The Ultimate Averaged Chart - The BBC Chart Re-Imagined

[Robbie]

That's a really interesting point. I know that Dave Taylor once told me that from 1956 RM was a more accurate chart than NME and there are some ways I actually think this can be evidenced.

There's an interesting (if legally long winded) High Court case from 1956 where the publishers of the New Musical Express attempted - and failed - to stop Record Mirror from claiming its top 10 was "the most authentic" and thereby implying that the NME's top 10 was not. Included in the legal action against Record Mirror were two singers named as "Whitfield" and "Earl" and a single called "My September Love". Whitfield (surely David Whitfield) appears to be accusing Record Mirror of mixing up sales of his version of 'My September Love' with another singer called Earl (Robert Earl?). The legal decision then gets bogged down in a long winded discussion of the Record Mirror singles chart of 17 March 1956.

It's quite amusing to think that the relative accuracy of two national charts were being debated in the High Court by men presumably in wigs...

https//academic.oup.com/rpc/article-pdf/73/10/211/4490680/73-10-211.pdf (PDF document)

[Graham76man]

Can't find the document Robbie the link on Google only shows this post!

[MrTibbs]

I had a read at that article Robbie and it's an interesting find. I think it highlights that NME were rattled by having a competing chart with their own and most certainly saw it as a serious threat.
RM were obviously confident enough with their own chart to boast it was the most authentic almost certainty taking a swipe at NME

[MrTibbs]

Greetings Pop Pickers !

Here is the next Ultimate Averaged Chart for Week Ending April 27th 1957

Here are all '' the uppers, the downers, the just hanging 'arounders '

The Ultimate Averaged Chart - Week Ending April 27th 1957							NME	MM	RM	Total
Last	This		The Sound Survey			Stores	65	25	60	Points
Week	Week		The Top 30 Singles Chart					TOP	30	Scored
1	1	Cumberland Gap - Lonnie Donegan					1	1	1	4500
2	2	Young Love - Tab Hunter					3	2	2	4285
3	3	The Banana Boat Song - Harry Belafonte					2	5	3	4215
5	4	Long Tall Sally - Little Richard (B)					5	3	4	4010
4	5	Don't Forbid Me - Pat Boone					4	4	6	3930
7	6	Baby Baby - Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers (B)					6	6	5	3810
8	7	Look Homeward Angel - Johnny Ray (A)					7	8	8	3515
14	8	I'll Take You Home Again Kathleen - Slim Whitman					11	7	7	3340
25	9	When I Fall In Love - Nat King Cole					9	11	10	3190
12	10	Ninety-Nine Ways - Tab Hunter					8	12	13	3050
13	11	Freight Train - The Chas McDevitt Skiffle Group with Nancy Whisky					12	14	9	2980
16	12	Heart - Max Bygraves					14	9	14	2675
10	13	The Girl Can't Help It - Little Richard (A)					17	10	11	2635
9	14	I'm Not A Juvenile Delinquent - Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers (A)					15	20	12	2455
22	15	Butterfly - Andy Williams					16	15	16	2275
6	16	Knee Deep In The Blues - Guy Mitchell					12	17	20	2245
15	17	True Love - Bing Crosby and Grace Kelly					17	20	20	1845
11	18	Don't You Rock Me Daddy-O - Lonnie Donegan					10	18		1690
28	19	Butterfly - Charlie Gracie					21		17	1490
19	20	I'm Walkin' - Fats Domino					25		15	1350
17	21	She's Got It - Little Richard (B)						13	17	1290
NEW	22	Butterfingers - Tommy Steele						15	19	1120
23	23	Love Is A Golden Ring - Frankie Laine					22	18		910
NEW	24	Rock-A-Billy - Guy Mitchell					19			780
25	25	Singing The Blues - Guy Mitchell					20			715
29	26	Heart - The Johnston Brothers					23			520
20	27	You Don't Owe Me A Thing - Johnnie Ray (B)					24			455
21	28	Cumberland Gap - The Vipers Skiffle Group (A)					25			390
18	29	Singing The Blues - Tommy Steele						20		275
27	29	Maggie May - The Vipers Skiffle Group						20		275
		Mangos - Rosemary Clooney					27			260
		Why Baby Why - Pat Boone					28			195
		Friendly Persuasion - Pat Boone					29			130
		Marianne - The Hilltoppers					30			65
24		The Banana Boat Song - Shirley Bassey
30		Tutti Frutti - Little Richard (A)

[MrTibbs]

Graham for me the link led to a file with the article but it had to be downloaded it to see it. It is very long winded like Robbie said, spun out and very repetitive but doesn't really say any more than when Robbie said. But it is interesting just the same.

