   british hit singles & albums (originally known as the guinness book of british hit singles and the guinness book of british hit albums) was a music reference book originally published in the united kingdom by the publishing arm of the guinness breweries, guinness superlatives. later editions were published by guinness world records and hit entertainment. it listed all the singles and albums featured in the top 75 pop charts in uk. in 2004 the book became an amalgamation of two earlier guinness publications, originally known as british hit singles and british hit albums and publication of this amalgamation ceased in 2008. a new version of the book published by virgin, was entitled the virgin book of british hit singles, first published in november 2008. the first ten editions were compiled by paul gambaccini, mike read and brothers tim rice and jonathan "jo" rice. read left the team in the mid-1980s and the other editors resigned in 1996. chart editor for many editions was david roberts. ==content== british hit singles & albums was generally considered to be the authoritative reference (and only) source for both the uk singles chart (since its inception in 1952) and the uk albums chart. it listed all the singles and albums ever to have been in the uk charts since 1952 (albums: 1958), listing them in alphabetical order and by both artist and song title. the entries also included the date of chart entry, highest position, catalogue number and number of weeks in the chart. short biographical notes accompanied many of the artists' chart details. the book's sources are the new musical express (nme) chart from november 1952 to march 1960, and the record retailer (later music week) chart thereafter. it could be said that this division is misleading, since the record retailer chart was little known until it was adopted by the bbc in 1969 and that by adopting this chart as its standard, the editors had a non-consensual view. an example often given is the case of the beatles' second single "please please me" which was recognised as a number one hit by every other publicly available chart of the time, but not by record retailer and therefore not by british hit singles. other records to which this applies include "19th nervous breakdown" by the rolling stones, "stranger on the shore" by acker bilk and the eurovision song contest entry "are you sure" by the allisons. co-founder jo rice has defended the book's choice of source material on the grounds that record retailer was the only chart to consistently publish a top 50 from 1960 onwards. this can be substantiated by the fact that charts published in the nme were of a shorter
1977_books 1977_establishments_in_the_United_Kingdom British_encyclopedias Encyclopedias_of_music Reference_works