‘OkPop Demon Hunters’ and Conan Gray set new benchmarks on the charts : NPR

Conan Gray, who’s labored his manner up from the YouTube content material mines to turn out to be a pop star in his personal proper, enters this week’s chart at No. 3 along with his album Wishbone.

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Katja Ogrin/Redferns/Redferns

This week, Morgan Wallen’s I’m the Problem sits at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart but once more. But the 2 titles slightly below it are making probably the most noise: At No. 3, former YouTube star Conan Gray hits a brand new profession peak with Wishbone. And at No. 2, OkPop Demon Hunters pulls off one thing no soundtrack has ever completed: it is landed 4 high 10 singles concurrently. Not even Saturday Night Fever or Waiting to Exhale ever pulled that off — although, to be truthful, the world of streaming providers was nonetheless many years away.

TOP ALBUMS

Last week, one other wave of high 10 debuts washed up on shore, because the Billboard 200 albums chart welcomed new entries by Gunna, MGK, Jonas Brothers and Babymetal. This week, Gunna stays on a sunny patch of dry land — The Last Wun slips a single spot to No. 4 — whereas the opposite three are sent hurtling back to the turbid seas whence they got here. (Babymetal went from “the first all-Japanese band ever to hit the top 10” to “off the charts entirely” in simply seven days, but it surely’ll at all times have that one week at No. 9.)

That’s in step with the charts’ common sample in latest weeks, by which a number of new albums debut within the high 10, solely to be jettisoned per week later by an excellent more energizing crop of information. This week, nonetheless, the jettisoning actually solely advantages one debut: Conan Gray’s Wishbone, which enters this week’s chart at No. 3. Gray has visited the highest 10 twice earlier than, however Wishbone is the highest-charting album of his profession. It’s a pleasant second for Gray, who’s labored his manner up from the YouTube content material mines to turn out to be a pop star in his personal proper.

But Wishbone is the one debut on this week’s high 10, whereas — as famous above — three of final week’s debuts plummet precipitously. So what’s filling the void?

In this case, the reply lies in two of 2024’s greatest hits, albeit for various causes. Billie Eilish launched a particular vinyl version of Hit Me Hard and Soft to commemorate the album’s one-year anniversary. That helped the album climb from No. 24 — it had left the highest 10 as of this previous June — to No. 6.

Then there’s Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department, which leaps from No. 18 to No. 10. That blockbuster wasn’t rereleased in some recent iteration — no new vinyl, no recent bonus tracks, nothing like that. But Swift did lately announce the discharge of a brand new album referred to as The Life of a Showgirl (out Oct. 3), which she promoted on Travis Kelce’s New Heights podcast throughout the eligibility window for this week’s charts. With a following the dimensions of Swift’s, a easy act of prerelease promo is sufficient to transfer an album again into the highest 10.

With Morgan Wallen’s I’m the Problem sitting at No. 1 for a twelfth nonconsecutive week, OkPop Demon Hunters seems positioned to imminently full its run to the highest of the Billboard 200. Why? For one, the development traces within the albums’ respective streaming numbers have been headed on this route for weeks now, and the 2 titles are already extraordinarily shut. For one other, a sing-along version of OkPop Demon Hunters simply bought a profitable theatrical launch — and the word-of-mouth increase that comes with it.

But the most important motive of all for OkPop Demon Hunters to anticipate a seat at No. 1 subsequent week? The soundtrack’s label simply lastly launched a CD version, and people first-week gross sales numbers must be greater than sufficient to shut the hole on their very own. It’s a matter of time.

TOP SONGS

As famous above, the runway is now clear for the OkPop Demon Hunters soundtrack to imagine its place atop the Billboard 200 albums chart. But the album picks up one more vital milestone this week — one which no different soundtrack has completed within the historical past of the Billboard charts. It’s bought four singles in the Hot 100’s top 10 concurrently, which has by no means occurred because the Hot 100 premiered in the summertime of 1958.

