When Elvis Presley passed in 1977, record stores sold out of their remaining copies of old Presley albums within hours. His contemporary single “way down”, which had already peaked at #31 on the Billboard Hot 100 and had fallen to #53, did rebound upon his death, but only to #16.

John Lennon had just released his latest album Double Fantasy on December 8^th, 1980. It sold modestly, until Lennon’s assassination that night catapulted the album and its lead single “(Just Like) Starting Over” to #1 in the U.S. and the U.K.

Both Presley and Lennon died unexpectedly. Both Presley and Lennon had current hits on the Hot 100 at the time of their deaths, the sales of which Billboard charted.

What we didn’t know is how often fans went back and listened to those old records from their favorite artists upon learning they had left us, especially for legendary artists whose hitmaking years were behind them.

In today’s streaming era, we do know.

Legendary artists with short-lived streaming tributes

Tina Turner is universally respected for escaping Rock ‘n’ Roll’s most infamous abusive marriage and professional partnership, as well as her unexpected 1980s comeback. When Turner left us in 2023, two of her songs emerged on the Spotify 200 the day after her death. Those two songs accounted for only 1% of the day’s Spotify 200 streams and were gone from the chart the following day.

Later that year, Jimmy Buffet stepped on life’s Pop Top. Buffet is more polarizing than Turner: Parrot heads don’t merely love his music; they long for its lifestyle. Detractors find his music and subculture it created shallow and kitschy.

The day following his passing, 11 of his biggest solo hits and collaborations appeared among Spotify’s 200 most-played songs in the U.S., accounting for 6% of all Spotify 200 streams that day. Even his biggest hit, “Margaritaville,” reached #6 on Spotify that day, but slid out of Spotify’s chart after only three more days.

Many other artists’ passing, from Little Richard to Rush’s Neil Peart, to Toby Keith, failed to launch any of their songs into the Spotify 200.

Dolly Parton smashes streaming records

If you want to understand perceptions of your brand, examine how people make fun of you…

Streaming on Spotify in the U.S. reflected our universal love for Dolly.

When news broke of Dolly Parton’s death on Tuesday afternoon, August 25^th, 2026, fans began streaming her songs instantly: Even though half the day was already over in most of the U.S., “Jolene” and “9 to 5” garnered enough streams during the rest of the day to be the #2 and #3 most-streamed songs on Spotify in the U.S. “Islands In the Stream” reached #8.

The following day, those three songs would be Spotify’s Top three songs, a first for an artist’s passing in the streaming era.

Overall, 15 Dolly Parton classics reached the Spotify 200 the day after her death, Fans collectively played those songs almost 12 million times—that’s 13% of all streams in the Spotify 200 for the day. That’s the highest of any artist’s death in the streaming era.

A week and a half later, “Jolene” was still #30 in the Spotify 200.

A week after her death, Dolly’s #1 hit “9 to 5” surpassed “Jolene” and its streams began growing again. On Friday, August 4^, 2026, it was still #19.

There’s another artist whose death generated substantial tribute streaming who might surprise you.

The second biggest death of the streaming era

Ozzy Osbourne also left us on a Tuesday. The following Wednesday, July 23, 2025, 16 of his solo songs, collaborations, and Black Sabbath classics reached the Spotify 200. That’s one more song than Dolly Parton, but with slightly fewer total plays. Additionally, while “Crazy Train” and “Mama, I’m Coming Home” reached the Top 10, they peaked at #7 and #9, respectively.

Osbourne fans would keep “Crazy Train” in the Spotify 200 for almost three weeks, far surpassing Jimmy Buffet’s tribute streams. However, it spent the last two of those weeks below #40.

In comparison, “9 to 5” (and Jolene) not only peaked higher than did “Crazy Train,” fans played “9 to 5” more often than did “Crazy Train” a week later.

It might seem surprising that Osbourne’s death generated more streaming than Jimmy Buffet, Tina Turner, or Toby Keith. Between making Heavy Metal a genre with Black Sabbath in the 1970s, scoring Album Rock hits as a solo artist in the 1980s, launching the Heavy Metal tour Ozzfest in the 1990s, and becoming a TV celebrity with The Osbournes in the 2000s, Ozzy remined relevant for generations.

Appealing to fans from nine to 98 is exactly why Dolly set streaming records upon her death.

Doly Parton on the Hot 100

Now that the vast majority of music consumption happens on Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music, tribute streaming is now directly reflected on the Hot 100.

In 1974, “Jolene” was Parton’s second #1 as a solo artist on the Billboard Country chart. Despite the song’s appeal today, “Jolene” had little impact beyond Country. On the Hot 100, it debuted at #92 and only reached #60.

For the chart week ending September 5th, 2026, “Jolene” re-entered the Hot 100 52 years later at #16. It’s one of five Parton songs charting again on the Hot 100 after her death and it’s the highest of the five:

“9 to 5” was already a #1 Pop hit in 1980, also reaching #1 on Billboard’s Adult Contemporary and Hot Country charts. It re-entered the Hot 100 at #18.

Other Parton songs that re-entered the Hot 100 thanks to fans streaming them include:

• “Islands in the Stream”, her #1 duet with Kenny Rogers, re-entering at #26

• “I Will Always Love You” debuted at #27. It’s the song’s first time on the Hot 100.

• “Here You Come Again” which re-entered at #44. It originally peaked at #3 on the Hot 100, #2 on the Adult Contemporary chart, and #1 on the Billboard Hot Country chart in 1977.

Back when honoring our lost artists involved pulling out those old albums, we simply had no way to track that tribute listening.

The Future of Tribute Streaming

Now that we can track it, we can sadly expect to see new record-setting tribute streaming in coming years. Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, and Smokey Robinson are all in their eighties. Phil Collins and Elton John are in their seventies. Willie Nelson is 93.

It’s fathomable that Paul McCarnety’s passing could cause The Beatles to posthumously repeat their 1964 feat of owning the Top 5 slots on the Billboard Hot 100.

Let’s enjoy the music while they’re all still with us.

Data sources for this article

• Daily Spotify Charts (2019-2026 for the USA): https://charts.spotify.com/charts/overview/us

• The Billboard Hot 100: https://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100

Why songs this report calls “Recurrents” are really still Currents, “Sue Me” stages a comeback, and five songs CHR needs to give up.

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Tame Impala’s “Loser” shows how radio still makes songs hits. Country and Alterative crossover hits abound. Plus, is Steve Lacy moving beyond his Gen Z fan base?

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Right now, there are more people listening to this station than the #1 radio station in Chicago.

