(Credits: Far Out / NASA / Uwe Conrad)
Sun 1 June 2025 17:30, UK
It began to seep in in the twilight of the millennium’s first decade, but the 2010s were the era when the album’s cultural primacy finally started to ebb after over 50 years of lauded music expression.
It was never completely quashed, though, fantastic records still and always will be cut across pop heights and alternative fringes as long as there’s a music community. But the era of customised playlists, streaming immediacy, and the growing necessity for TikTok’s promotional arm for a moment blunted music fans’ bandwidth and reverence for the cohesive statement of the album as a set of songs to be experienced as an arc.
Pop, by definition, is always the chart monster of any given decade, but the 2010s’ shifting consumer priorities toward the dopamine hits of a trending single, likely attached to a viral video or big Netflix show, naturally pushed the hip-hop and pop stars of the day to a royalty level of commercial stature. Taylor Swift, Rihanna, Katy Perry, and Bruno Mars all dominated the charts with numerous number-one singles that weren’t so tethered to an essential album as previous pop behemoth Billboard 200 mainstays.
For anyone broadly in the rock and classic pop camp, the 2010s are the decade when many of the music world’s heroes and icons seemed to drop like dominos with alarming acceleration. 2016 was peak year of high-profile deaths, David Bowie, Prince, George Martin, Leonard Cohen, and George Michael among scores of other artists seemed to spell a sharp sense that the musical world many grew up in and were wedded to was truly passing.
A look at the longest-held number ones in the UK reveals little in the way of surprises. Third place at 11 weeks is Tones and I’s irritating ‘Dance Monkey’, the silver medal’s handed to bafflingly world-conquering Ed Sheeran with his insipid ‘Shape of You’ at a gobsmacking 13 weeks – and possessed with as much sex appeal as a damp tea cloth – and in at the coveted top spot is ‘One Shot’ from Drake coupled with Wizkid and Wyla.
It’s hard to see how or why, considering the likes of Kendrick Lamar were crafting infinitely more electric hip-hop, and Kanye West had yet to lapse into creatively bereft gospel rap and outright deep dives into fascist fancy.
So, what song held the number one spot the longest?
For the decade’s chart milestones, we have to look over to America. In second place, as the Billboard Hot 100’s longest-held number-one, is the piquant Latin pop fluff of Luis Fonsi’s ‘Despacito’ featuring Puerto Rican rapper Daddy Yankee. Staying put at the top spot for a staggering 16 weeks, the 2017 single and lead to Vida was the first Spanish-sung number to top the charts since Los del Río’s Butlins nightmare ‘Macarena’ in 1996.
The 2010s’ longest-held number one is the ultimate record breaker, beating Frankie Laine’s 1950s standard with an unholy 19 weeks and only just matched with Shaboozey’s ‘A Bar Song’ in 2024. It shouldn’t have worked, but Georgian queer rapper Lil Nas X – notable for attempting to flog 666 pairs of limited-edition Satanic Nike Airs bosting a drop of human blood each – sampled Nine Inch Nails and brought ‘Achy Breaky Heart’ jiver Billy Ray Cyrus for a confounding ‘country rap’ number with ‘Old Town Road’.
He struck gold, certified Diamond-selling less than a year after its release and standing as Lil Nas X’s defining song in the eyes of many.
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