I'm struggling to find a better example than Foundations - 5 weeks at #2, SIXTEEN copies from the top!

 

However, I'm going to go with Deee-Lite - Groove Is In The Heart which peaked at #2 having had joint sales with Steve Miller Band's The Joker but losing out because of some sales increase techincality.

 

Or from a more subjective point of view, Better Off Alone by DJ Jurgen presents Alice Deejay, a dance classic held at #2 by three different #1's, one of them a Westlife song with less than 500 sales in it. Still bitter 13 years on :(

 

edit: and Deee-Lite was mentioned earlier, oh well!

Deee-Lite were later found to have actually missed out by 4 copies weren't they? So the #1 was right anyway.

 

Puretone's Addicted To Bass was really close to #1 and would have got there had it not had a few thousand (?) copies leak into the previous sales week leading to a #68 debut.

I'm struggling to find a better example than Foundations - 5 weeks at #2, SIXTEEN copies from the top!

 

However, I'm going to go with Deee-Lite - Groove Is In The Heart which peaked at #2 having had joint sales with Steve Miller Band's The Joker but losing out because of some sales increase techincality.

 

Or from a more subjective point of view, Better Off Alone by DJ Jurgen presents Alice Deejay, a dance classic held at #2 by three different #1's, one of them a Westlife song with less than 500 sales in it. Still bitter 13 years on :(

 

edit: and Deee-Lite was mentioned earlier, oh well!

Deee-lite did lose out by 8 sales after they looked into it more deeply after the controversy- mind you I suppose they would have to say that really (suspicious head on)

 

I posted this a while ago in the "Closest races to No 1 thread

 

"Posh Vs Spiller, Blur Vs Oasis- they're probably the most famous battles of all time but only one battle resulted in a change of chart rules.

 

Yes it's time for THAT close shave. The closest race of all time occured W/E 15th September 1990 when a difference of just 8 copies seperated The Steve Miller Band and Deee-Lite.

 

"The Joker" was originally a 1973 track by The Steve Miller Band whose biggest UK single to this point was 1982 hit "Abracadabra" a US chart topper and UK #2 hit. It was picked up by Levi's and used on the jeans commercial which saw it propelled back into the charts in Septemeber and going into this week it was placed at No.6, and as the week progressed it became clear that it's main opposition would not be the out- going No 1 (Bombalurina's "Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini") but Dee-Lite's "Groove Is In The Heart" which had risen to No.4 the previous Sunday.

 

In midweek flashes it was Dee-Lite who looked like they were heading towards the number one position but come that Sunday evening it was Steve Miller Band who were announced as the nations No.1. It then emerged that the panel sales for both records were the same but Steve Miller Band was granted the top slot due to it's sales increasing by a larger percentage than those of Deee-Lite. Rather than going into the in's and out's of the situation here is the MW article from the following week which should spell it out (Thanks to Fiesta who recently posted this on Buzzjack to save me the trouble!)

 

"Controversy raged last week over the tussle for the Gallup Chart’s Number One spot between Steve Miller’s ‘The Joker’ and Record Mirror favourites Deee-Lite’s ‘Groove Is In The Heart’. The latter’s record company issued a press release last week attacking the fairness of the Gallup Chart for placing the Miller track at Number One, despite both records achieving the same “panel sales” – the first time it’s happened with the Number One spot. Here Alan Jones, Record Mirror’s chart statistician and a chart consultant with Gallup, explains the complexities of the situation from the chart compilers’ point of view, while on page 31 News Plus looks at the music industry’s response to the affair.

 

The reality of the situation is that according to Gallup’s best guess, the Steve Miller Band single actually sold eight copies more than Deee-Lite’s and only the way in which Gallup presents the information to suit record industry tradition conceals the fact.

 

The “panel sales” of 2595 mentioned by WEA in its press release are a distillation of a very complex mathematical logarithm. A panel sale represents about one in every 17 actual sales, even though Gallup actually monitor a good deal more. The notion of a panel sale exists because from when the British Market Research Bureau (BMRB) started to compile the chart in 1969 to when Gallup took over in 1983, the panel of shops used to compile the chart was 250 strong. Gallup immediately set about strengthening the panel for the good reason that a larger panel makes hyping very expensive and difficult, and provides statistically significant samples from which they can (and do) extrapolate a mass of marketing information for record companies. The chart is only the tip of the iceberg.