Its logo is so iconic, it shows up in memes.

It has a personality so adored by its audience that when she briefly disappeared, listeners were emotionally distraught.

It has a community where fans of the station interact and even support each other through tough times.

The New York Times has even written about this radio station.

So why have you likely never heard it?

Technically, it’s not a radio station. It’s a YouTube channel called Lofi Girl.

Lofi Girl’s main video is a 24/7 live stream called “lofi hip hop radio - beats to relax/study to”. The channel has almost 16-million YouTube subscribers. Between 30,000 and 60,000 listeners are streaming it at any given moment. It’s the creation of France’s Dimitri Somogyi, a.k.a. ChlledCow, who also runs the music label that crafts the songs.

What is Lofi?

True to the name, the stream plays Lofi Hip Hop—or simply Lofi—a style of instrumental music that merges hip hop beats with slow and simple melodies and ambient sounds into hypnotic but non-obtrusive music. It’s intentionally and unapologetically background music, intended to help you “relax” or “study.”

Don’t let the Hip Hop moniker fool you. While the beats are from that genre, there’s no rap—or any words—in Lofi Hip Hop. Its vibes are more Kenny G than Kendrick Lamar.

The genre is so intentional in its purpose of blending into the background that the music avoids very low base and very high treble, focusing on the 200Hz to 10kHz range—hence the “Lofi” name. The idea is that since fans are listening on headphones, limiting the frequency response of the music will better blend the beats the listener hears in their headphones with the random and distracting noises in their environment.

Lofi also leaves in imperfections, from beats that aren’t always on beat to ambient noise. For such a minimalist music style, it is those imperfections that give the music character. This isn’t AI generated. Real musicians craft this music.

Does a radio station meticulously designed to help you relax sound familiar?

Jim Shulke and the Pursuit of Perfected Relaxation

If you’re of a certain age, you’ll likely recall your dad, grandma, or aunt listening to a “Beautiful Music” station. Also called “Easy Listening” or, derogatorily, “Elevator Music,” they played lush, inoffensive instrumental versions of popular songs that were the soundtrack to your dentist appointments. At its peak in the 1970s, the local Beautiful Music station was often the #1 station in town.

And while he didn’t invent Beautiful Music, one man did more for the meticulous musical engineering of its relaxing mood; Jim Shulke.

A Harvard MBA and advertising executive, Shulke theorized that if he could sequence songs together in such a way that it felt like one never-ending performance, listeners would stay tuned in hour after hour. He didn’t own or manage any radio stations. Instead, his company, Stereo Radio Productions (SRP), provided all the music on reel-to-reel tapes for client stations. Shulke carefully built playlists in 15-minute increments using “matched flow sequencing,” in which music would flow from slow to (relatively) upbeat back to slow.

Here’s how it sounded on the air at its peak on Philadelphia’s WWSH FM 106:

But Shulke’s obsessiveness went far beyond crafting playlists.

• He demanded stations tweak their frequency response based on ratings. Fewer men tuning in? Add more low-end bass. Female ratings down? Roll off the treble frequencies to eliminate distortion.

• At a time when radio regularly aired 18 minutes of commercials an hour, Shulke’s clients could only air 6 minutes an hour. The audio for those commercials had to be -6dB lower than the music, so as not to jar the listener the way TV notoriously does.

• Local announcers were carefully chosen to sound soft and unobtrusive, with each word carefully scripted.

• Stations had call letters that spelled out words; WWSH was “Wish.” WLYF was “Life”. WPCH was “Peach.”

This obsessive attention to continuously flowing music with scientifically engineered frequency response is eerily similar to today’s Lofi.

What’s different about Lofi is the listeners’ demographics. From Shulke’s Easy Listening to Smooth Jazz to the Yacht Rock revival, it’s always been older listeners attracted to relaxing music.

However, Lofi’s audience is almost exclusively Gen Z listeners in their teens and early 20s. It’s their parents, in fact, who are lambasting the genre, as in this New Yorker article that called it Apathetic Music to Make Spreadsheets To.

Why are kids embracing an Easy Listening genre?

Kids These Days

It makes sense when you understand today’s teens and young adults.

Generation Z’s childhood has seen financial uncertainty, political divisiveness, climate fears, war in Europe, multiple wars in the Middle East, the onslaught of AI threatening their job prospects, and a deadly pandemic. For college bound teens, choosing the wrong school—where a degree’s earning potential can’t pay off the massive student loan debt—is a financial life and death decision.

As generational historian Neil Howe highlights in his latest book, while we Generation X teens craved more freedom from a society with stifling structure, today’s teens are craving security from a society with crumbling structure.

No wonder they’re embracing music that takes the edge off.

What Lofi Girl can Teach Us About Radio’s Future

Lofi Hip Hop Radio’s music is accompanied by an animated image of a girl studying while wearing headphones. She writes, sips tea, and does other things her listeners are likely doing, too. In 2023, she disappeared from her room. It turned out to be a part of an elaborate promotional stunt to launch a new side channel playing synth beats for gamers, but listeners were genuinely distraught that something bad happened to her.

Remember, she’s an animated picture.

There’s a chat window for listeners to comment and connect with each other. While it’s mostly fans saying hi to each other, listeners sometimes offer each other real support and encouragement during difficult times.

A well-defined music format, beloved personality, promotional events, and a sense of community and belonging: These are the elements that make great radio stations.

Lofi Girl’s success should be encouragement to any radio programmer who believes radio is about sharing carefully curated music and building community—not towers in fields.

Further information:

• the science behind lofi music:

• The Beautiful Music Radio Format: An insider’s Perspective
  By Dennis R. Ciapura: http://www.kratoville.com/jackjr/rise_and_fall.html

• The Museum of Broadcast Communications, “The Beautiful Music format”: https://www.museum.tv/portfolio-2/easy-listening/beautiful-music-format

• Radio Automation … circa 1974!: https://marlintaylor.com/radio/radio-automation-circa-1974/

Why Justin Bieber shouldn’t be in heavy rotation—and the two songs that should be Currents. Plus, the Audrey Hobert song that’s making a comeback.

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Ella Langley and Olivia Dean never grow old, the newest Ariana Grande flops, and Gen Z favorite Steve Lacy may have his biggest hit since “Bad Habit.”

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As a lifelong radio fanatic, I pick on my beloved medium a lot for sticking with the same old songs too long. (I discussed why poorly implemented research is a big part of that problem in this article.) Songs are staying around so long now that Billboard recently changed their rules to get squatters off the Hot 100.

