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: Rihanna
Likely to have happened without the Marvel stardust on it, but “Lift Me Up” put Rihanna in the big chair this week, the most-followed artist to appear on all of the biggest New Music Fridays. Rihanna forever!
🚀 The Challenger: Holly Humberstone
Holly Humberstone did particularly well this week, with “Can You Afford To Lose Me?” elbowing its way through a crowd of heavier-hitters to also appear on all of the big nine NMFs. This one’s a new track among reworked older songs, and she describes the release as “closing the chapter on the first part of my journey.” The next chapter will feature the debut album, due next year – it’s well-primed to be a big one.
🥊 Punching Above: Ice Spice
Following up on her viral breakout “Munch”, Ice Spice keeps the speed up with “Bikini Bottom“, which made it onto sic of the biggest nine lists this week. Being signed by Drake, and remixed by Cardi B damn sure doesn’t hurt, but this new release moves her waay beyond one-hit wonder, and she’s getting support on the same level as artists with significantly larger follower counts.
🧛♂️ New Blood: charli d’amelio
“if you ask me to“, the debut release from charli d’amelio (pictured), made it onto five of the big nine this week, but is really just this week’s “power of TikTok” example. She was the first TikTok user to achieve both 50 and then 100 million followers, and up until July this year, was the most followed account on the platform – so, few surprises here.