James Masterton (born 2 September 1973) is a British music critic and columnist , his work focusing on the UK Singles Chart having been an online fixture on various sites since the 1990s. Masterton is also a producer for talkSPORT , and has worked on air as a presenter at the Bradford independent local radio station the Pulse .
29-499: Music Week is a trade publication for the UK record industry distributed via a website and a monthly print magazine. It is published by Future . Founded in 1959 as Record Retailer , it relaunched on 18 March 1972 as Music Week . On 17 January 1981, the title again changed, owing to the increasing importance of sell-through videos, to Music & Video Week . The rival Record Business , founded in 1978 by Brian Mulligan and Norman Garrod,
58-608: A number of format and genre charts (Music DVD, Classical, Rock, etc.), as well as a background on sales and airplay analysis from Alan Jones. Following a redesign in October 2008, the magazine introduced live charts based on Tixdaq data, a Box Office chart, and predictive charts based on information from: Rakuten.co.uk , Amazon , Shazam , Last.fm , HMV . Music Week compiled and published weekly club charts from chart returns supplied by DJs in nightclubs; Upfront Club Top 40, Commercial Pop Top 30 and Urban Top 30. The magazine also published
87-612: A profit warning in October 2011. It was noted that a re-structuring would be necessary as the company moved to a digital model. Future announced it would cut 55 jobs from its UK operation as part of a restructuring to adapt "more effectively to the company's rapid transition to a primarily digital business model." The company announced in March 2014 that it would close all of its U.S.-based print publications and shift U.S. print support functions such as consumer marketing, production and editorial leadership for Future's international print brands to
116-646: A separate free-to-access site for the Music Week Directory listed 10,000 contacts in the UK music industry. In mid-2007, the magazine was redesigned by London company This Is Real Art. In October 2008, another redesign led to major changes. In June 2011, Music Week was sold to Intent Media. The package was sold for £2.4m and also contained titles Television Broadcast Europe , Pro Sound News , Installation Europe , and additional websites, newsletters, conferences, show dailies and awards events, which generated £5.4m of revenue in 2010. As of issue 30 July 2011, UBM
145-553: A weekly Cool Cuts chart compiled from DJ feedback and sales reports from independent record shops, which traced it roots back to James Hamilton's BPM section in Record Mirror (a publication which ended up as the middle dance music section of Music Week in 1991). Even though the magazine is now a monthly publication, the website still posts weekly Charts Analysis pages for the UK Official Singles and Albums charts. Alan Jones
174-486: A £594m takeover of GoCo plc, known for its Gocompare.com price comparison website. In August 2021, it acquired another 12 magazines for £300 million. The company was criticised in February 2022 for the size of the remuneration package being offered to Zillah Byng-Thorne, the chief executive. It was noted that she could receive £40 million if the company performs well. Byng-Thorne resigned with effect from 3 April 2023 and
203-541: Is still named as publisher, as the new publisher Intent Media took over on 1 August 2011. In the first edition under new ownership it was announced that the title would switch its day of publication Monday to Thursday with immediate effect. NewBay Media acquired Intent Media in 2012. Future acquired NewBay Media in 2018 and decided that the publication would go monthly from March 2021, in keeping with its Louder Sound publications such as Metal Hammer and Classic Rock magazine . Music Week features these British charts:
232-619: The Official Top 75 Singles of the month , the Official Top 75 Albums of the month (similar to charts used by Top of the Pops in the early 1990s and Absolute 80s on Sundays) and the Official Vinyl Charts. Specialist charts include the Official Top 20 Americana, the Official Top 20 Classical, the Official Top 20 Hip-Hop & R&B, the Official Top 20 Jazz, the Official Top 20 Country,
261-466: The Charts Analysis posts on 5 November 2021, Alan Jones resumed the role again, writing the 12 November overviews, with no explanation of why he returned (with the pages titled Charts analysis: ABBA's Voyage opens with huge sale of 204,000 for the albums and Charts analysis: Adele spends fourth week at summit ahead of album release for the singles). Music Week is published monthly by Future (from