There’s just one problem with blaming radio for today’s forever lingering tunes.

On streaming services, where fans are in control of their music, those fans are increasingly picking the same old songs over newer releases, too.

Today, we’re analyzing how long songs stay on the Spotify 200 chart in the U.S. and how it’s changed from 2019 through today. The change isn’t subtle.

How Long Do Songs Stay On The Spotify 200

The time the typical song spends among Spotify’s 200 most-played songs has more than doubled since 2019. Back then, the typical song only spent half a year on the Spotify 200 chart. Today, a typical song stays in the Top 200 for well over a year.

If we zoom in on the biggest hits—those songs that reach the Top 10 most-played songs on Spotify—the increase is even more dramatic. Back in 2019, the typical Spotify 10 stayed in the Top 10 for only 10 weeks. Today, it’s almost half a year.

That timeframe increased steadily every year---except 2024. That’s the year when Post Malone and Morgan Wallen’s “I Had Some Help,”, “Not Like Us” from Kendrick Lamar, Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso,” Shaboozey’s A Bar Song (Tipsy), and Chappel Roan’s “Good Luck, Babe” were all massive hits on both radio and Spotify. With so many mass-appeal hits vying for listeners’ play buttons, Spotify’s Top 10 turned over faster than it has ever since.

There’s wide variation on just how long an individual song stays a Top 200 hit on Spotify. Overall for 2019 through today, over a third of all songs are only Top 200 for one week. Most of these songs are album tracks from mid-tier artists that fans sample when the album releases, but don’t stream in subsequent weeks. Most spend their lone week in the Spotify 200 far closer to #200 than #1. Overall, only seven percent of all songs that reach the Spotify 200 stay there for over a year.

When we examine the songs that generate the most streams, however, almost half of the streams of songs reaching the Spotify 200 are for songs that stay in the Spotify 200 for a year or longer. That means about half of the Spotify streams for Top 200 songs come from only seven percent of the songs in the Spotify 200. That also means Spotify makes their money from the songs you never stop streaming.

When we focus on those songs that peak in the Spotify 200’s Top 10, the most likely outcome (one-in five) is for that song to stay in the Spotify 200 for one to two years.

Finally, let’s examine the extremes year by year, specifically, the percentage of songs that only spend a week in the Spotify 200 versus how many songs stay in the Spotify 200 for a year or longer. From 2020 through 2025, the percentage of one week only songs fell by 37%, while the percentage of 1+ years songs almost doubled:

Three Reasons Fans are Streaming Songs Longer

Demographics: Back in 2019, primarily teens and younger adults used Spotify. The younger you are, the more time you typically devote to new music. Subsequently, the faster you move through your favorite new songs. During the pandemic, older adults embraced music streaming. Those 30- to 49-year-olds who are now on Spotify take longer to get to know new songs—and longer to get sick of them—than do 12- to 29-year-old listeners.

The Current Music Slump: So far, the 2020’s have not exactly been a golden age for contemporary hit music. When new songs fail to excite, folks keep playing the older songs they know and love. When we do have a bright spot for mass-appeal popular music, as we had in the Spring of 2024, the songs we stream most do indeed rotate faster.

Songs Designed for Streaming: While it’s the smallest and hardest to quantify, another reason songs are staying on the Spotify 200 longer is that music creators now understand how to maximize a song’s streaming performance. From release strategies to how the song itself is crafted, music makers now think first about maximizing streaming, not CD sales or radio exposure.

It’s not the biggest hits that fans keep playing forever.

The biggest hits aren’t always the longest lasting songs

The chart below shows the 25 most-streamed songs on Spotify from 2019 through today (left), compared to the 25 songs that stayed in the Spotify 200 the longest (right). Only nine of the 25 songs are the same.

Among the nine leaders in both total streams and chart longevity are big hits from the past decade, such as Post Malone & Swae Lee’s “Sunflower” and Morgan Wallen’s “Whiskey Glasses,” Gen Z favorites including Tyler, The Creator & Kali Uchis’ “See You Again,” and enduring classics like Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams” and “Mr. Brightside” from The Killers.

Among the 25 most-played songs are many more of the decade’s biggest hits, including Glass Animals’ “Heat Waves”, The Weeknd’s “Blinding Lights,” and Espresso from Sabrina Carpenter.

Among the longest lasting songs that are not among the most-streamed songs are lots of titles from Hip Hop artists with rapid fan bases, including Juice WRLD, XXXTENTACION, and Kendrick Lamar. There’s also younger Country starts with rabid fans, including Chris Stapleton’s “Tennessee Whiskey” and Luke Combs’ “Beautiful Crazy.”

Why are so many of the biggest hits not among the songs that fans stream forever? Simple: Fans eventually got tired of them and stopped playing them nearly as often as they did when they were big hits.

Familiarity still eventually breeds contempt.

It’s a timeless trait that radio is wise to remember.

Need help knowing when songs are in the sweet spot between familiarity and contempt? My day job can help…

Data Source for this article:

Spotify Charts (weeks of 1/1/2019 through 7/30/2026 for the USA): https://charts.spotify.com/charts/overview/us

Here are resources to get you ready to use The Hit Momentum Newsletter:

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Here are resources to get you ready to use The Hit Momentum Newsletter:

• Quick Use Guide: You just want to know how to read and implement the report ASAP

• Complete Guide: Here, you’ll learn in detail what the report shows you and why behind our recommendations on how to use it.

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In 2025, something happened on the billboard Hot 100 that has never happened since the chart’s birth in 1958: Every Top 10 song was from an artist from the same generation, namely the Millennial Generation.

In June of 2024, Eminem became the last aging Gen Xer to reach the Top 10 at age 51 with “Houdini,” a song radio swore was a hit, but fans flatly rejected.

As of August 2026, no true Generation Z artist has reached the Hot 100’s Top 10. So far, the youngest artist to reach the Hot 100’s Top 10 is Sombr, born July 25^th, 2005.

“But Matt,” I hear you shouting, “Plenty of Generation Z artists born after 1997 have hit the Top 10.”

Ahh, but where did this 1997 dividing line come from? Not from the experts who invented the name “Millennials.”

Straus/Howe Generational Theory

I rely on historians Neil Howe and his late partner William Strauss to define when each generation starts and ends. Their seminal work, Generations: The History of America’s Future, not only invented the term Millennial, it also predicted “The Crisis of 2020” – in a book they wrote in 1991!

