DanChartFan

We have two EE's in Swindon with one small shop in between, where we once had an orange and a t-mobile, so makes sense they'd be shutting a fair few down now. "This thread makes me want to tear my eyes out, delusional idiots who can't see six feet in front of them. CDs will survive as long as people are willing to pay a little extra to have a physical copy of an album. If they're not then so be it, digital albums will take over if download stores are clever enough to undercut the physical by enough to make it worthwhile. In an age when even ignoring illegal downloads music is cheaper than ever I cannot see how the idea of paying for an album is going to disappear." While he might not fully understand business concepts, and probably doesn't claim to, I can't see why Big Mistake is getting so much abuse on here. I completely see where he is coming from when he says that download albums will never replace physical ones. I think that even if the vast majority of physical purchasers can be wooed over to the download format they just won't buy whole albums in the same way online, but cherry pick things, which is why the singles market is somewhat artificially buoyant, if you only counted the sales of products actually marketed or planned as singles then the singles market probably wouldn't be anywhere near as healthy looking. And he said something about there being no difference between a legal and illegal download, I agree that since the result is virtually the same file on your computer either way there isn't really a strong incentive to want the legal version, whereas with physicals an illegal cd would always look wrong in some way and a legal one somehow more real and satisfying. Probably the overall question for the health of the music industry is whether the continually increasing back catalogue track sales can compensate for the loss of sales in complete albums.

Interesting to note the ones they completely ignored 1953 Frankie Laine - I Believe 1954 Winifred Atwell - Let's Have Another Party 1956 Johnny Ray - Just Walkin' In The Rain 1958 Conway Twitty - It's Only Make Believe 1959 Emile Ford and the Checkmates - What Do You Want To Make Those Eyes At Me For 1960 Cliff Richard and the Shadows - I Love You 1961 Danny Williams - Moon River 1962 Elvis Presley - Return To Sender 1966 Tom Jones - Green Green Grass Of Home 1970 Dave Edmund's Rockpile - I Hear You Knockin' 1971 Benny Hill - Ernie The Fastest Milkman In The West 1972 Little Jimmy Osmond - Long Haired Lover From Liverpool 1975 Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody 1977 Wings - Mull Of Kintyre/Girls' School 1979 Pink Floyd - Another Brick In The Wall Pt 2 1980 St. Winifred's School Choir - There's No One Quite Like Grandma 1983 Flying Pickets - Only You 1986 Jackie Wilson - Reet Petite 1987 Pet Shop Boys - Always On Your Mind 1989 Band Aid II - Do They Know It's Christmas 1991 Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody 1999 Westlife - I Have A Dream/Seasons In The Sun 2002 Robbie Williams and Nicole Kidman - Something Stupid 2003 Gary Jules and Michael Andres - Mad World 2004 Band Aid 20 - Do They Know It's Christmas? 2010 Matt Cardle - When We Collide So they skip two of the biggest sellers of all time, and some of the biggest cheese. Personally I would have thought that Winifred would have been highlighted as supplying the first novelty xmas number one (or at least 'fun' xmas number one) and far from the lights going out in the early seventies I'd say that those three skipped #1s were pretty colouful, I think 1970 was a very close battle with MacGuinness Flint and I really couldn't believe they skipped Benny Hill's epic. I can however understand them skipping some early 60s and later-mid eighties #1s as they are slightly more debatable due to the chart and anouncement dates for the later dates and of course the multiple magazines for the late fifties and early sixties. Someone questioned the bit about Spice Girls - Goodbye, they said they used the xmas #1 to bid us farewell, well I think at the time it *was* the last single as they hadn't expected at that point to do a third album or another single a couple of years later, certainly that's how I remember it as a fan at the time anyway.

Did I hear somewhere that this years xmas specials have more or less been confirmed as the last ever new editions of TOTP due to the BBC basically seeing TOTP as a tainted brand now due to the obvious? Do we know if the BBC4 reruns will continue into 1978 next year?

