So last night I finally took the bull by the horns and got stuck into some Chart analysis.

I have spent the last few days looking for that PERFECT set of Album chart data, and I realize that search could take me forever.

I want data that:

• covers a substantial timescale  – at least back to 1980 (beyond if possible)
• is not too detailed (i.e “of the year” as opposed to monthly or weekly – which would look cluttered as I’m covering such a  such a long time period)
• Gives a decent number of entries (ideally Top 40)

So, ideally I am looking for the end of year Album Charts from 1980 – 2010

Oh, and whilst the Official Charts Company has an amazing archive of retro album charts (here), it’s a NIGHTMARE to extract (although if I was any good at ScraperWiki I may be able to nail it) and is not available to send out (according to a recent email conversation with the OCC)

And I found it, here: Chart Archive – everyHit.com

The site has helpfully listed the Top selling albums for each year from the 60’s to the present day. The only downside is that it only provides the Top 10 albums, not the Top 40

(I have contacted the site to see if they have larger charts, I am awaiting a response)

Is this enough? Are the Top 10 selling albums of a year, a good enough representation of musical tastes?

I may make up for this, and use the time I am saving in having to processes a Top 40, by taking my research back to 1970.

——–

So last night I started  a MONSTER spreadsheet (I promise to make this available online as soon as possible)

I have still not decided fully on the DATA I wish to use so I’m doing as much process now, so I can decide which one works the best.

The left hand columns are the Top Ten albums from 1980 – 2010

I then marked each one, either No GUITAR, ACOUSTIC GUITAR or ELECTRIC GUITAR with a 1

I repeated this process for GENRE: (rock, dance, urban, pop, compilation, classical/choral/world)

I then created a similar table (in red) which generated the RANKING of each album (10 points for the number 1 album, 9 number 2 etc)

E.g.

1 x(11-chart position)  =ranking

If the square had no “1”entry the calculation would = 0

I then created a series of other tables which colalted each years results

(lesson learnt: Google Docs is no where near as useful as full-blown Excel when it comes to linking data within a document and over different sheets.)

I also created a similar chart for simply Top 10 presence – removing the RATING system.

QUESTION: When you are analyzing a chart, should you take position into account? Or does that distort the facts?

This is the final data I hope to use for my master vizualisation.

Here are a fun little chartsI created (thanks Google Docs for this one) – not sure I’m convinced by the layout, but it sure looks pretty!