1 – THIS IS WHERE THE MADNESS BEGINS – The obligatory intro.

2 – MADNESS MEETING A MAN AND HIS DOG – Over in the cupboard, John
Tovey recounts his tale of meeting Madness at Butlins.

3 – PAUL RODGERS MADNESS STATS, FACTS AND FIGURES – Absent from last
week’s issue, the man behind the stats is back with another
batch of Madness related chart info.

4 – THAT WAS THE WEEK THAT WAS – This week MIS co-editor, Rob Hazelby
goes back 5 years to issue number 459, and the week of Sunday 17th
February to Saturday 23rd February 2008, and then back 10 years
to issue number 197 and the week of Sunday 16th February to
Saturday 22nd February 2003.

5 – 10 MINUTES WITH CLIVE LANGER – He gets his hair cut in Camden:
‘six quid’. His favourite Madness song is Our House, and
favourite crisp flavour is Salt n Shake. I met Clive for a quick
trip to the Pillars of Hercules pub for a necessary Suggs-induced
hair of the dog (where I tried very hard to steal his scarf),
writes Julie Hamill on her music related blog. Here are extracts
from her interview with Madness’ most famous record producer.

6 – PAUL RODGERS’ END OF THE YEAR SHOW – Whilst researching Madness
chart facts and stats I’ve accumulated quite a few online and
paper publications, which have been rich in pickings that I’ve
then been able to pass onto you my faithful readers. However
there is a slight downside to this, because sometimes the wealth
of information means I miss things. It is with this in mind that
a look at a new publication detailing the best sellers from 2011
(it take amateur chartologists ages to publish their stuff these
days) set me thinking that I should have a look back at previous
years to see if there was anything I’d missed. And there was.
Enough I thought to make it worthwhile writing more than one
article this week.

7 – THAT’S YER LOT – A few last minute bits and pieces before we
finish for the week.

[1] – THIS IS WHERE THE MADNESS BEGINS

Hello, and a very warm welcome to this week’s edition of the MIS Online newsletter.

In this issue we hear from Madness fan John Tovey, who recounts his meeting with a number of band members during November’s Minehead Weekender.

We’ve also been given permission to include an interview writer Julie Hamill recently had with the legendary Clive Langer, which we’re certain you’ll find to be a fascinating read.

Alongside all that we have the regular “That Was the Week That Was”, looking back 5 and 10 years ago this week, and if that wasn’t enough we have not one but two articles from the man with the Madness stats, facts and figures, Mr. Paul Rodgers.

So, sit back and enjoy the read!

Simon Roberts, Rob Hazelby, Jonathan Young, Liz Maher
Email us at: simon, robert, jonathan, liz @mis-online.net

[2] – MADNESS MEETING A MAN AND HIS DOG

Over in the cupboard, John Tovey recounts his tale of meeting Madness at Butlins.

Hello Chris,

I just want to say what a massive honour it was to meet you on Saturday in the cinema at Butlins. I was so happy after and thought life doesn’t get any better than this!

Later, Paul Rodgers told me we were going to a bar to meet some M.I.S people prior to the show. It turned out that the `bar` was backstage and you had arranged for me and my guide dog Dez, to meet the band!

When I realised where I was and it sank in that I had just been talking to Suggs and was now chatting to Lee my legs turned to jelly!!!

I cannot thank you enough. People say things that deep down is slightly over the top but Sat 24th of November really was the happiest day of my life. Oh, and before I forget, the two Madness shows sounded brilliant, but I need you to promise us that you won’t be leaving us for AC/DC because if they get to hear that Brian Jones will be sacked!!! He! He!

With love and respect from John Tovey and `Dez`

Nice to meet you John and Dez of course

CB

John Tovey/Chrissy Boy – Taken from the cupboard.

[3] – PAUL RODGERS MADNESS STATS, FACTS AND FIGURES

I know I know you wanted to hear from me last week, but I was otherwise occupied watching telly doing some hoovering or something so I didn’t get round to writing anything.

I’d better get started by filling you in on everything you missed last week…

Refusing to go away without a fight Never Knew Your Name managed another week on the singles chart top 200, falling to number 123 on its third week. This position is still higher than any new Madness single since Dust Devil.

Although numbers are modest, I would expect Never Knew Your Name to be Madness’ first single for absolutely ages to sell 10,000 copies.
That same week the single also fell to number 12 on the indie singles chart.

