Chart Beat
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This fall, Charli XCX & Troye Sivan Present: Sweat will bring the British and Australian pop stars to arenas across the U.S. and Canada. It’s the first time that either of them will headline North American arenas, but following their respective recent releases and subsequent solo shows – let alone the growing force behind the fall shows’ sales – they need not sweat it.
The tour, which kicks off Sept. 14 in Detroit and went on sale in April, has already sold out more than 90% of its tickets, according to Brian Greenbaum, Sivan’s agent at CAA.
Greenbaum says the tour dates in Boston, Chicago, New York and San Francisco sold out immediately, while high demand pushed a second show in Los Angeles. He notes that tickets across the tour were 67% sold after the first weekend of availability, and 70% by the end of May.
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The Sweat announcement and on-sale were planted after Sivan’s latest album cycle (for the October 2023 release of Something to Give Each Other) had mainly run its course, but before Charli’s Brat rollout kicked into high gear (June 7 release date). That off-cycle and on-cycle rollout was by design, giving ample time to sell arena tickets by artists who were not historically arena acts.
But even with strong opening sales, the team behind Sweat knew they’d get “a second bite at the apple,” said Greenbaum. Since the on-sale, Sivan made his arena debut abroad, and Charli executed an entire album campaign. Rather than the typical drop-off, momentum has carried Sweat through the (Brat) summer, with Greenbaum noting that North American sales rose to 80% by mid-June and beyond 90% by the end of July.
Sivan’s third studio LP, Something to Give Each Other, earned him his first two Grammy nominations and became his first album to land multiple songs on the Billboard Hot 100.
That success set up the European leg of the Something to Give Each Other Tour, leveling him up to arenas in Europe on his own before coming Stateside with Charli. According to figures reported to Billboard Boxscore, he played 15 shows across the continent in May and June, grossing $5.7 million from 108,000 tickets sold, averaging $379,000 and 7,227 tickets per show.
Those figures mark a 225% increase over Sivan’s last European jaunt. In Amsterdam, he went from selling 6,000 tickets at AFAS Live on The Bloom Tour in 2019, to 13,500 at the Ziggo Dome in June. In Berlin, he leapt from 3,333 tickets at Tempodrom to 8,884 tickets at Velodrom. In London, his audience ballooned from 5,133 tickets at Eventim Apollo to 11,254 at OVO Arena Wembley.
In the eight European markets where Sivan returned, attendance grew by no less than double, and earnings multiplied by at least three. Assuming similar growth in the U.S., where he played more shows and commanded bigger grosses on The Bloom Tour, he is well set up for arenas in North America, especially teamed up with a similarly buzzy pop star.
In June, Charli XCX played a string of club and festival dates in North and South America. In contrast to Sivan’s international arena tour, she chose to tease their fall tour with underplays that lived in the more intimate, visceral world of Brat. Her handful of headline shows sold out, ranging from 850 tickets in Sao Paulo to 5,000 in Los Angeles.
The numbers on Charli’s live shows were intentionally smaller than Sivan’s, but the energy and word-of-mouth around them matched the intensity of the album. Not only did it debut to career-peak commercial returns (No. 3 on the Billboard 200) and universal acclaim, it has penetrated the cultural consciousness. Amid a string of music videos, remixes and viral dance challenges, Brat has infiltrated the 2024 U.S. election cycle via a swirl of memes and momentum behind Democratic presidential hopeful Kamala Harris (“kamala IS brat,” Charli virally tweeted last month).
It’s perfect timing, then, for Sivan and Charli to join forces on Sweat. In her own words, in Billboard’s July cover story, it finally made sense due to the dance-leaning nature of both of their albums – the first No. 1 for each of them on Top Dance/Electronic Albums. They’ve built toward arena status over their decade-plus careers, each building cult-pop success from one album to another.
Beginning her career with a smattering of hits with Iggy Azalea and Icona Pop and songwriting credits alongside Selena Gomez and Shawn Mendes, Charli continued to accrue acclaim for her solo projects, growing her base from 965 tickets per show on 2014’s Girl Power North America Tour, to 1,439 on 2019’s Charli Live Tour, and then to almost 4,000 tickets on 2022’s Crash the Live Tour. Sivan’s recent European leg grew his base two-to-one, while The Bloom Tour expanded his reach worldwide, with more than 60 shows on five continents.
With more than a month left before Sweat begins, sales are expected to creep closer toward a continental sell-out. Just this week, Brat track “360” jumped from No. 78 to No. 55 on the Hot 100, while “Apple” debuted, becoming the album’s third track to chart. A new remix looms, hinting at more gas in the tank in the remaining weeks before opening night.
Both Sivan and Charli will tour on their own again after Sweat wraps, with each artist playing hometown shows in Oceania and the U.K., respectively. By the end of the year, their combined ticket sales could approach 500,000 in 2024.
Ivan Cornejo achieves his first No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Latin Albums chart with Mirada, his third studio album, which debuts atop the Aug. 3-dated ranking. The 12-track effort follows two other top 10 albums for Cornejo, both within a year, between 2021-22.
