with so many songs stuck in the charts for ages? Sweet About Me, American Boy, Rockstar, Black & Gold, Low and so on.

 

And in most cases those songs are preventing the follow-up singles of having decent chart careers.

 

It makes miss the old chart days when there was plenty of new entries in the top 20 and a single could be considered an enduring hit if spent over six weeks in the top 10.

Edited September 3, 200816 yr by N-S

with so many songs stuck in the charts for ages? Sweet About Me, American Boy, Rockstar, Black & Gold, Low and so on.

 

And in most cases those songs are preventing the follow-up singles of having decent chart careers.

 

It makes miss the old chart days when there was plenty of new entries in the top 20 and a single could be considered an enduring hit if spent over six weeks in the top 10.

 

Yeah i know what you mean these songs as much as their are great songs, clogs up the chart and don't let other singles have the chance to do well. This is what bugs me i really want the old rule back but then you wouldn't have these classics in the charts rarely ;)

Yes, I think we and just about everyone is. It's stupid, 80% of the top 40 consists of the same songs week in, week out and they just about all fall about one or two places maximum per week. It's mundane.

I wanted the charts slowing down a little...but not this much :( I want an element of unpredictability, and aside from the odd Gabriella Cilmi/Nickelback case, we just aren't getting that at all -_- And now single deletion is near impossible really as demand just keeps on going thanks to bloody Radio 1 :manson:

I know i am. The chart is just ridicolous and apart from Sweet About Me none of these songs seem to be actually any good at all.

it's very boring but at least most songs climb to their peak now...it's just shame they don't drop away from their peak as quickly as they climbed to it...

 

but then a song with a chart run 21-14-6-4-2-1-5-9-15-27 etc...would probably rack up less than 200,000 sales overall

 

so you either have slow charts or low overall sales...it's a lose/lose situation

I bloody well am as well - I thought that including downloads would be a good thing, but they've slowed right down that it wouldn't surprise me if we have the same songs in the Top 10 three weeks running (apart from the post-Christmas chart, obviously).

I wanted the charts slowing down a little...but not this much :( I want an element of unpredictability, and aside from the odd Gabriella Cilmi/Nickelback case, we just aren't getting that at all -_- And now single deletion is near impossible really as demand just keeps on going thanks to bloody Radio 1 :manson:

 

Same here. I didn't like 2004 when it was practically a fresh chart every week but I think we had a happy medium between 2005-7. This year has gone awful the opposite way. Radio 1 and other stations constantly play these tracks so people lap it up.

Yup, I agree too. The charts have become so slow that it has made the charts boring. Even when a song makes a big climb it's followed by a few weeks of crawling up the charts.

 

I wouldn't want a return to the charts of a few years ago, but now it's gone far too much the other way.

I wanted the charts slowing down a little...but not this much :( I want an element of unpredictability, and aside from the odd Gabriella Cilmi/Nickelback case, we just aren't getting that at all -_- And now single deletion is near impossible really as demand just keeps on going thanks to bloody Radio 1 :manson:

You've hit the nail on the head there, it's made the singles chart really meaningless now.

Apart from the odd exception, the top 40 is essentially just the Radio 1 Playlist these days :arrr: I would never vote for David Cameron but privatising such an awful radio station is really the way forward for Radio 1, it doesn't really do much for new artists AT ALL these days :manson:

Yup, I agree too. The charts have become so slow that it has made the charts boring. Even when a song makes a big climb it's followed by a few weeks of crawling up the charts.

 

I wouldn't want a return to the charts of a few years ago, but now it's gone far too much the other way.

 

 

I totally agree, listening to the chart show every Sunday is really grating on me now with 2 DJ's that know fooked all about the charts making a mockery of it each week, please Mark Goodier come back.

 

Its really taking the p... listening to old tracks week after week but seriously in the past few weeks I've lost interest in the charts, even the midweeks are boring. As we now know what the chart will look like by Friday.

Yes, I think we and just about everyone is.

 

Speak for yourself - if a song remains popular for an extended period of time, so be it. The chart is now more reprentative of what is currently popular than it has ever been before - how can that be a *bad* thing?

 

The old rules wouldn't have helped - they were designed for a time when most sales were physical, and the exclusion rules didn't affect songs still in the T40 anyway. Downloads have changed the market so much that we can't ever go back.

