Compare the hit songs of 2024 and compare the hit songs of 2025 (or the attempts at hit songs).

It has nothing to do with algorithms. It’s a songwriting issue. The music is not connecting with people.

Right because a Post Malone & Morgan Wallen collaboration is the peak of songwriting that captures everyone’s emotions

For a certain demographic, it is.

Both of those artists are currently on solo stadium tours btw

If we made a list of the Top 10 hits of 2024 and the 10 biggest “hits” of 2025 and put them next to each other, you would see exactly what the problem is.

its what it was meant to be yea
but label members are like 10% of the album. It's full of some of the biggest rappers in the game

it's more like a trav mixtape in general id say

this has been said every year for like 5 years now

the quality isn't way worse than prev years

yet this is the first time numbers have greatly tumbled

Cactus Jack members are on every song except two so how are they 10% of the album?

When people hear “jackboys” nobody thinks it’s a Travis project in the same vein as Rodeo or Astro. They don’t even see it as a mixtape like DBR.

Like nobody sees this project as anything more than a label tape. No idea why you’re so thirsty for people to hate on the sales

I'm very fine with agreeing to disagree with you on this but I'll say this last thing. I'm speaking specifically and only on and about how albums are categorised based on genres before they get uploaded to DSPs.

If Tyler the Creator has always made rap music but then makes a more Alternative album, if he doesn't explicitly tell the people at his record label to specify the genre of that exact album as "Alternative," they won't. They'll continue to label it as rap. That's my whole point.

Taylor Swift started out making primarily Country music. Since then, she's made Pop and Alternative music but she specifies each time she wants a change in the genre of an album made. Drake has done the same thing. He wanted it to be known from jump that Honestly, Never mind was a Dance album (despite having rap songs on it) and it's labelled that way on DSPs. $$$4U has several songs with Drake rapping and it's classified as an R&B/Soul album because that's how Drake wants it.

There's even a genre labelled "Singer/Songwriter" that most acts who primarily write and produce their own songs (usually acoustic songs) use to differentiate themselves. All these genres are available for artists to use as they please. They're all options available for them to categorise their music however they please and it's a courtesy all labels extend to their artists.

Some Nigerian acts label the genre on their albums as "World." Some label them as "Afrobeats." Every Davido album from 2012-2023 is labelled "Afrobeats," his latest album is labelled "R&B/Soul" because that's what he wanted.

We went from the biggest songs averaging 2-4M Spotify US streams daily from 2017-2023 to now, seeing massive songs possibly debut with that amount of streams but struggle to sustain them and immediately crash back down to 1-1.6M daily Spotify US streams. There's definitely been a change in their algorithm and it's not because people are streaming music way less this year or something. I think it's also related to them suddenly cracking down hard on bots and erasing manipulated streams every month since February this year.

Real music wins again

s u r p r i s e
d a n c e
a l b u m

Damn this surprise dance album is on pace to outsell another specific surprise dance album

what a surprise!

I used spotify last year and I could immediately tell the streaming numbers were artificially inflated. Anyone with a brain could see it. I unironically think the Drake lawsuit has affected how they're handling bots.

lol

Kinda crazy that people really believe the botting stuff lmao

Im saying it because tyler increased in hype last few years.... nothing to do with drake.

i agree.
im saying getting #1 for him is a given regardless.
He can do it with announcing a solo album automatically unless he gets blocked by someone crazy.

Best surprise dance album of all time

The most dominant song in the country for the last 2 months straight is not even half as catchy or memorable as the bottom half of the top 20 at any period before this year

The grammy committees decide on categories. Thats why they moved post malone out of rap etc.

140k pure

i did not fw this but good for ty