Despite its continuing presence at the top of the chart, As It Was wasn’t No.1 on digital downloads or streams this week, trailing some distance behind Kate Bush’s resurgent Running Up That Hill on both metrics. In fact, the only measurement on which As It Was was more popular was CD sales, where its one trumps Bush’s zero – and yet, there it sits, No.1 again.
Back on the chart for the first time since 1985, when it peaked at No.3, Running Up That Hill’s current popularity is fuelled by its prominent and frequent use in Season 4 of the Netflix sci-fi/drama series Stranger Things. No.8 last week, Running Up That Hill now surges to No.2 (a new peak), with consumption of 44,739 units, made up of 5,863 digital downloads, 38,875 sales-equivalent streams and one 10-inch picture disc dating from 2013. It is, of course, encumbered with ACR, otherwise its combination of 7,470,792 premium audio streams, 1,029,666 ad-funded audio streams and 657,694 premium video streams, when added to its digital sales, would give it a total of 83,613 sales, relegating Styles to No.2 and providing Bush with a richly-deserved second No.1, more than 44 years after her first single, Wuthering Heights, topped the list.
Running Up That Hill’s renaissance is also reflected on the album chart, where Bush’s chart-topping 1986 compilation The Whole Story leaps 76-19 (2,729 sales) – its highest position for eight years – while RUTH’s parent album Hounds Of Love is back in the Top 200 at No.84 (1,431 sales).