On Tuesday, April 9, rapper Lil Nas X turned 20 years old and received an impressive birthday present: news that his viral “country trap” song “Old Town Road” had reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road” is officially the biggest song in the country
The song rose to No. 1 on the Billboard Top 100 — on the rapper’s birthday, no less.
The achievement is the latest development in what has become quite a saga around the song, after Billboard removed “Old Town Road” from its country chart and reignited a longstanding debate over what country music truly is.
But regardless of the song’s genre classification, it’s now an indisputable hit: The Hot 100 is Billboard’s most prestigious, all-encompassing chart; snagging the No. 1 slot means “Old Town Road” has conquered radio airplay, streaming, and music sales across all genres.
Billboard publishes new editions of its various charts every Tuesday. As of the April 9 editions, “Old Town Road” has risen to the No. 1 spot not only on the Hot 100, but on several genre-specific charts as well. Those include:
- The Hot Rap Songs chart, cataloguing rap songs’ performance across several different metrics, including sales, streaming plays, radio plays, and views on YouTube.
- The Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart, which measures the same metrics as the Hot Rap Songs, just in a different genre.
- Both the Rap and R&B/Hip-Hop Streaming charts, which measure how frequently a song is played on streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music.
- The R&B/Hip-Hop Digital Sales chart, which tracks digital music sellers’ most-downloaded songs in those genres.
Lil Nas X’s soaring popularity has been fueled by a number of factors — particularly the debate over whether “Old Town Road” should be classified as country music. Controversy over Billboard’s removal of the song from its Hot Country Songs chart boosted Lil Nas X’s profile among a larger audience, building on momentum that began with the rapper’s meme-filled Twitter presence and a fast-growing TikTok meme dubbed the “Yee Haw Challenge” that centered on the song.
Interestingly, though Billboard reclassified “Old Town Road” as rap, the song has since appeared on another chart of note: Billboard’s Country Airplay chart, where the song debuted at No. 53, signaling that country music radio stations are embracing it to a not-insignificant degree.
Perhaps that’s why Billboard hasn’t closed the door on another reclassification for “Old Town Road.”
“Determining which chart a song lives on is an ongoing process that depends on a number of factors, most notably the song’s musical composition, but also how the song is marketed and promoted, the musical history of the artist, airplay the song receives, and how the song is platformed on streaming services,” a representative for Billboard told Rolling Stone on April 6, when asked whether Billboard would be open to reintroducing “Old Town Road” to the country charts.
“Billboard welcomes the excitement created by genre-blending tracks such as Lil Nas X’s ‘Old Town Road’ and will continue to monitor how it is marketed and how fans respond. Our initial decision to remove ‘Old Town Road’ from the Hot Country Songs chart could be revisited as these factors evolve,” the rep said.
In the meantime: Happy birthday, Lil Nas X. Let’s all listen to this galloping lament of the lonely Southern life in his honor; it undeniably slaps, genre conventions be damned.
