Chart Beat - Sales Chart Articles - Airplay Chart Column

TELLING ON ‘TOLD’

Hi Fred!
 
You mentioned the possibility of Carrie Underwood taking "I Told You So" to No. 1 on the Hot Country Songs list and that her take would follow Randy Travis' version, which also hit No. 1 in 1988.
 
Two other things come to mind on that subject:
 
1) In the event "I Told You So" does top the country chart this time around, it looks to be the first song to top the survey as an original and as a cover since "It Must Be Love," which hit No. 1 for Don Williams in 1979 and as a cover for Alan Jackson in September 2000.
 
2) It would not only make Carrie’s “Carnival Ride” the third album to spawn five No. 1 hits since 1989, following Rodney Atkins' "If You're Going Through Hell" and Brad Paisley's "5th Gear," but it would make Carrie the first female soloist to have five No. 1 country hits from an album in quite some time, if not the first overall.
 
I guess you never know what's going to happen in the wonderful world of Billboard!
 
John Maverick
Burt County, Neb.


Dear John,

No, you never do!

We’ll be keeping an eye on Carrie Underwood’s “I Told You So” to see if she rewrites chart history once again. When I was in Orlando for the opening of the “American Idol” attraction at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, I bumped into Carrie at the Disney radio studio, where she was about to do an interview on Ryan Seacrest’s radio show. I thanked her for giving me so much to write about in Chart Beat.


‘AL’ RIGHT NOW

Dear Fred,

As a partial answer to Ron Raymond's question [about singles getting a boost from the Grammys], I remember when Paul Simon's "You Can Call Me Al" had a resurgence thanks to a Grammy win, though it would not qualify for Ron's main question concerning a huge leap up the chart in one week.

Digital downloads were pretty scarce in 1986 and the ranked-list technology then in use to compile the Hot 100 produced slow climbs up the chart. 

But Ron also asked about a song peaking at a low number in its first release, then peaking much higher a year later. "You Can Call Me Al" originally peaked at No. 44. Half a year later it re-entered the chart after the album "Graceland" walked off with the Grammy for Record of the Year, eventually peaking at No. 23 in 1987.

Larry Dhooghe
Forest Grove, Ore.


Dear Larry,

Simon says thank you for remembering the resurgence of “You Can Call Me Al.” Or at least I’m sure Paul would say that if he read this column.


‘BREAKING’ NEWS

Dear Fred,

While walking down the street today, Rihanna's song “Breakin' Dishes” came up on my iPod. This is personally one of my favorite tracks from her latest album “Good Girl Gone Bad.” I read in your column that this song could possibly be the ninth single from the album (breaking a new record?).

But as I listened to the lyrics "I ain't gon’ stop until I see police lights, I'm a fight a man tonight..." I was suddenly uncomfortable and the fun of that song seemed tainted. The lyrics feel inappropriate for the current horrible situation she is in.

As I continued to listen it struck me that the social circumstances that have occurred in the past two weeks will affect the release of another single from her album. She could have broken a record with the release of a ninth song, but I'm guessing the record label will not release any further singles.

I don't mean to be insensitive with this comment, just indicating another loss from this controversy. The entertainment industry is often affected by current events, and when an artist eventually does release nine singles from one album, we won't remember that Rihanna could have done that with another great song, we will only remember this tragic event.

Ben Diskant
New York, N.Y.


Dear Ben,

I don’t remember indicating “Breakin’ Dishes” was going to be the ninth single from Rihanna’s “Good Girl Gone Bad” album, but the first time I heard the album, that was one of the tracks that stood out and I thought it could be a hit  (and some readers might remember “Good Girl Gone Bad” was my No. 2 favorite album of 2007).

While “Breakin’ Dishes” didn’t appear on the Hot 100, it did show up on Hot Dance Club Play, debuting the week of Dec. 1, 2007, and peaking at No. 4 on the chart dated Feb. 9, 2008.

As you point out, it would be uncomfortable to listen to the lyrics in light of recent events. How these events will affect the careers of Rihanna and Chris Brown remains to be seen.


THIS COULD BE THE LAST TIME

Hello Fred,

I was just wondering what you thought of music-related networking sites such as Last.FM. In case you're not familiar with it, they monitor what people (well, the ones who have signed up for accounts) are listening to, and do metrics and stuff on the information collected. For example, for the week ending Sunday, Feb. 22, Coldplay's "Viva La Vida" was the most listened-to track, garnering over 79,000 plays from Last.FM members. 

Is Billboard presently taking this information into account when calculating the Billboard Hot 100 chart positions?  If not, don't you think it makes sense to do it, seeing that more and more people are increasingly turning to their own MP3 players for audio entertainment rather than the radio?

Best regards,

Jerwin Maximo
Toronto, Ont.
Canada


Dear Jerwin,

I don’t personally listen to Last.FM but I am familiar with a number of current ways to hear music, including Last.FM and Live 365, Pandora, streaming on AOL and Yahoo and Sirius XM Radio (I should mention that I have done some freelance assignments for Sirius XM, including my recent interview with Paul McCartney, and all of the interviews for their recent dedicated ABBA channel. If you want to see three short video excerpts of my interview with Paul, go to www.sirius.com/firemanradio).

Billboard is constantly revising chart policy to reflect changes in how people purchase and listen to music. Currently, streaming music from AOL and Yahoo figures in to the Hot 100. Billboard’s director of charts, Silvio Pietroluongo, tells me we may be adding more sources in the future, so it’s possible that Last.FM will eventually be part of the mix