 LONDON, UK (Top40 Charts) - The King of Rock'N'Roll top of the charts with the re-release of his hit 'One Night.' Elvis Presley is getting Britain's 1000th No 1 in the music charts, but the king of rock'n'roll would be crying in the chapel over the recent slump in record sales. But the impressive run masks a more worrying statistic for the record business - One Night secured the top slot by selling only 30,000 copies, one of the lowest No 1 tally ever and a fraction of the figure needed to reach the summit in the recent past. A spokesman for the Official UK Charts Company said "sales of singles tended to be low in January, when artists were reluctant to release major tracks after the Christmas rush when spending power among consumers was at its lowest."
But that cannot explain a slump in business since 1999, when legal and illegal downloading from the internet sent the sale of singles records spiralling lower. Sales of "physical" singles are at crisis point as consumers desert record shops for their home PCs, where tracks can be downloaded for about 79p each, rather than the �3.99 shop price. Obviously, 'physical' Singles are going to be dead at UK, faster than any music industry expert ever has been imagine.
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