A few weekends ago, I had the distinct pleasure of introducing my friends’ parents to Chappell Roan.
It started when I had a few bars of “Good Luck, Babe” stuck in my head and couldn’t stop humming it. The next thing I knew, we were all learning the “HOT TO GO” dance. And by the end of the weekend, we were sitting on their deck in upstate New York, listening to lyrics about a “sexually explicit kind of love affair” like it was the most normal dinner music in the world.
Now that I’m back home in Brooklyn, I’ve got a new favorite reference: You can’t walk a block without hearing someone bumpin’ one of Charli xcx’s instant club classics (from her album Brat) — even more so now that Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign has embraced the internet’s delighted moves tying her to brat summer.
And now’s as good a time as any to mention that for weeks earlier this year, I was perpetually working laaaaate (cuz I’m a singerrrrr). That’s that me, “Espresso.”
These artists — Chappell Roan, Charli xcx, “Espresso”’s Sabrina Carpenter — have ruled my playlists this summer. My friends are playing their songs at parties. My social media feeds are overwhelmed with news and memes about them. They’re inescapable contenders for Song Of The Summer 2024, right? … Right?!
Wrong. Take a look at the top of the Billboard Songs of the Summer chart right now and you’ll find that the Top 10 is chaos. Post Malone and Morgan Wallen occupy the top spot with their song “I Had Some Help,” a song that I really don’t think I could hum for you, even if pressed. Someone that I have literally never heard of, Tommy Richman, is in the fourth spot.
So what gives? How are these relative unknowns beating out the biggest pop girlies for song of the summer 2024? And if I barely recognize the most popular song in America right now, is there even such a thing as a song of the summer anymore?
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What Defines a Song of the Summer?
In the absence of an agreed-upon definition for what makes a song of the summer 2024, it’s helpful to look back at the history of the concept. The idea stretches further back than many realize — all the way to the 19th century, when tunes were mainly distributed through sheet music.
As Phil Edwards detailed in a Vox article a few years ago, sales in that era were slow. It could take decades for early popular songs like 1826’s “The Old Oaken Bucket” to spread across the country.
Entering the 20th century, new technologies like the radio played a crucial role in popularizing songs more widely and rapidly. While songs gained summertime popularity, the official designation of a song of the summer was still absent.
“It’s not like people were walking around in 1925 and saying, ‘You think that’s the song of the summer this year?’” music critic and author David Hajdu told CNN. “But the phenomenon was beginning to happen.”
When Billboard launched its first Hot 100 chart in 1958, with Domenico Modugno’s Italian ballad “Nel Blu di Pinto de Blu (Volaré)” topping the list, it provided a metric to define the song of the summer. However, it didn’t invent the concept itself. For a period, the Hot 100 seemed to accurately identify the most ubiquitous music of the season: The Supremes’ “Where Did Our Love Go?” in 1964, “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart” by Elton John and Kiki Dee in 1976, and Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger” in 1982.
The shift occurred in the 2000s. The early years of the new millennium gave us songs so recognizable that they almost didn’t need to be played as examples: “Crazy in Love,” “Umbrella,” “Call Me Maybe,” “Despacito.” But by the 2020s, things took a turn. DaBaby’s “Rockstar” might have been a chart-topper in 2020, but it didn’t resonate as a defining song of the summer for everyone. Similarly, Morgan Wallen’s “Last Night,” despite its chart success last year, didn’t achieve widespread song of the summer status in the cultural consciousness for many listeners.
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Is There Still a Definitive Song of the Summer in the Streaming Era?
You might be surprised to learn how drastically music consumption has evolved since Billboard began tracking summer hits. We are now firmly in the “streaming era,” where a significant portion of music listening occurs on platforms like YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Music, supplementing traditional radio.
This evolution has reduced the influence of radio DJs and music executives in dictating hits, shifting the power towards listeners. Many listeners are now influenced by Spotify’s personalized recommendation algorithms, which have been a priority for the company since at least 2020.
Since Billboard’s Hot 100 chart incorporates streaming data, musicologist and Switched on Pop co-host Charlie Harding suggests that the charts are now more reflective of actual listening habits.
“In the era of mass media monoculture, we just weren’t as talented at capturing people’s collective listening,” Harding stated on Today, Explained. “Sure, maybe they were being broadcast more of the same stuff, but you didn’t know what people were playing back to back on their boombox. Now we can actually count exactly what people are listening to on streaming services.”
The streaming era has enabled diverse artists to organically climb the charts, cultivating fanbases through non-traditional routes. Currently, Harding points out, the top of the charts showcases a range of listening communities: from Black country artists like Shaboozey, to pop stars such as Sabrina Carpenter, rap icons like Kendrick Lamar, and alternative indie artists like Hozier. This eclectic mix reflects the fragmented nature of popular music and the potential difficulty in pinpointing a singular song of the summer 2024.
However, music listening is, in some respects, a zero-sum game. As listeners delve into niche listening habits facilitated by streaming, even the biggest artists are experiencing a decrease in their overall streams. This creates a landscape where the Billboard-anointed song of the summer 2024 might not be universally recognized or resonate with every listener.
But perhaps that’s not necessarily a negative development.
“Whatever your community is listening to, that’s going to be your song of summer 2024,” Harding concluded. “I think you shouldn’t stress about what everyone is listening to. I think you should pay attention to what your friends and community are connecting with.”
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This story originally appeared in Today, Explained, Vox’s flagship daily newsletter. Sign up here for future editions.
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