This week's Official UK Singles Chart
This week's Official UK Albums Chart
[And now, for one of the most notorious chart weeks of the decade, when a former politician died and.... well, if you've come this far then you know the story already].
For the second week running Need U (100 Percent) by Duke Dumont featuring A*M*E is the Number One single on the Official UK Singles Chart and for the second week running is a Number One single remarkable by its lack of remarkability. This time around the issue is not so much its own lack of talking point but simply because its presence at the top of the chart is overshadowed almost totally by the extraordinary events immediately below.
Anyone familiar with the workings of this country over the last two decades or so will be aware that particular moments in public life or involving public figures tend to turn a section of the British public ever so slightly potty. Last Monday an 87-year-old Grandmother died peacefully in bed after a period of ill health and after a long and satisfying life. This appeared to be a long-awaited cue for a small group of people to play a game of who could behave in the most loathsome manner (an unusual game in which there are no winners but an overabundance of losers). Within 24 hours the idea had been hit upon to buy a short piece of music from the famous 1939 musical version of The Wizard Of Oz, not out of appreciation for the music of course, but simply because it had a title calculated to cause the maximum amount of offence and outrage. The result is the rather regrettable and distasteful presence on the singles chart of a 74-year-old 49-second track whose title I won't dignify by naming here. As it rose up the hourly sales rankings during the week a larger number of eyes than usual were on its final resting place - as it happens Number 2 although some way off the pace of the record at the top.
The puzzling thing is that the old lady in question - Mrs Thatcher - during her time in office inspired a grand list of passionately felt and eloquently worded protest singles to rank amongst some of pop music's finest polemics and the crowdsourced idea to buy any one of them to place it on the bestsellers list to make some kind of statement would have represented a rather classier method of expression. As it stands the most notable record on the singles chart this week stands as a totem to a lack of humanity and dignity and as political statements is on the same intellectual level as those who think that changing their Facebook picture makes a contribution to world peace.
One side effect of the Number 2 single this week was to thrust the BBC's own weekly chart show into the fray, the producers and managers at Radio One faced with the prospect of a major hit single putting them in violation of broadcasting standards of taste and decency if they chose to air it with a full explanation of its context. After much speculation, it was announced that they would instead air a clip of the track as part of a brief news report explaining just why people had bought the track. The chart officially records the performers as "Wizard Of Oz Film Cast" although naturally among their number is Judy Garland who thus registers only her second ever chart hit, following Number 18 track The Man That Got Away which was a hit in June 1955.
To further complete the madness, at the tail end of the week those who sit on the other side of the debate converged on a single of their own which was the subject of an attempted chartjack of its own, swiftly soaring to the live Top 10s of the online stores although ultimately the sales came rather too late in the week for the single to make the impact it might well have done. Nonetheless to compete with the Wizard Of Oz track we have the old punk single I'm In Love With Margaret Thatcher as performed by the Notsensibles at Number 35. Originally released as a small independent single in 1979, the track was rescued from obscurity by its use in the soundtrack of the recent film The Iron Lady and hence its rediscovery by those seeking to use the charts to pay a more positive and tasteful tribute - even if the song itself is a rather obvious and heavy-handed satire. But this week hasn't been about music - just song titles as they appear on a chart countdown.
Back to normality, and we have forward progress for other singles such as Taylor Swift's 22 which advances to a brand new peak of Number 9 after three weeks lodged just outside the Top 10. The track duly becomes the third Top 10 hit from her current album Red. A few places below are Imagine Dragons who move 18-12 with Radioactive, the single now on its 20th consecutive week on the singles chart and on the verge of completing what will be one of the slowest ever climbs to the Top 10 in chart history.
As a hip-hop performer who is female, white and Australian Iggy Azalea uniquely avoids every single cliché of the genre going to make her one of urban music's more distinctive prospects. She made her UK chart debut at the end of last year as guest performer on Steve Aoki's Beat Down which made Number 44 but she now has a Top 20 hit under her own steam as the single Work rises 16 places to Number 20.
One place below is the week's second highest new entry as Nina Nesbitt makes her own chart debut with Stay Out. Having been mentored by Ed Sheeran, the Scottish singer-songwriter made a cameo appearance in the video for his hit Drunk after the pair toured together last year. Although driven by the title track, Stay Out is actually available as an EP of four songs, the fourth she has released since late 2011 but the first to gain any kind of chart traction.
Paramore crash in at Number 26 with Still Into You, the single making a flying leap back up the chart after it first peaked at Number 56 three weeks ago. The occasion is the release of their brand new self-titled album which shoulders Justin Timberlake out of the way to debut at Number One on the album chart, their second in a row following in the footsteps of 2009's Brand New Eyes.
Clues as to what the top end of the singles chart may look like in a few weeks time can be gleaned from the 65-31 leap by High School by Nicki Minaj & Lil Wayne and the debut at Number 57 of the new Little Mix single How Ya Doin'. Based on both the Curiosity Killed The Cat single Name And Number and Zoom by Fat Larry's Band, the single charts early as a result of radio airplay in its album version, the full single release in a few weeks time set to feature a guest turn from Missy Elliott.
Meanwhile 2012 worldwide sensation Psy is attempting to capture lightning in a bottle with new single Gentleman which debuts at a lowly Number 61 after being released on Friday and thus with just two days sales behind it. Mind you, Number 61 was the exact same point that Gangnam Style entered the charts at the tail end of last year. Whether anyone cares about him enough to make him more than a one-hit wonder remains to be seen. If only he'd sung something about witches.
