Taylor Swift’s ‘Folklore’ Outraces Fontaines D.C.’s ‘A Hero’s Death’ For U.K. Chart Title

The U.K. chart week was a game of two halves as Taylor Swift’s Folklore started slow but pulled away to snag a second successive week at No. 1.

Folklore fell to No. 3 in the first half of the week, with Irish rockers Fontaines D.C. looking well set for their first No. 1 with A Hero’s Death (Partisan).

However, Swift and her U.K. record company EMI changed the course of the race by bringing forward the release of Folklore on CD, and the LP dashed to the finish line in first position.

When all streams and sales were tallied up, Folklore finished 3,500 chart sales ahead of Fontaines D.C.’s second set, which starts at No. 2 on the Official U.K. Albums Chart and is the market-leader in vinyl sales.

Folklore is now Taylor’s longest-reigning No. 1 album in the U.K., according to the OCC, as her previous chart-topping albums, Red (2012), 1989 (2014), Reputation (2017) and Lover (2019) all held the chart crown for just one week.

Also bowing inside the Top 5 is Creeper’s Sex, Death & The Infinite Void (Roadrunner) at No. 5. It’s a new career high for the Southampton horror punk band, easily eclipsing the No. 17 best for their 2017 debut album Eternity In Your Arms.

Alanis Morissette bags her fifth Top 10 entry with her comeback album Such Pretty Forks In The Road (RCA), new at No. 8. Pretty Forks is the Canadian artist’s first appearance in the Top 10 since So-Called Chaos went to No. 8 in 2004.

Over on the Official U.K. Singles Chart, Joel Corry and MNEK’s “Head & Heart” (Asylum/Perfect Havoc) rules for a third week, clocking up 79,000 chart sales, including 9.5 million streams, according to the OCC.

That’s 24,000 sales ahead of the No. 2-ranked single, “Savage Love” (RCA) by Jawsh 685 & Jason Derulo.

Billie Eilish has the highest new entry of the current cycle with “My Future” (Interscope) starting at No. 7. It’s the Grammy-winning U.S. artist’s seventh U.K. Top 10.