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It’s a happy birthday today to something that seems to have woven it’s way through most of my life – the UK Album Chart, seventy years old today. And this week’s incumbent, believe it or not, is none other than the Rolling Stones with ‘Foreign Tongues’ – a brand new album, and their fifteenth to hit the top slot over the last sixty-four years. Seems amazing to think they have been going just a few months longer than I have been writing my Album of the Year blog.

The first number one album on July 22nd 1956 was Frank Sinatra’s Songs for Swinging Lovers, one that never graced my collection. However, I played it today, and it ain’t half bad even all these years later. Could it become a contender for ‘The One That Got Away’ this year? Tune-in in December to find out …..

Since then, 1,437 others have made that coveted top slot, quite a number of which have also dented my wallet!!  At first I thought I might run through my collection and see how many I actually still own, but looking at all those racks, if I did I might not finish this blog for a few months, so that idea was quickly abandoned. Instead, I decided to look at my 63 Albums of the Year and see how many of those actually ‘made it’ to the top spot.  And the answer is 22, or just over a third.

What did surprise me was their duration in the top slot – a total of merely 110 weeks, or just over two of the 63 years I have been doing this. The longest running were early-on – the two Beatles’ albums, Sgt Peppers for 28 weeks and With the Beatles for 21. No others even made double-figures, and seven only managed one week – Last Dinner Party Prelude to Ecstasy in 2024, Sam Fender Hypersonic Missiles in 2019, Coldplay Parachutes in 2000, Mansun Attack of the Grey Lantern in 1997, Frankie Goes to Hollywood Welcome to the Pleasuredome in 1984, incredibly Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours in 1977, and utterly inexplicably Who’s Next in 1971!

But commerciality has never been a driving force for me.  Looking at the decades, the sixties held the most top slots with 49 weeks, but that was just those two Beatles albums.  In the 1970s it was 14 weeks, the 1980s 26 weeks, 1990s eight weeks, noughties nine weeks, 2010s three weeks and this decade so far just one week – Last Dinner Party, say no more!  Nevertheless, I must have been very tuned into the charts between 1976 and 1986, because every one of my choices made the top three.  Or maybe the music world itself was more innovative, because all of those eleven have become classics in their own right.

I also looked at longevity in the Top 100, and by far and away the longest is Rumours at 1158 weeks – that’s a total of 22 years, believe it or not. Next was Sgt Peppers at 277 weeks, Phil Collins and 1981’s Face Value at 275, Hozier’s eponymous debut from 2014 at 201 weeks (a real surprise that one) , and Parachutes at 193.  Somehow, it seems the older I get, the less time my choices spend in the charts.   But is that me getting older, or the fact that music is much cheaper to stream, as opposed to having to buy physical product, meaning the bar is much lower on obtaining a chart position, and staying there?

Overall, 25% of my selections didn’t even manage a month in the Top 10, something I actually find that reassuring.  Half of those didn’t even trouble the scorers, which were:

2018 – Everything is Recorded by Richard Russell
1991 – Living with the Law by Chris Whitley
1990 – We Never Had it so Good by Tom Robinson & Jakko M Jaksyk (renamed Blood Brother on streaming platforms)
1988 – American Dream by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
1973 – Solid Air by John Martyn
1972 – First Base by Babe Ruth
1969 – Yes (their eponymous first album)

All great albums, which I still play regularly, particularly Solid Air which is rated 67th Best British Album of All Time by Q Magazine.

Which simply proves that you should always buy/stream/listen to as much as you can, but most importantly what you love.