I dive deep into their work in The Generational Music Theorem. For now, just know that they define generational cohorts a bit differently than you might see elsewhere:

• Boomers were born between 1943 and 1960, a few years earlier than the postwar birthrate boom. If you faintly remember World War II, you’re from the previous Silent Generation.

• Xers were born from 1961 to 1981, which starts a few years before the baby bust the birth control pill spawned. If you can at least faintly recall the Kennedy Assassination, you’re actually a Boomer. If you’re too young to recall the Challenger explosion, you’re a Millennial.

• Millennials stem from 1982 to 2005. That’s later than some cite, but consistent with the typical length of a generation Straus and Howe’s research finds throughout America’s history.

• Generation Z emerged in 2006, according to Niel Howe’s latest book “The Fourth Turning.” If you’re old enough to remember a time before the Great Financial Crisis and the Obama administration, you’re a Millennial. If you can’t, you’re Gen Z. (Howe labeled this cohort “The Homeland Generation” before the generation itself embraced Generation Z.) Generation Alpha is simply a term today’s high schoolers invented to separate themselves from embarrassing six-seven-loving middle schoolers.

Here’s a summary of each generation, including their major recording artists and U.S. Presidents.

Generations Mix It Up on the Chart

Throughout chart history, at least two generations are crafting Top 10 hits.

Consider the early 2000s: Generation X artists dominated the chart, including The Backstreet Boys, Eminem, and Matchbox Twenty. Just as aging Boomer artists such as Madonna were finally ceding the Top 10, however, Millennials began scoring Top 10 hits. By 2008, Xers like Flo Rida and Millennials such as Rihanna were equally represented in the Top 10.

Or consider 1981. Boomers such as Rod Stewart, Diana Ross, and Blondie dominated the Top 10. However, Silent generation icons such as John Lennon and Smokey Robinson still scored hits and Tina Turner was about to have a major comeback. Meanwhile, Xer artists Culture Club and Wham! were waiting to replace those Silent icons. By the late 1980s, Xer artists such as Guns N’ Roses and Janet Jackson surpassed Boomer artists in the Top 10, but Silent legend Roy Orbison could still top the charts.

From the Hot 100’s inception in 1958 all the way through 2024, at least two generations are contributing hits to the Top 10. Even when one generation dominates the Top 10, such as Boomers in 1981 or Xers in 2000, a few gaining icons from the previous generation and a few fresh faces from the younger generation reached the Hot 100’s Top 10.

So how is it that Millennials have fully owned the Top 10 for two years now?

It’s a matter of age:

The typical age of a hitmaker

Historically, the typical age of a Top 10 hitmaker is 28.5 years old. About a third of Top 10s are from 25- to 29-year-olds, 38% are from artists 30 and older, while 28% are from artists 24 and younger.

The average age does change throughout the years and with different generations. The all-time oldest year was 1981, when the typical Top 10 hit was from a 34-year-old, followed by 1985 at 33.2 years old. However, the second oldest era is now: In 2025, the average Top 10 hitmaker was just over 32 years old

With boomers, it’s generational: During the years they dominated the Top 10, the typical Top 10 artist’s age was 31.2, higher than any other generation’s dominant era.

For Millennial hitmakers, however, it’s only a recent phenomenon. Until the early 2020s, Millennial artists were of comparable age to the Xers that dominated before them, specifically 27 years old. Suddenly in 2022. However, the average age jumped to 32-years-old.

Almost half of the Top 10 hitmakers in 2025 were 30-to 34-years-old, five years older than the 25- to 29-year-old age range that typically is the largest plurality in the Top 10.

As for the lack of Gen Z artists, no teenaged artist has scored a Top 10 hit since Gayle took “abcdefu” to #3 in March 2022. Billie Eilish and Olivia Rodrigo started as teen wonders and were still teens for their 2021 hits, but they’re now 24 and 23, respectively.

Throughout the 2020s, artists have simply aged in place, with few younger artists emerging to take their place.

That’s largely the fault of who is picking the hits, namely, aging Millennials.

Generation Z began influencing which artists score Top 10 hits: Starting with Lil Nas X and Billie Eilish in 2019 and continuing with Olivia Rodrigo, Noah Kahan, and Chappel Roan this decade, A few Millennial artists that primarily appeal to Gen Z fans have successfully dominated streaming and radio.

Other Gen Z favorites, however, such as Steve Lacy, Tyler, the Creator, and Gigi Perez, have top tier hits on streaming, but have been largely absent from Top 40 FM radio, largely keeping them out of the Hot 100’s Top 10.

Radio may no longer play the hits first, but it still validates which hits are the biggest.

Instead, aging millennial icons such as Taylor Swift, Bruno Mars, Drake, and Miley Cyrus, alongside traditional Pop creators such as Sabrina Carpenter and Gracie Abrams, fill the airwaves.

A major factor is that radio increasingly ignores the tastes of listeners in their early- to mid-20s. There’s logic there. Generation Z simply doesn’t spend nearly as much time with FM radio as do older generations, so FM radio programmers are increasingly focusing their music research on the tastes of Millennials in their late 20s, 30s, and early 40s.

Three songs in particular have cumulatively spent years in the Hot 100’s Top 10 this year because of radio’s aging audience research: Teddy Swims’ “Lose Control,” Benson Boone’s “Beautiful Things,” and Alex Warren’s “Ordinary.”

Gen Z’s Streaming Hits

Consider Malcom Todd’s “Earrings” It’s consistently been among the most streamed songs on Spotify in the U.S. It’s 29 weeks old (for the chart date ending July 23, 2026), and is still #2 on the Spotify 200, behind only “Choosin’ Texas” by Ella Langley.

What will break this stronghold of aging Millennials?

Historically, we experience a resurgence in mass-appeal hit music when an emerging generation turns 21 and becomes the dominant generation consuming contemporary music—and thereby becoming the generation picking the hits. It happened before:

• In 1983 when Gen X tastes replaced Boomers, replacing Christopher Cross and Air Supply with Michael Jackson and New Wave.

• In 1964 when the Beatles led the British invasion. Those screaming teens at the Ed Sullivan Theatre were Boomers, and their tastes suddenly made the Silent Generation’s sounds obsolete.

• In 2003, when Millennials had finally had enough of Generation X’s biting reality: They rejected 90s-style gangster rap and ushered in fun-clubbing Crunk.

If Straus and Howe correctly pegged the first birthyear for the new generation’s cohorts as 2006, Generation Z’s moment to pick the hits will finally emerge in 2027.

The bigger question will be if radio will be ready to play more Malcom Todd and less Ales Warren.

