Rihanna cements her place in the Official Charts history books this week becoming the only female artist ever to achieve the Official Singles and Albums Chart double twice in the same year with different singles and albums. She’s also broken a flurry of additional chart records in the process.
Today, We Found Love ft Calvin Harris nails a sixth week as the Official Singles Chart Number 1, after a fiercely fought battle with the new Olly Murs single Dance With Me Tonight, and new album Talk That Talk, her sixth studio release, soars straight to the summit of the Official Albums Chart selling over 160,000 copies in week 1 to become one of the fastest sellers of the year. In January, Rihanna landed the double with single What’s My Name ft Drake and album Loud.
Rihanna breaks yet another record, by bagging two different Number 1 albums in the same year, Rihanna becomes the first female solo artist in Official Albums Chart history to do so joining the likes of high musical achievers Michael Jackson, REM, Elton John, Blondie and Robbie Williams.
Rihanna continues to push forward on last week’s achievement of overtaking Adele to spend the greatest number of weeks of any artist at Number 1 in the Official Singles Chart in 2011. Today’s chart brings the total to 7 weeks for this year, and a career total of 21 weeks (excluding other artists’ tracks that Rihanna has featured on as guest vocalist), that’s one week away from equalling the Spice Girls career total.
We Found Love gave the US-Barbadian singer a phenomenal sixth Number 1 in five consecutive years, a record unequalled by any other female solo artist, when it first claimed the Official Singles Chart title seven weeks ago. The song has never been out of the Top 3 since its release.
Though not a chart record, Rihanna today has an impressive 20 individual entries in the Official Singles Chart – 17 solo releases and three tracks featuring Rihanna as a guest vocalist. Two of these make the Official Singles Top 10, We Found Love ft. Calvin Harris, and Drake’s Take Care at Number 9.
We Found Love follows Rihanna’s previous Number 1s What’s My Name (Jan, 2011), Only Girl (In The World) (2010), Run This Town (2009), Take A Bow (2008) and Umbrella (2007). She has also scored five Top 10 Albums including the Number Ones Good Girl Gone Bad (2008), Loud (2010) and Talk That Talk (2011).