Every Single Number One from 2023: Ranked
Another year of music has passed by and brought us many more viral hits, beautiful ballads, and bangers we have sung our hearts out to. This year there have been 16 number-one singles from both male and female artists.
From a mixture of hip hop and UK Rap to pop bops to even remastered classics, there wasn’t any genre that didn’t hitting the UK charts this year. Grab your headphones and those reading glasses and dive in for our ranking of everyone’s number-one single from 2023!
Escapism. – Raye featuring 070 Shake
Raye opened the year with the R&B and Hip-Hop banger produced by Mike Sabbath. The single released in October 2022 as the third single from Raye’s debut album, My 21st Century Blues. The song spent a week at number one in January, landing Raye her first UK Number One.
Escapism immediately went viral on TikTok after a sped-up audio of the song was made. Aside from its viral potential, Escapism is our number one pick because of its real and raw meaning. The music video depicts the singer as she sings about being broken up with by the love of her life and using parties, drugs, and other people to distract herself from the pain. For many young women, it is a relatable and catchy reminder of pain from breakup’s past. It launched Raye into a larger international spotlight outside of the UK where she has been a successful artist for years and has won a few awards since its release. We are so proud of Raye!
Is it Over Now? (Taylor’s Version) – Taylor Swift
Is It Over Now is a vault track from Taylor Swift’s rerecorded 1989 album, which she released originally in 2014. 1989 was a transformative album for Taylor at the time, documenting her move to New York, and some of her highly-publicised dalliances with young One Direction members, and marked the beginning of her shift into the pop genre.
The electropop banger recalls moments from a relationship the megastar had with specific references to a certain snowmobile accident (in the lyrics red blood, white snow) and the aftermath of a failed relationship. The synth sound mirrors that of 1989 and feels faithful to a forgotten track of an era.
On top of the song’s beautiful production featuring Swift’s go-to Jack Antonoff is some intense lore that we Swifties find fascinating. Through her clever lyricism, it’s obvious that Is It Over Now is referencing Swift’s on-and-off again romance with One Direction band member Harry Styles. What is more iconic is upon the song entering the US Billboard Hot 100, Swift replaced herself on the chart! We conquer it deserved longer than a week at number one!
Dance the Night – Dua Lipa
Summer 2023 had all the girls dressed in pink waiting outside to see Barbie and learn the steps to that iconic disco dance scene. Dua Lipa’s song for the scene, Dance The Night is a pop masterpiece by Lipa who is notorious for blending elements of modernity with sounds of the 80s. It’s her fourth number-one single and has a whopping 570m streams on Spotify! To put it bluntly, the song is for the girls and the girls only. It teaches us to shake off our worries and dance the worries away, we wish it could be done in a Barbie Dreamhouse!
Production on the song is one of the strongest on the Barbie album, with a range of instruments creating an orchestra in the song’s instrumental. “Uptown Funk” producer Mark Ronson was part of the production process, which is automatically a win, and what a way to launch Lipa into a new era.
Olivia Rodrigo – Vampire
20-year-old Olivia Rodrigo has had a monumental two years with her highly successful angsty debut album Sour and now her sophomore pop rock album, GUTS. Vampire was the breakout single from the album and earned Olivia a UK number one in September.
She has always been strong with her single choices and Vampire demonstrates Rodrigo’s funky rock sound and continued image of an angsty young woman. The song was nominated for Best Pop Solo Performance at the Grammy’s and she described writing the song as an “out of body experience.”
Out of body is right in the details, as Vampire references gothic elements to the creature of the night, the vampire. “Bloodsucker”, “Bleeding me dry”, as if someone has metaphorically drained the life from her. Part of Vampire’s appeal is its mystery: who is Olivia referring to? There is speculation that the song is about either Rodrigo’s older ex-boyfriend Zack Bia, her rumoured ‘feud’ with Taylor Swift, or another ex-boyfriend Adam Faze. Either way, the song is a bop and even if we never know who it’s about, we will still blast it.
Strangers – Kenya Grace
Kenya Grace’s dancey drum and bass track Strangers represents a contemporary moment in British music where women are up and coming at a rapid rate and nobody is complaining about it! The debut single is a strong entry into the mainstream music world and immediately went viral on TikTok. Currently, there are 1.1 million views of the song’s sound on the app, and the young singer has earned over 370 million Spotify streams on Strangers.