As expected the album Oui Oui Si Si Ja Ja Da Da fell, although only to number 33, a slight improvement on its midweek showing. To illustrate that the album chart is less competitive at this time of year than it is in the run up to Christmas, the album’s downward trajectory is shallower than it was in its first run in the top 40.
First time round it entered and peaked (so far) at 10 and then fell to 40 and 59 in its first three chart weeks. The album also climbed to 69 from 80 in the year to date album sales chart. This ignores all
2012 sales for the album. In the indie chart the album fell from 1 to 2. Based on sales figures published in Music Week for albums around Oui Oui in the charts I estimate sales of around 3,700 for the week.

Much lower down the top 100 Complete Madness achieved a slightly surprising (pleasantly obviously) further week on the chart dropping to 96 from 90. It was a non mover at number 13 on the indie chart.
Not bad for an album with no promotion, a soft release from 2009 to plug a gap in the market. Hell it doesn’t even have the pretty much obligatory Union Square deluxe edition.

Total Madness was also on the indie album chart at 46 down from 33.

Right now it’s time to move on to the more recent charts, issued on Sunday 10 February, dated 16 February. Never Knew Your Name exited the main singles chart but managed a fifth week on the indie chart, dropping to number 20. The lowest indie single to also be on the top
200 is at numbers 16 and 192 respectively.

The album Oui Oui Etc Etc falls again to number 46 on its 14th week on the top 200. Again based on sales of albums around it in the charts I estimate its sales this week were around 2,800. It drops to
4 on the indie chart on week 15 (remember it fell out of the top 200 completely for one week). It rises again on the year to date charts, a modest climb of one place to number 68. Hopefully it will progress up this chart as the year goes on.

I have a special treat for fans of my column to come as I’ve found some archive facts and figures on albums that I am currently assimilating into another of my somewhat obsessive articles.

Complete Madness dropped out of the top 100, but only to number 113 on its 92nd week on the top 200. Since release it has missed out on the top 200 for only 112 weeks. I believe it was deleted for some of that period. On the indie chart it fell to number 15 on its 145th week on the indie chart top 50. This week also represents its 194th week on the indie top 100.

Total Madness fell to number 48 on its 34th week on the indie top 50.

Moving back to the single briefly, it has now been dropped from most of the playlists it was on at radio, notably Radio 2 and Absolutely (who haven’t played it since Sunday night). This has meant a swift fall from grace on the weekly airplay charts, but it is still faring well on the year to date one where it is at number 49, with over 90 million estimated listeners from 3,237 plays this year. I would imagine this will mean that a publisher is announced soon for Madness’
new output. This might be a little complicated as Cathal appears to have his own publishing deal with a company called Bright Girl Songs.
Interestingly (or otherwise) this company’s address is listed as care of Madness’ accountants C C Young & Co as is Madness’ company Stirling Holdings Limited business fans.

Anyway I digress. Many publishers are likely to be interested in publishing a song with over 3,000 radio plays (in the UK alone) in its first five months.

Which brings me to the future. In his cupboard Chrissy Boy recently answered a question about whether there would be another single from Oui Oui in the affirmative. On7 February he replied to a chap called Jason thusly: “Sure will. How can I tell you? CB”. Here’s hoping he’s right and that a physical release and/or digital bundle will be considered by Cooking Vinyl.

There’s all sorts of stuff going on in the French charts too, but as they are published across numerous dates and the stuff I find comes from three different sites I will leave it to JP Boutellier at the French MIS to bring you up to dates on these on their Facebook page.
If you’ve not already liked it be sure to soon as it is a real goldmine of information and ‘precious things’.You’ll find them here:
http://www.facebook.com/groups/frenchmis/

At present they have a criminally low membership of 183. I hear there is a special prize available for their 200th member. Could it be you?
Oh yeah, you don’t have to speak much (if any) French to enjoy it.

Until next time chart chans.

Paul Rodgers

[4] – THAT WAS THE WEEK THAT WAS

This week MIS co-editor, Rob Hazelby goes back 5 years to issue number 459, and the week of Sunday 17th February to Saturday 23rd February 2008, and then back 10 years to issue number 197 and the week of Sunday 16th February to Saturday 22nd February 2003.

5 years ago…

Issue 459 – Sunday 17th February to Saturday 23rd February 2008

Following last week’s horrifying news of the Camden Town market blaze, it would seem that plans were already afoot to get the famous trading establishment back up and running, and returned to its former glory.

