Apple Music Australia have recently reported the 200 most streamed songs from the 1990s on their platform. I thought it would be interesting to share:
1. AC/DC - Thunderstruck 2. Backstreet Boys - I Want It That Way 3. Daryl Braithwaite - The Horses 4. Oasis - Wonderwall 5. The Notorious B.I.G. - Juicy 6. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Under the Bridge 7. TLC - No Scrubs 8. Nirvana - Smells Like Teen Spirit 9. Mariah Carey - All I Want For Christmas Is You 10. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication 11. The Goo Goo Dolls - Iris 12. The Notorious B.I.G. - Hypnotize 13. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Scar Tissue 14. Blackstreet - No Diggity (feat. Dr. Dre & Queen Pen) 15. The Cranberries - Zombie 16. blink-182 - All the Small Things 17. Destiny's Child - Say My Name 18. 2Pac, Dr. Dre & Roger Troutman - California Love 19. Ginuwine - Pony 20. 2Pac - Changes (feat. Talent) 21. Smash Mouth - All Star 22. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Otherside 23. Foo Fighters - Everlong 24. Dr. Dre - Still D.R.E. 25. Metallica - Enter Sandman 26. Coolio - Gangsta's Paradise (feat. L.V.) 27. 2Pac - Hit 'Em Up (feat. Outlawz) 28. Nirvana - Come As You Are 29. Eminem - My Name Is 30. Rage Against The Machine - Killing In the Name 31. Shania Twain - Man! I Feel Like A Woman! 32. The Notorius B.I.G. - Big Poppa 33. Metallica - Nothing Else Matters 34. Dr. Dre - The Next Episode 35. Dr. Dre - Forgot About Dre 36. Puff Daddy - I'll Be Mising You (feat. Faith Evans & 112) 37. Backstreet Boys - Everbody (Backstreet's Back) 38. Whitney Houston - I Will Always Love You 39. Pearl Jam - Better Man 40. Matchbox Twenty - 3 am 41. Guns N' Roses - November Rain 42. Spice Girls - Wannabe 43. The Verve - Bittersweet Symphony 44. Counting Crows - Mr. Jones 45. Jeff Buckley - Hallelujah 46. Green Day - Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) 47. Fugees - Killing Me Softly With His Song 48. Cher - Believe 49. TLC - Waterfalls 50. Mark Morrison - Return of the Mack 51. Aerosmith - I Don't Want to Miss a Thing 52. 2Pac - Ambitionz Az a Ridah 53. Natalie Imbruglia - Torn 54. Powderfinger - These Days 55. Robbie Williams - Angels 56. Nirvana - About a Girl (Live) 57. Pearl Jam - Alive 58. House of Pain - Jump Around 59. Oasis - Don't Look Back in Anger 60. LIVE - Lightning Crashes 61. blink-182 - What's My Age Again? 62. Britney Spears - ...Baby One More Time 63. Shania Twain - You're Still the One 64. Vanilla Ice - Ice Ice Baby 65. Foo Fighters - Hero 66. Dr. Dre - Nuthin' but a G thang (feat. Snoop Dogg) 67. Michael Jackson - Black or White 68. Hunters & Collectors - Holy Grail 69. James Horner & Céline Dion - My Heart Will Go On 70. Shania Twain - That Don't Impress Me Much 71. R.E.M. - Losing My Religion 72. Radiohead - Creep 73. Guns n' Roses - Knockin' On Heaven's Door 74. 2Pac - Dear Mama 75. Savage Garden - Truly Madly Deeply 76. Sonia Dada - (Lover) You Don't Treat Me No Good 77. Lou Bega - Mambo No. 5 (a Little Bit of...) 78. blink-182 - Adam's Song 79. The Cranberries - Linger 80. Silverchair - Tomorrow 81. 2Pac - All Eyes On Me (feat. Skye) 82. The Offspring - Self Esteem 83. