UK Singles Chart: 2018

Joining the 30+ UK Top 40 hits club this year is Nicki Minaj who had 8 this year. Drake climbs to 12th in the rankings after 13 Top 40 hits, one of which gives Michael Jackson another Top 40 hit:

	Artist	No of Hits	New Hits	Year of Last Hit
1	Elvis Presley	124		2007
=	Cliff Richard	124		2009
3	Elton John	69		2009
4	Madonna	68		2015
5	David Bowie	58		2013
=	Status Quo	57		2010
7	Queen	53		2009
8	Michael Jackson	52	Don't Matter to Me	2018
9	Kylie Minogue	51	Dancing	2018
10	Paul McCartney	49		2015
11	Rihanna	48		2017
12	Drake	46	Gods Plan, Diplomatic Immunity, Walk It Talk It, Look Alive, Nice For What, I'm Upset, Don't Matter to Me, Non Stop, Emotionless, In My Feelings, No Stylist, Mia, Going Bad	2018
13	Rod Stewart	45		2001
14	Pet Shop Boys	44		2009
15	Diana Ross	43		2005
=	Rolling Stones	43		2005
=	Depeche Mode	43		2009
18	Stevie Wonder	41		2005
=	U2	41		2009
=	Justin Bieber	41	No Brainer	2018
21	UB40	40		2005
=	Kanye West	40	Yikes, All Mine, Ghost Town, I Love It, Mama	2018
=	Eminem	40	The Ringer, Lucky You, Fall, Killshot, Venom	2018
24	Mariah Carey	39		2013
=	Jay-Z	39		2013
26	Prince	38		1997
=	R Kelly	38		2014
=	David Guetta	38	Mad Love, Flames, Like I Do, Don't Leave Me Alone, Goodbye	2018
29	Janet Jackson	37		2006
=	Bon Jovi	37		2013
31	Tom Jones	36		2009
=	George Michael	36		2012
=	Ed Sheeran	36		2017
34	Robbie Williams	35		2016
=	Beyonce	35		2017
36	Erasure	34		2007
=	Manic Street Preachers	34		2010
=	Nicki Minaj	34	Chun Li, Barbie Tingz, Bed, Fefe, Barbie Dreams, Goodbye, Woman Like Me, Mama	2018
39	Frank Sinatra	33		1993
=	Shakin Stevens	33		2005
=	Morrissey	33		2009
=	Calvin Harris	33	One Kiss, Promises, I Found You	2018
43	Iron Maiden	32		2007
=	Simply Red	32		2007
=	Whitney Houston	32		2009
=	Chris Brown	32	Freaky Friday	2018
=	Pink	32	A Million Dreams	2018
48	Roy Orbison	31		1992
=	Bee Gees	31		2001
=	REM	31		2005
51	Lonnie Donegan	30		1962
=	Beatles	30		1996
=	Tina Turner	30		2004
=	Duran Duran	30		2005
=	Paul Weller	30		2010
=	Mary J Blige	30		2010
=	Glee Cast	30		2011
=	Britney Spears	30		2015

Calvin Harris has 2 number ones bringing him to 7th overall and Jess Glynne score her 6th and 7th number ones:

	Artist	No of #1s	New #1s
1	Elvis Presley	21
2	Beatles	17
3	Cliff Richard	14
=	Westlife	14
5	Madonna	13
6	Take That	12
7	Calvin Harris	10	One Kiss, Promises
8	Abba	9
=	Spice Girls	9
=	Rihanna	9
=	Eminem	9	River
12	Rolling Stones	8
=	Oasis	8
14	George Michael	7
=	Michael Jackson	7
=	Kylie Minogue	7
=	U2	7
=	Elton John	7
=	McFly	7
=	Robbie Williams	7
=	Tinie Tempah	7
=	Jess Glynne	7	These Days, I'll Be There
=	Sam Smith	7	Promises
24	Slade	6
=	Rod Stewart	6
=	Boyzone	6
=	Blondie	6
=	Queen	6
=	Sugababes	6
=	Britney Spears	6
=	David Guetta	6
=	Justin Bieber	6

No Rihanna in the charts this year so Chris Brown now has the most consecutive years of Top 40 hits:

	Artist	Hits Every Year Since
1	Chris Brown	2006
2	Calvin Harris	2007
3	Jason Derulo	2009
=	David Guetta	2009
5	Drake	2010
=	Ellie Goulding	2010
=	Nicki Minaj	2010
8	Little Mix	2011

After the Ed Sheeran vs Ed Sheeran (with Eminem) battle from Christmas number one, 2018 began with the losing song "River" by Eminem and Ed Sheeran eventually get to number one. This would however be the last we'd see of Ed Sheeran in the Top 40 in 2018.

The Christmas number one went to Ladbaby with "We Built This City" which was a comedy take on the Starship song.

The X Factor winner was Dalton Harris and his winners song was "The Power Of Love", a cover of the Frankie Goes to Hollywood song, in collaboration with past winner James Arthur.

Previous years winners Rak-Su scraped into the Top 40 reaching 39 with their second hit "I Want You To Freak". Aside from those already mentioned, the only other X Factor act to chart this year was Little Mix who had 3 hits.

Aside from Little Mix, the only song by a girl group to chart this year was "Bad Vibe" by M O which featured Lotto Boyz and Mr Eazi. There were no boy bands in the Top 40 in 2018.

It seems then that what we've known to be Pop music in the 21st century is dying out, but what is there in it's place? The answer quite simply is Rap.

Nearly half of all Top 40 hits in 2018 were Rap records. Whilst we've had more records from a single genre in a year previous, no genre has ever had such a large share proportionately.

Making a significant contribution to the number of Rap records this year was Drake with his 13 singles which included 3 number ones, "Gods Plan", "Nice For What" and "In My Feelings". Also helping to contribute to that number was Nicki Minaj with 8 Top 40 hits. Then there was XXXtentacion who died halfway through the year and ended up having 8 Top 40 hits.

We also had a battle of rappers with Machine Gun Kelly dissing Eminem with "Rap Devil" and Eminem dissing him back with "Killshot".

It wasn't just the Americans though, there were a number of British rappers who aren't household names and don't even have Wikipedia pages who were getting into the Top 40.

Outside of Rap, it was a successful year for Calvin Harris with 2 number ones. One of them, "One Kiss" was a Tropical House record, but there were very few Tropical House, or Deep House records in the charts. EDM as a whole though spawned the most hits outside of Rap.

We are now up to date with the chart reviews. As mentioned previously, in some ways the charts have come full circle as in the early day's there was little variation, plus few singles charted, which more or less sums up the charts now. The difference being in the early days you could see for example, the first act to score multiple number ones, the first act from a given country to chart etc. It also gave the opportunity to follow the evolution of the music over the years.

Maybe we'll see new styles of music evolve in years to come and maybe I'll look back on this period as a key moment for this evolution. However until this happens, I'm afraid the singles chart of 2018 isn't very interesting at all.

However I'm not going to stop here, I will aim to put up a review of 2019 in January.