Mirada starts at the summit on Top Latin Albums with 34,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. during the July 19-25 tracking week, according to Luminate. The set was released July 19, the first day of the tracking period, on Zaragoza/Insterscope/ICLG.
Of Mirada’s 34,000 units in its coronation week, 25,000 of those derive from streaming activity, which represent 35 million official on-demand U.S. streams of the album’s songs. Album sales comprise 9,000, while the remainder negligible amount stem from track sales. On Top Latin Albums, one unit equals one album sale, 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams for a song on the album.
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Third Regional Mexican Act to Debut at No. 1 on Top Latin Albums in the 2020s: 20-year-old Cornejo joins an elite group of regional Mexican acts whose projects launched at the summit on Top Latin Albums in the 20s decade. Alejandro Fernández’s Hecho En México debuted at No. 1 in Feb. 2020, while Eslabon Armado enlisted two No. 1 debuts, through Vibras de Noche and Desvelado in Aug. 2020 and May 2023, respectively.
Further, Cornejo captures his third top 10 on Top Latin Albums with a third appearance. The singer-songwriter visited the chart with the No. 7-peaking set Alma Vacía (Oct. 2021) and Dañado which peaked at No. 2 (Dec. 2022) and earned him a first Billboard Latin Music Award for regional Mexican album of the year in 2023.
Largest Debut Sales Week for a Regional Mexican Album Since 2020: Adding to Cornejo’s triumphs this week, the Riverside, Calif.-born artist likewise scores the largest debut sales week for a regional Mexican album since 2020, with 9,000 sold. The last regional Mexican album to start with a bigger sales figure was Fernández’s Hecho En México, which debuted at No. 1 on the Feb. 29, 2020-dated Top Latin Albums chart with 10,000 sold. Mirada‘s first-week sales were supported by a signed CD exclusive to his webstore, and a standard CD.
Second Regional Mexican Album to Debut in The Top 10 on Top Album Sales: Mirada is just the second regional Mexican album to debut within the top 10 on the all-genre Top Album Sales chart, which began in 1991. In total, 33 Latin albums have opened in the top 10. The only other regional Mexican album to debut in the top 10 was Fernández’s Hecho En México, with a No. 8 debut in 2020.
11 cuts from Mirada have landed on the multi-metric Hot Latin Songs chart, led by “Baby Please,” which bowed and reached a No. 8 high last March. Here’s a look at the album tracks on Hot Latin Songs, including two already ranked songs, a reentry, plus seven debuts on the current survey:
No. 7, “Intercambio Injusto”No. 9, “Sale Para Ser Feliz”No. 14, “Mirada”No. 19, “Baby Please”No. 21, “Herida Abierta”No. 23, “Vuelve”No. 27, “Donde Estás”No. 29, “Atención”No. 31, “Aquí Te Espero”No. 41, “Interlude”
Adding to Mirada’s breakthrough week, Cornejo reaches the top 20 for the first time on the overall Billboard 200, as the new album debuts at No. 17. He previously peaked at No. 28 with his last album, Dañado, in 2022. Plus, Mirada also debuts at No. 1 on Regional Mexican Albums, for Cornejo’s second No. 1 there.
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: Big movie soundtracks are back, as the classic hits-laden Deadpool and Wolverine and the modern country All-Stars-colleting Twisters both generate huge gains for their featured synchs upon their release, while a pair of very different artists get bumps from their memorable Olympics appearances and much more.
Deadpool & Wolverine & *NSYNC: Marvel Smash Boosts ‘Bye Bye Bye’ & More
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Last weekend at the box office, Deadpool and Wolverine tag-teamed to shatter records: the Marvel superhero crossover starring Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman grossed a staggering $205 million domestically in its opening weekend, earning the top debut of 2024 so far, and the biggest bow ever for an R-rated movie. Naturally, the success of a film full of popular music cues — the Deadpool & Wolverine soundtrack includes smashes from Fergie, Goo Goo Dolls, Huey Lewis and the News and Avril Lavigne, among others — has resulted in several of those songs experiencing hefty streaming bumps… with Justin, JC, Joey, Lance and Chris leading the way.
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The beginning of Deadpool & Wolverine features Deadpool performing *NSYNC’s classic “Bye Bye Bye” choreography while the No Strings Attached single soundtracks an opening-credits action scene, a sequence that has already been deconstructed and meme’d across TikTok ad nauseum. As a result, “Bye Bye Bye” is booming on streaming platforms — the track sits at a new high of No. 32 on today’s Spotify daily top 50 U.S. chart, ahead of more recent smashes like Eminem’s “Houdini” and Taylor Swift & Post Malone’s “Fortnight” — and scored 3.35 million official on-demand U.S. streams from July 26-29, according to Luminate, up 382% from that streaming total during the same period the previous week (695,000 from July 19-22). “Bye Bye Bye” peaked at No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2000, and while the boy band classic probably won’t climb that high again, *NSYNC could actually threaten a return to the Hot 100 if these streaming numbers continue to grow in the coming days and weeks.
