Miley Cyrus’ ‘Flowers’ Tops Hot 100 for Fifth Week, PinkPantheress & Ice Spice Surge to Top 10
Written by djfrosty on February 21, 2023
Miley Cyrus‘ “Flowers” rules the Billboard Hot 100 for a fifth week, encompassing its entire run on the chart so far, dating to its debut at No. 1.
The song also becomes the most-heard hit on U.S. airwaves, marking Cyrus’ first No. 1 on the Radio Songs chart.
Plus, PinkPantheress and Ice Spice each make their first appearance in the Hot 100’s top 10 as “Boy’s a Liar, Pt. 2” bounds from No. 14 to No. 4.
The Hot 100 blends all-genre U.S. streaming (official audio and official video), radio airplay and sales data. All charts (dated Feb. 25, 2023) will update on Billboard.com tomorrow (Feb. 22, a day later than usual due to the Presidents’ Day holiday in the U.S. Feb 20). For all chart news, you can follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both Twitter and Instagram.
“Flowers,” released on Smiley Miley/Columbia Records, drew 85.8 million radio airplay audience impressions (up 15%, good for the Hot 100’s top Airplay Gainer award for a third consecutive week) and 33.7 million streams (down 13%) and sold 22,000 (down 18%) Feb. 10-16, according to Luminate.
The single jumps 4-1 in its fifth week on Radio Songs, becoming Cyrus’ first leader on the list, among four top 10s. “Flowers” wraps the fastest flight to the top of the chart in nearly seven years, since Justin Timberlake’s “Can’t Stop the Feeling!” also needed just five frames to reign in June 2016. Since Radio Songs became an all-format survey in December 1998, only three other songs have hit No. 1 in five weeks or fewer: Adele’s “Hello” (four weeks, 2015), Destiny’s Child “Survivor” (five, 2001) and TLC’s “No Scrubs” (five, 1999).
“Flowers” rebounds for a fourth week at No. 1 on Digital Song Sales and dips to No. 2 after four weeks atop Streaming Songs.
As previously reported, “Flowers” also hits No. 1 on the Pop Airplay chart, becoming Cyrus’ third leader and, as on Radio Songs, completing the quickest coronation (five weeks) since “Can’t Stop the Feeling!” in 2016. As Cyrus first topped Pop Airplay with “Party in the U.S.A.” in 2009 and led again with “Wrecking Ball” in 2013, she joins Maroon 5 and Taylor Swift as the only acts with No. 1s on the chart in the 2000s, ’10s and ’20s.
SZA’s “Kill Bill” ranks at its No. 2 Hot 100 best for a sixth week. It returns for a fourth week atop Streaming Songs and leads Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs and Hot R&B Songs, which use the same methodology as the Hot 100, for a 10th week each.
Metro Boomin, The Weeknd and 21 Savage’s “Creepin’ ” rebounds to its No. 3 Hot 100 high, from No. 5.
PinkPantheress and Ice Spice each claim their first Hot 100 top 10 as “Boy’s a Liar, Pt. 2” roars 14-4. The team-up, released Feb. 3, drew 31.1 million streams (up 54%, as it takes top Streaming Gainer honors) and 2.1 million in airplay audience (up 258%) and sold 1,000 (up 58%) Feb. 10-16. The track is a remix of PinkPantheress’ original solo “Boy’s a Liar,” released in November. (All versions of the song are combined into one listing on Billboard’s charts.)
Notably, “Liar” leaps to the Hot 100’s top 10 in just its second week on the chart. It’s the first duet by two acts each making a first top 10 appearance since Nicky Youre and Dazy hit No. 4 with “Sunroof” last September. That song took 10 weeks to hit the top 10; “Liar” is the first song between two acts each scoring a first top 10 to reach the region in two weeks or fewer since Lil Tjay’s “Calling My Phone,” featuring 6LACK, debuted at its No. 3 peak in February 2021.
“Liar” deconstructed: PinkPantheress wrote and produced the 2-minute, 15-second track with Mura Masa (who also appears on the Hot 100 for the first time). Notes Hit Songs Deconstructed, which analyzes the compositional traits of Hot 100 top 10s, “In addition to the strategic pairing of PinkPantheress and Ice Spice, one of the song’s core strengths is how it pushes the boundaries of the Hot 100’s top 10 while at the same time staying in line with current trends. On one hand, it features a unique lo-fi ‘bedroom’ production, classic 8-bit video game-sounding synths and a Jersey club beat, which separate it from many of its mainstream contemporaries and immediately captures the listener’s ear. On the other hand, its super-catchy and repetitive hook structure and troubled-love lyrics impart a sense of familiarity and relatability, along with its under 3-minute runtime, vibrant tempo, omission of a pre-chorus and synth-heavy production, all of which are in line with rising top 10 trends.”
Morgan Wallen’s “Last Night” dips to No. 5 on the Hot 100 from its No. 3 best. It concurrently tops the multi-metric Hot Country Songs chart for a second week.
Elsewhere in the Hot 100’s top 10, Sam Smith and Kim Petras’ “Unholy” descends 4-6, after it ruled for a week in October; The Weeknd’s “Die for You” rebounds 8-7, after reaching No. 6; Taylor Swift’s “Anti-Hero” retreats 7-8, following a personal-best eight weeks at No. 1; Beyoncé’s “Cuff It” backtracks to No. 9 from its No. 6 high; and David Guetta and Bebe Rexha’s “I’m Good (Blue)” slips 9-10, after reaching No. 4, as it leads the multi-metric Hot Dance/Electronic Songs chart for a 22nd week.
Again, for all chart news, you can follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both Twitter and Instagram and all charts (dated Feb. 25), including the Hot 100 in its entirety, will refresh on Billboard.com tomorrow (Feb. 22).
Luminate, the independent data provider to the Billboard charts, completes a thorough review of all data submissions used in compiling the weekly chart rankings. Luminate reviews and authenticates data. In partnership with Billboard, data deemed suspicious or unverifiable is removed, using established criteria, before final chart calculations are made and published.