Tom Ewing

Since 2003, I've been writing a blog called Popular, talking about every No.1 single in the UK Top 40. These songs were, once upon a time, the country's highest sellers - I ask why, and what it meant, and whether they were any good. I've been lucky enough to attract a patient readership and some excellent commenters along the way.

For the last sixteen years I've been funding my writing via my day jobs. As my responsibilities have increased, the time I have to work on Popular (and other fun things) has shrunk. I'm now going freelance, and funding Popular using Patreon.

I need to be very clear about one thing: Popular will still be on Freaky Trigger, and still free to read for non-patrons and patrons alike. What I'm offering backers is early access and exclusive side material, and the opportunity to help guarantee the Popular project's future. 

Your very generous contributions let me create space in my life to keep the project moving and maybe even, one day, complete it.

This Patreon also helps fund the time I take curating and running the Peoples' Pop Polls, which I've been doing on Twitter each month as a way of entertaining myself and others during the Covid-19 pandemic. If you're a fan of those, subscribing here gives you playlists a few days before I post them publically, and often my own previews and speculations about each of the brackets.

Patreon funding lets me set aside writing time each month - patrons on any higher tier ($2 or above) see Popular entries early. I'm also writing other Patreon-first features:

• LESS POPULAR: Popular-style entries for songs that didn't get to Number One. ($5 or above)
• PARALLEL LINES: Entries for the forty "lost number ones" from the 50s and 60s which hit No.1 on those UK charts that didn't later get retconned into being 'official'. ($5 or above)
• THE TOP 100 SINGLES OF THE 2010s: A follow-up to the Top 100 90s singles, which I did 20 years ago. (This was a stretch goal so it's available to all patrons at any tier)

I've never attempted to monetize any of my online writing projects before - this was a scary step for me, and I am thrilled and grateful to anyone who's decided to back me in this, and to anyone who backs me in future.