290-499: The Christmas (Week Ending: 31 December 2020 and 7 January 2021) and Easter charts (Week Ending: 8 April 2021) posted as there was no updates by Music Week due to the holidays, Masterton did not return to writing a regular column on his Chart Watch UK review pages until 6 November 2021, when he posted the 11 November overview with facts about Adele's number one single "Easy On Me", Ed Sheeran's new album and Halloween associated records in
319-599: The March 2021 edition), though previously it was a weekly magazine (50 editions p.a.). It was available as a B4-sized printed magazine and a PDF digital edition . ISSN 0265-1548 . As of July 2021 print edition Former editors The weekly print circulation in 1997/98 was 12,503, but by the time the publication left the ABC scheme in 2011 it had fallen to around 5,000 weekly copies. In October 2011, Music Week deregistered with ABC after 54 years of membership. The website musicweek.com had 63,904 monthly unique browsers for
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#1732851288425348-492: The Music Week family: Music Business International (MBI) , Promo , MIRO Future Hits , Tours Report , Fono , Green Sheet , ChartsPlus (published from May 1991 to November 1994), and Hit Music (September 1992 to May 2001). By May 2001, all newsletters (except Promo ) closed. In 2003, Music Week relaunched its website of daily news, features, record release listings and UK sales, airplay and club charts. In early 2006,
377-493: The Official Top 20 Dance, the Official Top 20 Folk and the Official Top 20 Rock & Metal. Also found in Music Week are charts for streaming and various album compilations, whilst James Masterton's weekly Official UK chart analysis column can now only be accessed online by subscribers. When the magazine was a weekly publication, it included Top 75 Singles, Top 75 Artist Albums, Top 10 Downloads, Top 20 Ringtones, Top 20 Compilation Albums, Top 50 Radio Airplay, Top 40 TV airplay, and
406-466: The U.S. consumer music magazines to Future, with the exception of Revolver which had been sold to Project Group M LLC in 2017. It bought the Purch Group for $ 132m by September 2018, and in February 2019 bought Mobile Nations including Android Central, iMore, Windows Central and Thrifter for $ 115 million. Future also acquired Procycling and Cyclingnews.com from Immediate Media . In July 2019
435-700: The UK. Later in 2014, Future sold its sport and craft titles to Immediate Media , and its auto titles to Kelsey Media. In April 2014 Zillah Byng-Thorne , then finance director, was appointed chief executive, replacing Mark Wood, who had been in the position since 2011. In 2018, Future made further major acquisitions. It bought the What Hi-Fi? , FourFourTwo , Practical Caravan and Practical Motorhome brands from Haymarket and it acquired NewBay Media , publisher of numerous broadcast, professional video, and systems integration trade titles, as well as several consumer music magazines. This acquisition returned most of
464-432: The audited period 1–31 October 2008. By 2009, the website had been deregistered with ABC. Future plc Future plc is a British publishing company . It was started in 1985 by Chris Anderson . Among its titles are Country Life , Homes and Gardens , Kiplinger Personal Finance , Decanter , Marie Claire , and The Week . Zillah Byng-Thorne was chief executive officer from 2014 to 2023, when she
493-578: The company bought SmartBrief, a digital media publisher, for an initial sum of $ 45 million. In November 2019 the company bought Barcroft Studios for £23.5 million in a combination of cash and shares. It renamed it Future Studios and announced the launch of "Future Originals", an anthology gaming series, a factual series focusing on the paranormal, and a new true crime show, in partnership with Marie Claire . In April 2020 it acquired TI Media , with 41 brands for £140 million, and, in November 2020, it agreed
522-409: The job. After Andre Paine and Ben Homewood wrote one each of the Charts Analysis posts on 5 November 2021, Alan Jones took over his old job, writing the 12 November overviews (with the pages titled Charts analysis: ABBA's Voyage opens with huge sale of 204,000 for the albums and Charts analysis: Adele spends fourth week at summit ahead of album release for the singles). Apart from an overview of
551-682: The merged title Multichannel News dating from 1980. In October 2024, the company closed a number of consumer titles in the United Kingdom, including Play , All About Space , Total 911 and 3D World , with the monthly movie magazine Total Film ceasing publication after 27 years. In addition to media and magazines, the company has two other businesses: Future's portfolio of brands includes TechRadar , PC Gamer , Tom's Guide , Tom's Hardware , Marie Claire , GamesRadar+ , How it Works , CinemaBlend , Android Central , IT Pro , BikePerfect , Windows Central , Chat and
