#187

 

HELPING HAITI

“Everybody Hurts”

stand-alone single

[February 2010]

1-1-9-26-42-77-x

 

 

~ 450 points // 6 weeks // #1 peak ~

 

If you weren’t living under a rock (is that in poor taste?) in early 2010 you would have heard about the disastrous earthquake in Haiti. I’d type something about the earthquake but I’m sure you already know everything you want to know about it. If you want to learn more just use this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Haiti_earthquake. Anyway, in aid of the Haiti Relief fund Simon Cowell drafted in a bunch of artists (mostly X Factor acts and friends of the X Factor) to record a cover of R.E.M.’s classic Everybody Hurts. Artists involved included Leona Lewis, Rod Stewart, Mariah Carey, Cheryl Cole, Mika, Michael Bublé, Joe McElderry, Miley Cyrus, James Blunt, Take That, Jon Bon Jovi, James Morrison, Alexandra Burke, Susan Boyle, JLS, Westlife, Kylie Minogue and Robbie Williams. At this point I should point out that I’m not trying to claim the points system is an accurate depiction of the most popular songs of the year, as it’s not. This song had enormously huge sales in its first week (453,426 to be precise, a record never broken this year, not even by Matt Cardle) and it entered the Year To Date chart at #1. It did no such thing in this chart and is frankly lucky to be in the top 200.

Edited December 27, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

#186

GYPTIAN
“Hold You”
from the album “Hold You”
[November 2010]
16-23-28-37-40-47-63-



~ 453 points // 7 weeks // #16 peak ~

Now this is interesting. It’s definitely not often you get a reggae song in the top 20 these days, but Jamaican singer Gyptian (real name Windel Edwards) did just that with Hold You. There are several different versions of the song around, including a version featuring Nicki Minaj, but it’s the original that charted. By the time it had charted it was a very old song. It had been big in the USA under the strange title of Hold You (Hold Yuh) way back in July. Hold You (the album) was on iTunes for several months leading up to the release of Hold You (the single), so it can be assumed the only reason it didn’t chart earlier is because it was album only for some reason.

Edited December 28, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

#185

JUSTIN BIEBER
“Somebody To Love”
from the album “My World”
[June 2010]
47-62-x(1)-99-33-37-36-45-56-63-76-x



~ 456 points // 10 weeks // #33 peak ~

Ugh. Justin Bieber. According to Wikipedia, not only is he 16, but he’s male. I know this may seem shocking, but that’s apparently the truth. Also, he's Canadian. Anyway, this song would have been a deserved flop (well, bigger flop, it’s already kind of a flop) if it weren’t for the existence of that remix in the video featuring Usher. I don’t want to spend any more time talking about this song or Justin Bieber, but unfortunately he’s got a few more entries in the top 200. Sigh.

Edited December 28, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

#184

JAY SEAN FEAT. LIL WAYNE
“Down”
from the album “All Or Nothing”
[November 2009]
-26-34-37-46-46-60-71-76-78-81-97-x



~ 459 points // 11 weeks // #26 peak ~

Let’s not forget that Jay Sean (real name Kamaljit Jhooti) was big in the UK long before he broke through to the USA - he scored a #4 hit with Stolen and a #6 hit with Eyes On You (feat. The Rishi Rich Project), both in 2004. The British R&B singer, however, became something much bigger by becoming one of those rare British artists to cross over to the USA. Down, featuring Lil Wayne who thus becomes the first person to have 2 entries in the top 200 so far, as well as Do You Remember (feat. Sean Paul and Lil Jon) and more recently 2012 (It Ain’t The End) (feat. Nicki Minaj) have all been big hits in the U-S-of-A as a result of Jay signing with Cash Money Records. He’s also been dragged into the obligatory ‘collaborate with everyone in Cash Money’ thing, also having a top 40 hit this year in the form of I Made It (Cash Money Heroes) (Kevin Rudolf feat. Birdman, Jay Sean and Lil Wayne). It namechecks the record label in the TITLE! Gosh. But yes, well done to Jay Sean, Down made #3 last year to become his biggest hit to date in the UK and crosses into 2010 enough to make #184 here.

