Every week, my robots scour the biggest nine New Music Friday playlists in the world to see whose getting backed hard by the big green machine. This week:
🏆 The Champ: Queen
The kings of New Music Friday this week are, erm, Queen, whose rediscovered, Freddie-featuring track “Face It Alone” appeared on all nine of the big lists. It’s hard not to get a little teary hearing that magical voice do previously-unheard things.
🚀 The Challenger: RAYE
RAYE also made it onto all of the largest NMFs this week, the artist with the least amount of followers to do so. As well as a well-built tune, this usually means there’s something else going on and in this case it’s likely the collab here with 070, a Kanye signing.
🥊 Punching Above: niceboy ed
Familiar to any self-respecting Swiftie, this enigmatic artist is near-on invisible to almost everyone else. Their first release was spruiked by Tay-Tay out of nowhere to create the myth on TikTok, but this second release has gathered precisely zero press that I can find. Whether niceboy ed turns out to be Mr.Swift or not – per the theories – the music’s still coming, and Spotify are still chucking it up onto a bunch of NMFs (four in this case, including the global one). To be fair to Spotify, when an artist’s backstory involves intrigue, Taylor Swift, and TikTok, it’s impossible to resist paying at least some attention.
🧛♂️ New Blood: STANY
STANY has a deep pedigree, a French composer, DJ, and producer who’s worked with some of the boldest of bold-faced musicians, so it’s unsurprising that he’d garner instant cred from NMF. This debut track – also featuring Rema and Offset – appeared on eight of the top nine NMFs this week, only missing out in Korea. Currently brand new – literally with followers in the hundreds – expect this to change in short order.