Just under a year after announcing his departure from One Direction so he could ‘be a normal 22-year-old’, Zayn Malik has topped the UK singles chart. Malik’s debut solo outing ‘Pillowtalk’ is straight in at number one this week and has become the fastest-selling single of the year so far.

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According to the Official Charts Company, 'Pillowtalk' had combined sales of 112,000 (including 4.97 million streams, knocking Shawn Mendes’ ‘Stitches’ off the top spot. ‘Pillowtalk’ is the first single from Malik’s upcoming album Mind of Mine which is scheduled for release on March 25th.

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‘Pillowtalks’’ sales didn't seem to be affected by Malik pulling out of two major promotional appearances in the space of a week. Last week he pulled out of a guest spot on ‘The Graham Norton Show’ which was scheduled to air January 29th and on Monday he canceled an appearance on BBC Radio 1 with Greg James.

The rest of this week’s chart sees former number one ‘Stitches’ fall two places to number three, while Jonas Blue’s ‘Fast Car’ has climbed up one place to number two. The top five is rounded off by Rihanna’s ‘Work’ which goes from 13 to four and Justin Bieber’s ‘Love Yourself’ at number five.

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Danish soul-pop band Lukas Graham are high climbers this week, moving a massive 18 spots to number six with ‘7 Years’. Craig David also moves up four places to number 10 with 'When The Bassline Drops', giving him his first top ten single in eight years.