I thought as well as the #3 entry today I would do my rank of the #1 singles in Australia in 2011.

The first list is the list of songs in order they were at #1 from January to December. The second list will be my order from favourite to least favourite.

Official Australian #1's in 2011

1. Bruno Mars - Grenade

2. Who's That Girl - Guys Sebastian ft Eve

3. Dirty Talk - Wynter Gordon

4. S&M - Rihanna

5. Born This Way - Lady Gaga

6. On The Floor - Jennifer Lopez ft Pitbull

7. Sweat - Snoop Dogg ft David Guetta

8. Party Rock Anthem - LMFAO ft Lauren Bennett and GoonRock

9. Someone Like You - Adele

10. Somebody That I Used To Know - Gotye ft Kimbra

11. Mr Know It All - Kelly Clarkson

12. Sexy And I Know It - LMFAO

13. Good Night - Reece Mastin

Paddington James's rank of the Australian #1's in 2011

1. S&M - Rihanna

2. Dirty Talk - Wynter Gordon

3. Someone Like You - Adele

4. On The Floor - Jennifer Lopez ft Pitbull

5. Bruno Mars - Grenade

6. Who's That Girl - Guys Sebastian ft Eve

7. Mr Know It All - Kelly Clarkson

8. Somebody That I Used To Know - Gotye ft Kimbra

9. Born This Way - Lady Gaga

10. Sweat - Snoop Dogg ft David Guetta

11. Party Rock Anthem - LMFAO ft Lauren Bennett and GoonRock

12. Sexy And I Know It - LMFAO

13. Good Night - Reece Mastin

Edited Saturday at 06:462 days by Paddington James

So by my calculation only 4 songs reached #1 in both the UK and Australia in 2011, Grenade, On The Floor, Party Rock Anthem and Someone Like You. (5 if you include We R Who We R which reached #1 in Australia at the end of 2010.)

I was surprised at the time that Dirty Talk didn't perform better in the UK than its peak of #25. I though it would've easily gone top 10 and challenged for #1.

S&M was quite big here and I thought that might've translated over to the UK as well, but I guess Only Girl In The World, What's My Name and Who's That Chick were all quite big in the UK.

Someone Like You was massive globally but only got to #1 in Australia at the end of June.

Who's That Girl would be in my top 5 Guy Sebastian songs, it's a shame he never took off outside of Australia.

41 minutes ago, Paddington James said:

I thought as well as the #3 entry today I would do my rank of the #1 singles in Australia in 2011.

The first list is the list of songs in order they were at #1 from January to December. The second list will be my order from favourite to least favourite.

Official Australian #1's in 2011

1. Bruno Mars - Grenade

2. Who's That Girl - Guys Sebastian ft Eve

3. Dirty Talk - Wynter Gordon

4. S&M - Rihanna

5. Born This Way - Lady Gaga

6. On The Floor - Jennifer Lopez ft Pitbull

7. Sweat - Snoop Dogg ft David Guetta

8. Party Rock Anthem - LMFAO ft Lauren Bennett and GoonRock

9. Someone Like You - Adele

10. Somebody That I Used To Know - Gotye ft Kimbra

11. Mr Know It All - Kelly Clarkson

12. Sexy And I Know It - LMFAO

13. Good Night - Reece Mastin

Paddington James's rank of the Australian #1's in 2011

1. S&M - Rihanna

2. Dirty Talk - Wynter Gordon

3. Someone Like You - Adele

4. On The Floor - Jennifer Lopez ft Pitbull

5. Bruno Mars - Grenade

6. Who's That Girl - Guys Sebastian ft Eve

7. Mr Know It All - Kelly Clarkson

8. Somebody That I Used To Know - Gotye ft Kimbra

9. Born This Way - Lady Gaga

10. Sweat - Snoop Dogg ft David Guetta

11. Party Rock Anthem - LMFAO ft Lauren Bennett and GoonRock

12. Sexy And I Know It - LMFAO

13. Good Night - Reece Mastin

A lot less number ones than over here that year. Which ones were at the top longest, and do you know which were the end of year best sellers in Australia?