While “Bye Bye Bye” may be getting the biggest boost from Deadpool & Wolverine, just about every song on the soundtrack – from Eric Carmen’s ‘80s pop gem “Make Me Lose Control” to the Platters’ doo-wop standard “Only You” – sees major gains this week. In particular, a pair of late-20th-century pop perennials see major gains after being featured in the blockbuster: Madonna’s “Like a Prayer” was up 229% in streams from the weekend prior to the film opening (506,000 streams from July 19-22) to its opening weekend (1.66 million streams from July 26-29), while over that same tracking period, Green Day’s “Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)” was up 88% in streams, from 708,000 streams to 1.33 million streams. – JASON LIPSHUTZ
New Songs by Country Hitmakers Swept Up by Twisters Soundtrack
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Before Deadpool and Wolverine stormed the box office, the biggest story in the film world this July was the breakaway success of Twisters, spiritual sequel to the 1996 tornado-chasers action-drama blockbuster Twister. While the soundtrack to the Oklahoma-set original film featured a mix of alternative and stadium rock, with just a smattering of country, the new installment – also taking place in the Sooner State – leans all the way in on the latter genre, with a 29-track accompanying album featuring big names from all corners of the country world.
While many of the tracks had been rolled out prior to the official release of the movie and its soundtrack two Fridays ago (July 19), all of those previously available songs saw huge bumps in the tracking week that followed. Miranda Lambert’s “Ain’t in Kansas Anymore” was up 112% in official on-demand audio streams (to 2.3 million) and up 268% in sales (to 1,700) from the prior week, according to Luminate, while Lainey Wilson’s “Out of Oklahoma” grew 182% in streams (2.9 million) and 750% in sales (3,100). And Luke Combs’ “Ain’t No Love in Oklahoma,” already an established top 40 hit, jumps to a new peak on the Hot 100 this week (32-13), thanks to gains of 75% gain in streams (15.2 million) and 178% in sales (7,400).
All the streaming success helped Twisters: The Album score an impressive No. 7 debut on the Billboard 200 albums chart this week – making it the first soundtrack album to reach the chart’s top 10 since last summer’s Barbie: The Album, and the first country soundtrack to do so since Country Strong in 2011. – ANDREW UNTERBERGER
Olympics Opening Ceremony: Gojira, Céline Dion Streaming Catalogs Go for the Gold
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The opening ceremony of the 2024 Summer Olympics — the first commencement extravaganza held outside of a stadium in modern Olympics history, as athletes from around the world paraded by boat along the Seine in Paris on Friday night (July 26) — also included some unexpected musical showcases, from Lady Gaga’s take on “Mon truc en plumes” to Drag Race France stars dominating a fashion runway.
Two of those performances, at very opposite ends of the musical spectrum, were still making waves on streaming platforms in the U.S. days after the opening ceremony: French head-bangers Gojira, which became the first metal act to perform at an Olympics ceremony, and pop legend Céline Dion, in her first performance since 2022 due to her struggle with stiff person syndrome.
Gojira’s surprising spot on the world stage naturally led viewers to peruse the long-running group’s back catalog: the band’s discography earned 3.12 million U.S. on-demand streams from July 26-29, according to Luminate, which represented a whopping 283% increase from the same four-day period the previous week (814,000 streams from July 19-22). And while Dion’s streaming catalog was starting at a much higher level of listens prior to the Olympics, her emotional return to the stage also sparked a major increase in plays, from 4.13 million streams from July 19-22 to 5.91 million streams from July 26-29 — a 43% gain. – JL
Virality of Royel Otis Cover (And Cranberries Original) Continues to “Linger” Thanks to… Uh, Well Just Read On
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Australian pop-rock duo Royel Otis is rapidly becoming the internet’s favorite covers band. After their rendition of Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s Saltburn-revived U.K. pop hit “Murder on the Dancefloor” brought them a surprise top five hit on the Rock & Alternative Airplay chart, they caught fire this summer with a new take on the Cranberries’ enduring mid-’90s crossover smash “Linger.” While the cover version had been racking up millions of U.S. streams every week for months already, the song is spiking again the past week, for some extremely 2024 reasons.
Your 14-year-old cousin could probably do a better job explaining the ins and outs of the cover’s recent virality than us, but we’ll give it a shot: Recently, popular Twitch streamer Sketch (real name: Kylie Cox) did a livestream that he called “Sketch of the Union,” meant to address rumors that had surfaced about him having previously appeared in gay porn films that had been shared on adult subscription service OnlyFans. During a particularly memorable part of the stream, Sketch gave credit to some of the folks who had stood by him during backlash he’d received stemming from the rumors (“Shout out Banks, shout out my parents…”), with his voice breaking from the emotion.
Clips of this climactic moment of the livestream ultimately made their way from Twitch to TikTok, with user @DennysJob laying the Royel Otis “Linger” underneath video of Sketch’s shoutout section, for a clip that has amassed nearly seven million views. The combined audio of the song and the speech ended up going viral in its own right, with other users lip synching to the shoutouts, and many more flocking to the song’s YouTube comments section to post variations of “shout out Banks” (with Banks referring to FaZe Clan CEO Richard Bengston, better known as FaZe Banks). As a result, the Royel Otis “Linger” posted over 3 million official on-demand U.S. streams over the first four days of this tracking week (July 26-29), a gain of 135% over the same period the week before, according to Luminate.
