This week's Official UK Singles Chart

Go on, admit it. You're now bored with a single stuck at the top for more than a week. The singles chart remains static on top as Taio Cruz notches up a third week at the summit with Break Your Heart - albeit with a lowly sale that suggests it is Number One by default more than anything else. In a quiet week for big new releases, his biggest challenge comes from Jay-Z and Alicia Keys who ascend to Number 2 with Empire State Of Mind, as we mentioned last night giving Jay-Z what is for the moment his third runner-up on the UK chart since the start of his career over 12 years ago. Those with half an eye on the release schedules will note that time is at the very least running out for Taio Cruz. Even if Break Your Heart manages a fourth week next week it is all but guaranteed to be his last.

In a quiet week for big new releases, the biggest chart waves are made by two singles which have each been charting for a number of weeks and have slowly but surely been edging their way up the rankings. This week they both shatter the glass ceiling and grab themselves Top 10 status for the very first time.

Leading the way is Sweet Disposition from The Temper Trap which climbs to Number 7. The first ever UK hit single for the innovative Australian rock band, it first charted as long ago as mid-August. In the nine weeks since it has risen more or less continuously, making the Top 40 in its second chart week, the Top 30 in its fifth and the Top 20 after six weeks. Now nine weeks old the single at long last makes a deserve breakthrough into what I guess we must call the upper reaches.

Also poking its head above the parapet is Hotel Room Service from Pitbull which sits this week at Number 9 following a 12 place jump, giving the rapper his second Top 10 hit single to follow I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho) from August. This second hit first charted back in August as well, taking a leisurely six weeks to reach the Top 40. Since it did so a fortnight ago it has taken off in some style and now sits just five places below the eventual peak of its predecessor.

Just missing out on the Top 10 but making a strong play nonetheless is Ghosts N' Stuff from Deadmau5 and Rob Swire which makes a flying 58-12 jump this week. At a stroke it gives the progressive house producer from Canada his biggest UK hit to date. His first chart single was I Remember which hit Number 14 in the spring in partnership with Kaskade. The track was actually some months old before it finally hit, having first appeared on Deadmau5's album Random Album Title at the end of 2008. The new single is a rather more up to date piece of work and is taken from his third studio album For Lack Of A Better Name which is released this week. Guest singer Rob Swire is best known as the lead singer of Pendulum whose biggest UK hit Propane Nightmares hit Number 9 in May 2008.

A rather more startling new entry to the Top 20 is New York from Paloma Faith which makes a 16 place climb to sit at Number 15. The heavily hyped single appeared to have been and gone after dipping to Number 31 last week following its initial charting at Number 21. It appears to have been given a helping hand this week thanks to the release of her debut album Do You Want The Truth Or Something which charts at Number 14. The resulting fillip given to the single means it now stands as Paloma Faith's biggest hit to date, beating out the Number 17 peak scaled by Stone Cold Sober back in June.

After all that it is not until Number 17 that we encounter the highest new entry of the week, and even that is a single which is rather longer in the tooth than most people will realise. 4ever was famously the first ever hit single for the Veronicas in their native Australia way back in 2005, appearing as one of the tracks on their debut album The Secret Life Of. For international purposes it now becomes their second single of 2009, following up Untouched which gave the sisters a Number 8 hit back in June. News that 4Ever was to become their new single here was greeted with something approaching ecstasy by friends who had been following the group since they first emerged down under, yet for all that it is rather more of an acquired taste than its predecessor. Despite its age, the track appears on the international version of the Veronicas' album Hook Me Up which finally gets a UK release this week, almost two years after it was first released in Australia.

What is possibly the cleverest single of the week rests at Number 18 for the ever-reliable Jordin Sparks. Her last single Battlefield blew many people away with its lavish scale, epic production and the fact that it may actually rank above Bleeding Love as the best single Ryan Tedder will ever write. For all that it wasn't quite the chart-topping global smash it was made out to be, despite still ranking as one of the best pop records of the year. Fortunately though Jordin Sparks has followed it up with a single that is actually almost as good, thanks to the inspiration of one of the most seminal records in pop history. As the title suggests SOS (Let The Music Play) is based heavily on Let The Music Play which was first released by Shannon back in 1983. A flash of inspiration in the studio led to co-producer Chris Barbosa adding in a rather more complicated rhythm track than was the fashion of the time and in the process he invented the syncopated Latin freestyle beat that would go on to become the defining sound of American pop music for the rest of the mid-1980s. In an era when US radio stations had tired of old-fashioned disco records, Let The Music Play forced pop-dance back onto the mainstream agenda and its vibe was still at the core of many Stateside pop hits at the turn of the decade. In the UK the Shannon single was only a mid-table hit, peaking at Number 14 in early 1984. An attempt was made to update the track for a new generation by Mary Kiani in April 1996 but her version could only stagger to Number 19. The Jordin Sparks single isn't a direct cover but is instead a new song that just happens to steal the rhythm and chorus of Let The Music Play creating an inspired hybrid single that not only makes you appreciate just how much the Shannon original (made six years before she was born) was but which also stands proud as one of her best uptempo singles to date. After poking its nose inside the Top 40 last week the single has shoulder barged its way into the Top 20 and as you might have guessed I would love to see it edge even higher.

Also new to the Top 40, although it first charted last week at Number 55, is I'm Not Your Toy which is the third hit single of the year for La Roux. Noting that In For The Kill and Bulletproof were Number 2 and Number One hits respectively really only tells half their chart story, with their first single having had an epic four week run in the runners-up slot and an extended chart run that still continues today, whilst the follow-up single debuted at Number One and then spent seven weeks in the Top 10 before only this week dropping out of the Top 40. You could be forgiven for assuming that this third hit will only be a minor footnote in their chart story this year, however, given their past form it is not too hard to see La Roux "doing a Lady Gaga" and sneaking a long-running third hit under the wire without too many people noticing.

We should also acknowledge the arrival on the Top 40 at Number 33 of Naturi Naughton's remake of Fame, boosted by the arrival in cinemas of the new version of the hit 1980 film. As we mentioned last week it is a reworking of the Irene Cara original which hit Number One here in 1982. Also of note is the appearance at Number 39 of What About Now which gives former American Idol contestant Chris Daughtry and his self-titled band their first ever Top 40 hit in this country. The single was first released back in August and just missed out at Number 43. It returns to the chart due to - what else - a play on the X Factor show last weekend. It is the TV talent show that also causes Last Request by Paulo Nutini to make a chart reappearance at Number 41. The live shows start next week, so expect plenty more strange comebacks as we approach Christmas.

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