Really looking forward to your top 3, my favourite 2 are still to come, will they be in the same order as yours?!

Official Australian #1's in 2011

1. Bruno Mars - Grenade (1 week in 2011, 2 weeks in 2010 - 3 weeks total)

2. Who's That Girl - Guys Sebastian ft Eve (1 week in 2011, 1 week in 2010 - 2 weeks total)

3. Dirty Talk - Wynter Gordon (3 weeks)

4. S&M - Rihanna (2 weeks, then 3 weeks) total 5 weeks)

5. Born This Way - Lady Gaga (1 week)

6. On The Floor - Jennifer Lopez ft Pitbull (3 weeks)

7. Sweat - Snoop Dogg ft David Guetta (1 week)

8. Party Rock Anthem - LMFAO ft Lauren Bennett and GoonRock (10 weeks)

9. Someone Like You - Adele (7 weeks)

10. Somebody That I Used To Know - Gotye ft Kimbra (8 weeks)

11. Mr Know It All - Kelly Clarkson (1 week)

12. Sexy And I Know It - LMFAO (6 weeks, then 1 week) total 7 weeks)

13. Good Night - Reece Mastin (2 weeks, then 2 weeks) total 4 weeks)

Official Year End Top 20 - 2011

1. Party Rock Anthem - LMFAO ft Lauren Bennett and GoonRock

2. Somebody That I Used To Know - Gotye ft Kimbra

3. Moves Like Jagger - Maroon 5 ft Christina Aguilera

4. Someone Like You - Adele

5. Rolling In The Deep - Adele

6. Sexy And I Know It - LMFAO

7. Give Me Everything - Pitbull ft Ne-Yo, Afrojack and Nayer

8. Born This Way - Lady Gaga

9. Price Tag - Jessie J ft B.o.B

10. On The Floor - Jennifer Lopez ft Pitbull

11. S&M - Rihanna

12. We Found Love - Rihanna ft Calvin Harris

13. Sweat - Snoop Dogg ft David Guetta

14. The Lazy Song - Bruno Mars

15. E.T - Katy Perry ft Kanye West

16. Jar Of Hearts - Christina Perri

17. Super Bass - Nicki Minaj

18. Titanium - David Guetta ft Sia

19. Dirty Talk - Wynter Gordon

20. Good Feeling - Flo Rida

Official Top 100:

https://www.aria.com.au/charts/2011/singles-chart

3 – What’s My Name – Rihanna ft Drake

1 Week at #1 / Weekly Sales – 53,018

#49 in EOY 2011 – Total Sales of 347,600

Finishing in 3rd place and with the bronze medal is Rihanna who was one of the biggest names on the planet in 2011 and she ended the year with two #1 singles and a further four top 20 singles. The first of those two #1 singles was What’s My Name ft Drake. Debuting at #18 in November the previous year it would then climb to #10 the following week before continuing it’s rise to #8 then #4, three weeks at #2 behind Matt Cardle followed before this finally got to #1 in its 8^th week on the chart. Despite being a big Rihanna fan and owning all her albums I wasn’t really a fan of What’s My Name at the time. I liked it but I felt it seemed a little flat compared to her bigger hitters like Only Girl, Don’t Stop The Music, Umbrella and SOS, but as I gave the album more listens in early 2011 it started to grow on me, I still preferred songs like S&M, Fading and Cheers (Drink To That) but it was definitely improving for me on multiple listens.

As with many of the #1’s from early in 2011 I have very good memories of this one. I can remember listening to this on the train when I was going in to have lunch with a friend in the city one weekend, in fact I think that’s when this really started to click with me.

Elsewhere in the charts this week Jessie J scored her first top 5 hit with Do It Like A Dude at #5. Who’s That Chick re-entered the top 10, giving Rihanna three top singles in the one week and we had two songs titled The Flood in the top 20, Take That at #14 and Cheryl Cole at #18. As well as hitting #1 in the UK What’s My Name peaked at #1 in the US, #3 in New Zealand and #18 in Australia.