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Give It Away 84. Paul Kelly - How to Make Gravy 85. Foo Fighters - Learn to Fly 86. Darude - Sandstorm 87. The Screaming Jets - Better 88. Boyz II Men - End of the Road 89. Backstreet Boys - As Long as You love Me 90. Pearl Jam - Even Flow 91. Matchbox Twenty - Push 92. The Offspring - Pretty Fly (For a White Guy) 93. Metallica - The Unforgiven 94. Nirvana - Lithium 95. blink-182 - Dammit 96. Mr. Big - To Be with You 97. Warren G - Regulate (feat. Nate Dogg) 98. Whitney Houston - I Have Nithing 99. Bryan Adams - (Everything I Do) I Do It for You 100. Lauryn Hill - Doo Wop (That Thing) 101. Alan Jackson - Chattahoochee 102. Aqua - Barbie Girl 103. Pearl Jam - Last Kiss 104. Mariah Carey - Fantasy 105. Ronan Keating - When You Say Nothing At All 106. Montell Jordan - This Is How We Do It 107. The Notorious B.I.G. - Mo Money Mo Problems (feat. Mase & Puff Daddy) 108. Pearl Jam - Black 109. Ice Cube - You Can Do It 110. Blur - Song 2 111. Christina Aguilera - Genie in a Bottle 112. Fuel - Shimmer 113. Run-DMC vs Jason Nevins - It's ike That 114. Shaggy - Boombastic 115. Ice Cube - It Was a Good Day 116. Crowded House - Fall at Your Feet 117. MC Hammer - U Can't Touch This 118. Mobb Deep - Shook Ones, Pt. II 119. Céline Dion - It's All Coming Back to Me Now 120. The Notorious B.I.G. - Who Shot Ya 121. 4 Non Blondes - What's Up 122. Los del Rio - Macarena (Bayside Boys Remix) 123. Seal - Kiss from a Rose 124. 2Pac - Hail Mary 125. Destiny's Child - Jumpin', Jumpin' 126. Alan Jackson - Little Bitty 127. Tracy Chapman - Give Me One Reason 128. Smashing Pumpkins - 1979 129. Crowded House - Weather with You 130. Alan Jackson - Gone Country 131. Lee Kernaghan - Boys From the Bush 132. Eagle-Eye Cherry - Save Tonight 133. Lighthouse Family - High 134. Green Day - When I Come Around 135. The Cranberries - Dreams 136. Dr. Dre - What's the Difference 137. Salt-N-Pepa - Shoop 138. Next - Too Close 139. The Offspring - Why Don't You Get a Job 140. Céline Dion - Because You Loved Me 141. Green Day - Basket Case 142. Rusted Root - Send Me On My Way 143. Mariah Carey - Always Be My Baby 144. 2Pac - Keey Ya Head Up 145. Limp Bizkit - Break Stuff 146. Bon Jovi - Bed of Roses 147. Pearl Jam - Daughter 148. No Doubt - Don't Speak 149. Sarah McLachlan - Angel 150. Bon Jovi - Always 151. Third Eye Blind - Semi-Charmed Life 152. Semisonic - Closing Time 153. Sixpence None the Richer - Kiss Me 154. Boyz II Men - I'll Make Love to You 155. K-Ci & JoJo - All My Life 156. The Goo Goo Dolls - Slide 157. Foo Fighters - Monkey Wrench 158. Oasis - Champagne Supernova 159. Roxette - It Must Have Been Love 160. Eminem - Guilty Conscience (feat. Dr. Dre) 161. Eric Clapton - Tears In Heaven (Acoustic Live) 162. Queen - The Show Must Go On 163. Will Smith - Gettin' Jiggy Wit It 164. Soundgarden - Black Hole Sun 165. Céline Dion - The Power of Love 166. R.E.M. - Everybody Hurts 167. Brooks & Dunn - Boot Scootin' Boogie 168. Hanson - MMMBop 169. George Michael - Freedom! '90 170. Marilyn Manson - The Beautiful People 171. Michael Jackson - They Don't Care About Us 172. Rednex - Cotton Eye Joe 173. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Suck My Kiss 174. Sir Mix-A-Lot - Baby Got Back 175. Randy Newman - You've Got a Friend In Me 176. Ini Kamoze - Here Comes the Hotstepper 177. Tal Bachman - She's So High 178. Ricky Martin - Livin' la Vida Loca 179. Macy Gray - I Try 180. Jennifer Lopez - Let's Get Loud 181. Bush - Glycerine 182. Korn - Freak on a Leash 183. Lonestar - Amazed 184. 2Pac - Life Goes On 185. Daft Punk - Around the World 186. Metallica - Sad but True 187. Pearl Jam - Jeremy 188. Nirvana - In Bloom 189. Wu-Tang Clan - C.R.E.A.M. 190. Extreme - More Than Words 191. Cypress Hill - Insane in the Brain 192. New Radicals - You Get What You Give 193. Smadhing Pumpkins - Bullet With Butterfly Wings 194. Matchbox Twenty - Real World 195. Michael Jackson - You Are Not Alone 196. Santana - Smooth (feat. Rob Thomas) 197. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Soul to Squeeze 198. Michael Jackson - Remember the Time 199. Metallica - Wherever I May Roam 200. Real McCoy - Another Night
Thanks for posting! Very interesting to see an Australia-specific list.
