Most nations like ours need fools for their heroes

Continuing my trip forward in time through the album charts

18/10/24 : The Mighty Several - Paul Heaton

Our fourth visit with Mr Heaton but this the first time he's on his own because we've previously met him once with The Beautiful South and twice with Jacqui Abbott. I'm not expecting a wild departure from his usual style, but maybe this is his venture into Scandi-death metal?

Nope - it's more of his dry Northern humour complete with intelligent and wry lyrics. It's a bit more upbeat than his recent stuff, harking back more to The Beautiful South days and I think I appreciated it more as a result. Having said that, one of the slower numbers was the stand-out track for me - "After The Sugar Rush" is a gorgeous number about enduring love. I also liked "Couldn't Get Dead" which is an inappropriately amusing song about failing to commit suicide. They've definitely been raiding the dressing-up box for the album cover though, haven't they?

We're at #2 in the charts this week with a new entry, with Charli XCX preventing him from achieving a hat-trick of #1 albums with her remix version of the deluxe version of brat, which is snappily titled its brat and it's completely different but also still brat, which resulted in her rising from #13 last week to claim her second #1 album. The rest of the top five are Sabrina Carpenter, Coldplay and Chappell Roan but, in keeping with Charli's resurgence at the top spot, we have a curious collection of re-entries to consider lower in the chart

James Blunt (#7)
Last seen at #99 for single week in '10, this is back with a 20th anniversary edition

Lady Gaga (#11)
Last seen at #59 for a single week a fortnight ago, I assume they must have upped the marketing effort on this when they realised they weren't going to make any more money off the film.

The Last Dinner Party (#14)
Last seen on an eight week run earlier in the year, including debuting at the top, I assume this is back because they've been touring. I've seen them doing a couple of festival slots and they're pretty good - and this is a fine album as well.

The Beatles (#61)
How come this best-of album ever left the charts?

Ben Howard (#65)
Last seen on a two week run in '15, this is back due to a 10th anniversary edition - I just need to know who was asking for that?

Enough of OLD stuff, what about the new entries this week?

Skinny Living (#24)
I'd never heard of this lot but they've got a very decent white-boy soul sound to them - I was reminded of Paolo Nutini.

Jelly Roll (#41)
These are nice enough songs, but it all feels a bit like musical poverty porn where he repeatedly explains how miserable his life has been.

The Offspring (#44)
I guess it’s fine if you’re massively into that sort of thing, but it’s adding absolutely nothing to the genre. To be honest, it really just feels like they should have given it all up by now.

Rod Wave (#63)
This is vocoder heavy rap that I’m sure some people think is great (someone has to surely?) but I have absolutely no time for. And what kind of a name is Rod Wave?

Myles Kennedy (#98)
Some fine guitar work if you're in the mood for such a thing. But I wasn't.

Last week I said that Coldplay would drop to #20 and we've already seen that I was pretty wrong about their enduring popularity - I'm hoping Paul's fans are equally loyal, but there are certainly fewer of them so let's guess at #56 next week for him. And this week's Taylor stats are one in the top ten, two in the top thirty and eight in the entire chart.

Wikipedia doesn't have an entry for the album but this is a nice article in The Guardian about the man and his music, which tells us that Jacqui Abbott isn't on this album because she needs the time to look after her autistic son - on this one he's joined by Rianne Downey (who played with him at Glastonbury this year), Yvonne Shelton and Danny Muldoon. I also read another review of the album which described him as a "less dramatic Morrissey" and that seems a fair enough comment. As usual, the only other place it's troubled the charts is Ireland, where it's reached the lofty heights of #82.

"Customers also listened to" Rianne Downey, Mt Desolation, The Housemartins and The Beautiful South - Mt Desolation are a Keane side-project apparently. I liked this album - I'm quite surprised his solo stuff does as well as it does, but the charts are a better place for such things from such people.

11/10/24 - Less annoying than expected
25/10/24 - A bit of an odd one