The start of my personal chart - Top 40 from 1997 to 2002(3?)
Originally I started my first personal chart sometime early in 1997. It had been a Top 40 chart. Top 40 as the Austrian Chart also had been a Top 40 during in 1990’s until the expansion to a Top 75. Most of the charted songs came from this chart. Other charted songs had been songs from the CD’s I bought or got as a present during this time. Songs not played on the Austrian radio station “Ö3” had hardly no chances to chart. As I remember there are some exceptions, because some songs didn’t chart here in Austria, but they did in Germany which means airplay on MTV or VIVA.
The start of my first chart had been influenced by the alternative rock band The Beautiful South with their smash hit “Rotterdam”.
This song went to 5 in the UK. On the other side this song failed to impact here in Austria, but during the Austrian Top 40 countdown this song was played within the part of the Top UK hits. I’m sure that this song failed to make it to the top spot on my chart, but I cannot remember at which position “Rotterdam” peaked. All in all I don’t know much about my chart at this time. Sometime in 2002 or 2003 I ended my chart, because in 2001 I began to study Mathematics and History in Salzburg. It had been a busy time which marked the end of my Top 40 chart. Some remarkable facts I could remember about this period are that Aqua peaked at #1 with their smash hits “Barbie Girl” and “Doctor Jones”.
Christina Aguilera (“Genie in a bottle”), Nana (“Lonely”) and Puff Daddy feat. Faith Evans and 112 (“I’ll be missing you”) also reached to top spot. I think that “I’ll be missing you” stayed there about 10 weeks which was the longest run at #1 I can remember. And I can say for sure that I had a different tast in music than nowadays. I believe that no Austrian Band had a #1 hit during this period, but I'm not sure about that fact. That’s everything I can remember.
2011 - To present: The comeback of a chart
Early
in 2011 I started thinking about creating a music chart again. It took
about six or seven weeks before I decided to take the next step. On
March 5th I started my comeback with a Top 60
chart. Already the first #1 of my chart came from the Austrian band Any Major Dude with "July July".
This song stayed there
for 4 weeks. With 20 songs more to count down I thought it would be a
good way to express my taste of music. But already in its 4th week I decided to expand to a Top 100 format, the actual format. I
personally think there won’t be any expansion in the future.
The
charting songs are a mixture of pop, rock and music from North America
to Europe. It’s
no necessary that a song is in English. Very good represented are songs
in French, Italian and Spain. And in the autumn of 2011 the first time
songs from Southern Korea charted.
