It’s the Summer of Sexyy Red on Streaming

Welcome to Billboard Pro’s Trending Up column, where we take a closer look at the songs, artists, curiosities and trends that have caught the music industry’s attention. Some have come out of nowhere, others have taken months to catch on, and all of them could become ubiquitous in the blink of a TikTok clip. 
 
This week: Sexyy Red follows her breakout hit with two more viral singles, Taylor Swift’s new-old smash sends listeners to an even older warm-weather perennial and Myke Towers launches a mid-summer bid for global ubiquity.

Summer 2023 Is Sexyy Red Season 

Sexyy Red is officially one of the biggest breakout artists of summer 2023. The St. Louis rapper has been a social media fixture for years thanks to her vulgar raps and round-the-way personality, but she has now reached a new level of mainstream prominence and commercial success thanks to the virality of several tracks from her latest mixtape, Hood Hottest Princess. 

Back in January, Sexyy Red released “Pound Town,” a delightfully ratchet ode to the crudest edges of the sexual experience, which eventually received an equally ratchet remix from rap icon Nicki Minaj, titled “Pound Town 2” in May – helping the song debut at No. 66 on the Billboard Hot 100. Minaj’s remix also kickstarted a new phase of the song’s multi-platform appeal: According to Luminate, “Pound Town” collected 5.4 million official on-demand U.S. streams in the week ending July 6 – up 4% from the previous week – while on radio, “Pound Town” currently ranks at No. 14 on Rap Airplay and No. 21 on R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay for the charts dated July 15. After driving the culture for so many months — the love for her breakout song is so strong that Sexyy Red gave an impromptu performance of the track from her seat in the audience at the 2023 BET Awards — “Pound Town” now has legitimate commercial success to add to its accolades. 

“Pound Town” functioned as the de facto lead single for Hood Hottest Princess. Released on June 9, the mixtape did not debut on the Billboard 200 until this week’s chart (dated July 15), entering at No. 193 — a testament to the consistent growth of the tape’s streams. Two songs from the 11-track tape have emerged as the follow-ups to “Pound Town:” “Skee Yee,” a burgeoning summer anthem that garnered love on TikTok pre-release, collected 2.5 million official on-demand U.S. streams in the week ending July 6, a 22% increase from the week prior. Aided by a trend in which users aggressively whip their hair as Sexyy Red yells out her “skee yee” ad-lib, the most popular “Skee Yee” sound has over 237,000 clips on TikTok. Recently, Grammy-nominated rap star Travis Scott invited Sexyy Red to perform the song (along with “Pound Town”) during his headlining set at Wireless Festival in London — further proof that the rapper’s TikTok virality is translating into streams and support.  

Another song from her mixtape, “Looking for the H–s (Ain’t My Fault),” is currently going viral on TikTok. Users put their own voice over Sexyy Red’s as she raps, “You like my voice? It turn you on? / This ain’t nothin’, wait ’til you see it in a thong.” “H–s” earned 1.6 million official on-demand U.S. streams in the week ending July 6, a whopping 292% increase from the period prior. The official TikTok sound for the song soundtracks over 305,000 clips on the app. 

All in all, from the period of June 30-July 6, Sexyy Red’s catalog has received 11.1 million official on-demand U.S. streams, a 24.5% increase from the week prior. Between her audacious one-liners and knack for natural hooks, Sexyy Red has become one of the defining artists of the summer, one outrageously obscene song at a time. – KYLE DENIS

A Summer Twice as Cruel: Taylor Swift’s Smash Boosts Bananarama Streams  

On this week’s Hot 100 chart, Taylor Swift’s “Cruel Summer” completes its long-overdue climb into the top 10, as the former deep cut from her 2019 album Lover jumps from No. 13 to No. 7 after recently becoming promoted as an official single. “Summer” has benefited from prime placement in Swift’s Eras tour set list, renewed fan support on TikTok and social media as the summer heats up, and prime placement on playlists like Spotify’s Today’s Top Hits and top 40 radio blocks (it’s up to No. 20 on this week’s Radio Songs chart).  

Benefiting, in turn, from Swift’s “Cruel Summer”: Bananarama’s classic hit of the same name. The British trio’s “Cruel Summer” became a new wave crossover hit upon its 1983 release, climbing as high as No. 9 on the U.S. Hot 100. And while Swift’s song becomes the highest-peaking “Cruel Summer” in Hot 100 history this week, Bananarama’s track is riding the “Summer” wave to increased plays, four decades after its release. 

Weekly streams for Bananarama’s hit have increased for seven straight weeks: after earning 519,000 U.S. on-demand streams during the week ending May 25, according to Luminate, the original “Cruel Summer” is up to nearly 724,000 streams for the most recent tracking week (ending July 6), making for a 39% cumulative spike in weekly listens. Of course, streams for Swift’s “Cruel Summer” dwarf those numbers – the song enters the Streaming Songs top 10 with 14.4 million weekly streams for this week. But who knows? Maybe if there’s another hit “Cruel Summer” in the year 2063, Swift’s version will see an uptick then, too. – JASON LIPSHUTZ 

Myke Towers Turns TikTok Into ‘Lala’ Land

Puerto Rican rapper-singer Myke Towers has been a fixture on Billboard’s Latin charts for most of the past half-decade, but he’s yet to score a major crossover onto the Billboard Hot 100. That may be coming soon with the sweet reggaetón jam “Lala,” which is the penultimate cut on his 23-track March album La Vida Es Una. The song has taken over TikTok in the past month with its addictive title hook, a super-sticky backing vocal that plays throughout most of the song. 

The song has come to soundtrack both a dance challenge and a series of CapCut videos, with over 1.4 million videos being made to the official sound. Consequently, the song has absolutely exploded on streaming, jumping from 206,000 U.S. official on-demand audio streams for the chart week ending June 22 to over 2.6 million for the week ending July 6 – a gain of 1,172% over the two-week span, according to Luminate.

With the song’s upward trajectory continuing this week – debuting at No. 26 on this week’s Billboard Global 200, and even rising to No. 1 on Spotify’s Daily Top Songs Global chart – “Lala” may be on pace to announce itself as a very late song of the summer contender. – ANDREW UNTERBERGER

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