Thanks for doing this Bray. Must of taken ages to prepare :o

 

I didn't like Somebody to Love at first, but I went to the US for a few weeks, and it was really popular there, and it ended up growing on me. :blush:

#183

THE PRETTY RECKLESS
“Make Me Wanna Die”
from the album “Light Me Up”
[May 2010]
16-20-31-40-19-60-77-87-92-x(5)-92-88-100-x



~ 460 points // 12 weeks // #16 peak ~

US band The Pretty Reckless (Taylor Momsen, Ben Phillips, Mark Damon, Jamie Perkins), best known as ‘that band Taylor Momsen is in’, are another one of those select few rock bands to have made a decent showing on the singles chart in 2010. They’re a female fronted rock band, much like Hole or Paramore or… did I mention Hole? But yes, the emo-titled Make Me Wanna Die was a surprise hit for Taylor Momsen & Co. making the UK top 20. Follow-up single Miss Nothing only just scraped the top 40 but their album Light Me Up did pretty well to make up for it.

Edited December 28, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

#182

THE X FACTOR FINALISTS 2010
“Heroes”
stand-alone single
[December 2010]
1-1-7-14-33-



~ 460 points // 5 weeks // #1 peak ~

And here’s another bunch of X Factor protégés for you. Also in the form of a charity single (like Everybody Hurts) and also a cover, this time of Heroes by David Bowie. Why Bowie allowed this we’ll never know. Anyhow, ever since the X Factor 2008, we’ve been subjected each year to a #1 single that is all of the X Factor final 12 (16 in this year’s case) singing a cover. In 2008 it was Hero, a Mariah Carey cover for Help For Heroes. In 2009 it was You Are Not Alone, a Michael Jackson cover for Great Ormond Street Hospital. And this year it’s for Help For Heroes again. The personnel on this cover are, of course, Nicolò Festa, F.Y.D, Storm Lee, Diva Fever, John Adeleye, Belle Amie, Treyc Cohen, Aiden Grimshaw, Paije Richardson, Katie Waissel, Wagner, Mary Byrne, Cher Lloyd, One Direction, Rebecca Ferguson and winner Matt Cardle. 2008’s single spent 3 weeks at the top, 2009’s had just one and this year’s had 2 - hopefully 0 next year then. This song originally appeared at #181 in the countdown but has been knocked down after news of an error in the OCC chart (scandal!) which printed its position 4 places too high.

Edited December 29, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

#182

OLLY MURS
“Thinking Of Me”
from the album “Olly Murs”
[December 2010]
4-4-8-13-12-



~ 464 points // 5 weeks // #4 peak ~

Time for another X Factor protégé, this time the 2009 runner-up Olly Murs (formally Oliver Murs). Murs has become (arguably) the 4th X Factor runner-up to, in the long run, out-perform the act who won - see also G4 vs. Steve Brookstein, Rhydian vs. Leon Jackson and JLS vs. Alexandra Burke although both of those have been pretty successful. Murs’ début single Please Don’t Let Me Go went to #1, beating off Katy Perry’s Teenage Dream. Follow-up single Thinking Of Me didn’t quite match the chart-topping status of its predecessor but certainly hasn’t done badly - notice how it’s as high as #182 here in just 5 weeks while Joe McElderry’s Ambitions missed the top 200 entirely despite having 11 weeks. Both of Murs’ singles are taken off #2 début album Olly Murs (creative title there), only kept off #1 by the Progress juggernaut. Olly Murs sold over 100,000 four weeks in a row. Not too shabby. And if iTunes is anything to go by Thinking Of Me is likely to return to the top 10 in the first chart of 2011.

Anyways, this countdown shall continue at some point tomorrow. :D

Edited December 29, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

Thanks for doing this Bray, quite interesting to read :).

#180

SUGABABES
“Wear My Kiss”
from the album “Sweet 7”
[March 2010]
7-14-23-24-39-55-79-x



~ 466 points // 7 weeks // #7 peak ~

The fourth separate line-up of UK girl group Sugababes (Heidi Range, Amelle Berrabah, Jade Ewen), otherwise known as Sugababes 4.0, rather bizarrely contains none of the members present in the ‘group’ back in the hazy days of début album One Touch. Keisha Buchanan, Mutya Buena and Siobhán Donaghy have all left the band for some reason or other and been replaced. Most recently Keisha was expelled from the band for unknown reasons and replaced with the woman who saved the United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest, Jade Ewen who finished fifth place in the 2009 Eurovision with It’s My Time which would later chart at #27 in the UK, before her failed post-Eurovision career only saw second single My Man reach #35. Unfortunately the UK’s reputation in Eurovision was soiled once again this year by Josh Dubovie who finished dead last with That Sounds Good To Me. Luckily, the track still charted at… er… it didn’t chart. Anyway, enough about Eurovision, Wear My Kiss was released as the third single from seventh album Sweet 7 and the second single by Sugababes 4.0 (after About A Girl, #8 in 2009). Unfortunately for them, the song couldn’t save their album from absolutely bombing, reaching just #14 on the album chart. On an unrelated note, this song appears to sample or at least very closely resemble Steam’s Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye, which is slightly unoriginal as the track was already sampled in Wale’s #12 hit Chillin (feat. Lady GaGa), Jay-Z’s #79 hit D.O.A. (Death Of Autotune) and Kristinia DeBarge’s flop-but-it-was-big-in-the-US Goodbye.

