Suedehead2

How weird. The caption saying it was halftime in extra time was in English, as were the team names! I’m still definitely watching a French channel.

Thankfully my French is good enough for me to understand the on-screen message that extra time is on a different channel!

I shall be watching with French commentary

If England win, they will be the first senior England team to win a major trophy away from Wembley.

Free - All Right Now had multiple rereleases in the days of physical singles. It charted in 1970, 1973, 1978 and 1991. Similarly, Moody Blues’ Nights In White Satin has had three top twenty runs. A fourth chart run peaked outside the top forty.

Same as the men, except that the women actually managed to win one.

Looks like I might have to watch the final with a commentary in French

2-1 to the Engerland

Yet a 19-year-old can be put in charge of a £2bn budget? Oh, BTW, do you have a source for your assertion?

Yet the party thinks 16- and 17-year olds shouldn't be able to vote.

Yes!

Badenoch has appointed a shadow minister for policy renewal and development. In other words, there is a shadow minister who isn't actually shadowing anyone.

Justin Bieber has one of the widest ranges between songs I really like and songs that I think are awful. Daisies is easily one of his better songs.

I played it a lot when it came out, but hadn't listened to the whole album for ages. I ;listened to it this afternoon and it still sounded great. One of many favourite gigs was MGMT on my 50th birthday in 2010.

Easy choice.

Peter Gabriel - No Self Control Siouxsie And The Banshees - Christine Yellow Magic Orchestra - Computer Game ('Theme From The Invaders')/Firecracker Joy Division - Love Will Tear Us Apart Kate Bush - Babooshka Worst Teena Marie - Behind The Groove The Detroit Spinners - Cupid/I've Loved You For A Long Time The Detroit Spinners - Body Language Tie-break - It's impossible to choose, so I will have to abstain.

This week's ramblings are now available from the Blogs page and the Forums index page. Better late than never!

MK and Chrystal’s single Dior spends a second week at number one. Lewis Capaldi's Survive therefore remains the only 2025 number one to spend just seven days at the top. Only two other songs have been single-week number ones in the last twelve months. Sabrina Carpenter’s Manchild remains at number two. She has accumulated a total of fourteen weeks at number two to add to her 23 weeks at number one in the singles chart giving her a total of almost nine months in the top two since June last year. Calvin Harris and Clementine Douglas climb three places to number three with Blessings. It is Harris’s 25th top five hit and Douglas’s first. Her first chart hit was as a featured artist on an MK song. Justin Bieber sprang a surprise last week by releasing a new album. Surprise album releases are always a risk. Part of the risk is that they will come without any single releases to build up momentum before the album is released. Predictably, three songs from the album (the most allowed in the chart by one artist under current rules) are in the top forty. Unusually though, one of them is much higher than the other two. That song is Daisies which is a new entry at number four. Yukon is at number 32, one place ahead of All I Can Take. Bieber has now had 60 top forty singles, 28 of them reaching the top ten. The charting songs just happen to be the first three tracks on the album. The fact that third track Yukon is not very good (the other two are decent enough) perhaps put casual listeners off hearing any more of it. Ed Sheeran’s Sapphire climbs four places to a new peak at number five. There is just one other new entry to report. Sadly, it’s more K-Pop, this time in the form of a new single from Blackpink. Jump is their first single for two years and it is a new entry at number eighteen. Their only single to chart higher was a collaboration with Lady Gaga which reached number seventeen. Still on the subject of K-Pop, Golden from the soundtrack of a film about it climbs into the top ten at number nine. After three weeks of declining streams, two songs with long runs in the top ten have gone on to the Accelerated Chart Ratio (ACR). With the value of their streams now halved, the songs have been banished from the upper tier. Ravyn Lenae’s Love Me Not has crashed nineteen places to number 22 after thirteen weeks in the top ten. Chappell Roan’s Pink Pony Club slums 25 places to number 30 after a massive 22 weeks in the top ten. Alex Warren’s thirteen-week number one Ordinary has been on ACR for four weeks but is still picking up enough streams to remain in the top ten. In the music industry the Isle Of Wight is generally better known for its festival than for its musicians. The only bands of note from the island are Level 42 and, more recently, Wet Leg. The latter band topped the chart in 2022 with their eponymous debut album. Now they have done so again with their second set Moisturizer. While I haven’t yet heard the whole album, I have found the tracks I’ve heard so far rather disappointing. There are still three Oasis albums in the top five and they all fall one place this week. The Time Flies compilation is now at number two, (What’s The Story) Morning Glory is at three and debut album Definitely Maybe is at five.The band has now spent 162 weeks in the top ten of the albums chart and 1,001 weeks in the top forty. If anyone has a list of artists with 1,000 or more weeks in the top forty albums, perhaps they would like to share it with us. Completing the top five is the aforementioned album by Justin Bieber, Swag, at number four. It is his seventh top ten album. Those albums have spent a total of 55 weeks in the top ten. After a short absence, the person who writes the Official Chart Company’s albums chart summary has chosen to remind us of his or her fondness of the word multihyphenate. This time s/he has used it to describe Burna Boy. As in the past, its use is a bit of a stretch as all his listed talents are in the music industry. A true multihyphenate might for example, be a successful songwriter / performer as well as being an acclaimed actor and writing as best-selling novel. Anyway, Burna Boy is at number six with No Sign Of Weakness. While she has been absent from the singles chart for some time, Amy McDonald is still capable of making it into the albums chart. The Scottish singer has reached the top ten with every studio album and she continues that run with Is This What You’ve Been Waiting For at number eight. We have heard a lot recently about how Teddy Swims. However, Scottish DJ and producer Joshua Mainnie would like to inform us that Barry Can’t Swim. Loner, his second studio album under that moniker, is at number ten. It will already have become clear to regular readers that Sabrina Carpenter’s Short ‘n’ Sweet has dropped out of the top five after a record-breaking 46 weeks. In fact, the number of high new entries and the endurance of three Oasis albums means that it has dropped out of the top ten. It stands at number eleven this week. There are two other new entries in the top forty. Let God Sort Em Out, a collaboration between Clipse, Pusha T and Malice, is at number sixteen. Californian singer-songwriter Giveon is at number 38 with Beloved. Now that the school holiday has begun, I will be heading for France next week to enjoy some sunshine (I hope). Therefore, for the next four weeks, Popchartfreak will be delivering his alternative chart commentary.

Today has been the last day of term which meant a little get-together on the school field. Having enjoyed some grape juice, I will be delaying the chart commentary until tomorrow. Sorry for the delay.

Even if every 16- and 17-year-old in a constituency voted for the same party, it would only make a difference in a very small number of seats. The hope has to be that schools and colleges encourage their students to register and to vote. Most people who vote in the first election after they are eligible to do so continue to vote in subsequent elections. Most people who don't bother the first time continue not voting. Anything that incerases participation should be encouraged (within reason).

It's hilarious that Reform think 16- and 17-year-olds are too young to vote, but also think an 18-year-old is old enough to run a County Council with a budget of hundreds of millions of pounds.

Martha and the Muffins - Echo Beach Typically Tropical - Barbados

Did you say anything similar when Johnson did the same thing against MPs who rebelled once?

Oops, that's what I meant to type. Apologies to them.

Dave Cousins, singer with The Strawbs, has died aged 80. Can we have Part Of The Union in the RIP slot?