I see to remember at the time of Woolworths demise that there were two suppliers of physical media, a Woolworths owned company and one within HMV. Since the death of the woolworths one doesn't that mean the HMV supply chain has been supplying all the other retailers (supermarkets & online etc), so won't the death of HMV mean that there'll be no supply chain left to supply anyone else? I hope I'm wrong though.

Just noticed I used the wrong week's chart for 1952 (20th December 1952 instead of 29th November 1952), but if you scrub out Louis Armstrong, Johnnie Ray and Tony Brent, but add in Ray Martin (11/10/1918-07/02/1988) who was at that time 34, and you get the correct list for exactly 60 years ago, and a revised average age of around 37.1 (increasing despite dropping the old chart star of 1952 Louis Armstrong off the list).

Very nearly Steve201, I think I've seen Mantovani's birth quoted before as being in 1900 or 1899, but I can't find the source for that off-hand, and every where I consulted today says 1905 so maybe I'm imagining that. I've now done the list for this week in 1962 (1st December): Joe Loss 22/06/1909 53 died 06/06/1990 Nat 'King' Cole 17/03/1919 43 died 15/02/1965 Marty Robbins 26/09/1925 37 died 08/12/1982 Nick Massi (Four Seasons) 19/09/1927 35 died 24/12/2000 Tommy DeVito (Four Seasons) 19/06/1928 34 Now aged 84 Mr Acker Bilk 28/01/1929 33 Now aged 83 Rolf Harris 30/03/1930 32 Now aged 82 Kenny Ball 22/05/1930 32 Now aged 82 Ray Charles 23/09/1930 32 died 10/06/2004 Frankie Valli (Four Seasons) 03/05/1934 28 Now aged 78 Pat Boone 01/06/1934 28 Now aged 78 Ronnie Carroll 18/08/1934 28 Now aged 78 Del Shannon 30/12/1934 27 died 08/02/1990 Elvis Presley 08/01/1935 27 died 16/08/1977 Bobby Darin 13/05/1936 26 died 20/12/1973 Buddy Holly 07/09/1936 died aged 22, would have been 26 died 03/02/1959 Shirley Bassey 08/01/1937 25 Now aged 75 Don Everly (Everly Brothers) 01/02/1937 25 Now aged 75 Paddy Lightfoot (Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen) Sept Quarter 1937 Frank Ifield 30/11/1937 25/26 Now aged 75/76 Susan Maughan 01/07/1938 24 Now aged 74 Roger LaVern (Tornados) 11/11/1938 24 Now aged 74 Liquorice Locking (Shadows) 22/12/1938 23 Now aged 73 Phil Everly (Everly Brothers) 19/01/1939 23 Now aged 73 Marty Wilde 15/04/1939 23 Now aged 73 Johnny Tillotson 20/04/1939 23 Now aged 73 Heinz Burt (Tornados) 28/08/1939 23 Now aged 73 Jimmy Justice 15/12/1939 23 Now aged 73 Alan Caddy (Tornados) 02/02/1940 22 died 16/08/2000 Brian Bennett (Shadows) 09/02/1940 22 Now aged 72 Billy Fury 17/04/1940 22 died 28/01/1983 Adam Faith 23/06/1940 22 died 08/03/2003 Ringo Starr 07/07/1940 22 Now aged 72 Mike Sarne 06/08/1940 22 Now aged 72 John Lennon 09/10/1940 22 died 08/12/1980 Cliff Richard 14/10/1940 22 Now aged 72 Maureen Kennedy (Vernon Girls) ??/??/1940 Frances Lee (Vernon Girls) ??/??/1940 Craig Douglas 12/08/1941 21 Now aged 71 George Bellamy (Tornados) 08/10/1941 21 Now aged 71 Hank Marvin (Shadows) 28/10/1941 21 Now aged 71 Bruce Welch (Shadows) 02/11/1941 21 Now aged 71 Carole King 09/02/1942 20 Now aged 70 Tommy Roe 09/05/1942 20 Now aged 70 Paul McCartney 18/06/1942 20 Now aged 70 Clem Cattini (Tornados) 25/07/1942 20 died 07/04/2000 Bob Gaudio (Four Seasons) 17/11/1942 20 Now aged 70 Chris Montez 17/01/1943 19 Now aged 69 Mark Wynter 29/01/1943 19 Now aged 69 George Harrison 25/02/1943 19 died 29/11/2001 Little Eva 29/06/1943 19 died 10/04/2003 Brian Hyland 12/11/1943 19 Now aged 69 Jean Owen (Vernon Girls) 17/11/1943 19 Brenda Lee 11/12/1944 17 Now aged 67 Billie Davis 22/12/1945 16 Now aged 66 John Bennett (Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen) Dave Jones (Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen) Ron Weatherburn (Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen) Ron Bowden (Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen) Vic Pitt (Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen) Dickie Bishop (Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen) As you can see I've struggled for complete info for Kenny Ball's Jazzmen and the Vernon Girls and didn't even find names for Joe Loss' Orchestra

