BLACKPINK’s ROSÉ has achieved her first no.1 on the UK Big Top 40 with her single ‘APT’, a collaboration with Bruno Mars. The girl group member is no stranger to UK charts, as BLACKPINK are known for hit singles, such as ‘How You Like That’, ‘Shut Down’, and ‘Pink Venom’, all of which also charted. She has also become the highest charting female K-pop soloist on the Official Singles Chart Top 40 with the single, peaking at no.2. It’s by no means her first entry into the chart. The idol already has 8 UK top 40 singles with her group, BLACKPINK.

‘APT’ while different from the hard hitting, girl boss sound BLACKPINK are known for, still maintains the catchy chorus that is so integral to any k-pop song. The song is based on a Korean drinking game and ROSÉ wrote the lyrics herself. She later got Bruno Mars to collaborate as her solo work is in partnership with Atlantic Records, where Bruno Mars is also under contract.

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BLACKPINK are a South Korean K-pop quartet that debuted in 2016. Since the popularity of Korean music has risen, BLACKPINK are probably one of the most well-known girl groups in the world. Since early in their career they have broken record after record, including the most viewed Korean music video in 2018 with ‘Ddu-Du Ddu-Du’, becoming the first K-pop girl group to perform at the popular US music festival Coachella in 2019, to becoming the first k-pop girl group to have a song reach 1 billion streams on Spotify in March of this year.  They have visited the UK on multiple tours including three times for their ‘Born Pink’ world tour on November 30, and December 1 both in 2022 as well as performing at BST Hyde Park as headliners on July 3, 2023. They made history as the first K-pop act to headline a major UK festival and garnered a sold-out audience of 65,000. The members were also given honorary MBE’s by King Charles in 2023 during the President and First Lady of South Korea’s state visit to the UK.

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The 27-year-old New Zealand-born singer is the only member of BLACKPINK to sign to an existing label for her solo career, THE BLACK LABEL, rather than creating her own company as fellow members JISOO, JENNIE and LISA did. JENNIE, 28,  is also currently charting on the UK Top 40 with her single ‘Mantra’, which peaked at 37 after its release last month. Thai-born LISA, also 27, has released solo music this year too, charting in the top 75 on the UK charts. Eldest member JISOO, 29, has yet to release solo music since BLACKPINK separated from company YG Entertainment in December 2023. The group remains with YG Entertainment for their group activities and according to entertainment company, BLACKPINK will have a comeback in 2025 as well as embark on a world tour. Given that BLACKPINK has visited the UK on their previous two world tours, they are likely to be back next year.

They are no strangers to global success including in the UK music scene, and will likely continue to appear with subsequent releases as a group. ROSÉ is set to release her first full-length album, ‘Rosie’, on December 6th. It will be her first release since her single album ‘-R-‘ in 2021.

Sealing last year’s number one spot was none other than Miley Cyrus with her smash hit “Flowers”, which spent an incredible 10 weeks at the top of the Official UK Singles chart. “Flowers” was the lead single from Cyrus’ eighth studio-album Endless Summer Vacation, and went on to accumulate 198 million combined audio and video streams in the UK in 2023, making it the most-streamed song of the year. The 31-year-old’s single also went on to be the most-downloaded song of the year, with 91,000 UK downloads.

Joining Miley in a 10-week long reign at the number one spot were British rappers Dave and Central Cee with their single “Sprinter”. The track was a smash hit as it broke UK chart records as it clinched the biggest streaming week for any rap song in Official Chart history, and also claimed the title of the longest-running rap Number 1 in the UK. Since its release, the team duo have racked up 161 million UK audio and video streams, landing them the number two spot on the top songs of 2023.

The track claiming the number three spot in this list was originally the first Official Number One Single of 2023. When RAYE and 070 Shake’s track “Escapism” soared to number one, RAYE told Official Charts: “We are Number 1 in the UK! It’s the first Number 1 of the year, it’s my first Number 1 in my life. I’m an independent artist, this is sickening! This is proof you should back yourself, no matter what. Thank you, this is mad. These are happy tears!” 

Completing 2023’s top five was Taylor Swift’s resilient 2022 hit “Anti-Hero”, and collaboration trance track “Miracle” from Calvin Harris and Ellie Goulding. Celebrating the success of the latter, Goulding told Official Charts: “This is just very cool. Thank you very much to everyone for listening to it and supporting it, Oontz, oontz…rave on!” 

The Official top 10 songs of 2023:

1. “Flowers” – Miley Cyrus
2. “Sprinter” – Dave & Central Cee
3. “Escapism” – RAYE feat. 070 Shake
4. “Anti-Hero” – Taylor Swift
5. “Miracle” – Calvin Harris & Ellie Goulding
6. “Calm Down” – Rema
7. “Kill Bill” – SZA
8. “Boy’s A Liar” – PinkPantheress
9. “As It Was” – Harry Styles
10. “People” Libianca

Currently perched upon a pile of desiccated dance tracks and bloodless bops in the number two spot, new blood ‘Vampire‘ looks set to sink its fangs into the BBC Radio One Official Chart top spot, biting at the heels of Dave/Central Cee’s brag-rap banger ‘Sprinter‘. Having sat atop the chart for five weeks in a row, Cench’s senile beat is ripe for ex-sanguination.

Having torn up the charts like a bat out of hell Rodrigo’s previous victims rest in pieces. Littered amongst a scattered trail of bejewelled teeth and fake nails lies the shrivelled remains of J Hus and Drakes ‘Who Told You’ as well the cold corpse of her childhood hero Taylor Swift’s  ‘Cruel Summer’.

Olivia’s piano driven self pity-ditty paints a portrait of an individual plagued by a parasitic personal relationship, lyrically the bemoaning ballad appears to have been penned about yet another boy who played her false and left her feeling lied to and leeched on, and surprise surprise she’s a little bit pissed off about it. So pissed off in fact that she exhales an ‘eff’ word during the chorus, branding the belligerent boy as a “Bloodsucker, fame fucker”. Fair enough Olivia.

The metaphorical allusions to vampirism are reflected not only in the songs lyrics but also in the singles cover artwork, a pseudo gothic side profile still soaked in a monochromatic filter perforated colourfully by a protrusive shade of purple plasters plugging Rodrigo’s presumably punctured jugular, in a nod to an old horror movie poster from the 1968 British Hammer Horror classic ‘Dracula Has Risen From The Grave‘.

The track serves as the singer’s flagship single taken from her upcoming sophomore album ‘Guts‘, slated for release on September 8th 2023. Produced and recorded by frequent collaborator Dan Nigro at the legendary Electric Lady Studios in New York (a recording studio commissioned by the one and only Jimi Hendrix way back in 1968 that has since been used by a plethora of musicians including the likes of David Bowie, Led Zeppelin, Stevie Wonder, and more recently Lady Gaga and Taylor Swift to name but a few) Rodrigo describes the song as being about “feeling hurt and confused”.

Released June 30th via Geffen/Interscope Records, ‘Vampire‘ has amassed over 36 million streams on Spotify as well as drawing an international audience of 26 million through radio airplay. An accompanying music video directed by Petra Collins was also released simultaneously online during a live Youtube premiere. The video racked up 13 million views with 24 hours of being uploaded to the platform. So will Olivia Rodrigo clip Central Cee’s wings and claim her spot at the top of the UK chart or will Cench and Dave sprint to safety for another week at No.1?