24 December 1987

Pos LW Weeks Song Artist
1 2 12 Never Gonna Give You Up  – Rick Astley
2 1 16 La Bamba  – Los Lobos
3 3 11 You Win Again  – Bee Gees
4 5 18 It’s a Sin  – Pet Shop Boys
5 4 13 Funky Town  – Pseudo Echo
6 8 4 Faith  – George Michael
7 6 12 Call Me  – Spagna
8 7 10 Bad  – Michael Jackson
9 9 6 Mony Mony  – Billy Idol
10 10 6 Mary’s Prayer  – Danny Wilson
11 14 9 Crazy  – Icehouse
12 11 13 Wishing Well (A Tone Poem)  – Terence Trent D’Arby
13 13 7 Paper in Fire  – John Cougar
14 12 15 Always  – Atlantic Starr
15 20 3 (I’ve Had) The Time of My Life  – Bill Medley & Jennifer Warnes
16 15 8 My Pretty One  – Cliff Richard
17 16 17 Who’s That Girl  – Madonna
18 17 19 I Just Can’t Stop Loving You  – Michael Jackson
19 29 5 What Have I Done to Deserve This  – Pet Shop Boys & Dusty Springfield
20 28 2 Come On, Let’s Go  – Los Lobos
21 18 6 Heart and Soul  – T’Pau
22 22 5 Causing a Commotion  – Madonna
23 19 12 Jet Airliner  – Modern Talking
24 25 3 My Kind of Girl  – Cinema
25 21 3 Brilliant Disguise  – Bruce Springsteen
26 23 22 Luka  – Suzanne Vega
27 24 9 Scales of Justice  – Living in a Box
28 26 22 Let’s Dance  – Chris Rea
29 30 3 Barcelona  – Freddie Mercury & Montserrat Caballé
30 New 1 Beethoven (I Love to Listen to)  – Eurythmics

Twas the night before Christmas and things were stirring at the top of our charts as ‘La Bamba’s run at 1 came to an end after 9 weeks. The new nation’s favourite was Rick Astley’s ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’ which moved up from 2 in a place swap with ‘La Bamba’. ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’ was the 33rd song to top our charts that would also top the US and UK charts. This put the UK and US acts back on level pegging for number of number 1’s with both nations having produced 119, however, the Americans were ahead for weeks at 1 with 427 compared to the Brit’s 405.

The Pet Shop Boys and Dusty Springfield’s ‘What Have I Done To Deserve This’ was the climber of the week as it moved up 10 from 29 to 19. This was the Pet Shop Boys’ first biggest climber award and they sat on 44 weeks in the charts, the 3rd highest weeks count for an act seeing their first climber. Only Blonde on 46 and Kenny Rogers on 53 had been on higher weeks counts when seeing their first biggest climber. ‘What Have I Done To Deserve This’ was the 146th song to climb 10 or more in a week. It was joined in being a new entry into the top 20 by Los Lobos’ ‘Come On Let’s Go’ which made a star rater climb of 8 from 28 to 20. There was one other star rater and this was Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes’ ‘(I’ve Had) The Time Of My Life’ which moved up 5 from 20 to 15 and this was the biggest climb within the top 20.

Modern Talking’s ‘Jet Airliner’ shared the faller of the week award with Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Brilliant’ Disguise’ as the 2 songs both fell 4 to land at 23 and 25 respectively. ‘Jet Airliner’ was joined by T’Pau’s ‘Heart And Soul’ in leaving the top 20. The faller within the top 20 was Atlantic Starr’s ‘Always’ which fell 2 from 16 to 14. This was the 33rd time a top 20 biggest fall had been 2 or less.

Chris Rea’s ‘Let’s Dance’ and Suzanne Vega’s ‘Luka’ continued as the oldest in the top 30 with both songs on 22 weeks and enjoying their 3rd week as the oldest while Michael Jackson’s ‘I Just Can’t Stop Loving You’ and the Pet Shop Boys’ ‘It’s A Sin’ moved on to 17 top 20 weeks and were the oldest in that part of the chart for a second week.

Viktor Lazlo’s ‘Breathless’ was the sole leaver this week as it dropped off the top 30 after 12 weeks and a peak of 13. This would be her only SA chart hit and it would be the last we would see by any Belgian act. The Belgians had clocked up 3 hits, 48 weeks and by far the best performer of the 3 was The Klaxons’ ‘Clap-Clap Sound’ which spent 7 weeks at 1 and accounted for 30 of 48 weeks. The other hit by a Belgian act was Telex’s ‘Moskow Diskow’ which, like ‘Breathless’, also peaked at 13.

The Eurythmics clocked up their 6th hit on our charts and the new entry was ‘Beethoven (I Love To Listen To)’. They were the 69th act to reach 6 hits. Written by band members David A Stewart and Annie Lennox, this was the first single off their ‘Savage’ album. It was the band’s 17th hit to make the UK charts, but it only peaked at 25 there and was not released as a single in the US, only appearing on the b-side of the 12” single of ‘I Need A Man’. It made the top 20 in Australia (#15), Finland (#5), Ireland (#11), The Netherlands (#10), New Zealnd (#6), Norway (#6), Spain (#18), Sweden (#9) and Switzerland (#19). It got to 14 on the Radio 5 charts and 21 on the Capital 604 ones but did not chart on Radio 702.

Michael Jackson became the 12th act to see a run of 10 consecutive weeks with 2 hits in the charts. Of those 12 acts, only Jennifer Rush had seen such a run twice. Of the 10 weeks in Michael Jackson’s run, 7 had been with the 2 hits (‘I Just Can’t Stop Loving You’ and ‘Bad’) in the top 20. He had also seen ‘Billie Jean’ and ‘Beat It’ in the top 20 at the same time, making this his 10th week overall for 2 in the top 20 for him.

Los Lobos also had 2 in the top 20 now as ‘Come On Let’s Go’ joined ‘La Bamba’ in that part of the chart. They were the 72nd act to manage 2 in the top 20 at the same time.

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