SZA crowns both the latest Billboard 200 albums chart and the Billboard Hot 100 songs chart dated May 3. While it’s customary for star acts to lead both lists simultaneously, SZA does so differently than the way that the feat is usually achieved.
As previously reported, SZA’s album SOS rebounds for a 13th week at No. 1 on the Billboard 200. Concurrently, Kendrick Lamar and SZA’s “Luther,” from Lamar’s album GNX – not SOS – logs a milestone 10th week at No. 1 on the Hot 100.
Since the beginning of the 2020s, only three acts have led the charts simultaneously but with a Hot 100-topping song not from the album at No. 1 on the Billboard 200. The two prior to SZA: GNX headed up the Billboard 200 as Lamar’s stand-alone single “Not Like Us” led the Hot 100 for a week in February and Taylor Swift’s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) was No. 1 on the Billboard 200 as the then-four-year-old “Cruel Summer” ruled the Hot 100 for a week in November 2023.
Comparatively, in a hefty 50 weeks this decade, and continuing coordination common since the ‘60s, acts have doubled up atop the Billboard 200 and Hot 100 with albums and songs from those sets. Most recently, Lamar did so twice via GNX: the LP was No. 1 on the Billboard 200 as “Luther” (March 15) and “Squabble Up” (Dec. 7, 2024) topped the Hot 100. Leading the way since 2020, Morgan Wallen’s One Thing at a Time and its smash “Last Night” spent 11 weeks atop the Billboard 200 and Hot 100 side-by-side. (The set and song reigned for 19 and 16 total weeks, respectively.)
Prior to SZA, Lamar and Swift earning such commands, no act had scored such a divergent double-up since August 1997, when Diddy (then Puff Daddy) was No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with No Way Out (with The Family) while being featured with Mase on The Notorious B.I.G.’s Hot 100 leader “Mo Money Mo Problems.” Among artists in lead roles, none had earned the honor before SZA, Lamar and Swift since 1975, when, for two weeks that January, Elton John’s Greatest Hits led the Billboard 200 as his cover of The Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds,” not on the collection, topped the Hot 100.
The recent relative uptick in the feat suggests that songs’ success can be less tied to album campaigns than in the past. In the case of the acts above, the reign of “Luther” aligns with the recent reissue of SOS; “Not Like Us” was re-diss-covered after Lamar performed it at the Super Bowl LIX halftime show and it won five Grammy Awards, all within an eight-day span in early February; and “Cruel Summer” was revived from Swift’s 2019 album Lover, partly from fan fervor as she performed it early in the run of her The Eras Tour.
Meanwhile, in a digital era, artists can more easily release single tracks than before, while the likes of TikTok and media synchs can more randomly spark popularity for songs not on albums that acts are simultaneously promoting.
Further tying Lamar and SZA together, GNX is No. 2 on the Billboard 200, while the stars kicked off their co-headlining Grand National Tour April 19.