This article is brought to you by my day job…

Data sources for this article:

• The Billboard Hot 100: https://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100

• Wikipedia’s Billboard Hot 100 Top 10 singles: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Billboard_Hot_100_top-ten_singles

Here are resources to get you ready to use The Hit Momentum Newsletter:

• Quick Use Guide: You just want to know how to read and implement the report ASAP

• Complete Guide: Here, you’ll learn in detail what the report shows you and why behind our recommendations on how to use it.

Read more

Here are resources to get you ready to use The Hit Momentum Newsletter:

• Quick Use Guide: You just want to know how to read and implement the report ASAP

• Complete Guide: Here, you’ll learn in detail what the report shows you and why behind our recommendations on how to use it.

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2026 has been a great year for pretending it’s some other year.

From the finale of Stranger Things, renewed interest in Bruno Mars’ and Justin Bieber’s heyday, the Michael Jackson biopic, and the whole #BringBack 2016 thing, we seemingly want to exist in any time that isn’t now.

Based on the songs Americans are streaming most on Spotify, which years are we musically longing for most? Are there particular forces affecting the era of songs we’re craving lately? Finally, which nostalgia fads have already faded?

To find out, I examined the Spotify 200 in the U.S. for the first 26 weeks of 2026:

Specifically, I tagged every song with a release date 2016 and earlier, counted up the total streams for those songs for the week ending January 1^st, 2026 through June 25^th, 2026, and tallied which years garnered the most streams. I ignored songs that were released during this time but ultimately became bigger hits contemporaneously, the quintessential example being “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)” by Kate Bush.

Reliving the Recent Past

Spotify users have more interest in the recent past than the distant: 53 songs from the 2010s made the Spotify 200, while only 2 hits from the 1960s did. (The oldest being “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” from Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell.) When examining total streams for songs from each decade, fans play 2010s songs in total twice as much as any other decade.

What one year are we most reliving on Spotify? Let’s count them down.

#7: 1997 (215 million streams)

In what was the last year before boy bands and teen pop ended the Grunge era, the biggest song on Spotify from 1997 was one of the last massive hits of the genre, “Everlong” by the Foo Fighters

Spotify users also played Sublime’s “Santeria” and Third Eye Blind “Semi-Charmed Life”. Radiohead’s “Let Down,” an album cut from OK Computer, also made the Spotify 200 for 12 weeks.

Finally, The Notorious B.I.G.’s “Hypnotize” was the only 90s Hip Hop track making the Spotify 200 so far this year..

#6: 1992 (238 million streams)

In a year originally dominated by Nirvana and Pearl Jam, Boyz II Men and Sir Mix-A-Lot, Radiohead’s “Creep” has the most Spotify streams from 1992 and has consistently made the Spotify 200 so far this year—a fact that the band historically would have hated. Nirvana’s “Come As You Are” makes the list (as does “Smells Like Teen Spirit” for 1991). So did the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “Under The Bridge” for a few weeks. The Michael biopic brought “Remember The Time” to the Spotify 200 in April.

Finally, one of the very few Country classics that’s consistently on the Spotify 200 these days is 1992’s “Neon Moon” from Brooks & Dunn. (Keep in mind that Country is bigger on Amazon Music than on Spotify. Plus, 1992;s biggest Country star Garth Brooks is exclusively available on Amazon Music.)

#5: 2003 (245 million streams)

The perennial classic of Millennials “Mr. Brightside” from The Killers has for years been a permanent resident of the Spotify 200. It got 142 of the 245 million Spotify plays for 2003 songs. It’s not only the most streamed song over 10 years old, it’s also the overall #8 most streamed song on Spotify so far this year among ALL songs.

Evanescence - Bring Me To Life has also made the Spotify 200 every single week this year.. Linkin Park’s “Somewhere I Belong” and “Numb”, along with Outkast’s “Hey Ya!”, also contribute to 2003’s count.

#4: 2016 (270 million streams)

The year most famous for fans reliving is only the fourth most-relived year on Spotify. #BringBack2016 favorite “One Dance” from Drake, Wizkid, & Kyla has the most streams of any 2016 song and has made the Spotify 200 every week so far this year. Another song associated with the trend, “Closer” from The Chainsmokers & Halsey, only returned for two weeks, however. Rihanna’s “Love On The Brain” and “Kiss It Better” have also charted.

Justin Bieber’s Coachella brought “Let Me Love You” from DJ Snake and Bieber back to the Spotify 200.

The most recent 2016 bringback is Mac Miller featuring Ty Dolla $ign’s “Cinderella,” which has become a graduation season TikTok trend.

#3: 2007 (280 million streams)

Only four songs from 2007 made the Spotify 200 so far this year, but three of them have made the chart every single week: Arctic Monkeys’ “505” has taken up permanent residence on the Spotify 200, with over 100 million streams so far this year. Kanye West & Dwele’s “Flashing Lights” and Rihanna’s “Don’t Stop The Music” have also never left the Spotify 200 this year. Rihanna’s “Breakin’ Dishes” only made it for 13 out of 26 weeks.

#2: 1983 (285 million plays)

You can almost single-handedly thank the Michael biopic (about which I wrote last time) for 1983 being the second-biggest year we’re reliving on Spotify: “Billie Jean,” “Beat It,” Human Nature,” “P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing),” and “Thriller” all began charting on the Spotify 200 with Michael’s appearance in theaters.

There’s one other 1983 classic that’s actually made the Spotify 200 every week so far this year: The Police, “Every Breath You Take”

#1: 2012 (335 million streams)

Bruno Mars’ resurgence brought “Locked out of Heaven” back to the Spotify 200 every week through the end of June (It dropped out of the Spotify 200 in July). Fans remembering Justin Bieber exists brought “Beauty And A Beat” with Nicki Minaj back for 11 weeks. (It’s the only Bieber throwback still in the Spotify 200 in July).

Gen Z favorite “Thinkin Bout You” from Frank Ocean and Disclosure & Sam Smith’s “Latch” also helped make 2012 the biggest year fans are reliving on Spotify.

Plus, the only other Country classic to make the Spotify 200 in the first half of 2026, Eric Church’s “Springsteen”, stems from 2012.

By far the biggest song from the biggest bring back year on Spotify is The Neighbourhood’s “Sweater Weather.” With over 100 million plays, it’s the 29^th most played song on Spotify in the U.S. so far this year. It’s been a permanent resident of the Spotify 200 since August 2020 and its streams have steadily grown ever since, comparable to the Killers’ “Mr. Brightside.”

