Apple Music released their Top Songs of the year 2024 based on streams yesterday afternoon and the rankings of songs coupled with the conversations coming out of the list are thought-provoking, to say the least.
Seyi Vibez’s Different Pattern emerged as the most streamed song in 2024 on Apple Music Nigeria, but that’s not the most surprising thing. The first thing that catches my attention is that of the 10 songs in the top 10, only one was released in 2024 and the remaining 9 were released in 2023.
Different Pattern, Omah Lay’s Holy Ghost, Shallipopi’s Cast, Kizz Daniel’s Twe Twe, Seyi Vibez’s Cana, Wizkid’s IDK, and Chike’s Egwu make up the top 7 and were all released in late 2023. Burna’s Tshwala Bam remix takes the number 8 spot. City Boys comes in at number 9 and Bnxn’s Pidgin and English takes the 10th spot.
This only means one thing. Nigerians rejected 2024 releases, heavily. 2024 was a bad year for Afrobeats in terms of singles, and though we tried to make up for it by having a lot of quantity and quality in albums, our songs didn’t connect with the masses this year. Nostalgia was chosen over substandard content, and it was shown on the charts.
Normally, they say a good hit song has a life span of three months in the Nigerian music market. After that, the power of the song begins to fade on consumers and the market also becomes saturated by other releases, drowning the hit. However, Shallipopi’s Cast is still one of the biggest pop anthems a full year after release.
Another thing to note is the success of mid-tempo records in 2024. Songs like Different Pattern, Holy Ghost, Pidgin and English, Dog Eat Dog, Dealer, Lonely At The Top, and more make up a large portion of the top 20 most streamed songs. In an industry where there’s so much noise about the sound dwelling on Amapiano and we needing a reset from it, the complaints do not sync with the evidence on the charts.
Asake also has only three songs in the top 20, and two of them were off his Work of Art album (Lonely At The Top and Remember ). The other record is MMS, so it’s a good time to wonder if his chokehold on the charts is beginning to soften, or maybe fans didn’t just accept his last album like they did the first two.
Odumodu Blvck also has two songs in the top 20 and is the only Rapper on the list. Of the 20 songs, there are 14 songs with different artists as leads, so it’s safe to say the charts weren’t really dominated by anyone. Nobody can lay claim to having a clear dominance level in 2024. Interesting.
My takeaway from this year’s Apple Music list is that Omah Lay might just be the GOAT of the streaming era. Since he made his debut in 2020, he’s been present and dominating.
In 2020 he had the most streamed song (Bad Influence) on the platform. He had two songs in the top 10 & four songs in the Top 20. In 2021, he had three Songs in the Top 10 & four Songs in the Top 20.
2022 saw him having Apple Music’s Best Song of 2022 (Soso) and 2023 ended with him having the Most Streamed Song of 2023 (Soso) and Reason at number eight.
Fast forward to 2024, he has the second most streamed song of 2024, and the only record he put out in 2024 (moving) is currently at 20 million streams on Spotify despite being released very late in the year.
Also, Subscribers lamented all through the music year in review that they couldn’t pay for Apple Music with their cards, and a lot of them considered moving to Spotify. Whether this affected the numbers or not, we would not know but it’s important to see platforms like MTN offer services where the local consumer can have access to the music.
Some argue that the charts are not the most accurate metric to judge what the country listens to as only a very small percentage of Nigerians have access to and use streaming platforms. While this is correct and understandable, it is still the next best option for us and will continue to be our yardstick.
The charts do show that something is wrong with Afrobeats. The charts show that we definitely had a bad year. It’s scary to see that of the 20 most streamed records in 2024, only 5 were released in 2024. Nigerians rejected 2024 releases, and rightly so. To our creatives, it’s time to go back to the drawing board. Or not.
