On the albums chart, the Okay-pop group Stray Youngsters debuts at No. 1 with HOP; the group has debuted atop the Billboard 200 with its first six charting albums, which is a brand new report to kick off a profession.
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Penske Media/through Getty Photos
Vacation music guidelines the pop charts as soon as once more this week, as Mariah Carey’s “All I Need for Christmas Is You” scores its seventeenth nonconsecutive week at No. 1 — the third longest run of all time. On the albums chart, the Okay-pop group Stray Youngsters debuts at No. 1 with HOP; the group has debuted atop the Billboard 200 with its first six charting albums, which is a brand new report to kick off a profession. And, although the identical 5 vacation songs sit atop the Sizzling 100 as final week (and final 12 months right now, for that matter), there is a recent milestone for extra recent-vintage Christmas songs by Ariana Grande and Kelly Clarkson.
TOP ALBUMS
This previous summer time, the Okay-pop group Stray Youngsters debuted atop the Billboard 200 with a report referred to as ATE. That feat tied an all-time report, as just one different artist’s chart historical past — that of the late rapper DMX — started with 5 straight albums that debuted at No. 1. Now, simply 4 months later, Stray Youngsters can declare the report outright, as a brand new album referred to as HOP debuts atop the charts. That is a run of six straight No. 1 debuts, all of them inside a span of simply three calendar years.
As a result of a lot of HOP‘s chart success is derived from gross sales somewhat than streaming — with an emphasis on CD gross sales, curiously sufficient — Stray Youngsters’ keep atop the Billboard 200 could also be brief. (The group’s earlier information have adopted an identical path.) However it speaks to the appreciable energy of Okay-pop music that so many albums within the style have debuted at or close to the highest of the charts this 12 months.
In the event you’re in search of a metric to convey Okay-pop’s development within the U.S. — in addition to the more and more worldwide nature of the pop charts within the streaming period — a complete of 27 albums have hit No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with vocals predominantly carried out in a language aside from English. Of these 27, precisely two-thirds of them are in Korean, and all of them have come out since 2018.
Beneath Stray Youngsters, Kendrick Lamar’s GNX holds at No. 2 for a 3rd straight week since its debut atop the chart, whereas Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Division slides from No. 1 to No. 3. Sabrina Carpenter’s Brief n’ Candy climbs from No. 5 to No. 4, the Depraved soundtrack slips from No. 6 to No. 7, Billie Eilish’s Hit Me Arduous and Tender rises from No. 9 to No. 8 and Chappell Roan’s The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess surges again into the Prime 10, climbing from No. 11 to No. 9.
That leaves three vacation titles to spherical out the Prime 10. Although none of its songs have hit the Prime 10 on the Billboard Sizzling 100, Michael Bublé’s Christmas climbs from No. 7 to No. 5 — which means that a lot of its viewers prefers to listen to Bublé drain the life out of vacation favorites in album-length doses, principally through streaming. Bing Crosby’s Final Christmas, a generously portioned vacation assortment from earlier this 12 months, climbs from No. 8 to No. 6, whereas Mariah Carey’s Merry Christmas leaps into the Prime 10, climbing from No. 14 to No. 10 on the power of… nicely .
TOP SONGS
Sure, in a improvement as predictable because the tides, Mariah Carey’s “All I Need for Christmas Is You” as soon as once more sits atop the Sizzling 100. It is the tune’s third straight week atop the chart, which isn’t any large shock; what’s notable is the buildup of weeks at No. 1, which is approaching report territory. With 17 weeks at No. 1 — all of them racked up in two- to four-week bursts beginning in 2019 — the tune has now posted the third-longest run at No. 1 within the historical past of the Billboard Sizzling 100, which dates again to 1958. It additionally stands alone with the longest run of Carey’s profession; her “One Candy Day,” with Boyz II Males, was a world-beating record-setter with 16 weeks at No. 1 again in 1995-96.
Assuming it tops the chart subsequent week, as nicely, “All I Need for Christmas Is You” seems primed to interrupt the all-time report shortly after the graduation of the 2025 vacation season — assuming no tune runs up an extended streak between every now and then. At the moment, the all-time report of 19 weeks at No. 1 is held by two songs, each of them from the streaming period: Lil Nas X’s “Previous City Street (feat. Billy Ray Cyrus)” from 2019 and Shaboozey’s “A Bar Tune (Tipsy),” which dominated the Sizzling 100 for a lot of this 12 months. (It lastly dropped out of the Prime 10 simply this week, however seems poised to reenter the chart’s higher reaches as soon as the vacation perennials get mothballed.)
Talking of vacation perennials — and the stench of mothballs — the same old suspects spherical out the Prime 5. Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ Across the Christmas Tree” holds at No. 2, a spot it is aware of nicely, whereas Wham!’s “Final Christmas” jumps from No. 4 to No. 3, thanks partly to a brand new bodily launch and the discharge of a Wham! documentary on Netflix. “Final Christmas” swaps locations with the zombified corpse of Bobby Helms’ “Jingle Bell Rock,” whereas Burl Ives’ “Holly Jolly Christmas” holds at No. 5.
Just one non-holiday tune sits on this week’s Prime 10, so give credit score to Girl Gaga and Bruno Mars for his or her resilience as “Die With a Smile” holds at No. 6. Andy Williams’ “It is the Most Great Time of the 12 months” dampens the season by leaping from No. 11 to No. 7 — severely, folks, Andy Williams, we have talked about this — whereas Dean Martin’s “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!” leaps from No. 12 to No. 8. And at No. 9 and No. 10 are… nicely, sit tight for a sec.
WORTH NOTING
So, earlier than we get to Nos. 9 and 10, here is a wild statistic: Till this week, the latest vacation tune to hit the Billboard Prime 10 is from… 1999, when Kenny G launched a sax-y cowl of “Auld Lang Syne.” (The tune had a “Millennium Remix” that included information clips from the twentieth century, which helped G’s “Auld Lang Syne” attain No. 7 in 2000.)
Which implies that, for practically 25 years, not a single newly recorded vacation tune — of the 1000’s upon 1000’s which have been launched — has graced the Billboard Prime 10. Nothing by Taylor Swift, nothing by Beyoncé, not one tune by any artist whose profession started within the Twenty first century. Hope you want Andy Williams, suckers, as a result of the vacation season is for songs that bored your grandparents!
So contemplate it progress that two Twenty first-century vacation songs have ended the drought and hit the Prime 10 for the very first time this week: Kelly Clarkson’s 2013 tune “Beneath the Tree” climbs from No. 15 to No. 10, whereas Ariana Grande’s “Santa Inform Me,” from 2014, rises from No. 14 to No. 9. So if you wish to understand how lengthy it takes a vacation tune to journey from “new” to “formally welcomed into the canon,” the reply is: “at the very least a decade.” Even for these of us who’ve had “Santa Inform Me” caught of their head for weeks, it has to depend as progress.
By the way, if you happen to’re in search of a way of simply how outdated most seasonal requirements are, contemplate that “Auld Lang Syne” is considered one of solely two vacation songs from the ’90s to have ever hit the Prime 10. The opposite? A candy little ditty, maybe you have heard it, referred to as “All I Need for Christmas Is You.”
