In a week where major new albums are out for three proven No.1 debutees like Elvis, Gaga and Buble, this week’s No.1 album is the same as last week, Jessica Mauboy with the TV Soundtrack to her series “The Secret Daughter”, and it achieves Gold (●) this week also.
This is only the sixth album this year to spend two or more weeks at the top, in most years it’s more usual for No.1 albums to stick around at the top, but with so many No.1’s this year it’s more or a rarity. “The Secret Daughter” joins other double week layover albums from Human Nature (August), Red Hot Chili Peppers (June/July), Keith Urban (May), the Molly TV Soundtrack (February) which all lasted for two weeks, whilst “25” by Adele spent three broken weeks at the top of January. Jess helped retain the top spot this week after her X-Factor performance of “Flame Trees” last Monday night, and after that, her show ‘The Secret Daughter’ screened its fourth episode to high ratings.
So landing the highest new entry of the week is Lady Gaga with her fifth studio album “Joanne” (named after her late aunt), and it enters at the same position her third set “ArtPop” achieved back in November of 2013, plus this becomes her sixth Top 10 album and fifth Top 3 set (I counted ‘The Fame’ and ‘The Fame Monster’ as two separate chart runs), plus with her appearance on The Late Late Show with James Corden and his segment Carpool Karaoke this past week, plus her promotion of the set, it has all helped for a high entry this week.
The ninth studio album for Michael Buble entitled “Nobody But Me” debuts at No.3 this week, becoming his seventh Top 10 album in Australia, and his first NOT to debut in the top position since the initial release in 2011 of his “Christmas” set (#4 entry), but that later climbed to the top spot for five weeks by the festive season, plus this is his first new material in three-and-a-half years, but with seven more weeks of sales for the year, expect this set to be joined by the (again) repackaged “Christmas” set soon, plus the album features three new tracks by Michael and plenty of crooning covers..
For a man that next year will have been physically out of our lives for 40 years, Elvis Presley lands his third Top 10 album during 2016, as the second teaming with The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra entitled “The Wonder of You” debuts at No.4 this week, and features fifteen tracks with the orchestra including the title track from 1970 (HP-3, peaked August), plus the last No.1 single in Australia for the 1960’s “Suspicious Minds” (HP-1×3, peaked late Dec 1969), “Kentucky Rain” (HP-9, peaked late May 1970) and “”A Big Hunk O’ Love” (HP-2, peaked Sept 1959), and follows the No.9 peaking “Down in the Jungle Room” from mid-August as the second Top 10 for him during 2016, whilst the first set from the pairing “If I Can Dream” (HP-1×2, TW-67) debuted at No.1 back in mid-November of 2015 and spent five weeks during 2016 still within the Top 10, and overall this becomes his 24th Top 10 album in Australia (since 1965). This new set also landed at the top of the UK Albums chart this week, becoming his thirteenth No.1 to do, the most by any solo act apart from The Beatles (15 #1’s Albums in the UK for them).
Landing their eighth Top 10 album is Korn with their twelfth studio set “The Serenity of Suffering” at No.5, becoming the band’s first new material in three years and two weeks, as their eleventh album “The Paradigm Shift” (14th October 2013) debuted and peaked at No.7, whilst this new set becomes the band’s first Top 5 album since 2002’s fifth album “Untouchables” debuted and peaked at No.2 in June.
Two years (and three weeks) ago Leonard Cohen landed at No.6 with his thirteenth album “Popular Problems”, well now this week his fourteenth set “You Want it Darker” also enters at the same position of No.6, becoming the fifth Top 10 album in Australia for Leonard (four for ARIA, one pre-ARIA in 1971). Holding for a third week within the Top 10 is the Triple J compilation “Like a Version Vol.12”, dropping three spots this week to No.7 and landing their debut album within the Top 10 this week at No.8 is US post-hardcore act I Prevail with “Lifelines”. “WALLS” for Kings of Leon drops six places to No.9 and also landing the third week in the Top 10 is Barry Gibb with “In the Now” halving its position from last week and down five to No.10 this week.
UP: Sia’s second No.1 album “This is Acting” has been repackaged with her latest single “The Greatest” (TW-8) and six more songs and this helps propel the album back up forty-eight places to No.12, and after entering at No.27 last week the Andre Rieu set “Falling in Love” is up seven places to a new peak of No.20. The Guns N’ Roses collection “Greatest Hits” is back up twelve places to No.38, Julie Jacklin rebounds nineteen places to a new peak of No.42 (formerly No.49 upon entry) with “Don’t Let the Kids Win”, and back into the Top 50, jumping thirty-two spots to No.46 is the soundtrack for “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.1”, possibly pre-empted by the recent TV screening and the just released movie trailer for the 2017 part two.
