Chart Beat
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For the first time in over four years, two albums debut in the top 10 at the same time on Billboard’s Latin Pop Albums chart.
On the May 11-dated list, Jay Wheeler’s Música Buena Para Días Malos opens at No. 4, while Kany García’s García, arrives at No. 8. The pair marks the first time the Latin Pop Albums chart has dual titles launch in the upper region since Oct. 12, 2019, when José José bowed at Nos. 1, 6 and 7, following his death that September, with Serie Platino – 20 Exitos Vol. 2, El Principe de La Canción and Secreto, respectively.
Wheeler’s Música Buena Para Días Malos starts with 5,000 equivalent units earned in the U.S. in the week ending May 2, according to Luminate. Out of those, a little over 4,000 derive from streams, which equates to 6.3 million official on-demand streams of the album’s songs. Traditional album and track sales comprise the remaining sum of the album’s first week.
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Música Buena Para Días Malos was preceded by one song on the overall Latin Airplay chart: “Historia,” which peaked at No. 35 (chart dated April 27).
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Further, with the simultaneous top 10 debuts on Latin Pop Albums by two different artists, Wheeler and García also repeat a feat last achieved five years ago, when Miguel and Anitta debuted at Nos. 3 and No. 4, with Te Lo Dije (EP) and Kisses on the April 20, 2019-dated list.
Both sets add to the list of few albums that have debuted on Latin Pop Albums in 2024. Here are those five top 10 debuts, including two No. 1 albums:
Debut Date, Debut Pos., Title, ArtistJan. 27, No. 1, Orquídeas, Kali UchisApril 6, No. 1, Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran, ShakiraApril 13, No. 6, Final, Vol. 2, Enrique IglesiasMay 11, No 4, Música Buena Para Días Malos, Jay WheelerMay 11, No. 8, García, Kany Garcia
García’s eponymous album arrives on Latin Pop Albums with 2,000 equivalent units earned in the U.S. during the same period. García’s opening frame was almost entirely driven by the streaming activity of its 12 songs. That figure equals to 3.4 million official on-demand streams of the set’s songs.
García, who has history on the tally, returns to the top 10 after almost five years, when the Puerto Rican singer-songwriter’s Contra El Viento debuted and peaked at No. 3 in June 2019.
García has landed 10 titles on the chart altogether, with eight of them reaching the top 10, spanning three decades since the album Cualquier Día, her chart debut, rose to No. 10 in September 2007.
García was preceded by three songs on Latin Pop Airplay. The No. 15-peaking “Una Vida Buena” led the new recruits (Feb. 3). Meanwhile, “Que Vuelva,” with Carla Morrison, and “En Esta Boca,” with Young Miko, reached No. 12 on the March 16- and March 30-dated rankings, respectively. Lastly, “Te Lo Agradezco,” with Carin León, re-enters at No. 43 on the current multi-metric Hot Latin Songs chart, which combines airplay, digital sales, and streaming activity.
Of 15 debuts on the May 11-dated Billboard Global Excl. U.S. chart, the most noticeable, at least in terms of a lengthy backstory, may not be Tommy Richman’s seemingly out-of-nowhere breakout hit “Million Dollar Baby” (No. 74) or Kendrick Lamar’s rap battle entry “Euphoria” (No. 98). The most surprising title on the tally overall may […]
Madonna played the final shows of The Celebration Tour, closing her six-month trek with $225.4 million and 1.1 million tickets sold over 80 shows, according to figures reported to Billboard Boxscore.
The Celebration Tour is Madonna’s sixth trek to gross more than $100 million. The only other acts to achieve this are the Eagles, The Rolling Stones, Bruce Springsteen and U2, making her the sole woman in this elite group.
The Queen of Pop first announced The Celebration Tour in January 2023, with a planned start date in July of last year. But a medical emergency delayed the North American leg by five months, instead starting in Europe in October. There, she played 27 shows in 10 countries, finishing with $77.5 million and 429,000 tickets.
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By year’s end, Madonna played three shows in Brooklyn and two in Washington, D.C., before resuming the North American leg with 42 more shows from January through April. In the U.S. and Canada, she earned $133.1 million and sold 616,000 tickets, sending the tour’s total figures beyond $200 million and 1 million tickets.
Finally, Madonna went to Latin America for the first time since 2016, as part of the Rebel Heart Tour. Five shows at Mexico City’s Palacio de los Deportes grossed $14.8 million and sold 82,400 tickets.