Edited Saturday at 11:592 days by Paddington James

Great song, if not quite as good as the other one left to come, Rihanna could hardly do any wrong at this stage. And yes, your top 2 are the same as mine!

3 hours ago, Paddington James said:

Official Australian #1's in 2011

1. Bruno Mars - Grenade (1 week in 2011, 2 weeks in 2010 - 3 weeks total)

2. Who's That Girl - Guys Sebastian ft Eve (1 week in 2011, 1 week in 2010 - 2 weeks total)

3. Dirty Talk - Wynter Gordon (3 weeks)

4. S&M - Rihanna (2 weeks, then 3 weeks) total 5 weeks)

5. Born This Way - Lady Gaga (1 week)

6. On The Floor - Jennifer Lopez ft Pitbull (3 weeks)

7. Sweat - Snoop Dogg ft David Guetta (1 week)

8. Party Rock Anthem - LMFAO ft Lauren Bennett and GoonRock (10 weeks)

9. Someone Like You - Adele (7 weeks)

10. Somebody That I Used To Know - Gotye ft Kimbra (8 weeks)

11. Mr Know It All - Kelly Clarkson (1 week)

12. Sexy And I Know It - LMFAO (6 weeks, then 1 week) total 7 weeks)

13. Good Night - Reece Mastin (2 weeks, then 2 weeks) total 4 weeks)

Official Year End Top 20 - 2011

1. Party Rock Anthem - LMFAO ft Lauren Bennett and GoonRock

2. Somebody That I Used To Know - Gotye ft Kimbra

3. Moves Like Jagger - Maroon 5 ft Christina Aguilar

Thank you for this, very interesting! LMFAO at number one for 17 weeks in total!

I’ve just noticed, isn’t it weird that Moves Like Jagger was a massive selling non number one of 2011 in both Australia and the UK?! Which were the songs that blocked it in Australia?

16 minutes ago, Jaz13music said:

Great song, if not quite as good as the other one left to come, Rihanna could hardly do any wrong at this stage. And yes, your top 2 are the same as mine!

Thank you for this, very interesting! LMFAO at number one for 17 weeks in total!

I’ve just noticed, isn’t it weird that Moves Like Jagger was a massive selling non number one of 2011 in both Australia and the UK?! Which were the songs that blocked it in Australia?

It really is quite amazing. According to wikipedia it spent 10 weeks at #2, blocked by 3 songs. Somebody That I Used To Know, Mr Know It All and Sexy And I Know It.

'Price Tag' is Jessie J's best song, it talked directly to the audience in a way not many pop songs do anymore which seemed to complement what Bruno Mars was doing with pop music around that time.

'Don't Hold Your Breath' is very vanilla for me, I think 'Poison' was a better Nicole solo single.

I've never been massively into 'On The Floor', but it's enjoyable from the "Afreeka" and other locations shoutout onwards, plus I think the 'Lambada' interpolation works very well.

'What's My Name' is decent, the verses and chorus aren't the most striking, but Rihanna has a good flow on the bridge and hits some big notes.

I have a clear favourite of the remaining two, and it would be my top #1 of the decade!

I absolutely adore What's My Name, I was addicted to it from the moment I bought Loud and it was a big song for me at the end of 2010. I remember driving to work in the snow (which didn't clear for about a month and a half in north Wales that year) and would have three songs on repeat; this, The Flood by Take That and White Light Moment by Tove Styrke. All three remain are still in my top 50 songs of all-time or thereabouts.

The beat and production is so solid, Drake's verse is actually so well delivered and quotable and Rihanna sounds so good on it, especially on the verses. This was absolute peak Rihanna and I was so glad when it got to No.1 in the new year.

On the Aussie No.1s, it's nice to see that Kelly Clarkson got there, lovely song. I actually like that Reece Mastin track too, very early One Direction style. Obviously the likes of S&M, Born This Way and Sweat were absolutely huge here without going to No.1 quite. Dirty Talk was played a lot and well known but absolutely robbed in terms of a good peak for some reason.

