This week's Official UK Singles Chart

This week's Official UK Albums Chart

By now you would have thought we'd all learned not to assume things. Based on sales flashes throughout the week and indeed the official midweek report on Wednesday it seemed a racing certainty that we would this week see a changing of the guard at the top of the Official UK Singles chart. Bills by Lunchmoney Lewis was a lock for Number One and further speculation was unnecessary.

Not so. Following what we are told is a 'late surge' over the weekend it is Cheerleader by OMI which retains its chart-topping crown and spends a third week at the top of the British charts - for those keeping track no less than the fourth single this year to stay at Number One longer than a fortnight. Once again though the combined singles chart masks a fascinating story for the biggest selling single of the week was indeed Bills, and by some considerable margin too. What hurt it, however, was our old friend the digital stream. As is now becoming only too apparent the market for buying music exists in parallel to that for streaming and to conquer the charts you now need to command domination in both. With the most listened to singles now regularly exceeding 3 million plays a week - equating to an extra 30,000 chart "sales" - you simply cannot rely on your paid for purchases to propel you to the top.

So it proves this week. Lunchmoney Lewis sold 78,000 singles to the 57,000 of OMI. But that 21,000 gap was more than bettered by the extra 31,600 sales credited to Cheerleader thanks to its streams. Bills by comparison was streamed just 700,000 times and so added just 7,000 extra sales to its total. The result is a comprehensive 89,000 to 78,000 victory to the incumbent Number One single.

None of this is to take anything away from the appeal and quality of the Lunchmoney Lewis track which debuts this week at Number 2. Driven throughout by a boogie-woogie piano it is essentially the kind of record Fats Domino would be producing were he still active today. It helps to make Bills one of the more divertingly different and above all fun singles of the moment. For now, its low-level streaming performance has cost it a week of glory at the top of the charts, but it would be foolish to write it off forever.

The other big new arrival of the week is the latest clubland sensation. Runway (U and I) from Swedish duo Galantis lands at Number 4.

Having been available since November on David Guetta's album Listen, his single Hey Mama has taken time to catch fire but appears now to be growing in ferocity, jumping 47-17 this week. It is the third time the Frenchman has collaborated with Nicki Minaj on a hit single, and given that both Where Them Girls At? and Turn Me On were both comfortable Top 10 hits in 2011 it would be foolish not to predict the same things for this irresistibly catchy single. The other credited performer on the track is Afrojack whose only Top 10 single to date has been his cameo role on Pitbull's Give Me Everything which topped the charts, also back in 2011.

It was Christmas the last time any record managed two weeks in a row at Number One at the top of the Official UK Album chart, so the fact that Mumford & Sons manage to cling on to Number One with Wilder Mind is a matter for some commendation. The highest new entry of the week is Eric Clapton's new compilation Forever Man which debuts at Number 8. The album is named after the track which first appeared on his 1985 album Behind The Sun and which reached Number 51 in March that year.