It is for most performers the ultimate dream. Something which marks them out as something particularly special, yet at the same time is not so out of reach as to be a wild unattainable fantasy. Selling a million copies of a record, any record. For years it has been a badge of honour for any track, so much so in fact that before the totals were revised down in 1989, the only way to be awarded a Platinum disc for a single release was to ship a million copies of it. In the near 60 year history of the British charts, just 110 different singles have been officially noted to have sold a seven figure total, their numbers swelled just this last week by ‘Party Rock Anthem’ by LMFAO.

LMFAO’s accolade comes just a couple of weeks after million seller #109 was announced to the world, as ‘Moves Like Jagger’ by Maroon 5 and Christina Aguilera inched over the line to be officially certified as having shifted seven figures worth of product. I noted in many places online that this made it one of just a small handful of singles to have reached the magical figure without actually having topped the charts. For years this was the rarest of rare things, famously just one record in chart history had officially topped a million whilst peaking at Number 2, but since then the numbers have grown. Just how many are there? Five, I thought, starting a mad mental scramble to name them all.

Yet I wasn’t actually correct, because there are a handful more.

The waters of “total sales” are these days rather muddied thanks to the effectively constant availability of singles to be purchased. Back in the days when records dropped out of the charts, copies ceased to be pressed and stocks dried up it was possible to call a definitive halt to brand new sales of a record and thus tot up its final total. In the 21st century a single is theoretically available forever, and indeed many older singles whose sales had previously ground to a halt are suddenly finding themselves revived either as brief high end chart hits, or as catalogue product which continually bubbles under.

Therefore we should really draw a distinction between the singles which sold a million during their “regular” shelf-life (or inside a year in the case of more recent hits) and those which have crept over the line some time after their initial success. With that in mind then, this I hope is what is at the time of writing the definitive list of “unsuccessful” singles which have sold one million copies in the UK:

Last Christmas – Wham!

Total UK sale: 1,601,000

For a great many years it was famously the only single ever to sell a million copies and miss the top of the charts (although see below), this thanks to circumstances given that it spent the Christmas period at the end of 1984 locked at Number 2 behind the original Band Aid single. Although it easily passed the million mark during its original chart run, the single has also added to its total with a re-release the following year (upon which it made the Top 10 again) plus naturally an annual topping up of its total as it returns for a brief chart run as a seasonal download.

Stranger On The Shore – Acker Bilk

Total UK sale: 1,145,000

Now this is an interesting one. For years this 1961 single simply did not figure in countdowns of the biggest sellers of all time, the difficulty in pinning down exact sales for singles from that particular era just one of the reasons behind this. I don’t think it was until ten years ago when an attempt was made to compile a definitive list of the all-time biggest sellers in time for the 50th anniversary of the singles chart that it was noticed that the haunting jazz instrumental could be certified as having sold seven figures, and so into the best sellers list it went. It should therefore be noted that Acker Bilk actually beat Wham! to the honour of selling a million copies of a Number 2 single some two decades before they became the “first” to pull off the trick. Before then ‘Stranger On The Shore’ was at least notable for what used to be the longest unbroken chart run of all time, clocking up 55 weeks on the Top 50 chart without a break. All without being downloaded once.

Blue Monday – New Order

Total UK sale: 1,125,000

Another retrospective addition to the list as it is only possible to arrive at this total by adding up the three separate chart runs of the classic single. Its two spells on the Top 40 in 1983 were enough to make it the 18th best seller of 1983, whilst the Arthur Baker remix which saw it released as a seven-inch single for the first time in 1988 made it the 57th best seller that year. A further re-release in the summer of 1995 has further added to the number, yet for all that the single has never climbed higher than a peak of Number 3.

Ghostbusters – Ray Parker Jnr

Total UK sale: 1,080,000

A single which is contemporaneous with the Wham! track but which was actually only awarded its seven figure honour some years later. A Number 2 hit in September 1984, the track memorably dropped out of the Top 40 just prior to Christmas that year only to gain second wind as the popularity of the film for which it was written steadily grew. This led to a renewed burst of interest which saw the track return to the Top 10 early in the new year. For years its sales held film until the arrival of the download era which saw it become one of a handful of “ghostly” themed singles which ensured it shifts a couple of thousand more copies every October.  Add these to its original 1984 total and it is an easy million seller.

Torn – Natalie Imbruglia

Total UK sale: 1,075,000

Another latecomer to the party and a prime beneficiary of the download era. Natalie Imbruglia’s most famous hit, a cover of a Scandinavian single which had been doing the rounds for some years beforehand, the track peaked at Number 2 in November 1997. By the end of that year it had sold an impressive 810,000 copies, adding a further 157,000 in 1998 to take it to 967,000 copies in total. The 99,000 it has added since have all been as a result of downloaded sales over the last seven years.

Angels – Robbie Williams

Total UK sale: 1,060,000

Robbie’s most famous single was never a Number One you will note, its eventual chart peak being a mere Number 4 in February 1998. Released at the very back end of 1997 it had shifted 340,000 by the end of that calendar year, adding 467,000 in the following one. Total in its first chart run then, 807,000 which has since been topped up thanks to a constant demand for it to soundtrack funerals and weddings. Nobody listens to this dirge for fun surely?

Wonderwall – Oasis

Total UK sale: 1,050,000

Another track which spread the love across two calendar years initially, the bulk of its sales coming in 1995 when the ballad first peaked at Number 2. 653,000 units of the single were sold by December 31st that year, the track remaining available throughout 1996 when it added 270,000 to its total. Thus it was never going to take much for it to reach seven figures from a starting point of 923,000 and as Oasis’ most famous single ever, it seems certain to steadily add to that total for some time to come.

Love The Way You Lie – Eminem and Rihanna

Total UK sale: undetermined, but was confirmed to be over a million during 2011

The biggest selling single of 2010 is famously the only track ever to outsell all others in a calendar year without ever topping the charts, the track peaking at Number 2 in the summer of that year but hanging around the the Top 10 until well into October. We can argue until the cows come home whether this counts as a single which topped a million during its initial chart life – the track was only confirmed as having reached seven figures during October 2011, 15 months after it was first released.

Moves Like Jagger – Maroon 5 featuring Christina Aguilera

…which is where we came in, the smash hit single selling its millionth copy over the Christmas period after just five months on the charts. Before the holiday it was also reported that Fairytale Of New York had been confirmed as a million seller too, but I think this was based on a miscalculation of its original 1987 sale as the claim has now been withdrawn. Best estimates are that it is about 100,000 copies short, a gap it should theoretically make up over the next couple of years if its popularity remains undimmed.

So it is confirmed. As of January 2012 there are nine of the (so far) 110 million selling singles which never actually topped the charts, of which three (or possibly four) did so during their first chart runs, the rest nipping over the line with downloads or as a result of re-releases some years later.

For those curious, the next million seller is likely to be one of either ‘Price Tag’ or ‘We Found Love’. The Jessie J single ended the year just 19,000 copies short, but may need a boost from something like the Brit awards or a talent show performance to edge over the line ahead of the Rihanna track, currently sitting pretty on about 933,000 sales but for the moment adding to them still to the tune of about 20,000 copies a week. Both, you will note are Number One singles. As for lower charting hits ‘The A Team’ and ‘Rolling In The Deep’ both have 800,000 sales to their name at the present time, but at their present rate it will be a long haul to cross the line.