songs that weren't a bands biggest hit, but have gone on to be their legacy song and biggest iTunes seller

Apparently it’s the official song of the Toronto Maple Leafs (this reporter sounds dubious about it as well):

If you're coming to the Scotiabank Arena to watch the Maple Leafs play, you'd better like Hall and Oates.

For whatever reason, the Leafs game operations people have chosen the "You Make My Dreams Come True" -- the ear-worm hit from the 1980s duo -- as the team's goal song.

And if Friday's exhibition game against Detroit -- a 6-2 Toronto win -- is any indication, you're going to hear that song a lot.

The most-played Royal Trux song on Spotify (by far) is an Aerial P1nk remix of a song from their 2019 reunion album... kind of depressing.

haha as opposed to eras and formats in which royal trux album cuts were broad popular favourites?? cmon of course something like that is going to be top of their chart

I don't think morris is depressed that Twin Infinitives isn't huge among the maga / attempted insurrection fanbase

whew!!

Duran Duran’s biggest chart hit “The Reflex” has fallen by the wayside a bit. It’s about their 7th most streamed track. Insert ragged tiger joke.

highest (US) chart peak - but was it ever their "biggest hit?" like in terms of time spent on the charts etc.

put another way, even getting to know these songs from radio in the 90s, at that point "Rio" and "Hungry Like the Wolf" had already been cemented as their legacy songs, so i guess i'd be surprised to learn that "The Reflex" had a more robust showing originally. but it'd be interesting! cause in that case the shift would majorly predate iTunes, Spotify etc.

I think the shift definitely predated the streaming era - the Rio singles got regular play on my local radio stations in the 90s but I never heard the Ragged Tiger singles until buying the albums. If Ragged Tiger charted higher/sold more, it's a New Jersey

In more recent years, I do hear "The Reflex" on 80s playlists/stations, but Duran has a stronger rep nowadays and has been more thoroughly canonized imo

Ragged Tiger was totally a New Jersey

I just found out the most played track on Spotify for The Beach Boys is "Wouldn't it be nice" (320M) far ahead of "Good Vibrations" (250M) then "Surfin USA" (170M) while they had 12 songs that charted higher than "WIBN".

"WIBN" has been in a whole lot of movies, hasn't it?

it’s also the first track on their most famous album, and first tracks are always boosted on spotify

Yeah I thought about the first track explanation but still it's a very minor hit for them and I'm sure many people who only know the mainstream hits don't even know that song (at least in France) !

It's been used a lot in American films and TV, to the point of being iconic.

The earlier surf rock stuff has mostly fallen off oldies playlists ime.

oh ok. So it perfectly fits this thread then !

Yeah, it was a great example.

it's also one of their best songs, imo an example of the cream rising to the top. which is definitely not true of many of the entries on this thread

Why is "Man Of Oil" the second most played Animal Collective song on Spotify?

I dont like how much i care about it, but last year i heard this one hipster artsy girl at work likes animal collective, i got super hyped, and then i finally get to talk to her about it and shes like “yeah man of oil is a beautiful song” or some shit, and thats all shes heard, it was a little let down but still she likes anco.

Few months later i go to an anco concert and meet another hipster artsy girl and ask her about anco and she says the same thing as the other girl, “love man of oil, havent heard any of there other stuff”, and thats when i start to think “why the fuck is man of oil specifically getting around to all these hipster girls”, turns out she knows the girl i work with, crazy enough, so it makes a little more sense.

THEN few months later my hipster friends like “lets put on some animal collective!”... she puts on “man of oil”... “this ones great”...

My best guess is they all heard it in the “im not like most girls cause i listen to one anco song” playlist. seriously though am i missing something? it confuses the shit out of me annoyingly, why this one anco song seemingly randomly became super popular.

i don't like how much he cares about it either

The 2002 album track "Till I Collapse" is Eminem's second most streamed song on Spotify, just barely below (and gaining on) "Lose Yourself". Googling reveals that it's because it regularly features on popular workout playlists.

I wonder how many other non-singles have reached a billion streams?

