Chart Beat
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The challenger defeats the champion on Billboard’s Hot R&B Songs chart this week as rookie singer 4Batz’s “Act II: Date @ 8,” now featuring Drake, rockets 7-1 to crown the list dated March 23. The buzzy single’s rise comes after the release of a remix, which added the heavyweight, on March 8. In taking the summit, the new leader ends a historic run for SZA, who had reigned atop the chart for the last 53 weeks through four songs – “Kill Bill,” “Snooze,” a featured turn on Drake’s “Slime You Out” and “Saturn.”
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“Act II: Date @ 8” debuted on the chart dated Jan. 6 and spent its first 11 weeks on the list (including nine in the top 10) billed solely to 4Batz. With the majority of the song’s activity in the latest tracking week coming from the Drake-assisted remix, the song’s chart listing undergoes two key changes: The artist billing switches to “4Batz featuring Drake” and the servicing label, previously just 4Batz, is updated to 4Batz/OVO Sound. From a business perspective, 4Batz and Drake will be partners again soon, as Billboard reported the budding singer signed with OVO Sound — which Drake co-founded — for a one-EP deal.
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In the tracking week of March 8-14 for the multimetric Hot R&B Songs chart — which combines streaming, radio airplay and sales data — “Act II: Date @ 8” generated 19.9 million official U.S. streams, according to Luminate, a 187% burst from the week prior. The nearly tripled improvement shoots the track 6-1 on the R&B Streaming Songs chart, where it becomes 4Batz’s first champ on the list and Drake’s ninth. It also nabs the week’s Greatest Gainer honor, as the song with the largest streaming increase.
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“Act II: Date @ 8” sold 1,000 digital downloads in the same period, sparking a No. 5 debut on R&B Digital Song Sales. The track also registered 8.4 million audience impressions, helped by gains on multiple radio charts: It climbs 19-16 on Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay (up 21% in plays during the tracking week) and 28-24 on Rhythmic Airplay (a 33% increase).
Elsewhere, “Act II: Date @ 8” powers 26-3 on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart, where it captures both the Sales Gainer and Streaming Gainer honors, and 61-7 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100, with the Streaming Gainer prize to boot.
Though “Act II: Date @ 8” gets most of the shine, two other 4Batz installments also occupy spots on the Hot R&B Songs chart: “Act I: Stickerz 99” rebounds 24-19 in its seventh week on the list, while “Act III: On God (She Like)” slips 10-11 in its second frame.
The Contenders is a midweek column that looks at artists aiming for the top of the Billboard charts, and the strategies behind their efforts. This week (for the upcoming Billboard 200 dated Mar. 30), Kacey Musgraves and Justin Timberlake both have much-anticipated new albums – but will they be well-received enough to take down Ariana Grande’s 2024 pace-setting set?
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Ariana Grande, Eternal Sunshine (Republic): In its debut week, Ariana Grande’s seventh studio album moved an impressive 227,000 units in the U.S. March 8-14, according to Luminate. That’s not just up more than 50,000 units from Grande’s most recent first-week performance (for 2020’s Positions), but nearly 70,000 units higher than the previous best single-week performance of 2024 (the 149,000 posted by Ye and Ty Dolla $ign’s Vultures 1 in its first frame). Needless to say, it landed at No. 1 last week by a decisive margin, and may not be moved from the top spot all that easily in its second week.
In its second week, Eternal Sunshine will undoubtedly see a heavy drop-off in sales – it sold 77,000 copies in its first week – but its streaming activity should be considerable. As of Tuesday (Mar. 19), the album still had six songs in Spotify’s Daily Top Songs USA’s top 40 and four in the Apple Music real-time top 40, led on both by “We Can’t Be Friends (Wait for Your Love),” which bowed atop the Billboard Hot 100 and will remain one of the top-streamed songs in the country this week. It should be enough to ensure that a new album will need to post first-week units in the high five digits to unseat it at No. 1 next week.
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Kacey Musgraves, Deeper Well (Interscope/MCA Nashville): Despite being one of the most acclaimed artists in country music for over a decade – and now an arena-touring, album of the year Grammy-winning crossover star as well – Kacey Musgraves has still yet to score a No. 1 album on the Billboard 200. Each of her four non-holiday studio albums has reached the chart’s top five, with her 2013 debut set Same Trailer, Different Park even getting to the runner-up spot. But she’s never quite gotten over the top – with her most recent charting effort, 2021’s lukewarmly received Star-Crossed, only making it to No. 3.
Musgraves no doubt hopes that the fifth time is the charm with the release last Friday (Mar. 15) of her new set, Deeper Well, which pulls back a little on the multi-media (and multi-genre) ambitions of Star-Crossed for a lower-key, more gently introspective singer-songwriter vibe. The album should stream respectably – though not quite as well as Eternal Sunshine, even in that album’s second week – and should sell well, with nine vinyl variants of the LP currently available, including eight different-colored versions and exclusive variants for Target, Walmart, Spotify and Amazon, as well as four different CD versions, three different digital editions and a cassette.