In all, The Celebration Tour’s $225 million finish marks Madonna’s highest-grossing tour in over a decade. While in Europe, it surpassed her theater experiment on the Madame X Tour ($51.5 million in 2019-20). And during her North American leg, she partied past the Rebel Heart Tour’s $169.8 million from 2015-16.
Madonna’s recent high dates back to 2012’s MDNA Tour, which grossed $305.2 million and sold 2.2 million tickets. That trek played many of the same American arenas as The Celebration Tour, but took her to Europe’s outsized outdoor stadiums, plus a lengthier stadium run throughout Latin America. Her biggest tour ever was the one before that, earning $407.7 million from 3.5 million tickets on the Sticky & Sweet Tour (2008-09).
The apples-to-apples improvement over the Rebel Heart Tour – Madonna’s most recent all-arena run – combines an uptick in ticket prices ($162.42 – > $199.93) with a 12% increase in average per-show attendance count (12,750 – > 14,274).
That average attendance is missing an obvious asterisk. After playing her final show in Mexico City, Madonna staged a free concert at Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, marking her first stop in the city since a Dec. 2, 2012, performance on the MDNA Tour. The show’s gargantuan success does not factor into her official Boxscore results because it was a free event, but it’s plenty worth noting that she drew 1.6 million people – roughly 40% more than the combined attendance of her entire tour. According to concert promoter Live Nation, it’s the largest audience ever for a stand-alone concert by any artist in history.
The Celebration Tour pushes Madonna’s reported career total to $1.6 billion and – without accounting for the Brazil show – 12.8 million tickets.
On the Billboard Hot 100 dated May 9, 1964, Louis Armstrong ended the most dominant run at No. 1 in the chart’s history to that point.
The Beatles had ruled the Hot 100 for 14 consecutive weeks, via three singles in a row, neither feat of which had previously been achieved: Their landmark U.S. breakthrough hit “I Want To Hold Your Hand” began a seven-week reign on the Feb. 1, 1964-dated chart, followed by two weeks on top for “She Loves You” and a five-week No. 1 stay for “Can’t Buy Me Love,” through the ranking dated that May 2.
The following frame, amid The Beatles-led British Invasion, famed New Orleans-born trumpeter and vocalist Armstrong’s “Hello, Dolly!” rose to No. 1. The title song from the hit musical was written by Jerry Herman and produced by Michael Kapp. It went on to win song of the year and best vocal performance, male at the Grammy Awards in 1965, while Armstrong’s recording was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2001.
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Despite The Beatles’ onslaught of hits at the time, Armstrong’s Hot 100 conquest with “Hello, Dolly!” had momentum thanks in large part to its parent musical.
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As researched in-depth by Grammy Award-winning author and Armstrong historian (and musician) Ricky Riccardi for a 2021 piece, “Hello, Dolly! Opens; Critics Toss Hats” a headline read in the Jan. 25, 1964, Billboard issue. “The critics flipped,” the story noted. “‘Don’t bother holding onto your hats,’ said Walter Kerr in The Herald Tribune, ‘because you won’t be needing them. You’d only be throwing them into the air. A musical comedy dream.’ ”
Per Riccardi, Arvell Shaw, who played bass with Armstrong, told documentarian Ken Burns, “Three or four months [after “Hello, Dolly!” was recorded], we were out on the road [in early 1964] doing one-nighters in Nebraska and Iowa, way, way out. And every night we’d hear from the audience, ‘Hello, Dolly!,’ ‘Hello, Dolly!’ The first couple of nights Louis ignored it, and it got louder … ‘Hello, Dolly!’ Louis looked at me and said, ‘What the hell is ‘Hello, Dolly!’?’ We had to get the music and learn it and put it in the concert. The first time we put it in, pandemonium broke out. We were so far out he didn’t even realize he had a big hit.”
“Hello, Dolly!” entered the Hot 100 dated Feb. 15, 1964, when “I Want To Hold Your Hand” was No. 1 and the typically copy-heavy front page of the issue and showed The Beatles behind Billboard’s logo, above three stories devoted to the band. (“U.S. Rocks & Reels From Beatles’ Invasion,” read the main headline.)