[brian05]

22 Butterfingers - Tommy Steele
First we had Butterfly, now we have Butterfingers.

Mangos - Rosemary Clooney
First we had Bananas, now we have Mangos.

[Graham76man]

Graham for me the link led to a file with the article but it had to be downloaded it to see it. It is very long winded like Robbie said, spun out and very repetitive but doesn't really say any more than when Robbie said. But it is interesting just the same.

I used another browser and that produced the file. The other browser was Chrome, so if you can's get the file and your on that switch to Firefox or something else.

[Graham76man]

22 Butterfingers - Tommy Steele
First we had Butterfly, now we have Butterfingers.

Tommy Steele did his own film called "The Tommy Steele Story" you can get it on DVD, it's quite good.

[Splodj]

Looking back a few pages I see that 'My September Love' by David Whitfield lurked in and out of the lower reaches of both Top 20s. On the week in question it was absent from both charts. The Robert Earl version appeared for a few weeks only in RM, but I imagine was just outside the NME 20. It is possible David Whitfield was rather embarrassed that the Grade brothers brought this action on his behalf as his record label Decca was (I believe) the majority owner of RM!

[RokinRobinOfLocksley]

In my Top 10 records analysis of Mar 1960-Mar 1962, RM fared extremely well. In a comparison of all 5 charts (NME, RM, MM, Disc, RR), in terms of closest to the average peak, fewest outliers, and most inliers, MM came in first, RM second, NME and Disc essentially tied at third, with RR lagging in fifth.

For you number nuts, here's that thread:

https://www.ukmix.org/forum/chart-di...ts=&highlight=

Alas I haven't gotten around to doing a 50s comparison of Top 10 peaks across the 5 charts. Hopefully one day...

[Splodj]

Sad to see in that thread (linked to above) that when Alan Smith asked his MM contacts if they had kept the Top 31-50s they continued to compile after April 67 he was told 'no'.

[kingofskiffle]

The BBC did the same with Dr Who episodes and many of those have been found as a collector took them home. It’s always possible somebody did the same here.

[Leo]

NOMINEE for the 4th Annual UKMIX Hot100 AWARDS as

Voting will start once all categories are announced! Stay tuned!

[Graham76man]

The BBC did the same with Dr Who episodes and many of those have been found as a collector took them home. It’s always possible somebody did the same here.

But more people worked on TV shows like that then they did at Melody Maker.

[MrTibbs]

Greetings Pop Pickers !

Here is the next Ultimate Averaged Chart for Week Ending May 4th 1957

Here are all '' the uppers, the downers, the just hanging 'arounders '