Justin Timberlake, Everything I Thought It Was (RCA): Unlike Musgraves, Justin Timberlake has visited the Billboard 200’s top spot – four times in a row, in fact – most recently with 2018’s Man of the Woods. It’s been over 20 years since Timberlake released an album that didn’t reach No. 1: his 2002 solo debut set Justified, which got stuck at No. 2 behind the Eminem-led 8 Mile soundtrack. However, JT’s No. 1 streak is at risk of coming to an end with his latest LP, the Friday-released Everything I Thought It Was.
The album should sell fairly well, helped by four different vinyl LPs (including exclusives for Target, Amazon and his webstore) and three different CD box sets (each with a specific branded T-shirt) — as well as by a fairly successful lead single in the radio hit “Selfish,” which debuted at No. 19 on the Hot 100 and is still in the top 40 six weeks later. But the album’s streaming presence should be fairly minimal, even with an extensive 18-track runtime. Not one of the set’s cuts appeared in either the 200-spot Spotify Daily Top Songs USA or iTunes real-time charts in the day following its release – which may leave Timberlake looking up at Grande and Musgraves on the Billboard 200 next week.
IN THE MIX
Bossman Dlow, Mr Beat the Road (Alamo/Sony Music): Bossman Dlow has become one of the breakout rappers of early 2024, largely thanks to his viral hit “Get in With Me,” which has crossed over from TikTok to the top half of the Hot 100. That song can be found on the rapper’s new 22-track set Mr Beat the Road, along with still-growing streaming fixtures “Mr. Pot Scraper” and “Piss Me Off,” though whether Bossman can carry over the level of interest in his hits to a full album remains to be seen.
Black Crowes, Happiness Bastards (Silver Arrow): The Brothers Robinson are back together again as co-pilots of Southern Rock staples the Black Crowes on new album Happiness Bastards, the duo’s first together in over a decade. It’s been three decades since the bros’ early-’90s commercial peak, but modern-day country gold-spinner Jay Joyce is behind the boards for the new set — which is available in three vinyl variants, as well as on standard and indie-exclusive CD.
Muni Long’s viral hit “Made for Me” solidifies its status as a radio winner by crowning Billboard’s Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart dated March 23. The song moves from No. 3 after a 20% surge in plays that made it the most-played song on U.S. monitored R&B/hip-hop radio stations in the tracking week of March 8-14, […]
2023 was a banner year for live events, with grosses from the top 100 tours up 53% from 2019, the last full year before the pandemic, according to figures reported to Billboard Boxscore. But beyond these record-breaking earnings, concerts also affect artists’ recorded music consumption, spurring local boosts as they tour the country.
Luminate and Billboard collaborated to dig deeper into touring’s effect on streaming totals. Examining a sample of nearly 1,000 shows from 50 of 2023’s top-grossing acts, the analysis found that the median concert yielded a 42% increase in local on-demand audio streams during the week of each event as compared to the eight weeks prior.
Of course, the size of the bump varies by artist. There’s a spectrum of effects, from Odesza doubling its local consumption after an average concert (+143%) to Blake Shelton‘s bump coming in slightly below the overall median (+32%).
But one of the defining factors in how big of a local streaming bump an artist receives is genre. Fan bases across pop, rock, country and beyond boast their own demographic and geographic characteristics, and as a result, their consumption habits vary widely.
Some of the biggest boosts in local consumption are reserved for the dance/electronic acts included in this analysis. The genre’s live footprint is often tied to festivals or nightclubs, meaning few of its marquee acts tour in the traditional sense. When they do play ticketed headline shows, in many cases those concerts amount to mini residencies in particular pockets of the country.
Pretty Lights exemplifies this phenomenon. When the producer played three shows in two Colorado markets — plus three each in Atlanta and Philadelphia — last year, his local streams averaged a 132% bump. And shows played by LCD Soundsystem during the group’s 20-date residency at New York City’s Brooklyn Steel translated to a 125% jump in its New York-area streams, which sustained throughout the residency’s duration.
K-pop acts function in a similar way. In the United States, K-pop is a relatively young genre that has firmly established itself in only a handful of markets. SUGA and TOMORROW X TOGETHER each played a small number of American cities on tour in 2023, with both hitting New York and Los Angeles as well as cities like Atlanta, Chicago, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. Similar to dance acts, SUGA and TOMORROW X TOGETHER enjoyed local weekly streaming gains of 133% and 129%, respectively — roughly three times higher than the average touring artist.
