James Masterton has been writing chart commentaries for a little over 20 years (beating me by some 15 years or so). In that time he has often considered how to turn those commentaries into a book. Unsurprisingly, his biggest obstacle has been finding a publisher. Now, in the same way that downloads have transformed the singles market, technology allows him to publish a book himself in digital form. He has used his commentaries as the starting point for a series of annuals describing all (or very nearly all) the songs to reach the top 40 each year. The 2012 edition is available now.

 

The first decision the compiler of such a book has to make is which singles should be included. His selection method can be summarised as one entry per (top 75) chart run based on the year in which the song reached its peak. The only exception is that songs which re-entered the top 40 solely as a result of a price reduction are not included but all other re-entries, including old Christmas songs, are.

 

Any ruling on what is included in a given year is bound to lead to some anomalies. By Masterton’s own admission Imagine Dragons provide a perfect example. Two songs from the same EP charted simultaneously last December but the more successful of the two, Radioactive, peaked in 2013 and so is omitted from the 2012 edition. No method of selection is perfect so such quirks have to be accepted. All singles will appear eventually (if he is able to complete the project); it just might need a little patience for some to appear.

 

There is a description of each act followed by details of each of their top 40 entries for the year. These details include, for example, information on why the song charted (performances on talent shows, Olympic ceremonies) as well as notes on the song’s chart performance. These descriptions will be invaluable for anyone browsing through old charts and wondering why various old songs suddenly reappeared in the chart. In some cases (Gotye’s Somebody That I Used To Know) there is even a detailed description of the song itself.

 

When writing a weekly chart commentary it is inevitable that mistakes will be made. A book written to a self-imposed - and flexible - deadline allows the luxury of time to avoid these errors. So, are there errors in the book? Sadly, yes. In the write-up for Arctic Monkeys’ cover of Come Together he gives the date of the London 2012 Opening Ceremony as 21 July. It was the 27th. Worse than that, the write-up for Underworld’s Caliban’s Dream refers to the 2010 Olympics. In his notes on Wizzard he lists Roy Wood’s role in The Move but omits his early contribution to ELO. However these are relatively minor errors or omissions. None of them will achieve the notoriety of the edition of the Bible which listed one of the ten commandments as “Thou shalt commit adultery”.

 

Masterton offers his opinion at times although he seems less ready than this chart commentator to be really scathing. That, of course, is a matter of choice but it does maan that anyone expecting a scathing review of, for example, Gangnam Style will be disappointed. However I was surprised to read his notes on the Hillsborough Collective where he suggested that the idea of raising money for the victims of a tragedy that occurred 24 years earlier was “bizarre”. As recorded in my own commentary, the aim was to raise funds for the fight for justice by the families of the victims. There may be many words to describe that campaign but bizarre is not one of them.

 

In an apparent attempt to make more work for himself most of the artist write-ups are in a 2012 context so they will need to be revised for editions for earlier years as well as subsequent years. As it avoids reading the same description of a band several times it has to count as a good thing for the reader.

 

Books such as this are not written in the expectation that people will read the book from start to finish. Therefore, there is bound to be some repetition although Masterton has generally managed to present the same information - such as the Olympic ceremonies - in a number of different ways.

 

The book is a well-researched and readable piece of work and should appeal to a wider audience than just chart obsessives. The chart details are relatively limited - date of entry into the top 40, peak position and date the peak was reached. There are exceptions if a song had a particularly unusual chart run. With the Official Charts Company’s tendency to be very protective of its data this caution is understandable.

 

Finally, assuming there are to be future editions, an index by song title as well as artist would be helpful. At least the artist index is in the correct order so, for example, Emeli Sande appears under S and The Vaccines appear under V. These things matter to a pedant. Similarly, credited artists who failed to have a hit in their own right (e.g. Alex Trimble) could be the subject of a separate list. For completeness, perhaps a list of songs excluded form each year’s volume (whether because they peaked in the previous or following year or because they re-entered solely due to a price reduction) would be a useful addition as well. Whether Masterton is also planning a series of annuals for the albums chart, I do not know.

 

Full disclosure - I was offered a free copy of the book by the author on condition that I wrote a review. James Masterton has not seen the review before publication. His only contribution has been to confirm the reasons for the limited chart details.

 

The book is available from http://www.masterton.co.uk/books/ for £4.48.

 

Sounds like a great read i may have to buy it to go along with my Virgin book of hit singles!!

Sounds like a great read i may have to buy it to go along with my Virgin book of hit singles!!

If you click on the link you can download part of the book, JM has made available the "A" artists part as a free download.

Edited September 4, 201311 yr by Robbie

^^ Yeah ive been reading it, i like the format alot its basically how songs became the hits they did. Right up my street!!

I downloaded this, there are various mistakes littered throughout but it's very good information wise. I still read his chart commentary weekly and this is basically a much fleshier version of that.

I downloaded this, there are various mistakes littered throughout but it's very good information wise. I still read his chart commentary weekly and this is basically a much fleshier version of that.

I'm sure he won't mind if you point out the errors.

If it was covering the Top 75 I might have been tempted. Restricted to the Top 40, probably not.

 

It would have been improved, for example, by naming the individual members of groups and indicating their part in the band (Drums, Keyboards, Vocals etc.)

If it was covering the Top 75 I might have been tempted. Restricted to the Top 40, probably not.

 

It would have been improved, for example, by naming the individual members of groups and indicating their part in the band (Drums, Keyboards, Vocals etc.)

Again, I suggest you pass on your comments to the author as well as posting them here. He is open to suggestions for improvements. I suspect extending it to the top 75 would be an awful lot of work. If he hasn't already recorded the reasons for a song entering the chart in his weekly commentary it could take a lot of research to find out. A list of the band's personnel at the time of the release seems like a stronger possibility although even that will require a fair bit of research for bands whose line-up has been rather fluid.

 

One of his comments to me was that he wanted to provide something not available on sites such as Wikipedia or Polyhex and the line-ups, arguably, fall outside that remit.

Is James Masterson on buzzjack btw?

Is James Masterson on buzzjack btw?

Not that I'm aware of but from comments he has previously made when his column was at Yahoo Launch it seems certain that he does sometimes visit here.

 

He did used to made the occasional post in the Chart Forum at Dotmusic, as did Alan Jones though that is because both were employed by either Dotmusic (JM) or Music Week (AJ) who actually owned Dotmusic until 2002. Ben Drury and James Kane who co-own the digital website 7 digital also used to post at Dotmusic. Again both were at one time employed by Dotmusic before they opened 7 Digital in January 2004 when Dotmusic closed. Drury was responsible for setting up Dotmusic in 1995 and opening the message boards in 1998 and Kane joined Dotmusic in 1999 as a web developer. Both were also moderators who banned their fair share of troublesome posters!

Edited September 8, 201311 yr by Robbie

Thanks for the info, I suppose BJ is a great source of info for anyone interested in the charts so they are bound to come & go checking chart histories & the like!

 

I mean the OCC survey even mentioned us!