5 minutes ago, Severin said:

X number of plays by a user = 1 sale. Be that 20, 30, whatever arbitrary number the OCC feels is relevant. After that the plays of that song, on that account do not count to the main chart. This would mean only new listeners would contribute to 'sales' and you'd see songs grow and decline in popularity in a more natural way, in a faster moving chart. Songs would also have to be genuinely popular to gain something like Platinum status rather than just be around long enough to gather the plays over time.

I don't think the average person responsible for keeping songs hanging around for months/years is listening to them hundreds of times, so I'm not sure that would make any real difference. I think the best answer would be an overhaul in how streaming services like Spotify promote fresher music.

Hot take yes follow the Australia and New Zealand style recurrent rules by automatically moving every singles and albums with original date release over 18 month/78 week (New Zealand) or 2 year/104 week (Australia) to a separate catalogue or on-replay chart. Then remove the 3 tracks rule while keep ACR in possible improved methodology

Australia On Replay Singles and Albums Chart

https://www.aria.com.au/charts/catalogue-singles-chart/2025-10-20

https://www.aria.com.au/charts/catalogue-albums-chart/2025-10-20

New Zealand Catalogue Singles and Albums Chart

https://aotearoamusiccharts.co.nz/charts/catalogue-singles

https://aotearoamusiccharts.co.nz/charts/catalogue-albums

Recurrent rules would be much better than ACR which should be scrapped altogether. ACR just makes songs chart in the lower region of the top 40 for ages instead of in the top 10 whereas recurrency would clear them out of an already artificial position.

However I'd prefer there was neither ACR nor recurrency rules and it went back to how it was pre-2017.

This thread will go on for pages and pages, and so it should do becuase if there is one thing we all agree on (apart from Joseph it seems) is that the OCC have to do something different, and the time is now.

Long may this subject be drawn attention to for that is the only way to bring about change.

15 hours ago, DanielCarey said:

The UK charts (and other charts around the world) have been incredibly stale this year. These days, it is incredibly hard for old songs to leave the charts, and for new ones to achieve a decent peak. The Billboard Charts has changed its recurrent rules. Songs will no longer be spending as many weeks in the chart due to these rules.

Should the OCC introduce recurrent rules?

It's hard for old songs to chart highly at all because of permanent ACR and there's the matter of automatic resets.

From the outside, it feels too complicated, but maybe it's the best thing we've got.

1 hour ago, awardinary said:

This thread will go on for pages and pages, and so it should do becuase if there is one thing we all agree on (apart from Joseph it seems) is that the OCC have to do something different, and the time is now.

Long may this subject be drawn attention to for that is the only way to bring about change.

I think this will be debated every so often for ages, we've had countless discussions about ACR, and without ACR we'd have countless other discussions about how to solve the depressingly slow pace of the chart. Ultimately it comes down to the question of what the chart represents - accurate statistics, or fresh hits, or both as it tries to do now.

I don't think the current model is perfect, I'm just not hugely convinced that any model would be perfect, we'd see other issues arising instead I'm sure.

Aly brought up the most valid point for me - it's the streaming services that could do so much more to promote fresh hits and new artists, and it's their approach and playlisting that needs the biggest critique.

1 hour ago, Severin said:

X number of plays by a user = 1 sale. Be that 20, 30, whatever arbitrary number the OCC feels is relevant. After that the plays of that song, on that account do not count to the main chart. This would mean only new listeners would contribute to 'sales' and you'd see songs grow and decline in popularity in a more natural way, in a faster moving chart. Songs would also have to be genuinely popular to gain something like Platinum status rather than just be around long enough to gather the plays over time.

In action I think it would certainly do something, but from what I've seen based on auxiliary data points (eg last fm), I think in practice at best it'll introduce a similarly stale equilibrium that doesn't provide the feeling of freshness, and at worst it'll actively punish newer singles because they're the ones that are more prone to quickly run up repeat plays. When Olivia Rodrigo was bursting out the gate with a million streams in a day, it wasn't from a million listeners, but it was those repeat plays (capped at 10 on Spotify) that took her from an impressive start to a #1 debut. I think singles like "Mr. Brightside" are genuinely propelled by people who have listened to the song less times than some current hits are, they just have that much wider a net of potential listeners.

