{"id":3490,"date":"2016-07-27T21:55:07","date_gmt":"2016-07-27T20:55:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=3490"},"modified":"2016-07-27T21:55:07","modified_gmt":"2016-07-27T20:55:07","slug":"charts-22-july-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=3490","title":{"rendered":"Charts – 22 July 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

So, I’ve been\u00a0out of town, which is why\u00a0I haven’t got around to\u00a0reviewing\u00a0the\u00a0Uncanny<\/em> arc that finished last week. \u00a0I’ll get\u00a0to it in the next\u00a0couple of days. \u00a0But first, let’s see what’s happened in the chart while I was away…<\/p>\n

Oh.<\/p>\n

1. \u00a0Drake featuring Wizkid & Kyla – “One Dance”<\/strong>\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

Another challenger is seen off, as\u00a0the\u00a0Chainsmokers’ “Don’t Let Me Down”\u00a0falls back to number 3 this week, and\u00a0Drake’s seemingly eternal run\u00a0at the top drones on. \u00a0We’re\u00a0getting to crunch time, because this\u00a0matches the fifteen week run of\u00a0Wet Wet Wet’s “Love Is All Around” in 1994, and one more week will match the all-time record for the longest single stay at number one, set by Bryan Adams’ “(Everything I Do) I Do It For You” in 1991.<\/p>\n

For the\u00a0Official Charts Company, this hasn’t been\u00a0entirely good news, because if anything it’s generating news coverage about how streaming has broken the charts. \u00a0Which isn’t really true. \u00a0The singles chart has two main functions. \u00a0One is to measure popularity, and the\u00a0point of\u00a0a sales chart was supposed to be that sales were a proxy for popularity; if streaming has\u00a0driven out the records that only charted\u00a0on first-day fanbase sales, and clogged up the chart with records that people keep listening to for weeks on end, then that’s\u00a0very likely a better measure of real-world popularity than we had before. \u00a0Granted, the other main function is to promote\u00a0music – that’s why the industry pays for this thing – and it’s not looking so good\u00a0from that standpoint. \u00a0But that’s not really\u00a0our problem.<\/p>\n

And even within the streaming era, “One Dance” is an outlier. \u00a0If it hadn’t been\u00a0around, there would have been a decent turnover of number one singles. \u00a0Its fifteen weeks at number one have seen\u00a0six different number two singles. \u00a0That’s the same as\u00a0“Love Is All Around” had – if you’re interested, the songs in question\u00a0were\u00a0“Come On You Reds” by\u00a0Manchester United FC, “Baby I Love Your Way” by Big Mountain, “I Swear” by All-4-One, “Crazy For You” by Let Loose, “Compliments on Your Kiss” by Red Dragon (me neither), and “Confide In Me” by Kylie Minogue.<\/p>\n

It may look as though nothing is happening, but in fact\u00a0“One Dance” is tailing off,\u00a0and other records are closing in. \u00a0Interestingly, Drake’s record company chose this week to knock the price down to 59p on iTunes. \u00a0That did indeed boost download sales, by around 4,000 compared to the previous week – and\u00a0without those 4,000 copies, it would have dropped to number 2.<\/p>\n

2. \u00a0Jonas Blue featuring JP Cooper – “Perfect Strangers”<\/strong>\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

Swapping places with the Chainsmokers to match the peak of Blue’s\u00a0previous single “Fast Car”. \u00a0There’s also now an acoustic version of this<\/a>, which is predictably more of a showcase for the guest singer.<\/p>\n

9. \u00a0Shawn Mendes – “Treat You Better”<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

This has been a slow burner – it’s moved\u00a031-45-38-29-20-13-9. \u00a0It now gives Mendes a second top ten hit to follow last year’s number one “Stitches”.<\/p>\n

19. \u00a0M\u00d8 – “Final Song”<\/strong><\/p>\n