Noted Riccardi, Armstrong drew front-page Billboard ink of his own a week later in a story headlined “Broadway Lights Up Labels; Diskers Aim for Peak Year.” “The music and drama of Broadway is making solid impact on the record company scene this season,” Mike Gross wrote. “Not since the heyday of My Fair Lady have the diskers looked to Broadway product with such bullish attitudes.”
As “Hello, Dolly!” scaled the Hot 100, Armstrong further realized its impact. Riccardi sourced a story by columnist Jimmy Breslin quoting Armstrong: “People keep coming up to me about ‘Dolly’ and sayin’, ‘You’re doing all right. You’re selling records right behind The Beatles.’ I’m with The Beatles. Music is music. There’s all kinds. But it all come from the same place. It all come from old, sanctified churches. I don’t care how they change it … old, sanctified churches is the essence of it.”
By mid-April 1964, according to Riccardi, Armstrong told Newsweek of his impending Hot 100 No. 1, “I like that tune. It’s got a good feeling, it’s a good, happy one.” Of its recording, he said, “We didn’t have no arrangement or nothin’. We just scat out our parts. I played it the way I am, Satchmo’s way. The people don’t forget that old beat. They know the essence, and it’s Satchmo.”
As for the acts then occupying the Hot 100’s upper reaches, added Armstrong (whom Ed Sullivan praised in a May 15, 1964, New York Daily News column for “that famous gravel-velvet voice”), “It’s awful nice to be there among all them Beatles.”
The Beatles, meanwhile, reciprocated, Riccardi pointed out, by playing a bit of “Hello, Dolly!” – on kazoo – in a 1964 holiday message.
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Beyond its notable journey to No. 1 on the Hot 100, “Hello, Dolly!” made history for Armstrong, who at 62 became the most senior artist to lead the list. The mark stood until last December, when Brenda Lee, then 78, jingled to No. 1 with “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” (although she was 13 when she recorded the carol, originally released in 1958).
Plus, by dethroning The Beatles after 14 weeks atop the Hot 100, Armstrong put a stop to the longest continuous command for an act in the chart’s history to that point, one that stood solely until 1993, when Whitney Houston tied it, via “I Will Always Love You.” Boyz II Men surpassed the mark with a 16-week No. 1 run in 1994, while The Black Eyed Peas currently hold the record: 26 consecutive weeks, thanks to “Boom Boom Pow” (12 weeks) and “I Gotta Feeling” (12) in 2009.
Following the reign of “Hello, Dolly!,” Armstrong remained prominent on Billboard’s charts. The song’s parent album of the same name crowned the Billboard 200 for six weeks beginning in June 1964, while he added two more Hot 100 entries that year.
“Hello, Dolly!” also became Armstrong’s first of five Adult Contemporary top 10s, ruling for nine weeks – with “What a Wonderful World” reaching No. 7, as well as No. 32 on the Hot 100, in 1988, the 1967 recording revived thanks to its spotlight in the box office hit Good Morning, Vietnam. In 1999, a remake of the latter song by Kenny G featuring Armstrong hit No. 22 on Adult Contemporary.
Armstrong, who died in July 1971, has additionally logged 12 top 10s on Billboard’s Jazz Albums chart. Most recently, his retrospective Gold hit No. 7 this March, with its 40-song tracklist including “Hello, Dolly!”
Though it never produced a chart crown, The Killers’ “Mr Brightside” is a record-breaker in the U.K.
Two decades after release, the U.S. alternative rock act’s signature song is anointed as the biggest-ever single which didn’t snag a U.K. No. 1.
The Killers were originally discovered by and signed to U.K. independent Lizard King, and were embraced by Brits as one of their own. “Mr Brightside” was initially released in 2003 with a limited-edition 500 CD run, and was reissued in May 2004, peaking at No. 10.
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The track failed to set the charts on fire but has proven a slow burner, notching 408 weeks on the Official U.K. Singles Chart – almost eight full years.
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Since its release, “Mr Brightside” has accumulated 5.57 million combined units, including 1.066m sales and 530,340,000 streams, the Official Charts Company reports, good enough for third place on the all-time list of biggest songs, behind Elton John’s “Something About the Way You Look Tonight”/”Candle in the Wind 1997.” That streaming tally sends it to No. 5 in the list of most-streamed songs of all time in the U.K.
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The biggest week (across all formats) for “Mr Brightside” in the U.K. was July 2019, when it amassed 17,700 chart units following the Las Vegas act’s headline set at Glastonbury Festival, while its biggest week of sales was registered in 2012, when the single was bought and downloaded 125,200 times.
