Last week, all the popular songs from the last few months had drastically fallen out of the UK top twenty to make space for Christmas classics and festive tunes. WHAM! dominated charts for two weeks, with Maria Carey and Brenda Lee right behind them overtaking the end of the year in UK charts. However, now that the festive excitement has died down and the new year has begun, ‘Last Christmas‘ and all the other iconic songs that were present on the top ten will go back into hibernation awaiting next December. This means that the UK top ten went back to looking almost exactly like it did back in November, with Gracie Abrams, Rosé and Bruno Mars topping the list and a few new arrivals.
After spending last week at number 21 and the previous two at number two, ‘That’s So True‘ by Gracie Abrams returned to number one, becoming the first number one song of 2025. ‘That’s So True’ became a hit after being released alongside the deluxe version of Abrams’s second full length album, ‘The Secret of Us‘, which also contains a song featuring Taylor Swift. It is Abrams’s first number one song, after ‘I Love You, I’m Sorry’ peaked at number four. The song is currently on its sixth week at number one and overall it has spent eleven weeks charting with a debut at number nineteen. In March, Abrams will embark on a completely sold out tour of the UK, where she’ll play the O2 Arena in London, which has a capacity of 20,000: a big step compared to the 2,000 people venues she played last year on her ‘Good Riddance Tour’.
At number two, Rosé and Bruno Mars are still going strong with their ‘Apt‘, originally released as the lead single for Rosé’s debut solo album ‘Rosie‘ which peaked at number one and spent two weeks in the UK top 100. The song, which has already become a radio classic, debuted at number four and eventually peaked at number two, always blocked by Abrams. Last week, the song was charting at number 28 but it made a comeback to the top spots of the charts big enough that it might even achieve that number one position in the upcoming weeks. In the meantime, Bruno Mars’s collaboration with Lady Gaga ‘Die With a Smile‘ was included in the biggest songs of 2024, claiming the 37th spot in the list.
At number three, London-based Lola Young peaks with TikTok viral ‘Messy‘. The song first appeared on charts at the end of November at number 87. Slowly but steadily, it climbed charts and finally reached the top ten! Young was nominated for a BRITs rising star award back in 2021, and was included in BBC’s Sound of 2022 poll where she arrived fourth. Despite already being recognised in the UK music industry, Young gains her breakthrough song with ‘Messy’, which is the only song by the artist to ever chart. Official Charts included Young’s an artist to watch in 2025, and her hit song is predicted to achieve an even higher position in the weeks to come.
At number four, a big comeback for ‘Sailor Song‘ by Gigi Perez that had previously fallen out of the top ten; Perez takes back the top spots and tries to climb back to number one which ‘Sailor Song’ had achieved at the beginning of November. Number five is a song that is new to the top spots of charts: ‘The Days‘ by Chrystal, like Young, also had a slow ascent towards the number one position but it is now getting there and did not let the festive slump stop it!