Last week, Alex Warren’s “Ordinary” reclaimed the No. 1 spot, thanks partially to the discharge of a reside model Warren recorded at Lollapalooza with nation star Luke Combs. This week, “Ordinary” slides again all the way down to No. 2 and HUNTR/X’s “Golden” — persistently the OkPop Demon Hunters soundtrack’s top-performing hit, not less than thus far — resumes its run on the high of the Hot 100.

Two extra songs from the soundtrack — each by HUNTR/X’s display screen rivals in Saja Boys — now reside within the high 5: “Your Idol,” which holds at No. 4, and the sugary earworm “Soda Pop” at No. 5. Then, HUNTR/X lands a brand new entry within the high 10: “How It’s Done,” which leaps from No. 14 to No. 10. (Three extra songs from the soundtrack flip up within the high 25, as nicely: “What It Sounds Like,” “Free” and “Takedown.” It’d take an enormous surge to cram a fifth KPDH tune into the highest 10 — “What It Sounds Like” is ranked the best, at No. 20 — but it surely’s removed from unimaginable within the coming weeks.)

The explosion of OkPop Demon Hunters songs has lastly crowded one withered chestnut out of the highest 10: Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” which was within the midst of a record-tying 19-week run at No. 1 a whole calendar 12 months in the past, drops to No. 13 this week. (It’s not even the highest-charting Shaboozey tune anymore, with “Good News” leaping to No. 12.) Somehow, Teddy Swims’ “Lose Control” nonetheless manages to carry at No. 7 because it extends its record-obliterating runs within the high 10 (75 weeks) and the Hot 100 (105 weeks, which implies it is now in its third 12 months on the chart). Unfortunately, “Lose Control” is not more likely to go away the highest 10 till shortly after the discharge of Taylor Swift’s The Life of a Showgirl in October.

WORTH NOTING

This is not to rain on OkPop Demon Hunters‘ parade — it is an amazing and enjoyable film, and the songs are terrific! — however just a few of its statistical milestones must be put in perspective. Yes, no soundtrack in historical past had ever posted 4 simultaneous high 10 hits previous to this week. But “history” regarded rather a lot completely different previous to the streaming period.

Consider the blockbusters that got here earlier than it. The soundtrack that is posted probably the most high 10 hits in historical past — not concurrently — is Waiting to Exhale, which holds the all-time file with 5. That movie, which starred Whitney Houston and boasted a assassin’s row of further soundtrack superstars (Mary J. Blige! Toni Braxton! Brandy!), got here out in 1995.

Three different soundtracks have produced 4 high 10 hits: Saturday Night Fever, from 1977; Grease, from 1978; and Purple Rain, from 1984. As famous final week, Saturday Night Fever and Waiting to Exhale even landed three songs within the high 10 on the similar time. These numbers are spectacular however unsurprising, on condition that we’re speaking about a few of the most iconic and best-selling soundtracks ever launched.

But the hits from these earlier motion pictures weren’t all launched concurrently. Before streaming, the charts had been based mostly on gross sales of vinyl singles (and, in a while, songs bought on cassette and CD) and radio airplay. And labels typically maintained a system by which they had been extraordinarily deliberate about pacing the discharge of economic singles. It took a wild phenomenon — Beatlemania, for instance, or the Bee Gees’ late-’70s assault on the charts — to create a pileup of singles from one album close to the highest of the Hot 100.

Nowadays? It simply takes an amazing large surge of streaming — like, for instance, the one which gave Taylor Swift the top 14 songs in the country within the aftermath of The Tortured Poets Department‘s launch final 12 months. Just one thing to remember when contextualizing not solely OkPop Demon Hunters, but in addition the arrival of Swift’s The Life of a Showgirl in October. It’s a unique world on the charts, and each new milestone is going down in an ecosystem that will have been unrecognizable 15 or 20 years in the past.