But that’s not all, of course. The Cranberries’ original “Linger” – which has already seen some major TikTok success this year, even reaching No. 13 on the Billboard TikTik Top 50 back in February – also had been racking up weekly streams in the millions this summer, and is now also seeing a spillover bump from the Royel Otis version’s increased exposure. The ‘90s “Linger” notched nearly 2.6 million streams from July 26-29, a 25% gain over the same period the week before. If the gains continue, the two versions could be duking it out for position on various rock-based Billboard charts in the weeks to come. – AU
Indian Rapper Hanumankind Makes Global Splash With Project Pat-Inspired “Big Dawgs”
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Thanks to an eye-popping daredevil music video and Project Pat’s timeless, irresistible flow, Kerala-born rapper Hanumankind has scored his first global hit with “Big Dawgs.” During the week of July 12-18, “Big Dawgs” earned just over 40,000 official on-demand U.S. streams. That number exploded by an unbelievable 3,055% to over 1.27 million streams during the week of July 19-25, according to Luminate.
Hanumankind, who is signed to Def Jam India, dropped “Big Dawgs” on July 9, with its official music video arriving the following day (July 10). The music video is inspired by the Well of Death, an attraction where people essentially drive motorbikes or cars around the walls of a silo at a near-90-degree angle. Naturally, such a visually arresting video made major waves, with several major streamers and Internet personalities sharing the clip with their Stateside followings.
On July 24, hip-hop commentator DJ Akademiks shared the music video to his official Instagram page, which boasts 5.3 million followers. On July 25, TikTok personality @itsyujen shared a reaction to the music video, which garnered a whopping 6.4 million views. Over the next four days (July 26-29), “Big Dawgs” posted an 824% increase in streaming activity versus the same period the week prior, with over 3.8 million streams.
The song, which also features Kalmi, has taken over hip-hop discourse in the States, with many lauding Humankind’s nod to Project Pat and his commitment to the art of the music video. On TikTok, the official “Big Dawgs” sound boasts over 25,300 videos and the official music video has earned over 6.1 million views on YouTube.
In an interview with The Hindu, Hanumankind revealed that both Project Pat and Bun B have privately given him his flowers. “These are my idols, my heroes. They hit me up,” he said. “They’re messaging me, telling me that they appreciate what we’re doing over here.” – KYLE DENIS
Kapo Scores Breakout Hit With “Ohnana”
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Five years after he debuted with the sultry “Humo,” rising Latin music star Kapo has secured an undeniable breakout hit in “Ohnana.
According to Luminate, “Ohnana” has posted a 125% increase in streams over the past four weeks, with the song pulling in over one million official on-demand U.S. streams in each of those weeks. Released June 6, the song ended that month with just under 700,000 streams during the period of June 21-27. On June 27, TikToker user @kendryoficiall posted a self-choreographed dance video that kicked off a larger trend on the app. To date, Kendry’s initial video – which featured several dancehall-informed moves – has garnered 4.1 million views, leading the official “Ohnana” sound to over 230,500 posts on the app.
On July 17, Grammy-nominated global superstar Maluma teased an upcoming remix of “Ohnana,” which garnered over 9.3 million views on his official Instagram alone. While the remix is still yet to be released, the tease helped “Ohana” earn one of its biggest week-over-week increases, jumping 35% in streaming activity from 1.7 million streams (July 12-18) to 2.3 million streams (July 19-25).
In addition to its TikTok virality, “Ohnana” has soundtracked nearly 150,000 Instagram Reels and its official music video has pulled in nearly 31 million views in just one month. Already a massive hit in his hometown of Colombia – the song reached a new peak of No. 3 on the Colombia Songs chart dated Aug. 3 — “Ohnana” also helped Kapo make his first appearance on the Billboard Global 200 (No. 112, chart dated Aug. 3). With the Maluma remix still on the way, Kapo could be making hisHot 100 debut next. – KD
THE RAMPAGE from EXILE TRIBE’s “24karats GOLD GENESIS” soars to No. 1 on this week’s Billboard Japan Hot 100, rising 49-1 on the chart dated July 31.
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Digitally released in June, the track debuted at No. 40 on the list dated June 19 after collecting points in downloads, streaming and radio airplay. The CD version went on sale July 24 and sold 326,342 copies in its first week, powering the track to No. 1 after seven weeks on the Japan Hot 100 where it consistently performed well mainly in radio leading up to this week.
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Mrs. GREEN APPLE‘s “Lilac” holds at No. 2, still leading streaming for the sixth straight week. Overall points for the Oblivion Battery opener have increased slightly, with the track coming in at No. 7 for downloads, No. 3 for video, No. 98 for radio, and No. 9 for karaoke.
