Monday, September 17, 2007

The King, The Tenor and The Drummer Breathe Life into Stagnant Chart

With the top four singles clinging to their positions for a second straight week, the UK singles chart has a surprising déjà vu feel.

Sean Kingston sits tight at number one with ‘Beautiful Girls’ while Plain White T's hang on to the runner up spot with ‘Hey There Delilah’. Kanye West’s ‘Stronger’ holds tight at three and James Blunt remains at four with ‘1973’.

50 Cent featuring Justin Timberlake and Timbaland climb three spots with ‘Ayo Technology’ to claim a new peak of number five. Rihanna stalls at six with ‘Shut Up And Drive’, while Girls Aloud slip to seven with ‘Sexy No No No’.

A pair of former number ones fill the eight and nine positions. First off, the brilliant dance record ‘With Every Heartbeat’ by Robyn with Kleerup and the infectious ‘The Way I Are’ by Timberland. Rounding out the top 10, Scouting For Girls slip one notch with ‘She's So Lovely’.

Just below the top ten at 11, retro groove singers Booty Luv jump 31 – 11 with their third R&B remake ‘Don't Mess With My Man’. A fine tune that deserves all the attention.

Up 12 spots from where it debuted on the charts last week, the death of Luciano Pavarotti nearly guaranteed a chart re-release of his most famous work, ‘Nessun Dorma’. Performed at his funeral last week, this single climbs the chart based on downloads alone. This chart performance marks the great tenor’s first posthumous hit.

Two slots down Elvis Presley, no stranger to chart hits from beyond the grave, returns with ‘Party’. This somewhat obscure chart single from the late fifties comes as part of the campaign to re-release all his chart singles to coincide with the King’s 30th death anniversary.

White Stripes are still alive and kicking, however, they are probably kicking themselves over the poor chart performance of latest single ‘You Don't Know What Love Is’ which limps into the charts at 18.

Down four, Armand Van Helden mixes Taylor Dayne’s ‘Do you want it right now’ from her 1987 debut album into ‘I Want Your Soul’, the second cut from his gender bending album ‘Gettoblaster’. A must on any dance floor.

Continuing the retro trend this week, Phil Collins makes an impressive return to the charts with his first solo single from 1981, ‘In The Air Tonight’. This classic Collins track climbs up on downloads alone after featuring in a series of television commercials.

Two new tracks enter in the mid twenties. In at 26, Taio Cruz moves in with ‘Moving On’ while at 27, the Chemical Brothers dip in with a rather ridiculous concept song, ‘The Salmon Dance’. After one spin, you’ll wish you could swim upstream to get away from it.

New at 31, Andy Lewis & Paul Weller with ‘Are You Trying To Be Lonely’. An odd choice for a single in this decade, it sounds more like a talent show gimmick from a late seventies variety show. Completely awful.

Inching up three places from last week, the brilliant Peter Bjorn & John bring their summer influenced ‘Young Folks’ deeper into the top 40.

By all rights, this song should go top ten for at least a month. Considering this is the re-release of said single, the probability of this happening is slim. Still, a killer tune no matter what its chart performance.


Dave Spoon Ft Lisa Maffia dance into the top 40 at 36 with ‘Bad Girl (at Night)’. Not a bad dance track but as a single it sounds too close to wallpaper to truly enjoy.

Hi Tack, the remixers behind last year’s dubbed version of the Paul McCartney/ Michael Jackson team up on ‘Say Say Say’, return to the charts at 38 with ‘Let’s Dance’ based around the David Bowie song. Not a bad dance record, if a little too faithful to the original for a new production. Strip away the electric beeps and you essentially have the eighty’s recording.

Last but not least, Akon debuts at number 40 with an open letter to the people he’s hurt due to his huge success amassed over the last year.

‘Sorry Blame It On Me’ sums up the chart nicely this week.

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