Edited Saturday at 14:322 days by gooddelta

Great song from RiRi which still holds up well today!

7 hours ago, gooddelta said:

On the Aussie No.1s, it's nice to see that Kelly Clarkson got there, lovely song. I actually like that Reece Mastin track too, very early One Direction style. Obviously the likes of S&M, Born This Way and Sweat were absolutely huge here without going to No.1 quite. Dirty Talk was played a lot and well known but absolutely robbed in terms of a good peak for some reason.

If I remember correctly Kelly Clarkson was in Australia doing promo that week and even performed on The X Factor which helped its rise to #1. If I’m being honest it feels a little out of place as #1 single for her as I don’t think it’s one of her best, but I do love her.

The Reece Martin track always sounded like a cheap rip off of P!nk’s hit Raise Your Glass, but I guess it was common to slightly copy songs back then. Samantha Jade’s winners single the following year in 2012 is still one of my favourite winners singles from any X Factor, Idol etc show.

I was so happy S&M and Dirty Talk got to #1 here, they were absolutely everywhere at the time and just soundtracked the wonderful first half of 2011 for me.

Later on today/tomorrow I’ll be taking one more detour before revealing my final top two. I’d like to shine a light on some of my favourite songs of 2011 that didn’t reach #1. I know it’s a little off script for these threads but 2011 was such a significant year for me I want to include it. 🙂

'What's My Name' is fab. Much preferred that to 'Only Girl...' too. Would rank it quite high among her discography. 'S&M' is a tune also, think that was actually the highest of Rihanna's in my EOY that year. I liked the other singles from Loud too.

Over the next few posts I'm going to be shining a light on a little more than 10 of my favourite non #1's from 2011.

Simple Plan ft Natasha Bedingfield - Jet Lag

This was one of the first new songs that I remember hearing in May 2011 when I returned home to Australia from my 4 weeks in the UK. (Outside of the new Lady Gaga album Born This Way).

I think I connected with it in a way that I'd just come back from a 21hr flight to get back home, so I liked that there was a song referencing Jet Lag, even though I didn't feel like I had any. I'd also made some really good friends and strong connectionections with people whilst away so I also resonated with juggling the time differences with trying to talk to people.

Jet Lag peaked at #8 in Australia and ended the 2011 as the 60th highest selling single in Australia. Jet Lag failed to chart in the UK.

Havana Brown - We Run The Night

I can still remember the first time I saw this charting on the iTunes Australia chart. I was in a hotel room in Waterford, Ireland and I'd just came back from dinner and was checking out the iTunes store on my phone and I had a real WTF moment when I saw this in the top 5 because I'd only ever known Havana Brown as a DJ (DJ Havana Brown) and not a singer. The preview sounded good but it wasn't until I returned home a little over three weeks later that I heard this song properly for the first time. I fell in love with it straight away and had it on heavy rotation for a good month or two.

We Run The Night peaked at #5 in Australia and ended 2011 as the 40th highest selling single in Australia. A remix featuring Pitbull and produced by RedOne was released the following year in 2012 and would peak at #26 in the US.

Adele - Rolling In The Deep

What a way to kick off a second era. I can remember listening to Rolling In The Deep for the first time on a Friday afternoon in the office at work. I'd stopped working as this song just hit me. I was just sitting there taking it all in. Still one of my favourite Adele songs. It's a shame it never got to #1 in the UK or Australia.

Edited yesterday at 10:191 day by Paddington James

Rihanna - Cheers (Drink To That)

Cheers (Drink To That) was released as the final single from Rihanna's 5th studio album Loud and it's one I've always absolutely loved. The song partly samples Avril Lavigne's single I'm With You and you can even hear Avril on this track to (Yeah-Yeah). Whilst it wasn't a pop/dance/club banger from Rihanna the song still spoke about having a good time at the weekend.