On its 20th anniversary, “Mr Brightside” eclipses Oasis’ 1995 ballad “Wonderwall” for the unusual honor. “Wonderwall,” lifted from the Manchester rock band’s sophomore album (What’s the Story) Morning Glory), peaked at No. 2.
The OCC crunched the numbers and declared “Mr Brightside” is actually gathering pace. Last year saw the track generate its biggest volume of streams, with 79.97 million plays, the OCC reports, and in 2024, combined weekly sales and streams are up 23% year-on-year.
The Killers will dish out the hits for the Rebel Diamonds Tour of the U.K. and Ireland this summer, which includes 16 arena shows.
Marc Anthony adds a 15th top 10 to his Billboard Tropical Albums chart career as Muevense, his 11th studio album, starts at No. 4 on the ranking dated May 11. The 10-track set, released April 24 via Sony Music Latin, enters with 3,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending May 2, according to Luminate.
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Sales and streaming activity contribute to Muevense’s first week sum: albums sales comprise 1,500 units, while 1,500 units derive from streams, equaling 2.2 million official on-demand streams of the album’s songs. Track-equivalent album units comprise a negligible sum of the album’s first week.
On the Tropical Latin Albums chart units comprise album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). Each unit equals one album sale, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album.
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May is a month for celebration for Marc Anthony, who in addition to banking his 15th top 10 on Tropical Albums, launched his new Sirius XM channel, Muevense Radio, on May 1. Running for a limited time, through May 31, the channel features a best-of-playlist, plus music from his influences and favorite artists, and stories surrounding the breadth of his over three-decade tenure.
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Muevense arrives on Tropical Albums two years and two months after Marc’s previous album Pa’lla Voy reached No. 3 in March 2022. Plus, the new album extends his span of 15 top 10s to 31 years, dating to his first week in the top 10 on Feb. 17, 1993, when Otra Nota debuted and peaked at No. 2.
Further, Muevense joins two other Marc Anthony albums on Tropical Albums: 3.0 and Sigo Siendo Yo. While the latter claims its 280th week on the tally, 3.0 banks its 509th week and extends its record for the set with the most weeks overall since Tropical Albums began in 1985.
Beyond its Tropical Albums arrival, Muevense, encompassing eight salsa tracks, one bachata, and one regional Mexican ballad with Pepe Aguilar, also opens at No. 50 on Top Latin Albums.
The set was preceded by three songs. “Ale Ale” flies 16-3 on Tropical Airplay with a robust 227% gain in audience impressions, to 4 million, earned in the U.S. during the same tracking week. The song likewise opens at No. 22 on Latin Airplay as the Hot Shot debut of the week. The song was premiered live at the Latin American Music Awards on April 25.
Back on Tropical Airplay, with the new visit to the upper tier, Marc collects his 57th top 10 entry, and extends second-most record among all acts behind Victor Manuelle who continues to lead with 65 top 10 career hits. The bachata “Punta Cana,” meanwhile, dips 4-6 due to a 34% dip in audience, to 2 million.
Lastly, over on Regional Mexican Airplay, thanks to his co-billed “Ojala Te Duela,” with Pepe Aguilar, the Puerto Rican scored his first entry ever on a regional Mexican chart in Nov. 2023.
Grupo Frontera and Christian Nodal‘s first collaboration, “Ya Pedo Quien Sabe,” glides 3-1 on Billboard‘s Regional Mexican Airplay chart (dated May 11). The new joint champ marks the eighth No. 1 for Grupo Frontera and 17th for Nodal. All eight of Grupo Frontera’s leaders are collaborations.
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The duet crowns Regional Mexican Airplay after a 17% gain in audience impressions, to 7.8 million, earned in the U.S. during the April 26-May 2 tracking week, according to Luminate. “Ya Pedo Quien Sabe” was released March 7 via the Grupo Frontera label. The song is the second cut from Frontera’s forthcoming album, Jugando A Que No Pada Nada (slated for May 10 release).
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“Ya Pedo” was composed by Edgar Barrera, Horacio Palencia, Nathan Galante and Diego Bollella and produced by Barrera.
