Several months ago I dipped my toes into the murky waters of the music charts – a place to which I don’t venture all that often, if truth be told. I managed to find quite a few that I liked and it seems a good idea to take another dip. I’ve chosen six songs to play you, three of which currently feature in the Singles Chart and four of which are in the Albums listings. Don’t worry, I haven’t lost the ability for simple maths – one song is in both, as a single and on two albums. All will become clear, never fear. I should point out that these are the UK Charts of which I speak, and no doubt things will be different elsewhere, but I’m basing this on the latest from the UK’s Official Charts Company, whose lists are published every Friday at 5.45pm.

Regular readers will know that I am a big fan of Lewis Capaldi, whose struggles with mental health issues I have documented before. He took time away after a breakdown live on stage at Glastonbury in 2023, and it was great to see him make a successful return there at this year’s event. To date he has released just one new song, which of course went straight into the Singles Chart at #1 – his sixth song to achieve that. It is a statement of what he had gone through and came out on the right side:

Survive is currently at #19 on an eight week stay, and I for one am very pleased to see him back making music. He has announced plans for a new album and to tour again, but no dates have yet been set. Watch this space!

I mentioned that one of today’s tunes is currently in both charts. It is this one:

That was, of course, Fleetwood Mac with The Chain. The version I played was from the live album, The Dance, which was released in August 1997, but studio versions of the song are currently at #79 in the Singles Chart, and at #6 in the Albums Chart as part of the compilation 50 Years – Don’t Stop, and at #15 on its original album, Rumours (just the 1,111 weeks so far!).

Roughly a third of the Albums Chart is comprised of compilations, and I thought I’d play you a few from these, as the music is more likely to be to my taste than Korean pop kids. One of these is a recent release, which is a new entry at #29 in this week’s chart. It comes from a band I played a few Tuesdays ago, and gives me the perfect excuse to play my favourite of their songs:

That was OneRepublic with Counting Stars, originally released in March 2013 on their third album, Native, and now included in their imaginatively titled compilation The Collection. I’m not alone in liking that one: the video has well over 4.2 billion views!

The first time I did this look at the charts I found myself becoming a fan of an artist that was new to me, though she had actually been around for five years. That’s me, always down with the kids! Her debut album is still high in the charts, as is its mega hit single, but she has recently released a new single, hopefully a sign that a second album is on the way. This is Chappell Roan with The Subway, currently at #4 in the Singles Chart, having been #1:

It may not be another Pink Pony Club, but I think it is rather nice – and the Tube was never like that in my commuting days!

One of the things that always strikes me about the album charts is the length of time albums stay there. This next song is one of those. The album in question is Greatest Hits: God’s Favorite Band, by Green Day, and this is one of the new tracks that were included on it:

Ordinary World finds the band in their more reflective mode, in a lovely duet between Billie Joe Armstrong and Miranda Lambert. The album has had a weird chart life. It was first released in November 2017, when it reached #22 in its first week. It has since spent a total of 328 weeks on the chart, including currently at #54 in an unbroken run of 122 weeks, but has never got higher than that, and has only spent eight of those weeks in the top forty. That longevity has, however, helped it to more than 600,000 sales here and Double Platinum status.

I’m closing today with another of my favourites, both the song and the video:

The Killers first released Read My Mind on Sam’s Town, their second album, in September 2006, and it actually outsold the US here: 1.5m in the UK against 1.3m in the US. One of my daughters saw them in concert at the Royal Albert Hall a little later and said they were fantastic – sadly I never saw them. The song has featured on all four of their compilation albums including the most recent, Rebel Diamonds, which came out in December 2023 and reached #1 here in the UK. It has spent a total of 72 weeks in our Albums Chart, and is currently hanging on in there at #95 – but this was a fun way to round off today’s tunes!

So, that’s my second look at the UK charts. I may have cheated a little by including some tracks from compilations, but when they are more to my taste than most of the current stuff who can blame me? I hope you found something in here to enjoy – they were fun for me to put together.

See you again for Song Lyric Sunday? Hope so 👍