07/11/2010 - Rihanna Takes The Singles Crown
Grammy award winning, Barbadian born, US-based Rihanna scores her fourth UK number one as Only Girl (In The World) climbs from last week’s number two to take pole position in the new Official Singles Chart released today, the Official Charts Company reports.
Last week Only Girl (In the World) recorded the biggest first week sales (126,000) for any number two record this year so far. This week sees the single posting a sales increase with over 134,000 copies sold in its second week alone.
Only Girl (In The World) follows Rihanna’s previous UK number ones Umbrella (2007), Take A Bow (2008) and Run This Town (2009). In total Rihanna has had fourteen Official Singles Chart Top 10 hits. In the US, she recently became the first female artist of the decade to score six number ones on Billboard’s Hot 100 Chart. Rihanna has sold 25 million records worldwide. She releases her fifth studio album Loud on November 15th.
There are just two new entries in this week’s Official Singles Chart Top 10; Alexis Jordan who reached the semi-finals in the first season of US TV show America’s Got Talent and went on to be signed by Jay-Z’s label Roc Nation, is straight in at number three with debut single Happiness, while The Saturdays’ Higher featuring US rapper Flo Rida climbs to number ten this week up from last week’s 22 giving the British girl group their eighth Official Singles Chart Top 10 hit.
Cheryl Cole scores her second number one in as many weeks as Messy Little Raindrops tops the Official Albums Chart following her Official Singles Chart number one last week, Promise This, which logged the biggest first week sales of a non-charity single this year so far. Cole’s 2009 first solo album, the triple platinum 3 Words also debuted at number one in the Official Albums Chart and has gone on to sell some 900,000 copies to date.
The Official Albums Chart Top 10 sees a flurry of new entries. Bon Jovi are new at number two with Greatest Hits, the second greatest hits compilation of their career (following 1994’s number one album Cross Road – The Best Of…) and their thirteenth Top 10 hit in the Official Albums Chart including a total of five number ones; thirty-one-year-old much feted singer-songwriter Rumer (aka Sarah Joyce) is straight in at number three with her debut album Seasons Of My Soul; the perennial Rod Stewart is new at number five with Fly Me To The Moon, the fifth release in his American Song Book series which has generated sales of some 2.5 million; Jamiroquai secures his eighth Official Album Chart Top 10 album with Rock Dust Light Star new at number seven; the evergreen Neil Diamond lands his 34th Official Albums Chart Top 40 album with Dreams new at number eight and Peter Andre’s Accelerate is new at number ten.
Source: OCC
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Singles
With Rihanna’s Only Girl (In The World) moving 2-1 (134,540 sales) to secure her a number one hit for the fourth straight year (Umbrella in 2007, Take A Bow in 2008 and Run This Town in 2009), Cheryl Cole’s Promise This falling 1-2 (77,453 sales), Alexis Jordan’s Happiness debuting at number three (60,153 sales) and Katy Perry’s Firework improving 6-4 (58,353 sales), female solo stars occupy all of the top four places for the first time ever.
Remarkably, apart from Promise This, all were co-written and produced by StarGate, the New York based Norwegian duo of Tor Erik Hermansen and Mikkel Storleen Eriksen.
Girl groups aren’t doing badly either – the defunct Shakespears Sister’s 1992 chart-topper Stay jumps 64-12 (25,943 sales), still benefitting from The X Factor effect, while The Saturdays’ Flo Rida collaboration Higher – which has peaked at number 22 three times finally goes higher, jumping to number 10 (32,500 sales) to furnish the group’s eighth Top 10 entry.
There are also Top 40 debuts for Check It Out by will.i.am feat Nicki Minaj (number 11, 32,442 sales), One In A Million by Ne-Yo (number 20, 17,009 sales), Second Chance by Tinchy Stryder feat. Taio Cruz (number 22, 15,025 sales), Insatiable by Nadine Coyle (number 26, 11,391 sales), Take Control by Roll Deep feat. Alesha Dixon (number 29, 10,894 sales) and Janiroquai’s White Knuckle Ride (number 39, 8,323 sales).
Matt Cardle’s performance of Bleeding Love on The X Factor helped Leona Lewis’ original recording of the song to enjoy a 58.5% jump in sales week-on-week. The 1,117 copies it sold was enough for it to re-enter the chart at number 172 and, more importantly, to raise its career sales tally to 1,000,534. It’s the 103rd million selling single in the UK, and the 14th by a female solo star.
Overall singles sales, at 2,853,101, are down 1.58% week-on-week and 10.04% above same week 2009 sales of 2,592,851.
1 Rihanna 134,540 (Total: 261,153)
2 Cheryl Cole 77,452 (Total: 234,660)
3 Alexis Jordan 60,153
10 The Saturdays 32,499 (Total: 125,054)
11 will.i.am/Nicki Minaj 32,441
12 Shakespear's Sister 25,943
20 Ne-Yo 17,009
26 Nadine 11,392
29 Roll Deep/Alesha Dixon 10,894
39 Jamiroquai 8,232
172 Leona Lewis 1,117 (1,000,534)
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Albums
A week after spending the 15th week of her singles chart career at number two, Rihanna registers her 14th week at number one, as Only Girl (In The World) races ahead of Cheryl Cole’s Promise This – but spare your sympathy for Cole, as she has bigger fish to fry, debuting atop the album chart with second solo set, Messy Little Raindrops.