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Creepy Nuts’ “Bling-Bang-Bang-Born” is back at No. 3, rising a notch after points for radio increased from the week before. The viral hit has been charting in the top 5 for 28 consecutive weeks.
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STARTO for you’s “WE ARE” rises to No. 4. The charity single by the project featuring 75 members from 14 groups under STARTO ENTERTAINMENT, including King & Prince, SixTONES, and Snow Man, launched with 209,847 CDs to hit No. 2 for sales, but didn’t chart in any of the other metrics of the Japan Hot 100’s methodology.
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Kocchinokento’s “Hai Yorokonde” continues to rise, moving 10-8 on this week’s chart. The track continues to hold at No. 1 for video for the fourth week in a row, and climbs 12-9 for downloads, 16-13 for streaming, and debuts at No. 75 for karaoke. Incidentally, while the video for “Hai Yorokonde” is being watched mostly in Japan (60%), it’s also being consumed in other countries including South Korea (8%) and the U.S. (5%), and the number of views in the latter two countries has been increasing in recent weeks, according to Luminate.
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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 July 22 to 28, here. For more on Japanese music and charts, visit Billboard Japan’s English Twitter account.
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 charts dated Aug. 10, we look at two artists who have largely defined the summer in pop music so far, and who are experiencing new gains after Kamala Harris’ announced presidential candidacy.
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Chappell Roan, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess (KRA/Amusement/Island/Republic): Since climbing to a peak of No. 5 on the Billboard 200 dated July 13, Chappell Roan‘s Midwest Princess has hung around the top 10 of the chart, landing at No. 8 this week. Improbably, the album continues to grow in streams — most recently thanks in large part to a surge in interest and consumption after “Femininomenon,” the album’s anthemic lead track, was used in a promotional TikTok from the official Kamala Harris account just days after Harris became the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination.
“Femininomenon” debuts at No. 96 on the Billboard Hot 100 this week, the lowest of an incredible five songs from Midwest Princess which have bowed on the chart in the past two months and are still working their way up its rankings. Each of the other four reaches a new peak position this week: “Hot to Go!” is the highest at No. 26, while “Red Wine Supernova” reaches No. 47, “Pink Pony Club” No. 50 and “Casual” No. 79. None of the songs has yet found a major foothold at radio, which would likely be the final step in them threatening for the chart’s top tier, but “Hot to Go!’ and “Red Wine Supernova” have both started to gather steam on the top 40 airwaves.
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In the meantime, with steady streaming and sales numbers, Midwest Princess could move back up on the Billboard 200 this upcoming week. There aren’t major new Friday releases currently threatening for a top debut, and with the sales-driven bows of Stray Kids’ ATE and Jimin’s MUSE likely to take a hit in their second week, there should be an opening for the album to return to the top five – and if it can continue to build on its recent momentum, it may even challenge for a new peak of No. 4. It will still have its work cut out to pass the 30-plus-track streaming behemoths from Taylor Swift and Morgan Wallen that have been lodged near the top of the Billboard 200 since their respective releases, but it should be in the mix for some time to come, and with another extra song boost or two – or perhaps a physical reissue – it wouldn’t be inconceivable that it could get to No. 1 before year’s end.
Chappell Roan, “Good Luck, Babe!” (KRA/Amusement/Island/Republic): Arguably the most impressive thing about the run that Midwest Princess has had on the Billboard 200 is that it’s making it without even getting any help from the song that’s actually Roan’s biggest of all of 2024. “Good Luck, Babe!” was released in April as a standalone single, unattached thus far to Midwest Princess or any other album of hers, and it has taken her further on the Hot 100 than any of that album’s breakout hits. This week, “Babe” returns to its peak of No. 10, which it originally reached on the chart dated July 13, while gaining on both the Streaming Songs (9-7) and Digital Song Sales (22-17) charts.
More important to its chart potential is that it has finally clicked the last piece of the puzzle into place: major radio support. Unlike the Midwest Princess hits, “Babe” has been fully (if somewhat belatedly) embraced by top 40 radio: It climbs 12-9 on Billboard’s Pop Airplay chart this week, and 25-21 on the all-format Radio Songs listing. As “Babe” continues to expand on the airwaves, and with no major new song releases expected to provide additional traffic in front of it on the Hot 100, it has a good chance of getting even higher on the chart next week. And with plenty of room for it still to grow – and streaming and sales support also strong – a run to the top five could certainly be in play for the song in the weeks to come.
Could it get to No. 1? It’s still well behind such four-quadrant smashes as Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” Post Malone and Morgan Wallen’s “I Had Some Help” and Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” at the top of the chart, so it would take some considerable growth across all metrics for “Babe” to really mount a challenge there. But it’s worth noting that as far as “Babe” has already come, it’s done so without some of the more traditional promotional tactics used to boost songs in its position – no official remixes, no major national performances of it beyond a Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon appearance, not even a non-lyric music video. So if it gets close, there’s plenty of cards for Roan still to play to get it that final push over the top.
