NEW YORK (AP) — Yearly, summer season arrives with a buzzing power. College’s out, the solar is shining, music is blaring out of automotive home windows and audio system are blasting on the seaside.
However this summer season, the seashores appear quieter. The playlists really feel aimless. The radio waves aren’t being dominated by the standard upbeat, sing-along tune. The place is our track of the summer season?
On this age of fractured listening habits, it’s exhausting to totally quantify a yearly winner. Nonetheless, Billboard’s weekly Music of the Summer season chart makes an attempt to crown one annually by monitoring streaming, airplay, and gross sales between Memorial Day and Labor Day within the U.S. Typically, the track is effervescent, from Katy Perry’s “California Gurls,” the inaugural choose in 2010, to final yr’s “I Had Some Help,” by Submit Malone and Morgan Wallen.
However for the previous 14 weeks and counting, the highest spot has been held by a love ballad: Alex Warren’s “Ordinary.” As Berklee School of Music professor and forensic musicologist Joe Bennett notes, the February launch is “a fair bit slower than the mean average for the Hot 100, or for a historical song of the summer.”
So how has Warren’s romantic sluggish jam rested comfortably within the prime spot for nearly all the summer season?
Listeners are turning again to acquainted hits
One purpose why “Ordinary” has maintained its prime spot is perhaps that the competitors is scarce this yr. The track of the summer season is usually launched far earlier than the solstice, besides, curiosity within the newest choices from our favourite pop stars can also be waning, leaving little competitors for Warren. As an illustration, the likes of Justin Bieber and Sabrina Carpenter have given us new music this summer season season — and none has taken off like “Ordinary.”
In line with a mid-year report from Luminate, the corporate that produces knowledge for the Billboard charts, listeners are clinging to the previous and selecting older tunes.
Streaming on new tracks declined by 3.3% within the first half of 2025, in comparison with 2024. Solely three of the report’s 10 prime songs — based mostly on on-demand audio streams within the U.S. — had been launched in 2025. A lot of the songs on Billboard’s charts have been there for dozens of weeks, like Chappell Roan’s “Pink Pony Club,” which at the moment sits at No. 8 on the summer season chart, and has been on the Sizzling 100 for 63 weeks.
Jaime Marconette, Luminate’s vp of music insights and business relations, says the disinterest in new music, mixed with our wistful listening habits, can also be resulting in the resurgence of “recession pop.”
“Recession pop” refers to music that was initially launched main as much as and following the 2008 monetary disaster. “We’re actually seeing pop music from those years outpace the growth of the industry at large. It highlights a sense of nostalgia and potentially bigger themes of escapism,” Marconette defined.
Along with the pop hits of the late aughts, the shelf lifetime of final yr’s songs has proved lengthy, crowding the area and leaving little room for brand spanking new music to interrupt via. Final summer season was “an absolute tsunami, surplus, exuberance of pop,” says Paula Harper, a musicologist and assistant professor on the College of Chicago.
“When I’ve talked to folks about the 2025 song of the summer, it’s not uncommon for them to cite a song from one of the 2024 releases — and then they sometimes get jumpscared when they realize how long ago those songs actually originally came out,” Harper mentioned, pointing to TikTok as one engine that saved their reputation going.
What does the recognition of ‘Ordinary’ say about listeners?
Ballads aren’t uncommon songs of the summer season — assume Olivia Rodrigo’s “Driver’s License.” However they are not designed to rule the season.
“It’s not going to keep the mood of the barbecue lively, it’s not going to pep up the pool party,” Harper says of “Ordinary.” “Ultimately, it’s engineered for something other than song of the summer status.”
Ethan Hein, an adjunct professor of music at New York College and the New College, says listeners’ gravitation towards a track like “Ordinary” reveals one thing about their well-being.
“When I teach songwriting, I always assign a fun pop banger as one of the projects, and this year no one felt much enthusiasm for it, or turned in somber tracks like ‘Ordinary,’” he mentioned. Hein thinks the disinterest in typical upbeat pop alerts a contempt for each the current and the longer term.
“Usually, pop music is aimed at young people. I remember being a kid in the ’80s and ’90s and thinking how futuristic all the synth pop, hip-hop and techno sounded,” Hein mentioned. “But now, I don’t know a lot of young people who are excited about the future.”
Music psychologist Ray Leone, who research the intersectionality of music and well being, says individuals could also be favoring “Ordinary” as a result of it’s the antithesis of a seemingly extraordinary state of the world.
“There seems to be chaos every day, no matter where you look,” Leone mentioned. “I think to counter that, people are looking more inward. Looking for something personal to connect to. It’s almost as if a song like this speaks to us on a personal level as opposed to a collective level.”
Warren’s love track, written about his spouse, appears to be performing as a beacon of sunshine in darkish occasions.
“Songs of love and devotion are a constant in our world,” mentioned Bennett. “Whatever else is happening in our lives, someone somewhere will always be singing a timeless love song.”