Compared to *worldwide* Spotify plays, the biggest songs I see that don't appear here are Sublime - Santeria (which ranks probably #35-ish on Spotify, so all the absolute biggest ones are here), The Offspring - The Kids Aren't Alright, Incubus - Drive and Haddaway - What Is Love.
The whole top 20 doesn't surprise me much, with the exception of "All I Want For Christmas Is You", 'cause that only really gets streamed in the lead up to Christmas time. Sure, the Christmas period means that it does get streamed a lot, but enough to be #8 overall for songs from the 1990s... I'm a bit sceptical about that fact
A bunch of classics in the top 200! Happy with the amount of entries 2Pac, Bon Jovi, and Dr Dre have Disappointed that "Sandstorm" isn't higher than #86 though
I am not surprised to see Backstreet Boys make it but I am surprised to see them come in at #2. Feels a bit odd as that being the 2nd biggest song from the 90's. Otherwise not many surprises at all. Did I miss Wilson Phillips? They always seem to feature in the ITunes chart every now and then.
@theogsean I definitely believe it. On Spotify worldwide it's the 3rd-most-played '90s song:
Plays
Song
667,807,823
Wonderwall
542,498,943
Smells Like Teen Spirit
493,187,129
All I Want For Christmas Is You
465,822,201
Under The Bridge
446,894,529
Californication
426,703,607
Iris
401,481,165
All Star
391,300,508
Still D.R.E.
383,866,386
I Want It That Way
367,639,601
Creep
The thing is just that its November/December plays are so big that they make up for the rest of the year. For example from records of mine, during 2017, these are how many plays those top 5 songs got each month:
Month
Wonderwall
SLTS
AIWFCIY
UTB
Californ
Jan 2017
10,558,097
8,368,052
2,164,779
7,742,904
7,468,810
Feb 2017
10,958,814
8,749,820
799,131
7,624,357
7,142,636
Mar 2017
11,939,877
9,992,656
687,303
8,595,689
8,204,610
Apr 2017
11,688,143
9,549,162
546,004
8,259,223
8,047,669
May 2017
12,730,030
10,124,771
494,680
8,966,604
8,774,199
Jun 2017
13,370,272
9,474,075
467,518
8,097,816
8,661,882
Jul 2017
13,374,863
9,871,100
523,101
8,245,161
8,836,131
Aug 2017
13,355,854
10,032,329
625,524
8,066,454
8,715,136
Sep 2017
13,706,028
10,209,423
1,283,187
8,378,351
9,026,625
Oct 2017
16,132,533
12,192,734
2,964,965
10,497,682
10,942,084
Nov 2017
14,554,165
11,248,731
25,113,892
9,270,943
9,423,606
Dec 2017
14,749,671
11,486,068
94,127,022
9,072,542
9,536,861
Total
157,118,347
121,298,921
129,797,106
102,817,726
104,780,249
AIWFCIY was only doing about 5% as much as SLTS in the middle of the year, but then the plays it got in December were as much as SLTS had done in 9 months.
Of course, Spotify is different to Apple Music, and worldwide is different to Australia, but the patterns should be similar. Also, naturally, AIWFCIY would slip down the list over the course of the year and then rebound sharply in November/December, so how high it places would depend if the list is published in January or September
Wow very interesting read. Is Madonna not on Apple Music? Elsewhere, happy to see Mariah in the top ten (even if it is the seasonal hit) and other surprises for me is the frequency of 2Pac tracks (including one I've never heard of at #52), and only one Spice Girls track making the top 200!