I can remember my friend and I going out driving on cold winter nights blasting this song and winding down the windows screaming out the chorus to this song. Such fun memories in an otherwise sad time.

Cheers (Drink To That) peaked at #6 in Australia, #7 in the US and #15 in the UK. It also ended 2011 as the 41st highest selling single in Australia.

Alexandra Stan - Mr. Saxobeat

I could've very easily picked follow up single Get Back (ASAP) for this section but in the end I decided to chose the song that introduced me to Alexandra Stan.

This was one of my favourite new singles/new artist discoveries of 2011. I can remember hearing this for the first time, I was sitting at home on my laptop checking out BuzzJack (this was a good year before I decided to join BuzzJack) and I saw this mentioned in the UK Charts thread and so I checked it out. I'd never heard anything like this before but I was completely hooked. I absolutely loved this and Get Back (ASAP) so much that I ordered the album off Amazon.

Mr. Saxobeat peaked at #19 in Australia, #21 in the US and #3 in the UK. It ended 2011 as the 94th highest selling single in Australia.

JLS - Take A Chance On Me

Unpopular opinion time but this is my favourite JLS song. Ok I'll be honest, I've only ever heard 3 JLS songs in full. Take A Chance On Me, Beat Again and She Makes Me Wanna and the last one was only because I had to as it was a part of the #1 rank for 2011.

I don't even quite recall what made me check this out in November 2011 but for some reason I did. Maybe I thought it'd be an ABBA cover, or maybe I wanted to see what Rihanna blocked from reaching #1 in the UK. Whatever the reason though I found that I really enjoyed this song and it's one that I played a lot in the lead up to Christmas 2011. I'm still yet to make the dive into and other JLS songs.

Take A Chance On Me was never released in Australia but peaked at #2 in the UK.

Edited yesterday at 10:481 day by Paddington James

Nicki Minaj ft Rihanna - Fly

This was the song that really got me to start noticing Nicki Minaj as before hearing this the only songs I'd heard from her was Check It Out which didn't really do anything. In the days leading up to taking my first international trip and my first ever flight I stumbled upon this song when checking out Rihanna's wikipedia page, so I decided to check this one out because of her.

I felt that it really spoke to me at the time as the song was called Fly and I was preparing to 'fly' for the first time for my trip to the UK. It probably seems a little cringe now but at the time it really felt like I connected with the song, so much so that I played it more than a few times whilst on my flight. It also lead to me purchasing Nicki's debut album when I returned home, as by that stage Super Bass was blowing up and I was really getting into that song as well.

Fly peaked at #18 in Australia, #16 in the UK and #19 in the US.

Clare Maguire - The Last Dance + The Shield And The Sword

Both of these two songs were on heavy rotation for the first four months of 2011 for me. I used to make a new playlist on iTunes every month of new songs to listen to and I could never bring myself around to removing these two. The Last Dance was the first one I heard and like many other songs it was one that I loved from the moment I heard it, but it was The Shield And The Sword that would have the lasting impact on me. I found that the lyrics and music really spoke to me for some reason.

Edited yesterday at 11:161 day by Paddington James

Other songs I loved but won't include a write up on are:

Cascada - Night Nurse

Adele - Set Fire To The Rain

Christina Perri - Jar Of Hearts

Ed Sheeran - Lego House

The Saturdays - Notorious / All Fired Up / My Heart Takes Over

Vanessa Amorosi - Amazing

Nicola Roberts - Lucky Day

Katy B - Easy Please Me

Florence + The Machine - Shake It Out

Nicole Scherzinger - Wet

Bruno Mars - It Will Rain

Alexis Jordan - Happiness

For Nicola Roberts - Lucky Day is very good, but 'Beat Of My Drum' is annoying and awful imo.

Nicole - Wet is good with a 2002 style eurotrance production courtesy of StarGate.

“What’s My Name” is great. A lot of pop / rap crossovers from the time seem so formulaic now but this is just effortlessly lovely.

I don’t actually love either of the top 2, but they’re both very solid, critically acclaimed megahits.