Charli XCX, Brat (Atlantic/AG): The season familiarly known as Brat Summer has mostly come with impressive, but not quite overwhelming chart returns. Brat did debut at No. 3 on the Billboard 200, which marked a career-best showing for Charli XCX, but three weeks later it was out of the top 10, and it’s been hanging around the chart’s teens ever since. Meanwhile, before this week, she’d only launched two tracks from it onto the Hot 100, and neither in the top half – lead cut “360” debuted at No. 73 the same week as the album’s bow and had hung around the chart’s bottom quadrant since, while “Girl, So Confusing” entered at a slightly higher No. 63 two weeks later following the release of its Lorde-featuring remix, and was off the chart altogether a couple weeks after that.
But three words might have turned around the entire chart momentum of Brat Summer. The Sunday (July 21) that President Joe Biden officially dropped his re-election campaign and endorsed Kamala Harris as his replacement, Charli tweeted “Kamala IS Brat” — unofficially making her exciting new album the soundtrack to the global moment. Harris’ campaign seized said moment by adapting Brat’s already-iconic cover design for the header on their HQ’s official Twitter page, and within days, CNN was airing discussions about Brat Summer and what kind of impact the coolest pop star in the world could have on this year’s presidential election.
Despite seeing respectable gains in both sales and streams following last week’s spike in interest, Brat actually slides 13-14 on the latest Billboard 200 – thanks to a glut of high-performing new albums released at the start of the tracking week, four of which debut ahead of it on the chart. But with the album continuing to grow in both sales and streams so far this week, next week it could be ticketed for a trip back to the top 10, its first time back in the region since the chart dated July 6, which was its third frame on the listing.
In the meantime, two songs from Brat are surging on the Hot 100. “360” hits a new peak of No. 55 this week, while the TikTok-approved “Apple” debuts at No. 81. A top 40 hit could be in Brat’s future, as both songs still have room to grow – the latter has major virality on its side, with everyone from Twisters star Glen Powell to Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl doing the dance challenge that helped it light up social media, while “360” is starting to make inroads at radio, up 56% in plays for the week, according to Luminate, and bubbling under the Pop Airplay chart. And the album might not be done spawning hits yet: “365,” the album’s meme-spawning closing complement to “360,” has been rising in streams and sales the past couple weeks, and re-enters Spotify’s Daily Top Songs USA chart today.
The album is still pretty far from being a major contender for the top spot on the Billboard 200. But who knows? With the twists and turns that Charli’s season has already taken, we’d be foolish to bet against her finding new ways to challenge for supremacy on the chart, and officially cement Brat Summer in the 2024 record books. (Perhaps a new remix to one of the album’s deluxe edition bonus tracks — widely believed to be co-starring alt-pop superstar Billie Eilish — will be one of them.)
Zach Bryan rules Billboard’s June Boxscore report with 10 shows from The Quittin’ Time Tour. According to figures reported to Billboard Boxscore, Bryan grossed $68.9 million and sold 340,000 tickets in June.
It’s the first monthly win for Bryan, after scaling as high as No. 2 in March, seated behind Bad Bunny. He clocked two more top 10 placements in April (No. 10) and May (No. 4) before hitting the summit. Following Morgan Wallen (April 2023), he is only the second country artist to top the list.
The Quittin’ Time Tour has earned $184 million and sold 929,000 tickets since launching on March 5, current through the end of June. Barely past its halfway point, the trek has already quadrupled the gross of Bryan’s Burn Burn Burn Tour from last year, which itself had quadrupled 2022’s The American Run Tour. In two years, he has multiplied his average per-show gross by more than 14, up from $292,000 in ’22, to $4.3 million.
Coldplay is June’s runner-up, logging its third month at No. 2, in addition to its three months at No. 1. During the month, the British rockers grossed $68 million and sold 576,000 tickets.
The band’s consistency – six months in the top two, plus eight more elsewhere in the top 10 – has paid off: the Music of the Spheres Tour has grossed $875.8 million and sold 8.2 million tickets since launching in March 2022.
Both the tour’s gross and attendance are the second biggest in Boxscore history. Elton John’s Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour (2018-23) grossed $939.1 million, and Ed Sheeran’s The Divide Tour (2017-19) sold 8.9 million tickets. With more dates scheduled, Coldplay is likely to overtake both by the end of the summer.
The major asterisk for these all-time highs is that Taylor Swift has not reported figures for The Eras Tour. Billboard estimated more than $900 million in the bank and over four million tickets sold by last November. Since then, she’s performed in Asia, Australia and Europe, with a return to North America scheduled for the fall, meaning that she is likely far beyond $1 billion and nearing Sheeran’s attendance total to boot.
While Bryan leads Coldplay on Top Tours, they reverse fortunes on Top Boxscores, with the latter’s three shows at Groupama Stadium in Lyon, France, ($22.6 million, 165,000 tickets) beating the former’s double-header at Mile High Stadium in Denver ($20.5 million, 110,000 tickets). The Lyon venue rules Top Stadiums.
Both acts litter the rest of Top Boxscores, with Coldplay appearing four times in the top half, and Bryan totaling six entries. That’s each artist’s entire slate of shows from June, dominating the chart in stadiums – Coldplay in Europe and Bryan in the U.S.
