I define'pre-download' as before full inclusion at the start of 2007, since before then, the lack of a physical single could get you excluded from the chart.

 

I'm thinking of big hits that were deleted while still selling well 'to help their follow-ups', only for the follow-ups to do far worse.

 

I'll start the ball rolling with :

 

Gnarls Barkley - Crazy

Snow Patrol - Chasing Cars

Nelly Furtado - Maneater

 

I loved that track :wub:

Stopping Crazy was so stupid, I remember thinking that at the time.

It's a shame that Set Fire to the Third Bar wasn't a bigger hit. It is actually amazing where as Chasing Cars is atrocious.

Set the Fire to the Third Bar is indeed amazing,a highlight from Snow Patrol.

Crazy was deleted mainly to avoid it overshadowing St. Elsewhere as opposed to overshadowing Smiley Faces. It annoyed me though as I thought it was going to break all kinds of longevity records at the time!

Rihanna's 'SOS', cruelly deleted to make way for 'Unfaithful'. I think that was because there was a remix of 'SOS' on the 'Unfaithful' single if I remember correctly, which wasn't allowed I don't think?

The likes of Badly Drawn Boy and some other indie acts in the early 2000's used to release a single and delete it after only 2/3 days on sale, which I used to find quite daft.

Stopping Crazy was so stupid, I remember thinking that at the time.

 

IIRC it 'dropped out' from #5. :rolleyes:

 

I know it must be close to 1.1m now, but I have no idea what it had sold at the time it was deleted.

I think Wayne Wonder's No Letting Go was deleted in 2003 just as it was shaping up to become a really long running hit. I believe it went 5-5-5-7-3-6 and then was out within a couple of weeks.

Sean Paul's Get Busy as well - had 5 weeks in the top 10 and then more or less vanished.

Edited February 7, 201411 yr by MrJules

You're right to say they both would have had much more longevity, but both were out when sales for the top ten were atrocious (though worse was to come). I think the week Wayne Wonder got to #3 it was his lowest sales to that point on around 14k!

I remember JoJo's Leave being abruptly taken off the shelves hence its sharp decline.

 

And Sugababes 'Easy' became available just on the GH :angry:

'Get Busy' deserved a longer chart run I agree - what a classic. It's up there with the likes of 'In Da Club' in iconic early 00s hip-hop tunes.

IIRC it 'dropped out' from #5. :rolleyes:

That will be confusing to the casual chart watcher who isn't aware of the ins and outs and the reasons for these things. They will hear it high in the top 10 one week then it's vanished the next. *WTF* they will think, even a casual chart watcher will know tracks don't normally do that. These deletions made the charts into a bit of a farce at the time.

JoJo- Leave and The Streets-Dry Your Eyes both fell 7-21 and then out the top 40 within weeks of each other. Outlast-Roses seemed to fall oddly sharply too although I'm not sure if that was deleted. Same for Dido's White Flag which disappeared from 35 after many weeks top 40.

Black Eyed Peas' 'Shut Up' and Pussycat Dolls' 'Beep' both left the chart suddenly whilst in the Top 40.

 

'Shut Up' is one of my favourite BEP tracks, in fact I'm sure I heard that lots more as a kid than I heard 'Where is the Love?'.

Rihanna's 'SOS', cruelly deleted to make way for 'Unfaithful'. I think that was because there was a remix of 'SOS' on the 'Unfaithful' single if I remember correctly, which wasn't allowed I don't think?

It was because chart rules stated (and still do) that a follow up single can't chart if the B side features a version of a current top 40 hit on the "B side". Rules have been slightly relaxed (a current top 40 single can drop outside the top 40 and re-enter without making the follow up single ineligible for the chart) but as very few singles are released as more than one track download singles the chart rule is pretty much redundant.

 

IIRC it 'dropped out' from #5. :rolleyes:

 

I know it must be close to 1.1m now, but I have no idea what it had sold at the time it was deleted.

The week before it disappeared from the chart it had sold 694k copies in total.

That will be confusing to the casual chart watcher who isn't aware of the ins and outs and the reasons for these things. They will hear it high in the top 10 one week then it's vanished the next. *WTF* they will think, even a casual chart watcher will know tracks don't normally do that. These deletions made the charts into a bit of a farce at the time.

 

Well, except if they're Xmas songs, of course.

 

The week before it disappeared from the chart it had sold 694k copies in total.

 

Thanks.

Crazy was deleted mainly to avoid it overshadowing St. Elsewhere as opposed to overshadowing Smiley Faces. It annoyed me though as I thought it was going to break all kinds of longevity records at the time!

 

I don't think it would have broken longevity records, on the download chart its run was: {1}-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-3-8-10-19-21-25-22-21-23-21-28-37-37 (24 weeks)

 

11 weeks at #1 and 24 weeks in the Top 40; although the fast drop off could of course be because it dropped out of the official chart and therefore commercial radio and TV airplay slowed down dramatically..