It was a slow burn to the top, but Glass Animals finally have the number one song on Billboard's Pop Airplay chart with their summertime smash "Heat Waves."
The song, released in June 2020, first heated up the alternative charts before crossing over into pop territory around February 2021. From there, the track began its climb to the top — a feat that almost lasted a year. For those who need concrete numbers, it took Glass Animals precisely 11 months and one week to go to number one.
Despite the amazing journey, that is not the song that spent the most time climbing the Pop Airplay chart — the honor actually goes to Lewis Capaldi, who spent 37 weeks watching "Before You Go" rise to the top. For Glass Animals, their wait lasted 32 weeks.
But, Glass Animals had a much bumpier ride after the song seemingly sputtered in June and fell off the chart in July. "Heat Waves" re-emerged in November, thanks to the power of TikTok and its love of the "all I think about is you" lyric, and then spent the next 10 weeks racing to the top of the pile.
The song also has the rare honor of becoming the first number one track in four years to have been written and produced by one person — which is the band's frontman, Dave Bayley. The last time a song went to number one with only one person behind the wheel was when Ed Sheeran's "Perfect" took the crown in January 2018.
To date, "Heat Waves" has been streamed an eye-boggling 737 million times and has been downloaded almost 175,000 times in the U.S. It is currently in third place on the Billboard Hot 100.
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