USA
Billboard Report (excerpt)
'Luther' leads Hot 100 for an eighth week
Tuesday, April 15, 2025
by Keith Caulfield & Gary Trust, Los Angeles

Kendrick Lamar and SZA’s “Luther” leads the Billboard Hot 100 songs chart for an eighth total and consecutive week. The single, whose title celebrates late R&B legend Luther Vandross,

who is sampled on the track, became Lamar’s sixth No. 1 and SZA’s third. Lamar and SZA each extend their longest career Hot 100 reigns with the song. “Luther” totaled 63.1 million radio airplay audience impressions (up 3% week-over-week), 22.7 million official streams (down 7%) and 2,000 sold (down 8%) in the U.S. April 4-10. The song is expected to sport gains on next week’s charts following the Friday (April 11) premiere of its official video. “Luther” leads the Radio Songs chart for a second week and dips to No. 3 after six weeks atop Streaming Songs and 21-23, after reaching No. 4, on Digital Song Sales. Drake’s “Nokia” rises 3-2 for a new Hot 100 high. It drew 23.4 million streams, up 9%, April 4-10, after its official video premiered March 31. It’s also up 28% to 19.7 million in airplay audience and 20% to 8,000 sold. The track becomes Drake’s record-extending 24th top two Hot 100 hit, lifting him over The Beatles and Mariah Carey for the most in the chart’s

66-year history. BigXthaPlug’s “All the Way,” featuring Bailey Zimmerman, launches at No. 4 on the Hot 100 with 24.1 million streams, 30,000 in airplay audience and 8,000 sold in its first week, following its April 4 release. It begins atop Streaming Songs and Digital Song Sales, marking each act’s first No. 1 on each ranking. The genre-blending hit is the first Hot 100 top 10 for Dallas native BigXthaPlug, who previously reached a No. 63 best with his first chart entry, “Mmhmm,” in April 2024. Zimmerman scores his second top 10, after “Rock and a Hard Place” (No. 10, April 23). “All the Way” marks the first Hot 100 top 10 for the UnitedMasters label. Alex Warren’s “Ordinary” surges 14-7 on the Hot 100 to become the singer-songwriter’s first top 10. It totaled 20.4 million streams (up 9%), 8.3 million in radio reach (up 71%) and 6,000 sold (up 19%) in the tracking week. Elsewhere in the Hot 100’s top 10, Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars’ “Die With a Smile” slips 2-3, following five nonconsecutive weeks at No. 1 beginning in January. Chappell Roan’s “Pink Pony Club” is stable at its No. 5 Hot 100 best and Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” drops 4-6 on the Hot 100, following its record-tying 19 weeks at No. 1 beginning last July. Teddy Swims’ “Lose Control,” which led the Hot 100 for a week in March 2024 – and became the year’s No. 1 song – retreats 6-8. It adds an 86th week on the list overall, the fourth-longest residence in the chart’s history, below only Glass Animals’ “Heat Waves” (91 weeks, in 2021-22); The Weeknd’s “Blinding Lights” (90 weeks, 2019-22); and Imagine Dragons’ “Radioactive” (87 weeks, 2012-14). Morgan Wallen “I’m the Problem” keeps at No. 9 on the Hot 100, after it started at its No. 2 high in February, and, rounding out the top 10, Benson Boone’s “Beautiful Things” rises 11-10, after it reached a No. 2 peak in March 2024. Playboi Carti’s Music returns to No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart (dated April 19), rising one spot, with 64,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending April 10, according to Luminate. Of that sum, 96% was driven by streaming activity. With Music earning 64,000 units in the latest tracking week, that marks the smallest weekly sum for a No. 1 album in over a year, since the Jan. 20, 2024-dated chart, when Morgan Wallen’s One Thing at a Time was tops with 61,000 units. Of the 64,000 equivalent album units earned by MUSIC in the week ending April 10, SEA units comprise 61,500 (down 27%; equaling 84.61 million on-demand official streams of the set’s songs; it’s No. 1 for a fourth week on Top Streaming Albums), album sales comprise 2,500 (down 59%; it falls 11-33 on Top Album Sales) and TEA units comprise a negligible sum (down 44%). Ariana Grande's Eternal Sunshine falls to No. 2 (56,500 equivalent album units; down 59%); PartyNextDoor and Drake’s $ome $exy $ongs 4 U rises 5-3 (56,000; down 3%); SZA’s SOS steps 6-4 (54,000; down 4%); Kendrick Lamar’s GNX dips 4-5 (53,000; down 9%); Sabrina Carpenter’s Short n’ Sweet rises 7-6 (49,000; down 2%); Morgan Wallen’s One Thing at a Time climbs 10-7 (44,500; down less than 1%); and Bad Bunny’s Debí Tirar Más Fotos is a non-mover at No. 8 (42,500; down 5%). Elton John and Brandi Carlile’s first collaborative album, Who Believes in Angels?, debuts at No. 9 on the Billboard 200, marking the 22nd top 10 set for John and the fourth for Carlile. The set earned 40,000 equivalent album units in its opening week. Of that sum, album sales comprise 36,500 (it debuts at No. 2 on Top Album Sales), SEA units comprise 2,500 (equaling 3.54 million on-demand official streams of the set’s songs) and TEA units comprise 500. John and Carlile ushered in the release of the album with a flurry of media appearances, including CBS News Sunday Morning (CBS, March 30), The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon (April 3), Saturday Night Live (NBC, April 5) and the concert special An Evening With Elton John and Brandi Carlile (CBS and Paramount+, April 6), along with interviews with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe, NPR and SiriusXM’s The Howard Stern Show, among other outlets. Rounding out the top 10 of the latest Billboard 200 is a debut at No. 10 for singer-songwriter Ethel Cain’s 2022 album Preacher’s Daughter. The set jumps onto the list with 39,000 equivalent album units earned (its best week yet), with 37,000 of that sum driven by album sales (it debuts at No. 1 on Top Album Sales). SEA units comprise 2,000 of the set’s total for the week (equaling 2.77 million on-demand official streams of the set’s songs), while TEA units comprise a negligible sum. The album was released on vinyl for the first time on April 4, marking its first release on any physical format. It had previously only been available to purchase as a digital download, and via streaming services. Vinyl sales comprise essentially all of the set’s 37,000 copies sold in the latest tracking week – the sixth-largest sales week for a vinyl album in 2025.