In stark contrast, R&B/hip-hop acts see comparatively small upticks in their local streaming activity after concerts. For much of the last decade, R&B/hip-hop has been the most popular genre in America, and its rise coincided with the dawn of the streaming era. For these artists, sky-high streaming activity tends to be a baseline, so adding a concert to the mix doesn’t yield the same growth rates.
Still, tours by Drake, 50 Cent and J.I.D. & SMINO generated local weekly boosts of 28%-34% — far less than K-pop or dance/electronic artists and below the 42% average, but a material increase across lengthy national tours nonetheless.
Local streaming increases for the country genre also tend to be slightly below average, with the size of the increases often dependent upon how long the acts have been around. Little Big Town and Blake Shelton, both of which began their careers in the early 2000s, post typical post-show gains of 36% and 32%, respectively. Jelly Roll and Morgan Wallen, both of whom scored the biggest hits of their careers last year, sit lower at 18%.
Jelly Roll and Wallen have led a new class of crossover country stars who have enjoyed more success on the Billboard Hot 100 and Streaming Songs charts than the genre has seen in years. Much of that success is owed to a more focused digital footprint, with robust activity across social media and streaming platforms compared to acts like Shelton and Little Big Town, who rose to fame in the CD era. That positions them closer to hip-hop acts who boast higher consumption figures on streaming platforms than older artists, therefore giving them less room to grow.
Of course, many artists cross genre lines or operate within sub-genres or different sects of genres, blurring its effects. The Jonas Brothers, a pop band that blossomed in the 2000s and reunited five years ago, typically see massive local streaming increases, with the group averaging a 129% boost following last year’s shows. RBD, a Latin pop vocal group with a similar timeline as the JoBros, demonstrated even bigger local streaming gains, which were up an average of 285% following dates on the band’s reunion tour last year. This pattern continues with tours by Backstreet Boys and New Kids on the Block (172%), suggesting that classic pop acts are perhaps the biggest benefactors in terms of streaming numbers when they go on tour.
Speaking of reunions, last year also marked the 20th anniversary of landmark records by Death Cab for Cutie and The Postal Service, both of which are the brainchildren of indie-rock stalwart Ben Gibbard. Both acts, fronted by Gibbard, returned to the stage in 2023 to co-headline the Give Up & Transatlanticism 20th Anniversary Tour. During that run, their local streams bloomed by 195% — a number outdone only by RBD among the 50 artists in the analysis.
Click here for more on the symbiotic relationship between touring and streaming.
It’s no secret that Taylor Swift and Beyoncé staged the two biggest tours of 2023, with Swift even continuing the Eras Era throughout 2024. But not only did both artists earn record-breaking grosses and affect local economies with their treks, the stage shows also juiced each artist’s recorded music consumption.
Luminate and Billboard partnered to dig deeper into the connection between touring and streaming, capping a colossal year of headline tours. Beyoncé and Swift proved perfect examples of artists’ abilities to capitalize on their concert calendar to not only score a local bump in each city but sustain long-term national interest throughout the duration of their tours and beyond.
Both Beyoncé and Swift saw expected bumps to their consumption totals upon their respective tour kick-offs. When The Eras Tour launched, Swift’s U.S. on-demand audio streaming count increased by 59% in the week ending March 23, according to Luminate. For Beyoncé, the effects were teased out, as the tour’s first leg in Europe allowed domestic streaming to build slowly before her North American arrival. By the end of their U.S. runs, streams were up – from the week before each tour began through the release of each artist’s concert film – by 106% and 34%, respectively.
Initially, these bumps could be explained by the analysis of touring’s local short-term impact on consumption. In each city that Beyoncé and Swift played, market-level streams immediately grew by 89% and 95%, respectively, on average. But as their tours continued, isolated regional bumps compounded on one another, with particular narratives and trends aggregating to a mountain of consumption at the national level.
The mere announcement (Feb. 1, 2023) of Beyoncé’s Renaissance World Tour – coupled with the 65th Annual Grammy awards, where she did not perform but accepted two record-breaking trophies – spurred three weeks of gains, as the tour’s on-sale kept excitement alive. The beginning of Beyoncé’s domestic dates naturally fueled consumption in dramatic fashion with six consecutive weeks of increases (July 7 – Aug. 17).
Beyoncé stretched out her summer streaming bump with intention, focusing on individual moments of choreography and arrangements within the setlist. For “Energy,” a deep cut from Renaissance, she made a meal out of the lyric, “Look around, everybody on mute.” She took it literally, pausing the song and freezing alongside her dancers and band, teasing the audience before resuming, “Look around, it’s me and my crew/ Big energy.”
The Mute Challenge soon became an integral part of the show. By the time “Energy” hit its own streaming peak of 1.7 million clicks (week ending Sept. 7), it had nearly tripled its consumption from before the tour.
