Play Long
The Official UK Albums chart is 70 years old this year. At least that is if you take the date of the first such listings published in Melody Maker, a set of charts that were incorporated into the canon at the turn of the millennium. So you might argue it is entire appropriate that we begin this anniversary year with a notable new record being set.
Britpop, Robbie Williams' fourteenth studio album, and his first of that kind in almost seven years, was originally slated for release next month - this a revised date after it was realised that going head to head with Taylor Swift last autumn was an exercise in futility. The date had been advertised, physical pre-orders were in and everyone was happy. Only for him last week to go "fuck it, have it now" and flung it out on digital platforms. Leaving said physical purchasers naturally fuming. A spontaneous go ahead, all part of the long term plan, or fuelled by a realisation that the original date was also going to result in an unfortunate head to head? Whatever the reason, the stunt worked. Britpop is this week's No.1 album and results in Robbie setting a particularly notable record.
He has more No.1 albums than any artist in history. Britpop is his 16th solo No.1, a total that helps him sail past The Beatles who have held the crown for some considerable time. The full roll call of his chart-topping albums over the past 29 years is:
Life Thru A Lens (1997)
I've Been Expecting You (1998)
Sing When You're Winning (2000)
Swing When You're Winning (2001)
Escapology (2002)
Greatest Hits (2004)
Intensive Care (2005)
Rudebox (2006)
In And Out Of Consciousness - Greatest (2010)
Take The Crown (2012)
Swings Both Ways (2013)
The Heavy Entertainment Show (2016)
The Christmas Present (2019)
XXV (2022)
Better Man - OST (2025)
Britpop (2026)
His only album releases not to reach the top are 2003's Live At Knebworth and 2009's Reality Killed The Video Star, both No.2 records themselves. Of course as always when considering Robbie we have to take into account that he was also a member of Take That on three of their chart-topping studio albums as well as all but one of the tracks on their 1996 Greatest Hits collection.
Take Me Dancing
We are four weeks into the new year but have yet to see any 2026 single release make it to No.1. Instead the third singles chart champion of the new calendar is once again a track that has been waiting in the wings for a good few months. 13 weeks after it first debuted at No.5, Raindance by Dave and Tems finally fulfils what you might view as a much delayed destiny and makes it to the very top. This is indeed delayed gratification, as you may recall the single was the surprise No.7 on the Christmas chart and in a world devoid of festive songs would indeed have made it to the top back then. So at the very least justice is now done.
The diverting rap ballad becomes Dave's fourth No.1 single, although fascinatingly the first to actually climb there. It is his first hit to reach the summit since 2023's Sprinter, a total that puts him level with Stormzy. The record for a British rap star is, depending on who you talk to, held either by Dizzee Rascal (who has five to his name) or Tinie Tempah (who has six, but not all are what you would call pure rap hits). That definition of what counts as a rap record also means it is open to debate what the last such record to hit the top was. Arguably it was also Sprinter, given that Chase and Status' Backbone (voiced by Stormzy) was in theory a club track that just happened to feature a rap vocal.
Mine's an IPA if we are arguing this over a pint.
Back to Raindance, and it is notably the first No.1 single for Dave's co-star, 30 year old Temilade Openiyi, aka Tems. The presence of a Nigerian woman at the top of the charts is itself something quite notable. She made her chart debut back in 2021 on Wizkid's No.16 hit Essence, making the Top 10 for the first time the following year on Future's No.8 hit Wait 4 U. She's charted twice as a solo artist, but 2023's No.34 Me and U is as high as she has got. For now, anyway. The track only grew its original video a couple of weeks ago, the chemistry the pair display in it doing little to dispel rumours they are dating in real life.
Devoid
The rest of the Top 10 is largely devoid of action, although we should acknowledge Bruno Mars' I Just Might edging to a new peak of No.5, Zara Larsson's Lush Life reaching a new peak for this chart run of No.7 (it made No.3 when first issued in 2016) and Sienna Spiro returning Die On This Hill to the No.9 peak it first scaled at the end of November - some nine weeks ago.
Meanwhile Olivia Dean's Man I Need may have slipped to No.10 (its lowest position ever with the exception of the two Christmas-dominated charts) but its unadjusted SCR would once more qualify it to be No.1 in place of Raindance. This fact still hasn't stopped being entertaining. Ms Dean has landed herself five BRIT Awards nominations and should hoover up most of them. Remember, the world is a better place when you listen to Olivia Dean.
The highest climber is fascinatingly Stateside from PinkPantheress and the still uncredited Zara Larsson which is now No.12 to become the former's third Top 20 hit single at long last.
Food For Thought
The continuing new year calm (soon to be properly shattered children, soon) leaves room for plenty of other slow burners to smoulder. Now 14 weeks old Think About Us by Sonny Fodera and collaborators reaches the Top 20 for the very first time as it shifts to No.18.
A Walk
A singles chart peppered with golden oldies gets to add one more to the pile - Boys Don't Cry from The Cure, first released in 1979 but not a chart hit until a reworked version in 1986 climbed to No.22. Both versions of the track contribute to its reappearance at No.39, this prompted by much publicity that it has become their first cut of any kind to reach one billion streams on Spotify globally. Although Music Week notes sagaciously that it isn't actually their most streamed track in this country, that honour going to 1992's Friday I'm In Love.
Posh And Tantrum
The most amusing story of the week actually lies well outside the Top 100. I won’t go into the details of the ludicrous feud between Brooklyn Beckham and his celebrity parents, not least because I want to mess with anyone reading this as an archive piece in years to come. But a small online campaign to propel his mother - one Victoria "Posh Spice" Beckham - to No.1 with purchases of her 2001 hit Not Such An Innocent Girl resulted in the track selling 3,578 downloads last week. It does actually top one chart as a result - the old school singles sales list which still exists buried in the Official Charts website. But they all count, right?
See you next week for the grand changing of the guard. If this results in Harry Styles being No.1 for the next 11 weeks then don’t say I didn’t warn you.
