UK Top 100 selling albums 2006

-- Dom Passantino (juror...), January 5th, 2007. (Dom Passantino) (later)

you hate women!
-- reverto levidensis (n...), January 5th, 2007. (blueski) (later)

I mean, seriously, there are 854,391 closeted lesbian 15 year olds in this country?
-- Dom Passantino (juror...), January 5th, 2007. (Dom Passantino) (later)

88 A Fever you can't Sweat Out - Panic at the Disco 220,000
99 First Impression of Earth - The Strokes 197,400
REVELATION

-- reverto levidensis (n...), January 5th, 2007. (blueski) (later)

Da yoof prefer Victorian circuses to the 1970s non-shock.
-- Dom Passantino (juror...), January 5th, 2007. (Dom Passantino) (later)

Rap is apparently less popular than Welsh mining village choirs.

Straws are being clutched here.

So... dance, hiphop/rap and genuinely alternative "guitar" music are dead in the water, commercially, and MOR reigns supreme. Same as ever?

x-post!

Anyone got the top 100 singles sales list to balance it out?

# X&Y ~ Coldplay
# Employment ~ Kaiser Chiefs
# Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not ~ Arctic Monkeys
# Eye to the Telescope ~ KT Tunstall
# You Could Have It So Much Better ~ Franz Ferdinand
# Confessions on a Dance Floor ~ Madonna

01 01 Gnarls Barkley Crazy 819553
02 02 Leona Lewis A moment like this 699330
03 03 Shakira Hips don’t lie 495000
04 04 Scissor Sisters I don’t feel like dancin' 353373
05 05 Sandi Thom I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair 325600
06 06 Infernal From Paris to berlin 308000
07 07 Nelly Furtado Maneater 296000
08 08 Take That Patience 282423
09 09 Rihanna SOS 243000
10 10 Justin Timberlake Sexyback 241250

11 11 Lily Allen Smile 228500
12 12 Orson No tomorrow 227000
13 13 Notorious BIG Nasty girl 222000
14 14 Snow Patrol Chasing cars 210606
15 15 Cascada Everytime we touch 199000
16 16 Shayne Ward No promises 197500
17 18 Razorlight America 197000
18 17 Shayne Ward That's my goal 196000
19 19 Kooks Naïve 186000
20 23 Fedde le Grande Put your hands up for Detroit 184500

21 20 The Automatic Monster 182500
22 21 Meck Thunder in my heart 181000
23 22 Rihanna Unfaithful 177250
24 24 Corinne Bailey Rae Put your records on 174000
25 25 James Morrison You give me something 171000
26 26 My Chemical Romance Welcome to the black parade 169000
27 31 Akon Smack that 166250
28 27 Rogue Traders Voodoo child 163500
29 33 Beyonce Irreplaceable 159000
30 29 Pink Who knew 157500

31 28 Pussycat Dolls Beep 157000
32 30 Ne-Yo So sick 152250
33 32 Christina Aguilera Ain't no other man 152000
34 34 Black Eyed Peas Pump it 148500
35 35 Mary J Blige/U2 One 148000
36 40 Girls Aloud Something kinda ooh 147000
37 36 Nizlopi JCB Song 146500
38 38 Nelly Furtado Promiscuous 141500
39 39 Kooks She moves in her own way 141000
40 37 Chico It's Chico time 140500

41 41 Chamillionaire ft Krayzie Bone Ridin' 140000
42 42 Beatfreakz Somebody's watching me 137000
43 43 Red Hot Chili Peppers Dani California 136500
44 43 Madonna Sorry 136000
45 45 Paolo Nutini Last request 134500
46 46 David Guetta vs The Egg Love don’t let me go 132000
47 48 Killers When you were young 130000
48 47 LL Cool J & J Lo Control myself 129000
49 49 Ordinary Boys Boys will be boys 127000
50 50 Cassie Me and u 124000

51 51 Arctic Monkeys When the sun goes down (Scummy) 123500
52 53 Razorlight In the morning 123000
53 52 Beyonce Check on it 122500
54 54 Bob Sinclar & Cutee B Rock this party 120500
55 62 Justin Timberlake My love 118000
56 58 Beyonce Déjà vu 117500
57 56 PussyCat Dolls Buttons 117250
58 55 Will Young All time love 117000
59 57 Chris Brown Run it 115500
60 60 Snow Patrol You're all I have 113000

61 59 Hi-Tack Say, say, say 112500
62 61 Westlife The rose 111250
63 63 Madonna Hung up 109000
64 64 The Feeling Fill my little world 106000
65 65 Ne-Yo Sexy love 105000
66 68 Bodyrox Yeah yeah 104500
67 66 Sunblock I'll be ready 102000
68 67 Zutons Valerie 100250
69 69 The Feeling Never be lonely 100000
70 70 Pink U & Ur hand 99500

71 71 The Source ft Candi Staton You got the love 97000
72 68 Jose Gonzalez Heartbeats 96500
73 NE Booty Luv Boogie 2nite 95500
74 74 Keane Is it any wonder 94500
75 73 Black Eyed Peas My humps 94250

how do the gaps between these compare to the gaps between previous year top 3 singles?

hey dom those kids are really going for the emo over the r&b!