When Beyoncé performed “My Power,” a non-single from The Lion King: The Gift, she was joined by daughter Blue Ivy Carter on stage. Their much-memed and much-imitated dance routine entered the cannon of iconic Beyoncé choreography, with fans tracking Blue’s progress throughout the tour. The track posted explosive streaming gains over several months, ultimately up 449% by its peak (the week ending Aug. 17) from before the tour’s launch (the week ending May 4).
Spotlights for under-the-radar tracks like “Energy” and “My Power” yielded organic, drawn-out increases in consumption that snowballed alongside a parade of guest stars, controversy over the Queens Remix of “Break My Soul,” and a constant influx of social media content showcasing Beyoncé’s rotating wardrobe from local designers.
Swift’s catalog soared as soon as her tour began on March 17. Even before the July 7 release of Speak Now (Taylor’s Version), which warped her streams beyond the impact of The Eras Tour, consumption had almost doubled, at 372.9 million clicks in the week ending June 1. After the new release receded, her catalog maintained, at 391.4 million by the U.S. leg’s end in the week ending Aug. 10.
Like Beyoncé, Swift found songs within her ever-expanding catalog to highlight, particularly those that weren’t already world-conquering hits. Even with a nightly setlist of more than 40 songs, she left room each night to perform two rotating “surprise songs.” On average, the surprise songs got a 27% bump the week of their performance. Removing performances of songs from Speak Now after the release of the Taylor’s Version set, more affected by new-release streaming patterns than the typical tour impact, the average gain bumps to 31%.
After the exposure and subsequent streaming increase, the typical next-week drop was just 5%, indicating that inclusion in the surprise-song section encouraged sustained streaming action.
Within the show’s routine set pieces, Swift turned a fan-favorite into a Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 hit. Lover’s “Cruel Summer,” from 2019, was the first properly performed song each night at The Eras Tour, helping to reignite Swifties’ passion for the album cut. Without an official music video or announcement, even as Swift launched the 2022 Midnights track “Karma” as a single with its Ice Spice remix, “Cruel Summer” showed unstoppable growth from the tour’s launch. Steady between 1.9-2.1 million streams in the early months of 2023, the song ballooned to 16.7 million by the final U.S. show (in the week ending Aug. 10).
The prolonged championing of “Cruel Summer” and the one-after-another success of Swift’s surprise songs underlined The Eras Tour’s ability to transform her from superstar to stratosphere. Her relationships, philanthropy and seemingly every move during the tour continued to fuel her consumption, consistently more than double the streams she drew from earlier that year.
Both Beyoncé and Swift extended their good fortunes with the release of record-breaking concert films, each delivering profits for distributor AMC and more consumption boosts for their catalogs. The seeds they planted with “Energy, “Cruel Summer” and more took full bloom, even inside movie theaters, with audiences singing and dancing along — except when they had to be on mute.
Months after each tour wrapped in the U.S., Renaissance: A Film By Beyoncé scored the pop-dance-R&B(-country) chameleon a streaming increase of 54% the week of its Dec. 1 release, while Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour earned its once-country-now-pop star a 20% boost upon its Oct. 13 release.
Beyoncé and Swift are, of course, enormous stars that were likely to attract some amount of attention for going on tour even if they didn’t plan and work for these kinds of long-term rewards. But this kind of long-term, national growth isn’t only reserved for top-of-the-line megastars, as Maluma, ODESZA and Weezer experienced similar touring impact last year.
Both five years removed from their last stadium tours, Beyoncé and Swift designed their shows for maximum impact and staged campaigns that turned each trek into an era of its own.
Click here for more on the symbiotic relationship between touring and streaming.
Ariana Grande is the top musical act in the U.S., as she returns to No. 1 on the Billboard Artist 100 chart (dated March 23) for a 16th total week on top, thanks most prominently to her new album, Eternal Sunshine.
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The Artist 100 measures artists’ activity across key metrics of music consumption: streaming, radio airplay, album sales and track sales. Using a methodology comprising those metrics, the chart provides a weekly multi-dimensional ranking of artist popularity.
Eternal Sunshine arrives at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, as Grande’s sixth leader, with 227,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in its opening week (March 8-14), according to Luminate. The set scores the biggest weekly sum of 2024. Concurrently, the LP’s “We Can’t Be Friends (Wait for Your Love)” launches as her ninth No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
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With 16 weeks at No. 1 on the Artist 100, Grande passes Ed Sheeran for the sixth-most frames spent in charge since the chart began in 2014.
Artist 100, Most Weeks at No. 1:102, Taylor Swift38, Drake28, The Weeknd21, BTS20, Adele16, Ariana Grande15, Ed Sheeran
Here’s a breakdown of the metrics contributing to Grande’s latest reign on the Artist 100.
