RabbitFurCoat

01. Swedish House Mafia feat. John Martin – Don’t You Worry Child 1 week at #1 (entered 14th October) 01-02-02-04-05-12-15-12-14-17-15-11-{09-14-16-21-25-27-32-37-36-36-34-37-49-54-59-52-56-57-55-62-63-65-62-64-70R(3)-66-72R(5)-40R(4)-44-65R(6)} (42 weeks) Kept off #1: Adele - Skyfall Sales: 135,563 EOY: #13 (632,000) It was never going to be anything else. Whilst there's essentially a hairs breadth between the three songs below, the number one number one was never in doubt, from when I first looked at the list of chart toppers, to listening to them all in a vague likely order, to writing all the commentary. The all-Swedish collaboration Don't You Worry Child has always been a favourite, instantly too with a 20-02-01 personal chart run as quick a rise to the top as anything where it then had a four week run. It ended the year ranked as my 3rd favourite track from it behind Bat For Lashes - Laura and Blur - Under The Westway, two songs I'd probably rate lower than it now, the latter definitely as I was probably too drawn in to a Blur comeback than it being quite that good. Swedish House Mafia are a supergroup formed in 2008 of three Swedish DJs who'd been active for between 9 and 15 years, Axwell, Steve Angello and Sebastian Ingrosso. They had been able to attract some big names on their singles and had produced a stellar set of hits in One (Your Name) with Pharrell, Miami 2 Ibiza with Tinie Tempah, and Greyhound, a fantastic instrumental released earlier in 2012. There was also Save The World, with fellow Swede John Martin providing the vocal. Before Save The World, John Martin had only been in a rock band called Steroids, mainly just performing live within Stockholm. Whilst in the band he met producer and songwriter Michael Zitron who got him involved with the Mafia trio for Save The World. Impressed as they were with its quality and success, they agreed to work together again on another song, Don't You Worry Child. In the summer of 2012 Swedish House Mafia confirmed that their upcoming tour would be their last, called it One Final Tour in 2013 and would then part ways, their show in Milton Keynes Bowl was where Don't You Worry Child was first played and went down a storm. It was to be their final single and as a result gained more attention than it perhaps would have done. It entered the chart at #1 with a massive sale but it could've been different. Thankfully Adele released her boring Bond theme on a Friday, and despite selling 176k in its first nine days didn't come close to hitting the top. They did, of course, get together to release music and perform again later (and are still doing both), but had a five year hiatus to 2018. It was Zitron that was largely the writer of the lyrics of Don't You Worry Child, and they are some fantastic lyrics. The chorus he said are words that his Dad had said to him after his parents had divorced, whilst the pre-chorus of "upon a hill across the blue lake, that's where I had my first heartbreak" is a wonderfully evocative image of young love and heartbreak. They're made all the more fantastic by Martin's delivery of them. I find his voice exceptional, and he's someone that can elevate dance songs to a new level, as he also did with Save The World and Reload (a later release with Sebastian Ingrosso), and in fact still does - there aren't may people who would make me want to listen to 2026 David Guetta but he has done over the summer. Don't You Worry Child is incredibly euphoric, and for me is the absolute peak of the EDM boom of this period. But it has to be the full mix, the radio edit doesn't do it justice, although it never feels like it lasts 6:43, it's just an absolute joy to listen to from start to finish. A group of us went to Dublin shortly after this was released for a friend's birthday, we all loved the song and it was everywhere there; "I still hear the songs reminding me of a friend" - indeed, an unforgettable trip and set of people, helped in part to this. I rejected the chance to go to Oslo to see them on that final tour as it seemed like too much of an expense to justify, but did see a Sebastian Ingrosso DJ set in O2 Brixton in 2013, he of course finished his set off with this and it was an incredible moment to experience. Don't You Worry Child has definitely gone on to be an all time favourite song, and top 5 of the many dance sub-genres. It's always been incredible to listen to and I'm still mesmerised by how good it is. I can't see it ever beginning to tire.

