The Week in Number Ones: Ed Sheeran, Lewis Capaldi, and The Police rise
Welcome back to The Week in Number Ones, where all the biggest movers from the US and UK charts get condensed into one article. Last week, we investigated the quiet groundbreaking nature of the Sam Smith/Kim Petras collaboration ‘Unholy’, gave a big congratulations to Steve Lacy on his first US number one, and revisited a time when Mark Wahlberg was simply a hunky pop-rap star with the Funky Bunch and the number one single ‘Good Vibrations’.
It’s not exactly the sunniest week for pop music. Rex Orange County, the indie-pop titan currently on trial for alleged sexual assaults that took place earlier this year, leads the pack in sordid headlines. The singer then announced the cancellation of his recent tour dates due to “unforeseen personal circumstances”, which is a really slimy way to phrase “sexual assault allegations”, but hey, that PR team has got to spin this somehow.
It’s just a bit of a bummer week, I suppose. Legendary actress and singer Angela Lansbury passed away, Fugees member Pras is getting implicated in a major geo-political embezzlement case, and Animal Collective have had to cancel their European tour because touring is a goddamn nightmare these days. Maybe we’ll get a little peppier next week, but things are just not great for now.
This week, Ed Sheeran pairs up with Pokemon on another lifeless single; we investigate the differences between the US and UK Charts and revisit when The Police were on top of the world as Britain’s biggest rock band. All that and more as we round up all the best chart news of the modern-day and recent past.
Current UK Number One: ‘Unholy’ – Sam Smith and Kim Petras
For the most part, the UK Singles Chart didn’t really change much from last week. Sam Smith and Kim Petras are still at number one with ‘Unholy’, and the top five remain consistent from last week. Nicki Minaj and Chris Brown both dropped a spot, while Steve Lacy stayed at number nine. In fact, there are only two real changes to the chart: Beyoncé jumped up to number ten with ‘Cuff It’, and Ed Sheeran bolted up to number six with ‘Celestial’.
Now, if you’ve read any of these columns before, you probably know that I love to rag on Ed Sheeran. He’s an easy target, with an extremely outsized ratio between his level of fame and the number of quality songs he has. But I’m no monster: I slow danced to ‘Thinking Out Loud’ at my high school senior prom. I’ve jammed to the Beyoncé-duet version of ‘Perfect’ before. So why not give Sheeran’s latest hit single/Pokemon collaboration ‘Celestial’ a chance?
Well, open minds don’t always lead to open hearts. God, do I hate ‘Celestial’. It’s just the same toothless pop schlock that Sheeran loves to drop on us every couple of months or so. There’s nothing of note about the song apart from its connection to the newest Pokemon games, Pokemon Scarlet and Violet. Even then, the song doesn’t even attempt to shoehorn a reference to Pikachu or Charizard anywhere in it. Do you know why? Because that would be too much fun for an Ed Sheeran song.
I get that my disdain for Sheeran is outsized. The man can sing and write a catchy song, and he seems to be one of the less annoying pop stars in the world right now. But can he at least do me a favour and write one interesting song? Just one that doesn’t sound like it came straight off the pop music machine press? Obviously, that’s too much to ask, and I blame everyone who listens to him for continuing to keep him famous. Shame on you all for liking inane crap like ‘Celestial’. Shame on you.
UK Singles Top Ten (Week of October 12th, 2022):
- ‘Unholy’ – Sam Smith & Kim Petras
- ‘I’m Good (Blue)’ – David Guetta ft. Bebe Rexha
- ‘Forget Me’ – Lewis Capaldi
- ‘B.O.T.A’ – Eliza Rose/Interplanetary
- ‘I Ain’t Worried’ – OneRepublic
- ‘Celestial’ – Ed Sheeran
- ‘Super Freaky Girl’ – Nicki Minaj
- ‘Under the Influence’ – Chris Brown
- ‘Bad Habit’ – Steve Lacy
- ‘Cuff It’ – Beyoncé
Current US Number One: ‘Bad Habit’ – Steve Lacy
Just like the UK Charts, the Billboard Hot 100 is struggling for any kind of change or news item this week. Steve Lacy is still at number one with ‘Bad Habit’, and in a recent move, Sam Smith and Kim Petras leapfrog their way up to number two with ‘Unholy’. That leaves Harry Styles’ ‘As It Was’ sitting at number three, the lowest position it has been at in months.
But the comparisons between the US Charts and UK Charts end there. Between the two, there are only three crossover songs between each of their respective top tens: ‘Bad Habit’, ‘Unholy’, and ‘Super Freaky Girl’. In fact, the disparity between what makes a hit in America vs what makes a hit in Britain is surprising.
Take, for example, Lewis Capaldi’s ‘Forget Me’. After debuting at number one a few weeks ago in the UK, Capaldi sits comfortably at number three this week. Do you know where it is on the Billboard Hot 100? All the way down at number 97, sitting between new songs from former rap superstar Diddy and current country person Jimmie Allen.