Streaming
In the March 8-14 tracking week, Grande’s catalog generated 219.3 million on-demand official U.S. streams (encompassing songs on which she has lead artist billing). She ranks as the third-most-streamed artist in that span, after only Taylor Swift (286.7 million) and Drake (224.7 million).
Grande’s songs that generated the most official streams (on-demand and programmed) during the week: “We Can’t Be Friends” (32.6 million, making it the most-streamed song overall), “The Boy Is Mine” (17.6 million), “Yes, And?” (17.3 million), “Supernatural” (16.4 million) and “Eternal Sunshine” (15.9 million).
Radio airplay
Grande’s songs earned a combined 33.7 million in radio airplay audience March 8-14. Her songs that drew the most impressions in that span: “Die for You,” with The Weeknd (14.4 million), “Yes, And?” (13.7 million) and “We Can’t Be Friends” (4.6 million).
Grande is also charting on the following radio rankings:Adult Pop Airplay: “Yes, And?” (No. 11) and “We Can’t Be Friends” (No. 29)Dance/Mix Show Airplay: “Yes, And?” (No. 12)Pop Airplay: “Yes, And?” (No. 20) and “We Can’t Be Friends” (No. 31)Adult Contemporary: “Yes, And?” (No. 24)Radio Songs: “Yes, And?” (No. 48)
Album sales
As for Grande’s album sales March 8-14, here’s a breakdown, by configuration:
Overall album sales: 79,000, the most among all actsVinyl sales: 34,000, the most among all actsCD sales: 32,000, the most among all actsDigital sales: 13,000, the most among all acts
Eternal Sunshine sold 77,000 copies, almost the entirety of Grande’s album sales for the week. It’s the top-selling album overall, as well as the top-seller on both vinyl and CD.
Meanwhile, Grande’s collections earned a combined 241,000 equivalent album units in the tracking week, the second-most among all acts after Swift (261,000).
Track sales
Grande’s songs sold a combined 14,000 downloads March 8-14, making her the third-best-selling artist of the week in terms of digital song sales, after Swift (26,000) and Teddy Swims (16,000).
Grande’s songs that sold the most in that period, all from Eternal Sunshine: “We Can’t Be Friends” (9,000), “The Boy Is Mine,” “Bye” and “Imperfect for You” (1,000 each).
March has ended up a much more crowded pop month in 2024 than it has the past few years, with new albums delivered or expected from big names like Justin Timberlake, Kacey Musgraves, Shakira, Future x Metro Boomin and Beyoncé. But up first among the A-listers was Ariana Grande, and her first-week performance should set the star standard for the rest of the month, if not even longer.
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Grande debuts atop the Billboard 200 this week with her recently released seventh album Eternal Sunshine, moving 227,000 units in the set’s first week of availability — easily outshining the 149,000 first-week units previously moved by Ye & Ty Dolla $ign’s Vultures 1, 2024’s prior high-water mark. Meanwhile, the set’s new single “We Can’t Be Friends (Wait for Your Love)” also debuts atop the Hot 100, making for the album’s second No. 1, following the fast-starting, quickly receding “Yes, And?”
How should Ariana feel about her big debut week? And will “We Can’t Be Friends” have better chart endurance than its predecessor? Billboard staffers answer these questions and more below.
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1. Ariana Grande debuts atop the Billboard 200 with 227,000 units moved — up about 30% from the 174,000 Positions bowed with in 2020, though still down from the 360,000 Thank U, Next debuted with the year before. On a scale from 1-10, how excited do you think Grande should be with that entrance?
Katie Atkinson: 10. Any time a veteran artist builds on their last release – in this case, selling even more than she did with her most recent Billboard 200 No. 1 album – it’s cause for celebration. Her fanbase clearly missed her and didn’t go anywhere, and in fact grew in numbers this time around. So she didn’t match her Thank U, Next numbers… yes, and? This is excellent news for Ari all around.
Kyle Denis: 9. Eternal Sunshine pulled first-week numbers that are comparable to that of the two albums she released when she was arguably at a popularity peak in terms of her social media presence and general media coverage. Furthermore, Eternal Sunshine arrived on the back of considerable controversy regarding Grande’s personal life, as well as a lead single that garnered fairly lukewarm reception. Despite those obstacles, Grande pulled off the year’s best sales week yet with an album on which she wrote nearly every song by herself. That’s got to feel pretty amazing – especially for an artist who has spoken at length about how much Eternal Sunshine feels like a new chapter in her life and career.