The Ultimate Averaged Chart - Week Ending May 4th 1957							NME	MM	RM	Total
Last	This		The Sound Survey			Stores	65	25	60	Points
Week	Week		The Top 30 Singles Chart					TOP	30	Scored
1	1	Cumberland Gap - Lonnie Donegan					1	1	1	4500
3	2	The Banana Boat Song - Harry Belafonte					2	2	3	4290
6	3	Baby Baby - Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers (B)					4	4	2	4170
2	4	Young Love - Tab Hunter					3	3	6	4020
4	5	Long Tall Sally - Little Richard					8	5	4	3765
24	6	Rock-A-Billy - Guy Mitchell					6	10	5	3710
10	7	Ninety-Nine Ways - Tab Hunter					5	8	10	3525
15	8	Butterfly - Andy Williams					10	6	8	3370
7	9	Look Homeward Angel - Johnnie Ray (A)					7	12	9	3355
9	10	When I Fall In Love - Nat King Cole					11	11	7	3240
5	11	Don't Forbid Me - Pat Boone					9	6	12	3195
8	12	I'll Take You Home Again Kathleen - Slim Whitman					13	8	11	2945
13	13	The Girl Can't Help It - Little Richard (A)					12	13	13	2765
11	14	Freight Train - The Chas McDevitt Skiffle Group with Nancy Whiskey					13	17	14	2540
14	15	I'm Not A Juvenile Delinquent - Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers (A)					16	13	15	2385
23	16	Love Is A Golden Ring - Frankie Laine					22	16	17	1800
22	17	Butterfingers - Tommy Steele					25	19	18	1470
17	18	True Love - Bing Crosby and Grace Kelly					15	18		1365
12	19	Heart - Max Bygraves					17	15		1310
20	20	I'm Walkin' - Fats Domino					26		16	1225
16	21	Knee Deep In The Blues - Guy Mitchell					19	20		1055
19	22	Butterfly - Charlie Gracie					27		19	980
18	23	Don't You Rock Me Daddy-O - Lonnie Donegan					17			910
25	24	Singing The Blues - Guy Mitchell					20			715
21	25	She's Got It - Little Richard (B)							20	660
RE	26	Mangos - Rosemary Clooney					21			650
NEW	27	Why Baby Why - Pat Boone					23			520
RE	28	Marianne - The Hilltoppers					24			455
26	29	Heart - The Johnston Brothers					28			195
NEW	30	The World Is Mine - Malcolm Vaughan					29			130
		Round And Round - Jimmy Young					30			65
27		You Don't Owe Me A Thing - Johnnie Ray (B)
28		Cumberland Gap - The Vipers Skiffle Group (A)
29		Singing The Blues - Tommy Steele
29		Maggie May - The Vipers Skiffle Group (B)

[kjell]

Yeah Splodj, MM didn’t but many of those 31-50s were in fact published in a more obscure publication. MM wouldn’t publish them themselves because they had discovered suspicions of hyping in their own chart.

[kingofskiffle]

Yeah Splodj, MM didn’t but many of those 31-50s were in fact published in a more obscure publication. MM wouldn’t publish them themselves because they had discovered suspicions of hyping in their own chart.

01/04/1967 to 20/09/1969 Top 30, then 17/04/1971, 01/05/1971 onwards are all Top 30's for me. I have the missing set of dates above from Music Business Weekly. What else printed the Top 50 from Melody Maker in the 1970's?

[kjell]

Just checked my files. The 31-50 were published in Music Business Weekly 69 Sep 20 thru’ 71 Mar 27. These dates are chart dates, publication dates one week later. Publication dates 71 Apr 17 and May 1 must be Disc chart tips that was discovered late. Apr 24 was Easter date with no chart tips. Disc carried the MM chart then and added weekly 20 chart tips to MM top 30. A rather small percentage of the tips charted.

[Splodj]

So did the Music Business Weekly 50 appear one week after the 30 had appeared in MM, after MM had monitored them to remove any suspicious activity?

Otherwise, if the 50 were released at the same time as the 30 the whole object of not having the full 50 in MM would be defeated. Hypers would know what they needed to do to 'beat the system'.

[kjell]

It’s about 14 years since I worked on that. I can’t really remember. However, if they really had done such a strange thing as publishing the 50 one week later I probably would have remembered. The point for MM was as I remember it that MM shouldn’t publish a chart that might have been hyped.

[MrTibbs]

I've always believed, irregardless of chart, that all positions below number 30 back in the sixties and seventies were much less accurate and not worthy of serious consideration.
Two reasons, as you say above MM stopped publishing the 31 to 50 positions originally because especially at that lower level of their chart the figures were so low it was open to hyping and manipulation. It commenced again and stopped again. So they obviously had no great interest in an extended chart much favouring just a Top 30 in reality.
This fact was further borne out when the BMRB chart came into being. It was common knowledge that even in the sales chart sales were so low under the Top 30 and unreliable that only a handful of copies could change a chart position. That is why the BBC back then only considered, used, and broadcast only the Top 30.
When considering the criteria for the UAC I also discounted an extended chart for the above reasons. Top thirties from 1962 were consistent on all charts so this was the obvious format to use for the best result.