Here’s the streams for all years examined…

Nostalgic or Timeless?

Compare streaming for “Mr. Brightside” and “Sweater Weather” above with Justin Bieber and Nicki Minaj’s “Beauty And A Beat,” a song revived by nostalgia for Bieber’s heyday after his Coachella performance:

“Beauty and a Beat” streams spiked quickly, then faded along with the nostalgia. In contrast, fans steadily play the Neighbourhood’s and the Killers’ defining classics week after week, year after year. In fact, their streams keep growing as these songs become more established.

They’re becoming timeless.

When a fan plays The Chainsmokers and Halsey’s “Closer,” she’s reliving 2016, a simpler time before pandemics, AI, political instability, and when the Cubs won the World Series.

When fans plays “Mr. Brightside,” they’re not reliving 2003; They’re simply enjoying a classic.

Here are the top 30 songs from 2017 and earlier that made the Spotify 200 alongside today’s biggest hits during the first half of 2026. Notice that all but three of the most-streamed classics made the Spotify 200 chart every (or almost every) week.

Consider Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams.” It started as a fad, thanks to that Tik Tok of a that guy riding his skateboard to the song. Its streams quickly rose and fell.

Then, something uncommon happened: Fans discovered they actually loved “Dreams,” not as a meme, not as a 70s flashback, but simply as a great song.

Perhaps we should stop considering every song from a previous decade that continues to enjoy popularity an act of nostalgia. Yes, sometimes we enjoy old songs to relive the past. But most of the time, the old songs we’re enjoying are simply timeless.

Subscribe to Graphs About Songs for more Timeless Classics turned into PowerPoint Charts:

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Data Source for this article:

Spotify Charts (weeks of 1/1/2026 through 6/25/2026 for the USA): https://charts.spotify.com/charts/overview/us

Here are resources to get you ready to use The Hit Momentum Newsletter:

• Quick Use Guide: You just want to know how to read and implement the report ASAP

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Here are resources to get you ready to use The Hit Momentum Newsletter:

• Quick Use Guide: You just want to know how to read and implement the report ASAP

• Complete Guide: Here, you’ll learn in detail what the report shows you and why behind our recommendations on how to use it.

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Take a gander at Spotify’s chart of the 200 most-streamed songs in the U.S.A. Alongside the latest hits from Olivia Rodrigo, Drake, and Ella Langley for the week ending June 25^th, 2026 are numerous songs from Michael Jackson. Those songs cover five decades of Michael Jackson’s work, from the Jackson 5’s debut smash “I Want You Back”, to his largely forgotten “You Rock My World.”

On April 10^th, there were no Michael Jackson songs on the Spotify 200.

You already know the reason is Michael, the hugely popular biopic depicting Michael Jackson’s life from the boy wonder of Gary, Indiana through the late 1980s, back before things got really weird. Michael has already become the highest grossing biography of a musician, surpassing 2019’s Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody.

Three weeks after the film’s U.S. release, fans played Jackson’s songs almost 63 million times (and that’s just the songs reaching the Spotify 200.). Almost 9% of all streams on the Spotify 200 that peak week were for Jackson titles, For the entire month of April 2026, Michael Jackson was the second most-played artist on Spotify in the U.S. Only Noah Kahan and Drake, who both released new albums in April, eclipsed Jackson

Fans started streaming a wide variety of Jackson’s discography. Of course many are from Thriller (1982), as well as from Bad (1987) and Dangerous (1991). Fans also reached back to Off The Wal (1979) and the Jackson 5’s fist massive hit “I Want You Back” (1969). The song that might most surprise you is “Chicago,” a 1999 recording that remained unreleased until 2014. In total, 16 different songs have appeared on the Spotify 200 chart recently thanks to Michael.

At their peak, “Billie Jean” received over eight million plays a week, “Chicago” got over seven million weekly streams, while “Beat It” and “Human Nature” both got played over six million times each that week. That’s more streams for the biggest Michael Jackson titles than the big current hits from Bruno Mars, Justin Bieber, and Olivia Dean received.

It’s not a given that a biopic will rejuvenate interest in a legend’s work enough to generate massive streaming of their hits. The 2020s saw biopics about Aretha Franklin (Respect), Whitney Houston (I Wanna Dance with Somebody), Elvis Presley (Elvis), and Amy Winehouse (Back to Black) and none of these artists saw any songs chart on the Spotify 200 as a result of their portrayals. Even A Complete Unknown, the highly popular film about Bob Dylan, failed to bring back his songs.

The only artist biopic from this decade that did so was 2024’s Bob Marley: One Love, which boosted Bob Marley & The Wailers’ “Could You Be Loved” onto the Spotify 200 for two weeks.

The only biopic comparable to Michael

The only biopic with a comparable impact on streaming is Bohemian Rhapsody, the biopic of Freddie Mercury that was the biggest grossing musical biography until Michael. It pushed seven different Queen tracks onto the Spotify 200 in late 2018 and 2019.

At their peak in November 2018, however, the total weekly streams for those Queen songs were less than 15 million, a scant 2% of all streams in the Spotify 200 that week.

Queen’s streams received another boost when Bohemian Rhapsody swept the Oscars and remaining members of Queen along with Adam Lambert performed “We Will Rock You” / “We Are the Champions”. That boost ultimately kept the title track on the lower rungs of the Spotify 200 all the way until the 2019 holiday season.

How did Michael Jackson’s biopic spawn such strong streaming, when other icons from Whitney Houston to Bob Dylan didn’t?

1) An Artist with multi-generational appeal

Thriller made him an icon with Generation X, but Michael Jackson’s appeal spans four generations: Boomers embraced the Jackson 5 from the start, sending their first four hits to #1 on the Hot 100. Millennials and Generation Z have also embraced Jackson’s music as timeless.

Queen, the only other artist whose biopic generated significant streaming, also enjoys multi-generational appeal, but Michael has another advantage over Queen.

In contrast, I hate to bear the news, Boomers, but most Generation Xers think Bob Dylan is overrated. Millennials and Generation Z don’t even know why he’s a legend.

2) A long and deep library

From The Jackson 5’s 1969 chart debut to 1995’s HIStory, Michael Jackson was a consistent hitmaker for over a quarter of a century. He’s also scored 30 Top 10 hits and 13 #1 hits on the Hot 100 as a solo artist. That’s on top of the Jackson 5’s eight Top 10 and four #1 hits.

Jackson is also a holiday staple, with the Jackson 5’s “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” and “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” a part of the Christmas cannon and “Thriller” now a defining Halloween song.