DOWN: The first of six Top 10 dropouts occurs for “Let There Be Light” (HP-2, WI10-1) for Hillsong Worship down nine to No.11, Green Day and their latest album “Revolution Radio” (HP-2, WI10-2) drops eight to No.14, leaving the Top 10 for the first time is “Suicide Squad: The Album” (HP-1×1, WI10-11) which is down eight to No.15, Norah Jones’ fifth album “Day Breaks” (HP-4, WI10-2) drops nine to No.19, and two of last week’s Top 10 debuts fall hard this week, with Lisa Mitchell falling thirty-one spots to No.40 with “Warriors” (HP-9) and for the first time this year (and possibly this century), falling out of the Top 100 from last weeks debut at No.8 is Trophy Eyes and “Chemical Miracle”. Keith Urban falls six to No.17 with “Ripcord”, Shawn Mendes drops seven to No.22 with “Illuminate”, but it should rebound next week when he is in the country, and down thirteen to No.25 is the Dolly, Linda and Emmylou collection “My Dear Companion”. “Chapter and Verse” by Bruce Springsteen is down fifteen spots to No.28, Bon Iver drops thirteen spots to No.36 with “22, A Million”, “Lemonade” by Beyonce falls five to No.43, Paul Kelly & Charlie Owen is down fourteen to No.44 with “Death’s Dateless Night”, after its rebound last week the INXS “Very Best of” is back down twenty four to No.45 and The Wiggles’ “The Best of” drops eight to No.47. Falling hard into the lower fifty are D.D.Dumbo (20 to 55), Alter Bridge (33 to 56), Ariana Grande (28 to 59), Bridget Jones’s Baby Soundtrack (42 to 63), John Williamson (46 to 65), Meshuggah (40 to 69), The Dillinger Escape Plan (14 to 84), Fleetwood Mac’s G.H.’s (34 to 85) and OneRepublic (36 to 93), whilst falling out of the Top 100 from last weeks fifty are The Game (#19), Two Door Cinema Club (#24), The Naked and Famous (#37), Sabrina Carpenter (#44), Jagwar Ma (#47), JoJo (#48) and Opeth (#49).
2016’s Season 5 of The Voice saw the trio of islanders known as The Koi Boys reach the Top 10, and this week the boys see their debut album “Meant to Be” debut at No.13, and it came in at No.4 in New Zealand. The fifth studio album and second festive collection for US vocal harmony act Pentatonix entitled “A Pentatonix Christmas” debuts at No.16 this week, including their rendition of the Leonard Cohen classic “Hallelujah” (new TW-59). This becomes the band’s fourth Top 30 album and beats the No.21 peak that their first seasonal album “That’s Christmas to Me” reached in December 2014 (it again hit No.25 in Dec 2015 too).
Former Little Birdy lead singer Katy Steele sees her third solo album entitled “Human” enter at No.23 this week, her first albums chart entry. The seventh chart entry and ninth studio album for American rock band Jimmy Eat World debuts at No.27 entitled “Integrity Blues”, and it becomes their fifth Top 30 album, as their fifth to ninth albums all debuted and peaked within this chart region. Their last set ” Damage” (June 2013) came in one place higher at No.26 and their fifth album “Futures” (Oct 2004) also debuted and peaked at No.27.
Portland-based indie rock act Graves are led by Hawaiian born singer/songwriter Greg Olin, and the band’s second album “Monster” becomes their first albums chart entry at No.29 this week. The third studio album by US rock band The Pretty Reckless entitled “Who You Selling for” is new at No.33 and becomes the band’s third Top 100 and second Top 50 entry. The first entry and second studio album for Tasmanian artist Ange Boxall come in at No.39 entitled “Into the Wind” and the final Top 50 entry for this week is the debut release for US duo NxWorries, made up of producer Knxlwdge and singer-songwriter Anderson.Paak, and their first album “Yes Lawd!” comes in at No.48.
Lower 50: “Civil Dusk” by Bernard Fanning is back up fifteen places to No.51, “The Eminem Show” by Eminem is back in at No.58, “The Best of Cold Chisel” rises eighteen to No.66, and after teetering on the edge of the Top 100 last week, the No.1 Elvis album from last year with “If I Can Dream” is back up thirty-three places to No.67 thanks to his new collection entering this week’s Top 5. “American Idiot” by Green Day returns at No.68, followed by returns for “Waco” by Violent Soho (#72), self-titled Tracy Chapman (#74), Blink 182’s “California” (#75), N.W.A. and “Straight Outta Compton” (#78), “Get Weird” for Little Mix (#86), “Beauty Behind the Madness” by The Weeknd (#96) and finally back in at No.99 is “Wildflower” by The Avalanches.
The cast recording for the new Broadway play “Lazarus” using music from David Bowie’s last album “Blackstar” and featuring two previously unreleased tracks, sees its soundtrack come in at No.57 this week. The third album and first entry for Danish singer/songwriter Agnes Obel debuts at No.64 entitled “Citizen of Glass”, followed at No.71 by Christian singer Chris Tomlin with his twelfth album “Never Lose Sight” which is his third albums chart entry here, and matches the No.71 peak and entry of his eleventh set “Burning Lights” (Jan 2013). Finally coming in at No.97 is local country singer Melinda Schneider with her second Doris Day covers album, this one entitled “Melinda Does Doris Again-The Movie Songs”, whilst her first collection of Doris songs was “Melinda Does Doris” (HP-24, August 2010), and overall this becomes her eighth album and seventh entry to the ARIA Albums Chart.
Gavin Ryan reports with thanks to Australian-Charts.com