As the dynamo collaboration takes the lead on Regional Mexican Airplay, it becomes the fourth team-up by a group and a soloist in 2024 to top the list. Here’s the recap:
Chart Date, Title, Artist, Weeks at No. 1Feb. 3, “Harley Quinn,” Fuerza Regida & Marshmello, oneMarch 2, “Alch Si,” Carín León + Grupo Frontera, oneApril 13, “La Cumbia Triste,” Los Angeles Azules y Alejandro Fernández, oneMay 11, “Ya Pedo Quien Sabe,” Grupo Frontera & Christian Nodal
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With “Ya Pedo,” Nodal extends his record for the most No. 1s among soloists, with 17 champs in his account since the chart’s inception in November 1994. Plus, he enters a tie with La Arrolladora Banda el Limón de René Camacho for the fifth-most rulers in the Regional Mexican Airplay’s chart’s nearly 30-year history. They trail Calibre 50 who remains at the lead, way ahead of its next competitor, with 25 No. 1s, Banda MS de Sergio Lizárraga with 20, Intocable (19) and Banda El Recodo de Cruz Lizárraga (18).
Grupo Frontera picks-up its eighth No. 1; a collection that began a little over a year ago, when “Que Vuelvas,” with Carín León, topped the Regional Mexican radio ranking for six weeks starting the Jan. 28, 2023-dated list.
Further, “Ya Pedo” takes the crown from Calibre 50’s “Días Buenos, Días Malos” after the latter’s one week in charge. The song drops to No. 14, marking the biggest fall from No. 1 since Los Temerarios’ “Sin Que Lo Sepas Tú” equally tumbled 1-14 in 2007.
With the Regional Mexican Airplay locked, “Ya Pedo” next looks to give each act a new No. 1 on the overall Latin Airplay chart, where it climbs 10-5 with a 16% gain, and adds 8 million in audience.
Welcome to Billboard Pro‘s Trending Up newsletter, 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.
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This week: Drake and Kendrick Lamar see the catalog side effects of their recent beefing, a couple new hit movies impact streaming with their very different soundtracks, the calendar turns to *NSYNC season and more.
Kendrick Lamar’s Diss-Track Parade is Lifting His Entire Catalog – Drake’s, Not So Much
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“At least your fans are getting some raps out of you / I’m happy I could motivate you,” Drake declares near the end of “The Heart Part 6,” the most recent volley in his genre-consuming feud with Kendrick Lamar. Indeed, one of the by-products of this ongoing back-and-forth has been a new spate of material from a superstar who’s notoriously been stingy with his releases in between album cycles, as Lamar has already more than doubled his 2023 output with 2024 diss tracks alone. And while those shots at Drake have been doing boffo business on streaming services, Lamar’s entire catalog — even outside of his recent diss tracks — is up as well, as rap fans return to K. Dot’s discography for general appreciation (or to parse through subtle attacks against Aubrey Graham).
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“Euphoria,” the first of Lamar’s recent diss tracks, debuted at No. 11 on this week’s Hot 100 chart and could move up next week, as the song earned a whopping 27.6 million official U.S. on-demand streams from May 3-6, according to Luminate. “Not Like Us,” the most club-friendly diss track which dropped late on May 4, could debut even higher, with 21.1 million streams in its first three days of release, while the vicious “Meet the Grahams” earned 8.8 million streams from May 3-6. (“6:16 in LA,” another Lamar diss track, has yet to arrive on streaming services.)
Plus, listeners have been interested in perusing the classic songs that have served as samples in Lamar’s diss tracks. Teddy Pendergrass’ “You’re My Latest, My Greatest Inspiration” was up 76% in streams from Apr. 26-29 (76,000) to May 3-6 (134,000) after being sampled at the beginning of “Euphoria,” while Al Green’s “What a Wonderful Thing Love Is” shot up 283% over the same time period once it was used on “6:16 in LA.” And “BBL Drizzy,” the King Willonius song that Metro Boomin sampled for his anti-Drake beat challenge, is naturally way up in streams, from a negligible amount at the end of April to 185,000 from May 5-6.
