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Music

Stormzy Just Beat the X Factor Winner's Single in This Week's Charts

"Shut Up" came in at number 8 above Louisa Johnson's "Forever Young", which is the poorest performing Xwinner’s single in the history of X Factor

Your boy Big Stormz has been on a crusade this week to get his track "Shut Up" to Christmas number one. The freestyle fired back up the iTunes charts after he played British boxing heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua into the ring last Saturday, and Stormzy then tweeted "Nah fuck this #ShutUpForXMasNo1 LET'S DO THIS BUN X FACTOR!!!"

The Christmas charts won't be tabulated until next week, so keep streaming, but this week's charts have just come out and "Shut Up" has come in at number 8, beating X Factor winner Louisa Johnson's single by, we're hearing, around 150 sales. Justin Bieber's "Love Yourself" and "Sorry" are at 1 and 2, making him the first ever artist to hold those spots in the UK charts for four consecutive weeks.

Johnson's "Forever Young" is currently in at number 9, making it on track to be the poorest performing X Factor winner’s single in the history of X Factor. This is pretty awful for the X Factor, who normally respond to stories about their falling viewership by pointing at the huge commericial success their artists still enjoy. Occasionaly an X Factor winner will end up at number 2 rather than 1, but number 9 is an unimaginably poor performance, considering Louisa basically had a 20 week advert for her on ITV 1 every weekend and she's been beaten by such household names Grace ft. G-Eazy and Sigala ft. Bryn Christopher.

Stormzy, it's worth remembering, has no record label, no big-name management, and has never had a big TV slot. This whole thing came almost entirely from him tweeting to his own fans. Yet he has beaten the biggest juggernaught in music.

He's poured lemon juice in the wounds by launching a video for G Factor, a grime parody of X Factor for the gritty youth of the UK who want to see contestants MCing on hoverboards on their HD screens straight after their parents are done watching Strictly Come Dancing.