While her voice and style somewhat resemble Pink Pantherss to me, the soft quality of it makes an otherwise synthy and upbeat instrumental feel mellow and easy to listen to.Not to mention Grace wrote the song herself and to have your debut go this viral with your name in the songwriting credits is an applause-worthy achievement!
Sprinter – Dave and Central Cee
Summer is always a season when the bangers come from left, right, and centre, and that’s what Sprinter is.Spending ten weeks at number one, this UK rap collab between some of the UK’s biggest talent was bound to blow up. Dave with his clever lyricism and quick delivery continues to give his signature bars and Central Cee joins in with his witty wordplay.
These elements make the song an internet hit, as it’s been streamed over 500 million times!
Aside from its lyricism, the song’s unique Latin-flavoured beat makes it feel like a quintessential summer track that anyone can enjoy, even if you don’t relate to the problem of having so many girls around that you need a literal Sprinter van to transport them to your location!
Eyes Closed – Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran returned in 2023 with a number album after a two-year gap from his mathematically themed albums with the “-“ album. Released in March 2023, it spent a week at number 1 in April. With Eyes Closed, you have to understand what Sheeran created: a folk-pop song about using distraction to mourn someone, dead or alive.
The beautiful element of the song and why it’s ranked is because of its context. The loss of a specific person is hinted at heavily by Sheeran throughout the song, this person was a long-time friend, British DJ and music entrepreneur Jamal Edwards, who died of a cardiac arrhythmia in February 2022.
The singer was interviewed about the loss and said he was “dancing with my eyes closed to try to get through it”, hence the heartbreaking song title. Changing the song’s meaning to fit with his tragedy gives the track a darker tone that is relatable to the sad parts of life nobody wants to talk about.
What Was I Made For? – Billie Eilish
Another entry from the Barbie soundtrack, the sad girl hours pop song written by Billie and her brother Finneas is the fourth single from the Barbie soundtrack. Its award-winning formula with producer Mark Ronson with Eilish’s soulful sweet-like honey vocals help in softening the blow of the sad girl hours listening experience!
For girls everywhere, What Was I Made For is a relatable gut punch of a song exploring the trials and tribulations of girl and womanhood in the lyrics, and the emotions that come with not knowing how you’re supposed to behave, act or simply live.
Barbie may’ve served as the literal subject of the song, but the beautiful thing about Eilish’s track is that women everywhere can interpret it as they wish and find personal meanings in the lyrics.
Last Christmas – Wham!
No matter how annoying the retail Christmas playlist is, Last Christmas resurfacing every year is a welcome reminder that Christmas is here. After song gained a lot of traction online again, different audios of the song were used in over 200,000 videos. The appeal of the song is primarily based on seasonality and nostalgia . We are transported back to being a kid with the song being played from your NOW That’s What I Call Music CD. Nowadays, Wham’s hit is useful as background noise for Christmas content on social media.
The 80s classic is never tired of Christmas enthusiasts, it seems to be only the Scrooges who despise it! Kidding, but seriously, any track written by George Michael is bound to be pop royalty. Its synth-pop sound encapsulates the wonder of Christmas from the sleigh bells looming in the background combined with a sad and slow sound to represent a heartbroken lover at Christmas time.
Now and Then – The Beatles
The Beatles’ resurgence is much welcomed and needed in 2023. It’s a magical soft rock ballad that John Lennon wrote and didn’t finish before he tragically died in 1980. For their fans, it is an ode to all they accomplished during their reign as rock legends.
As Paul McCartney continued to work on it, he took out John Lennon’s vocals from the original and put them into the new one to create something beautiful. Bittersweet is the only word to describe the song which makes ranking it so difficult. Existing earlier versions of the song were essentially restored to create something new and beautiful with additions by McCartney. Melancholic music lovers will be able to appreciate the timeless psychedelic rock sound with the vocals from the original four that those who grew up in the 60s and 70s know and love so much. Read our review of Now and Then.
Lovin on Me – Jack Harlow
Another viral hit entered the Jack Harlow discography when Harlow teased it on his TikTok in a video playing with his adorable dog. The music video currently has over 33 million views. The song has garnered over 137 million streams in a month since its release.