Even if you remove all of the diss tracks from Lamar’s overall catalog, however, the rapper’s streams have still significantly increased since the simmering feud reached its recent boiling point. From May 3-6, Lamar’s discography earned 50.62 million streams — up 49% from the previous Friday-to-Monday tracking period (33.98 million from Apr. 26-29). Meanwhile, Drake’s overall catalog is actually down when you similarly compare his streams from that weekend (105.86 million from Apr. 26-29) to last weekend (100.69 million from May 3-6) and remove his two streaming-available response tracks, “Push Ups” and “Family Matters.” Of course, even with that 4.9% dip in catalog plays, Drake’s streaming numbers remain roughly twice as many as Lamar’s, which can be a minor source of comfort as his adversary’s diss tracks make the bigger splash on the charts. – JASON LIPSHUTZ
New Anne Hathaway Rom-Com Has the Right ‘Idea’ With Maggie Rogers, St. Vincent & More on Soundtrack
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The much-anticipated film adaptation of Robinne Lee’s hit novel The Idea of You made its Amazon Prime debut over the weekend – starring Anne Hathaway as a divorcee who takes her daughter to Coachella and ends up in an unlikely romance with the younger Hayes Campbell (Nicholas Galitzine), singer from the One Direction-ish fictional boy band August Moon. Unsurprisingly for a movie where music plays such a big part, the well-received film has a number of prominent synchs – more from the alternative end of the dial than the top 40 one – which have led to big streaming gains for those songs.
Singer-songwriter Maggie Rogers (who did play Coachella in 2019 and 2022) gets the movie’s opening credits song – also repeated in a flash-forward towards the end of the film – with her Heard It in a Past Life single “Light On.” The rousing song collected 354,000 official on-demand U.S. streams for the first four days of the film’s release (May 3-6), up 71% from the equivalent period the prior week, according to Luminate. Veteran art-rock star St. Vincent (a Coachella four-timer, most recently in 2018) also has three different songs appear in the movie, the most prominent being her Daddy’s Home highlight “Pay Your Way in Pain,” which plays on the radio (and is sung along to by Hathaway and her daughter, played by Ella Rubin) during a car ride. “Pain” racked up 32,000 streams from May 3-6, a 124% gain over the same period the week before.
And of course, you can’t have a movie about a fictional band without some fictional songs – and August Moon has a half-dozen of ‘em, appropriately co-penned/produced by go-to One Direction collaborator Savan Kotecha, most of which were released before the film. Those songs racked up a combined 1.3 million streams over May 3-6, led by “Dance Before We Walk,” which Campbell writes and records over the course of the movie. (And perhaps at least a couple viewers were also inspired to revisit the real thing over the weekend, as 1D’s U.S. on-demand audio streams were also up 5% over May 3-5 from the same three-day period the week before.) – ANDREW UNTERBERGER
Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross’ Challengers Score Is An Ace on Streaming
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Two weekends ago (April 26), Challengers, Luca Guadagnino’s acclaimed romantic tennis drama, hit theaters, bringing the electric throuple of Zendaya, Josh O’Connor and Mike Faist to the silver screen. To soundtrack the stylish, sexy film, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross provided a hypnotic techno-rooted score to track the intertwined fates of the film’s three characters.
According to Luminate, the Challengers score soundtrack collected 1.09 million official on-demand U.S. streams during the film’s opening weekend (April 26-28). In the following three-day period (April 29-May 1), streaming activity jumped 66% to 1.83 million streams. In its first week of release, (April 26-May 2), Challengers (Original Score) pulled 3.44 million streams.
While original songs remain big draws for tentpole movies – who can forget the multi-format dominance of last year’s Barbie soundtrack – score soundtracks tend to cater to markedly smaller audiences. With the danceable score and the star power of the film’s cast, younger artists have been particularly drawn to the Challengers score, which they’ve continuously expressed on TikTok. (The score also appeared in a Challengers-inspired SNL skit over the weekend.)
And who knows? Maybe the success of Challengers – in addition to her Labrinth-assisted Euphoria singles – could jumpstart Zendaya’s return to music. After all, she notched a Billboard Hot 100 top 40 hit with “Replay” (No. 40) 10 years ago! – KYLE DENIS
Online Edit Community Lifts Yëat to Another Viral Hit
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Whether you call them edits or fancams, you can always count on one of those video montages to catapult a song from obscurity to virality. While Yëat is no stranger to the Billboard charts — he’s already earned ten Hot 100 entries — “If We Bëing Real” could become his biggest solo hit yet.
Taken from 2093, his fourth studio album (which peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 in March), “If We Bëing Real” pulled over six million official on-demand U.S. streams during the period of April 26-May 2. That marks a whopping 214% increase in streaming activity from four weeks ago (March 29-April 4) when it earned 1.92 million streams.