02. David Guetta feat. Sia - Titanium 1 week at #1 (entered 14th August 2011, re-entered 8th January, #1 5th February) {16-31-53}-61R(19)-08-03-02-01-02-04-05-07-08-06-07-08-07-11-19-19-15-21-26-32-39-39-43-39-31-30-35-36-43-50-56-59R(2)-56-57-69-63-61-48-56-57-39-48-63-75{-47R(7)-60-47R(9)-38-37-66-71R(12)-58R(2)-59-61-65-60R(6)-74} (61 weeks) Kept off #1: Alyssa Reid feat. Jump Smokers – Alone Again Sales: 85,985 EOY: #4 (922,000) 2009 was the year where French DJ David Guetta went from occasional hitmaker to huge superstar that couldn’t stop producing massive hits, with 15 UK top 10s from When Love Takes Over to She Wolf (Falling To Pieces) and 5 end of year top 20s in a four year period, with him collaborating with a range of different vocalists, typically from the rap and R&B world but not always. His album One Love was a consistent if not massive seller, ending in the lower reaches of the top 100 selling albums in 2009, 2010 and 2011, partly down to a re-released expanded edition. Follow-up Nothing But the Beat was slightly more successful in that regard, ending each of 2011, 2012 and 2013 in the top 50. Both of them contain some genuinely brilliant hits and some less good ones, Sexy Bitch/Chick (with Akon) and Memories (Kid Cudi) being my favourites, but there’s a definite soft spot for Who’s that Chick (Rihanna), When Love Takes Over (Kelly Rowland) and even Where Them Girls At (Flo Rida and Nicki Minaj). However, the crowning glory of this period, and his whole career, was Titanium with Sia. Originally released as a promotional single just before the release of Nothing But the Beat, it had a brief chart run of 16-31-53. It was then when I first begun to enjoy it, and it reached #3 in my Personal chart in September. It got a proper single push in the new year and knocked Jessie J off the top in February, in its 4th of 13 weeks in the top 10, to become his 5th number one in four years. Titanium has gone on to become about his biggest and well known hit, it’s well ahead on Spotify numbers of almost all of his discography, behind just one song, I’m Good (Blue), which makes me want to weep. The majority of singers featured on Guetta’s work were more high profile than Sia, who at that stage had very little commercially successful output as a singer but had a significant amount of songwriting credits for other pop singers, which was the route she wanted to go down. She had written Titanium and recorded a demo of it with the intention of it being sung by a bigger name. Katy Perry turned it down, Mary J Blige recorded a version but David preferred Sia’s version so kept it on without her knowing and was initially upset about it. Titanium completely changed her career trajectory, as since then, she’s gone onto become far more successful with some huge worldwide hits in the years since. Sia’s vocal on Titanium is absolutely phenomenal, and it’s hard to imagine many, if any, singers could do it the same justice and she delivers one of the great choruses of all time. It was definitely the right decision to go with her vocal on it. By this point, Guetta hadn’t yet gone into the Guetta-by-numbers production and beats that he would definitely go on to, so this still felt fresh and original at the time and has aged superbly, if anything it’s got even better over time. I said in the opening post that two of these songs reached my personal chart #1 and ended in my End of Year Top 10, and Titanium has broken that duo as I rank it ahead of Feel The Love now (hard to directly compare as I ranked Titanium #16 in 2011). In recent years it’s probably the song here I’ve had most exposure to too, as my enjoyment of watching darts on TV has increased in the same period where Stephen Bunting became one of the more successful players in the sport. Maybe it's The Bullet that has increased my love for Titanium. I should probably acknowledge that Alone Again by Alyssa Reid and Jump Smokers is a song that was released and made #2, little else to say about it