Col1967 mentioned that the pre rock n roll era was likely to have an older average age, which got me researching. Here are all the artists from the chart of 60 years ago (29th Nov 1952) and their birthdates and ages, the average age for the whole chart is around 36.5. Louis Armstrong 04/08/1901 51 died 06/07/1971 Bing Crosby 03/05/1903 49 died 14/10/1977 Mantovani 15/11/1905 47 died 29/03/1980 Frankie Laine 30/03/1913 39 died 06/02/2007 Jo Stafford 12/11/1917 35 died 16/07/2008 Vera Lynn 20/03/1917 35 Now aged 95 Nat "King" Cole 17/03/1919 33 died 15/02/1965 Mario Lanza 31/01/1921 31 died 07/10/1959 Doris Day 03/04/1922 30 Now aged 90 Al Martino 07/10/1927 25 died 13/10/2009 Guy Mitchell 27/02/1927 25 died 01/07/1999 Johnnie Ray 10/01/1927 25 died 24/02/1990 Tony Brent 26/08/1927 25 died 19/06/1993 Rosemary Clooney 23/05/1928 24 died 29/06/2002

For more info about the million sellers, including a detailed comparison of the 2002 and 2012 figures, go to the million sellers thread in the chart vault.

Commonsense the X Factor single was released a week early last year, and got to number one, but not the xmas number one, which was the Military Wives charity single. The same will likely happen this year, with x factor winners single at number one the week before the xmas chart and the hillsborough charity single at no 1 for xmas. Of course with such poor ratings and lower sales for last years single the x factor could miss out on no1 altogether this year.

That's pretty much the formula for xmas charts now BillyH, although you are forgetting that a certain warbling diva's xmas hit usually sits one place above Fairytale each year. And of course the original version of whatever X Factor happen to be covering is likely to be in the Top 10 too.

I paid £9.06 on amazon, but I did preorder months ago.

"Actually you can buy it on two albums on iTunes- '100 Hits of the '70s' and 'The Best Year of My Life: 1972'. Artists is credited to The Pipes and Drums of the Military Band of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards." The former is likely to be a rerecording as that series of compilations does use rerecordings, though the OCC may possibly still add the sales to the original I guess, the latter one I'm not sure about as I don't know if that series uses original recordings throughout or not? I'm a bit of a purist and I'm trying to get original recordings of every number one since the chart started, Amazing Grace is one I'm finding thorny since the Guards have issued many albums over the years obviously with different lineups and recordings, another is Bright Eyes as I have two Art Garfunkel albums but both turned out on closer inspection to be a live recording, unless the original was a live recording maybe.

Cool, glad to hear the reunion will happen eventually then. Will it be televised or is it just something you have to be there to see? Back to the list I'm guessing Elton and Kiki also benefited from BBC4s TOTP reruns last year, just not enough to pass the million. And I think the least likely to make it on that list is the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards as to the best of my knowledge an original recording of that track is simply not available to download anywhere.

I think Misissippii may have benefited from several weeks of appearing on BBC4s Top Of The Pops reruns from 1977 earlier this year, and I can't help thinking that the planned reunion of Kylie and Jason this summer (cancelled due to rain) was meant (or at least hoped) to be a chance to announce it as a million seller and perhaps give them something commemorative onstage, shame it never happened.