"till i collapse" has been in lots of commercials and trailers too, i think

Tracer otm

Keith Murray’s most popular song on Spotify is not “The Most Beautifullest thing in this World” but a non-single called “High as Hell”

I wonder how many other non-singles have reached a billion streams?

it's the only one apparently

Most streamed non-singles on Spotify:

1. 'Till I Collapse 1,000,603,431
2. Everybody Dies In Their Nightmares 801,594,191
3. DNA. 710,870,511
4. Here Comes The Sun 594,263,262
5. the remedy for a broken heart (why am I so in love) 552,213,734

— Music Data (@DataTeak) February 19, 2021

"Ocean Deep" (1983) is Cliff Richard's third most popular song on Spotify, and one of only four of his tracks to top 10 million streams. Although it only peaked at #72 in the UK, it became big in South East Asia, as well as regularly topping annual international fan polls (25 times out of 26 between 1984 and 2009).

Seeing that Faces 'Ooh La La' up above - surely there must be many Faces 'Stay With Me's attributed to Rod splitting the vote?

― PaulTMA, Tuesday, June 27, 2017 7:25 AM (four years ago) bookmarkflaglink

you guys have clearly never seen rushmore...

This doesn't 100% fit, but the most streamed song by a very wide margin from the JLo album "On the 6" is "Let's Get Loud", which wasn't even released as a single in the US or the UK. It is far ahead of the actual hits from the album "If You Had My Love" and "Waiting for Tonight", and is just barely below "Love Don't Cost a Thing" for her most streamed song from her classic era.

Of course, her actual most streamed song on Spotify is "On the Floor" but I suspect that is because it was a hit when Spotify was widely used, not because it's any sort of legacy track of hers.

I was surprised to find out the n°1 Rolling Stones song on Spotify is "Paint It Black" (610M) far ahead of "Satisfaction" (427M).

Paint it Black is in a ridiculous number of movies and TV shows, and seems to have sort of become the go-to soundtrack when you want to show the dark underbelly of the sixties. Satisfaction is probably still the iconic Stones song but it doesn’t surprise me that people aren’t actually listening to it more. I would’ve expected Sympathy for the Devil to be ahead of it as well.

Even more surprisingly, "Sympathy for the Devil" (359M) is behind... "Gimme Shelter" (364M) !

I would have guessed Gimme Shelter or Paint It Black as #1 as, as mentioned above, both have been used countless times in TV & film (moreso than other Stones songs, at least imo).

Trying to remember the name of that 90s Vietnam show that had Paint It Black as the theme song.

Oh yeah, Tour of Duty !

The Coasters' "Down In Mexico" is 4 mil. ahead of "Yakety Yak"--and way the hell ahead of any of their other tracks--thanks to Tarantino.

xpost
Still I would have expected "Satisfaction", "Brown Sugar", "Start Me Up", "Angie" to be the top songs, "Paint it Black" in the top5 maybe but certainly not at the top and "Gimme Shelter" not in the top (I'm sure plenty of people don't even particularly know it or wouldn't think of it as one of their most famous).

Feel like the first 4 are more like boomer hits and Paint It Black and Gimme Shelter are more appealing to Gen X and Millennials.

Why "Angie"? I think I heard that after I'd heard every other Stones hit.

Those, along with "Miss You", "You Can't Always Get What You Want", "Jumpin' Jack Flash", and "Honky Tonk Women", were the ones you'd most likely encounter on Classic Rock radio.

"Angie" was a #1 Pop hit in the states.

"Gimme Shelter" wasn't even a single.

It was a hugely popular album cut that's also been in every Scorsese film.

Oh sure but I mean, I think if I asked my mother (a boomer !) if she knows it and if she can hum it she wouldn't have a clue.

(she was never a Stones fan, obviously, and may only think of "Satisfaction" or "Angie" if asked to name some of their songs).

"Angie" was a #1 Pop hit in the states.

sure, but it never got the kind of classic rock airplay that Paint It Black, or many others, did

I heard it alot, although maybe not as much as some of the other aforementioned tracks. One thing that I think helps it with listeners is it's a string-laden ballad, so it rubs up well with "Imagine", "Candle In The Wind", "Desperado"...stuff like that.

In general all the Stones numbers look low to me - were they late getting added to Spotify?

Their numbers are pretty high for an artist whose popularity peaked well before Spotify existed. Comparable to, e.g. The Beatles and Elton John, well above an artist like Stevie Wonder or David Bowie. The only pre-1990s artist I can find who has streaming numbers significantly above theirs is Queen and I'd assume that's at least in part due to "Bohemian Rhapsody"