Over the past month, streams for “If We Being Real” have increased at least 13% each week – thanks, in no small part, to its TikTok virality. An ominous, slowed-down version of “If We Bëing Real” has gained traction on the app as a soundtrack to edits of various fictional characters and real-life people, including Outer Banks’ Rafe Cameron (played by Drew Starkey), Kingdom of Heaven’s King Baldwin IV (played by Edward Norton) and Minnesota Timberwolves shooting guard Anthony Edwards. There are several unofficial “If We Bëing Real” TikTok sounds with upwards of 20,000 posts, including one with nearly 100,000 clips.
After hitting No. 2 on the Hot 100 by way of Drake’s “IDGAF” last year, Yeat could soon be revisiting the chart’s upper regions if “If We Being Real” continues to grow at this rate. – KD
Q&A: Josh Norek and Ernesto Lechner, Co-Hosts of The Latin Alternative Radio Show & Podcast, on What’s Trending Up in Their World
The Latin Alternative recently celebrated its 15th anniversary. What has it been like witnessing the evolving size and makeup of Latin music during that time?
Norek: In some ways, the evolving popularity and demographics of Latin music consumption has mirrored the growth of our show The Latin Alternative over the years. When we launched the program in 2009, we were airing in one single market (our parent station WEXT in Albany, NY). Today we are in 55 markets, including obvious ones like Los Angeles, Dallas and Orlando but also places you wouldn’t expect like Tulsa and Duluth where public radio stations reached out and asked for the show because they had real listener interest for Latin rock, hip-hop and left of center sounds. Latin music’s various subgenres have far more mainstream acceptance in all markets than when our program started, and that’s largely due to the ease in accessing the music via streaming. When I was a teenager growing up in Upstate NY back in the day, it was not exactly easy to find a Los Fabulosos Cadillacs import CD at the local record store, but a kid living in the boonies today would have no such problem finding the musical equivalent.
What has been the most surprising aspect of Latin music’s expansion over the past few years to you?
Norek: What I find surprising and couldn’t have anticipated when we began the show 15 years ago is how digital music distribution has leveled geographic barriers. For example, Uruguay is a tiny middle class country with just three million people, and its music seldom traveled very far in the CD era. But today we play more Uruguayan music on the show than the country’s size would indicate because we have lots of Uruguayan artists submitting music to us.
Another surprise is how regional Mexican music is finally “cool” and accepted in places like Miami and Spain where there was a lot of hostility – and not-so-subtle racism – directed at the genre. That’s really great to see, especially when over seventy percent of the U.S. Latino population is of Mexican origin.
Which trend in current Latin music fascinates you the most?
Lechner: I’m particularly obsessed with the way in which young artists in the reggaetón and Latin trap genres are questioning the very essence of what a pop song is supposed to be – and sound like. Their constant desire to experiment with form and content reminds me of impressionism in 19th century Paris, when Monet, Sisley and Pissarro reinvented the rules of painting. Some of the neo-reggaetón songs ignore the basics of song structure, and instead create vivid impressions, cinematic moods in the shape of song. I’m fascinated by the collaboration between Colombian producer Ovy on the Drums and KAROL G, as well as the latest works by Ozuna, Bizarrap, Rosalía, Arcángel, Rafa Pabön and Young Miko.
Fill in the blank: the Latin artist that not enough people are talking about yet is _______.
Lechner: I believe the prodigiously talented Chilean singer/songwriter Francisca Valenzuela should be an international superstar. – JL
Season’s Gainings: It’s Gonna Be *NSYNC Season
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Justin Timberlake might not have made quite the lasting impact on 2024 that he’d hoped to with his new Everything I Thought It Was album – and hey, it’s been a crowded year in pop, plenty hitmakers much younger and hipper than JT are struggling too – but at least one day out of the year is still guaranteed to be his. May 1 came and went a week ago, and with it, the biggest day for his old *NSYNC group’s lone Hot 100 No. 1 hit, “It’s Gonna Be Me” (with Timberlake of course delivering the last word of the title more like “May.”) The song first spiked 107% to 277,000 official on-demand U.S. streams on April 30, according to Luminate, and then another 60% the following day to 444,000 – before dropping 45% to 247,000 on May 2, as the song goes back into semi-hibernation for the next 363 days. – AU
Creepy Nuts’ “Bling-Bang-Bang-Born” returns to No. 1 on the Billboard Japan Hot 100, dated May 8, extending its record to 14 weeks atop the tally.
