Guinness World Records, known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as The Guinness Book of Records and in previous United States editions as The Guinness Book of World Records, is a British reference book published annually, listing world records both of human achievements and the extremes of the natural world. The brainchild of Sir Hugh Beaver, the book was co-founded by twin brothers Norris and Ross McWhirter in Fleet Street, London, in August 1955.
British Hit Singles & Albums was a music reference book originally published in the United Kingdom by the publishing arm of the Guinness breweries, Guinness Superlatives. Later editions were published by HiT Entertainment. It listed all the singles and albums featured in the Top 75 pop charts in the UK. In 2004 the book became an amalgamation of two earlier Guinness publications, originally known as British Hit Singles and British Hit Albums. The publication of this amalgamation ceased in 2006, with Guinness World Records being sold to The Jim Pattison Group, owner of Ripley's Believe It or Not!. At this point, the Official UK Charts Company teamed up with Random House/Ebury Publishing to release a new version of the book under the Virgin Books brand. Entitled The Virgin Book of British Hit Singles, it was first published in November 2008 with a separate albums book and second edition being published over the next couple of years.
Paul Louis Hardcastle is a British composer, musician, producer, songwriter, radio presenter and multi-instrumentalist. He is best known for his song "19", which went to number 1 in the UK Singles Chart in 1985.
Jo Jo Gunne was an American rock band formed in Los Angeles, California, United States, in 1971 by Jay Ferguson and Mark Andes after they had left the rock band Spirit. The band was named after the Chuck Berry song "Jo Jo Gunne". The band released their eponymous debut album in 1972 and had a top 10 hit song "Run Run Run" in the UK. They released three further albums before disbanding in 1974. They reunited in 2005 for a time to record a fifth album Big Chain.
Fat Larry's Band was an American R&B and funk band from Philadelphia, which enjoyed some commercial success in the late 1970s and early 1980s, particularly in the United Kingdom.
The Official Albums Chart, previously the UK Albums Chart, is a list of albums ranked by sales and audio streaming in the United Kingdom. It was published for the first time on 22 July 1956 and is compiled every week by the Official Charts Company (OCC) on Fridays. It is broadcast on BBC Radio 1 and found on the OCC website as a Top 100 or on UKChartsPlus as a Top 200, with positions continuing until all sales have been tracked in data only available to industry insiders. However, even though number 100 was classed as a hit album in the 1980s until January 1989, since the compilations were removed, this definition was changed to Top 75 with follow-up books such as The Virgin Book of British Hit Albums book only including this data. As of 2021, the OCC still only tracks how many UK Top 75s album hits and how many weeks in Top 75 albums chart each artist has achieved.
The UK Singles Chart is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-selling singles in the United Kingdom, based upon physical sales, paid-for downloads and streaming. The Official Chart, broadcast on BBC Radio 1 and MTV, is the UK music industry's recognised official measure of singles and albums popularity because it is the most comprehensive research panel of its kind, today surveying over 15,000 retailers and digital services daily, capturing 99.9% of all singles consumed in Britain across the week, and over 98% of albums. To be eligible for the chart, a single is currently defined by the Official Charts Company (OCC) as either a 'single bundle' having no more than four tracks and not lasting longer than 25 minutes or one digital audio track not longer than 15 minutes with a minimum sale price of 40 pence. The rules have changed many times as technology has developed, the most notable being the inclusion of digital downloads in 2005 and streaming in July 2014.
B.E.F. was a band/production company formed by former Human League members Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh which became largely eclipsed by its best-known project, Heaven 17.
David James McAleer is the main contributor for the Virgin Book of British Hit Singles, The Virgin Book of British Hit Albums and the Virgin Book of Top 40 Charts, and was the sole Music Consultant for the Guinness World Records between 1998 and 2011. McAleer is currently the OCC to the Official Charts Company. He was the Chief Consultant/Contributor for the Guinness Book of British Hit Singles & Albums for nine years, and has written or co-written over forty published music books.
Colin Larkin is a British writer. He founded, and was the editor-in-chief of, the Encyclopedia of Popular Music. Along with the ten-volume encyclopedia, Larkin also wrote the book All Time Top 1000 Albums, and edited the Guinness Who's Who of Jazz, the Guinness Who's Who of Blues, and the Virgin Encyclopedia of Heavy Rock. He has over 650,000 copies in print to date.
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music is an encyclopedia created in 1989 by Colin Larkin. It is the "modern man's" equivalent of the Grove Dictionary of Music, which Larkin describes in less than flattering terms. It was described by The Times as "the standard against which all others must be judged".
Rozalla Miller, better known as simply Rozalla, is a Zimbabwean electronic music performer who was born in what was then Northern Rhodesia. At the age of 18, she moved with her parents to her father's country of origin, Zimbabwe. She is best known for her three 1991/92 hit singles "Faith ", "Are You Ready To Fly", and particularly "Everybody's Free ", which has been remixed and re-issued several times. In December 2016, Billboard magazine ranked her as the 98th most successful dance artist of all-time.