Edited December 28, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

#179

SKEPTA
“Rescue Me”
from the album “Doin’ It Again”
[July 2010]
14-19-24-32-42-48-61-95-x



~ 473 points // 8 weeks // #14 peak ~

Poor Skepta (real name Joseph Adenuga). He’s been trying so hard, but he just hasn’t yet managed to crack the top 10 like nearly every other mainstream-ish British MC has. His first top 100 hit was 2008’s #86 Rolex Sweep and his chart positions improved for a while, with 2009’s Sunglasses At Night making #64, 2010’s Bad Boy giving him his first top 40 exposure reaching #26 and then this, Rescue Me which features uncredited vocals on the chorus unless Skepta’s singing voice is really that different to his rapping voice, went as high as #14. Logic would follow that his fifth chart single would see him reach the top 10 like all those other MCs - Wiley, Dizzee Rascal, Tinchy Stryder, Chipmunk, Tinie Tempah, Aggro Santos etc. - but Cross My Heart (feat. Preeya Kalidas) only stumbled in at a low #31 and 6th hit So Alive (Skepta vs. N-Dubz) has so far only reached #99. Poor Skepta.

Edited December 28, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

Rescue me is absolutely fantastic. I listen to it all the time still, and it was on Clubland 17, I think, which was pretty awesome (although it's hardly a dance song, but I think his appearance on the album was to do with record label politics, as is his recent collaboration with N-Dubz). :lol: Rescue Me really should've gone top 10 to be honest, as quality wize, it's fantastic, and Skepta should've been invited to participate on Game Over tbh, and on that note, Skepta's discography seems a bit similar to Devlin's, in a few ways, except I'm not imagining a Devlin/N-Dubz collab anytime soon.

 

And about Wear My Kiss, that always sounded so familiar!! :lol: I guess it reminded be of the Jay-Z or the Lady Gaga song, as I listen to both of those a lot. My theory about why the Sugababes's album flopped is because they released 3 mediocre pre-album singles. If you release 3 incredible pre-album singles, your album will sell bucket-loads, because people will think "Wow, his album must be amazing, if his 3 singles are this good" (recent example, Tinie Tempah's album, and that had 4 pre-album singles, in some senses). However, if you release 3 mediocre pre-album singles people will think "Is this really the best the album has to offer? If the singles aren't that good, I doubt the album is worth checking out". With the Sugababes, releasing the album after Get Sexy would sold it more I think. Plus, I think people were put off as they seemed really whiny, etc. with all the bickering and stuff when they changed the line-up...again!

#178

N-DUBZ
“Best Behaviour”
from the album “Love.Live.Life”
[October 2010]
10-16-27-38-51-72-68-91-x(1)-62-



~ 474 points // 9 weeks // #10 peak ~

Probably the only successful UK hip hop band unless you count Roll Deep who are more of a collective, N-Dubz (Dino “Dappy” Contostavlos, Tula “Tulisa” Contostavlos, Richard “Fazer” Rawson) have scored an impressive fifteen top 100 hits, twelve as the lead artist, but their sole #1 to date remains the appropriately titled Number 1 (Tinchy Stryder feat. N-Dubz). Best Behaviour was released as the first single from the band’s third studio album Love.Live.Life but has since become technically the second single as #6 hit We Dance On (feat. Bodyrox) was included on the album. Unfortunately, the song was just too ‘generic N-Dubz song’ to finally get them a #1 as a lead artist or even outpeak previous highest peaker I Need You (#5 in 2009) and instead barely scraped them a third top 10 hit (fourth if you count Number 1). Follow-up single Girls isn’t doing anything special in the chart either, having so far peaked at #18.

