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.
This week: A new remix points to another smash for Latto, breakout hits for Young Nudy and Byron Messia go viral on TikTok, Ted Lasso offers one last big synch and more.
Cardi B Getting ‘On Da Floor’ May Help Latto Score Another Hit
After breaking out last year with “Big Energy,” a pop-rap smash that peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and earned her a best new artist Grammy nod, Latto has yet to notch a proper follow-up hit, though she’s graced the lower reaches of the Hot 100 with her song “Lottery” and collaborations with Megan Thee Stallion and Lola Brooke. That may change with “Put It on da Floor,” a sharp-tongued single that Latto debuted at Coachella, now that the song has received a new Cardi B remix – titled “Put It on da Floor Again,” and released last Friday (June 2).
Although the original song has yet to hit the Hot 100, streams for “Put It on da Floor Again” have been way up upon the addition of Cardi, who spends her guest verse deploying an array of boasts (the best being, “Got so many chains on, I can’t even see my throat”). “Put It on da Floor Again” earned 3.92 million U.S. on-demand streams last Friday, a 554% increase from the previous day’s streams, according to Luminate. And while that number dipped to just above 2 million streams on Sunday, that total is more than three times what the song was averaging in daily streams prior to Cardi’s addition. (It also exploded in daily sales, shooting from under 100 to over 6,000 on June 2 after the remix’s debut.)
As the wait continues for Cardi B’s follow-up to 2018’s Invasion of Privacy, the superstar MC has become a guest-feature force: her “Tomorrow 2” remix with GloRilla helped that song hit the top 10 of the Hot 100 last year. We’ll see exactly how much her presence boosts “Put It on da Floor Again” in the coming weeks, but early returns are promising. – JASON LIPSHUTZ
Byron Messia’s Trap Dancehall Banger Continues to Build
As summer draws nearer and the weather gets warmer — wildfires notwithstanding — the race for 2023’s official Song of the Summer has begun. Byron Messia, a Kittitian dancehall artist, is looking to enter the race with his rising hit single “Talibans.”
According to Luminate, the dancehall-infused trap-Afrobeats track has nearly doubled its official on-demand U.S. streams from the week ending May 11 to the week ending June 1. “Talibans” garnered over 1.5 million official on-demand U.S. streams in the week ending June 1, up 64% from the week prior. Buoyed by growing traction on TikTok — the official “Talibans” sound currently soundtracks over 19,000 videos on the platform — and particularly strong responses from cities with significant Caribbean populations, “Talibans” has cemented itself as the premier breakout hit from Messia’s No Love album. The song has consistently ranked in the top 20 of Apple Music’s New York City (No. 2) and Miami (No. 15) charts, which are updated daily.
Messia, who recently signed to Interscope Records, released No Love on January 20, 2023, and the album entered Top Reggae Albums at No. 8 this week (dated Jun. 10). Should “Talibans” keep up this momentum, Messia’s new smash could follow a similar trajectory to Capella Grey’s “Gyalis,” the chief dancehall-inflected anthem of two summers ago. – KYLE DENIS
Ted Lasso Offers a Fond Farewell With “Father and Son”
Throughout its third and final season, Ted Lasso has regularly sent songs towards the top of the Shazam and Tunefind charts with its inspired synch choices, and caused big gains in streams for songs by The Buzzcocks, Michael Kiwanuka, Leonard Cohen and many more. The show signed off for good with its season three finale last Wednesday, and its final needle-drop was a doozy: Yusuf Islam (formerly known as Cat Stevens) with the acoustic tearjerker “Father and Son,” playing over a heartfelt closing montage.
After posting 88,000 official on-demand U.S. streams on May 29 (the day before the sports dramedy’s finale), that number jumped to 155,000 for “Father and Son” on June 1 – a gain of 75%, according to Luminate. The sales gains were even more pronounced, as the song sold less than 100 copies on May 29, but combined for nearly 2,700 in sales over the next five days (May 30 – June 3) – a sure sign that Ted Lasso still had its viewers emotionally ensnared right up to the end. – ANDREW UNTERBERGER
Young Nudy & 21 Savage Feast on “Peaches & Eggplants”
Fresh off a slew of smashes, including “Rich Flex” (with Drake) and “Creepin’” (with Metro Boomin), 21 Savage looks to have yet another hit on his hands. According to Luminate, “Peaches & Eggplants,” the breakout song from Young Nudy’s food-themed Gumbo album, has garnered a 45% increase in official on-demand U.S. streams over the past four weeks. In the week ending May 11, “Peaches & Eggplants” earned over 3.26 million streams. That number rose to 4.73 million official on-demand U.S. streams for the week ending June 1.