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The hip-hop hit dominated the chart for most of this year after it first hit No. 1 on the chart released Jan. 31 and stayed there for 13 straight weeks. The MASHLE Season 2 opener slipped to No. 2 last week (May 1) but returned to score its 14th week atop the list. The track has increased in all metrics of the chart’s methodology except streaming compared to the previous week. Downloads for the long-running hit are up by 117%, radio airplay and video views by 105%, and karaoke by 120%. And it’s far from doing poorly in streaming as well; weekly streams remain almost the same as the week before and the total has surpassed 300 million at the second fastest pace in Japan chart history.
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Moving 4-2 this week is Mrs. GREEN APPLE’s “Lilac.” The song gained 130% in downloads, 127% in karaoke, and notably, 425% in radio from the week before, hitting its highest position yet.
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Debuting at No. 3 is SixTONES’ 12th single “Neiro.” The theme song for the drama series Omukae Shibuya-kun starring member Taiga Kyomoto launched with 540,564 CDs sold, outselling the group’s previous single “CREAK” (471,285 first-week sales). The track tops sales and comes in at No. 9 for radio and No. 18 for video.
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In other chart moves, the theme song of a project by TOBE’s artists, called “Be on Your side,” re-enters the chart at No. 12 after selling 75,157 copies in its first week, and the first single “MORNING SUN” by EXILE B HAPPY — the new EXILE TRIBE music group led by EXILE TETSUYA — bows at No. 15.
The Billboard Japan Hot 100 combines physical and digital sales, audio streams, radio airplay, video views and karaoke data.
See the full Billboard Japan Hot 100 chart, tallying the week from Apr. 29 to May 5, here. For more on Japanese music and charts, visit Billboard Japan’s English Twitter account.
GloRilla’s anthem “Yeah Glo!” wins the No. 1 spot on Billboard’s Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart as the single crowns the list dated May 11. It climbs from No. 2 after a 14% surge in plays made it the most-played song on U.S. monitored mainstream R&B/hip-hop radio stations in the April 26 – May 2 tracking week, according to Luminate.
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“Yeah Glo!,” promoted by CMG/Interscope Records/ICLG, gives rapper GloRilla, whose real name is Gloria Woods, her third No. 1 on Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay. She previously reigned with her first two appearances: “FNF,” with producer Hitkidd, topped the list for one week in August 2022, while “Tomorrow 2,” with Cardi B, ruled for 10 nonconsecutive weeks in December 2022 – February 2023.
The “Yeah Glo!” radio rise parallels the song’s strong streams due to viral buzz on social media. It’s been especially prominent on TikTok, where users have used the song in clips in two common ways. In one version, two people rock side to side – one delivering the hook’s main lyrics, while the other acts as a hype act and lip syncs the “yeah, Glo!” ad-lib between lines. The song has also inspired a dance challenge, which GloRilla herself has noticed and participated in during her latest concerts. One video of the rapper from a stop at Louisiana State University, by user @amyroselin, has drawn 10.6 million views on the platform.
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In addition to its Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay triumph, “Yeah Glo!” drives 7-3 on the Rap Airplay chart through a 16% increase in weekly audience. It likewise cracks the top five on R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, which ranks songs through combined audience totals from adult R&B and mainstream R&B/hip-hop stations. There, it pushes 6-5 and registers 12.6 million in audience, up 15% from the previous week. On Rhythmic Airplay, “Glo!” grows 22-21 thanks to an 18% boost in plays at the format in the tracking week. Combined, the mounting radio activity thrusts “Glo!” 37-27 on the all-genre Radio Songs chart, where it tallied 17.4 million in total audience, a 16% week-over-week gain.
Swelling radio activity, in turn, helps fuel “Yeah Glo!” on the multi-metric Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart, which combines radio airplay results with streaming and sales data for its ranks. It climbs 13-11 on the list thanks to 17.4 million in airplay audience, 12.6 million official U.S. streams (up 7%) and 1,000 in sales (down 5%). The same statistics also spark its 59-38 swing on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100.
“Yeah Glo!” appears on GloRilla’s Ehhthang Ehhthang EP, released on April 5. The set debuted at No. 5 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart and has remained in the top 10 for its first four weeks, sitting at No. 8 on the current edition.