I have included a table of the 63 albums along with some chart info below:

Year		Title	Artist	Highest Chart Position	No of wks at No.1	No of wks in Top 40	No of wks in Top 100	Stream
1963		With the Beatles	The Beatles	1	21	50	50
1964		Kinks	The Kinks	3	-	25	25
1965		Mr Tambourine Man	The Byrds	7	-	12	12
1966		Small Faces	The Small Faces	3	-	42	42
1967		Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band	The Beatles	1	28	114	277
1968		In Search of the Lost Chord	The Moody Blues	5	-	25	32
1969		Yes	Yes	-	-	0	0
1970		Led Zeppelin III	Led Zeppelin	1	4	38	44
1971		Who's Next	The Who	1	1	13	18
1972		First Base	Babe Ruth	-	-	0	0
1973		Solid Air	John Martyn	-	-	0	0
1974		I've Got the Music in Me	Kiki Dee	19	-	6	8
1975		Fish Out of Water	Chris Squire	25	-	3	7
1976		A Trick of the Tail	Genesis	3	-	22	39
1977		Rumours	Fleetwood Mac	1	1	530	1158
1978		Parallel Lines	Blondie	1	4	82	115
1979		Reggatta de Blanc	The Police	1	4	66	74
1980		Pretenders	Pretenders	1	4	21	36
1981		Face Value	Phil Collins	1	3	62	275
1982		New Gold Dream	Simple Minds	3	-	13	53
1983		The Crossing	Big Country	3	-	39	81
1984		Welcome to the Pleasuredome	Frankie Goes to Hollywood	1	1	36	69
1985		Hounds of Love	Kate Bush	1	3	41	68
1986		Graceland	Paul Simon	1	8	73	163
1987		Robbie Robertson	Robbie Robertson	23	-	5	14
1988		American Dream	Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young	-	-	0	0
1989		A New Flame	Simply Red	1	7	58	91
1990		We Never Had it so Good	Tom Robinson & Jakko M Jaksyk	-	-	0	0
1991		Living with the Law	Chris Whitley	-	-	0	0
1992		The Madman's Return	Snap	8	-	9	15
1993		Wild Wood	Paul Weller	2	-	10	86
1994		Dummy	Portishead	2	-	44	111
1995		Garbage	Garbage	6	-	38	132
1996		Sheryl Crow	Sheryl Crow	5	-	60	108
1997		Attack of the Grey Lantern	Mansun	1	1	10	31
1998		Ray of Light	Madonna	1	2	83	138
1999		Play	Moby	1	5	60	108
2000		Parachutes	Coldplay	1	3	59	193
2001		Love is Here	Starsailor	2	-	19	47
2002		A Rush of Blood to the Head	Coldplay	1	3	69	150
2003		Never Never Land	Unkle	24	-	1	1
2004		Hopes & Fears	Keane	1	5	69	131
2005		Funeral	Arcade Fire	33	-	4	39
2006		Passing Stranger	Scott Matthews	45	-	0	4
2007		The State of Things	Reverend & the Makers	5	-	4	20
2008		The Seldom Seen Kid	Elbow	5	-	53	144
2009		The Hazards of Love	Decemberists	50	-	0	1
2010		The Defamation of Strickland Banks	Plan B	1	2	74	127
2011		Young the Giant	Young the Giant	45	-	0	4
2012		My Head is an Animal	Of Monsters & Men	3	-	19	53
2013		Pale Green Ghosts	John Grant	16	-	1	5
2014		Hozier	Hozier	3	-	64	201
2015		What Went Down	Foals	3	-	9	34
2016		Chaleur Humaine	Christine & the Queens	2	-	25	45
2017		Moonshine Freeze	This is the Kit	49	-	0	1
2018		Everything is Recorded	Richard Russell	-	-	0	0
2019		Hypersonic Missiles	Sam Fender	1	1	24	134
2020		Earth	EOB	13	-	1	1
2021		McCartney III Imagined	Paul McCartney	13	-	1	1
2022		Patient Number 9	Ozzy Osbourne	2	-	2	3
2023		Echoes - Ancient & Modern	Trevor Horn	81	-	0	1
2024		Prelude to Ecstasy	Last Dinner Party	1	1	6	9
2025		Dancing at the Edge of the World	Brooke Combe	83	-	0	1