Edited December 29, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

#177

ELLIE GOULDING
“Guns And Horses”
from the album “Lights”
[May 2010]
71-72-43-26-30-40-50-69-81-74-86-95-x



~ 475 points // 12 weeks // #26 peak ~

And we come back to Sound of 2010/Critics’ Choice 2010 winner Ellie Goulding. I mentioned earlier how The Writer outpeaked Guns And Horses, but the latter definitely had a better and more consistent chart run leading to it being higher here. Ms. Goulding (who will possibly be called Ellie James in the future depending on how her relationship with Radio 1 DJ Greg goes) had major competition for the BBC Sound of 2010 Poll win in the form of confusingly named solo artist Marina & The Diamonds who will have an entry on this chart later. Although Goulding’s first single Starry Eyed conclusively beat Marina’s début Hollywood #4 to #12, Guns And Horses actually matched the peak of Marina’s second release I Am Not A Robot, both tracks peaking at #26. Ellie returned to definitely beating Marina single-on-single when The Writer reached #19 compared to Marina’s Oh No! only making #38. Ellie was also the clear victor on the album chart, her Lights topping the chart while Marina had to settle for #5 with The Family Jewels.

Edited December 28, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

#176

DRAKE FEAT. KANYE WEST, LIL WAYNE AND EMINEM
“Forever”
from the album “Music Inspired By The Film More Than A Game”
[December 2009]
-49-42-42-50-54-51-56-71-73-80-78-84-x



~ 482 points // 12 weeks // #42 peak ~

This is the fourth highest placed song on the list which didn’t make the top 40 in 2010 (out of five total in the top 200, one of the others coincidentally also having both Lil Wayne and Eminem on it) and the highest entry on the list which didn’t make the top 40 in any year, #42 being its overall peak. From the soundtrack to the film More Than A Game and also appearing under a different version on Eminem’s deluxe version of the album Relapse entitled Relapse: Refill, Forever was the first chart hit by Canadian rapper Drake (real name Aubrey Graham). It’s one of an uncountable number of big hip hop collaborations, featuring very successful US rapper Kanye West, very successful US rapper Lil Wayne and very successful US rapper Eminem. It’s also one of an uncountable number of songs titled Forever. Despite its lowish peak the track showed great longevity and has very high sales for a song never played between 4pm and 7pm on Radio 1 on a Sunday.

Right, just filling in #180 - #176 for you, the countdown will continue at around 4-5pm depending on when I feel like starting it. :D

Edited December 28, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

Forever is amazing. :wub: I listen to it all the time too. Lil Wayne's verse is my favourite tbh, and the hook is epic too!

 

And when Forever came out, I bet none of us would've expected Drake to be possibly getting a UK #1 a year later! :o

 

And random trvia. 3 of the 4 rappers on that song have had a top 2 hit in the UK with Rihanna. :)

Edited December 28, 201014 yr by Eric_Blob

I just did a little check for errors by adding up the total points and the total weeks in my spreadsheet and found there was 1 week and 2 points missing.

 

Turns out I forgot to add in Paloma Faith's Upside Down re-entering at #99 this week, so Upside Down has moved up one place from #339 to #338.

 

Yeah, that's the most minor error ever but I've edited my post anyway.

 

EDIT: And I found 2 more very minor errors in 2009, so 'Broken Heels' has moved up and 'Superhuman' has moved down.

Edited December 28, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★

Forever is amazing. :wub: I listen to it all the time too. Lil Wayne's verse is my favourite tbh, and the hook is epic too!

 

And when Forever came out, I bet none of us would've expected Drake to be possibly getting a UK #1 a year later! :o

 

And random trvia. 3 of the 4 rappers on that song have had a top 2 hit in the UK with Rihanna. :)

 

Drake, Eminem & Kanye West, I presume?

 

Lil' Wayne will never be successful here.

#175

LADY ANTEBELLUM
“Need You Now”
from the album “Need You Now”
[May 2010]
28-21-28-46-73-83-98-x(8)-52-58-67-75-x



~ 482 points // 11 weeks // #21 peak ~

Much like Hold You by Gyptian earlier in the countdown, this song by US band Lady Antebellum (Dave Haywood, Charles Kelly, Hillary Scott) is firmly in a genre that gets little recognition in the UK singles chart - in this case, country. Country is huge in the USA, but generally not received as well here apart from the really big country hits Stateside, of which this is a good example. The album Need You Now was huge in the USA (and peaked at #8 in the UK) but the song of the same title was absolutely enormous, finishing second on the Billboard Hot 100 of 2010, only denied the status as the biggest song of the year by Ke$ha’s TiK ToK which was US #1 for 9 weeks at the start of the year. Clearly Need You Now didn’t get quite that much success here, but at least there’s some country representation in this top 200 countdown for people who are into that sort of stuff.

Edited December 28, 201014 yr by ★ 2011 Bray ★