Charts analysis: Paul McCartney now has 24 No.1 albums as new solo LP debuts at summit

Sir Paul McCartney scores an unprecedented 24th No.1 album with his poignant, semi-autobiographical new solo set, The Boys Of Dungeon Lane. Five years in the making, and comprising 14 new McCartney songs – five of them co-written with the album’s producer Andrew Watt – The Boys Of Dungeon Lane racked up first week consumption of 33,642 units (14,110 CDs, 16,296 vinyl albums, 346 cassettes, 1,298 digital downloads and 1,592 sales-equivalent streams), slightly more than its immediate predecessor McCartney III, which opened atop the list on consumption of 33,079 units at the end of 2020. It gives him consecutive No.1 albums for the first time since in over 40 years. Twenty when he topped the chart for the first time, as a member of The Beatles in 1963, McCartney thus extends his tenure as a No.1 act to more than 63 years, breaking the record set by the late Elvis Presley, with just short of 60 years elapsing between The King’s first No.1, Rock N’ Roll, in 1956, and his last, The Wonder Of You in 2016. Turning 84 a week on Thursday (June 18), McCartney is now the oldest solo artist ever to have a No.1 album with new material, eclipsing fellow knight Tom Jones, who was 80 when he topped with Surrounded By Time in 2021. The oldest living person to have a No.1 was Vera Lynn, whose compilation We'll Meet Again: The Very Best Of, which topped the chart in 2009, when she was 92, but all the recordings on that were more than 60 years old at that point. McCartney has had 15 No.1s with The Beatles – Please Please Me (1963), With The Beatles (1963), A Hard Day’s Night (1964), Beatles For Sale (1964), Help! (1965), Rubber Soul (1965), Revolver (1966), Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967), The Beatles aka The White Album (1968), Abbey Road (1969), Let It Be (1970), The Beatles At The Hollywood Bowl (1977), Live At The BBC (1994), Anthology 2 (1996) and 1 (2000). The Boys Of Dungeon Lane is his sixth listed as a solo act, following McCartney II (1980), Tug Of War (1982) – his last consecutive studio No.1s – Give My Regards To Broad Street (1984), Flowers In The Dirt (1989) and McCartney III (2020). Finally, Ram (1971) credits Paul & Linda McCartney, Band On The Run (1973) is attributed to Paul McCartney & Wings, and Venus And Mars (1975) to Wings. His closest rival in terms of career No.1s is Robbie Williams, who snared his 16th solo with Britpop in January, and – depending on how strictly you interpret his presence on Take That hits sets –has had 19, 20 or even 21 number one albums. Always brothers but only sporadically a recording act, 54-year-old Mike Sandison and his 53-year-old sibling Marcus Eoin, from the Scottish village of Cullen, form the ambient, psychedelically-inspired electronic duo Boards Of Canada, whose eagerly-awaited first album in 13 years, Inferno, is a collection of collages and soundscapes exploring death and the occult, and their highest-charting set to date, debuting at No.3 (17,612 sales). It is their fifth album, following Music Has The Right To Children (No.193, 1998), Geogadd (No.21, 2002), The Campfire Headphase (No.41, 2005) and Tomorrow’s Harvest (No.7, 2013). Their biggest-seller remains Music Has The Right To Children, which has accumulated consumption of 105,980 units, despite its lowly chart peak. Floridian hard rock quartet Shinedown score their third Top 10 and fifth Top 75 entry, with Ei8ht (No.8, 8,529 sales), which, as its title suggests, is their eighth studio album. A recording act since 2003, their 2008 third album is their only gold album in the UK, with to-date consumption of 129,250 units, despite a No.143 peak. The rest of the Top 10: The Essential (2-2, 25,197 sales) by Michael Jackson, Iceman (3-4, 13,148 sales) by Drake, The Art Of Loving (4-5, 10,619 sales) by Olivia Dean, Thriller (5-6, 9,280 sales) by Michael Jackson, The Great Divide (7-7, 8.,889 sales) by Noah Kahan, 50 Years: Don’t Stop (6-9, 7,914 sales) by Fleetwood Mac and Bad (8-10, 7,200 sales) by Michael Jackson. Number one on debut last week, Florescence wilts to No.37 (3,261 sales) for Maisie Peters. Also exiting the Top 10: +-=÷× Tour Collection (10-12, 6,532 sales) by Ed Sheeran and Glow (9-177, 1,354 sales) by Michael Ball. Live From Mexico (No.21, 4,823 sales), comprises 42 recordings from three sell-out concerts in Mexico City in support of her 2024 No1 album Radical Optimism by Dua Lipa. Digital only until today (June 5) when CDs and LPs drop, it is the newly-married 30-year-old’s fifth chart entry Her eponymous 2019 debut reached No.3, and 2023 follow-up Blood Orange peaked at No.7, but London singer/songwriter Freya Ridings falls short of the Top 10 with third album, Mother Of Pearl – on which she wrote the title track alone, and the rest of the tracks with a variety of co-authors – debuting at No.26 (4,248 sales). Blancmange and Erasure both had hits with ABBA covers, so it’s no surprise that Doublespeak – a collaboration between the former’s Neil Arthur, the latter’s Vince Clarke and producer Ben Edwards aka Benge – includes a cover of ABBA’s Visitors, alongside David Essex’s Rock On, Carpenters’ hit Goodbye To Love and eight other covers on their eponymous debut release (No.67, 2,431 sales). Also new to the Top 75: Grey (No.31, 3,690 sales), the fourth studio country album and third chart entry for 59-year-old actor Kiefer Sutherland, on which he alone penned all but one song, the outlier being a cover of Merle Haggard’s The Bottle Let Me Down – an American country hit even as Sutherland was born in London in 1966; and Live From Asbury Park 2024 (No.75, 2,274 sales), the 43rd chart album by Bruce Springsteen, which also credits The E-Street Band. Thirty weeks after singer/songwriter Skye Newman debuted and peaked at No.18 with her six-song 18-minute EP, SE9 Part 1, the release is expanded by eight songs and 26 minutes as, simply, SE9, and re-enters at a new high (No.11, 6,560 sales). Newly expanded digitally to mark its 10th birthday, Ariana Grande’s third album, and first No.1, Dangerous Woman is back in the chart (No.17, 5,361 sales) for the first time since 2019, and in its highest position since 2017. It is the second most popular of her seven studio albums, its to-date consumption of 623,333 units trailing only its 2014 predecessor, Grande’s second album, My Everything (724,068 sales). No.2 on the compilation chart for the last three weeks, the KPop Demon Hunters soundtrack set returns to No.1 (4,011 sales, including 222 Yoto cards, 42 digital downloads and 3,747 sales-equivalent streams), securing its 44th week at No.1 on its 50th chart appearance. That is the lowest weekly consumption of its career to date, being four fewer than its first week tally. Overall album sales are down 4.33% week-on-week to 2,546,356 units, 2.60% above same week 2025 sales of 2,481,764. Physical product accounts for 310,754 sales, 12.20% of the total. PHOTO: Mary McCartney

Charts analysis: Rein Me In sees consumption increase as it matches Alex Warren's No.1 chart run

Sunshine And Rein: Although it was not among the songs Olivia Dean performed in her sublime, televised 17-song finale performance at Radio 1’s Big Weekend in Sunderland on Sunday (May 24), her Sam Fender collaboration, Rein Me In, undoubtedly benefited not just from this, but also from the hottest May weather in history and a scorching bank holiday, which helped increase sedentary streaming across the board. Claiming pole position for the fifth week in a row, and 13th week in total, while securing its 32nd week in the Top 10 and 49th consecutive week in the Top 40 for the pair, its consumption surged 17.87% week-on-week to 56,132 units (663 digital downloads and 55,469 sales-equivalent streams), guaranteeing it will not fall into ACR for at least another four weeks. It has now spent longer at No.1 than any duet in chart history, and matches Alex Warren’s Ordinary as the track with most weeks at No.1 in the 2020s. The last of only six songs ever to spend longer at No.1 was Shape Of You, which spent 14 weeks at the apex in 2017 for Ed Sheeran. The only song to deny Rein Me In the No.1 slot in the last 11 weeks is Drop Dead, the first single from Olivia Rodrigo’s upcoming third album, You Seem Pretty Sad For A Girl So In Love, which topped the list on debut on consumption of 65,435 units five weeks ago. Follow-up The Cure looked like it might do likewise this week, with an early lead helped by its release in physical