Taylor Swift loses her positions at the top of the charts to the Demon Hunters cast and Dave.

After three weeks topping the singles and albums charts, Taylor Swift has been toppled from the summit of both of them. Her successor in the singles chart is not exactly new. It is the song toppled by Olivia Dean the week before Swift took over. The third run at the top for Golden by HUNTR/X, EJAE, AUDREY NUNA, REI AMI & KPop Demon Hunters Cast brings its total up to nine weeks at the top.

Taylor Swift's The Fate Of Ophelia slips to number two, one place ahead of Raye’s Where Is My Husband. Raye had her car stolen last year. This week it was found, complete with the songbooks left in it. The loss of those songbooks had led to the postponement of her second album. She is now in a much better position to work on that project. Swift is also at number four with Opalite.

There are three new entries from each of two new albums this week, so it makes sense to talk about both charts together for a while.

The multihyphenate is back! The Official Charts Company used the term to describe Dave in their write-up of Wednesday’s midweek update. As per normal, they are being a little generous. He is a rapper who has done a bit of acting. Alternatively, he is a part-time actor who is also a very successful rapper. 

After modest success with an EP, Dave’s first two full-length albums topped the chart - Psychodrama in 2019 and We’re All Alone In This Together in 2021. Now, after a four-year absence, he has completed a hat-trick with The Boy Who Played The Harp. For the record, there is a harpist on three of the tracks, but she is a woman.

The highest of the three tracks from the album in the singles chart is Raindance, which features Tems, at number five. History, featuring James Blake, is at nine giving Blake a first top ten single credit fifteen years after his only other top forty single. Chapter 16, with added Kano, is at number eleven.

Albums whose songs are largely influenced by the break-up of a relationship are not exactly unusual. However, the lyrics are generally relatively subtle. Lily Allen has chosen to eschew that approach with her new album West End Girl, her first for over seven years. The lyrics are full of outright contempt for her former husband. Oh, hang on. I don’t want to be sued. She doesn’t name anyone, but the assumption is that it is about her former spouse who I won’t name - not that I’d heard of him until this album was released.

Lily Allen does depart from the central theme on one track. At least I assume that Pussy Palace is about a luxury home for stray cats (not to be confused with Brian Seltzer’s band). That song is at number twelve in the singles chart. The title track is at number seventeen and Madeline is at number nineteen. She has now had sixteen top twenty singles. The album itself is at number four. It doesn’t yet have a physical release - the album was written and recorded very quickly, not leaving enough time for CDs and vinyls to be pressed. A physical release is likely to give it a new lease of life, perhaps taking it to number one if it happens in a quiet week. It should certainly beat the one week in the top forty managed by its immediate predecessor.

After my comments on the charting tracks from Taylor Swift’s album a few weeks ago, it is worth acknowledging that only one of the tracks from each of Dave and Lily Allen’s releases are among the three opening tracks.

Returning to the singles chart, there is one more new entry to report. Skye Newman gets her third top forty hit of the year at number eighteen with FU & UF, which I think stands for Fed Up and Under Fire. She made her chart debut earlier this year with Hairdresser and followed it up with the number five hit Family Matters which has returned at number 25..

Today is Hallowe’en which means that people have been streaming songs associated with the supernatural. Today’s streams will, of course, count towards next week’s chart which may mean some of them are in that chart. In this week’s top forty we have Michael Jackson’s classic song Thriller at number 33.

Alex Warren’s Ordinary remains in the top twenty for a 38th successive week. It breaks the record set way back in 1962 by Mr ‘Acker’ Bilk’s Stranger On The Shore. That song does still hold the record for an instrumental.

Taylor Swift’s The Life Of A Showgirl slips to number three in the albums chart. Olivia Dean is at number five with The Art Of Loving.

Bon Jovi last week joined the list of acts shameless enough to release a deluxe edition of an album only a year or so after the original release. Forever reached number three when it was released in June last year. It now gets a second week in the top forty, at number two.

Last week’s commentary contained an oblique reference to a 1970s Elton John album, Don’t Shoot Me I’m Only The Piano Player.. This week’s has a rather more direct reference to another 1970s Elton John album. It is a sign of his longevity that it is now half-a-century since he released his ninth studio album Captain Fantastic And The Brown Dirt Cowboy. By stalling at number two it brought an end to a run of three successive number one albums, beginning with the aforementioned Don’t Shoot Me.

In 2005, to mark the 30th anniversary of the album, Elton John played most of the album live in a series of concerts in the US. Some of those performances are included on this new edition, along with a number of demos. The 50th anniversary edition is at number 24.

Elton John had a number one album earlier this year in collaboration with Brandi Carlile. She gets her first top forty solo album at number 30 with Returning To Myself.

Bruce Springsteen recorded his sixth studio album Nebraska in a bedroom at home. The intention was to add backing from the E Street band as usual, but that didn’t happen. He released the original recordings in September 1981 and the album spent two weeks in the top ten. The follow-up, Born In The USA, was his first really big hit album in the UK.

Earlier this month, a film based on the recording of the album, Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere, was released. Naturally his record company has seized the opportunity to release a new edition of the album, complete with “the Electric Nebraska recordings” and a live performance of the  album in full. This release is at number fourteen.

This still isn’t the end of the anniversary editions. Pulp released their fifth studio album Different Class in October 1995. Only one of their four previous albums had charted at all. Different Class went to number one and spent 23 of its first 25 chart weeks in the top ten. It won the Mercury Prize and is considered to be one of the defining albums of the Britpop era. Its third track, Common People, was the song that took them from being moderately successful to one of the biggest bands of the day. That and Jarvis Cocker’s overblown charisma. The reissue is at number 38.

Birmingham based The Clause make their chart debut at number nineteen with Victim Of A Casual Thing. It really is the epitome of a curate’s egg album for me. Some of the tracks are really good while others are decidedly mediocre. It is at number one in the Independent Albums Chart.

Sigrid is at number twelve with There’s Always More That I Could Say. Skye Newman’s EP SE9 Part 1 is at number nineteen. Twenty-one-year-old Guildfordian Henry Moodie makes his chart debut at number 31 with Mood Swings.