Straight in at No.1

The issue of a new single by a group or artist has always been a big event in modern pop-culture, and anticipation was often so high that the single would go straight into the charts at the no.1 position, without any hesitation. This phenomenon was quite rare in the 70s and 80s and up to the mid-90s although afterwards record buying (or downloading and streaming) trends changed so much that it was unusual for a much anticipated new single not to go to straight no.1. In the 21st centry it is now more and more the case that if a single doesn't go straight in at no.1 then it never will reach the coveted top spot.

Here is a list of singles that entered the UK charts at the no.1 position, from 1964 to 1998. The list is based on information from the ukcharts.20m.com site and from the Official Charts Archive pages. Dates given are as falling on a Tuesday, the day on which the charts were officially announced on Radio 1 up to October 1987, after which the charts were announced on Sundays. tbc - for full list see here.