580-488: The move the complete archives were put online, featuring many articles which had been unavailable since their original week of publication. Masterton has come into conflict in the past for his strident views on the work of particular veteran acts and in particular for his criticism of fan-inspired chart campaigns. In 2009, he was openly critical of the campaign to get Rage Against the Machine to number one for Christmas, blasting
609-459: The post to be his last weekly edition as he was hired to take over the weekly Charts Analysis review pages from Alan Jones on the Music Week website (with the feature also appearing weekly in the magazine until Future Publishing turned it into a monthly). Masterton wrote two weekly Charts Analysis pages for the website (as the magazine now features charts compiled from monthly sales and streams) until 29 October 2021, when Music Week staff took over
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#1732851288425638-519: The record (" Killing in the Name ") as having been "purchased by people for what it represents rather than as a reflection of its cultural popularity" and provoked anger amongst fans of the Pet Shop Boys for asking "why they continue to bother" when their album Yes was released. On 28 February 2020, Masterton published his UK charts analysis page (Week Ending: 5 March 2020) to Chart Watch UK intending
667-420: The website goodtoknow.co.uk . James Masterton Masterton began posting his weekly comments about the latest singles chart on Usenet in 1992, while a student at Lancaster University , whence he graduated in 1994. In 1995 he became an important element of BT 's Dotmusic website, an online hub for the UK music scene and one of the few sites that posted the entire UK top 75 every week. When Dotmusic
696-708: Was floated on the London Stock Exchange in 1999. Anderson left the company in 2001. In 2004 the company was accused of corruption when it published positive reviews for the video game Driver 3 in two of its owned magazines, Xbox World and PSM2 . Future published the official magazines for the consoles of all three major games console manufacturers ( Microsoft , Nintendo , and Sony ); however PlayStation: The Official Magazine ceased publishing in November 2012, and Official Nintendo Magazine ceased publishing in October 2014. The chief executive and finance director both resigned at short notice after
725-402: Was absorbed into Music Week in February 1983. Later that year, the offshoot Video Week launched and the title of the parent publication reverted to Music Week . Since April 1991, Music Week has incorporated Record Mirror , initially as a 4 or 8-page chart supplement, later as a dance supplement of articles, reviews and charts. In the 1990s, several magazines and newsletters become part of
754-472: Was purchased from BT by Yahoo! on 28 October 2003, Masterton's commentary moved to Yahoo! Launch with it, remaining with the site as it transformed into Yahoo! Music UK and Ireland until the site's closure in September 2011. His chart column moved to About.com, where it remained until the summer of 2016. It finally moved to its own site Chart Watch UK where it has been a weekly fixture ever since. To coincide with
783-428: Was replaced as chief executive by Jon Steinberg . In April 2023, the company sold its shooting magazines including Shooting Times and Sporting Gun to Fieldsports Press. In August 2024, the company announced that its American trade papers Broadcasting & Cable and Multichannel News would be closing after more than 90 years, with the main title Broadcasting having been first published in 1931 and
812-519: Was replaced by Jon Steinberg . The company was founded by Chris Anderson as Future Publishing in Somerton, Somerset , England, with the sole magazine Amstrad Action in 1985. An early innovation was the inclusion of free software on magazine covers. It acquired GP Publications and established what would become Future US in 1994. Anderson sold the company to Pearson plc for £52.7m in 1994, but bought it back in 1998, for £142 million. The company
841-402: Was the writer of the section until he retired in March 2020, when Chart Watch UK writer James Masterton was hired to take over the role. Masterton wrote two weekly Charts Analysis pages for the website (as the magazine now features charts compiled from monthly sales and streams) until 29 October 2021, when Music Week staff performed the role. After Andre Paine and Ben Homewood wrote one each of
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