Well, for most people going straight in at number three is good news, but you can't help thinking that Westlife would have been hoping to go into the chart higher with their first single release for five months. 'Tonight' was postponed from its planned January release after the members Shane and Nicky weren't feeling so good. Had the boyband still been at their peak you would have assumed the anticipation among their fanbase would have sent them straight to number one. As it is they were outsold by label mate Gareth Gates whose charity version of 'Spirit In The Sky' has already been in the charts for four weeks, this week dropping one place to number two.
A top three single is a fine achievement of course, but missing the number one spot is bound to start "beginning of the end" talk about the Irish warblers. Certainly it puts their chances of beating Cliff's number ones record (he's had 14, they've had 11) somewhat further off – which is ironic given that the latest single is a cover version of Cliff's 'Miss You Nights'. Then again, the Westlife boys didn't seem too keen about their latest single even before it was released. The group's Mark Feehly told reporters last week, "We're fed up with cover versions and this was a bad cover version. But it's still out on this week because some will like it. We reached a turning point when Miss You Nights was lined up as the next single and none of us liked the song. It made us realize the next album needs to be fresh and different. If we carry on, we'll be bored."
As it was it was the soundtrack to that Sure commercial that took the top spot – oh the power of advertising, because Room 5's 'Make Luv', essentially a reworking of Oliver Cheatam's eighties song 'Get Down (Saturday Night)' ain't that good a track without the accompanying 'geeky guy dance'. But we're assured it's gonna be an clubbing anthem of 2003 and who are we to argue? Elsewhere in the chart this week new entries for Coldplay with 'Clocks' (who themselves might have been hoping for a higher entry position than 9 given their profile just now), and particularly welcome new entries for Hot Hot Heat with 'Bandages' at 25 and Athlete with 'El Salvador' at 31.
Albums wise and Norah has been finally knocked off the top spot (though her album is still in the Top Three a year after its release!), with Linkin Park's 'Metorea' storming in at number one proving the "nu-metal is dead" commentaries to be wrong, for the time being release. Good news for Warners with Linkin Park, but perhaps less so that Mick Hucknall's self-released Simply Red album goes straight in at number two a few days after he slagged off his former record company (Warners label East West) for making lots of profits from little work with his previous albums. Only other new entry of note in the albums chart this week is Placebo's 'Sleeping With Ghosts' which enters at number 11, though The Cardigan's 'Long Gone Before Midnight' enters just below the Top 40 at number 47.