In contrast, Queen was only crafting hits for less than a decade. Furthermore, their catalog lacks the depth of Jackson’s: Despite being a Classic Rock radio mainstay, Queen only reached the Hot 100’s Top 10 four times during Freddie Mercury’s lifetime. (”Bohemian Rhapsody” returned Queen to prominence and made them a Generation X favorite thanks to Wayne’s World in 1992.)

3) A culture primed for nostalgia

Between the lackluster state of current hit music and a culture seeking refuge from fearful times, the timing is perfect for people to latch on to a classic.

Mass appeal still matters

As soon as Napster made music on the internet a thing, pundits assured us the monoculture was dead: With infinite choices and endless personalization, no one would ever settle for the same choices as everyone else ever again. A quarter century later, Michael Jackson’s Spotify takeover demonstrates that appealing to a wide variety of passionate fans is still a winning formula, even when the goal is amassing streaming plays.

Want to know which hits are really hits?

• If you’re the type to argue with my chart stats: Choose the “FREE” option to get Graphs About Songs’ directly in your inbox.

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Date sources for this article:

• Spotify Charts (weeks of 11/1/2018 through 6/25/2026 for the USA): https://charts.spotify.com/charts/overview/us

• The Billboard Hot 100: https://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100

• Wikipedia’s Billboard Hot 100 Top 10 singles: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Billboard_Hot_100_top-ten_singles

Here are resources to get you ready to use The Hit Momentum Newsletter:

• Quick Use Guide: You just want to know how to read and implement the report ASAP

• Complete Guide: Here, you’ll learn in detail what the report shows you and why behind our recommendations on how to use it.

Read more

Here are resources to get you ready to use The Hit Momentum Newsletter:

• Quick Use Guide: You just want to know how to read and implement the report ASAP

• Complete Guide: Here, you’ll learn in detail what the report shows you and why behind our recommendations on how to use it.

Read more

Quick—name every Drake #1 song you can name off the top of your head.

Perhaps you recalled “God’s Plan”, “Nice for What”, or “In My Feelings.” Combined, these three songs spent 29 weeks at #1 on the Hot 100 in 2018.

If you’re reliving 2016, you might remember, “One Dance”, Drake’s hit featuring WizKid and Kyla, or Rihanna’s “Work” featuring Drake. Those two songs owned #1 for 19 weeks.

How many #1 songs do you think Drake has had this decade? How many can you name?*

In his Slate column “Why Is This Song No, 1,” Chart expert and music critic Chris Molanphy observes this curiosity about Canada’s biggest Hip Hop export: Drake has had eight songs reach #1 on the Hot 100 from 2020 through 2023, including his recent response to the Kendrick Lamar feud, “Janice STFU”.

However, of Drake’s seven other #1 songs from this decade, all seven spent only 1 week atop the chart.

The Emergence of The Irrelevant #1

Back when Casey Kasem announced the week’s #1 song, that song had penetrated the awareness of anyone even vaguely paying attention to popular music. Some #1s remain iconic classics. Others received widespread derision even when they were #1. If you were alive and not residing at the Pines of Mar Gables, you knew the #1 song.

That’s because #1 song used to remain omnipresent for months.

My rule of thumb for a song to be relatively well known in its time, it needs to be a Top 10 hit for at least four weeks. We generally don’t get to know a song from casually hearing it once. We need to hear it over and over again for a period of time for our brains to store the song in long-term memory—whether we want it there or not.

Historically, since Billboard implemented electronic monitoring of song sales and radio airplay to compile the Hot 100, the #1 song remained in the Top 10 for an average of 16 weeks.

Before 2019. Only three #1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 stayed in the chart’s top 10 for less than four weeks:

• One was John Lennon’s “Whatever Gets You Through The Night,” a largely forgotten hit from 1974 that only lasted three weeks in the Top 10.

• The other two were songs from American Idol contestants Fantasia (2004) and Taylor Hicks (2006). Their TV performances spawned throngs of fans to immediately buy their winning song on iTunes, but those sales dried up as soon as the show was no longer hot news.

In short, if your song reached #1 on the Hot 100, you were guaranteed enough time in the Top 10 for your song to become well-known.

That changed in 2019.

Since streaming on services such as Spotify usurped paid digital downloads on iTunes, there have been 23 different songs reaching #1 on the Hot 100, only to fall out of the Top 10 entirely after fewer than four weeks. Somehow, these songs were the #1 most-consumed songs in America, only to be forgotten as soon as the following week.

That includes every #1 song so far this decade from Drake.

The King of the Irrelevant Hit

The chart below ranks the 24 artists with the most Top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 from the week ending January 5, 2019 through June 13, 2026., segmented by how many of each artist’s Top 10 hits:

• Stayed in the Top 10 for four or more weeks

• Remained in the Top 10 for two or three weeks

• Only were Top 10 for one week

No one during this timeframe has had more Top 10 hits than Drake, with 48, However, only seven of Drake’s songs stayed in the Top 10 for four or more weeks, compared to 25 songs that were only Top 10 for one week.

That makes Drake the artist with more irrelevant Top 10 hits than any other artist during the streaming era.

Taylor Swift is second with 47 total Top 10 hits from 2019 through 2026. She, too, has had 25 Top 10 songs fall out of the Top 10 after only one week. However, eight of her Top 10 hits have remained in the Top 10 for four or more weeks. Unlike Drake, Swift’s biggest hits have been massive, with “Cruel Summer” remaining in the Top 10 for 33 weeks and “Anti-Hero” for 28 weeks.

In contrast, the best Drake could muster since 2019 is keeping “Toosie Slide,” in the Top 10 for 10 weeks.

This chart shows those same artists’ percentage of Top 10 hits that stayed in the Top 10 for four or more weeks. Other than Juice WRLD or J. Cole (who both had significantly fewer Top hits overall), only 15% of Drake’s Top 10 hits since 2019 are “real” hits, based on my benchmark of four or more weeks in the Top 10.

How Streaming Created Irrelevant Hits

Streaming has made it easier than ever for an artist’s biggest fans to check out their latest music.

• Thirty years ago, you had to go to the mall and spend $34 in 2026 money for an entire CD to check out your favorite artist’s new release, a commitment only the most avid fans would make sound unheard.

• Fifteen years ago, you could buy that album on your laptop or your new smartphone, but you still had to pay up to $22 in 2026 money for the whole album. Perhaps you only bought the big track you’ve heard on the radio at that price, not the entire album.

Today, you can effortlessly listen to every single track on an artist’s latest project without spending anything beyond the streaming subscription you already have.

