For the second year in a row, the big box-office hit has landed a Soundtrack at the top of the ARIA Album Charts, as this week “The Greatest Showman” leaps up seven spots to land the fiftieth soundtrack at No.1 in Australia.
“The Greatest Showman” soundtrack becomes the 816th No.1 album in Australia (1965 to 2018) plus the 667th for ARIA (1983 to 2018), plus the 25th No.1 album for the Atlantic record label, their last being also a s’track in “Suicide Squad” (1 week on 15th of August, 2016), and this is the first new soundtrack to hit the top since 2017’s “Fifty Shades Darker” spent a week at the top on the 20th of February, with the soundtrack at the top this time last year being for “Trolls” (3 broken weeks from 9th of January, TW-46).
Not only is this the 50th soundtrack to hit No.1 in Australia since the first in “The Sound of Music” (76 weeks from 24th April, 1965), it is the twelfth for this decade which has seen such soundtracks at the top as two from the ‘Glee’ TV series, “The Sapphires”, “Frozen”, “Compton”, “Molly” and “The Secret Daughter” amongst them. This is also the first time that a Hugh Jackman soundtrack has gone to No.1 too, as his appearance on the “Les Miserables” made it to No.2 in January of 2013 (held off the top spot by Bruno Mars’ “Unorthodox Jukebox”), and its the second No.1 soundtrack for Zac Efron here (and the fifth Top 5 soundtrack for him too), as his 2006 Disney debut film “High School Musical” spent there weeks at No.1 in August. This is the nineteenth time that the word ‘Greatest’ has appeared in an album title, and the first time it wasn’t a ‘Greatest Hits’ set, and it’s the first time that the word ‘Showman’ has been at the top too.
After returning to No.1 last week for a 22nd week at the top, Ed Sheeran’s “÷ (Divide)” is back down a single place to No.2, which in turn pushes down the Pink album “Beautiful Trauma” and “Revival” by Eminem to No.3 and No.4 respectively. On hold at No.5 is the returning US No.1 album by Taylor Swift in her “Reputation” set, whilst Sam Smith survives another week within the ten as his set “The Thrill of it All” is down one spot to No.8.
The highest debut to the chart this week is the thirteenth studio album for local outfit King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard who open at No.6 with their fourth straight Top 10 album “Gumboot Soup”, with the band scoring three Top 10 albums during 2017.The filmed that opened on January 1st around the country sees its soundtrack become the trilogies third successive Top 10 album, as the “Pitch Perfect 3” soundtrack jumps up twenty-nine places to land at a new peak of No.7, with the first movie’s set reaching No.9 and the second instalment went to No.3. Returning to the Top 10 for the first time since August of 2017 is the Imagine Dragons album “Evolve” (HP-4), which is up six places to No.9 for a seventh overall week inside the Top 10, whilst also back into the ten is Post Malone and his “Stoney” (HP-9×2) set, leaping twenty-eight spots to No.10 for a fifth week within the Top 10.
UP:
* INXS jump up seven places to land at No.11 with the collection “The Very Best”, with a heap of other collections climbing for Cold Chisel (24 to 13), Eminem (30 to 19), Guns N’ Roses (48 to 30), Pink (44 to 36), Fleetwood Mac (Very Best of 43 to 38, GH 57 to 40), RHCP (62 to 44), ABBA (93 to 45 for Gold & More, while ‘Gold’ is up from 81 to 77), Queen (70 to 51), The Killers (58 to 52), The Foo Fighters (60 to 54), Roy Orbison (66 to 56), Crowded House (61 to 57), Tom Petty (89 to 59), Phi Collins (86 to 68), Michael Jackson (returns at #78), The Wiggles (returns at #79), Prince (returns at #89), Led Zeppelin (returns at #90), Maroon 5 (returns at #91) and Five Finger Death Punch (returns at #94).
* Other soundtracks climbing this week are for ‘Moana’ (21 to 15), ‘Guardians Vol.1’ (26 to 23), ‘Trolls’ (55 to 46), ‘Suicide Squad’ (returns at No.64), ‘Molly’ (returns at No.74) and ‘Sing’ (returning at No.84).
* Lorde’s “Melodrama” climbs back up eleven places to land at No.21 this week.
* Khalid rebounds too with his “American Teen” album, jumping back up fifteen places to No.24.
* Taylor Swift sees her four year old album “1989” move back up nine spots to No.31.
* Kendrick Lamar’s repackaged “DAMN.” album is back up twelve spots to No.33.
