Lola Young Scores the Year’s Last (?) Big Viral Hit
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: Getting in some of the last viral hits of 2024 — from alt-pop dances to country grief — and a final goodbye to one of the biggest music-boosting melodramas of the last decade.
Lola Young’s ‘Messy’ Cleans Up Thanks to Viral ‘Dance’
Can a dance go viral if it’s barely a dance at all? That’s been the debate raging around Lola Young’s breakthrough single “Messy,” which is zooming up the Billboard Hot 100 thanks in part to a viral clip in which influencer Jake Shane and model/social media star Sofia Richie vibe out to the British singer-songwriter’s vulnerable soul-pop track.
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Posted on Nov. 28, the 14-second TikTok clip finds the pair performing some vaguely defined moves, including finger-guns and a half-shimmy, while facing the camera. The comments on the clip are lightly clowning their dance skills, but Young herself approved (“ly guys,” she wrote), and since it was posted, streams of “Messy” have skyrocketed: the song logged 3.9 million official on-demand streams U.S. during the week ending on Nov. 28, according to Luminate, and that numbers more than doubled to 9.1 million streams two weeks later.
While “Messy” moves up from No. 90 to No. 64 on this week’s Hot 100, Young also comes in a few spots higher on the chart with “Like Him,” her collaboration with Tyler, The Creator on his Chromakopia album. Both tracks have greatly expanded Young’s profile as the year comes to a close, and could set up a big 2025 for the South East London native. – JASON LIPSHUTZ
Sam Barber’s “Indigo” Streams Surge Thanks to Mournful TikTok Trend
After breaking through with 2022’s “Straight and Narrow,” Missouri-bred country musician Sam Barber has scored his first Billboard Hot 100 hit with his Avery Anna-assisted “Indigo” (No. 98, chart dated Dec. 21) — and the heart-wrenching duet could fly even higher.
Originally released on Oct. 31, “Indigo” collected over 1.16 million official on-demand U.S. streams during the period of Nov. 29-Dec. 5, according to Luminate. That number jumped nearly 400% to over 5.7 million streams the following week (Dec. 6-12). Over the past week, TikTok users have latched onto the following lyric from the song’s chorus: “I used to shine bright like gold, now I’m all indigo.” Generally about losing your spark, the lyrics have now come to soundtrack grieving parents and partners. On TikTok, the official “Indigo” sound has amassed nearly 95,000 posts.
With strong streaming momentum and an official music video still on the way (as well as a Shaboozey co-sign), “Indigo” could very well grow into one of 2025’s earliest hits once the holiday season passes. – KYLE DENIS
‘Yellowstone’ Finale Offers Closing Bumps for Lainey Wilson Hit and Willie Nelson Classic
It’s a wrap on the second half of Season Five of Yellowstone, with its season finale attracting over 11 million viewers – a record for the show in what is most likely its last-ever episode. No spoilers here for the Paramount Western drama, but as the show has done throughout its five and a half seasons, the finale was heavily stocked with emotional country anthems – including multiple performed within the show by recurring cast members and real-life modern country artists Ryan Bingham (Walker) and Lainey Wilson (Abby).
Wilson took the stage on the Yellowstone finale to perform her 2024 hit “Hang Tight Honey,” which reached No. 61 on the Hot 100 earlier this year, while Bingham performed his Friday-released “A Song for the Stone.” Wilson’s hit saw a major bump following its use in the finale, with the song notching 86,000 official on-demand streams and over 700 digital sales on Monday (Dec. 16), gains of 47% and 2,669% from the prior Monday, according to Lumiante. (As a just-released song, Bingham’s numbers were up a more marginal amount.)
But Yellowstone has never just been for the kids, and the finale also featured prominent usage of Willie Nelson’s 1980 ballad “My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys” in its closing. Consequently, the classic was up 162% on Monday from the week before in streams, to just over 35,000. – ANDREW UNTERBERGER
Ceechynaa Spins Streaming Hit Out of Shock-Rap
From Central Cee to Little Simz, the MCs on the other side of pond have been putting in work throughout the year. In the last few weeks of 2024, Ceechynaa made sure that she wasn’t left out of that conversation.
The 20-year-old South London drill rapper made waves in 2023 with “Last Laugh” — which eventually got an NLE Choppa remix – but her new single has already made an even bigger impact. On Dec. 5, she dropped “Peggy” — a jaw-dropping drill track begins with her “peggin’ that man at the back of the bus” and ends with her proclaiming, “They said I’m a masculine bitch ’cause these little n—as ain’t really a man.” Our favorite American female rappers have been proudly waving the sexual liberation flag for decades now, but few go as far as Ceechynaa does on “Peggy.” During the four-day period of Dec. 6-9, “Peggy” earned over 888,000 official on-demand U.S. streams, according to Luminate. By the period of Dec. 13-16, that figure leapt 95% to over 1.7 million streams. In its first week of release, “Peggy” claimed over 1.92 million streams. On YouTube, the track’s official music video has earned over 1.5 million views in just a week and a half – that’s more hits than the music video for the NLE Choppa “Last Laugh” remix earned in 11 months!
Building on her already-solidified online fandom, the official “Peggy” sound plays in over 97,000 TikTok posts, the bulk of which follow children having their parents blindly react to the song’s outrageous lyrics. Already her very first UK Singles Chart entry (No. 79), “Peggy” could help Ceechynaa make her Billboard U.S. chart debut should its streams continue to rise. – KD
Additional reporting by Hannah Dailey.
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