Fleet Foxes Score First Hot 100 Hit, Thanks to Post Malone Collab ‘Love/Hate Letter to Alcohol’

Xander Zellner
·2 min read
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Fleet Foxes already boast numerous Billboard chart achievements, dating to the group’s first appearance in 2008, but the folk-rock group’s members can now officially call themselves Billboard Hot 100 hitmakers.

The band, which formed in Seattle in 2006, appears on the Hot 100 for the first time, on the chart dated June 18, thanks to its featured credit on Post Malone’s “Love/Hate Letter to Alcohol,” which debuts at No. 70. The song starts with 7.6 million U.S. streams and 1,100 downloads in the June 3-9 tracking week, according to Luminate.

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The track appears on Post Malone’s fourth studio effort Twelve Carat Toothache, which arrives at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 with 121,000 equivalent album units earned in its first week.

Fleet Foxes first appeared on a Billboard chart in April 2008 when their second EP Sun Giant debuted on Heatseekers Albums. That summer, the group followed with its debut self-titled studio set, which reached No. 36 on the Billboard 200 and No. 9 on Top Alternative Albums in February 2009.

The band has sent all four of its studio albums onto the Billboard 200: following Fleet Foxes, it charted with Helplessness Blues (No. 4, May 2011), Crack-Up (No. 9, July 2017) and Shore (No. 28, April 2021). (Plus, Sun Giant hit No. 170 on the survey in April 2009.)

The group’s sophomore LP Helplessness Blues hit No. 1 on Billboard‘s Folk/Americana Albums and Vinyl Albums charts in May 2011, marking its first No. 1 on any rankings. The band returned to No. 1 on Vinyl Albums with Crack-Up in July 2017 and on Americana/Folk Albums with Shore in April 2021.

Song-wise, Fleet Foxes have maintained a familiar presence on Adult Alternative Airplay, notching five entries, including three in 2021. The act first charted at the format with “Mykonos” in 2009 (No. 30 peak), followed by “Third of May/Odaigahara” (No. 26, 2017), “Can I Believe You” (No. 3, 2021), “Sunblind” (No. 28, 2021) and in a featured role, with Anais Mitchell, on Big Red Machine’s “Phoenix” (No. 33 in 2021).

“Can I Believe You” also earned the group its first entry on the all rock-format Rock & Alternative Airplay chart, reaching No. 37.

Fleet Foxes leader Robin Pecknold performed “Love/Hate Letter to Alcohol” alongside Post Malone on NBC’s Saturday Night Live on May 14. It was his first performance on the SNL stage since 2009, when the band performed “Mykonos” and “Blue Ridge Mountains.”

Fleet Foxes comprise Pecknold, Morgan Henderson, Skyler Skjelset, Christian Wargo and Casey Wescott.

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