Hitlist UK

Hitlist UK is a weekly UK late-night magazine which airs on . Its format has changed over the years. Originally airing on Channel 4 on 13 July 1992 as a two-hour television programme that aired the official UK Top 40 singles chart. The programme originally aired Mondays at 20:00 hrs (CET) and repeated through the week. On 1 April 1996, with the UK pre-launch of the localized Channel 5, In the UK, the chart continued to air on Channel 5. In 2002, both the UK and Italy discontinued the series, while Channel 5 continues to air the chart as a Top 20 playlist each week. Germany stopped importing the original English series in July 2000, creating a German version of Hitlist UK, which was hosted by several German VJs up until 2004, when this version was eventually discontinued as well. From 1992 to 2002 the series was hosted by a number of MTV VJ's, whereas the new series has had no presenter on MTV Europe since 2003.

On August 1, 2012, the UK Hitlist was suspended from programming on MTV Europe.

As of January 1, 2013, the UK Hitlist chart is back on MTV Europe – Every Thursday.

Contents[]

As many other MTV programmes in the nineties, Hitlist UK is a weekly late-night magazine, basing on the current top 40 of the UK chart. Due to the limited format, just the new entries and climbers would be shown, combined with some records of the top ten and the number one, provided there was a music video available. For positions 40 to 21, 20 to 11 and 10 to 2 a rundown would be included, consisting of short extracts from all songs (if no video was available, the cd cover would be seen instead; in the rare case MTV had neither a video nor a cd cover, a "video not available" sign would be shown, combined with a kind of "no signal" TV noise).

Sometimes, a video would not be shown although it had actually climbed the chart. Reasons for this would not be given, so why a song was neglected could only be assumed. In the case of Mr Blobby’s "Mr Blobby" and Manchester United Football Squad’s "Come On You Reds", both of which were number ones, one reason for showing just an excerpt of the video might have been that both records were intended for the UK market only.

For some time, the show also included songs that missed the top 40 mainstream list but which were successful in other UK charts, such as the dance, rock, indie, pop, "breakers" (i. e. singles just outside the top 40), or album chart.

Presenters[]

Hitlist UK had no regular host; it was presented by different VJs, including Paul King, Simone Angel, Carolyn Lilipaly, Lisa I'Anson, Cat Deeley, Emma Ledden, Edith Bowman and Dave Berry.

Web resources[]

A typical presentation of a new entry (excerpt from the show for week ending March 13, 1993)