Justin Bieber regains top spot in the singles chart. Adele gets a sixth week at number one in the albums chart.

Justin Bieber returns to number one in the final chart of 2015. Adele continues her residence at the top of the albums chart.

After being displaced last week, Justin Bieber’s Love Yourself returns to the summit to get a fourth week at number one. It is the 49th song to return to the top in the same chart run. It is the fifth 2015 number one to spend at least four weeks at the top. In 2014, there was just one.

In the last four months of the year (this week’s chart is counted as the last of 2015), Bieber has spent eleven weeks at the top of the singles chart having previously spent precisely zero weeks at the summit in any year. The last act to spend eleven weeks atop the singles chart without also topping the albums chart that year was Englebert Humperdinck in 1967. Those weeks came from two songs, Release Me (six weeks at the top) and The Last Waltz (five weeks). The two songs were the two best-selling songs of that year.

Sorry moves back up to number two to give Bieber another week occupying the top two positions in the singles chart.

It’s not just the top two singles that have climbed one place. The whole of this week’s top five is made up of one place climbers. Adele’s Hello is at number three, Justin Bieber’s what Do You Mean is at number four and Grace and G-Eazy are in fifth place with You Don’t Own Me. With three songs in the top four again, Bieber adds another week to his record-breaking chart domination.

After entering at number one last week, the Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Choir suffers a record-breaking drop to number 29.

The biggest “natural” drop from the summit is held by McFly’s Baby’s Coming Back / Transylvania which crashed to number twenty in its second week in 2007. One of the 2005 Elvis Presley re-releases, One Night / I Got Stung, also dropped to number twenty, but that was a limited edition, so it was always going to slump in its second week. The biggest drop in the sales chart was set in December last year when Union J’s You Got It All tumbled to number 22, but that only reached number two after streaming data was added to compile the Official Chart.

The shortest top forty run for a number one single, excluding limited edition, festive or charity releases, is three weeks. Blur’s second number one single, Beetlebum, fell to number seven after seven days at the top. A week later it fell to number 29, before leaving the top forty the following week. It did, however, get a further three weeks in the top 75 with a seventh week added after a gap of a couple months. McFly then equalled that record with Baby’s Coming Back / Transylvania just clinging on to a top forty place (at number 39) in its third chart week. Another Elvis re-release, Jailhouse Rock spent just two weeks in the top forty before returning after a two week absence.

The NHS Choir’s fall matches that of Christina Aguilera’s 28-place fall from the albums chart summit with Bionic in 2010. Continuing with the chart records, Louisa Johnson gets another place in the unwanted X Factor records book. Forever Young has left the top fortty after just two weeks, easily the shortest chart run for a winner’s single.

Thanks to zeuss at Buzzjack / orthon at Haven for the Union J and Englebert Humperdinck information.

With all but one of the Christmas songs all dropping out, something had to replace them. As in previous years, the gaps have been filled by re-entries. Two of them come from Fetty Wap, Trap Queen at number 40 and the equally dreadful 679 at number 32. Walk The Moon’s Shut Up And Dance re-enters at number 27, R City and Adam Leven jump back in at number 28, Little Mix are back with their Black Magic at number 30 and One Direction’s Drag Me Down has dragged itself back up to number 31. Ellie Goulding’s On My Mind returns at number 33. Arianna Grande is back at number 35 with Focus, Jamie Lawson re-enters at 36 with Wasn’t Expecting That and Sam Smith’s Bond theme Writing’s On The Wall reappears at number 38.

The sole Christmas survivor is Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas Is You at number 37, taking its number of weeks in the top forty up to 45 weeks.

In the 1970s, it was not unusual to see a song return to the chart just a few years after it had been a hit. Some even returned again after another relatively short gap. With vinyl the only format for singles, demand for a song would build up after the record company ceased pressing new copies, particularly if it continued to get played regularly on the relatively few radio stations available at the time. Then, they would re-release the song and, if they had judged it right, it would be a hit all over again.

Among the songs to benefit from this are Procol Harum’s A Whiter Shade Of Pale, Moody Blues’ Nights In White Satin, Free’s All Right Now and Hawkwind’s Silver Machine. The vocalist on the last of those songs was Ian Kilmister, better known as Lemmy who died this week, just two days after being diagnosed with cancer and only four days after his 70th birthday. A few years after Silver Machine’s first chart outing, Lemmy formed Motörhead. He remained the only constant member of the band over the next forty years.

Motörhead’s best-known hit is Ace Of Spades which reached number fifteen in 1980. Inevitably, it was the most-downloaded Lemmy-associated song in the days immediately following his death. While it hasn’t made the top forty, other Motörhead seem to have waited until the new chart week before downloading Ace Of Spades, so perhaps it will chart higher next week.

Incidentally, as I have mentioned All Right Now, I should add a very belated nod to Andy Fraser, Free’s bassist and songwriter who died in March 2015.

The last week of 2015 also saw the death of Leeds-born Stevie Wright, singer of Australian band The Easybeats (Friday On My Mind, 1966), one week after his 68th birthday. Friday On My Mind was voted the best Australian song of all time in 2001 by the Australasian Performing Rights Association. Rolf Harris must have been devastated. The music world also lost John Bradbury, the drummer with The Specials. Bradbury was the second member of The Specials to die in 2015, following Rico Rodriguez in September.

There is still no shifting Adele from the top of the albums chart as 25 extends its stay to six weeks. It is her 30th week at the top of the albums chart with just three albums. This matches the total achieved by Cliff Richard (with seven chart-topping albums) to put her joint ninth in the all-time list. The Carpenters, Madonna and Take That drop to joint eleventh.

Elvis Presley and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra get another week at number two with If I Can Dream while Justin Bieber’s Purpose stays put at number three. Jess Glynne climbs one place to number four with I Cry When I Laugh. One Direction complete the top five with Made In The AM climbing to number five.

Ed Sheeran’s × climbs back into the top ten to make it a total of 75 weeks in the upper tier. There are big climbs for The Weeknd, up fourteen places to number thirteen with Beauty behind The Madness, Years & Years, up seventeen to number fifteen with Communion and The Beatles’ 1, climbing eleven to number seventeen. Hozier’s eponymous debut is up twenty places to number nineteen and Mumford & Sons jump seventeen places to number 21.

As with the singles chart, there are no new entries but there is a string of re-entries. Bring Me The Horizon’s That’s The Spirit leads the way, re-entering at number 28. Oasis’s Greatest Hits set, Time Flies, is one place behind at number 29 with Jamie Lawson back at number 32 following an appearance on the Christmas Top Of The Pops. Sigma re-enter at number 34, Abba Gold is back at number 35 (its 218th week in the top forty) and Ben Haenow returns at number 38.

That’s it for this week. A Happy New Year to you all.