Huh, I nearly forgot about this one.

1. Alex Warren – “Ordinary” 

Nine weeks, and still no sign of anything getting close to him. What’s more, streams ticked up slightly this week, so he’s out of danger from the downweighting rule for another few weeks. Nine weeks matches Sabrina Carpenter’s “Taste” from last year. His next target is Dave and Central Cee’s “Sprinter”, which had a ten week run in 2023. Barring a miracle, he will make that. The top 4 are all non-movers.

8. Calvin Harris & Clementine Douglas – “Blessings”

This is the second single from Calvin Harris’s next album (presumably), and his highest position since 2023 when “Desire” reached number 6 with Sam Smith on vocals. It’s a fairly run-of-the-mill dance record, to be honest. But then the first single from the album went for country-pop and had Harris himself singing, and it missed the top 40 entirely. It’s quite a good vocal, too. Maybe airplay still matters more for artists like Calvin Harris than you might think, and releasing a single called “Smoke the Pain Away” was ill-advised in terms of daytime radio.

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Another very quiet week with no real threat of a change at the top. I know, I’m really building this up.

1. Alex Warren – “Ordinary”

Eight weeks. He still needs one more week to match Sabrina Carpenter’s “Taste” from last year. It’s down a bit, but still has a massive 74% lead over the number 2 single, which is now Ravyn Lenae.

17. Ed Sheeran – “Old Phone”

This is the second single from his upcoming album, making a rather muted debut. It’s been overshadowed by the first single “Azizam”, which is spending its fifth week in the top 5 – albeit without getting above number 3. Obviously, the strategy here is to lead with a pop song and follow up with an acoustic track to cover the bases.

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A decent range of new entries this week…

1. Alex Warren – “Ordinary”

Seven weeks. And its streams are up this week (a bit). This is the longest run at number 1 since “Stick Season” last year, though “Stick Season” is obviously the more interesting record. It still has a massive lead over the number 2 single “Pink Pony Club” – a margin of over 80%.

11. Lorde – “What Was That”

This is the lead single from her upcoming album, and she’s electropop now. It works, though. Lorde is not a consistent presence in the singles chart – she can usually get a lead single into the top 40 but the follow-ups tend not to. Number 11 is high for her, though – she hasn’t been this high since her debut, “Royals”, reached number 1 in 2013. The flashmob performance in Washington Square Park at the end of the video is apparently legit – those are actual fans turning up for the shoot.

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Basically a dead week on both the singles and albums charts, but let’s run through them anyway.

1. Alex Warren – “Ordinary”

That’s six weeks. It’s now two weeks past its peak but retains a massive lead over “Pink Pony Club” at number 2, and the top 3 is static, with “Azizam” at 3.

25. Addison Rae – “Headphones On”

A second top 40 hit to follow “Diet Pepsi”, which reached number 10 last year. Two other singles have missed the top 40 since then, but this charts immediately in its first week out. The Lana Del Rey influence is less pronounced on this one, which is a rather dreamy dance track.

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Coming up – a new answer to a chart trivia question!

1. Alex Warren – “Ordinary”

Five weeks. It’s down slightly from last week, but only marginally – it’s still beating the number 2 single by 78%. Now, what wonders does the music industry have in store for us this week?

21. Jack Black – “Steve’s Lava Chicken”

Yes, that’s the whole thing. The video has been padded out with the entire scene, but the audio track on streaming services is 34 seconds long. And three of those are silent. There is also an “extended version”, which runs to 65 seconds and is unlikely to be of any interest to anyone at all.

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Well, I was expecting a new number one, but…

1. Alex Warren – “Ordinary”

Four weeks, and still growing (slightly). It has a massive lead – beating the number 2 and 3 singles combined. Which is all the more surprising, since…

3. Ed Sheeran – “Azizam”

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Six new entries, three artists…

1. Alex Warren – “Ordinary”

Three weeks, and continuing to grow – it had more than double the points of the number 2 single, “Pink Pony Club”. Meanwhile, “Carry You Home” climbs 10-9 (which is a new peak), and “Burning Down” is still at 24. “Ordinary” is finally making some headway in his home country, reaching the top 20 on the Billboard Hot 100, but it’s been a number 1 in much of Europe.

5. Ariana Grande – “Twilight Zone”
19. Ariana Grande – “Dandelion”
26. Ariana Grande – “Intro (End of the World)”

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After a busy chart last week, we’re back to another virtually dead week for new entries – though some of last week’s newcomers are heading up the chart.

1. Alex Warren – “Ordinary”

Two weeks. Streaming is up by about a quarter from last week, and it has a massive 80% lead over the number two single (the previous number one, “Pink Pony Club”), so this is a big hit. There’s spillover interest in his other singles too: “Carry You Home” and “Burning Down” reached new peaks last week at 20 and 28, but now climb to 10 and 23 respectively.

“Ordinary” is still making slow headway in Warren’s native USA, but it’s reached number one in Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Norway and the Netherlands.

26. Leon Thomas – “Mutt”

Debut hit. This is the title track from his second album, and it’s been out for six months. It’s been climbing from the lower reaches for a month, but a remix with Chris Brown seems to be responsible for kicking it into the top 40.

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It’s a busy week for once! And this wasn’t in the script…

1. Alex Warren – “Ordinary”

This entered at number 7 five weeks ago, dropped out of the top 10 in its second week, and has been climbing ever since. It’s his first UK number 1; the track has also been a number 1 in several European countries. He has two other tracks on the chart: “Carry You Home”, which enters the top 20 for the first time (having first charted last September, though it went away for a while); and “Burning Down”, which climbs to a new peak of 28 (it first charted briefly in October and re-entered in February).

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Is the theme of 2025 going to be “records that were overlooked several years ago”, then?

1. Chappell Roan – “Pink Pony Club”

Two weeks. It has a lead of more than 15% over the number 2 single, but she does have a new single out – the first actually new single she’s released since breaking through last year – so we’ll see what the first week audience is for that.

4. Doechii – “Anxiety”

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