With a near blanket TV snub and radio avoiding it at best, nothing can stop “Relax” powering to the top of the charts this week, fuelled more or less on pure controversy. The only real exposure the track got was on “The Tube” on Channel 4 who re-aired the band’s appearance from last month, but even with that the song sold 69,000 to take the crown from the fast fading Paul McCartney who falls 1-2 (48,000). It’s also a ringing endorsement of the production kudos of Trevor Horn who has overhauled the track from the original 1982 version and has made commercial gold from the controversial track, a new video was released this week for the track which is considerably tamer than the first promo merely featuring the band performing the song but it remains unaired here.
Culled from the recording sessions for his “Double Fantasy” album, Lennon is back in the top 10 this week with “Nobody Told Me” which was unfinished at the time of his death. It was completed by his widow Yoko Ono and will form a track on the forthcoming “Milk & Honey” album which is released this week and was, apparently, always intended as the follow up to “Double Fantasy” which has so far sold just under 800,000 copies. It arrived at No 11 last week but can only advance 5 places this week to No 6 (33,000)
Big Country are currently in Sweden recording their second album at ABBA’s Polar studios but to keep their UK chart career ticking over they’ve released a stand alone single “Wonderland” which debuted at No 13 last week and this week climbs 13-8 (30,000). That makes it a third top tenner out of four releases from the Scottish band who big things are expected from this year, their debut album (which doesn’t contain the single obviously) responds with a 31-13 leap this week.
Liverpool is proving something an inspiration at present for top 10 acts with Frankie Goes To Hollywood, Paul McCartney, John Lennon and now China Crisis making it four acts in the current big ten. Last year’s “Christian” looked to be the start of their ascendancy went it peaked at No 12 but subsequent releases failed to dent the top 40 until “Wishful Thinking” debuted at No 36 a fortnight ago. It now shoots 16-9 (27,000) for the band and is the third release from their second album “Working with Fire and Steel – Possible Pop Songs Volume Two” which has yet to dent the top 20 but makes a positive step 46-22 this week.
Cyndi Lauper was told 7 years ago that she would never sing again after damaging her vocal chords, well she proves the doctors wrong this week as her cover of Robert Hazard’s “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” flies 23-10 (25,000) to give her the breakthrough she was after. Lauper has altered some of the lyrics with the consent of Hazard as the original was sung from a male perspective, and she’s turned it into something of a female anthem and her striking appearance is augmented with a promo which features wrestling star "Captain" Lou Albano and also her real life mother who appears as her on screen mother as well.
Joe Fagin rises 4-3 (45,000) despite actually losing sales in the process but should get a TOTP performance this week to bolster his sales, and Shaky & Bonnie hold at No 5 but again they are well down sales wise (34,000). Moving down are Howard Jones 3-4 (35,000) and Snowy White 6-7 (33,000).
https://forum.popjustice.com/threads/80s-top-10-sales-week-by-week-1984-1985.38232/page-3