‘Blurred Lines’ by Robin Thicke has become the biggest selling single of 2013 in the UK
The track was number one for fine weeks earlier this year and features Pharrell Williams and T.I. The single has now overtaken Daft Punk’s ‘Get Lucky’ which dominated the charts at the start of the year. However ‘Blurred Lines’ has beaten Daft Punk with sales of more than 1.36million.
‘Blurred Lines’ has knocked Daft Punk down to second place, selling 1.24million copies to date. The single also features a guest appearance from Pharrell Williams, so perhaps he has the magical music touch!
Currently the third best selling single is Avicii’s ‘Wake Me Up’ which has so far sold 980,000 copies since being released earlier this summer. In fourth place is Passenger with the single ‘Let Her Go’ which has sold 910,000 singles, and in fifth place is Naughty Boy’s ‘La La La’ which has so far sold 887,000.
The popularity of ‘Blurred Lines’ means that this year could be the biggest year in history for British singles sales. Back in the mid noughties, single sales took a dramatic slump as music buyers made the transition from purchasing physical CD’s to downloading their music online. This has meant that it is now very rare that a single reaches the number one spot without selling in excess of around 100,000 copies of their single a week.
However all is not lost. Last year increased music downloads meant that 2012 was the best year for single sales with around 188.6million singles sold.
The song has caused controversy since its release earlier this year and has already been banned in universities in Kingston, Derby, Edinburgh, Leeds and West Scotland.
Further controversy was fuelled at the VMA’s, with the now infamous performance of Miley Cyrus twerking in front of Robin Thicke while wearing a foam finger.
However in this instance it appears that controversy sells, and with only a few months left of the year it will take some beating to knock Robin Thicke off this top spot.