11th February 2022

 

Encanto’s Bruno tops for a 4th singles week, Bastille top albums

 

It’s a comfortable 4th week that we are talking about Bruno being on top of the singles chart, while Encanto’s Jessica Darrow’s Surface Pressure rises to 3 and t’other non-starred-out track Family Madrigal still makes for a trio of Enchanting songs. Peru is stuck at 2 for a third week (3 is the magic number this week, not that everyone will necessarily get the De La Soul reference what with Spotify not just lacking Neil Young & Joni Mitchell, even with Spiderman movie spots), so Fireball XL5 (oops I mean Fireboy DML, sorry I’m reliving my early childhood) will be a bit sad, Ed Sheeran less so as he’s been on top at least 137 times in the last 6 months. OK, 3 times I mean, 3 is the magic number!

 

Gayle drops one place with abcdefu to 4, giving her kindergarten school a bad reputation, I assume, for not being clear about the alphabet: “They are all the right letters, just not necessarily in the right order!” Lost Frequencies and Calum Scott hold at 5, with Where Are You Now, keeping the highest new entry out of the top 5. That’ll be ArrDee and Aitch, two more recent Primary school graduates also not entirely clear on the alphabet - you don’t have to spell things phonetically lads! Though, H was already taken and it’s not a tragedy. Anyways War is in at 6, Brighton rapper ArrDee is on his 6th top 40 and 5th top 10, while Manchester-rapper Aitch is on 13 top 40’s and 6 top 10’s. YouTube made me sit through a video about men with wrinkles having plastic surgery before I could watch War, probably more to do with me than them, but how very dare you YouTube! It was OK, avoided a lot of cliches but still had the “I’m defiant and up for a fight” message and through in a C-bomb (in the lyrics, not the Youtube version). I would be shocked and outraged, as per the targeted wrinkles advert, if I didn’t also use the C-bomb for dramatic effect now and again.

 

Belters Only and Jazzy rise one place to 8 with the clubby Make Me Feel Good, and Hazey just misses the top 10 up at 11 with Packs And Potions proving to have legs 4 weeks on from debut, as Scouse Rap catches on some more, ehhh, cahhm down, cahhm down, mahte! New at 18, and following on from his Brits appearance, Liam Gallagher exclaims Everything’s Electric and manages to get some actual decent rockpop into the charts from an over-40-something, his 6th solo top 40 hit as he heads towards almost 30 years of Oasis-dominated charting. Justin Bieber finally makes the top 20 with Ghost up at 19 after 18 weeks, almost entirely down to me buying it (and with a little help from Radio 2 A-listing it for weeks till it grew on me). Imagine Dragons manage a one place climb to 17, Enemy taking 13 weeks to peak.

 

Tate McRae is new at 24 with She’s All I Wanna Be, surprisingly only her 2nd top 40 hit since breaking through with You Broke Me First 2 years ago, the 18-year-old Canadian even fell short of the top 40 with the brilliant You, featuring on the Regard track with Troye Sivan. I saw a fab US TV version of them doing it, which clearly didn’t get the exposure it deserved. So under-the-radar that nobody’s bothered adding it to her Wikipedia discography. Galantis & Years And Years scrape up another 2 places with a bit of sweet talking, at 26, and Tiesto & Ava Max have a new Motto: 22 is better than a 26 peak. George Ezra also says the same, except 30 and 32 respectively. And Gunna & Future, 28 from 30.

 

More new entries come from veterans Nicki Minaj and Red Hot Chili Peppers - not together, sadly, that would be fun. Nicki is back at 31 with fellow rapper Lil Baby on Do We Have A Problem? Nicki’s 41st Top 40 in 12 years, Lil Baby’s 9th in 4 years. Youtube thinks this Minaj viewer should want to cash in their pension and spend it, and I’m getting ageist vibes now, but at least thats better than 3 minutes of non-music sweary “acting” before we get to the song. “Song” I should say, as it’s taken every rap obligatory cliche in the book and stuck it into a 9-minute-self-indulgent we-wanna-get-into-movies promo. It seemed much longer. I’ll stick with Turn It On, the David Guetta Minaj-featuring classic, I think, but thanks for the help with the pension advice guys!

