Nena hold the No 1 spot but with barely a boost in sales, just 88,000 copies flew over the counters last week making 292,000 copies sold in total. It recedes 2-3 in the US where it looks to have failed in its challenge for the No 1 spot, the song that held it off however we’ll deal with in depth later on. It was an easy victory for Nena with none of their top 4 rivals getting TOTP, Kool & The Gang come out of the melee the best as “Joanna/ Tonight” climbs 3-2 despite a 18% drop in sales to 53,000.
Produced by the same team behind the Village People (Jacques Morali and Henri Belolo) Break Machine are a US hip hop act who are riding on the current interest in the genre which makes occasional inroads into the UK singles chart. “Street Dance” body pops its way 11-5 (47,000) this week.
Onto the current US No 1 single, going since 1972 and already onto their sixth album, all Van Halen have to their name so far UK singles chart wise is the No 52 hit “Runnin With The Devil” in 1980, but this week “Jump” does just that and leaps 20-10 (37,000). The song represents a break from their traditional, more rockier, material but they are seeing the benefits as the track becomes their breakthrough on both sides of the Atlantic- watch this fly in weeks to come.
The only other climber is Slade who sprint 10-7 (46,000) but a trio of tracks manage to hold the fort, Nik Kershaw at No 4 (49,000) in the face of a 23% sales dip (which might be linked to the album debuting at No 10 this week), Rockwell at No 6 (46,000) and Billy Joel at No 8 (44,000). Bad news for Frankie Goes To Hollywood who continue to slide 2-3 (52,000) but they will sell their 750,000th copy sometime this week, and the Thompson Twins require medical attention as they drop 5-9 (43,000)