Do I find it depressing that the list of bestselling books of last year contains very few that I can imagine wanting to read, teach or write about? Not really, that's just life. Being an academic could be as insufferable as being a snotty rock critic if you imagined that what you were interested in had anything other than a tangential relation to most people's experience of life.

I'm slightly surprised by the singles list since it seems a lot less dull than actually listening to the radio last year was.

the pcds album is well odd

alex t otm really. mor dullness has always always always been around and it always always will.

um... is it not more insufferable that academics think that their proper subject should be of tangential relation to most people's experience of life? i would have thought so.

yeah but dom's argument has always been that emo has overtaken r&b as prime teenager listening material, not anything to do with mor

1) Bought it
2) Downloaded it
3) Got a copy from a friend...
4) Bought a promo
5) Downloaded it as part of a deal getting it for free but then cancelling when the subs were due...

i bought 'Maneater' on iTunes. v difficult to say why. but i don't buy new CD singles and own none of the others, unashamedly.

3 Ta-Dah – Scissor Sisters 1,127,332 - mp3s
16 The Sound of – Girls Aloud 672,500 - promo
25 Futuresex / Lovesounds – Justin Timberlake 550,989 - cd burnt for me from mp3s
28 PCD - Pussycat Dolls 536,340 - mp3s
30 Breakaway - Kelly Clarkson 506,000 - mp3s
31 St Elsewhere - Gnarls Barkley 489,100 - borrowed promo off friend, failed to return
38 Keep On - Will Young 445,700 - burnt off friend's promo
39 Loose - Nelly Furtado 444,000 - promo
45 A Girl like Me – Rihanna 391,000 - BOUGHT
46 Confessions on a Dancefloor – Madonna 387,500 - BOUGHT
56 Back to Basics – Christina Aguilera 352,000 - promo
62 B'Day – Beyonce 327,900 - bought as present for sister, burnt for self first
69 Back to Black – Any Winehouse 304,000 - mp3s
87 Taller in More Ways - The Sugababes 229,000 - promo
91 Scissor Sisters – Scissor Sisters 215,200 - mp3s
93 Late Registration - Kanye West 212,300 - BOUGHT

all the singles i have, i either downloaded or have on the album

Who would say this? I don't know how to read the 'should be' in your paraphrase of my position. I think you have to be realistic about the interest of debates about -- to look at what I'm marking just now -- the relevance of postfoundational theories of community and metaphysics to modern Scottish fiction, say, to people outside a very small social group. I think it's a failure of perspective to sit around cursing people for not being interested when they 'ought' to be. (or for buying the wrong records!) This doesn't mean such matters are beyond anybody else's comprehension. I don't think this is a necessary situation, or an ideal one, but to imagine that the ways of being of the modern research university ought to be those of the rest of the world seems to me exactly as stupid as imagining that everyone should listen to or talk about music in the same way that people on ILM do. I'm enough of a pluralist to think that to take your own tastes or way of life as somehow exemplary is dubious.

may yet buy on CD:
16 The Sound of – Girls Aloud 672,500
33 Collected - The Best of - Massive Attack 462,000
41 Overloaded – The Sugababes 417,000
46 Confessions on a Dancefloor – Madonna 387,500
93 Late Registration - Kanye West 212,300

well i'm probably not at a 'modern research university' but given that we have a government target of 50% uni entrance and given that most universities still have large public subsidies, i do think that there is some connectioon between what goes on there and outside. of course there are specialisms, as there are in any walk of life; but a specialist medic could hardly say his stuff is irrelevant to others, and afaic ditto the 'research' (doubtful term in the humanities and i say this as someone researching a phd) findings of the modern research university -- possibly idealistically.

not very many brit riding dirty

All my life I've been watching America.

(The idea of the research university goes back to the founding of the University of Berlin and is certainly the guiding one in Britain today so I'd be surprised if you weren't in a department at least influenced by this model. And I work in a country where the 50% target was achieved long ago.) But that's beside the point -- I think you're almost wilfully misinterpreting what I'm saying. I have nowhere said that what academics do is 'irrelevant' to the world! Nor do I think it should be! Obviously there are connections. But I'm talking about ways of doing things -- to think that everyone should read a novel in the same way that someone who is writing a research paper on a novel does, seems plain daft! They can if they want to, and no-one lacks the capacity to do so, only the inclination and the training. Look at my parallel -- anyone can become a rock critic, but it generally means subscribing to the kinds of values which lead to dismay at popular patterns of consumption of music. Nick bought dozens and dozens of albums last year, by his own admission. This puts him in a very poor position to do what he seems to want to do, which is judge others against his -- by his own admission -- extremely atypical tastes and ways of behaving.