The rap track isn’t anything too impressive lyrically or melodically, but it is a track you can bop your head to. However, for those who love a flirty bounce track, Lovin on Me is a funky variation of that, complete with a sample from the 1995 R&B track, Whatever (Bass Solique) by Cadillac Dale.
Flowers – Miley Cyrus
We can buy ourselves flowers, but can we get a single song to stay at number one for ten weeks at the beginning of the new year? Probably not. Flowers was the lead single for Miley’s 2023 album Endless Summer Vacation. It’s an upbeat pop self-love track written and serves as an address to an ex-love, who the singer no longer needs to rely on.
Flowers broke countless streaming records and was Cyrus’ second US number one. Motivation is an integral part of the song’s appeal as it appears to be the story of someone who has reached a good place. It’s funky, fun, and feisty, but its overplayed nature on radio and online has somewhat ruined the song’s likeability.
Its subject, however, has kept people intrigued. Rumours swirled that the song was an address to Miley’s ex-husband, Hunger Games star Liam Hemsworth, given it was pettily released on his birthday, and the lyrics make specific reference to the Malibu Home the couple shared.
Either way, for the girlies out there who are feeling vengeful and independent after their relationships ended, playing this as the clock strikes midnight on January 1st might be just the way to get you feeling like yourself again.
Paint the Town Red – Doja Cat
Paint the Town Red from Doja Cat’s Scarlet album is a fun and fierce hip-hop track about feeling yourself and not listening to the criticisms, as Doja declares she “said what she said”, referencing arguments she had with fans online earlier this year.
The song would be great if it were not for the context behind it, where the comments made by fans to the 28-year-old were unjustified. However, considering that, a song that would otherwise be bold and badass falls flat in what it is supposed to represent.
Context aside, the production of the song is jazz-inspired and samples the beat from Dionne Warwick’s 60s hit Walk on By. We appreciate the song’s lyricism and attempt to tackle criticism head-on with a funky beat and unapologetic tone, but this song falls flat for us.
Wish You The Best – Lewis Capaldi
If you’re on social media, you would’ve heard the chorus of Wish You the Best on a sad TikTok video, and honestly, that’s the most memorable part of the song. It’s another case of the things you should’ve said to your past love and regrets about those things ending a relationship.
Capaldi puts his heart and soul into the song as he belts out ‘My Love’ as a piano plays in the background, and for that, it’s easy to blast on a Friday after work, a big glass of red in your hand, and your feelings in the other.
As a number one single, nothing stands out about it. It’s a great slow song and burns with undying passion, but that’s about it. The music video will probably make you feel more than playing this song through your Airpods, we believe.
Turning up the heat, why not play the music video and watch in agony as a tiny terrier dog sits in front of her owner’s grave and wonders where he is if you want to maximise the pain?
Pointless – Lewis Capaldi
Capaldi is the king of pop ballads in the UK, and this piano-driven track is another love letter to his songwriting abilities. With Ed Sheeran credited as a writer on the track, how could the song not be great lyrically|?
Exploring the little things he does for his love, the lyrics explore small acts of service that Capaldi performs to keep his love with him and why he does them. After all, without her, “everything is pointless”. Pointless was certified Gold and spent one week at number one in January.
More beautiful than the touching lyrics is the music video that tells the story of a struggling single mother trying to raise her son. Again, the song’s composition is lovely, but the same generic message of “it’s not worth doing without you”, is boring. Even if we didn’t interpret it that way, the same sentiment has been echoed a million times in movies and romance novels; we don’t need it again in a song!
Miracle – Calvin Harris and Ellie Goulding
Miracle is the song for an Ibiza club night and summertime, but after that holiday, it becomes pretty hard to listen to. The lyrics are cliché at best. Everyone knows that Ellie Goulding and Calvin Harris have had much stronger collaborations! I Need Your Love echoes similar lyrics with a stronger EDM sound. When a song lacks a good sound, everything else about it falls apart.
Despite the song’s generic electronic sound, it still managed to spend a total of eight weeks at number 1 on the charts, staying at number one for two weeks in mid-April and climbing back to number one in May for a staggering six weeks, so at least some people liked it!
