 |
|
| |
|
||||
The UK Singles Chart is compiled by the Official UK Charts Company (http://www.theofficialcharts.com) on behalf of the music industry. The chart week runs from Sunday to Saturday, with the chart being compiled on Sunday afternoon. Most UK singles are released in record shops on a Monday. The main chart contains the top 200 singles, of which the Top 75 is generally considered to comprise the main chart (although only the top 40 are generally of interest), and uses only sales figures. No airplay statistics are used for the official Top 200. As of January 27th 2005 1003 singles have topped the UK singles chart according to the Official UK Charts Company's statistics. The precise number is debatable due to the profusion of different competing charts during the 1950s and 1960s, although the usual list used is that endorsed by the Guinness Book of British Hit Singles and subsequently adopted by The Official UK Charts Company. The current #1 single is Eminem's "Like Toy Soldiers". The Top 40 is currently, and always has been, sold to BBC Radio 1, who broadcast all the songs from the Top 40, in reverse order, on Sundays from 4-7PM. Mark Goodier and Bruno Brookes are famous for having been the presenters of this chart show for many years, but in 2003 Goodier was replaced by relative newcomer Wes Butters. In February 2005 the show is now presented by JK & Joel.
HistoryThe first British singles chart was published in the November 14, 1952 edition of the New Musical Express. It was at first little more than a gimmick, a tool in the circulation war against NME's much older (and more popular) rival Melody Maker. The chart, at first a top 12, was the creation of the paper's advertising manager, Percy Dickins, who compiled it by telephoning around 20 major record stores and aggregating their sales reports. He would continue to personally oversee the compilation of the chart well into the 1960s. The chart rapidly became one of the paper's most popular features. After only a few weeks, it started being quoted in record company advertisements and press releases. The chart also spawned imitators - Record Mirror launched its own chart in 1955 and Melody Maker in 1958. The forerunner of today's official chart first appeared in the music trade publication Record Retailer (now Music Week) in 1960 as a Top 50, but was not immediately recognised as the definitive chart in the country. Arguably, the NME chart was still the most recognised chart, and had the advantage of widespread exposure due to its use by Radio Luxembourg. Throughout the sixties, the various different charts vied for public recognition, leading to some historical anomalies — for example, The Beatles' second single "Please Please Me" was a number one on most charts, but not in Record Retailer. To add to the confusion, the chart used by the BBC on their popular shows Pick of the Pops and Top Of The Pops was actually calculated by averaging out all the others, and so didn't agree with any of them, and was prone to tied positions. It wasn't until 1969 that a truly reliable, official chart emerged, from an alliance between the BBC and Record Retailer. For the first time a professional polling organisation, BMRB, was commissioned to oversee the chart, and a pool of 500 record shops was used - more than twice as many as had been used for any previous chart. The new Official Top 50 was inaugurated in the week ending 12 February 1969. In 1978, the singles chart was extended from a Top 50 to a Top 75. In 1982, BMRB lost their contract to Gallup, who arranged for electronic data gathering to replace the old sales diary method of compilation. The first chart terminals appeared in record shops in 1984. As a result, in October 1987, it was now possible for the chart, incorporating sales up to close of business on Saturday, to be announced on Sunday afternoon, rather than being delayed until Tuesday as was previously the case. In 1990, the chart came under the auspices of CIN (Chart Information Network), a syndicate including the BBC, Spotlight (publishers of Music Week), the BPI and BARD (British Association of Record Distributors). This was basically a formalisation of the previously-existing informal arrangement, and did not significantly affect compilation. The entire UK top 75 can be found online on Yahoo! Launch UK (formerly Dotmusic) at The Official UK Top 75 Singles (http://uk.launch.yahoo.com/c/uk/single_charts.html) along with weekly commentary by James Masterton.
