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On the week end 26 December 2009, " Killing in the Name" by Rage Against the Machine became the fastest-selling download of all time. The single with the longest stay on the Downloads Chart is " Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley, which stayed the top spot for 11 weeks. By 2007, the UK had become Europe's largest consumer of online music, with almost 78 million tracks being downloaded that year – by 2012 this figure had more than doubled. The first album to top the chart was This New Day by English alternative rock band Embrace. In April 2006, the UK Official Download Chart was expanded to include an album chart. Sales of downloaded singles were finally incorporated into the UK Singles Chart on 17 April 2005, initially on the condition that physical copies were available to buy at the same time. The group topped the chart with a live version of their 1999 single " Flying Without Wings", a move that UK chart commentator James Masterton branded a "stunt". After this ten-week period, the UK Official Download Chart was launched on 1 September 2004, with Irish boy band Westlife achieving the first official number one. A "sample" download chart was trialled for 10 weeks, with the first number one being " Bam Thwok" by American rock band Pixies.
Īs a result of this growth, the OCC were commissioned in 2004 to compile a new music chart based solely on the UK's download sales, which was initially sponsored by Coca-Cola. The following year, the UK's online music revenue reached GB£42.1 million. Conversely, the music download market was growing considerably: during the same 2004–05 period, sales of downloads grew by 743%, and overtook physical sales in December 2004. One year later, a limited edition re-release of " One Night" / " I Got Stung" by Elvis Presley topped the chart with 22,000 copies, making it the lowest selling number-one single at that time.
By the start of 2004, they had dropped to their lowest level in over 35 years, with singles needing to sell only 35,000 copies to reach number one. From the late 1990s onwards, these sales began to significantly decline. Before the inauguration of the download chart, only sales of physical formats-such as CD, vinyl and cassette tape-contributed towards a single's position on the UK music charts.