1 hour ago, Popchartfreak said:

repeating myself endlessly, apologies again: album tracks are not singles, they are streaming album sales and should be removed from single track sales based on the lowest track "sale"

This isn't really how the streams accumulate in practice. The least popular song on a new Taylor Swift is certainly not deriving 100% of its streams from people listening to the whole thing, we just don't see the intricacies and cherry pickings that accumulate to the result we get. If such a system were in practice, I (or more likely, petty detractors) could deliberately stream her song "Honey" for the sole purpose of erasing her sales. The irony would be that it's people who don't get to the end of the album (potentially because they aren't loving what they're hearing) who end up bolstering the singles. It's just not a fix that improves things in any way, in my opinion.

How long did shops used to sell a single for ? Only sales for that length of time count towards the charts (they can still accumulate lifetime sales)

41 minutes ago, Dircadirca said:

This isn't really how the streams accumulate in practice. The least popular song on a new Taylor Swift is certainly not deriving 100% of its streams from people listening to the whole thing, we just don't see the intricacies and cherry pickings that accumulate to the result we get. If such a system were in practice, I (or more likely, petty detractors) could deliberately stream her song "Honey" for the sole purpose of erasing her sales. The irony would be that it's people who don't get to the end of the album (potentially because they aren't loving what they're hearing) who end up bolstering the singles. It's just not a fix that improves things in any way, in my opinion.

I'm sure the continual 1,2,3 positions for the first tracks on an album are due to curiosity streams and people getting bored enough to not bother streaming the rest - which is in itself showing that they arent being streamed because they are the most popular, necessarily. With physicals people invariably buy after listening, and with albums that includes the lesser tracks. I bought the entire Taylor Swift album, regardless of what I think about the individual tracks, but that is one complete album sale, the End. I'm not affecting the singles chart in any way beyond that. I can't see anyone spending time streaming one song to cause it to lose hypothetical singles sales under my suggested system and in any case that wouldn't work because as soon as that one track sells more then the next lowest track that becomes the new base album sale - so they would have to put one hell of a lot of time and effort to significantly affect the Lowest Sales Figure, track by track, until they start to actually increase sales to match the top 3 tracks. I doubt there's enough streaming time for whole albums in a week to exclude the more popular tracks from the single track charts, though they might well chart much lower down. Singles in advance of albums wouldnt be affected though, and a lot of artists go that route these days anyway but the results are usually more mixed for non-superstars.

I’m against recurrent, as imo if the song is doing well enough to chart it should be allowed to do so, they do need to fix the ACR rules though especially with resets, it does seem to be all over The place and songs like the chain or the night we met not getting deserving top 40 peaks while Coldplay and oasis (just an example) being reset multiple times doesn’t make sense, I do agree with double ACR where after a set time their total is halved again which would allow songs like lose control and beautiful things to maintain charting but not taking up space in the top 40!

52 minutes ago, Popchartfreak said:

I'm sure the continual 1,2,3 positions for the first tracks on an album are due to curiosity streams and people getting bored enough to not bother streaming the rest - which is in itself showing that they arent being streamed because they are the most popular, necessarily. With physicals people invariably buy after listening, and with albums that includes the lesser tracks. I bought the entire Taylor Swift album, regardless of what I think about the individual tracks, but that is one complete album sale, the End. I'm not affecting the singles chart in any way beyond that. I can't see anyone spending time streaming one song to cause it to lose hypothetical singles sales under my suggested system and in any case that wouldn't work because as soon as that one track sells more then the next lowest track that becomes the new base album sale - so they would have to put one hell of a lot of time and effort to significantly affect the Lowest Sales Figure, track by track, until they start to actually increase sales to match the top 3 tracks. I doubt there's enough streaming time for whole albums in a week to exclude the more popular tracks from the single track charts, though they might well chart much lower down. Singles in advance of albums wouldnt be affected though, and a lot of artists go that route these days anyway but the results are usually more mixed for non-superstars.

