RAYE is on track for her first-ever UK Number 1 single, as independent hit Escapism. rebounds into the spotlight in the post-Christmas shake-up to lead the way to the first chart topper of 2023.
As all the festive tracks that have dominated the Official Singles Chart drop out this week, newly independent artist RAYE reaps the benefit as her streaming hit Escapism. rises twelve places midweek, putting her on course to clinch the top spot for the first time in her career. Featuring experimental electronic producer and singer 070 Shake, the track previously peaked at Number 2 in December.
Since her first chart appearance featuring on Jonas Blue’s By Your Side in 2016, singer-songwriter RAYE has notched up a string of 10 Top 40 hits, four of which landed in the Top 10, but the Number 1 spot has escaped her. After publicly parting ways with her major label in 2022, could RAYE be about to go all the way on her own terms this Friday?
Speaking exclusively to OfficialCharts.com, Raye said: “It would be beyond a dream to be Number 1. With this song? At this time in my life? Don’t!”
RAYE previously logged Top 10 hits with You Don’t Know Me with Jax Jones (3), Secrets with Regard (6) and Bed with Joel Corry & David Guetta (3).
Raye’s closest competition for Number 1 is US R&B siren SZA, whose new single Kill Bill looks set to vault 30 places to become her first solo UK Top 10 hit (2). The star, born Solana Rowe, could also land a further two Top 40 entries this week with SOS tracks Shirt (26) and Nobody Gets Me (28).
Also on course to reach new peaks this week are Central Cee with Let Go (3), Rema’s Calm Down (4), and Bugzy Malone & TeeDee with Out of Nowhere (5) which would mark both acts’ first Top 10 hit.
Metro Boomin’, The Weeknd and 21 Savage’s team-up Creepin’ gains new ground, shuffling up to potentially reach the upper echelons of the chart for the first time (8).
Outside the Top 10, Lewis Capaldi’s Pointless is up for a new peak (11), as are Tiësto & Tate McRae with their frantic dance track 10:35 (15).
Following a series of viral fan videos attached to the new Netflix Wednesday series, Lady Gaga’s 2011 Born This Way album track Bloody Mary could enter the Top 40 for the first time (16), and Dean Lewis’s How Do I Say Goodbye might also break the Top 20 (20).
Two viral tracks are also set to reach new heights this week; JVKE’s Golden Hour (23), and American singer-songwriter Stephen Sanchez’s Until I Found You (32), originally released in 2021 but now due to enter the Top 40 for the first time.
Further down, Headie One’s 50s makes moves towards a new peak (35) and there could be a massive new re-entry for Whitney Houston’s classic 1987 Number 1 I Wanna Dance With Somebody (36) which gains new ground, thanks to the release of the biopic of the same name starring Naomi Ackie as Houston.
The Killers’ Mr Brightside (37) could return to the Top 40 for the first time in nine years, currently at Number 37; the record-breaking song has spent over six and a half years in total in the Official Singles Chart Top 100 thanks to its evergreen popularity on streaming services.
American rapper Lil Uzi Vert looks set to gain his first Top 40 hit in nearly three years with Just Wanna Rock (39) and finally, Pink’s Never Gonna Not Dance Again also heads for the Top 40 (40).
