This week's Official UK Singles Chart
The first single this year to spend longer than a fortnight at the top does so in quite an impressive style, Crazy by Gnarls Barkley selling well into six figures for the second week in succession. All this is at the expense of No Promises, the second single from X Factor winner Shayne Ward which lands at Number 2 with a sale that would in previous weeks have been enough to make it an easy chart-topper but which today just gives it at Number 2 placing. If you want my honest opinion though to see No Promises at Number One would have been a huge travesty. It is half the record his debut That's My Goal was, a track that would struggle to make a Westlife b-side and not a record which suggests his chart career will last beyond the end of the year. Still, he has at least made it to a second hit single, one more than his predecessor Steve Brookstein managed.
The release of the single appears to have had a positive effect on the other X-factor related available product. Chico's It's Chico Time reverses its chart decline quite spectacularly, soaring 26-13 whilst even That's My Goal goes on the rebound, soaring 67-36 to reach the Top 40 for the first time since the end of February.
The second biggest new hit of the week lands inside the Top 5 on downloads alone. SOS is Rihanna's third single, the follow-up to If It's Lovin That You Want which hit Number 11 back in December. It isn't hard to see why this track has such a buzz about it already, a stomping pop track that owes more than a little to Tainted Love for its instrumental arrangement. With the CD single set to hit the shops this week, it stands a very good chance of at least matching the Number 2 placing of her debut hit Pon De Replay which charted in September last year.
In at Number 14 this week are Hard-Fi who make Better Do Better the fifth track to be taken from the Stars Of CCTV album. It was a bold marketing move, given that most of the strongest tracks from the long player are familiar to most but it seems to have been worthwhile, the single landing nicely at Number 14, duplicating the peak of the re-release Cash Machine which hit the chart back in January. It does, of course, mean that Hard To Beat remains their only Top 10 hit to date - but then given that it is easily their best track so far makes perfect sense.
Just one place below, Here We Go from Trina makes a flying leap into the Top 20 after landing at Number 65 last week on downloads only. The sparky female rap star is actually now on her third album but this single marks her long overdue commercial breakthrough in this country. The single is doubtless helped by the presence of a guest vocal from Kelly Rowland whose smooth R&B parts contrast nicely with the grimy staccato nature of Trina's own lines. Destiny's Child aside, this is the first time Kelly Rowland has had a chart single since August 2003 when Train On A Track hit Number 20. Trina's only other Top 75 single came back in 2002 when No Panties went commando [oh bravo!] at Number 45.
Also charting on downloads only last week, albeit at a non-canon Number 87 is the multi-talented Jamie Foxx's Unpredictable which this week makes an official chart debut at Number 16. Really it was about time that the Oscar-winner had a hit under hit own steam, his most famous singles chart moments to date being on iconic hits with others - namely Twista's Slow Jamz and of course his turn on Kanye West's Gold Digger. Actually the single isn't that much to write home about but in both its R&B and reggae mixes has enough charm and sunshine to make it a welcome playlist addition. The single also features a vocal turn from the ever willing to please Ludacris who can now count six different artists with whom he has had a UK Top 40 hit, these alongside his own solo performances.
Jacko single of the week is Smooth Criminal which limps in at Number 19, the worst chart performance to date for any of these re-releases. We've skipped over Another Part Of Me (which only came with a shoddy concert performance in which Jackson appeared to not even know the tune to his own song) to get to this single which hit the charts first time around in November 1988. The gangster-themed video for the track was a sequence taken from the fantasy film Moonwalker which was, of course, a self-indulgent mess but which thousand flocked to see when it hit the cinemas the following spring. In truth the video was just about the only thing that gave the single a chance even at the time, the track famous for all the wrong reasons for its risible "Annie Are You OK?" chorus which sounded like it was knocked off in a lunch break.
Landing at Number 26 this week on downloads only is Fall Out Boy's Dance Dance, a single which should hopefully move upwards next week with the arrival of the CD single. It's a fascinating choice for a single as the track is the "original" version of one which appeared in remix form on one of the b-sides of their last hit Sugar We're Going Down. Needless to say, it is more common to feature a remixed version of a past single as the b-side of a newer one. Fall Out Boy appear to be doing it backwards.
Just a place below at Number 27 are Gorillaz with Kids With Guns/El Manana. After three Top 10 hits with the other singles from their second album this seems something of a comedown but in actual fact, their releases are just following the pattern set by their first album back in 2001. Similarly, they had big hits with the first three only for the fourth Tomorrow Comes Today to limp in at Number 33 and out again as swiftly as it came.
One act who sadly can't use the "download only" excuse are Studio B whose new single C'mon Get It On lands at Number 28 on physical sales. The track is the follow-up to the bizarrely popular I See Girls which hit Number 12 just over a year ago and then spent most of the summer hanging around the chart. The new track actually deserves a little better than this but is set to be nothing more than a chart footnote.
Sadly this is also the case for the Number 29 single I Feel It by Norwegian trio Lorraine. For months the name to drop in trendy circles, their debut single was hailed by many publications as the second coming and the record which was going to save the year from mediocrity. You know what? I'd be inclined to agree with them. The track is a magical electronic symphony, at one point sounding like the Pet Shop Boys performing New Order, the next coming across like the Cocteau Twins backing OMD. Originally released on an indie label last summer, this marks their major label debut - something which makes the relative failure of the track all the harder to stomach. I'm sure there is better to come for them, but in the meantime check this track out online if you've not done so already. It should actually make your week.
