Six years to the date since her last No.1 entry, this week Adele takes her fourth studio album “30” straight in at No.1 on the ARIA Albums Chart.
“30” by Adele (Melted Stone/Columbia) becomes the 933rd No.1 Album in Australia (1965 to 2021), the 783rd for ARIA (1983 to 2021), the 569th to debut at No.1, the 33rd No.1 for 2021, the 52nd No.1 Album for Columbia, and now the third for Adele after her second set “21” (32 weeks from May 2nd, 2011 over five separate runs at No.1) and her third album “25” (8 broken weeks from the 30th of November, 2015 from two runs in the top spot). The new album has also landed first week at No.1 in England (their highest first week sales of the year), Ireland and New Zealand.
Adele also grabs the top spot on both the single and albums’ charts this week, as she climbs back to the top with “30’s” lead single “Easy on Me”, plus nine further tracks from the album land within the Top 40 this week and two of them are Top 10 berths in the first week (increasing her singles T10 tally to now seven in total). The dual No.1’s become the 138th instance of this chart feat occurring (since 1965), and it now becomes Adele’s third such anomaly, having previous scored the double #1’s with “Someone Like You” (TW-54) and “21” (TW-10) for seven weeks from June 27th, 2011 and then again with “Hello” (TW-85) and “25” (TW-7) for two weeks on November 30th and December 7th, 2015. And with it being a week-on-week-double #1’s, it also becomes the third time in Australian Chart History that a dual occupation had done so again the following week. The previous two were the ‘Coyote Ugly’ soundtrack and it’s lead single “Can’t Fight the Moonlight” by LeAnn Rimes for six weeks between 22nd of Jan., 2001 to 26th of Feb., 2001 followed the week after on March 5th, 2001 by Eminem’s “Stan” and it’s parent album “The Marshall Mathers LP” for a single week. The first swap over also created it’s own chart feat too, as one group did it with one album and two songs, ABBA, with “Mamma Mia” ending it’s run on January 5th, 1976 and then replacing themselves on January 12th, 1976 with “SOS”, while at the same time having the No.1 album in the country with their self-titled set.
Talking of ABBA, they recently scored a No.1 album (Nov. 15th) with “Voyage”, which increased their overall weeks at No.1 in Australia to 40 weeks, and now Adele increases her tally of weeks at the top of the Albums chart to 41 weeks, making her outright seventh on the list for ‘Accumulated Weeks at No.1: Albums (1965 to 2021)’, putting her just behind Ed Sheeran (42 weeks) and Pink (43 weeks), which she could surpass in the next few weeks if she holds the top spot.
“30” by Adele is not the first album with the number or word ’30/thirty’ in it’s title, as this is now the third overall, with the previous two being “30 #1 Hits” for Elvis Presley (4 weeks from 30th of Sept., 2002) and “30:30 Hindsight” by Jimmy Barnes (1 week in 8th of Sept., 2014). Adele also becomes the second Solo English Female singer to land a No.1 album during 2021, as Dua Lipa did so for a week on March 22nd with “Future Nostalgia”, while overall this is now the 166th No.1 Album by an English act (solo male or female, duo or group) and the sixth for 2021, while for Solo Female Artists (local or overseas) Adele’s new set becomes the 149th overall and the thirteenth for this year. Lastly of the six Solo Female English artists that have hit No.1 in Australia, Adele now pulls into the lead with her third No.1 album, breaking away from second placed Dido (2 #1’s), while on one apiece are Leona Lewis, Lily Allen, Birdy and Dua Lipa.
The 28th studio and first seasonal/Xmas album for local artist Paul Kelly called “Paul Kelly’s Christmas Train” has started it’s chart run in the first week at No.2, becoming his twelfth Top 10 album and also his sixth Top 3 album, with his last Top 10 entry being August 2020’s teaming with Paul Grazbowsky and “Please Leave Your Light on” (HP-3). The 22 tracks on the album contains covers of classic Xmas songs like “Silent Night”, “Little Drummer Boy” and “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)”, plus the album also features guests such as Linda Bull, Emma Donovan, Marlon Williams, Lior, Dan Kelly, Kasey Chambers, Waleed Aly and Kate Miller-Heidke along with an updated version of his classic seasonal single “How to Make Gravy”.
This week’s U.S. and Canadian No.1 debut is last weeks chart-topping album in Taylor Swift’s redone “Red (Taylor’s Version)”, which here drops down two places to land at No.3, with the third and fourth former No.1 album within the Top 10 being “= (Equals)” for Ed Sheeran down one to No.4 and ABBA’s “Voyage” dipping two places to land at No.5.
The third and final Top 10 debut this week comes in at No.6, Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band with “The Legendary 1979 No Nukes Concerts”, which were recorded at Madison Square Gardens on the 21st and 22nd of September, 1979, with many of the tracks being live recordings from his prior albums “Darkness on the Edge of Town” (1978) and “Born to Run” (1975), plus upcoming tracks from his 1980 album “The River”, and covers of “Stay” featuring Tom Petty and the medley “Devil with the Blue Dress on/Good Golly Miss Molly”. This is the sixth live album from Bruce Springsteen, the fifth to chart here and his third to make it to the Top 10 since his first “Live ’75-’85” hit No.3 in December of 1986.
