Official Charts Flashback: 2008 – Rihanna's Take A Bow

It’s five years since Rihanna was at Number 1 with the massive Take A Bow.

Rihanna may be a globe-conquering megastar now, but as we take our Official Chart time machine all the way back to 2008, we see she’s scored only her second Number 1, Take A Bow. Her first was, of course, Umbrella the year before.

Take A Bow was Number 1 for two weeks and spent nine consecutive weeks in the Top 10. The track had risen from being a new entry at Number 2, selling 35,000 copies in its first week. So far the track has racked up almost 465,000 sales. It’s still got some way to go before it beats Rihanna’s biggest seller, however. That honour belongs to We Found Love, her 2011 hit with Calvin Harris, which shifted an eye-popping 1.3 million copies.

Take a look at all Rihanna’s Official Singles Chart placings in our Official Chart Artist Archive

Rihanna had taken over the top spot from the Ting Tings’ That’s Not My Name, the surprise hit of the early summer. They didn't quite hit the dizzy heights of that track again, but had another couple of hits, including a Number 6 with Shut Up And Let Me Go in July. Their follow-up single Great DJ was already making an impression in the lower reaches of the Top 40, a new entry at Number 33.

Madonna and Justin Timberlake completed the Top 3 with 4 Minutes, a former Number 1, which was Madonna's last residency at the top spot – well, for now anyway. But our Madge can certainly bide her time – she has been appearing on the Official Singles Chart for almost 30 years and has previously had an even longer gap between Number 1s.

After hitting number one with Vogue in April 1990, she didn't claim the top spot again until March 1998 with Frozen, a gap of eight years and her longest between Number 1s so far. Will Madonna be able to hit pole position again? She's got another three years to make sure that gap between Number 1s doesn’t get any longer!

Watch Rihanna’s Take A Bow video:

Rihanna - Take A Bow on MUZU.TV.

At Number 4, Heartbreaker was Cheryl Cole's first 'solo' placing in the Official Singles Chart, and her first collaboration with The Voice UK judge and Black Eyed Peas frontman Will.i.am. It was something of a shared experience – while it wasn’t Will's premier outing without the rest of the Peas, it was his first solo showing in the Top 10.

Will’s bandmate Fergie was in fact having a collaboration of her own farther down the chart – she popped up on Nelly's Party People at no. 14, peaking at its highest position this week.

Will and Cheryl’s track was boosted by Cheryl's appearance on ITV show The Passions of Girls Aloud, where she honed her skills as a street dancer. Originally tipped only to appear in Will's video for her moves, she ended up lending her vocal pipes to the track, too. It wasn't the last time Cheryl would get a boost from a TV show. The following week, Saturday nights changed for ever – well, a couple of years or so, anyway – when Cheryl was announced as the new X Factor judge, replacing Sharon Osbourne who, coincidentally, has just been revealed to be making a return to the show.

Completing the top 5 was Australian Sam Sparro, making his chart debut. His hit Black and Gold spent a whopping 39 weeks on the chart and peaked at Number 2, held off by Madonna and Justin. The world awaited the follow-up with bated breath, but sadly 21st Century Life didn't catch on – perhaps we were all still grooving to the super mellow Black and Gold, and young Sam never bothered the Top 40 again, stalling at 44. He's still recording music, however, and we hear a big comeback isn't far away!

Take a look at the whole Top 40 for that week in our Official Singles Chart Archive