 

Do you really want a situation akin to 'affirmative action' anyway, where songs not good enough to chart on merit are handed chart positions they don't deserve? Besides, these new artifically-boosted songs will have no staying power, and we'll just end up with endless re-entries.

 

Are there any other dissenters out there who think the charts are better now than in the 'wham,bam, thank you ma'am' era of fast turnover?

 

Another point raised is that of follow-ups being hurt by the continued presence of previous singles. Personally I regard that theory as complete BS!

 

People either like or dislike a song on its own merits - they don't think 'I liked their first single, and their follow-up, but I'm not going to buy the follow-up because the first one is still in the charts' :)

Edited September 3, 200816 yr by vidcapper

Another point raised is that of follow-ups being hurt by the continued presence of previous singles. Personally I regard that theory as complete BS!

 

People either like or dislike a song on its own merits - they don't think 'I liked their first single, and their follow-up, but I'm not going to buy the follow-up because the first one is still in the charts' :)

 

Not exactly, the follow-ups tend to get sidelined as radio and TV are still raping the previous singles to death because they're still stuck in the top 20. It's a vicious circle.

No no no. The charts are the fairest reflection of the songs people buy that they've been for years. Yes, it's annoying that the same songs overstay their welcome but people are still buying them.

 

We all complained when songs were excluded from the charts because they were download-only or because they had a free poster (for shame!). Now we complain because nothing's excluded.

 

Basically, it's up to record companies to supply a wider range interesting product - and for radio stations to play them rather than playing 'Sweet About Me' AGAIN. That way, the charts still reflect what people buy - it's just people are buying a bigger range of stuff and the charts are more interesting again.

Edited September 3, 200816 yr by Tim

Not exactly, the follow-ups tend to get sidelined as radio and TV are still raping the previous singles to death because they're still stuck in the top 20. It's a vicious circle.

 

Not necessarily - Gabriella Cilmi's 'Save The Lies' hasn't lacked for airplay, despite 'Sweet About Me' remaining popular.

 

In the above case, it was just a poor choice of follow-up - IMO 'Don't Want To Go To Bed Now' would have made a far better 2nd single.

 

Not necessarily - Gabriella Cilmi's 'Save The Lies' hasn't lacked for airplay, despite 'Sweet About Me' remaining popular.

 

In the above case, it was just a poor choice of follow-up - IMO 'Don't Want To Go To Bed Now' would have made a far better 2nd single.

 

I agree about 'Bed', but regardless with the case of Gabriella despite all the airplay it got, I still heard 'Sweet About Me' around much more than 'Save The Lies' when 'Save The Lies' needed it. And the same thing happens to many artists.

 

I still think the singles chart will speed up once again, when iTunes finally bows to record label demands of being able to remove tracks from sale. This will have the effect of making singles fall off the chart a lot quicker. iTunes won't do it at the moment because most of their profit comes from single track downloads but when digital album sales do finally take off, then iTunes will agree to do this a lot more.

The problem with the charts lies not with the charts themselves but squarely with the Radio stations & Music Video channels for not playing enough new music and not dropping old songs quickly enough from their rotations.

 

Radio 1 during the day is a complete joke. Back in the early & mid 1980s it had its near legendary "5 New 45s at 5:45" section where each day it would play 5 new singles (on Monday's to Thursday's) which would then be guaranteed a minimum 5 plays throughout that week during the day.

 

Just look at Radio 1's Playlists now, does it play 20 new singles per week 5 times during the week? Does it heck.

 

 

Then you have the Sunday Chart show. Would you watch a major Premiership Football match commentated on by two half ignorant frequently ill informed football supporters who have just come from the pub?

 

Answer: Of course not. Yet why does Radio 1 think it is a good idea to have the equivalent for a flagship radio chartshow. Especially when it is made even worse by playing a former Radio 1 playlisted track that has dropped 7 places for the 32nd time, at the expense of a Radio 2 or Radio 6Music friendly track that has dropped 2 places in the 2nd week in the chart.

I don't think all the blame can lie at the door of R1. The playlist regularly drops songs that have just made the charts, in favour of newer songs. On the other hand, not many people wish to listen to a station that only plays new music at the expense of chart songs.

 

Back in the 70s and 80s R1 only ever played chart music but that never stopped new songs from charting. I have R1 playlists from 1977 and they are all full of songs from the top 30, many songs were only added when they charted - which begs the question, where did people hear new music back then? There were less radio stations back then and less outlets for hearing new songs.