GTH

Whilst I have struggled to get into Lockdown, Secrets is absolutely stunning! Has such a timeless sound to it, which no doubt come from the Fleetwood Mac collaborators. I really hope Secrets blows up, but there doesn’t seem to be much (if any) interest in this campaign now.

After a few listens, I would say Time is my favourite of the album tracks. Her voice sounds so sweet on it. Glamorous sounds like it was made for Rupaul’s Drag Race. Not sure if that is a good thing or not, but it feels the least ‘Sophie’ song to me if that makes sense. Overall though, the album is very enjoyable and I will probably go back to this more than I have any album since Make A Scene.

Tbh, I prefer this to the excessive multi-formatting that we see now from some of the big name artists. It isn’t a compulsory purchase to get the early access link (though appreciate it isn’t something many highlight). I would also expect more of the people buying the albums will listen to them compared to people collecting multiple copies of the same album.

Almost a 250k lead for Olivia on Spotify!

After a few listens, I would say this is his best since Divide. None of the songs hit as strong as Bad Habits/Shivers, but much more consistent an album in quality than what we have had in since then.

Man I Need at a new Spotify peak of #11 and less than 1,000 streams from being in the top ten.

Looks like they have split the sales for Jojo's Leave (Get Out) based on the label attached to it. Already had a platinum certification with Mercury and now the 2021 re-release of the first two albums (with the other Blackground catalogue titles) is connected to this silver certification. Add in her 2018 re-recording and you got sales split all over the place. Expect this will also affect Too Little Too Late.

Swag II appears to have been quite the flop based on those Spotify updates. Would have expected something from the album to have picked up enough interest to be top 50 given Swag’s first week and Daises/Yukon’s success.

I think there have been some single additions that were missed in the BPI's first upload. Now also showing: 4x platinum - Celine Dion - My Heart Will Go On 3x platinum - George Michael - Careless Whisper 3 x platinum - Rage Against The Machine - Killing In The Name Platinum - 2 Chainz ft. Wiz Khalifa - We Own It (Fast & Furious) Platinum - Vance Joy - Mess Is Mine Platinum - Rae Sremmurd - This Could Be Us Gold - Bring Me The Horizon - Follow You Gold - Sister Sledge - He's The Greatest Dancer Gold - Moliy & Silent Addy - Shake It To The Max (Fly) Silver - Taylor Swift - State Of Grace (Taylor's Version)

I have gone 80-100k. Given the pre-sale for the two UK December arena tour dates are provided to those who have pre-ordered the album (through Amazon), that will no doubt encourage more people to buy a copy.

Love seeing CMAT has enough interest behind her now to debut in the Spotify top 100, even with the Sabrina album bomb. Euro-Country also sneaking into the top 200 as well. Looking forward to seeing how the album performs.

She is going viral globally now. Loads more coverage on socials. Man I Need is looking to be a big international hit. 23 on US Spotify down from a peak of 21 so far, with Nice To Each Other also starting to impact at the lower end (180 as of today). Love that we are now looking at an interesting race next week rather than Sabrina getting it by default. Share sentiments that it is great to see another uk act blowing up like this.

About time for Radiohead to break into the top 100 after spending so long bubbling under.

Catherine Zeta-Jones!!!

As much as I would love to see Ice Cream smash, Diana Vickers could be #1 on new music Friday and today’s top hits and still wouldn’t chart in 2025. She’ll be lucky if she makes top 100 of the sales only charts.

Their singles performance is very hit and miss, but all of their albums have decent chart peaks. Their last one in 2023 got to #3, so to go from that to not even charting seems suspicious. Could be the core fan base has lost interest for reasons mentioned in this thread or that most people don’t realise they have put something out. Either way, would be quite the flop compared to past performance if it is a case of very poor sales rather than exclusion from the main chart/ineligible sales affecting performance.

Really enjoying Perfect Love. The album is very hit and miss for me, but his voice still sounds so good. Just have to skip that In Your Hands monstrosity.

I am so ready for this. Video/visualiser already looking super camp.

Wondering why Jonas Brothers aren’t showing at all. Doesn’t make sense given their past performance and the current sales climate. Wondering if there are any purchase deals that have potentially resulted in some sales being ineligible? Otherwise I have noticed the album on Spotify is listed under Jonas Brothers and each of their solo pages. Potentially affected how the album is treated if this is something that has carried over into how sales are reported to the OCC and this is considered a compilation? Hopefully will show up by Fridays chart or we get an explanation what has happened in the sales report.

It’s been a good few weeks for Florence with the weekly certifications. Hans Zimmer & will.i.am - an iconic collaboration. Wonder if Hans had any input on ‘Big And Chunky’. 😄

Hadn’t realised Who Knew was doing so well. I make that P!nk’s sixth biggest song here now behind Just Give Me A Reason, What About Us, Lady Marmalade, Raise Your Glass & So What.

The new Bieber album sounds pretty strong to me, which probably means it will bomb now. 😂 Definitely a number of tracks which could do pretty well commercially. Saying that, Daisies seems like an odd choice to be the focus track. Not sure that would be the most popular album track by the end of the week. Blackpink are too far down New Music Friday. Expect Jump to have a good week still.

Happy to see Glastonbury has helped boost Thank U enough to go gold this week. About time for Don’t Phunk With My Heart. Given it sold over 150k in 2005, it seems a very long time to make up that extra 50k. Just shows what a poor choice of lead single that was. Edit: just realised DPWMH is gold. Makes more sense now.

Golden sounds more Eurovision than K-pop to me.

+5: Good Luck, Babe! +4: BIRDS OF A FEATHER +3: Pink Pony Club +2: APT +1: That’s So True -1: Die With A Smile -2: Messy -3: Ordinary -4: The Days -5: Beautiful Things As much as I love the top 5 of my list, I hope the end of year top 10 loses a couple of these.