Comparison of UK singles charts prior to 1969New Musical Express Record Mirror Radio Luxembourg Melody Maker Disc & Music Echo Record Retailer British Broadcasting Corporation Building the canonWhile the BBC/Record Retailer chart is almost universally accepted as definitive for the period from February 1969 onwards, there is some controversy over which charts should be considered "correct" prior to this. The most common solution to this problem is to regard the Record Retailer chart as the correct one from its inception in 1960, and the NME chart before that. This approach originated with the Guinness Book of British Hit Singles, first published in 1977. However, it may be argued that almost nobody considered the Record Retailer chart to be canonical at the time of publication, at least until "Record Mirror" began publishing it as well. Some chart reference books simply take "Record Mirror" as their source from the start; this is the approach taken by "The Top 20 Book" compiled biannually by Tony Jasper from 1978 to 1994, and "Rock File", an annual publication during the 1970s whose "Chart Log" feature was effectively the forerunner to "British Hit Singles", as well as numerous books by Dave McAleer. The result of this approach is a chart that begins in 1955, and joins up with the "Record Retailer" chart (and so agrees with the Guinness book) in 1962. A case may also be made for considering the NME chart to be the correct one for at least part of the 1960s, since it was arguably the one followed by the most people. Similarly, Melody Maker's charts could be considered correct for the same period because they drew on the largest number of shops for their compilation. (However, the latter is less practical since unlike the NME charts, the Melody Maker charts have never been reprinted and are therefore difficult to obtain.) The Official UK Charts Company have adopted the Guinness solution as defining the official chart canon, however different approaches continue to exist. Criteria for inclusionIn order to qualify for inclusion in the UK singles chart, a single must meet the following criteria:
The full chart regulations also place limits on how chart singles can be packaged and what free gifts can be offered to purchasers. The full regulations can be downloaded from the Official UK Chart Company website or obtained by post from them. Charts and the music industryThe record industry place a fair amount of importance on the UK singles chart. Music singles are mostly sold as a way of promoting the artist's album - the singles themselves usually make a loss. A single that charts in a high position, or makes it to number 1, is therefore good advertising for the album. Sometimes stickers are even placed on the album mentioning the popular singles. Because the record industry is mostly interested in the highest position which a single reaches, there is usually a wave of promotion of the single before it comes out, in the hope that people rush out to buy the single in its first week of release. This means that most singles enter the charts at a certain position, and then fall down the chart in subsequent weeks. Singles that climb the charts and spend a number of weeks at a high position are rare, and usually denote 'super' singles, which manage to enter the public consciousness and appeal to a wide range of people. An effect of this competition for high chart positions is that a number of high-profile "battles" have taken place in which singles released on the same day have become the focus of media attention concerning which will sell the most copies in their first week and therefore enter the chart higher. The first and most famous example was in August 1995 when the Britpop groups Oasis and Blur released their respective singles "Roll With It" and "Country House" on the same day. The outcome was that "Country House" entered the chart at number one, and "Roll With It" at number 2, and the rivalry was widely reported in the mainstream news media. Another high-profile battle occurred exactly 5 years later in August 2000, when "Groovejet (If This Ain't Love)" by Spiller featuring Sophie Ellis-Bextor beat "Out Of Your Mind" by Truesteppers featuring Dane Bowers and Victoria Beckham to the number one position. On this occasion the main media interest was in the supposed rivalry between the featured female vocalists on the two records. On both occasions, the press and TV coverage is generally believed to have increased sales for all parties. SponsorshipThere has been much controversy over the fact that the UK Singles Chart has, for many years, been sponsored by various companies. This in itself would be unremarkable were it not for the fact that the chart is broadcast exclusively on BBC Radio 1, a public owned radio station which cannot sell advertising or sponsorship. The singles chart sponsorship is, however, sold by the Official UK Charts Company, and so the BBC does not receive any money from the deal. They have, in the past, mentioned the name of the sponsors when doing the chart rundown and this has in effect allowed the sponsors to do indirect advertising on a publicly owned radio station. For many years the chart was sponsored by worldpop.com, a music website. However, in 2004, Coca Cola became the sponsors of the chart instead. For a while, the BBC continued the practise of mentioning the sponsoring company during the chart show, however there was a huge backlash against this - partly caused by controversy elsewhere over allowing sugary/fatty foods and drinks to be advertised to children. The BBC initially stuck to its guns, but eventually came to an agreement whereby the name would be dropped from its on-air broadcast. RecordsTo see what records are held by what artists associated with the singles chart, click here See also
External links
|
||
|
|
|
|
|
|
Copyright 2008 WordIQ.com - Privacy Policy
::
Terms of Use
:: Contact Us
:: About Us This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "UK singles chart". |