Lyndsey Havens: 10. Regardless of units, I think the cultural imprint of Eternal Sunshine is almost (if not just) as significant as Thank U, Next. Plus, Thank U had the added boost of following Sweetener — which likely led to a larger first-week sum, as it arrived within six months of its predecessor and continued to offer a behind-the-scenes look at Ari’s most front-facing era. With Eternal Sunshine, the first week showing is impressive for a variety of factors: the rollout was swift, with only one single in “Yes, And?” arriving ahead of the album’s release; Ari herself has been somewhat out of the spotlight – despite inspiring countless headlines – as she filmed Wicked; and she was selective with press leading up to its arrival. All in all, a No. 1 debut is always something worth celebrating – and even if its opening week had fallen short, Ari made this album for herself. As she declared in “Yes, And?”: “I’m so done with caring with you think.”
Jason Lipshutz: An 8. Eternal Sunshine follows the longest recording gap in her career, and while lead single “Yes, And?” debuted at No. 1 on the Hot 100 in January, the song hasn’t functioned like a months-long top 10 smash on the level of something like the Thank U, Next title track. With those factors in mind, Grande returning with the biggest debut of the years so far, and an even stronger first-week performance than that of Positions, has to feel highly encouraging, and the confirmation of a superstar who still generates a ton of excitement even after a relatively prolonged break.
Andrew Unterberger: Without “Yes, And?” and its relatively muted reception, I would’ve said 7. Following it, I might say 9. We’ll split the difference and say 8 overall here: It’s a very fine first-week total that feels even finer since Grande looked at least slightly at risk of coming in soft following the somewhat iffy response to its lead single.
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2. This album was promoted somewhat unusually compared to Grande’s other recent releases, considering that it was announced months in advance, but only with one new song dropped pre-release — the No. 1-debuting but somewhat coolly received “Yes, And?” Do you think the first-week debut justifies the promotional strategy, or did she potentially leave units on the table?
Katie Atkinson: It justifies the strategy, because her fans consumed almost everything all at once, instead of skipping over the pre-release tracks they’d already heard. The album’s commercial success appears to be the icing on top of an artistically and emotionally fulfilling rollout for Grande, too, given that the project is themed around the end of her marriage and the start of her new relationship, so she’s able to deliver it as a complete work from start to finish. “Sharing it has re-opened a lot of little and big feelings alike and it has been an emotional week in many ways!” she wrote on Instagram to celebrate her No. 1 debut, “but your overwhelmingly loving response to it all has made me feel such joyful, human connection and comfort.” Much of that response was possible by saving almost the full album for release day.
Kyle Denis: Absolutely — to both, kinda. There’s no doubt in mind that with a stronger-performing lead single, Eternal Sunshine could have at least crossed the 250,000 mark. Nonetheless, I do think the limited appearances and intentional focus on the music is a campaign much better suited for 2024 Ariana Grande than, say, 2014 Ariana Grande.
Lyndsey Havens: I’ve always been a fan of a highly anticipated album being preceded by one track – and not even its best one. My guess if that Ari may have not cared all that much about her album’s debut week, and instead of worrying about leaving units on the table she was more concerned with making an album that would last. It seems as if the rollout plan is just heating up, rather than coming to a slow stop – and to me, that’s a strategy that only a seasoned pop player can pull off so well.
Jason Lipshutz: The first-week performance of Eternal Sunshine — plus the fact that both its lead single and second single hit No. 1 on the Hot 100 — makes the rollout look like a stroke of genius. Grande was able to generate excitement around her return with “Yes, And?,” then preserve a lot of that anticipation around the rest of the album; “We Can’t Be Friends” was a clear standout upon its release, and a new music video was locked and loaded in order to help Grande score back-to-back chart-toppers. Of course, none of this works if Grande didn’t come correct with the new music, but as far as releasing that music for maximum impact, I’m not sure how you could have drawn it up better.
Andrew Unterberger: It maybe validated it, but it definitely rescued it. “Yes, And?” was a fine-enough “I’m back” single, but it probably wasn’t quite the undeniable smash that fans were hoping for after what was essentially a three-year absence for Grande. To see that song quickly tumble out of the top 10 and decline to follow it up was really putting herself at risk if the album didn’t deliver immediately. But it did — helps of course that the album is very, very good — and now the whole thing seems like it’s unfolded exactly as it should have. All part of Grande’s brilliant design? Only she knows for sure, but it doesn’t really matter at this point anyway.
3. Eternal Sunshine ultimately outperformed most early first-week projections, largely because consumption of the album — in particular lead single “We Can’t Be Friends” — continued rising past the weekend. Why do you think the album managed to maintain its momentum at a time when albums so often begin fading almost immediately after release?
Katie Atkinson: There was a lot of discourse online about what each song was about and what it said about her relationships, old and new. And for “We Can’t Be Friends” specifically, there’s the music video that takes the album’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind inspiration to its literal conclusion by re-creating vignettes from the film with Ariana stepping for Kate Winslet and Evan Peters stepping in for Jim Carrey. It bears repeat viewings for how beautiful and very, very sad it is. (And as the YouTube commenters have pointed out, it’s nice to see a “playful/smiley” version of Peters, who typically plays very dark characters.)