I would say in fairness that it doesn't always work that simply. Taylor Swift for instance, she's charting 1, 3, 2. The same 3 tracks sure, but the swapped order introduces a snare in the principle that contradicts it. It can also be as simple as the artist/label/whoever's putting the album together know what they're working with, and put the strongest tracks up the front. Even if they don't, the listener themselves expects something like this and pays them the most diligence. If it were just a matter of listeners tapping out, I think a shift would have happened sooner, but here we are 18 days later and it's still the same 3 tracks in the same order, from what I'd say are cherry pickings. I always like to use Ed Sheeran's "Divide" album as a great example because Track 1, "Eraser", slid down the rankings so quickly in a way that it couldn't have if we're to equate this listening experience across the board. It's an exception that proves the rule.

I do genuinely think people would engage in that sort of chart trolling because it's so simple and some groups of people are very organised. If the bottom track slips into second last, that'd be okay as long as it doesn't make the top 3, mission accomplished. Meanwhile the artists themselves can just stick an interlude or a hidden track, anything like that and it can skew the numbers. The least streamed track on Justin Bieber's "Changes", the relative underperforming album, has more streams than the least streamed track on "Justice", his return to form, because the latter has an interlude that most people skip. Think it's just inviting an additional layer of mess to what is admittedly already a messy system, but two wrongs don't make a right 😅

-

There's a longer post I want to make but it's getting off topic, I just think that everything we're seeing is a consequence of music listening getting more fractured and the concept of the 'general listenership' that empower a mix of quirky and interesting hit songs by a wide variety of artists isn't quite as strong as it used to be. That's not to say such music doesn't exist, it does. But there just isn't a good way to pull it out of the chart data we have. Outside of the top 40, most songs that are released on any given week just follow similar downward sales & streaming trajectory that will feel like unrewarding and meaningless noise to all of us. But then I guess I don't know what the exact motivation always is for wanting more debuts on the chart. Is it for the false impression of activity, or is it people who genuinely need the chart to tell them what current music is worth listening to?

Here’s what I don’t understand.

With streaming we have pretty much the whole of the history of popular music available to everyone all the time, including far more new music to try than ever before and with no financial risk. What I mean is that in the physical era there was a certain reluctance to try a new artist due to cost of purchasing but that no longer applies.

And yet, I think, most would accept that the charts are slower moving than ever now, with longer stays at number one and especially songs hanging around the top 10/20/40 etc for much longer. That means, despite all this availability, the general public are choosing to listen to the same stuff over and over again week in week out, rather than trying something new. I know it’s slightly off topic, but it is related in a way, with the attempts (ACR, 3 track rule etc) to ‘speed up’ the chart and I genuinely wonder if anyone has any theories why that has happened? The only thing I could come up with was that maybe people find too much choice overwhelming so retreat to what they know and are comfortable with? Anybody got any thoughts?

12 minutes ago, Jaz13music said:

Here’s what I don’t understand.

With streaming we have pretty much the whole of the history of popular music available to everyone all the time, including far more new music to try than ever before and with no financial risk. What I mean is that in the physical era there was a certain reluctance to try a new artist due to cost of purchasing but that no longer applies.

And yet, I think, most would accept that the charts are slower moving than ever now, with longer stays at number one and especially songs hanging around the top 10/20/40 etc for much longer. That means, despite all this availability, the general public are choosing to listen to the same stuff over and over again week in week out, rather than trying something new. I know it’s slightly off topic, but it is related in a way, with the attempts (ACR, 3 track rule etc) to ‘speed up’ the chart and I genuinely wonder if anyone has any theories why that has happened? The only thing I could come up with was that maybe people find too much choice overwhelming so retreat to what they know and are comfortable with? Anybody got any thoughts?

I don't know many people who are willing to seek out new music, people just tend to stick with what they know. In a world where people have developed very low attention spans it's understandable why people aren't interested in giving new things a chance... I admit I do this sometimes!

Edited October 21Oct 21 by gasman449

2 minutes ago, gasman449 said:

I don't know many people who are willing to seek out new music, people just tend to stick with what they know. In a world where people have developed very low attention spans it's understandable why people aren't interested in giving new things a chance... I admit I do this sometimes!

Unfortunately this, we have become so spoon fed that a lot of people literally have to be told what to do when it comes to basics,

id say it even goes as far as music with the general public just whack on the big playlists etc etc, I dont do playlists but I know im guilty of just whacking on whats top 10 on Netflix when I cant find anything I like so id imagine the same happens with spotify etc

18 minutes ago, Jaz13music said:

Here’s what I don’t understand.