Not only does Adele have the new No.1 Album in the country, she also has all four of her albums within the Top 30, three of them residing inside the Top 10, as her last album from six years ago this week “25” rises back up four spots to No.7, and her third set (and first #1 here) “21” jumps up thirteen spots to land at No.10. She has achieved this feat once before on March 20th, 2017 as she was at No.2 with “25”, No.4 with “21” and No.9 with “19” thanks to her touring here. In between the two Adele albums are “SOUR” for Olivia Rodrigo and “Planet Her” by Doja Cat, both rising back up one spot each to No.8 and No.9 respectively.
UP:
TOP 20: Justin Bieber’s “Justice” set rises back up two spots to No.12, while Dua Lipa’s “Future Nostalgia” is back up one spot to No.14. Returning to the chart in between those two climbers is a re-entry at No.13 for Delta Goodrem’s “Only Santa Knows” set, which has been expanded with four extra tracks for this year’s edition, and is one of two Top 50 returning Xmas albums this week.
TOP 30: Ed Sheeran’s third set “÷ (Divide)” is back up three places to No.24, with the only other rising album into the Top 30 being Adele’s debut set “19” (HP-3×3), leaping back up forty spots to No.29.
TOP 40: Two albums re-enter the chart this week within the Top 40; first is the second studio album for Frenzal Rhomb called “Not So Tough Now”, which peaked at No.53 in late July of 1996, and now thanks to a vinyl reissue, it sets a new peak by coming back this week at No.34. The other re-entry occurs at No.40, the tenth anniversary edition of Michael Buble’s “Christmas” album, which has been expanded with five new tracks, including a duet of “Winter Wonderland” with Rod Stewart and a newly penned track “The Christmas Sweater” and his cover of “Let it Snow”.
TOP 50: Thanks to a vinyl issue of their latest album, twenty one pilots and “Scaled & Icy” returns to the chart at No.44, with the only album climbing within the Top 50 being “AM” for The Arctic Monkeys, back up three spots to No.49.
DOWN:
TOP 20: The first of five albums to leave the Top 10 this week starts with “An Evening with Silk Sonic” (HP-4, WI10-1), dropping down seven spots to land at No.11. Drake’s “Certified Lover Boy” dips three spots to No.15, Kid Laroi’s “F**k Love” mixtapes is down two to No.19, while the anniversary edition of Nirvana’s “Nevermind” drops back down seven to No.20 after blasting back in at No.13 last week.
TOP 30: For the second time this year, a Sony act has had their new best of collection certified in it’s second week of charting, as the Little Mix GH’s set “Between Us” (HP-8, WI10-1) falls fifteen places to land at No.23 and it scores a Gold (●) in sales (the other one was The Script in October). Former No.1 “Surrender” for Rufus du Sol falls six spots to No.27, while Taylor Swift is stable with “1989” at No.25 and drops down with “folklore” (24 to No.26) and “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” (18 to No.30).
TOP 40: Luke Combs’ second album “What You Get is What You See” leaves the safety of the Top 30 for the first time in its 107 weeks upon the chart, down three spots this week to No.32, while Kayne’s “Donda” set drops four to No.35 and Taylor’s “Lover” set tumbles nine chart-rungs to No.37.
TOP 50: Luke’s first entry “This One’s for You” and Rod Stewart’s entry from last week “The Tears of Hercules” are both down four spots each to No.41 and No.43 respectively, with Rod’s oldest mate Elton John dipping six to No.45 with his latest album “The Lockdown Sessions”. There are also five place dips for the INXS “Very Best of” (41 to No.46) and Pop Smoke’s “Shoot for the Stars…” (42 to No.47). The three other dropouts from last weeks Top 10 which fall into the lower fifty this week were from Courtney Barnett and “Things Take Time, Take Time” (5 to No.63, WI10-1), “Forever” for Flight Facilities (6 to No.84, WI10-1) and the repackaged and expanded “Disco” for Kylie Minogue (7 to No.91, three overall weeks within the Top 10).
FURTHER NEW ENTRIES:
* #18 (Colab#2) – Raise the Roof by Robert Plant & Alison Krauss (Warner UK) is now the second collaboration between the Led Zeppelin lead singer Robert and the bluegrass/country singer Alison, having first teamed up for the Grammy Award winning set “Raising Sand”, which made it to No.45 here in early March of 2009, with this album containing thirteen covers and an original penned by Plant and T. Bone Burnett called “High and Lonesome”, the albums second issued single from October.
* #28 (LP#66) – Happy Together by Andre Rieu & the Johanna Strauss Orchestra (Universal) is the 66th album for the Orchestra leader, and his first entry since his seasonal set “Jolly Holiday”, which debuted and peaked at No.10 in late November of 2020.
*ARIA Chart info is based on sales for the week from the 19th to the 25th of November, 2021.
Written, Compiled and Researched by Gavin Ryan.
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Gavin Ryan reports with thanks to Australian-Charts.com
