COMMENTARY:

I think I'm more pleased with the outcome of the albums chart than I am with the singles chart. There is no denying the fact that Plus One dominated the album chart this year. Obvious (#1) was easily the biggest album of the year, and no album even came close to the hold that this great pop record had. Kirk Franklin's The Rebirth of Kirk Franklin (#20) was the closest to matching it's longevity, but didn't land anywhere near Obvious, points or position wise.

There are 3 new artists who landed albums in the Top 10. Where Ronnie Freeman (#2) lagged in the singles department in comparison to Paul Alan (#3), he definely made up for on the album chart. Even though Alan spent a massive 5 weeks on top of the chart in the earlier part of the year, Freeman, who only spent one week at #1, spent 9 weeks longer on the chart. Shane Barnard & Shane Everett's (#6) was another album that really faired extremely well. In any other year, it probably would have been the New Artist album to beat, but unfortunately, it was outshined by both Freeman and Alan's freshman offerings. Other notable New Artist albums were Jody McBrayer's This Is Who I Am (#12), Inside the Outside's self-titled project (#16), and Jeremy Camp's Stay (#17). (New Artists on the Album chart are not defined the same as they are on the singles chart).

Ginny Owens (#11) and Rachael Lampa (#14) both delivered somewhat disappointing albums, and thus disappointing positions on the end scale. While they aren't terrible spots by any stretch of the matter, it was predicted that they would be the albums to beat this year. Yet that was far from reality.

By the Tree's These Days (#9) was the true shocker. I'm totally happy that it popped into the Top 10 without going #1, it was a fantastic album, and just barely missed the top spot because of other albums (much like Jeremy Camp's Stay).

Unfortunately, as every year shows, those albums that were released later always get lower rankings, despite being some of my favorites for the year. Tree63 (#29), MercyMe (#30), Superchick (#38), Owens' Blueprint EP (#39), Lifehouse (#41), and Phil Joel (#44) are the albums that I wish would've released earlier. They were some of the best albums released this year.

There were 25 #1 albums, of which 14 of them spent more than 1 week at #1.

TOP ARTISTS OF 2002
SINGLES COMMENTARY

HOW ARE YEAR END CHARTS COMPILED?
The year end charts are compiled by a true mathematical formula. It's really not that confusing, but I like to make it look like I am smarter than I am. Every week, the Top 50 Songs are given a numerical point value in inverse order, in other words, if a song ranks #1 for the week, it receives 50 points, #2 receives 49 points, #3 receives 48 points, etc. all the way down to #50, which receives 1 point for the week. At the end of the year, I add up all the points, and the songs with the most points make up the Top 150 for the year.

However, I do give some songs bonuses. If a song goes #1, it recieves 15 bonus points. This is my way of rewarding a song for going #1, which not every song does. So if a song goes #1 for 2 weeks, it receives 30 extra points, etc. So in actuality, a #1 song actually gets 65 points instead of only 50. So since "Camouflage" claimed 2weeks at #1, it claimed 30 bonus points, in addition to the points which it incurred during its stay on the chart.

 

PP Peak position on the chart
WO= # of Weeks song has charted