Kyle Denis: It’s not the most mind-blowing answer, but Eternal Sunshine is simply a great album that gets better and reveals more layers (both musically and conceptually) with each listen – and not too many mainstream pop albums are doing that currently. Grande also used to be notorious for how she would shower fans with snippets and teases months before releasing an album. With none of that happening this time around, fans had no choice but to sit with the album and immerse themselves in the world Grande and her collaborators crafted.
Lyndsey Havens: I think it’s directly correlated to the fact that projections were low for this album. On a musical level, it’s clear that Eternal Sunshine is Ari at her most confident – each song, especially lead single “Yes, And?” proves as much. And as it pertains to the album’s rollout, that self-assuredness has seemed to carry over. It’s as if Ariana knew she was sitting on gold – it was only a matter of time until everyone else saw the sparkle, too.
Jason Lipshutz: Multiple factors could have helped Eternal Sunshine sustain its streaming numbers beyond its first weekend, but the main reason is the most obvious one: the album is really, really good. Eternal Sunshine has been met with acclaim by both Arianators and overall pop fans alike, and along with immediate interest in “We Can’t Be Friends” as a breakout single, fans kept returning to, and gobbling up, the album on streaming services. The album outpacing its early projections bodes well for its long-term commercial health — I could see Eternal Sunshine hanging around the top 10 of the Billboard 200 for a while based on this type of universal embrace.
Andrew Unterberger: Grande’s extremely busy and visible weekend no doubt helped a good amount: Following the release of Sunshine that Friday, she brought “Friends” (and albummate “Imperfect for You”) to SNL on Saturday, while also acting in a couple sketches, then appeared at the Oscars to present best original song with her Wicked co-star Cynthia Erivo on Sunday. For a star who felt like she’d largely been absent for the past three years to suddenly be everywhere again undoubtedly made sure she was on everyone’s mind throughout the rest of the week, and no doubt helped those first-week streams a decent amount.
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4. While “Yes, And?” bowed at No. 1 at the Hot 100, it also slipped out of the top 10 two weeks after, not returning to the top tier until this week (when it rebounds to No. 10). Do you think “Friends” will follow a similar trajectory of sliding post-release, or will it be more enduring as a hit than “Yes, And?” has thusfar proven to be?
Katie Atkinson: Well, if you’re asking for me personally, I love “Yes, And?” and its Paula Abdul-indebted music video a lot. But after hearing the full project, “We Can’t Be Friends” feels far more in line with the theme of the album. So while I hope there is a world where “Yes, And?” endures, I will totally understand if the song that’s more emblematic of the album is what fans associate with it in years to come.
Kyle Denis: I think “Friends” will dwarf “Yes, And?” pretty easily. It’s much more easily digestible from a sonic and lyrical standpoint, Grande’s SNL performance was stellar, and the track’s stability throughout its first week signals that audiences are genuinely connecting with it. Although it’s a highly competitive spring — with Cowboy Carter, Tortured Poets and more Vultures LPs on the way — I see “Friends” sticking around the Hot 100 top 10 well into the summer. Hopefully by then, however, “The Boy Is Mine” will have emerged as the album’s next single.
Lyndsey Havens: I think now that we have the full Eternal Sunshine package, both songs could sustain top-tier placements – though I do think “Friends” is more likely to stick around the top 10, especially as Ari continues to reveal more behind the scenes clips online. And while I love “Friends,” I think the question isn’t is if it will be more enduring than “Yes, And?” but if it will be the most enduring track on the album at all. Grande also chose album standout “Imperfect for You” to perform on Saturday Night Live, a stunning ballad that has yet to reach its full mainstream potential, and we’re now seeing stars like Olivia Rodrigo and Megan Thee Stallion sing along to a sped-up version of “The Boy is Mine” on TikTok. All is to say, I think the genius of this album is that there isn’t one true standout song – we need them all.
Jason Lipshutz: “We Can’t Be Friends” sounds like the defining hit of this Ariana Grande era, a synth fantasia with blurring relationship lines and a big, heartfelt hook. “Yes, And?” has grown on me quite a bit, but its tone is slightly off-center compared to the rest of Eternal Sunshine; “Friends” captures the main ideas and sound of an album that fans have immediately championed, and I think that will help the single find more chart success than Grande’s previous No. 1 hit.
Andrew Unterberger: It does feel like “Friends” is a bit more of a pop bullseye than “Yes, And?,” and we should see that reflected in its chart performance. I don’t know if its run at No. 1 will ultimately be that much longer than the one week for “Yes, And?” however — the turnover on the charts this year has been much more consistent than it was early in the past couple years, and my recent prediction of a long run atop the Hot 100 for “Texas Hold ‘Em” already appears to have been proven over-enthused.
