"Hallelujah" Charts Three Times In U.K.

12/22/08 2:11pm

by Kate Harper (CHARTattack)

Jeff Buckley fans didn't succeed in preventing an X Factor version of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" from taking the Christmas #1 spot on the U.K. singles chart as they'd hoped, but they bought so many digital copies that Buckley's version ended up in second place.

X Factor finalist Alexandra Burke's version of "Hallelujah" has claimed the top spot on the U.K. chart after selling 576,000 copies. Buckley's version follows just one spot behind and is on the chart based on downloads alone. Cohen's original version of the song is also on the chart this week at #36.

This is the first time in more than 50 years that two versions of the same song have held the top two positions on the U.K. singles chart, according to NME.com. Tommy Steele and Guy Mitchell's versions of "Singin' The Blues" accomplished the feat in 1957.

"I think Jeff would have found this number one thing very amusing," Buckley's mother Mary Guibert told the U.K.'s The Independent newspaper.

"It's ironic in so many ways. I mean, here is 'The X Factor,' run by Simon Cowell, who is supposed to be the ultimate taste arbiter, and they've been run to the wire by my son.

"It's come about so organically, with no record label pushing it, and I think Jeff would have loved that, and loved his fans for doing it."

Buckley only released one album, 1994's Grace, before he drowned in a tributary of the Mississippi River in 1997.

In the meantime, vote for Cohen in the sexiest Canadian man category in CHARTattack's 14th annual year-end readers' poll. Until the rest of his competitors can age gracefully and have three versions of one of their songs on a singles chart, they don't get my vote.