Ever since the sales of records were monitored, fans have eagerly awaited the new music chart, showing the positions of their favorite artists each week. There are the general charts and sub genres for country music, classical and R & B. It's always been more of a challenge to achieve a number one hit on the American Billboard than a UK number one and British artists have always had Billboard success as a goal.

Times have changed and the music media has had to adapt to people's changing habits. Shows that present the hits of the day have fallen out of favor, as audiences prefer TV and radio that specializes in a certain type of music. The MTV generation can pick and choose from numerous channels and not simply watch a rundown of the latest music chart.

Downloading from the Internet is having a big impact on the sales from record stores. The recent number one UK hit, Crazy from Gnarls Barclay was the result of downloads sales alone. The Arctic Monkeys, a British guitar band, achieved success through the MySpace web site and had the biggest selling debut album of UK history. It's not that the music chart is no longer important, but it's being formulated in a different way. After dragging their heels, the compilers had to take legal downloading into account.

Many artists want to get the Christmas number one. These are the songs that everyone remembers and repeat plays are very lucrative. The UK band Slade still lives off the profits from their yuletide hit. There are some classics brought out for a spin at this time of year, including John and Yoko's Merry Christmas, War Is Over and the Pogue's Fairytale of New York, featuring Kirsty McColl. There have also been some festive offerings, best not remembered.

Controversy has sometimes involved the music industry and some disk jockeys have been cited for payola. This is when a presenter has taken a bribe to play a certain record, in order to push it up the music chart. Every now and then, the question is asked as to how accurate the charts are. Artists don't have to sell as many copies to get that coveted number one spot now but there is more competition than existed in the 1960s and 1970s era.

Many performers focus on the album charts and don't bother much with the sale of singles. Mega stars like Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd filled huge stadiums without much success through the singles music chart. The Beatles were successful in both, notably having the top five places on the singles chart in the US when they broke in America. We shall not see that happen again!