I shall post the top 2 tomorrow PM, in the mean time it's time for... Interlude #2 Feel The Love and We Are Young were consecutive number one singles, the former knocking the latter off the top and down to #2. It was the week after the Eurovision Song Contest and they were joined in the top 3 by that years winner, Loreen's Euphoria. 2012 was back when I still paid attention to Eurovision (thanks largely, if not wholly, to this site) and I was very much taken in by Loreen's song and performance, and whilst I don't rank Euphoria as highly as the other two it is still great - had it made #1, it'd towards the bottom of the top 10 here amongst the Florence and Calvin collabs. It got me thinking that this must challenge for being my favourite top 3 in history of the UK charts, so much so that I went back through years of top 40s on the OCC website to see if I could find any that are better. A lot of years were trawled through but so many where there's promise of a better top 3 fall short somewhere. There are some where there are three songs I love but aren't quite as great (e.g. The Fear, Just Dance, Use Somebody / All The Things She Said, Cry Me a River, Songbird), there are many occasions where two utterly brilliant songs are let down by a truly terrible third one (e.g. Sweet Like Chocolate and Hey Boy Hey Girl being behind Everybody's Free To Wear Sunscreen, and Telephone and Pass Out being ahead of Justin Bieber's Baby (they also shared a top 3 with Rihanna's Rude Boy which is much less bad but still meh)), occasionally you get close with a brilliant #4 and one slight let down in the top 3 (if Placebo's Nancy Boy and George Michael's Older had swapped their #4 & #3 positions behind Beetlebum and Your Woman it'd be perfection), and there are occasional top 3s that I might consider great but in a more lolz ironic way and I can't seriously say are better (Three Lions 98, Vindaloo, C'est La Vie). So, what do I conclude from this endeavour? 2012 contains the best UK top 3 of the last 30 years Like most years, there were swathes of 1996 I could just skip over as songs like Oooh Ah Just a Little Bit, Wannabee (I appreciate both of these but I'm never going to consider them in favourite ever lists) and Mysterious Girl had long runs in the top 3. But when Peter Andre's breakthrough left the top 3 on 7th July it was replaced by one of the greatest songs of all time, Underworld's Born Slippy Nuxx entering the chart at #2. At #3 was the final week in the top 3 for Three Lions as Euro 96 fever was still very much around, a song I still listen to a lot and get great enjoyment from (for a period of 4-6 weeks every other summer). As good as We Are Young and Feel The Love are, I don't enjoy them quite as much as those two. A #1 that's as good as Euphoria and I'd have to declare it a better top 3, and unfortunately Loreen, Euphoria doesn't quite touch The Fugees Killing Me Softly. Therefore, I have to say that July 1996 was the last time a top 3 was as good as when Loreen and Rudimental joined fun. there in May 2012.

03. fun. feat. Janelle Monae – We Are Young 1 week at #1 (entered 15th April, #1 27th May) 07-03-03-03-05-02-01-02-03-06-07-09-07-11-12-10-16-17-28-31-30-31-42-42-35-43-45-52-52-13-33-38-48-54-58-69-48R(2){-52-74-69R(5)-72} (41 weeks) Kept off #1: The Wanted – Chasing The Sun Sales: 72,997 EOY: #3 (986,000) Onto another slow burner of a song now, We Are Young ended the year as the third biggest seller in the UK, which meant the top 3 sellers were all breakthrough hits, as neither fun. or Janelle Monae had charted with any of their previous work. All three had been released elsewhere in 2011 before taking off fully in 2012. fun. were a relatively short-lived American band whose 2009 debut album hadn’t got much attention, but singer Nate Reuss wanted to involve producer Jeff Bhasker, more known for hip-hop and R&B, for a second in the hope it’d be more successful, and sung him the chorus of We Are Young, and was then invited into his studio to properly record it. It was through Bhasker’s contacts that they were able to get Janelle Monae to record some vocals on it, to provide a female vocal balance and introduce another element to the We Are Young had received a decent level of attention in the UK before its release which saw it enter in the top 10, but continued to get more exposure and was a remarkably consistent seller, with between 52,000 and 72,000 copies sold in each of its 8 weeks in the top 5, eventually making the top in its 7th week, after being within 1000 of knocking Rita Ora’s R.I.P. off the week before. Its longevity continued for a while too, and from entering in April was still in the top 10 come early August. This is the song I've listened to most again since taking on this thread, it's really reminded me just how good this is. The introduction is great and the percussion is wonderful throughout. Nate Reuss has a vocal which feels like it could be annoying, but it stays the right side in the entirety of the song as it continues to build throughout to its rousing anthemic chorus. It was thrilling to have this song so successful. On my own personal chart it spent 4 weeks at #2, each of them behind a song mentioned in my introduction – Bassline by Reverand and the Makers. Whilst thst was, and remains, an exceptional song and pivot in style for a landfill indie band, and I do still enjoy it a lot, it’s not the one of these two I’d pick to listen to now. Janelle Monae is the featured act on this, and I was delighted to see her get some success after enjoying her The ArchAndroid album in 2010. Her part in this is relatively small and in the background, but I do think it’s an excellent addition of a female vocal to it. fun. didn’t last much longer, splitting in 2015 and not releasing another album, but their follow-up single Some Nights was a lot of... fun, and Nate Reuss featured on one of the biggest sellers of the following year, Just Give Me a Reason with P!nk, which was also fabulous. In its week at the top it held off The Wanted with Chasing The Sun. They had moved into proper boyband fan purchase territory by this point with a 02-10-18 chart run to kick it off. I don’t really recall it but it’s pleasant enough, they definitely had better but had much worse too.