In a first, the entire top 10 artists – Bryan, Coldplay, P!nk, Dead & Company, Aventura, Justin Timberlake, Kenny Chesney, Chris Brown, Green Day and Luke Combs – boast grosses of $30 million or more. Nine tours had done it in August and September 2022, and again in June and July 2023.
Further, the entire Top Tours chart is stronger than ever. German singer Roland Kaiser rounds out the list at No. 30, via $11.5 million from nine shows. That’s higher than the bottom of the list has ever been, outpacing the $10.8 million from Marco Antonio Solis last September. June marks the second month since the charts launched in 2019 that all 30 ranked tours reported grosses of $10 million or more.
June’s top 30 artists mix veteran artists such as Dead & Company, Billy Joel and Luis Miguel with fresh faces including Bryan, Feid and Noah Kahan. Classic pop groups make their mark, as Girls Aloud’s 2024 reunion lands at No. 14 with $19.1 million and Take That’s U.K. tour continues at No. 26 with $13 million.
The top-grossing venue of June is Las Vegas’ Sphere. The room hosted 10 shows across four weekends with artist-in-residency Dead & Company. The supergroup brought in $50.2 million and sold 162,000 tickets, enough to land at No. 4 on Top Tours and sprinkle Top Boxscores at Nos. 4, 5 and 8.
Up 38% from May, it’s Sphere’s second consecutive month at No. 1, with its one-of-a-kind concert experience driving high ticket prices. Madison Square Garden out-sold Sphere by more than 80,000 tickets and grossed about $12 million less, with the latter nearly doubling MSG’s average ticket ($309 vs. $156).
The lower-capacity venue charts are dominated by Glasgow (OVO Hydro), Atlanta (Fox Theatre) and Las Vegas (Dolby Live and Encore Theater at Wynn Las Vegas). Historically blocked by larger venues on the 5,000-capacity-and-under ranking, Encore Theater scores its first month at No. 1 on the new chart that breaks out venues with a cap of 2,500 or less.
“For us, this is the launch of a signature artist,” then-RCA Records marketing vp Nick Cucci mused in the July 24, 1999, Billboard issue of Christina Aguilera, whose eponymous debut album arrived a month later. “She’s not a quick-burn teen artist. We’re planning on her being around for a long time. We’re pursuing performance opportunities to present her as an artist of extraordinary depth.”
The following week, Aguilera, then 18, was No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 with the LP’s lead single, “Genie in a Bottle.” Beginning with the July 31-dated chart, it reigned for five weeks.
Aguilera’s debut album subsequently launched at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with 253,000 copies sold in the United States in its first week, according to Luminate.
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Per Billboard’s story, written by Larry Flick, in the July 24, 1999, issue, RCA had showcased Aguilera that June in New York, Los Angeles, Toronto, Las Vegas and Minneapolis, as she performed the album with only piano backing. “It was a highly effective way of presenting her,” George Harrison, then-assistant music director at KSNE Las Vegas, shared. “She has the voice of a young Whitney Houston. Midway through the first song, it was clear that she’s going to be a big, big star.”
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With “Genie in a Bottle,” Aguilera unleashed her first of five Hot 100 No. 1s and 11 top 10s. Her introductory set also yielded the leaders “What a Girl Wants” and “Come On Over Baby (All I Want Is You).”
On the Billboard 200, Aguilera boasts two No. 1s among seven top 10s, through the No. 6-peaking Liberation in 2018. Her chart history also includes her second LP, the Spanish-language Mi Reflejo, which ruled Top Latin Albums for 19 weeks in 2000-01.
Aguilera’s breakthrough sparked her best new artist Grammy Award win in 2000. Among others, she triumphed in the category over Britney Spears, with whom she starred in The All-New Mickey Mouse Club in the early ‘90s (and whose own debut album, …Baby One More Time, had soared in at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in January 1999). Aguilera’s experience on the show also led to her recording “Reflections,” the theme to the 1998 hit Disney film Mulan.
“It was a great way to grow up,” Aguilera told Billboard in 1999 about being a Mouseketeer. “I got the most incredible education, both in terms of who I wanted to be as an artist and in terms of how the business works. It gave me the focus I needed to make this album.”
To date, Aguilera, who served as a coach on NBC’s The Voice in 2011-16, has sold 17.6 million albums in the U.S. Her songs have drawn 28.5 billion in radio audience and 3.1 billion official on-demand streams. Her upcoming tour dates include shows in Las Vegas and Japan, with her eight-month Christina Aguilera at Voltaire residency at The Venetian in Las Vegas running through Aug. 31.
Of “Genie in a Bottle” — which David Frank, Steve Kipner and Pamela Sheyne co-wrote — Aguilera told Billboard in 1999, “At first, I was a little afraid that some people might not completely get where I’m coming from,” referring to the song’s “occasionally seductive lyrical tone,” per Flick. (“Fueled by a chugging groove and richly layered vocals, the tune is punctuated by a breathy command to ‘rub me the right way’,” he wrote.)