Thankfully, five out of six markets in the area were still trading as normal, and a fund had been set up to help stallholders, and offer advice. Elsewhere, Camden Council were be running radio adverts, and Visit London would be advertising in the regional press, telling people to head to Camden to support local traders.

Whilst we were fully aware that it was going to be a massive uphill struggle for fire affected stallholders to get themselves back on track, it was encouraging to see the local council rallying around so quickly, ensuring that the traders got as much help as they could during this extremely difficult time.

In this week’s articles we featured a transcript of an article written by Stephen Dowling, which originally appeared on the BBC web site. Entitled “Camden – Britain’s Musical Mecca?”, the report covered pubs and clubs, bands and it’s immigrant roots, and it all made for an extremely interesting read.

Naturally, with the Camden Market fire still fresh in the minds of many, we featured two articles reporting on how locals and store holders were coping after the disaster. As mentioned above, people were rallying around to help one another and reduce the impact caused by this terrible event.

Next, we took a look at episode one of Suggs’ latest series, “Survivors”, which this week looked at a London perfumery, Elgood’s Ales brewery, Isokon Building in Hampstead, before rounding off the episode by visiting The Wall of Death at a local funfair.

Moving on, and MIS co-editor Lee Buckley, reported on the latest MIS web site news, explaining that a new set of streaming videos had been added to the site, and we finished off the issue with a few words about BBC TV show Ashes to Ashes, which featured The Prince as part of the soundtrack.

10 years ago…

Issue 197 – Sunday 16th February – Saturday 22nd February 2003

We started off this issue with some massive news, courtesy of subscriber Chris Carter-Pegg. It turns out that out of the 3 Laurence Olivier awards the Our House musical was awarded with the most prestigious of the lot – The Best New Musical.

Competition was fierce, in the form of Chitty, Chitty, Bang, Bang; Taboo and Bombay Dreams so this really is fantastic news that Our House has beaten them all to it, in what is the UK’s most prestigious theatrical awards of the year.

Whilst virtually the entire cast attended the awards, at the Lyceum Theatre, it was Suggs and writer Tim Firth who went on stage to collect the bronze trophy. Tim on behalf of the cast and Suggs on behalf of the band.

All good things come to an end, and the fanzine “Madness Unsugged” was one such good thing which came to an end last year. To promote the final issue Vince Carden joined the Ska Patrol radio show on Dublin’s Near FM and did the great service of playing an hour and a half of Madness songs on the radio.

In true MIS reporting style, co-editor, Jonathan Young gave readers an in-depth review of the whole show, detailing track listings, as well as a lowdown of what was discussed.

Our irregular Mimics of Madness took a look at some of the better known Madness tribute outfits currently doing the rounds. Gig dates were given for One Step Behind, Complete Madness, and Los Palmas 6.

Following the recent stick fans had been giving Madness merchandise stockists, Bluegrape, it was nice to receive a report from MIS subscriber Chris Wardell, who gave the company a glowing report, following the excellent customer service he received.

Rob Hazelby

[5] – 10 MINUTES WITH CLIVE LANGER

He gets his hair cut in Camden: ‘six quid’. His favourite Madness song is Our House, and favourite crisp flavour is Salt n Shake. I met Clive for a quick trip to the Pillars of Hercules pub for a necessary Suggs-induced hair of the dog (where I tried very hard to steal his scarf), writes Julie Hamill on her music related blog.

Here are extracts from her interview with Madness’ most famous record producer.

J: Please say your full name.

C: Say my full name? Even the bits that other people don’t know
about?

J: Yes please!

C: Clive William Langer, after my grandfather who was Bill Baptist.
So I was Clive William

J: William It was really nothing…

C: I wasn’t a Smiths fan. I was so busy with Madness and we were just
having hit after hit so I didn’t really listen too much… but I
was aware of it. I wouldn’t go home and play other bands records
unless I wanted to steal something! (laughs)

J: You’re not on Twitter anymore Clive Why’s that?

C: I went on Facebook for forty-eight hours and then shut it down.
It was enough. All these people contacted me that I didn’t really
want to talk to. I don’t mind saying hello to people but I don’t
want a long dialogue with people from school…

J: With Twitter you can talk to people you don’t know.

C: I don’t mind strangers, I don’t mind having a conversation with
people. With Deaf School I have had a lot of emails from people
and I enjoyed talking to them.

http://deafschoolmusic.com

J: I had been told that you don’t do interviews, and you don’t have an
email.

