Female pop act Little Mix follows its recent fourth No. 1 U.K. single “Shout Out To My Ex” (Syco Music/Sony) by landing its chart-topping album.
Glory Days goes straight to the top with 96,000 combined units, the highest opening tally for a British girl group since the Spice Girls sold 192,000 copies of Spiceworld in 1997. Meanwhile, Clean Bandit moves into a third week atop the singles chart with “Rockabye” (Atlantic/Warner), featuring Sean Paul and Anne-Marie.
Little Mix reached No. 3 with its debut album, DNA, in 2012; No. 4 with Salute the following year; and No. 2 with Get Weird, 12 months ago. The only album to shift more combined units than Glory Days in its first week in the U.K. this year is David Bowie’s Blackstar (Columbia/Sony), with 146,000 in January.
Metallica return to the album chart at No. 2 with Hardwired…To Self-Destruct(Blackened/Vertigo/Universal), while Bruno Mars arrives at No. 3 with 24K Magic(Atlantic/Warner), which features the recent No. 5 title track. Michael Ball and Alfie Boe’s Together (Decca/Universal) falls 3-4, while Elvis Presley’s The Wonder of You(RCA/Sony) holds at No. 5. The next highest new entry, at No. 17, is UB40’s Unplugged (UMC/Universal), featuring Ali Campbell, Astro and Mickey Virtue.
With combined units of 74,000, according to the Official Charts Company, the Clean Bandit single stays ahead of the pack, with “Black Beatles” (Interscope/Universal) by hip-hop duo Rae Sremmurd, featuring Gucci Mane, up 4-2, as it continues at No. 1 on the Hot 100.
“Shout Out to My Ex” holds at No. 3 for Little Mix, as James Arthur’s former No. 1 “Say You Won’t Let Go” (Syco/Sony) dips 2-4. Maroon 5’s “Don’t Wanna Know” (Interscope/Universal), featuring Kendrick Lamar, rebounds 8-5.The highest new entry of the week is “I Feel It Coming” (XO/Republic/Universal) by The Weeknd featuring Daft Punk, at No. 18; their other collaboration, “Starboy,” falls 5-8.