More fundamentally, we now don’t simply measure the moment you buy the CD or download the iTune: We measure every single time you play a song.

Drake Can’t Keep It Up

In this chart, you’ll see each artist’s Spotify performance in the U.S. from 2019 through 2026, including songs featuring other contributing artists.

• On the left is the aggregate streams for each artist during the debut week for their songs.

• On the right is the total streams for their songs for all weeks.

In other words, the chart on the left shows who turns out their fans the week they drop a new album. The chart on the right shows who attracts fans who keeps streaming a song week after week.

When it comes to debuting big and staying big, Taylor Swift is #1 on both charts.

The artist in second place for most debut week streams is Drake. But look where Drake is on the right—he’s only 11^th place for total streams week after week.

In contrast, look at Billie Eilish and Sabrina Carpenter: They rank 8^th and 9^th, respectively, in most streams the week a song debuts. For total Spotify streams week after week, however, they rank #3 and #4, behind only Taylor Swift and Morgan Wallen. Or SZA, who isn’t even among the top 20 in Spotify debuts but is 7^th in total streams.

Despite Kendrick Lamar’s efforts, Drake still has an ardent fan base who binges his latest releases. So does Taylor Swift, Morgan Wallen, and Bad Bunny.

The difference is those artists also attract a far bigger—albeit far less ardent—audience of causal fans in the weeks after their songs debut. That broader audience registers in radio research and keeps those songs on the radio for months. That broader audience also keeps playing their songs for months on their streaming service of choice.

The Hot 100 Never Measured Popularity

The Hot 100 is not a chart measuring how many people know and love a song. It is—and always was—a chart measuring consumption of each song. Back when the chart measured how many people bought a 45 and heard a song on Top 40 radio, the most consumed songs were also the most widely appealing songs.

Although radio exposure and song sales do still count, today, the Hot 100 is chiefly measuring how many times a song gets played on streaming. Because we’re now measuring plays—not people—streaming has broken the link between consumption and popularity. That’s because songs from established artists typically get the most streams the week they debut—but those streams are from a handful of passionate fans binging the song repeatedly.

The chart below compares the Spotify streams for a typical hit song from a major Pop artist with the percentage of Pop music fans who would typically be familiar with that song, as measured by radio audience research.

• During the debut week, when the artist’s Stans seemingly can’t get enough of the new song on Spotify, the majority of Pop fans have never heard the song.

• Fast forward eight weeks. Now, the vast majority of Pop fans know the song (and a lot of those Pop fans love it), but on Spotify, the song is garnering less than half the weekly streams it did the week it debuted.

As causal fans of the song discovered it, they, too, started playing it on Spotify. But unlike the artist Stans who binged it as soon as it dropped, those casual fans slowly ramped up how often they played the song as they got to know it over several weeks. Furthermore, those causal fans never played the song over and over again the way the artist Stans did its debut week.

Streaming services don’t tell us how many different people play a song in the course of a week. Furthermore, fandom is a spectrum, not a binary. For conceptual understanding, however, the chart below estimates which streams from that typical hit song come from artist stands verses casual fans each week.

Since the Hot 100 tracks how many times streaming users play a song this week—not how many different people played it---the Hot 100 no longer inherently reflects how many individuals know and love a song.

The thing is, the chart was never supposed to measure popularity.

Consider THE SCOTTS, by THE SCOTTS (Travis Scott and Kid Cudi). It was the #1 song on the Hot 100 for the week ending May 9^th, 2020. Then, it fell out of the Top 10 entirely. Examining its week-by-week Spotify streams shows how “THE SCOTTS” quickly faded compared to a mass-appeal hit:

“THE SCOTTS” was indeed the most heavily consumed song in the U.S. in early May of 2020. However, it was not—and never became—the most “popular” song in the U.S.

Billboard has always intended its charts to be tools for industry professionals to gauge music consumption. The fact is, the Hot 100 now does that job far better than it did in the past. It’s using census level data from every streaming service to track every single time someone plays a song.

• Even when we tracked every iTunes download, the chart had no idea how often you played that song after you bought it.

• Even when we tracked CD sales electronically via SoundScan, we had no idea what you did with that CD once you left Circuit City.

• During the heyday of Casey counting them down, the Hot 100 relied on a sample of self-reported rank lists from record stores and radio stations about what they were selling and playing the most. (No room for chart tampering there, right?)

Streaming “Slop”

That brings us back to Drake.

He has the dubious distinction of crafting more songs that his fan base will binge, but that never become “real” hits, than any other artist this decade.

The Switched on Pop podcast dubbed the 2020’s Drake’s “slop era.” Will fans simply listen to anything their favorite artist puts out?

For worse or for better, savvy artists including Taylor Swift, Morgan Wallen, and Drake have figured out that maximizing new release binging from fans is a lucrative business model. When you’re paid per stream, quantify beats quality.

Based on streaming of his latest track, “Janice STFU,” Kendrick Lamar didn’t kill Drake’s career. If anything does, it will be eroding the anticipation of his fans who are expecting another “God’s Plan” and instead get “What’s Next.”

* For the record…

Those eight #1 hits for Drake in the 2020s are:

1. “Toosie Slide” (2020)

2. “What’s Next” (2021)

3. “Way 2 Sexy” featuring Future and Young Thug (2021 )

4. “Wait for U” Future featuring Drake and Tems (2022)

5. “Jimmy Cooks” featuring 21 Savage (2022)

6. “Slime You Out” featuring SZA (2023)

7. “First Person Shooter” featuring J. Cole (2023)

8. “Janice STFU”(2026)

Want to know which hits are really hits?

• If you’re a fellow chart nerd: Choose the “FREE” option to get Graphs About Songs’ directly in your inbox.

• If you program a CHR station: “The Hit Momentum Newsletter” analyzes the Spotify 200 to find the songs that could be huge hits on your station. It’s yours every Monday for a $22 a month subscription below.

Subscribe now

Data sources for this article:

• The Billboard Hot 100: https://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100

• Wikipedia’s Billboard Hot 100 Top 10 singles: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Billboard_Hot_100_top-ten_singles

• Spotify Charts (weeks of 1/3/2019 through 6/4/2026 for the USA): https://charts.spotify.com/charts/overview/us

Here are resources to get you ready to use The Hit Momentum Newsletter:

• Quick Use Guide: You just want to know how to read and implement the report ASAP

• Complete Guide: Here, you’ll learn in detail what the report shows you and why behind our recommendations on how to use it.

Read more