When you find a song so good you think you should make a now rare BJSC appearance in the next contest but see @Iz様 🌟 got there first in the current one. Have a token Utopia 18 points.

04. Rudimental feat. John Newman – Feel The Love 1 week at #1 (entered 3rd June) 01-04-05-06-06-06-07-07-07-07-07-16-20-27-23-31-35-34-34-35-43-54-57-52-61-72-65R(5){-48-69-73-72-75R(12)-64-30-32-49-45-44-50-44-39-38-38-47-65-47R(4)-43-46-73-68R(24)} (50 weeks) Kept off #1: N/A Sales: 93,841 EOY: #16 (619,000) It’s the turn of another debut hit now, for Rudimental and guest vocalist John Newman. Rudimental are a drum & bass group of three childhood friends who’d formed three years earlier and had released a few songs which had been hits amongst club DJs before 2012 when they kicked off the year, and debut album campaign, releasing Spoons, with guest vocalist MNEK, before moving on to Feel The Love which was their first song to get significant promotion, including being huge on Radio 1 where it had premiered as Zane Lowe’s Hottest Record In The World almost two months before it was released. John Newman was the guest vocalist, he’d moved from Yorkshire to London in the hope of progressing his music career and became friends with Piers of Rudimental who suggested they should collaborate. It entered the chart at the top with a great sale, and whilst it fell straight from the top 3 showed incredible longevity in both the top 10 and top 75, spending almost a year on the chart in total. In terms of the gap between songs of how highly I rate them, there probably isn’t a bigger one in this countdown than between Paradise and Feel The Love, as it's now really into the territory of songs I absolutely adore now (as shown by the previous post), and it’s hard to imagine there have been many years of number one singles when a song as good as this is as low as #4. Feel The Love is a perfect combination of an excellent instrumental track with a vocalist that suits it perfectly. I’ve a bit of a soft spot for drum & bass when it’s at its more mainstream end and this is definitely that, the first real bassy bit is excellent and it really kicks in to be a fantastic song, even the brass within it is great. The way it continues to change pace makes for such an interesting listen, and John’s vocals are a perfect fit for the song and his delivery ic exceptional, particularly the chorus and the build up to it, and it’s so incredibly easy to sing and dance along to. It's a song I've continued to listen to loads over the years and it still sounds totally fresh. A great introduction to the mainstream for both acts who have both gone on to have more deserved success. Neither have quite made something this perfect again, but both careers have produced some quality hits, including the followup to this, Not Giving In, which was released towards the end of the year.

The good thing about doing 2012 in this series is I have definitely got to be positive about more songs than in other years, so positive in fact that it's possible that the top 4 here is the same as if I were simply ranking my favourite number ones of the decade. When I think of what I'd rank as my favourite of others years I come to the likes of Pass Out and Forget You, We Found Love, Get Lucky and Mirrors, Hideaway, and House Every Weekend, and I'm not sure I rate any of them higher than the next song 🤔

I don't particularly disagree with your overall opinion of Coldplay, and feel that a rank of their albums would look very similar to their release order, with Viva La Vida being the outlier at #1, and the number of post-Mylo Xyloto songs I think are great can probably be counted on one hand, I just think we reached the "there are already enough Coldplay songs" stage at a slightly different time!

