Mateja

I don't think non-binary artists need accomodation in this case. The vast majority of artists and people in general have no issues with their gender identity and gender-based awards. If Sam doesn't want to be recognized in 'Best Male Artist" category, that's his choice and I'm sure the Brits can accomodate him by not not nominating him in gendered categories. More room for other artists! I agree that The Brits need genre categories, too. The moment gendered categories get removed from the awards shows we will see and hear complaints how women don't get nominated or don't win enough. There are already complaints almost every year at the Oscars or Grammys when people of color don't get nominated or they don't win. When there are only 4 or 5 nominations available in a category, race or gender (in a non-gendered category) of the nominees shouldn't matter. Nominations should be based on the merit of the work, not artists' diversity. If the 5 nominees at the Oscars for Best director all happen to be white, male and over 50 years old in a given year, I won't care as long as the movies they are nominated for are good. With only 5 nominations available there are notable snubs of every gender, race and age every single year. I'm all for a female film director to be nominated, but I want her to be nominated for the quality of her work, not just because she's a woman and released a movie in the past year. One nomination spot in the category shouldn't be reserved for women or people of color just to provide diversity. And before anyone jumps on me for using male pronouns for Sam, I refuse to use they/them pronouns for a single person. Until English language expets come up with new pronouns for non binary people, I'm going to keep using he/him or she/her.

I don't find it shocking at all. It's a re-recording of an old song, they are not going to push it like a new song. I actually listened to some Spotify playlist that featured the original Love Story last week. The re-recordings will do what they will and that's it.

For stupid reasons. The fact that AIWFCIU and LC got to #1 despite being on ACR should tell you all about what the general public wants to listen to in December. This year there was no normal smash hit to compete with the Christmas songs in the charts. The artists and the labels should try harder if they want big hits in December. But to be honest, I think the labels are happy making bank with Christmas music in December. I'm in my thirties and perhaps I'm getting old, but in the last few years I love Christmas music more and more. By November I'm itching to start listening to it. I try to wait until the last Friday in November, but It's difficult. I don't care for a lot of newly released music (especially rap, hip-hop variety) and switching to Christmas playlists is kind of a relief. Seriously, ACR and 3 tracks rule are dumb. If one artist can make 20 songs chart at the same time, more power to them. If that's what the people are streaming, great. A mild recurrency rule would suffice to keep the charts reasonably fresh: Once the song is half a year old (26 weeks), is out of the TOP 20 and in the decline for three weeks in a row, it goes recurrent. There should also be rules for songs recharting. Christmas songs should be exempt from the recurrency rules.

Great new music? Where is it? Perhaps people don't find the newly released music all that great and are happy to replace it with Christmas music for the last two months of the year? Christmas songs are already unfairly hit by the ACR rule on the charts and they are still about to rule the TOP 10 and #1 weeks long before Christmas! The Music Business should just accept that people really like to listen to the Christmas music and adapt to these new listening habits. If you have a great song and you are worried it might get lost in the shuffle during the last two months of the year, keep it under wraps until January. Problem solved. Plan the album releases carefully. Have the Christmas albums and singles out early (at least by the end of October) and non Christmas albums out by the end of November. There is no point in releasing anything new in December. Yes, we do. Let us listen to Christmas music as we please, save great new music for January.

ACR sucks and should not be a thing, same for double ACR.

Which label is promoting NTFT? Nathan Dawe's? Who knows what the plan is. Do you think it's possible the Confetti album gets a re-release in 2021? Now in the streaming era it's really hard for any post-album single to become a huge success. Usually it just doesn't work, so many artists release a lot of singles before the album and then their eras die soon after the album's release. Little Mix released three singles before this album plus a few instant grats and I just don't know if any other song on the album could work as a single. Now they are releasing a collaboration with Nathan Dawe. I suspect there might be a few more singles (new material) released in 2021 and then an album re-release. The girls have a tour scheduled in 2021 and a re-release would make the album relevant again in time for the tour. This might explain why they didn't release a deluxe version of the album along with the standard.

Yes, Robbie could release one or two new Christmas songs every year for the next few years. Gwen Stefani released her Christmas album in 2017 (12 tracks). In 2018, she released a deluxe version with 5 new tracks (17 in total). In 2020, she re-released the deluxe version with 2 new tracks (19 in total). John Legend re-released his Christmas album with 1 new track this year. Re-releasing an album has never been easier than now in the age of streaming. Just appreciate the new material. With Christmas albums, the re-releases are really common in recent years.

I see Robbie's Christmas album has been re-released on Spotify with the new track added.

So, they expect Covid-19 to go away by the end of April? This is .... bold.

This is really catchy, my favorite single from LM since 'Woman Like Me'.

