Tag: popular

10 Wild Card Tracks Join Spotify’s Songs of Summer 2025 Editorial Picks

July 23, 2025

The days are longer, the nights are warmer, and the soundtrack of summer keeps evolving. Back in May, Spotify’s global editors kicked off the season with our annual Songs of Summer predictions, blending cultural expertise, editorial instinct, and streaming data to spotlight contenders for this year’s defining anthems.

But summer never stands still. Now that we’re halfway through the season, our editors are shaking up the list with 10 new “wild card” tracks—songs released since our initial reveal or experiencing a recent surge in global streams. These wild cards reflect what’s resonating with listeners right now, capturing the moments and moods dominating culture across the globe. For example, global streams of “Illegal” by PinkPantheress shot up 155% on Spotify in the last month, while Sabrina Carpenter’s “Manchild” and Addison Rae’s “Fame is a Gun” both charted on Spotify’s Global Top 50 following their releases.

From high-speed dance floor bangers to bold main-character anthems, this year’s wild cards cut across genres and tap into the euphoric feeling of summer. There’s breezy optimism, infectious energy, and a few surprises along the way.

Spotify’s 2025 Songs of Summer: Midseason update

Listed alphabetically by artist first name; wild card picks in italics

“Our team of editors are constantly monitoring listening trends and cultural signals from around the world to understand what’s truly connecting with audiences,” said J.J. Italiano, Head of Global Music Curation and Discovery at Spotify. “Our wild card additions are a reflection of that real-time curation. Whether it’s the innovative production of ‘No Broke Boys’ or the intensity of ‘ALAMBRE PùA,’ each of these songs has captured a specific energy that listeners are gravitating toward right now. They represent the diverse sounds and stories shaping the season across borders.”

A summer celebration in Los Angeles

To toast summer’s next musical moment, Spotify’s annual Songs of Summer party landed Wednesday in Beverly Hills, featuring performances from Ravyn Lenae and Jessie Murph—two artists making waves on this year’s list.

‘The Big Hit Show’ Podcast Analyzes What Makes Something Pop in Pop Culture

January 12, 2022

What makes something a cultural phenomenon? Is it the people involved or the topics covered? Or does it just have to have that special je ne sais quoi? The Big Hit Show, a new podcast from Spotify and Higher Ground—President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama’s media company—is setting out to examine the rise and enduring power of global sensations. 

This new podcast looks at a moment where a title made it big across mediums—film, music, TV, internet culture, and video games. Each topic gets its own “chapter,” with each chapter spread out over five episodes. “The shows and films and albums we explore have all been chosen not just because they’re massive pieces of popular culture. We’ve picked them because each has had a profound butterfly effect on our culture,” said host Alex Pappademas. 

The first chapter of the podcast will highlight Twilight, the four-book teenage vampire series that became a global phenomenon and eventually inspired a movie franchise. To understand fans’ love for the saga, just look at Spotify, where listeners have made more than 1.3 million Twilight-themed music playlists. The movies’ soundtracks have also seen quite a bit of play time, from Muse’s “Supermassive Black Hole – Twilight Soundtrack Version” (almost 310 million streams) to “Bella’s Lullaby” (almost 18 million streams). 

Now, nearly two decades after the first book’s release and 13 years since the first movie premiered, The Big Hit Show will explore this unlikely success story as well as the power of teenaged girls and the rise of fan fiction.

In the second chapter, which debuts in February, Alex will explore the musical styles of American rapper Kendrick Lamar—and specifically, the effects of his album To Pimp A Butterfly. The music that won Kendrick a 2016 Grammy for Best Rap Album was born out of his grappling with personal tragedy and the world around him. Since 2015, the album has seen more than 1.5 billion streams on Spotify, and every year it has remained in the top 1,000 of the most streamed albums on the platform.

“Whether we’re tracing how an author’s vivid dream about a sparkly vampire led to an entirely new fan culture or how a megastar reckoning with success, expectation, and survivor’s guilt crafted a masterpiece that became the soundtrack to the biggest protest movement in a generation, listeners will know from chapter to chapter they’re getting a high-stakes narrative that explains how our culture has been influenced and shaped by these creations,” explained Alex.

After dissecting Twilight and To Pimp A Butterfly, the show will continue its deep dive into pop-culture phenomenons. Follow the podcast to find out which topic it will cover next.

Athletic Greens is the premier sponsor of season one of The Big Hit Show. Dive into the first chapter on the Twilight phenomenon, below.