Artist · chart history
James Bay
Solo artist Hitchin English singer‐songwriter
James Bay is an artist from Hitchin. James Bay has 20 chart appearances on 18 radio countdowns from 11 stations on RockLists, spanning 2014–2026. The most successful song on radio countdowns is “Hold Back the River”, which appears on 7 lists with a best position of #16. The station that charted James Bay most often is 107.1 The Peak (Westchester County, NY), with 4 appearances. The artist’s biggest year on year-end countdowns was 2015.
James Bay, a singer-songwriter and guitarist from Hitchin in England, born in 1990, broke through in 2014 with "Hold Back the River", a big, rolling, soul-stirred holler of a single that went platinum and set the table for his debut album, Chaos and the Calm. That record, released on Virgin EMI and Republic, topped the UK albums chart and climbed to number 15 in America.
The sound pulls soul, Americana, rock and pop into one place: a guitar player's songs, sung with plenty of feeling and built to swell from a murmur into a full-room singalong. The industry was paying attention early. He took the Brit Awards' Critics' Choice prize in February 2015, then Best British Male Solo Artist at the 2016 Brits, and the Grammys nominated him 3 times that year, for Best New Artist, Best Rock Album and Best Rock Song.
In May 2018 he came back with his second album, Electric Light, with "Pink Lemonade" among its songs.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs by James Bay on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Peak year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hold Back the River | 7 | #16 | – | 2015 | |
| 2 | Up All Night | 4 | #8 | – | 2024 | |
| 3 | Let it Go | 5 | #32 | – | 2014 | |
| 4 | Pink Lemonade | 2 | #106 | – | 2018 | |
| 5 | Sunshine In The Room | 1 | #77 | – | 2025 | |
| 6 | Chew On My Heart | 1 | #94 | – | 2020 |
Albums with charting songs
Where each song was first released, from MusicBrainz.
Year-end chart timeline
Combined year-end countdown points per year. Taller bars mean more songs placing higher across more stations.
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