Weekender : it's all Sean Rowley's fault this week

CHART OF DARKNESS: So yeah, Meck Featuring Leo Sayer goes to number one and suddenly it's seen as a big comeback for the bepermed funk-disco pariah. Nobody claimed there was a Steve Winwood revival going on last year but sure enough, here comes the repromoted Best Of. Gilbert O'Sullivan must be frantically calling his publishers day and night at the moment. BIG two, Ordinarys three, You Got The Love seems to attract new listeners with every release at 7, Fall Out Boy finally get the big hit over and done with at 8, Kubb prove the Travis-Coldplay-Keane-Athlete declining funnel of indie-MOR can bottom out yet at 18 and Antony Costa finds his reality show thunder long stolen at 19. The Alarm, now The Alarm MMVI doubtless for legal reasons, enter at 24, a position that puts that Poppyfields nonsense from a couple of years back into perspective, Bullet For My Valentine inevitably have a single out this week but not even the commercial track can lift them above 29, the quite decent for deep south crunk crips Three 6 Mafia are at 33 and the quite rubbish for everything El Presidente steal in at 39. Tatu pay the price for having Sting and Dave Stewart on one song and enter at 48, the Ying Yang Twins continue to find the country politely looking the other way at 49 and Mew's 12 track single somehow doesn't prohibit them from racking up a number 53. Stasis is the album chart watchword with Blunt back at 2 behind you know who while Clarkson returns to the top ten and Mathis keeps a'climbing, while Belle & Sebastian's extended tribute to Guilty Pleasures production values is the highest new entry at 8. Johnny Cash unsurprisingly still climbs, this week at 11, while also entering are Chris Brown at 29 (one below a prematurely accelerating Take That), another Elvis compilation at 39, Sway's giveaway This Is My Demo at 45, Ashlee Simpson - who knew Clarkson would have copyists so quickly? - at 50, a heartening appearance for Sparks at 66 and, remarkably, a third Jack Johnson album. Imagine how he'll sell when someone notices.

FREE MUSIC: Coldcut's new album Sound Mirrors still finds them plotting no course but their own through glitch techno, laptop acoustics and, on True Skool, Roots Manuva-helped party hip hop.

BARGAIN HUNT: Clearly loathe to give up on a good thing just yet, the HMV sale has regenerated into a just slightly different form, one that's giving REM's two best major label albums, Green and Out Of Time, away for £4.99.

HEY YOU GET OFFA MYSPACE: You may know J Xaverre's backstory already, the drummer off Kenickie and brother of her off CD:UK making laptop Sparklehorse-meets-Manitoba/Caribou-meets-LA psychedelia on corking 2003 debut These Acid Stars. There's previews of his next album, ETA late spring, up now and properly downloadable, which throw the Shins and nu-folk into the mix.

VISUAL REPRESENTATION: Devo do Jocko Homo on Saturday Night Live in 1979, with Booji Boy and General Boy 'explaining' all at the start.

BLOG ROLLING: The Polyphonic Spree have wedged back into the studio, The Fragile Army following their progress through various members' own words, including guest pianist and longtime Bowie associate Mike Garson.

EVERYBODY GET RANDOM: WFMU's Beware Of The Blog is the gift that keeps on giving. Giving in this case, Shut Up and Play Volume One - Forgettable Moments on Stage, a collection of live banter of a slightly disturbing stripe, including the fabled Fall onstage fight in New York (speaking of which, they were on Radio 3's Mixing It the other night - get it while it's still on Listen Again) and assorted 'distracted' musings of Morrison, Love, Presley etc.

IN SHOPS TOMORROW ADDENDUM: A forthcoming Hefner compilation might just earn Darren Hayman the songwriting credit he deserves, but until then there's his debut commercially available album Table For One.

IN OTHER NEWS: The final Smash Hits is out now, and if it's the same one we saw in WH Smith today it comes with a free notebook and polka dot design pen, promises 'Secret Celeb Snogs!' as the main cover feature and makes a big thing of McFly's pecs. And EMAP wonder how it all went so wrong.