Nudy and 21’s collaboration has gone viral on TikTok, with the official sound boasting nearly 500,000 videos. There is currently a dance trend set to the final three lines of 21 Savage’s verse and Young Nudy’s onomatopoeia-laden chorus; creators use Nudy’s “boaw” ad-libs to simulate the sex positions the lyrics describe. Nonetheless, the track has now reached a level of virality where its use in TikToks is no longer exclusively reliant on choreography. Lyrically, the song is also in line with the recent onslaught of tongue-in-cheek sex-centric rap smashes such as Sexyy Red & Tay Keith’s “Pound Town,” Nicki Minaj’s “Super Freaky Girl” and NLE Choppa’s “Slut Me Out.” In fact, the track’s title is an allusion to the way seemingly mundane fruit and vegetable emojis have been repurposed as sexual innuendo by the social media generation.
As the song continues to grow, the Gumbo single looks to become the first Hot 100 entry for Young Nudy, who is currently signed to RCA and Paradise East Records. “Peaches & Eggplants” currently sits at a peak of No. 32 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay and No. 2 on the Bubbling Under Hot 100. – KD
Q&A: Brooke Hershey, Account Executive at Production Resource Group (PRG), on What’s Trending Up in His World
PRG helps touring artists scale up. What’s been the company’s No. 1 goal for a busy summer 2023 touring season?
PRG’s primary objective is to deepen relationships with our clients as we support them in executing their visions to the highest level. My group, which focuses on nurturing artists in the beginning and mid-level stages of their careers, is instrumental in providing the expertise and resources to scale artists up from club level shows to arenas and stadiums. We use PRG’s experts, gear and experience to support and execute the best live shows possible, beginning at the earliest stage of an artist’s career.
Within all of PRG’s live industry project management, what’s one example of a major stage show production detail that not enough fans think about, but is absolutely crucial to get right?
There are so many crucial details—it’s difficult to pick one! Planning a tour is like putting together a puzzle where each detail needs to fit together seamlessly. Rigging is one of the first things that needs to be accounted for, and it is often overlooked by the audience. Using engineers to calculate the exact weights and positions of heavy video walls or hanging lighting systems is necessary to ensure a safe and good-looking show.
This recently happened on Rauw Alejandro’s Saturno World Tour. His creative team came to PRG with an in-the-round LED spaceship concept for his 2023 arena tour, which meant a design comprised mostly of flying elements. PRG’s CAD team immediately developed preliminary concepts and completed a weight study based on the specified products they were looking to use. The original design came in at 230,000 lbs.; the final for touring, 160,000 lbs., just at the A-market arena limit. These are some of the number-crunching details that aren’t always at top of mind!
The live industry has been especially volatile over the past few years. What’s one piece of advice you’d offer to rising artists thinking about plotting future tours that might make their lives easier?
You don’t have to be selling out major venues to have access to great tour production. I truly don’t think a lot of people know this. That’s why I’d say surrounding yourself with a solution-focused team is key. Partnering with people who share your vision, cater to your specific needs, but who also provide long-term support, is crucial, as it will ensure consistent quality throughout every tour. Working with a strong production manager, tour manager, and production partner, like PRG, who already has strong, enduring relationships facilitates continuous growth.
We have the global infrastructure to give up-and-coming artists access to the same top-of-the-line tech and services as some of today’s biggest acts. It is our mission to make artists and their teams’ lives easier – from engineering, CADs, truck packs, crew services and much more, we can work with almost any budget.
Leading up to Billie Eilish’s 2019 When We All Fall Asleep tour, we witnessed a remarkable surge in an incredibly brief span. The production transitioned from her father managing the lighting to a tour that involved seven fully loaded trucks of equipment within a remarkably short timeframe. PRG played a crucial role in efficiently managing the logistics during this rapid period of expansion while continuing to deliver top-notch video services for her ongoing tours.
Fill in the blank: from a technological standpoint, the biggest touring production breakthrough over the next five years will involve ___________.
AI. The future collaboration between AI, creative teams, and existing touring equipment will be fascinating. AI is already being used by designers to create some of the content you are seeing displayed on video walls, and we expect to see this technology extend to lighting programming in the near future.
For me, one of the most rewarding aspects of working with PRG is being at the forefront of innovation. Through COVID, it was exhilarating to see the rapid adaptation of extended reality technology at our Virtual Production Studio – things really took off after Katy Perry’s “Daisies” performance on American Idol. The speed at which this technology became ubiquitous was breathtaking. – JL
Season’s Gainings: Feels Like Summer
The calendar might not officially show it yet – still technically spring until June 21 – but based on the jams folks are streaming, summer is basically already upon us. (As the year’s first nationally agreed-upon barbecue holiday, Memorial Day Weekend might’ve made the difference.) After making small gains the previous few weeks, a number of “Summer” classics made big jumps in official on-demand U.S. streams in the charting week ending June 1, including Kid Rock’s “All Summer Long” (2.3 million, up 24%), Sly & The Family Stone’s “Hot Fun in the Summertime” (192,000, up 51%) and naturally, DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince’s “Summertime” (941,000, up 58%), according to Luminate. Those numbers should only continue to grow throughout June – unless, of course, they’re overtaken by streams of songs about wildfire smog. – AU