Morgan Wallen Is the No. 1 Billboard Hot 100 Artist of 2023 & ‘Last Night’ Is Top Song

Gary Trust
·6 min read
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Morgan Wallen rules Billboard’s 2023 year-end Hot 100 Artists chart, while his smash crossover single “Last Night” leads the year’s Hot 100 Songs recap.

He is the first artist that primarily records country music to top Hot 100 Artists since 1981, while “Last Night” is the first year-end Hot 100 Songs No. 1 by a solo male to have led the weekly Hot Country Songs list since 1959.

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Explore All of Billboard’s 2023 Year-End Charts

Wallen commands Billboard’s 2023 year-end Hot 100 Artists chart, with “Last Night” one of 40 songs that he logged on the weekly Billboard Hot 100 during the chart year; five hit the top 10, all from his album One Thing at a Time – the No. 1 title on this year’s Billboard 200 Albums recap.

Notably, Wallen is the first artist that primarily records country music to claim the top Hot 100 Artists title since late legend Kenny Rogers in 1981.

“Last Night” leads the 2023 year-end Hot 100 Songs chart, having topped the weekly ranking, which blends streaming, radio airplay and sales data, for 16 weeks beginning in March – the most for a non-collaboration in the survey’s 65-year history. It led the Country Airplay chart for eight weeks and crossed over to No. 5 peaks on the Pop Airplay and Adult Pop Airplay charts.

The track also crowned the Hot Country Songs chart for 25 weeks. It’s just the third year-end Hot 100 Songs No. 1 to have led the weekly Hot Country Songs list, joining Faith Hill’s “Breathe” in 2000 and Johnny Horton’s “The Battle of New Orleans” in 1959, the only such hit by a male artist.

Meanwhile, with “Last Night” parent LP One Thing at a Time topping the 2023 Billboard 200 Albums recap, the year-end No. 1 on Hot 100 Songs is from the leading title on the Billboard 200 Albums tally for the first time since 2011, when Adele’s 21 and “Rolling in the Deep” doubled up, respectively. Wallen claims the first such twofer by a solo male since 2004, when Usher’s Confessions reigned as the year’s biggest album and its single “Yeah!,” featuring Lil Jon and Ludacris, wrapped as the top song. Only two other solo males have achieved the feat: In 2003, 50 Cent finished with the No. 1 Billboard 200 album, Get Rich or Die Tryin’, and Hot 100 song, “In Da Club,” after George Michael ruled in 1988 with, respectively, his album Faith and its title track.

“Last Night” is also the No. 1 title on the 2023 year-end Streaming Songs chart.

SZA claims the No. 2 spot on the 2023 year-end Hot 100 Artists retrospective, thanks to 25 Hot 100 hits during the chart year. She achieved her first two Hot 100 No. 1s in that span, with “Kill Bill,” for a week in April, and as featured on Drake’s “Slime You Out,” for a week in September.

Taylor Swift ranks at No. 3 on Hot 100 Artists, followed by Drake at No. 4 and Luke Combs at No. 5. Swift’s “Anti-Hero” became the longest-leading Hot 100 No. 1 of her career, notching its eighth and last week on top in January; Drake upped his count to 13 No. 1s, thanks to “First Person Shooter,” featuring J. Cole, in October – tying Michael Jackson for the most leaders among solo men; and Combs hit No. 2 on the weekly chart with his cover of Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car,” outperforming the original’s No. 6 peak in 1988. Combs’ remake ruled Country Airplay for five weeks, Hot Country Songs for four frames and Adult Pop Airplay for two weeks.

Rounding out the 2023 Hot 100 Artists top 10 are Miley Cyrus (No. 6), Zach Bryan (No. 7), 21 Savage (No. 8), Peso Pluma (No. 9) and The Weeknd (No. 10).

Cyrus’ “Flowers” places at No. 2 on the 2023 year-end Hot 100 Songs chart. It also dominates the Radio Songs ranking, having led the weekly list for 18 weeks – the most for a song by a woman since the chart began in 1990. The song, which became Cyrus’ second Hot 100 No. 1, after “Wrecking Ball” in 2013, and reigned for eight weeks from its debut in January, is also No. 1 on the year-end Adult Pop Airplay Songs chart.

SZA’s “Kill Bill” slashes its way to No. 3 on the year-end Hot 100 Songs chart, followed by Swift’s “Anti-Hero,” which leads the Digital Song Sales recap, at No. 4 and Metro Boomin, The Weeknd and 21 Savage’s “Creepin’” at No. 5.

Rema and Selena Gomez’s “Calm Down” and The Weeknd and Ariana Grande’s “Die for You” finish at Nos. 6 and 7, respectively, on the 2023 year-end Hot 100 Songs chart. Notably, both songs were not originally duets – Gomez joined on “Calm Down” and Grande was added to “Die for You” – and both traveled lengthy routes to their chart peaks. “Calm Down” was originally released in February 2022 by Rema; its mix with Gomez arrived that September; and the song hit No. 3 on the weekly Hot 100 this June. It also tops the year-end Billboard U.S. Afrobeats Songs chart, having run up its record reign to 58 weeks in October, and the Pop Airplay Songs tally.

“Die for You” was even more vintage when it hit No. 1 on the Hot 100 in March, sparked by the arrival of its remix with Grande. It led six years, two months and three weeks after it debuted on the chart in December 2016, then from early interest on The Weeknd’s album Starboy – the longest such run to No. 1 ever among non-holiday songs.

Closing out the year-end Hot 100 Songs chart’s top 10, Combs’ “Fast Car” ranks at No. 8, SZA’s “Snooze” places at No. 9, and David Guetta and Bebe Rexha’s “I’m Good (Blue)” finishes at No. 10. In addition to Combs’ remake of Chapman’s classic, “Snooze” brought co-writer Babyface back to the weekly Hot 100’s top 10, with his history in the region dating to the ‘80s, while Guetta and Rexha’s collaboration reworks Eiffel 65’s “Blue (Da Ba Dee),” a No. 6 hit in 2000.

Meanwhile, thanks to Wallen, Swift and Drake, among other artists, Republic Records tops Billboard’s 2023 year-end Hot 100 Labels chart. The label defends its 2022 title, after it also led in 2021, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015 and 2014. Plus, Swift rules Hot 100 Songwriters, with writing credits on 44 entries on the weekly ranking during the chart year, while Joey Moi, who produced “Last Night,” wraps at No. 1 on Hot 100 Producers.

Billboard’s year-end music recaps represent aggregated metrics for each artist, title, label and music contributor on the weekly charts from Nov. 19, 2022, through Oct. 21, 2023. Rankings for Luminate-based recaps reflect equivalent album units, airplay, sales or streaming during the weeks that the titles appeared on a respective chart during the tracking year. Any activity registered before or after a title’s chart run isn’t considered in these rankings. That methodology detail, and the November-October time period, account for some of the difference between these lists and the calendar-year recaps that are independently compiled by Luminate.

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