05. Coldplay - Paradise 1 week at #1 (entered 30th October 2011, #1 1st January) {14-17-20-13-11-12-07-02-05}-01-02-07-10-17-20-21-24-23-31-27-37-37-40-30-39-55-54-50-45-59-61-60-58-64-65-68-66-62-67-72-49R(7)-72-62R(14)-41-54-67-61-67-62R(26)-49-69 (51 weeks) Kept off #1: N/A Sales: 108,390 EOY: #45 (#39 in 2011) 3 Psy – Gangnam Style (#12) 2 Carly Rae Jespen – Call Me Maybe (#7) 1 Coldplay – Paradise (#5) For anyone who’s checked the list of songs at any point to see what’s to come, or has a much better knowledge and memory of chart toppers from specific years than I have, then you’ll realise that this is the highest non-collaboration song to appear here, with just three in the top 12. Coldplay had long been one of the biggest and most successful acts in the UK by 2012, but they had always been more of an album seller than a single seller, lead singles from albums 2 and 3 both went to #2 but they were their only top 3 entries until their fourth album when Viva La Vida finally became their first chart topper. Paradise came from Mylo Xyloto, their fifth album released in 2011, following the underrated but not overly successful Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall. It was initially ineligible for the chart as it was an “instant grat” release, where anyone who pre-ordered the album download automatically got a copy of the song, so it didn’t chart until the album was released, and as a result missed the top 10. It had sold 118k in six weeks whilst ineligible. Paradise had begun to rebound already when Coldplay performed it on the final of X-Factor, which saw it jump to #2 behind Little Mix’s winners single before dropping to #5 in Christmas week. It was largely behind campaign songs though, so was in prime position for the post-Christmas iTunes Gift Card rush. The gift card effect was so big by this point that the first chart of 2012 saw record breaking sales as 5 million singles were sold in a week for the first time ever. People tended to use them for their recent favourites and bigger hits of the previous year and there were loads of big climbs for that type of song, in part helped by stopping buying of Christmas songs, although there were only around a dozen in the chart back then. The 2011 Christmas chart top 4 fell to 4, 6, 41 and one departed the top 100 altogether, and the songs that were immediately below them each climbed 4 places into the top 3, with Paradise hitting the top on its 10th week in the chart, comfortably beating Olly Murs’s Dance With Me Tonight by 30k. Had it been eligible for its entire release period, Paradise would have broken the record for most weeks in the top 40 before hitting #1 with 16, but alas it stayed with Celine Dion’s Think Twice. I had typically been a Coldplay fan, and the whole Viva La Vida project had dragged me back in after I thought X&Y was a much weaker album than their first two, but I think Mylo Xyloto was when I began to lose interest. That said, it was a strong album for singles and I still think Every Teardrop… is wonderful. Paradise was a slower burner for me and I can understand why it reached #1 four months after it was released, but I’d certainly rank it towards the top of my favourite Coldplay songs now (top 10 certainly, but perhaps not top 5). I would maybe say it’s a bit Coldplay-by-numbers to the extent it’s up there with Fix You as the Most Coldplay-like Coldplay Song, if that makes any sense, others may call it unoriginal and boring! But I don't mean it as a bad thing, they knew their audience and Chris Martin can write great anthems made for the stadium concert, and Paradise is certainly that, with some good sing-a-long Oh’s and Oooh’s for good measure.

01 (01) Palace - Dream On (01) (06) (3 weeks) 02 (03) Tame Impala - Hummer (02) (06) 03 (05) Yard Act - New Beginnings (03) (05) 04 (07) Overmono feat. John Joseph Holt - Knight In Shining Prada (04) (04) 05 (02) Pond - Skyworks (02) (08) 06 (04) Mystery Jets - A Hole To See The Sky Through I (01) (11) (4 weeks) 07 (08) Olivia Rodrigo feat. Robert Smith - What's Wrong With Me (07) (07) 08 (14) Hercules & Love Affair feat. Hips & Lips - Boy (08) (03) 09 (06) Modest Mouse - Life's A Dream (04) (07) 10 (12) Boy Harsher - Jeans (10) (05) 11 (20) Mystery Jets - Anaglypta (11) (03) 12 (11) Radio Free Alice - Lunch Money (04) (08) 13 (17) Nina Simone - That's All I Ask (HAAi Remix) (13) (06) 14 (28) The Drums feat. Mareaux - It Didn't Matter (14) (02) 15 (09) FKA Twigs feat. Lil Yachty - On Your Mind (05) (08) 16 (10) Angine de Poitrine - Sarniezz (10) (07) 17 (30) Wolf Alice - Hammond Song (17) (02) 18 (17) The Big Moon - Gravity (16) (05) 19 (33) Slayyter - Brand New Chanel$ (19) (02) 20 (24) STUM - Way to High (20) (03) 21 (13) Paris Paloma - Stem the Flow (03) (10) 22 (22) BALTHVS - Liminal Stages (22) (05) 23 (15) Phoebe Bridgers - Lost Boys (12) (06) 24 (27) DMA's - Killing Time (24) (04) 25 (31) Hot Chip - Do Not Wait (25) (03) 26 (18) Yard Act - Redeemer (02) (13) 27 (19) Gener8ion feat. Yannis - Love & Tears (19) (07) 28 (41) Man/Woman/Chainsaw - Something Else To Give (28) (01) 29 (37) HAAi feat. Echonomist - Ignition (29) (02) 30 (21) Blossoms - Joke About Divorce (01) (15) (5 weeks) 31 (**) Portraits of Tracy - Caught In a Jam (31) (01) 32 (25) The Temper Trap - Runaways (25) (04) 33 (26) The Itch - No More Sprechgesang (05) (10) 34 (44) Westside Cowboy - Pin Up Boys (34) (01) 35 (23) Touring feat. Holybones - Ten O'Clock (14) (09) 36 (29) Boards of Canada - Prophecy At 1420 MHz (02) (14) 37 (35) Jon Hopkins feat. Imogen Heap - Reckoning (32) (06) 38 (**) Brooke Combe - Love Was Made of Stone (38) (01) 39 (32) BALTHVS - Shakedown Street (02) (14) 40 (34) Ed O'Brien - Teachers (12) (11)