 

Today more than 900 shops are equipped with the Epson machines into which they key, or more frequently ‘wand’ their sales by passing a light pen over a barcode. Gallup’s computer collects data from them all. The problem is that the record industry needs to see sales represented by a constant base of shops, so all the sales are distilled back down to a typical sample of 250 every week.

 

Gallup breaks the UK record market down into small “cells” to analyse its sales. If for the sake of argument, there are 104 medium sized independent shops in London and Gallup has Epson computers in 26 of them which register 59 sales for a record, the assumption is that the record would sell 236 copies in the 10 [spelling error, should read 104] shops as a whole. Similarly, if Gallup has established the fact that there are, say, 30 small Woolworths branches selling records in the South East, of which the 12 on the panel sell 18 copies of a record, they wouldn’t be far wrong in estimating that a total of 45 would be sold by the 30 Woolies together.

 

Sales from the shops on the Gallup panel are all “grossed up” in this way until the company has an estimate of the total number of sales for each of the 20,000 or so different titles on which it detects sales every week.

 

It could represent this information to the industry as an estimate of actual sales. For example, last week’s number three by Bombalurina sold an estimated 40,596 copies. The problem is, as I said before, that the industry knows where it is with its weighted average of 250 shops so everything has to be reduced to represent the wider picture in microcosm. Two hundred and fifty shops represent about a 17th of the actual UK total. All sales are therefore reduced to a 17th of their grossed up totals. Bombalurina thus ended up with 2388 panel sales.

 

‘The Joker’ and ‘Groove is In The Heart’ you will recall both had published panel sales of 2595. But these are “rounded” figures. The Gallup computer actually adjudged that ‘The Joker’ sold 44,118 copies and that ‘Groove is In The Heart’ sold 44,110 copies, which equate to panel sales of 2595.2 and 2594.7 respectively. So either way you look at it, ‘The Joker’ was Number One".

 

Hope you're up to speed! As the rules changed to take into account the decimal places it actually made a tie in the future less likely, whilst allowing it to occur. Tied chart positions have occured ever since but never at the number one spot (either before or after this rule was implemented). "The Joker"'s bassline was also sampled by Shaggy on his 2001 Chart Topper "Angel" when it was a No 1 without any controversy, and so it was that the closest race of 1990 and of chart history came to pass and changed the way it was compiled forever........

"

Doctor Pressure by Mylo and Bad Day by Daniel Powter had joint sales at #4 and #5 one week in 2005 didn't they? How do they work out which song goes ahead in exact sales ties now, I know it's still a very regular occurrence lower down the chart each week.

Doctor Pressure by Mylo and Bad Day by Daniel Powter had joint sales at #4 and #5 one week in 2005 didn't they? How do they work out which song goes ahead in exact sales ties now, I know it's still a very regular occurrence lower down the chart each week.

hmmm i don't know the answer to that one- i'll do some investigating.....

The most unlucky song in terms of missing the number one spot is arguably 'Stop' by Spice Girls. Not because it missed out on the #1 by very few copies (i don't think it did), but because it was the Spice Girls' only single NOT to reach #1. If it had, they would've had a record-breaking discography.

The most unlucky song in terms of missing the number one spot is arguably 'Stop' by Spice Girls. Not because it missed out on the #1 by very few copies (i don't think it did), but because it was the Spice Girls' only single NOT to reach #1. If it had, they would've had a record-breaking discography.

In a way yes- and had they released it a week earlier it would have made No 1 but on the other hand it was the only one of their 90s releases ("wannabe" aside) that opened with under 200k sales so it was a genuine "fail" if you like.

The most unlucky song in terms of missing the number one spot is arguably 'Stop' by Spice Girls. Not because it missed out on the #1 by very few copies (i don't think it did), but because it was the Spice Girls' only single NOT to reach #1. If it had, they would've had a record-breaking discography.