With streaming we have pretty much the whole of the history of popular music available to everyone all the time, including far more new music to try than ever before and with no financial risk. What I mean is that in the physical era there was a certain reluctance to try a new artist due to cost of purchasing but that no longer applies.

And yet, I think, most would accept that the charts are slower moving than ever now, with longer stays at number one and especially songs hanging around the top 10/20/40 etc for much longer. That means, despite all this availability, the general public are choosing to listen to the same stuff over and over again week in week out, rather than trying something new. I know it’s slightly off topic, but it is related in a way, with the attempts (ACR, 3 track rule etc) to ‘speed up’ the chart and I genuinely wonder if anyone has any theories why that has happened? The only thing I could come up with was that maybe people find too much choice overwhelming so retreat to what they know and are comfortable with? Anybody got any thoughts?

The way I think of it is - say you and I both have very eclectic music taste and listen to huge amounts of obscure stuff, but there’s very little in common between us. Then during the year we both host a couple of parties where we play a few tracks like “Mr Brightside” to get in the mood.

Then imagine there are thousands more like us listening to plenty of weird and wonderful stuff and only occasionally putting on something mainstream.

Add up everything that we’ve all listened to and what is the most popular track? It’s “Mr Brightside” of course. Not because any of us are obsessively listening to it but because it’s one of the few common tracks that many people with very different taste will put on occasionally.

Surely it's not hard to know whether an account has listened to a song once, so why don't they just allow that one play via a "Single EP" per account and then use the model they have rn for songs that are listened to via a playlist or something? I think if someone is likely to seek out a song to play, they actually want to listen to it, but if it's played via a playlist just coz they chucked it on as background noise/for a party etc.. people will just play either on shuffle or in order and this will avoid "accidental plays" of songs people don't really like etc.. getting a full "sale".

Same with albums, surely they can differentiate accounts who have listened to the album from those who just cherry picked?

Also I think ACR should be gradual decline after the 9th week as opposed to immediately being halved.

8 minutes ago, Julian_ said:

The way I think of it is - say you and I both have very eclectic music taste and listen to huge amounts of obscure stuff, but there’s very little in common between us. Then during the year we both host a couple of parties where we play a few tracks like “Mr Brightside” to get in the mood.

Then imagine there are thousands more like us listening to plenty of weird and wonderful stuff and only occasionally putting on something mainstream.

Add up everything that we’ve all listened to and what is the most popular track? It’s “Mr Brightside” of course. Not because any of us are obsessively listening to it but because it’s one of the few common tracks that many people with very different taste will put on occasionally.

Hitting the nail on the head here. I liken it to witnessing a huge crowd. Close up, you can see everyone's individual actions and words, which can be all manner of things. Once you zoom out, there's very little you can discern from it outside of large, shared, sweeping actions that they're all participating in.

It's not that everyone's boring, but we create our version of what's considered safe, entry level, (or whatever denigrating term you have for it) as a constantly correcting reaction to what's successful. A self-fulfilling, defeatist perspective.

Something something death of monoculture something something.

Thanks for the comments guys, interesting reading and what you’re all saying makes a lot of sense.

Firstly, I certainly didn’t mean to ‘put down’ anyone for sticking to what they’re comfortable with, I hope it didn’t come across that way. In fact, if anything, my little autistic brain tends to direct me to repetitive stuff anyway, I think maybe I sometimes try to resist it too much! 

Don’t get me wrong, as a chart fan I love to see a massive hit as much as anyone, à la Ordinary, even if I don’t like the song itself. I suppose the ones that surprise me most are the older songs hanging around in the mid to lower charts. Not just Mr Brightside (though I often think I’m the only person who never liked that song, even as a big Killers fan) but also things like Lose Control and Beautiful Things (with no reflection on the merits of the songs themselves). Thanks Julian your explanation makes perfect sense!

I’m sure I’m in the minority, being an old git, but I stream predominately as a way to try out new music before I buy physicals or Bandcamp downloads of the stuff which passes a ‘three-listen test’. That way I feel I’m giving decent payments to the artists as directly as I can. If I had limitless money and could just bulk-buy each week's releases, I'd do so in a heartbeat.  For now, my bank balance hates me, but my music lover side is very happy.😂

Don't know if its possible but stop counting pre created playlists on Spotify Amazon etc.