Hassaan

I'm hesitant to use his 2023 albums as a marker. They seem like they were passion projects for him. He didn't push them as hard as Equals either. His fanbase may not be heavy on "stans" but I think that's a good thing. He still has a significant amount of people streaming his stuff.

Sort of? Since 2022, he just has a single series that runs from September to February. He used to have a series that ran from April to June but not anymore.

Norton isn't back until September, unfortunately.

He's not had a single that has really been pushed since then either, to be fair.

It is indeed a new tour.

I don't think it's necessarily the case that the artists are getting paid anyway. From what I gather in the industry, the money now comes from touring, not record sales. Not particularly surprising given streaming but it hasn't been a secret how little Spotify pays per stream.

I'm thinking a tour. It could be a new release but I think it's difficult for an act like them to get their fans interested in the new stuff.

James Blunt - Love Me Better ("saw you standing outside a bar, would have said you're beautiful but I used that line before" Ed Sheeran - Castle on the Hill ("singing to Tiny Dancer")

Yeah the last time they were a four was 2014, before Abz decided to leave. I think they had technically been a four between 2006 and 2014.

I liked the two golden buzzers. I hope with the watermelons there wasn't actually any danger, but Simon definitely put himself through it because he knew it going wrong would make for good TV (and he was right).

There are four more games I intend to play on my Switch (before the Switch 2 comes about). I've completed 23 so far (and that doesn't include my ongoing play of Mario Kart). Those are Yoshi's Crafted World, Kirby and the Forgotten Land, Donkey Kong Country Returns and Epic Mickey: Rebrushed.

Also, trained West End stars tend to do well at Eurovision (Jade Ewen, Lucie Jones), certainly compared to the years either side of it anyway.

Those early weeks in January always seems to be quite low for everything. Particularly albums, we've seen albums get to #1 on less than 10,000 copies. For some reason, it also happens the week after the Olympics.

Re: S Club, they did previously reunite for a tour in 2015 but didn't release anything new. The Saturdays seem like they parted on good terms but feel life has generally gotten in the way.

I think Take That managed theirs very well. One of the rare artists/bands I can think of who were actually more successful post-reunion than before. Most of the bands that reunite do so for the tour and the odd new song. Yet Take That's new material hit quite big and outsold their albums in the 90s. I think there's a few reasons. They had Gary who was always trusted to write the best stuff for them - it could have gone very different with different material. They had a lot of goodwill from the public. Perhaps it was also timing; paid-for sales were still very strong so people were actually still buying albums.

I think they're getting in the swing of officially uploading old performances to their YouTube. They uploaded their BRITs performance the other day. It feels like it's the first real bit of attention they've had since they were last a five-piece.

Oh god, imagine if Hallelujah was their first single. I don't think JLS would have won if the two finalists got to sing a different song for the winners single (which they later implemented) but it may have been a lot closer. I would certainly like to see the full video though.

It does feel like the golden buzzers so far are quite homegrown this year. I enjoyed the impressionist.

I went to see Westlife when they played Wembley Stadium in 2022. A bold choice for a first gig, and on your own. I would have preferred to not have gone on my own as I found a lot of it very intimidating. At least I have some people in my life I can ask next time.

I think Jack did a good job. The BRITs are a difficult hosting job because the audience generally aren't there to hear your jokes, they're just there to get pissed when there's not an award being given out.

Just thinking of all the former X Factor contestants to have performed at the BRITs (just the main show, not the pre-ceremony): 2008 - Leona Lewis: Bleeding Love 2010 - JLS: Beat Again 2012 - Olly Murs (feat. Rizzle Kicks): Heart Skips a Beat 2013 - One Direction: One Way or Another 2016 - Little Mix: Black Magic 2017 - Little Mix: Shout Out to My Ex 2018 - Liam Payne & Rita Ora: For You 2019 - Little Mix: Woman Like Me 2020 - Harry Styles: Falling 2023 - Harry Styles: As It Was And now JADE. She's the fifth soloist to perform at the BRITs.

Interview with This Morning earlier:

Seems to be heavily implying it's the five of them.

It returned tonight! It was a nice mix of acts as usual. I quite liked both golden buzzer acts. Interesting that there's no pre-performance VTs anymore.

It looks like every reunion has kind of faded into nothing in terms of any new material. I wonder if they'll give that a go or not, as they didn't really have any backing previously. I wonder how many people have been aware that they've still been active (just the three of them).