Capaldi’s not alone, either. Eliza Rose’s ‘B.O.T.A.’, a song that was also a former number one, has yet even to make a single appearance on the Hot 100. The world is more connected than ever, but you probably wouldn’t be able to tell just by looking at the singles charts.
US Billboard Hot 100 Top Ten Singles (Week of October 15th, 2022):
- ‘Bad Habit’ – Steve Lacy
- ‘Unholy’ – Sam Smith & Kim Petras
- ‘As It Was’ – Harry Styles
- ‘I Like You (A Happier Song)’ – Post Malone ft. Doja Cat
- ‘Sunroof’ – Nicky Youre & Dazy
- ‘I Ain’t Worried’ – OneRepublic
- ‘You Proof’ – Morgan Wallen
- ‘Super Freaky Girl’ – Nicki Minaj
- ‘The Kind of Love We Make’ – Luke Combs
- ‘About Damn Time’ – Lizzo
This Week in Number Ones: ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’ – The Police (#1 on the UK Singles Chart, October 11th, 1980)
Punk and new wave were not subcultures at the end of the 1970s. They were above-ground, mainstream concerns, one that could seriously contend with the biggest and brightest stars in pop music. Of course, the most popular acts were ones that harboured pop music dreams themselves, including Blondie and Squeeze. That list would be incomplete without The Police, a legitimate rock back who still used genres to hide behind the fact that they had a major pop songwriter in their midsts.
Sting is a lot of things: millionaire, world-famous musician, musical impresario, and yoga practitioner. But he’s most definitely a pop songwriter, which is apparent once you strip away the genre tags and monster musicianship surrounding his songs. If Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers hadn’t added their unique contributions to Sting’s material, The Police could very well have been an out-and-out pop band.
Audiences caught on to Sting’s classic pop songwriting tricks early on. Even though they presented themselves within the guise of punk rock, The Police’s first single, ‘Can’t Stand Losing You’, rose all the way to number two on the UK Singles Chart. Sure, it was fast, loud, and a bit snotty, just like punk songs should be. But ‘Can’t Stand Losing You’ was a clear sign that The Police were looking far beyond the constraints of punk rock in their scope.
Reggae was another genre in which The Police could disguise their pop songs. ‘Roxanne’, the band’s second single, found Sting taking on what almost amounted to a Jamaican accent in his vocal delivery. The fusion of pop and punk gave The Police their first number one in the UK with 1979’s ‘Walking on the Moon’. Still, as they began to explore the possibilities that modern technology afforded them, The Police began to embrace new wave in earnest with their second number one, ‘Walking on the Moon’.
The punk and reggae elements were minimised on what became the band’s biggest UK hit, ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’. With only Copeland’s drums hinting at their previous infatuation with reggae, ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’ was richly infused with the latest contemporary synth pop tools, including a then-new guitar synthesiser that Summers had discovered. Used sparingly during his solo, Summers’ addition gave ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’ some palpable tension and futuristic drive.
Even though he was a master of pop melodies, Sting also showed off his knack for dropping some disconcerting themes into his candy-coated hooks. For ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’, that meant singing about an inappropriate relationship between a grammar school teacher and one of his students. Curiosity got the better of audiences, especially when it was pointed out that Sting himself was a teacher before The Police made it big, but Sting pointed to literature as his inspiration and insisted that the song wasn’t autobiographical.
“To be frank, it was right in our market,” Sting claimed in 1993, explaining that Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita was the reference point for ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’. “A lot of teenage girls were buying our records. So the idea was, let’s write a Lolita story.”
Despite its unsavoury central plot, ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’ was the biggest-selling single in the UK during 1980, topping out at nearly one million copies sold that year. It also became the band’s first top ten hit in America, scraping in at number ten in April of 1981. While they were a well-known band before ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’, The Police officially ascended to pop star juggernauts after the song’s release.
‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’ even had an afterlife on the charts, thanks to Dire Straits. The British roots rockers were making their own ascent to pop star status with 1985’s Brothers in Arms, and while recording what would become the album’s biggest single, Mark Knopfler asked Sting to contribute additional vocals. Sting obliged, reusing the melody from ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’ as the hook line in ‘Money for Nothing’. That song reached number one in the US and number four in the UK, proving that Sting’s pop instincts were right on the money when he wrote ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’.
UK Singles Top Ten (Week of October 11th, 1980)
- ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’ – The Police
- ‘D.I.S.C.O. ‘ – Ottawan
- ‘Baggy Trousers’ – Madness
- ‘Masterblaster (Jammin’) – Stevie Wonder
- ‘My Old Piano’ – Diana Ross
- ‘Stereotype / International Jet Set’ – The Specials
- ‘If You’re Lookin for a Way Out’ – Odyssey
- ‘One Day I’ll Fly Away’ – Randy Crawford
- ‘Amigo’ – Black Slate
- ‘Killer on the Loose’ – Thin Lizzy
Never Miss A Beat
The Far Out New Music Newsletter
All the latest New Music from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.