C: I do have an email! I just don’t like chatting much. Maybe I’m too
hungover. [Laughs] I’m hungover today because of last night. We
were celebrating! Madness just picked up an award from Poland
yesterday. They played there in the eighties and gave the money
they earned to Solidarity (they couldn’t spend it anywhere anyway
because they couldn’t export the money). So they all got these
medals.

J: Was it a heavy night?

C: Wine. Brandy. Vodka… Suggs and I are both used to drinking.
We first met when he was seventeen. We’ve been drinking ever
since. It’s a quick way to get to know people I suppose.

J: It has been a life-long collaboration for you and Suggs.

C: Very much a life-long friendship. Especially since he’s married
to Bette Bright who is the girl singer in Deaf School, so I knew
her since 1974 and I’ve known Suggs since 1978.

J: You went from playing in Deaf School to producing Madness.

C: I was suddenly put on a rollercoaster. After Deaf School, I had
my own band – Clive and the Boxes – and we toured with Madness.
The first album I ever produced was ‘One Step Beyond’… I was
just a bloke in a band that had made a few albums and knew a bit.
I kind of knew the process because I worked with Alan Winstanley
who has the engineer expertise and is a producer as well… it
meant that we could just make these records. When ‘One Step
Beyond’ came out. I remember listening to it the day after
thinking ‘this is a load of rubbish!’ Then suddenly it was a hit,
and all the singles were hits. It was a stepping-stone. Then I
did a Bette Bright album; Teardrop Explodes… record companies
wanted me. I then went on to work with Elvis Costello and
Dexy’s Midnight Runners.

J: Do you enjoy working with bands that have lots of members?

C: I do yes, because it means that the arrangements can be more
complex, and if someone wants to put a bit of brass on their
records, or a bit of strings, then they can. To me that was quite
normal working with Madness, who were flexible to arrangements.

J: Do you have a favourite Madness track or is it a bit like asking
who’s your favourite child?

C: I just feel pretty proud of Our House when I hear that. Does that
make it my favourite? Maybe. I remember Our House was out in
America – around the same time as Dexy’s – climbing the charts and
I was very proud of it because I had done a lot to shape it.

J: Any others?

C: My Girl was my original favourite track. Madness are a singles
band. Their 21st single got to number twenty-one and they’re still
selling. I went to the Palace when they were on the roof, which
was just incredible! They are playing over ten thousand seaters
everywhere now, including the O2, it’s the biggest tour they’ve
ever done.

J: The new Madness album is getting great reviews.

C: It was a bit too close for me to their last one. I had spent a
couple of years doing the one before and I wasn’t in the right
frame of mind to go in again.

J: Lovestruck is another, later classic Madness pop song with unique,
quirky lyrics.

C: Yeah, that’s Lee (Thompson).

J: He is a fantastic songwriter. That’s a great era for Madness as
well.

C: Yeah. Lovestruck was like a second coming for Madness, during the
mid nineties

J: Were there ever plans to put lyrics to One Step Beyond or one of my
favourites: The Return of the Los Palmas 7?

C: No. With every album we were asked to do an instrumental. It’s
just part of Madness, starting with One Step Beyond. For Return of
the Los Palmas 7 Mike Barson had a book of sixties hits – and I
think – if I remember correctly – he reversed a Cathy Kirby melody.

J: Do you think that Madness get the recognition they deserve in terms
of awards?

C: It will all happen now because this year has been so big. They are
seen as an English treasure now. Playing all these festivals,
getting through to the young kids. Everyone just sees them as an
evergreen now, as opposed to old Madness. They’ll get their
lifetime achievement very soon.

J: Who are you working with now?

C: My son is in a band called ‘Man Like Me’ and they’ve been
supporting Madness for the last few weeks. I’ve been playing with
them, I play guitar on one of their songs. I’m also writing stuff
on my own at the moment with Deaf School. I produced three tracks
for Madness this year and also worked with a guy called Eugene
McGuinness, I finished his album last year. But there’s not much
work for me these days.

J: Why’s that?

C: Well to get me and Alan into the studio is quite an expensive
experience because we don’t work computers really. We just didn’t
see the end. Kids can get music for nothing now, whereas I didn’t
see the end of the CD, or the album. But people don’t need to
buy a record now, so I don’t get the royalties. Our careers kind
of ended because everyone’s got a laptop at home to record stuff
at home, So I help my son out and we do bits and pieces.

