CHARTS: Indie charts get a new lease of life.

The OFFICIAL CHARTS COMPANY is overhauling the indie charts for the first time in their 30-year history to create a new promotional platform to the independent sector.

From this coming Sunday (June 21) the independent singles and albums charts will be based on new criteria for independence: under the new rules a download or CD will be eligible for the Official Independent Charts if released on a label that is 50% or more owned by an independent company (ie. not by one of the four majors).

This replaces the old chart rules, which defined an independent release as any record released by a label with independent distribution.

In addition, the OCC is launching two new charts: the Official Independent Breakers Top 20 and the Official Independent Album Breakers Top 20. These charts will follow the same criteria for independence as the main indie charts, but will not include any act that has charted within the top 20 of the Official Singles or Albums national charts.

From June 29 Music Week will be running the Official Independent Charts for singles and albums in the magazine every week and will alternate between the two Independent Breakers Charts in print. All four charts will be available on Musicweek.com.

OCC managing director Martin Talbot explains that changes to the independent sector since the indie charts first launched in 1978 - when major record companies were self-distributed and smaller labels used alternative routes - mean that the independent charts have long needed an overhaul.

"The criteria haven't changed at all since the chart launched," he says. "It was massively debated in the early to mid Nineties. For quite a long time there were some really entrenched views that didn't allow for reasonable debate but things have moved on from that."