Here in Slovenia we had 0 new confirmed infections yesterday, for the first time in two months! Schools and kindergartens are partially opening on May 18th. They closed on March 16th, so they will be partially re-opening after more than 2 months of distance learning. Kindergartens are reopening but all children might not be allowed back because of social distancing rules. So they will have to set up some guidelines. Primary schools are reopening for grades 1, 2 and 3. First graders are 6 or 7 years old. Primary school seniors (9th grade) might go back on May 25th. The Ministry for Education wants them to finish their primary education in a somewhat normal way. School year normally ends on June 24th, but 9th graders finish a week or two earlier. High school seniors go back on May 18th since they will be taking their final exams in June. Their school year ends on May 22nd. Primary school children with learning difficulties also go back on May 18th. Everyone else will likely end the school year at home. Some parents are mad because they want everyone to go back without any social distancing. We really have low numbers of daily infections in recent weeks, but we are lucky and countries around us have similar plans for re-opening of schools. The Ministry is already warning that online education might continue in the fall.

So, the UK reported 4617 new infections and 861 deaths due to Covid 19 in the last 24 hours. I think it's pretty clear it's way too early to talk about any plans of re-opening in public right now. You need to flatten the curve and then bend it. It will be a while before you get the virus under control.

Look, you can't compare the UK to Germany. It doesn't matter when Germany introduced their restrictions in comparison to the UK - the situation in Germany never got as bad as it is now in the UK. There is no point in talking about lifting of the restrictions right now, you are so deep in the hole. If anyone needs a vague idea of how the country will re-open, you can look at the exit plans of the other countries. You don't need anyothing more right now. Once the numbers of new infections and deaths significantly drop and there is an established trend of decline, expect the government to start talking about their exit plans and tentative dates.

I'm sure the UK government is making quarantine exit plans, just like any other government. But at the moment the country is so deep in the Covid-19 hole, there is no real light at the end of the tunnel yet. Once the number of new infections and deaths drops significantly (Let's say, 50, 60%), they might become more open about their plans and even offer some tentative dates. Patience. At the moment, the UK citizens need to be patient and follow the social distancing rules as much as possible. The examples of Italy and Spain can show you how long it takes before the situation gets better. And Italy and Spain are still in a very bad shape and will take their time with re-opening.

One word, 5 letters ... It's ADELE.

I don't mind the features if they are well executed. The inclusion of a reasonably well known artist also compells more people to at least listen to the song once.

https://twitter.com/BRITs/status/1218198794283732998 'Power' is now 2x Platinum.

https://twitter.com/BRITs/status/1218188728365133824 Another platinum single!

2 singles before the album release isn't enough anymore. Once the album is released, the era is done as far as releasing singles.

There is nothing wrong with the platinum certification mark being easier to achieve nowadays. Multiplatinum certifications exist. Also, they could always intruduce the diamont certification, like in the US.

There is no need to tackle the power of playlists. Streaming and playlists are the way music is consumed in 2020. The UK charts are innacurate and rigged enough with the ACR BS, don't go any further.

If a song can't get to the top of the chart on it's own, it doesn't deserve to be at the top of the chart. Rising to the TOP 10 or even #1 just because the songs ahead got put on ACR is simply LAME and undeserving.. Also, songs that get killed by ACR are still relatively new. 2 or 3 months is nothing. Representing what is rising and trending isn't the point of the chart. A song doesn't deserve to be #1 just because it's rising and trending, the most bought and streamed song deserves to be #1. If that song is 40 years old, so be it. If that song is already declining, so be it. Dance Monkey would have fallen from #1 eventually, I agree. But, why not let it fall from #1 and out of the TOP 10 and TOP 20 organically? ACR really turned the UK charts into a joke. Billboard at least removes the recurrents completely and recurrency is actually considered a badge of honor.

I lost a lot of interest in the UK charts once the ACR rule was added. I understand that something had to be done about old songs clogging up the chart forever, but when a song at #1 loses it's position because it becomes ACR eligible .... that is nonsense. If a song is losing ground, but it's still the most popular song in the country, it should not be put on the ACR and removed from #1 just because it's losing ground. ACR should only affect songs that are already out of the TOP 40 (or at least TOP 20) and more than 26 weeks (half a year) old. Holiday songs shouldn't go on ACR - ever. Those songs are seasonal, they re-appear every year, they are actually very popular during the holiday season. Billboard recurrency rules are far superior to OCC's ACR rule.

I think it depends on what the new music will sound like and the quality.

This is embarrasing, but voting for Boris Johnson and tories is a few levels above this. Anyway, I am not against raising money for charity, but I wish the musical part of the Christmas #1 quest was better. I am getting nostalgic for X Factor winner's singles from 10 years back or so.