06. Gotye feat. Kimbra – Somebody That I Used To Know 5 weeks at #1 (entered 15th January, #1 12th February) 36-21-07-03-01-03-01-01-01-01-03-05-03-03-06-07-10-09-10-09-17-17-16-19-20-17-16-17-25-27-30-46-44-42-48-53-51-51-54-60-50-66-59-62-69-56R(4)-55-60-{45-66-74-61R(4)-57} (53 weeks) Kept off #1: Emeli Sande – Next To Me (2 weeks), Dappy feat. Brian May – Rockstar, Nicki Minaj - Starships Sales: 83,625, 95,338, 87,057, 81,437 & 71,521 EOY: #01 (1.318,005) And now to switch those end-of-year positions around, we move on to the UKs biggest selling single of the 2012 and the second biggest worldwide, Somebody That I Used To Know by Gotye and Kimbra. In the UK, it would be the only chart entry for either act, becoming one of the biggest one hit wonders of all time. Somebody That I Used To Know was a genuine slow-burning smash hit, originally released in Gotye’s native Australia in the summer of 2011, and released in the UK at the end of the year, before being properly picked up on radio and TV at the beginning of 2012, originally entering the chart at #97 before climbing into the top 40 and taking 5 weeks to reach the top where it spent 5 weeks, with a week in-between at #3 where its sales were higher than in four of its five weeks at the top, falling temporarily behind new entries from DJ Fresh and Emeli Sande. I definitely remember it being something that was everywhere at the time, as the type of song that appealed to so many different audiences it would fit being played on a variety of radio stations and easy to have on in the background of any shop, café or bar, certainly unavoidable but it was something I always enjoyed and I began charting it myself in the first week of 2012. Remarkably, given how much I’d have been exposed to it, it isn’t something I’ve ever really tired of it. If I did a little at the time that’s been completely worn away as it sounds great again in 2026. The opening chords, sampled from Brazilian jazz artist Luiz Bonfa, are so good and it makes it instantly recognisable. Gotye’s voice in it is great and Kimbra’s verse is delivered fantastically, it’s kind of surprising in a way at how little a part she actually has on the song as it feels like she’s key in it. Its lyrical content of descriptions of previous relationships were easy for listeners to relate to too, and its success was definitely helped by having a fantastic video. In its second run at the top of four weeks, it held off #2 peaking songs in each of them. Next To Me I’ve already covered, then Dappy & Brian May’s Rockstar and Nicki Minaj’s Starships which was the biggest selling non #1 of the year, 11 weeks in the top 10 in total it ended as the years 7th best seller. As well as those, the second biggest selling song that didn’t make the top also peaked during this run, Flo Rida and Sia with Wild Ones (EOY #10, Chart Peak #4) as it remained remarkably consistent, 11 weeks bouncing between each of the positions between #4 & #8. Rockstar is a predictably horrendous attempt at Dappy to mix his style with guitars, Starships definitely felt massive at the time and I like it as much as I’ve ever liked a Minaj song but that just makes it ok, whilst Wild Ones is great, the Sia and Flo combination works really well and was a deserved smash hit, and would’ve battled Beneath Your Beautiful for a position in the top 10.

