South Summit are an interesting bet to get a lot bigger for a number of reasons – it’s not just the consistent growth and support over the last year, it’s also that they are in the exact same spot that similar-ish artists – in particular The Rions, DICE, The Terrys, and Teenage Dads – all were a year ago, and who are all enjoying a remarkably good 2024 right now. They look like they’re locked into a pretty solid path to success and as such are a strong tip to grow over the next twelve months.
Let’s start with the usual stuff, growth and support. In terms of growth, South Summit have seen 66% Spotify follower growth in the last twelve months, with their latest numbers sitting at around 13k. That growth has been consistent and fuelled by a busy schedule of eight releases, meaning they’ve rarely not had something new to talk about over the last twelve months.
That high frequency of releases has also given playlisters lots of opportunity to add them to their lists – an opportunity many of them grabbed with both hands. Half of their releases made it onto New Music Friday AU & NZ, three onto Triple J’s New Music Hitlist, while a wide-range of Spotify’s lists gave them repeat appearances over the year, alongside adds from a good range of indie and grassroots lists.
Outside of these numbers, they also have a large social following – 57k on TikTok and 146k on Instagram – which presumably had something to do with them just getting picked up globally by Lemon Tree Music management.
So far, so normal – on its own all that would make them pretty interesting. While messing around with some numbers though I noticed that there was something recognisable about four similar artists – The Rions, DICE, The Terrys, and Teenage Dads – and specifically what position those artists were in twelve months ago. These are those bands growth trajectories at this stage in 2023:
For all intents and purposes, South Summit are in the exact same spot now that those other four artists were a year ago.
Since those four artists are all still growing fast right now and are tipped to go even further, it’s not a stretch to suspect that South Summit might be expected to follow a similar route. For me, it’s a solid long-range bet to expect South Summit to gain a lot more attention over the coming twelve months, and for 2025 to be a very interesting year for them.
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* I tend to use Spotify Followers as the key metric to watch, instead of Monthly Listeners or Popularity. Monthlies are great, but they can be messed up by an artist being a contributor or songwriter on another artist’s track, and (along with Popularity) can fluctuate pretty wildly. Followers implies a conscious choice of preference from a user, so for me is the strongest and steadiest signal of solid, ongoing audience support.
Listen to South Summit on Spotify, or follow them on Instagram
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