paulc

Just one question: maybe I'm really stupid, but how do you 'ship' a download????

I'd love to see the top three acts from each of the seven seasons of X Factor release singles on the same day. So we would have: Steve Brookstein v G4 v Rowetta (I think she may have came third - or maybe it was Tabby?) v Shayne Ward v Andy Abraham v Journey South v Leona v Ray Quinn v Ben v Leon Jackson v Rhydian v Same Difference v Alexandra v JLS v Eoghan Quigg v Joe McElderry v Olly Murs v Stacey Solomon v Matt Cardle v Rebecca Ferguson v One Direction I guess I'd also have to throw in Diana Vickers (even though she came fourth) and Cher Lloyd (cos she's prob gonna have a post-X Facter chart career) And, they'd all have original songs. Who would make the top 5/10/40/75?

and yeah, I preferred it when there was a bit of variety in the ages of chart stars. Nowadays (with a couple of exceptions), if you're over 30 you're pretty much past it! haha

Thanks for jogging my memory on the top 5 that week! I'd forgotten about the top 6 week in 2000. Ah, it brings back so many memories haha. Was there really a week when the top 7 were all new entries?

Not sure if this helps, but I vaguely remember a week in about October 1998 when it was the first time (I think) the top 5 were all new entries. I think Alanis Morissette's Thank You was number 5 that same week, but i'm sure someone out there can correct me if i'm wrong on this!

Ta very much for the countdown. To be honest, I'm more into sales-based charts, but I'm really enjoying reading your commentaries for all the entries as well as the chart runs for each track. You've clearly put a lot of work in and I, for one, appreciate it. So thanks again!

I know I should probably have asked this at the time, but does anyone know the track that was used during Mary Byrne's audition in Dublin a few weeks ago? She sang Tom Jones's I Who Have Nothing, but after she had finished they played another track while the judges told her what they thought of her. It was mostly instrumental, but the few lines I caught sounded a bit like Gary Barlow's voice. Any ideas?

If I remember correctly, Whitney Houston's 1999 comeback album My Love Is Your Love performed pretty poorly prior to the release of the title track as second single. I may be wrong, but I think it debuted outside the top 20 and, despite the gold-selling first single It's Not Right But It's Okay (her biggest single in years), didn't make much of an impact until My Love Is Your Love started picking up airplay a few months later. I remember it climbed into the top 5 (peaking maybe at number four, I think) and went multi-platinum. Go, girl! Gabrielle's Rise album had much the same chart run - again, not selling much until the release of second single, Rise.

In response to what Mikal said about it being more interesting when an act reaches number one when their previous single(s) flopped, I always marvel at Atomic Kitten, who went straight to the top of the charts at the beginning of 2001 with Whole Again, after their previous singles charted at 10, 6, 10 and 20 - in that order. If I recall correctly, their record company was becoming increasingly unimpressed with the performances of their singles at the time, and Whole Again was kind of like their last chance to have a big hit - and what a hit it was! What was just as interesting, I thought, was that Kerry Katona recorded vocals for the track and had her picture on the CD cover with her bandmates but had left the group just before it was released. How unlucky was that!

Does anyone else think that the 90s TV show Stars In Their Eyes may have had an X Factor-style effect on the charts every week back then, when contestants performed well-known songs by big stars?

Just imagine - every Christmas could have been like 2007/2008! We could be looking at Slade's Merry Xmas Everybody making its 38th appearance on the charts this year! Heaven forbid! It would make the Mariah and Pogues tracks seem new!

So perhaps EBTG's Missing is the biggest selling track in the UK to peak at number three?

I began listening to the charts in about 1993-1994, about the time that slow climbers (indeed climbers of any description) began to die off. By 1995, I'd say for about 90 per cent or more of tracks, where you debuted was where you peaked - the real barometer of a track's success was how long it took to fall out of the chart. This is why, come the end of 1995, I found the staying power of Everything But The Girl's Missing incredible. It's chart run went, I think, as follows: 8-6-6-4-3-3-4-4-5-5-5-4-5-8-14-20-24-33-34. That's 14 weeks in the top 10 - 14 weeks yo-yoing between the positions of 3 and 8, to be precise. Pretty amazing for it's day! It went on to sell about three-quarters of a million copies in the UK and it has been reported that it is the biggest selling single ever in the UK to not reach the top two (but correct me if I'm wrong. I know New Order's Blue Monday sold about a million, but that was across several different releases, mixes and catalogue numbers).

Does anyone have a rough estimate for sales of Noisettes' Never Forget You? I know it sold about 150,000 copies last year and it hung around the bottom of the charts for a while earlier this year. I was just curious as to how close it was to the 200k mark, given that it only peaked at number 20 I think...