Year-End Review 2016 - Artists

The Christmas period is over and four days to New Year’s Eve are to go. Now it is time to start with my annual year-end countdown. Do you remember last year? Selena Gomez entered the Top 3 with her wonderful “The heart wants what it wants” (#3) which peaked at #1 for 3 weeks. This year she has several songs in the pipeline. “Hands to myself” reached #1 and “Sober” was stuck at #4 for 10 consecutive weeks. These are her candidates for reaching another Top 10 spot. In the runner’s up spot Finnish boy band Santin Circus ended with “Crossroads”. This year they had no hit so they will be missed in this edition. And of course there had only been one #1 in 2015. It had been “My heart ain’t that broken” by Leslie Clio who had been my favourite act too. And so much is betrayed, that she has again the chance of a top 10 placement with two of her songs which are “Damage done” (peaked at #1 for 5 weeks) and “Changes” (#1 for one week).

The next part is for the statistical freaks. In 2016 I charted 649 songs which are 12 songs less than in the year before. As in 2015 these songs are by 505 artists, but this time they are from 41 countries. At the top spot there is nothing new. Songs from US artists are still dominating and there is a massive K-Pop return on my chart. So let’s see the national ranking of 2016.

National ranking 2016:

1. (1.) USA
2. (3.) England
3. (2.) Germany
4.(-) South Korea
5. (5.) Canada
6. (4.) Austria

The British acts are climbing up one spot again after losing this spot one year ago. After a very bad year for K-Pop on my chart they bring South Korea back into the Top 4 in this year’s rank. Several of these songs including Stellar’s “Crying” can be found in my Top 100. On the other hand for songs from Austria 2016 wasn’t as good as 2015, but as every year there had been at least one #1 song. This year it had been the Christina Stürmer song “Seite an Seite” (“Side by side”) and I should not forget that 2016 opened with a #1 by Tagtraeumer with their song “Nichts” (“Nothing”). Both songs have done well this year.

Let’s go on and see which artists impressed my most in this year. If you’re following my chart you’ll have noticed that there could only be one artist topping 2016. Anouk is dominating since weeks, but lost her spirits with the last edition of my chart, but she still has three songs from her album “Queen for a day” in my Top 3. This year Anouk topped my chart with five songs (20 weeks). Only Leslie Clio (for six weeks) and Adele (for five weeks) managed to top my chart more than once in 2016. So these three artists topped my chart for more than a half year. In total I had 19 different #1 songs and the last one had been Kelly Clarkson’s “Nostalgic”. So let’s have a closer look at my Top 10 artists of 2016.

TY	LY		Artist	Info
10.	(---)		Cam	Country songs were well represented on my chart in 2016. Two artists dominated this particular genre on my chart. For the new US star Cam this is her first appearance on this list. Several songs made it into my Top 10, but my favourite “Hungover on heartache” only peaked at #3. I really hope that her future work will do as well as her debut for me.
9.	(---)		MisterWives	Back in 2015 I jumped on the bandwagon after giving “Reflections” a chance which peaked at #18 back in May 2015. They performed solid in 2015 and 2016 and reached some Top 10 spots, but failed to get a #1. From their debut album three songs reached my Top 10. Their biggest hit up-to-date is “No need for dreaming” which peaked at #5 back in March.
8.	(7.)		Tove Lo	Last year Tove Lo got her debut in this ranking. This year she dropped one spot, but she still profited from her debut album. Most of her songs had lower peaks in 2016, but “Moments” (peaked #8) was another highlight from this album. Late this year she released some singles from her new album and “Cool girl” (peaked at #8) also reached my Top 10.
7.	(3.)		Kelly Clarkson	For her it is an up and down in this ranking. Last year she re-entered in my Top 3 after “Heartbeat song” and “Someone” reached the Top 10. This year she had little problems, but what are problems when you have “Nostalgic” on the album? With the last edition of the 2016 countdown she reached #1 on my chart, but there had been two more Top 10 hits from “Piece by piece”.
6.	(---)		Carrie Underwood	Can you really believe that Carrie Underwood had never been on this list before? Back in 2012 she missed the Top 10 by one spot, but this year she finally reached such a spot, because of her “Storyteller” album. Three songs from her can be found in my Top 100 and “Dirty laundry”, her latest Top 10 hit, just missed my Top 100 by some weeks. Her biggest hit in this year’s countdown is “Church bells” which peaked at #1 in June.
5.	(10.)		Emma	Emma had been my #1 artist back in 2014. Last year she only managed to reach #10 and this year she climbed up five spots. What an up and down for this core artist! This year she had three Top 10 hits. Not bad for any artist, but for her it is another weak year. “Facciamola più semplice” (“Make it easier”) is the highest ranked in this show which peaked at #4 back in September.
4.	(---)		Selena Gomez	For the first time Selena Gomez can be found in this ranking list although she had a year-end Top 3 hit with “The heart wants what it wants" back in 2015. I absolutely love her album “Revival” and because of that fact several songs managed to reach my Top 10. Among others “Kill em with kindness” was such a song. Some of her songs of this album will debut next year and so she could do well in 2017 too.
3.	(re)		Adele	Back in 2011 Adele had the #1 song of the year with "Turning tables". And of course she did well with several other songs as “Rolling in the deep” or “Set fire to the rain” from her album “21”. Four years later she released “Hello” which got a #1 debut back on the 31st of October, 2015. Since this release it has been clear for me that she could dominate again. And what a year had been 2016 for her. “When we where young” and “Water under the bridge” reached the top spot and so she absolutely deserves this big return.
2.	(1.)		Leslie Clio	Two years in a row Leslie Clio can be found in the Top 2 of my artist of the year ranking. “Damage done” and “Changes” as well as “Remedy” are her big hits in 2016. These songs are still from her 2nd album “Eureka”. Last year she had the #1 song of the year with “My heart ain’t that broken” and because of the fact that “Damage done” topped my chart for five weeks (only two songs did better this year) she is in a good position to reach another Top 10 spot in this year-end countdown.
1.	(4.)		Anouk	It is hard to believe that Anouk had never been my #1 artist of the year since I decided to start charting again. Now she had done it with a domination which my chart hasn’t seen before. “Wanna little something” debuted at #1 back in September. And then later this year she had three #1’s in a row with “If I knew” (eight weeks at #1 and also a #1 debut), “Not a lovesong” (three weeks at #1) and “Be my baby” (two weeks at #1). But I should not forget about “Run away together” which spent three weeks at the top in middle of 2016. “Queen for a day” is an absolutely fantastic album, but the first two singles from her new one are arrrgh, but we will see how they will be represent on my chart in 2017. Before I chart this album there are five more songs from “Queen for a day” which I will chart. So all the other artist can be in fear of these songs, because I believe that her strong performance will continue early in 2017.