It feels like it'll be a result which can be spin to suit whichever narrative you want. More people voted for Farage than did in 2024 when the incentive to vote was much lower given the only other candidates were essentially a joke. It's not exactly unsuccessful for him.

I did think that would probably be the #32 as that act do attract the haterz, but I did think that my top 10 are all largely well regarded songs and its make up wouldn't be that different to a results of a rate/rank of the 36 songs.

07. Carly Rae Jepsen – Call Me Maybe 4 weeks at #1 (entered 8th April) 01-01-01-01-02-03-03-03-05-07-10-08-11-11-12-13-13-15-16-20-27-28-30-35-33{-40-38-39-46-51-50-60-54-52-67-67-70-56-33-25-41-53-59-73-62R(2)-62-70-75} (48 weeks) Kept off #1: Sean Paul – She Doesn’t Mind, Justin Bieber – Boyfriend, Conor Maynard – Can’t Say No, Calvin Harris feat. Ne-Yo – Let’s Go Sales: 106,657, 110,024, 114,993 & 99,569 EOY: #2 (1,142,995) Onto the one song in the top 10 I wasn’t overly enamoured with at the time but have grown to love over the years, Call Me Maybe by Carly Rae Jepsen, the biggest worldwide selling song of the year and #2 in the UK. Carly first came to prominence in her native Canada on Canadian Idol in 2007 and released a debut album with a folk influence the following year, but failed to chart, whilst a couple of its singles were minor top 40 hits there and nowhere else. She didn’t exactly have the profile of a singer who would return three years later to have the biggest worldwide hit of the year. Originally released in 2011 in Canada, it entered the chart at #97 and would gradually climb its way to the top 17 weeks later, helped along by support by Canada’s then-biggest star, Justin Bieber. It came to the UK in April, it had been promoted but not massively so its success wasn’t completely obvious, it climbed 48-24 on the airplay chart in the week it was released before shooting up to #6, although it was another that had demand to have a fake version chart, as Carly Rae Jepsen Tribute Team charted at #49 the week prior. Being so immediately successful from relatively little promotion, it was perhaps likely it’d grow in popularity and its sales increased in its 2nd and 3rd weeks at the top, before being a few hundred copies short of four consecutive weeks selling over 100k. Its chart run doesn’t look anything unusual in the present day, but 8 weeks top 3, 20 weeks top 20, and 44 weeks top 75 was phenomenal in 2012. Call Me Maybe is just a great pop song, exceptionally catchy, a great melody and decent lyrically too, a tale of describing someone you fancy is as old as pop music itself but the perspective felt modern and up-to-date for a 2012 audience and it’s no surprise it was able to appeal so widely to audiences of different ages. Great pop songs continued for Carly, though her relative lack of success I’ve found quite surprising – Cut To The Feeling and Run Away With Me make for a superb trio of pop songs as good as much bigger acts have. I suspect that my reasoning for taking a while to truly appreciate Carly’s Call Me Maybe is that I’d spent most of the 2010s listening to a different version of the song. As it was knocked off the top of the chart by Tulisa, my favourite act of the first half of the 2010s covered the song in Radio 1’s Live Lounge, and it’s Ben Howard’s version I’ve played endlessly, and I still can’t help but feel it’s the definitive version of it. In Carly’s four weeks at the top, there were four separate songs hitting #2, it was the third song Sean Paul got stuck behind before three new entries could only peak at #2, though in none of the four weeks was it a particularly close battle, 77k being the highest sale of any of them. No strong favourites here, Can’t Say No is boring and I’d forgotten about Connor Maynard’s existence entirely, Let’s Go amongst the more generic of Calvin’s offerings, making Bieber my preferred of the four. Still trying to find his way after the initial success being so young, definitely a decent song with a maturing sound.

It's hard to pick favourites off The Seldom Seen Kid, pretty much the whole album is so wonderful. Some Riot is great, I adore Friend of Ours with the story behind it, and Weather to Fly and Mirrorball are both gorgeous too.