5. It’s been about a week and a half — where, roughly, do you rank Eternal Sunshine within Grande’s catalog so far?
Katie Atkinson: I would probably put it at No. 3 or 4 at the moment. I love that Ari took a big autobiographical swing on this one, but I might have needed a few dance floor moments to move it up in my ranking.
Kyle Denis: No. 2. Give it until the fall, and we just might have a new No. 1.
Lyndsey Havens: This is the question I have grappled with the most. On one hand, I have always considered my top album Sweetener and Thank U, Next to be an unsplittable pair, coming in at Nos. 1 and 2, respectively. But the thing about Eternal Sunshine is that, to me, it is so good that I think it has done the impossible: broken the dynamic duo apart. Which is to say, Eternal Sunshine is looking at a runner-up spot to my forever No. 1 Sweetener, creating a bittersweet reality for Thank U, Next.
Jason Lipshutz: In a seven-album race, it earns the bronze medal. Eternal Sunshine represents another mature, high-quality album from Grande that’s more consistently pleasing than Positions but comes up just short of the transcendent nature of the Sweetener/Thank U, Next one-two punch. No shame in that game, of course; taken as a whole, Grande’s albums output has been dizzyingly good since 2018, turning her from a reliable hitmaker to one of pop’s very elite.
Andrew Unterberger: It’s in the exact middle of the pack for me: richer and more considered than her first three sets, but not as sonically satisfying as Sweetener, as sublime as Positions or as emotionally striking as Thank U, Next. Regardless, Grande is undoubtedly in the midst of one of the great album runs for any pop artist this century — maybe any artist, period.
Beyoncé’s “Texas Hold ‘Em” ascends to the top 10 on Billboard’s all-format Radio Songs chart (dated March 23). The track advances to No. 10, from No. 12, with 40 million impressions, up 11%, March 8-14, according to Luminate. It drew airplay on nearly 575 stations in the tracking week – the most of any song […]
Teddy Swims’ “Lose Control” lifts to No. 1 on Billboard’s Adult Pop Airplay chart (dated March 23). The song marks the Atlanta native’s first leader on a Billboard radio ranking. It rose to No. 2 on Adult Alternative Airplay in January and ascends to a new No. 6 best on Pop Airplay. The single concurrently […]
A beautiful week looms for Benson Boone, whose “Beautiful Things” (via Warner Records) leads the U.K. chart race.
“Beautiful Things” has topped the Billboard Global 200 and Billboard Global Excl. U.S. surveys but, in eight weeks on the Official U.K. Singles Chart, has never gone higher than No. 2.
That could be about to change. Based on midweek sales and streaming data published by the OCC, the Washington-born singer-songwriter’s breakout hit takes pole position, lifting 2-1.
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Meanwhile, after four weeks at the summit – for her longest U.K. reign – Beyonce’s “Texas Hold ‘Em” (Columbia/Parkwood Ent) finally loses its grip. It’s down 1-2 on the midweek tally.
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Closing out the top three on the chart blast is Ariana Grande’s “We Can’t Be Friends (Wait For Your Love),” up 6-3. The track is housed on Grande’s current U.K. No. 1 album, Eternal Sunshine (Republic Records), her fifth leader.
The top new release at the midway mark belongs to Mark Knopfler, whose charity fundraising single “Going Home” (BMG) is set for a top 10 start.
The former Dire Straits frontman assembled a starry cast of guitar heroes for the 9-minute recording, a remake of the theme from the 1983 feature film Local Hero. The likes of David Gilmour, Ronnie Wood, Slash, Eric Clapton, Sting, Joan Armatrading, Bruce Springsteen, Joan Jett, Pete Townshend and the late Jeff Beck are among the scores of performers on the recording, which raises funds for Teenage Cancer Trust and Teen Cancer America.
“Going Home” had briefly led the U.K. chart race, but slips to No. 6 midweek. The original cut, an instrumental, spent three weeks on the chart in 1983 with a peak of No. 56. The Northern Englishman recently sold 120 guitars and amplifiers, with charities the British Red Cross, Tusk, Brave Hearts of the North East and Teenage Cancer Trust among the beneficiaries.
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Also eyeing a top 10 berth is BTS member V (real name: Kim Tae-hyung), whose “FRI(END)S” (BigHit Entertainment) is predicted to open at No. 7. That would mark V’s first solo U.K. top tier appearance. If “FRI(END)S” holds its course, V would join bandmates Jimin (“Like Crazy” at No. 8) and Jung Kook (“Too Much” with The Kid Laroi and Central Cee at No. 10, “3D” with Jack Harlow at No. 5, “Standing Next To You” at No. 5, and “Seven” with Latto at No.3) as the BTS members with U.K. solo top 10 notches on their belts.
All will be revealed when the Official U.K. Singles Chart is published Friday, March 22.