Posted January 19, 20223 yr Years & Years' Official Top 20 biggest songs in the UK 19 January 2022 | By Ian Wade Since breaking through in 2014, Years & Years' Olly Alexander has become one of the UK's finest musical exports. First tasting chart success in a collaboration with Belgian DJ The Magician on the 2014 Top 10 song Sunlight, then-trio Years & Years really began to take off in their own right a few months later when Desire broke into the charts. Fast forward to 2021, frontman Olly announced that Years & Years would be continuing as a solo effort. 2021 turned out to be a major year for Olly Alexander, who returned to acting in the acclaimed It’s A Sin, duetted with both Elton John and Kylie Minogue, and saw in 2022 as part of the BBC’s New Year celebrations. With five Top 10 smashes, as well as a Number 1 album in the form of 2015’s Communion, Years & Years have racked up quite a catalogue. Ahead of the release of their third album (and first with Olly Alexander as a sole operator) Night Call, we’ve decided to take a look at Years & Years' biggest hits. Take a look at some highlights below, then jump into the full Top 20. 16. It’s A Sin (with Elton John) (2021) Official Chart peak: Number 47 UK Sales: 92,000 A topical remake of the Pet Shop Boys song that gave Olly’s hit drama its name (it was originally going to be called Boys until a show of the same name was discovered). He’d originally released a stripped-down version with piano, and then unveiled another version at The BRITs a few weeks later, this time recorded as a duet with Sir Elton John. The Pets also crop up just outside the Years & Years Top 20 with their duet with Olly on Dreamland. 10. Starstruck (2021) Official Chart peak: Number 31 UK Sales: 223,000 The first track released after Olly announced the slimming down of the band following the departure of Mikey Goldsworthy and Emre Türkmen. Starstruck hit Number 31 in April 2021, helped no doubt by a remix that featured Kylie Minogue. It also made it into the Top 40 best-selling songs of 2021 list on pure sales. 4. Desire (2014) Official Chart peak: Number 22 UK Sales: 953,000 The band’s third single and first Top 40 in their own right, Desire hung around on the Top 100 for 45 weeks despite peaking at Number 22. They released a remix featuring Tove Lo which helped to prolong its chart life. 3. Shine (2015) Official Chart peak: Number 2 UK Sales: 1.1 million The fifth track to come off Communion, Shine peaked at Number 2 in July 2015. Olly had written for a new boyfriend and was trying to express the ‘overwhelming and unstable feeling of falling in love’ in song. They also made an interactive video for the song, which allowed viewers to choose between various elements of ‘light’, ‘dark’ and ‘shadow’ and was premiered during an ad break on Channel 4 which relied on viewer tweets during it as to what would happen next. 2. If You’re Over Me (2018) Official Chart peak: Number 6 UK Sales: 1.2 million The second single from Palo Santo started off as new entry at 38, taking its time to crawl up to a peak position of 6 across the summer of 2018, rebounding back and forth to that peak another two times. This song that reflected on a romance that had gone wrong was co-written in two hours by Steve Mac (who’d also helped Clean Bandit’s Symphony and Ed Sheeran’s Shape Of You). 1. King (2015) Official Chart peak: Number 1 UK Sales: 1.8 million Disposing of Ellie Goulding’s Love Me Like You Do, King entered at Number 1 for a week in March 2015 to become the band’s first Top 10 hit and chart-topper. The song was recorded fairly early on in their career but they thought it sounded a bit lame, and could never decide as to what they wanted to do with it until stumbling on the idea of making it into an eighties-style dance pop track. King spent two months in the Top 10 and 59 weeks in the Top 100 overall. It was nominated for the Brit Award for Song of the Year and Video of the Year in 2006. Another accolade came in the form of Carly Rae Jepsen covering the song for Radio 1’s Live Lounge. Years & Years' Official Top 20 biggest songs in the UK POS TITLE ARTIST PEAK YEAR 1 KING YEARS & YEARS 1 2015 2 IF YOU'RE OVER ME YEARS & YEARS 6 2018 3 SHINE YEARS & YEARS 2 2015 4 DESIRE YEARS & YEARS 22 2014 5 EYES SHUT YEARS & YEARS 17 2015 6 PLAY JAX JONES/YEARS & YEARS 8 2018 7 SUNLIGHT MAGICIAN FT YEARS & YEARS 8 2014 8 SANCTIFY YEARS & YEARS 25 2018 9 TAKE SHELTER YEARS & YEARS N/A 2015 10 STARSTRUCK YEARS & YEARS 31 2021 11 ALL FOR YOU YEARS & YEARS 47 2018 12 BREATHE YEARS & YEARS N/A 2018 13 REAL YEARS & YEARS N/A 2015 14 WORSHIP YEARS & YEARS N/A 2015 15 METEORITE YEARS & YEARS N/A 2018 16 IT'S A SIN ELTON JOHN/YEARS & YEARS 47 2021 17 COME ALIVE YEARS & YEARS/JESS GLYNNE 80 2018 18 MEMO YEARS & YEARS N/A 2015 19 TIES YEARS & YEARS N/A 2015 20 GOLD YEARS & YEARS N/A 2015 ©2021 Official Charts Company. All rights reserved.