* The self-titled Harry Styles album is back up nine spots to No.41, two places higher than a falling Niall Horan album down to No.43.
* Chris Brown bounds back up twenty-seven places to No.48 with his “Heartbreak on a Full Moon” album (there was a full moon in the past week too).
* The Weeknd is up nineteen places to No.49 with his “Starboy” set, whilst his “Beauty Behind the Madness” album returns at No.98.
* The Carole King musical opens in Melbourne in mid-February, and her 1971 album “Tapestry” is back up twenty-nine places to No.50.
* Little Mix jump back up fourteen places to No.55 with their “Glory Days” Platinum edition album.
* Justin Bieber’s was heading out of the chart late last year, now his “Purpose” is back up nineteen places to land at No.58 this week.
* The AC/DC “Live” album from 1990/91 jumps back up thirty-nine places this week to No.60.
* With two climbing singles this week, the G-Eazy late December released album “The Beautiful & Damned” (HP-38) rises back up twenty-one spots to No.62 this week.
* Vance Joy climbed back into the singles Top 50 this week, and their debut album “Dream Your Life Away” is back up twenty-seven places to No.65.
* With a Top 15 single this week the Pnau album “Changa” is back up thirty-one spots to No.66.
* Returning albums are “More Life” (#71) and “Views” (#98) for Drake, “21” by Adele (#75), the self-titled Dua Lipa album (#81), Hilltop Hoods (#87), Ariana Grande (#95), Calvin Harris (#99) and London Grammar (#100).
* Sia rises back up twenty-three places to No.72 with her set “This is Acting”.
* Halsey and her second album “hopeless kingdom fountain” are back up fourteen places to No.86.
DOWN:
* There are four albums leaving the Top 10 this week, and most of them are seasonal sets, with the Michael Buble standard “Christmas” (HP-1×14, WI10-47a) down eight places to No.12 and the only Xmas title left within the Top 100, as the nine remaining festive titles depart the chart this week, the highest being “Friends for Christmas” (HP-1×2, WI10-13) leaving from No.6, the album having spent 13 of its fourteen Top 100 weeks berthed within the Top 10, whilst Top 20 dropouts occur for Elvis Presley (#12), Mariah Carey (#13) and Sia (#17). Also leaving the Top 10 are Jessica Mauboy and “The Secret Daughter Season 2” (HP-2, WI10-12) down five to No.14 and leaving the Top 10 for the first time, whilst the highest selling Australian recorded album in the Top 100 for 2017 was Paul Kelly and “Life is Fine” (HP-1, WI10-10a), which drops down fifteen places to No.25.
* Collections dropping this week occur for Daryl Braithwaite (11 to 17), Paul Kelly (25 to 37), Elton John (35 to 42), Midnight Oil (53 to 63) and Cat Stevens (64 to 76).
* The Roy Orbison album “A Love So Beautiful” is down eighteen places to No.34.
* After climbing the past few weeks The Foo Fighters’ “Concrete and Gold” falls this week thirteen places to No.35.
* After leaping to a new peak of No.51 last week the soundtrack for “Stranger Things” drops back down ten places to No.61, and “The Secret Daughter Season 1” set falls fifteen places to No.69,
* Linkin Park’s “One More Light Live” album drops down twenty-one spots to No.70.
* Guy Sebastian drops twenty-seven places to No.73 with his “Conscious” album.
* The Killers might see their best of rise, but their previous studio album “Wonderful Wonderful” is down eighteen places to No.83.
* Katy Perry and her “Witness” set are back down twenty-five places to No.88.
* Shania Twain and her “Now” album fall down twenty-nine chart rungs to land at No.96.
FURTHER NEW ENTRIES:
* #85 (S’track) – Bright: The Album Soundtrack is a thirteen track set of songs from the recently released Netflix movie ‘Bright’ starring Will Smith and Joel Edgerton as a black and an Ogre officer’s chasing after a magical wand. The soundtrack contains songs by Logic & Rag’N’Bone Man, Bastille, Machine Gun Kelly with the albums first single “Home”, Camila Cabello, Ty Dolla $ign, Marshmello, Snoop Dogg, YG, Steve Aoki, Portugal.The Man, alt-J and Neil Young with DRAM.
* #93 (GH#7) – The Very Best of Cat Stevens joins his other charted collection “Remember Cat Stevens” (TW-76) after his recent national tour, with a same-titled album hitting No.6 for three weeks in October of 1990.
Gavin Ryan reports with thanks to Australian-Charts.com