J: Do you have any regrets?

C: Not regrets, but there are certain things I shouldn’t have taken
on. Not really good enough. I wasn’t good enough. It was
tempting though, for the money, and I never wanted to do it for
the money but we were spending, on studios, on our lifestyle…

J: Were you leading an indulgent lifestyle then?

C: No, I was more indulgent later, only because, well I like eating
out, and I used to be happy if I could eat out and get a taxi and
I thought, that’s amazing… kind of all I wanted really. Then I
had a son, and a house, so we had a few luxuries but I never felt
really indulgent, but I never saved money. I liked to pay for
bands to eat, I like to buy them dinner, I thought that was a nice
thing to do.

J: Any wild nights that you remember?

C: Last night (laughs).

J: What time did you get to bed?

C: Not too late, probably one or something. I’ve had a few days of
really late nights. We had the 02, then my wife had a party at her
work, she has a gardening company and they’re all young kids… so
I’ve been indulgent recently [Laughs].

J: Morrissey is a fan of Madness. Were you/he driving the Kill Uncle
album to have more piano sound?

C: Well sometimes I’d say, ‘well it sounds a bit like Madness’ and
he’d say ‘good’. I knew he liked Sparks so I wrote the music for
Mute Witness in that style. I was used to writing that kind of
dink-dink-dink-dink-dink stuff for Deaf School.

J: Our Frank is very Madness.

C: Yeah, Our Frank is very Madness. Carl and Suggs were invited up
to Hook End at that time, as well as people like Vic and Bob. I
had to look after everyone [laughs].

J: What do you think is the most important thing that a producer can
do?

C: I think make the band feel comfortable, really. Make them enjoy
their record.

J: I want your scarf!

C: I’ve only just got it! It was Madness merchandise, a sample, the
manager had a couple and he said ‘oh I’ve just been given these’
and so he gave me one about a week ago.

J: Can you get me one?

C: No. I think there were only two, sorry [Laughs].

J: What is your favourite crisp flavour, Clive?

C: I don’t eat crisps. At school I used to get a packet of cheese and
onion crisps and squash them up when we had double physics – my
friend did the same – we’d see if we could make one packet last for
eighty minutes [Laughs]. I like those blue salt and shake ones
remember them?

J: What’s your favourite drink?

C: A good red wine. A good Cotes du Rhone but at Christmas I’d go for
something a bit more serious, like a Bordeaux.

J: Okay. Favourite band to see live?

C: Hendrix was pretty good. Family and Captain Beefheart. Exciting,
exotic, full of energy. Going to see Family again in February.

J: What do you consider to be the best pop song ever written?

C: Probably has to be Strawberry Fields Forever. It’s a ridiculous
question because I’ve probably got twenty.

J: Who cuts your hair, it’s great!

C: Thank you! My rockabilly mate Steve or six quid in Camden town.
I ask for a fifties rockabilly look.

J: Finally, Clive, are you sure you want to keep that scarf?

C: Yes.

Interview by Julie Hamill. Longer Version “15 Minutes with Clive Langer..” covering Morrissey, Dexys, Beach Boys, and Synths related questions as well as his college years and more is available to read on Julie’s blog. Many thanks Julie for the permission to use an extracted version in the MIS.

www.juliehamill.com

[6] – PAUL RODGERS’ END OF THE YEAR SHOW

Whilst researching Madness chart facts and stats I’ve accumulated quite a few online and paper publications, which have been rich in pickings that I’ve then been able to pass onto you my faithful readers. However there is a slight downside to this, because sometimes the wealth of information means I miss things. It is with this in mind that a look at a new publication detailing the best sellers from 2011 (it take amateur chartologists ages to publish their stuff these days) set me thinking that I should have a look back at previous years to see if there was anything I’d missed. And there was. Enough I thought to make it worthwhile writing more than one article this week.

So without further ado, although there will almost certainly be more ado later, in fact there’s some further ado already let’s report that Chart Log UK decided that in 2011 Complete Madness was the 321st most successful chart album. Not a bad return considering it was only on the top 200 for 22 weeks that year and rose no higher than number 83.