formats, but it ultimately falls somewhat short, debuting at No.2 for Rodrigo on consumption of 43,228 units (1,951 7-inch vinyl, 371 cassettes, 447 digital downloads and 40,459 sales-equivalent streams), becoming her 10th Top 10 and 17th Top 75 hit. Drop Dead bounces 10-9 (30,584 sales). The only other song in the Top 10 to reach a new peak is Go, which paused at No.7 last week for The Chemical Brothers, but now climbs to No.4 (34,849 sales). A No.46 single in 2015, its inclusion in Netflix streaming hit Apex has pushed it to new heights, its latest fillip making it their fifth Top 5 hit, and their first since 2005. Drake racked up three new Top 10 hits last week from his new album Iceman but now all are in steep decline with Janice STFU (2-6, 33,253 sales) holding up best. National Treasures trips 3-19 (18,650 sales), while Make Them Cry, his second-ranked song last week, when it debuted at No.6, now his eighth most popular track and disappearing into ‘starred-out’ territory. Taking up the slack – just because its decline is lesser than the rest – Shabang debuts at No.25 (15,275 sales). In so doing, it becomes Drake’s 101st Top 40 and record 156th Top 75 entry. Zara Larsson was another well-received star of Radio 1’s Big Weekend, with resultant dividends and rebounds below peak for both her viral 2016 song Lush Life (12-7, 32,882 sales) and the title track of her latest album, Midnight Sun (15-8, 31,760 sales). The rest of the Top 10: Billie Jean (4-3, 35,619 sales) by Michael Jackson, Dracula (5-5, 33,546 sales) by Tame Impala and Beat It (9-10, 28,102 sales) by Michael Jackson. Aside from the Drake tracks mentioned above, the only song to leave the Top 10 this week is Human Nature (8-11, 27,259 sales) by Michael Jackson. Less than four months after the release of Charli XCX’s chart-topping Wuthering Heights soundtrack – home to the hits Chains Of Love. Always Everywhere and Dying For You – and only a fortnight after new song Rock Music debuted and peaked at No.36, she registers her 39th Top 75 entry with another new song, SS26 (No.43, 11,403 sales, including 493 7-inch singles). Also new to the Top 75: Let Me Be In Your Arms (No.64, 8,138 sales), the 10th Top 75 entry for UK-based Aussie house producer/DJ/artist Sonny Fodera, and the second for Cameroonian singer Libianca, following her 2023 No.2 solo hit, People; Like A Prayer (No.69, 7,633 sales), a cover of Madonna’s 1989 chart-topper, also a No.3 hit for Madhouse in 2002 and No.16 for Glee Cast in 2010, and now the first hit for Australian DJ and producer Josh Fawaz; Cinderella (No.70, 7,577 sales), a previously uncharted 2016 rap track by Mac Miller feat. Ty Dolla Sign, becoming the former’s fourth hit, the latter’s 22nd after viral activity on TikTok and Instagram Reels; and Girl Like Me (77-75, 7,300 sales), the new single from PinkPantheress’ year-old Fancy That mixtape, and her 13th hit. Leeds electronic duo Prospa reach new highs with both of their first two hits, Cloonee collaboration Free Your Mind climbing 22-17 (22,706 sales) and Murda Beatz collaboration Baby moving 61-54 (9,988 sales). Increased viral activity catapults two Fleetwood Mac classics out of ACR and into the Top 40. No.24 in 1977, Dreams surpasses that peak, rocketing 66-18 (18,849 sales) while 1988 No.4 hit Everywhere surges 81-24 (16,214 sales) There are also new peaks for: Talk To You (34-21, 18,031 sales) by Anotr & 54 Ultra, Material Lover (23-22, 16,815 sales) by Sienna Spiro and Satisfy (60-46, 10,665 sales) by Calvin Harris & Jazzy. Harris also logs a major re-entry with Blessings – his No.3 2025 collaboration with Clementine Douglas – returning at No.27 (14,289 sales), after the latter’s reprise of the track at Radio 1’s Big Weekend. And thundering back, after its prominent placement in Amazon Prime’s new music-heavy streaming hit Off Campus, Jennifer Lopez’s chart-topping 2011 Pitbull collaboration On The Floor reappears at No.41 (11,526 sales). Overall singles consumption is up 5.06% week-on-week to 34,082,596 units, their highest level of the year and 12.30% above same week 2025 sales of 30,349,023 units. Paid-for sales are down 4.16% week-on-week at 266,513, 5.59% below same week 2025 sales of 282,302.

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