Leading a top three comprising entirely of new entries for only the second time this year, Messy Little Raindrops sold 105,431 copies last week to earn top billing, and arrives a year and a week after Cole’s debut solo album, 3 Words, made its debut at the summit on first week sales of 125,271. After reaching number 25 last week – a 24 week high – 3 Words now retreats to number 37.
It sold 5,710 copies last week, pushing its career tally to 896,045. Adding the first week sales of Messy Little Raindrops, Cole has now sold more than a million albums in Britain on her own, to add to the 3,847,949 albums that she has sold as a member of Girls Aloud.
Cole joined her fellow X Factor judges in giving a standing ovation to Bon Jovi after they performed on the ITV show eight days ago but the clash of release dates means that their new compilation Greatest Hits is – at least for the present – has to settle for a number two slot (87,145 sales).
In a sequence that goes back to 2001, it’s the band’s sixth number two from seven chart entries. The odd one out, This Left Feels Right, got to number four in 2003. Before their run of number twos, Bon Jovi put together a string of five straight number ones, including their previous ‘best of’ set Cross Roads – The Best Of. The band’s biggest selling album, it spent five weeks at number one, 15 weeks in the Top 10, and has thus far shifted 1,953,295 copies. Seven of the band’s songs re-enter the Top 200, led by Livin’ On A Prayer (number 42, 7,022 sales).
Rumer reached number 16 with debut hit Slow a couple of months ago, number 72 with follow-up Aretha last week and number 73 with Slow this week (3,026 sales) – but boosted by massive support from Radio Two and an appearance on Later With Jools Holland, her debut album Seasons Of My Soul races to a number three debut on sales of 66,452 copies. It’s the top sale for a number three album so far in 2010, beating the 55,192 sales that earned Alicia Keys’ The Element Of Freedom the bronze medal slot some 34 weeks ago.
The arrival of a new top trio scatters last week’s top three to the wind – after two weeks at the apex, Kings Of Leon’s Come Around Sundown falls to number four (48,571 sales), while Michael Buble’s Crazy Love dips 2-6 (34,684 sales) and Joe McElderry’s Wide Awake is performing like a nightmare rather than a dream, plummeting 3-20 (12,416 sales).
With debuts for Rod Stewart’s Fly Me To The Moon: American Songbook V at number five (38,456 sales), Jamiroquai’s Rock Dust Light Star at number seven (34,379 sales), Neil Diamonds’ Dreams at number eight (26,257 sales) and Peter Andre’s Accelerate at number 10 (21,090 sales), the artist album chart welcomes seven Top 10 debuts for only the second time in its history. It previously happened on 16 June 2007, when there were Top 10 debuts for Rihanna, Biffy Clyro, The Twang, Paul McCartney, Dizzee Rascal, Marilyn Manson and Mutya Buena.
Although a number seven debut is good enough for most acts, For Jamiroquai, it’s the end of a sequence of seven straight top three albums, dating back to 1993, perhaps surprisingly in view of the boost his appearance on The X Factor results show would have provided eight days ago. For 69 year old Neil Diamond, Dreams – primarily a covers set that includes his versions of 14 familiar oldies, including The Beatles’ Blackbird and Yesterday, The Eagles’ Desperado, Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah and his own I’m A Believer (a hit for The Monkees) – extends his album chart career to more than 39 years. For Peter Andre, it’s the second Top 10 album of the year, following Unconditional Love Songs (number seven in February).
Rod Stewart’s latest success, as its title suggests, is the latest in his ongoing series of covers albums celebrating traditional American songwriters. While its nine years since the writer of classic hits like Maggie May, Da Ya Think I’m Sexy and You Wear It Well penned a new song, the American Songbook series has proved a lucrative diversion – all five have reached the Top 10, generating total sales in excess of 2.4m.
With various catalogue reissues also doing well, compilations and two other covers sets – the R&B-themed Soulbook and Still The Same: Great Rock Classics Of Our Time - Stewart has racked up UK sales of 7,363,957 since 2000. In the same period, he has had nine Top 10 albums – equalling the highest tally for a solo star. Robbie Williams, Michael Jackson and Daniel O’Donnell have also had nine solo Top 10 albums in the survey period, although all three have had other Top 10 albums in group/duo releases, whereas Stewart hasn’t.
Outside the Top 10 there are debuts for Ne-Yo’s Libra Scale (number 11, 20,013 sales), Paul McCartney & Wings revamped Band On The Run (number 17, 14,599 sales), Elaine Paige & Friends eponymous album (number 18, 12,751 sales), rapper Devlin’s Bud, Sweat & Beers (number 21, 11,985 sales), Ultimate Pet Shop Boys (number 27, 8,886 sales), The Best Of Suede (number 32, 7,663 sales), Bryan Adams’ Bare Bones (number 35, 6,421 sales), Good Ol’ Fashioned Love by The Overtones (number 40, 5,371 sales) and Cardiology by Good Charlotte (number 63, 3,388 sales).
Overall album sales, at 2,272,390, are up 12.91% week-on-week at their highest level for 34 weeks, and trail same week 2009 sales of 2,272,622 by just 0.01021%.
1 Cheryl Cole 105,431
2 Bon Jovi 87,145
3 Rumer 66,452
4 Kings Of Leon
5 Rod Stewart 38,457
7 Jamiroquai 34,378
8 Neil Diamond 26,257
10 Peter Andre 21,090
11 Ne-Yo 20,013
17 Paul McCartney & Wings 14,599
18 Elaine Paige 12,751
21 Devlin 11,985
27 Pet Shop Boys 8,886
32 Suede 7,663
35 Bryan Adams 6,421
40 The Overtones 5,371