I recieved my copy this morning :-) I don't want to spoiler the whole book, and we have the list of 123 million sellers elsewhere anyway, but I thought one of the most interesting sections was the 'almost a million' section which details 13 more singles that were within 50k of 1 million as of May 2012. 990k Elton John and Kiki Dee - Don't Go Breaking My Heart 990k Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan - Especially For You 990k Cheryl Cole - Fight For This Love 980k Tornadoes - Telstar 980k Royal Scots Dragoon Guards - Amazing Grace 980k Atomic Kitten - Whole Again 980k Peter Andre - Mysterious Girl 980k Cliff Richard and The Shadows - The Next Time/Bachelor Boy 975k Lady Gaga - Bad Romance 960k UB40 - Red Red Wine 960k Pussycat - Mississippi 950k Lou Bega - Mambo No. 5 950k The Beatles - Help! The same section also mentions three 2012 songs as being close to the million, Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe, fun ft Janelle Mottae - We Are Young and David Guetta ft Sia - Titanium.

If Rihanna's collaborations didn't count towards her total, then how did Olivia Newton-John make the top 10? The vast majority of Olivia's singles sales will be the two singles with John Travolta and the later number one with ELO, so all collaborations, so should she even be there (not that I actually want to see Olivia relegated just seemed like on rule for one and another for another).

The publication date of 15th October is literally the day they start coming off the press though I presume? So it takes a few days to get through to shops I'd've thought, especially as a lot of retailers only get new stuff in on one day a week, where I work books/CDs/DVDs come in on a Wednesday. It's also a possibility that they could have delayed publication due to a sudden flood of additional million sellers to the original list, they do seem to come fairly regularly these days, but then they'd be waiting forever if they are.

As of 2002/3 Janet Jackson was the only non-charttopper in the Top 60 best-selling singles artists at number 57 witth total career sales to that point of 4,359,645 singles. However the 51-60 portion of this chart wasn't published anywhere at the time (it being a top 50 for the 50th anniversary of the chart) and I just happened to stumble on it on ukmix without being able to be certain of where they got it from. Also it's hard to say if anyone was close at the time as 60th place Erasure were on 4,077,372 so the next contender for this title could have been 'just' 282,274 singles sales (or one rather modest hit) away anyway. Of course a lot has happened in 10 years too so there could be an entirely different set of contenders now anyway. Thinking about I reckon The Saturdays could be contenders as they have had a fair few hits now without a number one. I would be interested to know if anyone has a longer listing of the biggest-selling singles artist in the UK, say a top 100 or top 150 as that'd most likely settle the question.

And while I think of it Sash has the record for most number twos without a number one (5!!) so he/they must be a contender for this too.

Sam and Mark got to number one though CianS. I believe Nat'King'Cole is somewhere in the running for this title. And I think the Darts had three or four number twos at a time when singles sold massively in the late 70s.

Wouldn't the Beatles have been in the charts continuously from 1962 to at least 65?

Bit of both depending on the age of the record and the confidence (or otherwise) in it's sales figures I should think Zero. I would like to see the split between physical sales and downloads for each million seller, plus maybe a download only top sellers list.

I voted for Pixie as I didn't know it was an old poll. But yeah Cheryl could end up doing it though I would prefer Pixie to. Can't see Leona or Alexandra ever having another number one myself (unless they happen to get themselves briefly featured on a track that would've been big anyway, so I guess Jessie J is the only other serious contender but then she is only on 2 at the moment.

I seem to recall there were 'fake' versions of Cha Cha Slide and Crazy Frog available (Pondlife?). Was also gonna mention Macarena and Who the #### is Alice but I see they've been said.

I'm guessing the lack of consistency is probably due to the fact that the writer's each must have written a complete article of 60 songs and then the editor probably chose the best write-up for each year from those he/she was given by the writers. Give them marks for having their own take on things though, the only list of best number ones to not feature Imagine or Bo Rhap in it!