Michael Jackson sets a record on the pop charts, thanks to spooky season
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Once again, Taylor Swift tops this week's Billboard albums and singles charts. Elsewhere, two holidays collide, as Halloween perennials coexist with the charts' first flurries of the Christmas season. Along the way, Michael Jackson's "Thriller" shoots up the chart, making this the sixth consecutive decade in which Jackson has scored at least one top 10 hit. That's an all-time chart record.
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Before the streaming era, holidays rarely had much of an impact on Billboard's Hot 100 singles chart. You'd see an occasional novelty hit here and there, but generally speaking, the Hot 100 in December didn't look all that different from the Hot 100 in, say, March.
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The streaming era has changed that radically — and in ways that extend well beyond Christmas time. Just this year, Toby Keith's 35 Biggest Hits compilation zoomed back into the top 10 in the aftermath of July 4. Earth, Wind & Fire's Greatest Hits re-entered the Billboard 200 albums chart because so many fans like to stream the g
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