Union J is pretty stark. \u00a0One Direction records, whatever else you say about them, actually gain momentum\u00a0the more you play them to a wider public.<\/p>\n<p><strong>5. \u00a0Oliver Heldens\u00a0featuring KStewart &#8211; &#8220;Last All Night (Koala)&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/8e_Vn3M79ao?rel=0\" width=\"400\" height=\"225\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The follow up to &#8220;Gecko (Overdrive)&#8221;, which had a week at number 1 in July. \u00a0As usual, the UK record label has whacked a vocal onto it; the European original was an instrumental, though it wasn&#8217;t actually a hit anywhere in that form. \u00a0It has <a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/y5tMw-dgLkI\" target=\"_blank\">a completely different\u00a0martial arts themed video<\/a> that doesn&#8217;t really work.<\/p>\n<p>Singer KStewart\u00a0makes her debut chart appearance. \u00a0She sings\u00a0for a <a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/LPTE9SxYUVE\" target=\"_blank\">group called Bondax<\/a>, who haven&#8217;t had any hits, and she released a rather good lounge-ish solo single called <a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/oZ9w33jkjeE\" target=\"_blank\">&#8220;Tell Me &#8216;Bout That&#8221;<\/a> earlier this year.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/i1jeiC-JEsI\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>3. \u00a0Band Aid 30 &#8211; &#8220;Do They Know It&#8217;s Christmas? (2014)&#8221;<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Rebounding because of the release of the CD single,\u00a0which you can buy in places like Starbucks. \u00a0That&#8217;s not enough to get it to number 1, or even 2, so we can be pretty sure that Band Aid are out of contention for next week&#8217;s Christmas number 1.<\/p>\n<p>This version of Band Aid has been reasonably successful and\u00a0has obviously raised useful money &#8211;\u00a0but it hasn&#8217;t\u00a0been the mass event of earlier versions, and there have been\u00a0a lot more\u00a0murmurings this time about the song being a bit patronising to Africans. \u00a0Bob\u00a0Geldof&#8217;s annoyance at this sort of reaction is understandable enough on the level of it distracting from the fundraising exercise (and given that he&#8217;s been essentially retired for years, it&#8217;s hard to see this as\u00a0anything other than wholly sincere on his part).<\/p>\n<p>That being said, it really isn&#8217;t the best song that could have been chosen for\u00a0the ebola outbreak. \u00a0It\u00a0was written with famine on the other side of the continent in mind;\u00a0and of the five African countries where ebola has claimed lives, only\u00a0Liberia is actually Christian, so if they are indeed unaware that it&#8217;s Christmas, this may well because they&#8217;re mostly Muslims.<\/p>\n<p><strong>1. \u00a0Mark Ronson featuring Bruno Mars &#8211; &#8220;Uptown Funk&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/OPf0YbXqDm0?rel=0\" width=\"400\" height=\"225\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>This wasn&#8217;t scheduled to come out until January, but it&#8217;s been rush-released after <a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/N9Wq7B_VV_U\" target=\"_blank\">a cover on\u00a0<em>X Factor<\/em><\/a>\u00a0by Fleur East unexpectedly\u00a0resulted in the <em>X Factor<\/em> download racing to the top of the iTunes chart. \u00a0It&#8217;s a rare case of\u00a0<em>X Factor<\/em> doing an unreleased song, and you have to approach these stories with a certain degree of scepticism, but like I say, this is not a week where most major labels deliberately release singles; they expect to lose their momentum while the radio stations are\u00a0doing Christmas songs and end of year reviews.<\/p>\n<p>Fleur East\u00a0wound up coming second in\u00a0Sunday&#8217;s final, which is probably good news all round, because\u00a0it means she&#8217;ll get signed anyway and\u00a0promoted as a proper artist. \u00a0As for winner Ben Haenow, we&#8217;ll be seeing him next week, because Simon Cowell has decided that it&#8217;s safe to try for the Christmas Number 1 again. \u00a0He&#8217;s obviously the favourite, but then again, this year&#8217;s\u00a0<em>X Factor<\/em> has had the lowest audience figures since season 1 &#8211; so it&#8217;s not inconceivable that it might fail to sustain its sales over a week. \u00a0I wouldn&#8217;t bet on it, though. \u00a0We haven&#8217;t had\u00a0a regular release &#8211; by which I mean a non-novelty, non-<em>X Factor<\/em>, non-campaign,\u00a0non-charity single &#8211; as the\u00a0Christmas number 1 since\u00a0&#8220;Mad World&#8221; back in 2003. \u00a0The Official Charts Company is claiming today that the race is &#8220;incredibly close&#8221;, but this is slightly disingenuous, because the chart week starts\u00a0on Sunday,\u00a0so Ronson has an advantage of most of a day over Haenow, and Haenow&#8217;s CD single doesn&#8217;t hit stores until Wednesday. \u00a0Normally physical sales are trivial these days, but records like this, stocked in supermarkets as impulse buys, are an exception.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s Bruno Mars&#8217; fifth number one, coming\u00a0three years and eight singles after the last one &#8211; though he has had two number 2 hits during that time. \u00a0His previous number ones were &#8220;Nothing on You&#8221; (2010,\u00a0with B.o.B.), &#8220;Just the Way You Are&#8221; (2010), &#8220;Grenade&#8221; (2011), and &#8220;The Lazy Song&#8221; (2011).<\/p>\n<p>Mark Ronson gets his first number one, though\u00a0he reached number\u00a02 twice in 2007 &#8211; with Daniel Merriweather on &#8220;Stop Me&#8221;, and Amy Winehouse on &#8220;Valerie&#8221;. \u00a0I find &#8220;Uptown Funk&#8221; a bit over-polished to really hit the mark, but it&#8217;s indisputably a\u00a0genuine hit.<\/p>\n<p>On the album chart:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>&#8220;X&#8221; by Ed Sheeran<\/strong> returns to number 1 again, so a lot of people are getting an album they already own for Christmas.<\/li>\n<li><strong>&#8220;You Got It All&#8221; by Union J<\/strong> limps in at 28.<\/li>\n<li><strong>&#8220;2014 Forest Hills Drive&#8221; by J. Cole<\/strong> enters at 33. \u00a0That&#8217;s a bit of a disappointment, after his last album &#8220;Born Sinner&#8221; made the top 10. \u00a0Single: <a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/eRaFMlZ1YHA\" target=\"_blank\">&#8220;Apparently&#8221;<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s the week before the Christmas chart,\u00a0and so effectively the last regular chart of the year &#8211; though\u00a0by this time\u00a0the regular music industry has already\u00a0gone into its festive shutdown. \u00a0The result is, with one\u00a0unusual exception, a week\u00a0of comparatively\u00a0niche releases that did well at the start of the week and tailed off badly, and the usual [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2846"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2846\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2855,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2846\/revisions\/2855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}