The Hit Parade

When the David Bowie exhibition was on at the V&A in London, they had some 7" picture discs of his 70s singles in the gift. I overheard two people discussing whether it was a real record or not, but they bought it anyway.

Are those the Virgin anniversary ones that seem to go for about £9 in the UK?

The free version of Spotify is restricted (though they no longer limit plays of individual tracks, you're only allowed a certain amount of listening per month). Other streaming sites like Deezer and We7 also work on the so-called "freemium" model.

For some reason I'd always thought Steriogram were Australian, but you're right they are from NZ. It's very pedantic and irrelevant to mention it but some line-ups of Crowded House are NZ/Aus/USA...

Release date for the Arctic Monkeys single is 9th Dec, according to their e-mail update. On 7" of course.

Yeah, I would associate disco mainly with the 70s - there were a lot of disco-influenced hits in the 90s but that's was a consciously retro thing to do then. Of course they could do a Nile Rodgers-themed edition. But even if they did they'd probably make the dullest possible choices ('Frankie'?) and get this year's comedy contestant to do 'Kissing With Confidence'.

That's not how a five-album deal works though - it means the act are committed to the label for five albums and can't go elsewhere. Labels can - and do - drop acts at any stage.

I suppose the problem is that in theory, you could put your album on pre-order for twelve weeks and trickle out twelve pre-order tracks that people have only got by default and have them counted as hits. In principle, I don't object to one-off sales being counted (as was actually the case with Bowie, though nobody seems to remember this) but that requires iTunes and the record company to disclose the split sales figures which they may not be willing to do.

Isn't this claim that the Wanted spent £250k (ie, the cost of the helicopter hire) rather than paying it to Freemantle. Isn't the story also quite likely to be made up PR nonsense?

Conversely, 'I Don't Need A Reason' was demoted to promo single because it flopped.

Earlier today I was even tempted to write a letter to my local paper! I'm totally middle-aged.

The only thing that gives me pause is that attaching Barlow's name to the Matt Cardle and Westlife songs he wrote, or to that Children In Need single, didn't exactly make them fly off the virtual shelves, so I think the jury's still out on whether his name is appealing outside Take That. But obviously the enourmous hype and the fans he does have will make it a fairly big seller anyway. Hasn't Susan Boyle already done a Christmas album?

Yeah, I don't really like pluralising the word "vinyl" either (except in carpet shops) but I was trying to be polite about it because I know it's how young people talk.

Funny you should mention Foals actually, that was an example I was thinking of quoting about record company mark-ups. Admittedly it's a double LP but it's not (AFAIK) a particularly special one, not on coloured vinyl or excitingly packaged - and it still costs something like £23, which is twice what some LPs cost even though they must have cost about the same to make. You don't even get a download code! Meanwhile the CD version costs the same as other CDs. That Turin Brakes record was £12:99 plus postage, and it's on splatter vinyl so it would have cost more to manufacture. And that Emeli Sandé 7"? Looks like it's going to set you back about nine quid.

They are a bit more expensive to produce, yeah, and to distribute as well - being larger, heavier and more breakable. All of these are part of the reason the industry promoted the shift to CD in the first place, and of course now that vinyl is a minority of the market there aren't as many economies of scale. Nonetheless labels do seem to have been milking it a lot in the last couple of years - the wild disparity in price between releases is kind of a clue to that.

I'm nearer the age where you start to wonder what was the last Number One by somebody older than you! Actually, there have been a few this year, thanks to Robin Thicke, Pharrell etc.

I bought the 12" of 'Turn On Tune In Cop Out' by Freak Power secondhand for 49p a couple of weeks ago. Last new vinyl was the day before, I got the new Turin Brakes LP. It looks very pretty too.

Guess it's just me who remembers this then? U6je85v6S-c

God only knows how people might react to the word "God" being used in a song title. -_-

So U2 haven't even finished the album yet? Not sure that's really clear enough to count as scheduled yet. In the print version of Metro it looks like Adam Clayton is falling asleep, although if he's listening to recent U2 songs that's hardly surprising...

I doubt any significant number of people do - my suggestion was not that most buyers of the single would know or care who co-wrote it, but that the reason Ryan Tedder gets so much work as a songwriter is because he knows how to write saleable songs.

People always say this but all the singles from his last album were A-listed there for weeks and flopped. The Tedder thing might be more relevant.

And Classic FM certainly isn't like Radio 4, which is a speech station.

That seems harsh, considering how successful Katy P would be in an ideal world!

In a logical world she'd be as successful as Haim, wouldn't she?