Now I will take you back much further to a time when the charts were dominated by a bloke called Suggs. That time was 1995 my friends. He wasn’t content with being the singer in leading greatest hits pop combo Madness, who scored the year’s 96th best-selling album with Divine Madness. This was achieved by spending 25 weeks between positions 32 and 75 and a further 15 between 76 and 200.

That year Chart Log UK decided Suggs had the 172nd most chart successful album in his debut The Lone Ranger. It peaked at 14, spent
3 weeks in the top 75 and another seven in the top 200.

It was in the singles chart that he really left his mark (as Madness used to). I’m Only Sleeping/Off On Holiday peaked at number 7 (on its first week), spent the next week at number 9 and then steadily slipped down the charts spending 6 weeks in the top 75 and another nine in the top 200.

He followed up this success with the perplexing and less than truthful Camden Town. Back then I used to spend a fair bit of my time in Camden Town in a bar called The Dublin Castle, you may have heard of it?
Despite Suggs’ semi-spoken, semi sung vocal promising me that in Camden Town you can do anything you want to do-ooh I never did manage to levitate whilst drinking a bottle of Newcastle Brown. And I was a lot slimmer then, so it wasn’t the weight. The song peaked on week one at 14, dropped one to 15 the week after and spent a total of 13 weeks in the top 250 (as it had become). Chart Log UK deemed I’m Only Sleeping and Camden Town the 131 and 165 best charting singles of the year. Unfortunately as professor Brian Cox was busy with D:Ream in
1995 there was still not a number high enough to rank The Tune. It was probably the infinity plus 43 most successful single!

1996 saw Top Of The Pops create for Suggs a little anecdote for his live show. Happily it wasn’t of the kind we’ve been used to reading about of late. Nope this involved a man with a lisp being asked to introduce Suggs at six with Cecilia. After that there would be a lot of mopping up of bodily fluids in the dressing rooms, again happily not of the kind we’ve got used to reading about. Cecilia was Suggs’
mammoth hit. It spent 23 weeks in the top 100 including 6 in the top 10, 11 in the top 40 and 19 in the top 75. It was the 32nd best seller of the year.

The follow up single No More Alcohol was nowhere near as successful, although it managed two weeks in the top 40, peaking at number 24. It was in the top 200 for 11 weeks. His album from the previous year was repackaged and reissued to highlight Cecilia and No More Alcohol, but it only served to prolong a second chart showing in the chart. It added another 10 weeks on the top 200 to the previous year’s haul, but climbed no higher than 66 this time round.

No doubt boosted by Madness touring at the end of 1995 and then the great year for Suggs, Divine Madness did well in 1996, racking up 33 weeks on the top 200. Apparently One Step Beyond… spent a week on the top 200 too, but I’ve not managed to verify that yet.

And that’s where I’ll leave it for now. Mainly because I can’t find my
1997 booklet, but also because I fancy having some dinner before the new charts come out and even my all vocalising all skanking new to me oven can’t make it without some intervention from me!

See you later chart (and space filler) fans.

Paul Rodgers

[7] – THAT’S YER LOT

Yes, it’s almost the end of another issue, but before we go there’s just time to pass on a few last minute bits and pieces.

First-up…

Behind the scenes things are getting quite exciting for The Ska Orchestra, with the one and only Dave Robinson popping up in involvement with the final stages and label/distribution of the debut album.

We’ve a feeling it will appear in coming months, and currently it’s undergoing some final overdub mixing points.

As proposed Ska Orchestra gig plans for May through to September fly around, it’s set to be a summer of ska. None are 100% confirmed as we go to press, so keep watching the facebook page for the band for news of gigs from London areas to Northern cities and even the continent. Multiple Missions are in the offing!

The Ska Orchestra Facebook group can be found at:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/138362986238425/?fref=ts

And finally, over to Mr. Rodgers to see us out…

This week’s chart: Oui Oui Si Si Ja Ja Da Da down to 58 on the main album chart. That’s 8 weeks on the top 75, 13 in the top 100 and 15 in the top 200. The album is now fast closing in on The Heavy Heavy Hits in the league table of Madness releases by chart performance.

The album is also down to 7 on the indie chart, where Complete Madness is a non-mover at 15. Assuming this means Complete has another week on the top 200 it is now only 4 weeks away from 52 straight weeks on that chart.

Never Knew Your Name has now bowed out of the indie top 40.

And that’s that.

Thanks for reading, and have a great week.

All the best,

Rob, Jon, Simon, Liz
(With special thanks to Julie Hamill and Paul Rodgers)