“The song is not about sex,” Aguilera said. “It’s about self-respect. It’s about not giving in to temptation until you’re respected. It’s time for something different. It’s time that music make[s] kids feel confident and secure.”
Brent Jones banks his second total and consecutive No. 1 on Billboard’s Gospel Airplay chart as “Live Your Best Life!” ascends to the top of the Aug. 3-dated list. During the July 19-25 tracking week, the song advanced by 3% in plays among format reporters, according to Luminate. The single is the title cut from […]
K-pop has been gathering commercial momentum in the U.S. over a decade, and this week it achieves a historic milestone on the Billboard 200. As Billboard reported on Sunday, this current chart (dated Aug. 3) marks the first time that the top two spots are both held by K-pop (Korean pop) albums. Stray Kids’ ATE debuts […]
Teddy Swims’ “Lose Control” adds another No. 1 to its uncommonly impressive résumé of radio chart coronations, as it rises to the top of Billboard’s Adult Contemporary survey (dated Aug. 3).
The song, on SWIMS Int./Warner Records, rules a fifth airplay ranking, as it led the all-format Radio Songs chart, Pop Airplay, Adult Pop Airplay and Adult R&B Airplay prior to its Adult Contemporary takeover.
(Also notably, the track halts Miley Cyrus’ record 57-week Adult Contemporary reign with “Flowers.”)
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“Lose Control” becomes just the fifth song to have reached No. 1 on the five charts, and the first in nearly a decade, after the first four led in 2014-16. Here’s a recap of the elite such crossover hits (dating to the early/mid-1990s, when the bulk of Billboard’s airplay charts began).
“Lose Control,” Teddy Swims:
Adult Pop Airplay, four weeks at No. 1, beginning March 23, 2024
Pop Airplay, two, beginning, April 13, 2024
Radio Songs, nine, beginning April 20, 2024
Adult R&B Airplay, three, beginning June 15, 2024
Adult Contemporary, one week (to date), beginning Aug. 3, 2024
“Hello,” Adele:
Radio Songs, 11 weeks at No. 1, beginning Nov. 28, 2015
Adult Contemporary, 21, beginning Nov. 28, 2015
Pop Airplay, four, beginning Dec. 5, 2015
Adult Pop Airplay, seven, beginning Dec. 5, 2015
Adult R&B Airplay, one week, beginning Feb. 20, 2016
“Stay With Me,” Sam Smith:
Radio Songs, six weeks at No. 1, beginning Aug. 23, 2014
Adult Contemporary, five, beginning Aug. 23, 2014
Pop Airplay, two, beginning Aug. 30, 2014
Adult Pop Airplay, two, beginning Sept. 6, 2014
Adult R&B Airplay, 13, beginning Oct. 11, 2014
“Happy,” Pharrell Williams:
Radio Songs, eight weeks at No. 1, beginning March 15, 2014
Pop Airplay, four, beginning March 29, 2014
Adult Pop Airplay, six, beginning April 5, 2014
Adult R&B Airplay, 13, beginning April 5, 2014
Adult Contemporary, six, beginning May 3, 2014
“All of Me,” John Legend:
Adult R&B Airplay, eight weeks at No. 1, beginning Feb. 15, 2014
Pop Airplay, five, beginning May 3, 2014
Radio Songs, seven, beginning May 10, 2014
Adult Pop Airplay, four, beginning May 17, 2014
Adult Contemporary, 10, beginning June 14, 2014
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Prior to topping the five airplay charts noted above, “Lose Control” also ascended to a No. 2 peak on Adult Alternative Airplay in January. It joins only Adele’s “Hello” and Sam Smith’s “Stay With Me” in having led Radio Songs, Pop Airplay, Adult Pop Airplay, Adult R&B Airplay and Adult Contemporary and having reached the top two on Adult Alternative Airplay, reflecting rare support at formats ranging from pop and adult to R&B and rock. (“Hello” and “Stay With Me” each hit No. 1 on Adult Alternative Airplay.)
Meanwhile, as “Lose Control” led the all-genre, multimetric Billboard Hot 100 for a week in March, it and “Hello” are the only songs to have topped the Hot 100 and the five airplay charts listed above.
“Teddy Swims is a once-in-a-generation talent who defies genres, making him truly unique in today’s music landscape,” says Warner evp of promotion and commerce Mike Chester. “When we began promoting ‘Lose Control,’ our journey was carefully planned. From the start, we noticed that the song was resonating in various pockets of culture, creating a strong and diverse fanbase. Our digital department played a crucial role, setting the groundwork for the song’s growth; shoutout to [the division’s] Randall Telfer.
“We understood that ‘Lose Control’ needed time to evolve before we could successfully introduce it to other formats, like adult R&B,” Chester adds. “Special thanks to Ron Stewart, our head of urban radio, for crafting an ideal strategy, alongside Josh Reich [pop], Rob Goldklang [rock/alternative] and Michelle Babbitt [adult]. Teddy Swims has a timeless voice that breaks boundaries, and we wanted to ensure his music reached as wide an audience as possible without being confined to a specific genre.”