Too many critics in both literature and music play to the gallery, reinforcing prejudices instead of considering different ways to overcome them, and this is not exactly a new phenomenon as the Slominsky anthology demonstrates. Whereas the best writers should in lots of ways be as undecided as their audience; the freedom to change their own minds, to double-back on themselves, to look at ways in which their writing can make the music they cherish and its underlying ideals accessible to their readers, rather than just pitch themselves in an Oblomov-like position and say this is my opinion and I'm sticking with it (which usually translates as "don't bother with all this difficult new literature/music that is so difficult to read/listen to" with the usual cheers and plaudits which depressingly ensue).

As if I need more reasons to build my Carlin shrine...

Christ that's depressing.

559,500 people in Britain need to be rounded up and shot.

(next up, oh noes, people watch EastEnders, what's *WRONG* with them)

Surprisingly enough, AlexT OTM.

HAHA

Slightly overrated maybe? Not because they are white guys with guitars playing traditional song-based music, but because those songs just don't hold up like the best songs do.

7 Stop the Clocks – Oasis 909,161

Kind of disappointing sales given their status. But I guess people already own "Morning Glory" and don't need this one. I have not bought it.

9 I'm not Dead – Pink 854,391

What is so depressing about this? Sure, she is a calculated puppy and all that, but at least she has proper good-old-fashioned songs with proper good-old-fashioned melodies. And her image is more Cyndi Lauper and less Britney Spears, which is good too.
She has done better things earlier in the decade though, and an album act she isn't. Period.

14 Under the Iron Sea – Keane 702,000

A brilliant album that would have deserved to sell bucketloads more. Along with Coldplay, Keane represent the future of music. (And the past, but the past is the future)

17 Love – The Beatles 672,385

Great songs, pointless release. They should have released "2" instead.

18 Twenty Five – George Michael 625,929
19 18 Singles – U2 616,955

No wonder compilations by huge acts sell. They always do.

21 Twelve Stops and Home - The Feeling 597,000

A new band heavily influenced by ELO becoming big sellers was one of the greatest things to happen in 2006. Absolutely great album. This, too, is the future (and the past) of music.

25 Futuresex / Lovesounds – Justin Timberlake 550,989

Would have loved to see him even lower. Terribly overrated crap, and I am depressed how even a lot of writers have fallen for this rubbish.

26 Black Holes & Revalations – Muse 545,000

Best album of 2006, and a huge leap forward from anything else they've ever done. Great Queen-influenced harmonies!

31 St Elsewhere - Gnarls Barkley 489,100

Among the better electronica albums lately, and probably one of few things liked by "hipsters" that I can tolerate.

32 Employment - Kaiser Chiefs 489,000

Seeing this still sells is nice and satisfactory. Kaiser Chiefs fill the hole left by Blur when Blur didn't sound like Blur anymore.

36 Rudebox – Robbie Williams 453,000

His best album in quite some time although it would have been more interesting had it been a fully fledged electro one, not half baked with boring AOR and ill-advised attempts at rap.

41 Overloaded – The Sugababes 417,000

One of the few great new singles bands of the oughties and no wonder this compilation sells.

Exactly. The American charts have been awful since the late 80s and are now more awful than ever.

-- You've Got Scourage On Your Breath (papiermachealamphibia...), January 5th, 2007.

put your hands up for louis jagger he loves the nazis?

That's some detailed reasoning there, Geir. Could you make the correlation between the evidence and the assertion slightly more concise?

Great songs, pointless release. They should have released "2" instead.

How many songs would that have on? One? Bit slim in the VFM stakes, maybe.

Slightly overrated maybe? Not because they are white guys with guitars playing traditional song-based music, but because those songs just don't hold up like the best songs do.

Name the best songs.

A brilliant album that would have deserved to sell bucketloads more. Along with Coldplay, Keane represent the future of music. (And the past, but the past is the future)

As Dom might say, HALL OF FAME

jesus christ. not in my house, they don't. if they represent the future of music in thw world at large then I'm never going out again.

they will produce a masterpiece of unutterable, unsellable glory

:P

Ah, quoting out of context...

I like "Live With Me".

I mean, OASIS?? Unless by that you mean to say that Be Here Now employs creativity as an exercise in sheer scale and saturation, I don't know what you're on about...

christina aguilera

I bought it because I was bored one day, Steve, but I haven't got the first album and would be glad to annoy Noel.

I listened to it quite a bit at first.

;_;

another night, another well-well
go to another party
and hang myself
gently on the shelf

however those chumps at Q reckon "2006 best ever year for British music" based on brits dominating the top 10 based on sales
http://news.q4music.com/2007/01/2006_best_ever_year_for_britis.html

"What the chart shows is a very strong year for British music"

an absurd statement !