January 19, 20223 yr Author I did have 'If You're Over Me' and 'Shine' penciled in as million sellers so it's nice to finally have confirmation. 'King' and 'Shine' will forever be their best. :wub:
January 19, 20223 yr Good to see they’ve had good sales! Kinda forgot that Shine and IYOM were that big! And Desire defo would’ve been a top 10 peak if released at their peak! Hoping Sweet Talker can hit silver certification soon enough
January 19, 20223 yr I love Y&Y - in fact Communion is probably one of my most played albums and i've seen them (of Olly) about 5 times.... but it irks me that 'If You're Over Me' is their 2nd biggest song. Its my least fave of their's by quite some way. So may great songs there that failed to make the top 40, or top 20 - yet that song got top 10. The charts and what smashes is baffling at times :D Edited January 19, 20223 yr by ElectroBoy
January 19, 20223 yr King is great but Shine and Eyes Shut are my favourites to listen to; both beautiful. Eyes Shut went platinum in 2017 so I guess it can’t be that far behind Desire.
January 19, 20223 yr IYOM doesn't deserve to be that high! Compared to the brilliance of Shine, Desire, Sanctify... it sounds dull and uninspired.
January 19, 20223 yr I can't help but feel this could've done with being a top 10 oops. 'King' will forever be truly unbeatable, but a decent chuck of tunes here. I still wish 'Take Shelter' had been given a re-release rather than that pointless 'Desire' one.
January 19, 20223 yr I can't help but feel this could've done with being a top 10 oops. I was thinking that as well, even that is kind of pushing it for relevant hits from him/them really lol 'Sanctify' really deserved to be a huge hit but of course it got vastly overshadowed by its awful follow-up.
January 19, 20223 yr I was thinking that as well, even that is kind of pushing it for relevant hits from him/them really lol 'Sanctify' really deserved to be a huge hit but of course it got vastly overshadowed by its awful follow-up. THIS!
January 19, 20223 yr For a name that's reasonably big, it's strange to think that they've only really had three top ten hits as lead artist.
January 19, 20223 yr 'Sanctify' grew on me hugely in the time since its release and I now probably rank it as one of their best. But to be fair, it doesn't sound remotely like a hit single and seemed like a bizarre choice to come back with after quite a long time away. 'All For You' flopping was also utterly criminal.
January 20, 20223 yr My favourite is “Eyes Shut” - just a really lovely song especially that ‘ Cause I want to be bigger than life’ part.
January 20, 20223 yr 'Sanctify' grew on me hugely in the time since its release and I now probably rank it as one of their best. But to be fair, it doesn't sound remotely like a hit single and seemed like a bizarre choice to come back with after quite a long time away. On the contrary I thought 'Sanctify' sounded like a hit at the time and I couldn't understand why it didn't smash. It's so much better than its follow up.
January 20, 20223 yr If You're Over Me was only that big cos it got crazy playlist support that Sanctify never had. Eyes Shut is my #1 followed by King. Also liked Desire but nothing from album 2 and 3. also liked the It's a Sin cover and thought it was gonna be huge, the performance at the Brits was great so pretty weird it didn't help the cover becoming a hit.
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