 

Very much in the young, pleasant female singer-songwriter groove, Em Beihold is new at 38 with Numb Little Bug, she’s a U.S. fencing champion it would seem. I get the point. Ouch! Sorry. Juice Wrld is back for a 14th top 40 hit at 37, most of them posthumously - Cigarettes . I never cease to be amazed at how much material record labels manage to unearth following the death of someone they might be expected to owe a duty of care to, to help stay well. I’m sure it’s what he would have wanted, though. More happily, Jax Jones, fresh from his recent Never Mind The Buzzcocks appearance, is new at 40 with MNEK featuring on Where Did You Go? Jax’s 14th Top 40 in 8 years and MNEK’s 7th in 8 years. I saw Hailee Steinfeld support Katy Perry in Barcelona the other year, and Hailee was giving a shout-out to MNEK on her collab with him, Colours. Ooooohhhhh, get me trying to get down wiv da kids!

 

Just missing out on a top 40? 60-somethings (more or less by the end of the year) Red Hot Chili Peppers almost get a top 40 this week, I hope they are not getting bombarded with the same “you’re really old mate” advertising I get when watching anything on YouTube.

 

On Albums Bastille are back! Give Me The Future glides to the top spot, their 3rd chart-topper, and 4th top 5 studio album since debuting on top in 2013 with Bad Blood. They last topped in 2017 with Wild World, so this is a welcome return to form, most of the sales physical. Sheeran is at 2, Adele at 4, not surprising after the Brits hype for the event. Black Country, New Roads is a name new to me at 3. The English rock band have previously charted at 4 in 2021 with For The First Time, a title with a mission-statement of confidence that turned out well as follow-up Ants From Up There is new at 3.

 

The Divine Comedy grab a new entry with Charmed Life, the-Neil-Hannon-fronted band’s closest brush with the top end in years, in at 5. Their 8th top 40, 4th top 10, in a chart career now-stretching over 26 years. Korn have been charting for 26 years too, as Requiem becoming their 11th top 40 at 8 and fails to equal the 4 peak of 2002’s Untouchables. Mitski is new at 6, her Laurel Hell not being a tribute to Mr. Hardy’s creative partner, but it is the first top 40 album for the critically-acclaimed Japanese-American singer-songwriter now a decade into her career.

 

New at 17, Sheffield’s Saxon are back 42 years on from them being a decent part of the Nu-Metal movement of the late 70’s and early 80’s, returning with Carpe Diem, their 9th top 40 album since 1980’s Wheels Of Steel hit peaked at 5, by far their biggest year and album. On TV, a Christine McVie documentary boosts the Fleetwood Mac back-catalogue, again, while Dave’s Psychodrama and James Blunt’s hits collection pop back into the 40 - the latter possibly due to his threatening to release songs on Spotify if they don’t stop anti-vaccine propaganda. And that’s it for new stuff, unless Billy Bragg manages to scrape a new top 40 entry (update: sadly he didn’t make it 39 years of top 40 entries - I’ll have to drive down the road and buy him a pint in his thatched-listed-village-pub as consolation, not too far from Union-founding Puddletown).

Well done the Divine Comedy. Their 50s revival tune National Express is still very good despite it being accused of sneering too much in the lyrics.

 

Yeah it was funny what James Blunt said although as 'Wisemen' still sounds good I actually wouldn't mind if he released new songs like that.

 

You're right 'Turn Me On' is better than 'Do We Have A Problem?' although it is rather cheesy so I assume (although I may be wrong) that Nicki doesn't like 'Turn Me On' much any more.

Edited February 11, 20223 yr by mdf

Well done the Divine Comedy. Their 50s revival tune National Express is still very good despite it being accused of sneering too much in the lyrics.

 

Yeah it was funny what James Blunt said although as 'Wisemen' still sounds good I actually wouldn't mind if he released new songs like that.

 

You're right 'Turn Me On' is better than 'Do We Have A Problem?' although it is rather cheesy so I assume (although I may be wrong) that Nicki doesn't like 'Turn Me On' much any more.

 

yeh, the Divine Comedy are great, and Neil's lyrics are witty and observational - there's a woke-ish assumption that observational humour is being judgemental, but I would argue that describing reality in a mildly amusing fashion is taking the mickey out of ourselves. National Express hasn't gone out of business, and I doubt anyone using it would take offence at the song :)

 

I love James Blunt, no matter what anyone throws at him because they don't like his music he's always got a great comeback (and I like his recent stuff as much as Wisemen, the best of his early stuff). I've not heard Turn Me On for a while, but I loved it at the time and the video is amazing.. :D