What were the most listened to tunes in South Africa in 2019? Don’t worry, you’re about to find out…
The year is about to end and Spotify is doing their recap of what an insane year it has been, giving everyone their respective statistics on the platform, us the listeners the album we’ve heard the most, the artist, the song, and also has shown us the evolution on the platform as a feature regarding the ending of the decade.
The most listened to tunes in South Africa in 2019
The stats were released globally, but also regarding each country, according to a Channel 24 note, the most listened to artist, globally, was Post Malone, followed by Billie Eilish. Posty released his last album Hollywood’s Bleeding, last September and included collaborations with Ozzy Osborne, DaBaby, Travis Scott, and more. The production though was the second most listened to globally, and the first most played in South Africa.
The number one Album listened globally was 17-year-old Billie Eilish’s When We Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?, with her reaching over 6 billion streams during the whole of 2019, making it the first time a female-led album topped the list, and in South Africa Eilish was the No. 5 most listened to artist.
Going into the South African Market there are little changes in comparison to the global list, with young R&B / Pop singer Khalid topping the list of most played artists, followed by Posty, Drake, Ed Sheeran, and Billie Eilish. Although Free Spirit, Khalid’s second album released in April this year was roughly criticized by a lot of critics, it debuted on No. 1 in the US and many places around the world.
In OkayAfrica, the list of most listened to songs in South Africa has quite a different order to the global one, as the global chart of Spotify showed for the longest time “Señorita” by Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello as the most listened to song, and the date is still on the top 20 spots.
The most listened to the song in South Africa is no other than “Sunflower” by Post Malone featuring Swan Lee, a track that you probably heard the most during the first half of the year, as it is part of the soundtrack for the animated movie Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse.
Posty’s song was followed by the Ed Sheeran and Justin Bieber Collab on “I Don’t Care” as Sheeran’s first promotional single for his album No. 6 Collaboration Project. We have to jump down to spot No. 7 to find Mendes’ “Señorita”.
South African Musicians
When it comes to local artists on the list there’s a certain winner and that’s Amapiano’s frontrunner, Kabza De Small, the electronic music artist topped the final list against DJ Maphorisa, who ironically enough produced his album Pretty Girls Love Amapiano, released last October.
Nasty C who got to 3rd place, the 22-year-old rapper has had quite a couple of years, with his 2018 studio album String And Bling, released under Universal Music Group keeping him up and getting critical acclaim during almost all 2019.
The most streamed South African Track streamed in South Africa though, was “Drive” by Dj’s Black Coffee and David Guetta featuring Delilah Montagu. Followed by Prince Kaybee’s “Fetch Your Life” featuring Msaki. And on 3rd place is “Dames” by Biggy, an unconventional rapper that has gone viral over his fusion of hip-hop and electronic music and the use of Afrikaans language.
Talking albums now, Prince Kaybee has got the winner on the category of most listened to in south Africa with Re Mmino, a 13-track production that includes the previously mentioned “Fetch Your Life” featuring Msaki. On second place Scorpion Kings by DJ Maphorisa and Kabza De Small; Emkhaya By Mlindo the Vocalist, and Nasty C’s Strings And Bling.
The competition in South Africa’s music scene seems to grow as fast as a horse race, throwing out different artists every year. Let’s see how they manage to escalate on the global charts, especially with genres that have that much power within the country as it is Amapiano.
So, what do you think of the most listened to tunes in South Africa in 2019? Do you like some of them? Do you dispise some of the artists on the list? Leave a comment below and let us know…
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