[RokinRobinOfLocksley]

I hear what everyone is saying about a Top 30 being the most accurate chart, and below that much less accurate. That is truth. But I approach the 31-50+ positions from a different perspective, and that is, I want to know about all these other minor records, that they existed, that an artist put them out, from a discography point of view. Having an expanded chart to 50 positions or more would not harm the upper Top 30, it would just be extra information to supplement it. Record buyers / chart watchers would want to know this extra info so they could go out and buy those records. Record companies and artists would want to sell those records. Win-win for everyone. Rock on !!

[kjell]

In principle I agree with you Brian. On the other hand I was so eager to get more info on other hits by my favourite artists that I was and still is willing to accept lower reliability on minor hits by the very same. And some of those hits weren’t necessarily distinctly worse than the bigger hits, but they were often hits when these artists were either at the beginning of their career or when it was fading. When it comes to your thread which I follow daily I agree with the concept that the hits below thirty don’t deserve the same thorough treatment as the lesser hits. Top 30 here feels just right.

[MrTibbs]

I don't disagree with that perspective on the chart Robin and kjell. The lower positions under the main Top 30 did indeed have value in as much as they could be viewed as potential 'breakers' just under the main upper chart. They did also show what was selling in much lower numbers just below the 'big numbers' and therefore without doubt did have an important part to play in respect of availability and future chart potential.

The point I was making above though was just that under the Top 30 these records, important and influential, as they were, were not selling in sufficient quantities in any given week to reliably claim a definitive chart position. The positions allocated between 31 and 50 were much less reliable than 30 to 1 but as a guide to what was hanging around and available with future chart potential for airplay etc were still useful and served a purpose for the market.

[MrTibbs]

It may also be significant that NME for whatever reason didn't see fit to expand to a Top 50 until into the eighties.
The NME , First chart with Top 20, then a Top 30 by 1956 was without a shadow of a doubt by far the biggest selling music paper in the sixties. They would have seen RM adopt the RR Top 50, MM go to the same, and even Disc for a time, yet NME resisted and stuck to a Top 30 format. All the more strange given the explosion of record sales in late 1963 and 1964.

[kingofskiffle]

And MrTibbs logic would say that you would do what - as a paper owner - sold papers. You would want - and the court case shows that. -to be the best chart and to be seen as such (I appreciate we can debate here if they where but that is what they would want to be seen as). They would have seen the MM claim of 'over 100 record shops' on their chart from 1960 onwards ad would have discussed what to do - it's common sense and you always keep an eye on the completion in a business world. They would have done experiments with a Top 50 themselves (or larger) and would have concluded not to - was it time? or accuracy?

The chart would have been a selling point of the paper, but they may have concluded that the outlay in terms of costs to increase to an accurate Top 50 would have necessitated a much larger sample and, as such, a higher amount of staff to process the larger returns. I am, of course, inventing a figure, but let us say it took 2 staff to tally 100 returns over two days. Thus they would take 4 days to tally 200 returns (possibly what they may have concluded was needed for an accurate Top 50 - possibly not, but let us assume they wanted, for the moment, ore returns to make a Top 50). That was untenable, so they would need to hire more staff. That would cost a lot of money, and was it really needed?

I do appreciate I am guessing a lot in the above, but we must remember that, first and foremost, these papers wanted to make money. Anything that cost and did not provide a return would be a big no-no. And would the larger chart have gathered them more revenue? I suspect they would have concluded no, it would not.

By 1983, when it expanded to a Top 50, Number 1 also took it as a Top 75 but they also had computer returns, or at least computer compilation. Gallup at this time was introducing electronic point of sale machines in their chart return stores - it would take 15 years to become widespread - but it was allowing for a faster compilation method and it could be that NME bought a computer in 1983 and so saved money that way. It could also be that they where trying to do a last ditch attempt at competing - the Network Chart was launched in September 1984, so could this have been discussed in mid 1983 making NME sit up and decide to take notice and change?