Billboard expands its coverage of the burgeoning dance scene by launching Dance/Electronic Songs, the first-ever ranking of the nation’s top dance songs combining digital download sales (tracked by Nielsen SoundScan), radio airplay (monitored by Nielsen BDS) and streaming data (tracked by BDS from such services as Spotify, Muve, Slacker, Rhapsody, Rdio, MySpace, Xbox Music and Guvera) and reported club play from a select national panel of 140 club DJs.
Outside of club play data, Dance/Electronic Songs will match the methodology applied to Billboard’s signature all-genre songs ranking, the Billboard Hot 100. Titles eligible for the chart will be determined based on a song’s core sound and tempo, as they have been for our sales-based Dance/Electronic Digital Songs chart, which launched in 2010. Dance remixes of titles categorized as pop, rock, R&B, rap or another genre would not make a song eligible for Dance/Electronic Songs, even if the title appears on the Dance Club Songs or Dance/Mix Show Airplay chart.
Topping the inaugural Dance/Electronic Songs chart is “Scream & Shout” by will.i.am & Britney Spears, followed by EDM trio Swedish House Mafia with “Don’t You Worry Child” at No. 2. The chart’s top 10 also features pop/dance tracks from Ne-Yo, Pitbull and Ludacris (with help from David Guetta) and EDM cuts from Calvin Harris and Zedd.
Billboard is also expanding its menu of streaming charts with the launch of Streaming Songs. The chart ranks the top web radio streams and on-demand audio titles from the leading streaming services mentioned above. This ranking represents the streaming portion of the Hot 100′s data pool as well as Billboard’s other hybrid genre charts for Country, R&B/Hip-Hop, R&B, Rap, Latin, Rock, and now Dance/Electronic Songs.
Where On-Demand Songs, which launched in March 2012, measures consumer-activated audio plays on the above streaming services with on-demand functionality, Streaming Songs includes that data, as well as on-demand streams.
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis featuring Wanz holds the top spot on both Streaming Songs with 1.45 million total streams in the U.S.
Additionally, Billboard is launching the R&B Albums chart, which ranks the week’s top R&B-only (non-rap) titles. R&B Albums, a companion chart to the recently-launched R&B Songs, will serve as 25-position distillation of the overall R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart.
Rihanna’s “Unapologetic,” which is bumped down to No. 2 on R&B/Hip-Hop Albums, claims the first-ever No. 1 on R&B Albums, followed by Alicia Keys’ “Girl on Fire at No. 2 and The Weeknd’s “Trilogy” at No. 3. The three titles are the only albums to share top 10 placement on both R&B Albums and R&B/Hip-Hop Albums.
Props to Billboard & AlLindstrom