 

But then they ruined it anyway when 'Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)' only peaked at #11 :P

Earthquake - Labrinth

Earthquake - Labrinth

 

Maybe wrong week to release, but its sales are through the roof and comfortably eclipsing that of what beat it to number 1, again I wouldn't personally describe massive selling number 2s/non top 10 hits as 'unlucky', not a lot of songs get those type of sales and they were genuine massive selling hits regardless of peak position

 

that said, I sometimes think of One Day Like This is quite unlucky peak position wise, you really would assume it would've achieved a higher peak yet when it keeps coming back it just cannot seem to break the top 34 :lol:

Edited April 8, 201213 yr by C.W

My fave 80s/90s star Taylor Dayne (who was SOOOOOOO much bigger in her native US) released her #2 US hit Don't Rush Me in late 1988 when it peaked at #78 :-( When reactivated a few months later, it got stuck at #76. How unlucky is that! I always feel sorry the most for tracks which stall at #76 cos only the T75 are ever really considered 'hits'. Even if a track misses T40 but makes T75 it'll be recorded in singles books and become part of history, however small. #76 'hits' might as well never have existed! Poor Taylor... :-(

Dee-Lite "Groove is in the heart". It sold exactly the same as Steve Miller Band's "The Joker", but lost in the tie-break.

 

How did it lose in a tie break?. I'm not questioning you I'm just curious to know how they decided what was gunna be higher.

How did it lose in a tie break?. I'm not questioning you I'm just curious to know how they decided what was gunna be higher.

I've posted the full explanation for this on this page. :D

As individuals, Frankie Sandford and Rochelle Wiseman are VERY unlucky in missing a #1.

 

One Step Closer - #2

Automatic High - #2

New Direction - #2

Puppy Love - #6

Fool No More - #4

Sundown - #4

Don't Tell Me You're Sorry - #11

If This Is Love - #8

Up - #5

Issues - #4

Just Can't Get Enough - #2

Work - #22

Forever Is Over - #2

Ego - #9

Missing You - #3

Higher - #10

Notorious - #8

All Fired Up - #3

My Heart Takes Over - #15

 

Frankie also had a #19 collaboration with I Dream and a #62 peak with Kids In Glass Houses.

 

That sounds like a post Kobbar would make :lol: especially the part in bold. Where is he these days?

 

I didn't actually mean it in a bitter way, haha I was just stating the facts that back to black went in at 8 and Adele remained at 11.

 

:drama:

 

 

Oh my God, the amount of people that post things that have already posted, and no one gives a shit. Just cause its me does NOT make it a bloody crime, good God do something better with your time instead of trying to pick faults out with me that aren't there.

'Rude Boy' is another song that was really unlucky not to reach #1. I definitely wouldn't call it the "unluckiest song in UK chart history" but I remember it being more or less joint top with the current #1 on iTunes before it started pulling away. If it had got there, it would've had the "number one effect" and probably got to #1 officially.

I didn't actually mean it in a bitter way, haha I was just stating the facts that back to black went in at 8 and Adele remained at 11.

Oh my God, the amount of people that post things that have already posted, and no one gives a shit. Just cause its me does NOT make it a bloody crime, good God do something better with your time instead of trying to pick faults out with me that aren't there.

 

Sorry... :unsure:

Ellie Goulding was pretty unlucky in that she was at the top of iTunes for what seemed to be for ever, was down on Nicole Scherzinger at the midweeks, over took her by the end of the week but was still behind X factor, despite them being 10 on iTunes or something like that.

Ooh yes Your Song was a bit of a mini MLJ too wasn't it. Got stuck behind tonnes of frontloaded songs and at one point was hitting #1 on iTunes at the end of every week.

 

Britney's -I Wanna Go- was so unlucky to chart in top 100. :lol: It was 9 weeks between #101-#200 :lol: Itunes peak was around #80, but that was not enough for top 100 and in that week when she reached top 80 on iTunes she peaked @ #111 on official chart, better #111 than #101 :lol:

 

Don't forget TTWE missing the top 20 because it was released on a Friday.

Don't forget TTWE missing the top 20 because it was released on a Friday.

 

In regards to Friday releases; 'Born This Way', 'Judas' and 'The Edge of Glory' all reached #1 on iTunes and would've got there officially ('Judas' at a stretch) if they had been released on a Sunday, or even a Monday in BTW's case.

 

Also, 'Billionaire' was incredibly unlucky. It would've undoubtedly got to #1 officially if it hadn't been released temporarily as part of a compilation a week or two beforehand.