The eleventh studio album for country singer Keith Urban called “The Speed of Now Part 1” becomes his fourth No.1 album in Australia this week.
“The Speed of Now Part 1” also becomes the 892nd No.1 Album in Australia (1965 to 2020), the 742nd for ARIA (1983 to 2020), the 529th to debut at No.1 (since 1976) the 30th No.1 album for 2020 and for the record company Capitol the 24th in total since their first in 1979, while it’s their second for this year after 5 Seconds of Summer took “C A L M” to No.1 back in early April for one week.
Keith’s first No.1 album here was with his second best of set “The Story So Far” (1 week, May 21st, 2012) followed by “Fuse” (1 week, September 23rd, 2013) and his last chart-topping album was with “Ripcord” for two weeks from May 16th, 2016, with his last studio set “Graffiti U” debuting and peaking at No.2 in early May of 2018. Overall this is his eighth Top 10 album in Australia (6 studio, 2 best of) and it features guest performers like Nile Rodgers, Eric Church and Pink, who features on the first ever Top 10 single for Keith, “One too Many” which enters at No.6 over on the singles chart this week.
Keith also joins twenty other acts who have had four No.1 albums in Australia, the two others which joined that list this year were 5SOS and Lady Gaga, while Keith has now amassed five weeks at No.1 here from his four chart-topping sets, moving him up from equal 140th to now 120th on the list for ‘Accumulated Weeks at No.1: Albums’. This is the seventh album to feature the word ‘Now’ in its title but the first with the word ‘Speed’ (although Wings had “Red Rose Speedway” in 1973) and ‘Part’.
In 2016 Australia sent twenty local or Aussie born artists to No.1, the following year in 2017 it was only eight, which was repeated again in 2019. But in 2018 we scored ten local artists hitting No.1 locally, and now 2020 has also cracked the tenth Aussie act at the top during the year, and the first new one since Lime Cordiale back on July 20th. Overall this new No.1 album becomes the 246th by an Australian act to hit the top, and Keith’s new set is the 253rd No.1 by a Solo Male Artist (local or overseas) and the first local Solo Male artist since Paul Kelly in late November of 2019 with his ‘Greatest Hits 1985-2019’ set.
The Pop Smoke album is back up two places to No.2 this week, with the set holding for a seventh broken week at No.1 in both New Zealand and Canada, plus it rises to No.1 in England for the first time in its twelve week chart run, as it’s their No.1 streamed album of the week. Taylor Swift is on hold at No.3 with her “folklore” set, followed by single place rises for “Legends Never Die” by Juice WRLD, “Fine Line” by Harry Styles (my prediction from last week did not come true for this album) and the Billie Eilish debut set “When We All Fall Asleep…” to No.4, No.5 and No.6 respectively.
The two further Top 10 debuts this week occur at No.7 and No.8, with the first album for pop singer Ava Max called “Heaven & Hell” coming in at No.7, which features her 2018 hit “Sweet but Psycho” as well as her current chart entry “Kings & Queens (TW-31), followed by the No.8 entry for the six track EP for Melbourne fusion act Mildlife and “Automatic”, and now their first chart entry as their earlier release of their first six track set called “Phase” from 2018 failed to chart.
The remainder of the Top 10 sees Katy Perry holding at No.9 with her latest album “Smile”, thanks in part to No.10 return on the vinyl albums chart this week for the set, and up one place to No.10 is the second Luke Combs album “What You Get is What You See”, which now logs it’s twelfth overall week within the Top 10 here, plus his first set “This One’s for You” follows suit and is up one spot just behind at No.11.
