Ella Langley Ties the Longest No.1 in Hot 100 History
The week of September 14–20, 2026 produced the chart fact everyone had been waiting on since July. Ella Langley’s Choosin’ Texas took a 22nd week at No.1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and drew level with the longest run the chart has ever recorded. Everything this site published in the same seven days was made between 1972 and 1985, or last month.
Last week we said the record was one frame away and left it there rather than call it. It arrived on the chart dated September 19, announced on September 14, and it arrived alongside something the previous seven days had not produced: Langley back on top of the album chart in the same week.
The charts
United States. One artist held both charts at once. Choosin’ Texas logged week 22 at No.1, matching Mariah Carey’s All I Want for Christmas Is You, which needed seven Decembers between 2019 and 2026 to build the same total; Langley has done it in a single stretch since February. Stella Lefty’s Boston held at No.2, Taylor Swift’s I Knew It, I Knew You at No.3, and Langley’s own Be Her climbed 10-9. On the same chart date Dandelion returned to No.1 on the Billboard 200 with 67,000 units, its third week on top after April 25 and May 2. Then Sunday’s chart took the album half away from her: Jhené Aiko’s Westside Whimsy debuts at No.1 with 74,000 units, her first leader 12 years and 10 months after her chart debut, and the first R&B album by a woman to top the Billboard 200 since SZA’s SOS in May 2025.
Europe. Britain spent the week ignoring the record everyone else was watching. Choosin’ Texas sat at No.2 on the Official Singles Chart published September 18, held off by Sienna Spiro’s Great Expectation for a second straight week and an eleventh week on the chart overall — the 20-year-old Londoner also has Die On This Hill back up at No.10 in its 49th week. Langley’s single is at 37 weeks in Britain, sixteen longer than its American run, for a song that has never led there. Underneath them the chart barely turns over: Sam Fender and Olivia Dean’s Rein Me In is at No.7 in week 66, Dean’s Man I Need at No.8 in week 57, and Dua Lipa’s 2024 single Training Season climbed 7-5 in its 19th week after a viral revival. Half the British top ten has been on it for the better part of a year.
Global. The biggest song in the world took nine months to reach the American top 10. Karol G’s Bby Wow, with Judeline and rusowsky, topped the Billboard Global 200 on the chart dated September 12, and only this week jumped to No.10 on the Hot 100. A Spanish-language record can now lead every territory Luminate measures and still be the tenth-biggest song in the one that publishes the famous chart.
This week in music
BTS returned to the iHeartRadio Music Festival in Las Vegas on September 18–19, six years after their last appearance, on a bill with Cardi B, Snoop Dogg, Muse, Weezer, LE SSERAFIM and Zara Larsson *** Shakira opened a 12-date Madrid residency on September 18, her first Spanish shows in eight years *** Céline Dion climbed onto a car in a Paris street the same evening and sang Pour que tu m’aimes encore with the crowd that gathered *** Sheryl Crow received the BMI Troubadour Award in Nashville on September 14, with Olivia Rodrigo, Chris Stapleton, Melissa Etheridge and Jason Isbell performing in her honor *** Ed Sheeran apologized from the stage in Philadelphia on September 19 for his handling of Macklemore’s removal as an opening act, after other support acts withdrew from the tour *** Nickelback released the video for Leave Me Behind on September 15, five weeks ahead of Everything Under The Sun *** Miley Cyrus and ROSÉ both featured in the week’s new-release coverage *** David Bowie’s The Shel Talmy Recordings arrived September 18, collecting the 1965 sessions with Jimmy Page and Nicky Hopkins *** Bob Seger’s Face the Promise returned the same day in an expanded edition carrying four new songs *** The Grateful Dead’s Summer Magic 1985 landed as a 20-disc live box *** Hole’s first three albums returned to vinyl *** Europe’s Scandinavian Eyes appeared in Classic Rock’s Tracks of the Week on September 14, alongside The War on Drugs and Airbourne.
The people
Duncan Sheik — born November 18, 1969; died September 17, 2026.
His family had posted two days earlier that he was in critical but stable condition, and he had put up a photograph of himself in a hospital bed on September 6. Barely Breathing reached only No.16 on the Hot 100 in 1996 and then refused to leave it for 55 weeks, which is the kind of chart run that makes a song feel like a No.1 to everyone who lived through it. He was nominated for a Grammy and then spent a decade getting out of the record business, writing the music for Spring Awakening with Steven Sater. That show won eight Tony Awards, two of them his, and put Lea Michele and Jonathan Groff on a Broadway stage for the first time. A revival of it and a new Sheik musical are both due to begin performances Off Broadway in the coming weeks, and both are going ahead.
The week also carries two of the heaviest dates in the calendar. Jimi Hendrix died in London on September 18, 1970, at 27. Jim Croce died in a plane crash outside Natchitoches, Louisiana on September 20, 1973, at 30, the day after finishing a show and with I Got a Name unreleased. B.B. King was born September 16, 1925, and Hank Williams on September 17, 1923 — two men who never shared a stage and between them built most of what American popular music sounds like. Cass Elliot was born September 19, 1941, and Brian Epstein on September 19, 1934, seven years apart to the day. Among the living: Morten Harket turned 67 on September 14, Kenny Jones 78 and Richard Marx 63 on September 16, and Frankie Avalon 86 on September 18.
New at Music Videos Club
Eleven stories this week, and an unusual number of them are current. Nickelback – Leave Me Behind went up the day the RIAA’s September certifications and a brand-new video collided, and MILEY – Let’s Get Married, Luke Bryan, Luke Combs – Finders Keepers, Carly Rae Jepsen – Versailles and Linda Perry – What Lies With You are all records you can still hear on the radio.
The rest is the usual business. Bill Withers – Ain’t No Sunshine was a B-side by a man still assembling toilet seats for airliners when he cut it. T. Rex – Children Of The Revolution came out the same year and went to No.2 in Britain without ever appearing on a T. Rex studio album. Eric Clapton – I Shot The Sheriff gave Clapton his only American No.1 with somebody else’s song. Stevie Ray Vaughan – Tin Pan Alley is eleven minutes of slow blues from the Capitol Theatre in 1985, and Bon Jovi – Someday I’ll Be Saturday Night is a song written about hitting bottom by a band that had not. Sandra – Maria Magdalena is the one to start with: German radio would not play it in July 1985, so Virgin sold it to tourists in Greece and let them carry it home to nine No.1s. That is the story behind the song, which is the only thing this site does.