Record Of The Month
The song was originally self-released by American rapper and songwriter Doechii to YouTube
on November 10, 2019. It was re-recorded in 2025 following it gaining traction on social media
platforms, being released to streaming platforms on March 4, 2025. 'Anxiety' contains a prominent sample of the 2011 song 'Somebody That I Used To Know' by Gotye feat. Kimbra.

United Kingdom
Music Week Report (excerpt)
Alex Warren stays at number one
Monday, April 14, 2025
by Alan Jones, London
 
Alex Warren’s Ordinary continues to prove anything but, securing a fourth straight week at No.1, with consumption increasing 2.75% to 73,490 units (1,943 digital downloads and 71,547 sales-equivalent streams), a new high for a No.1 single in 2025. That is slightly more than the combined consumption

of Pink Pony Club – No.2 for the fourth time in total and third week in a row with consumption up 6.08% at 37,111 for Chappell Roan - and Azizam, which debuts at No.3 (35,988 sales) for Ed Sheeran. It is the second week in a row that Ordinary has had greater consumption than the No.2 and No.3 songs added together. That’s quite rare – in 276 weeks in the 2020s that have elapsed so far, that has been the case a total of 18 times. Prior to Warren it was achieved by LadBaby, Olivia Rodrigo (seven times with two songs), Ed Sheeran, Adele (twice), Harry Styles, Miley Cyrus (twice), Dave & Central Cee and, most recently, The Beatles. Azizam is the first single from Ed Sheeran’s upcoming album, Play. The highest of six Top 75 debuts this week, it is, perhaps surprisingly, Sheeran’s first Top 10 hit since Eyes Open debuted at No.1 on consumption of 60,265 units in 2023. Sheeran’s 77th Top 75 entry Azizam is also his 42nd Top 10 entry, and his 64th Top