UP:
There are four albums which leap back up the charts (or return) thanks to their vinyl sales, firstly the Cold Chisel collection “The Best of: All for You” rebounds thirty-one spots to No.12 (#3 vinyl sales), Run the Jewels fourth set “RTJ4” returns to the Top 100 at a new peak of No.21 (former peak #24) and takes out the No.1 vinyl sales spot this week, with the Bob Dylan recent set “Rough and Rowdy Ways” is this weeks No.2 selling vinyl set, and it returns to the chart at No.27, and lastly the first issuing of the Charli XCX set “How I’m Feeling Now” (HP-37) re-enters at No.46 and is the No.4 selling set on the vinyl chart.
The INXS collection “The Very Best” rebounds eleven spots this week to No.23 and the set has a new sales certification of 7x▲Platinum, after which we see rebounds for the Lady Gaga album “Chromatica” (41 to No.28) and the Halsey set “Manic” is up a massive thirty-four places to land at No.29 this week. “Rumours” for Fleetwood Mac is back up four to No.42 and a lower fifty entry from last week jumps up thirty places this week to land at No.45, the soundtrack to the recently released show ‘Julie and the Phantoms’, about a girl who plays in a rock band with four spirits/ghosts/phantoms.
DOWN:
There are four albums leaving the Top 10 this week, with both of last week’s new entries dropping down this week “Sunday (The Gospel According to Iso)” for Vika & Linda (2 to No.18, WI10-1), and last weeks No.1 set by Marilyn Manson “We Are Chaos” (1 to No.24, WI10-1), followed by the 20th Anniversary Edition of the Powderfinger set “Odyssey No.5” (HP-1×3, WI10-28a, 10 to No.33) and the No.1 album from three weeks ago “Music from the Home Front” (HP-1×3, WI10-6a) which plummets forty places to No.48.
Dropping soundtracks this week are for ‘Hamilton’ (21 to No.26), ‘The Greatest Showman’ (24 to No.32) and the Queen biopic ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ (29 to No.38). Metallica’s “S&M2” falls twenty places to No.34, while Maroon 5’s best of is down eight to No.39 and The Weeknd slumps ten spots to No.40 with “After Hours”. Travis Scott’s “Astrworld” and “?” for XXXTentacion are both down fifteen places apiece to No.41 and No.43 respectively, while the self-titled Dua Lipa set falls back down seven to No.44. Harry Styles debut album of the same name falls nine to No.47 and the Eminem best of “Curtain Call” drops ten to No.49.
FURTHER NEW ENTRIES:
* #13 (LP#7) – ALICIA by Alicia Keys (RCA) is the seventh studio album since her debut set in 2001, and this new set was showcased on the James Corden ‘Late Late Show’ this past week, with guest artists on this album being Sampha, Miguel, Khalid, Jill Scott and 21 Savage. Overall this is her eighth chart entry here (7 studios and 1 live set) and it debuts one place higher than her sixth album “Here” achieved in November of 2016.
* #19 (LP#1) – Self Care by Yours Truly (UNFD/The Orchard) are an Australian four-piece punk band (1 woman and 3 men), and this is their debut studio album, which has so far had four tracks issued from it during 2020, “Composure”, “Together”, “Undersize” and “Funeral Home” at the start of September.
* #36 (LP#1) – Mind Like Mine by Take Two (Better Noise Records/MGM) are the twin brothers Jordan and Brandon from Sydney, who at the age of 17 in 2012 decided to take their singing and musicality seriously, with the pair having issued 77 tracks/singles/covers since 2016, with sixteen songs on this new album.
* #50 (LP#4.2) – Tea for the Tillerman2 by Yusuf/Cat Stevens (Cat-O-Log Records) is a full re-recording by Yusuf (Cat Stevens) of his fourth album issued in April of 1971 (in Oz) which peaked at No.2 during that year, after which he had two massive No.1 albums in “Teaser & the Firecat” (Nov 1971) and “Catch Bull at Four” (October 1972). The album is a reimagining of the original eleven songs for a new age, and it features some of his classic tracks like “Wild World”, “Father and Son” and “Where Do the Children Play?”.
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Gavin Ryan reports with thanks to Australian-Charts.com
