Annual charts: AC / DC with album of the year, "Blinding Lights" single of the year

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Brian Johnson and Angus Young from AC / DC at a concert in Kansas City (2016): With »Power Up« at the top

Photo: 

Jason Squires / WireImage / Getty Images

While thousands are looking at their personal annual review on Spotify and posting it on social media, the market research company GfK Entertainment has evaluated the German charts officially recognized by the Federal Association of the Music Industry and named the albums and singles of the year.

For the first time since 2011, when Adele topped the list, an English-language work was at the top of the album: »Power Up« by

AC / DC

.

Three weeks of sales were enough for AC / DC to land the album of the year, emphasizes GfK: It sold almost 160,000 copies in the first week alone, the most successful start since Rammstein ("Rammstein") a year and a half ago.

In the meantime, band members who had left the band returned to record "Power Up", including singer Brian Johnson.

AC / DC was even able to surpass the previous album "Rock Or Bust", which in 2014 came second in the German annual charts.

Before that was Helene Fischer, who had put the album of the year five times in the past seven years, but did not publish a new work in 2020.

Apart from AC / DC and

Metallica

(seventh place with the orchestral live album "S & M2"), the top ten albums of the year are dominated by German-speaking artists this year - as well as over two thirds of the annual charts.

The

Böhsen Onkelz

(“Böhse Onkelz”, second place) and the

Ärzten

(“Hell”, fourth place) are long-serving rock bands, alongside singers such as

Sarah Connor

(“Herz Kraft Werke”, number three) and

Kerstin Ott

(“Ich have to tell you something «, rank eight).

Like Ott,

Fynn Kliemann is

one of the younger top ten artists, "Pop" (sixth place) is only his second album.

Artists as diverse as the duo can be found on the most successful albums on nine and ten

Florian Silbereisen

and

Thomas Anders

(»The Album«) and the 187 street gang rapper

Bonez MC

(»Hollywood«).

Fresh remix for the single of the year

The hit of 2020 was released in November 2019.

“Blinding Lights”, the song by Canadian musician

The Weeknd

,

tops

the annual evaluation of the German single charts.

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Abel Makkonen Tesfaye aka The Weeknd at the MTV Music Awards in New York in August

Photo: Kevin Mazur, Kevin Mazur / MTV VMAs 2020 / Getty Images

The song, with its characteristic synthesizer theme reminiscent of the sound of the 1980s, entered the official charts at the beginning of December, but did not reach number one until January 10th.

In total, »Blinding Lights« was at the top for ten weeks, most recently on April 24th.

This means that the title, which was largely co-produced by the Swedish hit specialist Max Martin, is clearly ahead in the singles category.

The Weeknd was last advertised as a musical halftime act at the 2021 Super Bowl, but was passed over in the Grammy nominations.

The musician, whose real name is Abel Tesfaye, is currently giving the hit a lap of honor: on Friday he released a remix with the Spanish singer Rosalía as the star guest.

Of course, there was also a TikTok dance for “Blinding Lights” - but the much-discussed effect of the video platform as a place where the hits are created has a particular impact on the summer hit “Savage Love (Laxed - Siren Beat)” by

Jawsh 685 and Jason DeRulo

shown.

In seventh place, it is the only title from the top ten of the annual charts that is also listed among the TikTok hits of the year.

The overlaps with the most streamed titles on Spotify and Apple Music are greater: "Blinding Lights" was number one for both services.

Spotify's Top Ten shares eight tracks with the official charts, and Apple Music's seven.

Above all, it is noticeable that on Apple Music with "Why are you doing this to yourself?" And "200 km / h" two different titles by the Ludwigshafen rapper

Apache 207 are

placed than on Spotify (and the official charts), where "Roller" and »Fame« are the most successful tracks.

Either way, it is clear that Apache 207 has earned the award as "Single Artist of the Year".

All in all, the rapper and his songs have appeared in the official German charts over 250 times, according to GfK Entertainment.

He has ten titles in the annual charts, the most successful in third place, "Roller", was already among the top five in the annual charts in 2019.

“Dance Monkey” by

Tones and I

from Australia, number two in 2020, is such a long-seller.

Incidentally, Corona songs were not a recipe for success in 2020: titles such as Silbermonds »Make the most of it« (69th place) or »Victoriam« by Sinfoglesia (51st place) made the charts, but only reached low ranks.

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With material from dpa