40 hit. Among all UK solo acts, only Cliff Richard has had more Top 10 entries. Arriving just three weeks after Emergence – the first single from their eagerly-awaited fourth album Even In Arcadia – became their first hit, debuting and peaking at No.17, mysterious masked duo/band Sleep Token crash into the Top 10 with the album’s second preview track, Caramel. Debuting at No.10 (23,013 sales), it is more eclectic and less heavy than much of their output, and is a further indicator that Even In Arcadia, which will be released on 9 May, will be their first No.1 album. After stalling last week at No.14, Show Me Love - the first hit for WizTheMC (26-year-old Sanele Sydow, born in South Africa, raised in Germany and resident in Canada) and Bees & Honey, a London-based collective – dashes to No.8 (26,360 sales). The track has increased consumption eight times in a row since its release in February. The rest of the Top 10: Anxiety (3-4, 31,258 sales) by Doechii, Beautiful Things (4-5, 27,239 sales) by Benson Boone, Sports Car (6-6, 27,190 sales) by Tate McRae, Busy Woman (7-7, 26,619 sales) by Sabrina Carpenter and The Giver (8-9, 24,209 sales) by Chappell Roan. Overall singles consumption is up 1.09% week-on-week to 31,820,374 units, its highest level for 15 weeks and 12.07% above same week 2024 consumption of 28,394,107 units. Paid-for sales are down 1.27% week-on-week at 246,490, 8.13% below same week 2024 sales of 268,313. Leadership of the chart changes hands for the 17th week in a row, with Who Believes In Angels? debuting at No.1 for Elton John & Brandi Carlile, on consumption of 22,843 units (9,682 CDs, 5,548 vinyl albums, 5,266 cassettes, 431 blu-rays, 1,004 digital downloads and 912 sales-equivalent streams). The full-blown realisation of a working relationship that started tentatively when the pair collaborated on Simple Things, a track on John’s 2021 album The Lockdown Sessions, Who Believes In Angels? consists of 10 tracks, with John and Carlile credited as co-writers of them all, alongside John’s regular lyricist Bernie Taupin and producer Andrew Watt. It is Elton John’s 10th No.1, 34th Top 10 and 49th Top 75 album in a chart career spanning almost 55 years but only the second Top 75 entry for Carlile, whose previous appearance came in 2008, when The Story, the second of her seven solo albums, reached No.58. Originally from Cambridgeshire, the London-based experimental post-rock sextet Black Country, New Road have released three albums so far, reaching the Top 5 and increasing first week consumption every time. Their introductory album, For The First Time, debuted and peaked at No.4 (6,350 sales) in 2021, with follow-up Ants From Up There (No.3, 8,142 sales) following a year later. Third album, Forever Howlong, now opens at No.3 on consumption of 9,020 units. Almost three years after its digital release, Preacher’s Daughter enters the chart for the first time, after being issued on two vinyl variants which account for all but 429 of the 5,635 sales which earn the set a No.10 debut this week for Ethel Cain. The first album by 27-year-old Floridian singer/songwriter Cain, Preacher’s Daughter has been something of a sleeper success, with first week consumption of 18 units plumping to a to-date tally of 37,175 units. Cain’s official follow-up, Willoughby Tucker, I’ll Always Love You is due in August but she did self-release a challenging 90-minute, nine-track low key ambient/drone/spoken word digital set, Perverts, in January, which is a world away from the anthemic rock of American Teenager, the standout track from Preacher’s Daughter – Cain’s most-consumed song, with a to-date tally of 104,229 units. In the Top 5 for the 33rd week in a row since its release, Sabrina Carpenter’s Short N’ Sweet improves two notches to secure its 20th week in its favourite position, No.2, with consumption in the week of 15,481 units pushing it to the threshold of double platinum (600k) consumption, at 599,768 units. The rest of the Top 10: Eternal Sunshine (3-4, 8,940 sales) by Ariana Grande, +-=÷× Tour Collection (7-5, 8,471 sales) by Ed Sheeran, 50 Years: Don’t Stop (9-6, 6,767 sales) by Fleetwood Mac, The Highlights (12-7, 6,356 sales) by The Weeknd, Mayhem (8-8, 6,245 sales) by Lady Gaga and The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess (13-9, 5,764 sales) by Chappell Roan. Overall album sales are down 3.46% week-on-week at 2,565,706 units, 7.61% above same week 2024 sales of 2,384,366. Physical product accounts for 280,100 sales, 10.92% of the total.