Robbie Williams has spelled out in no uncertain terms what the prospect of beating The Beatles’ record of 15 Number One albums means to him. It is, apparently, “the most important thing” in the world.
The ex-Take That star was appearing on Scott Mills’ Radio 2 Breakfast Show, talking about his upcoming album, Britpop. It comes out on February 6, and if it does hit the top it will be his sixteenth UK chart topper. Of that record, Williams said: “Yeah, I want that more than anything in my career right now, of course I do.”
He added: “Let me just qualify that by saying I’ve broken the matrix. When that sort of record is mentioned and it’s me, I don’t know how that’s happened, I just know that it has. It massively makes my imposter syndrome come out to play and the first thing I feel is embarrassed about it.”
“And then the other bit, where the ego steps in is going, ‘It’s outside of my family, my kids and my wife, the most important thing to me in the world’,” he added. “Do I think I deserve that? No. Am I on the precipice of maybe achieving that? Yeah. Should I grab it with both arms? Yeah. And can I learn to be grateful and happy for it? Grateful, maybe, proud, I’m not sure yet, we’ll see if that happens.”
‘Fifteen albums? I didn’t know he’d had that many’, we hear you cry. But indeed he has. Since leaving Take That in 1995, he’s released twelve studio albums, including two ‘swing’ albums (Swing When You’re Winning and Swings Both Ways) and a festive set (2019’s The Christmas Present).
Eleven of those have indeed topped the UK charts (the exception being 2009’s Reality Killed The Video Star). In addition, there have been three greatest hits collections, and the Better Man soundtrack. So if indeed Britpop enters the chart at Number One in February, it will be number sixteen. Love him, loathe him or pity him, Robbie Williams has been very popular in his native land for a very long time.
Of course, most does not automatically mean biggest or best. After all, Westlife have somehow accumulated 14 UK Number One hits.
Nevertheless, the accolade clearly means a lot to Robbie. At a gig to launch Britpop last autumn, he admitted that he had pushed its release date back to 2026 for that very reason - to avoid clashing with Taylor Swift’s The Life Of A Showgirl and to nab the record: “We’re all pretending it’s not about Taylor Swift but it fucking is. Here’s the truth: I want 16 Number One albums.”
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