Faker it til you make it
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Chart topper … Chet Faker has edged out INXS to take top spot on the ARIA charts.
Source: Supplied
MELBOURNE musician Chet Faker has hit No. 1 in Australia outselling INXS by nearly four to one.
This week’s ARIA chart has also seen rock veteran Russell Morris score his highest chart debut to date.
Faker’s debut album Built on Glass easily topped the Australian chart with an impressive 16,074 sales.
INXS’s The Very Best sold 4851 copies at No.2. Sales are so low in Australia at the moment that figure is actually 137 copies more than what INXS’s album sold to make No. 1 last week.
Chet Faker has built up a strong live following here and internationally, and received major support from Triple J and community radio for Built on Glass.
Faker’s success has been achieved on indie label Future Classic, who previously topped the chart with electronic artist Flume (whose album also featured Faker on guest vocals).
Faker’s first release, mini-album Thinking in Textures, is at No. 43 this week.
Faker’s sales nearly matched the year’s highest — INXS sold over 22,000 copies the week their Never Tear Us Apart mini-series was watched by several million Australians.
Australian music icon Russell Morris has continued his career second wind, scoring his highest-charting album to date this week.
Resurgence … Russell Morris’ Van Diemen’s Land is the highest-debuting album of his career.
Source: Supplied
Morris’ album Van Diemen’s Land has entered at No.4. Last year’s Sharkmouth peaked at No. 6 and at the time became his first Top 10 album in a career that began in 1966.
“Russell’s success is even more impressive when you consider Chet Faker is the very cool Triple J darling and Russell has had little to no airplay,” Paul Cashmere of music website Noise 11 said.
“Russell had the biggest selling original Australian album of 2013, so that fanbase kicked in to generate a No. 4 debut, which is the highest debut album he’s had in his nearly 50 years making music.”
Morris scoring a Top 5 album in 2014 is also proof Australians will still buy new, original material from artists considered ‘heritage’.
Van Diemen’s Land is the second in his trilogy of blues albums written about Australian characters or episodes from our history.
The Voice’s Harrison Craig sees his second covers album L.O.V.E debut at No. 5, unable to match the No. 1 debut of his post-show album last July.
However Craig’s album will be heavily promoted in the lead up to Mothers’ Day, traditionally one of the biggest sales periods for music in the year.
Another Voice contestant, Rachael Leahcar, enters at No. 38 with her Beatles covers album Here Comes The Sun selling just 693 copies nationally; her previous two covers albums both went Top 10. She will also be hoping to pick up some Mothers’ Day sales over the coming weeks.
There are six Australian albums in this week’s ARIA Top 10 — Faker, INXS, Russell Morris, Harrison Craig, Dan Sultan and John Butler Trio.
Chart success … Jessica Mauboy has scored her seventh Top 10 single with Never Be the Same. Picture: Mark Stewart
Source: News Corp Australia
The singles chart has five Australian tracks in the Top 10 — including Sheppard scoring a second week at No. 1 with Geronimo, which has now reached gold accreditation for 35,000 sales.
Sia’s Chandelier also jumps to No. 2 — both Australian acts are also on independent labels.
Jessica Mauboy also scores her seventh Top 10 single in Australia with Never Be the Same bulleting to No.6.
The success of the single has also seen Mauboy’s album Beautiful jump from No. 17 to No. 42.
However it has been a ruthless week for The Used, Tim Campbell and Marcia Hines — their albums which debuted in the ARIA chart last week have now dropped out of the Top 100 completely just seven days later.
