Welcome to Billboard Pro’s Trending Up newsletter, where we take a closer look at the songs, artists, curiosities and trends that have caught the music industry’s attention. Some have come out of nowhere, others have taken months to catch on, and all of them could become ubiquitous in the blink of a TikTok clip.

This week: Olivia Dean’s new album keeps growing on streaming, while Role Model gets a bump from a TV appearance (and a Charli XCX cameo) and a big show for synchs wraps its second season.

Olivia Dean’s Breakout Album Keeps Breaking: ‘Art of Loving’ Still Growing After Two Weeks

It’s already been an incredible year on both sides of the Atlantic for rising British singer-songwriter Olivia Dean, who has both topped her home country’s Official Songs Chart for the first time and reached No. 12 on the Billboard Hot 100 (so far) with the exuberant “Man I Need.” The momentum from that crossover hit has helped her sophomore album, The Art of Loving, also find immediate success, bowing atop the Official Albums Chart and debuting at No. 8 on the Billboard 200. 

It’s an impressive stateside bow from an artist who’s never reached either the Hot 100 or Billboard 200 before — but it might only be the beginning of Olivia Dean’s U.S. takeover. This week, the album climbs from No. 8-7 on the Billboard 200, and next week it might go even higher, as several songs from the album continue to garner steam at an eye-catching rate. 

Dean has already notched three Hot 100 entries off Loving: “Man,” which falls No. 12-20 on the chart this week due to the avalanche of Taylor Swift debuts above it, “So Easy (To Fall in Love),” which climbs No. 98-87, and the album’s first single “Nice to Each Other,” which bowed at No. 98 last week but falls off this week. For the first four days of this tracking week (Oct. 10-13), all four songs are rising in official on-demand U.S. streams from the same period the prior week (Oct. 3-6): “So Easy” is growing at the fastest rate, up 54% to 3.6 million, but “Man” (up 4.1% to 7.6 million) and “Nice” (up 2% to nearly 2 million) also see gains, according to Luminate. 

Meanwhile, two other songs from Loving have already peeked their heads onto the Bubbling Under Hot 100 chart: “Baby Steps” (No. 24) and “Let Alone the One You Love” (No. 25). Both of those songs are also seeing strong gains over the same period — each rising 15% to nearly 1.7 million in streams — and could soon be threatening Hot 100 debuts of their own. 

All in all, The Art of Loving is up 12% to 23.4 million streams over the first four days of this tracking week — making it the extremely rare October 2025 pop album to keep finding its way to the light, while still overshadowed by the behemoth that is The Life of a Showgirl. – ANDREW UNTERBERGER

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Rodel Model Rides ‘SNL’ & Charli XCX Co-Sign to Major ‘Sally’ Streaming Gains 

Singer-songwriter Role Model (born Tucker Pillsbury) broke through as one of the buzziest new names in the alt-pop scene this year, and now he can check “Saturday Night Live performer” off his bucket list. On Saturday (Oct. 11), the Maine-born artist played his breakthrough single, “Sally, When the Wine Runs Out” on SNL, featuring a cameo from Charli XCX as Sally. Between Charli’s hair-flipping surprise appearance, coming on the heels of her and T-Swift’s rumored Showgirl tiff — and SNL viewers sarcastically trying to differentiate Role Model from fellow 2025 breakout Sombr — “Sally” won big on streaming. 

In the weekend following his SNL debut (Oct. 12-13), “Sally” collected 835,000 official on-demand U.S. streams, marking a 26% lift from the 661,000 streams it earned the weekend prior (Oct. 5-6), according to early data provided by Luminate. “Sally” also enjoyed a brief stint in the top five of the all-genre iTunes chart, with an 111% boost in sales. The track moved a little over 1,000 digital downloads following the SNL performance (Oct. 12-13), versus the 482 downloads it sold the previous weekend (Oct. 5-6). 

Although “Sally” has yet to reach the Hot 100, the song has already hit four different Billboard airplay rankings, including a chart-topping run on Adult Alternative Airplay. — KYLE DENIS 

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‘Peacemaker’ Season 2 Keeps on Keepin’ on With Finale Streaming Bumps

The James Gunn-created HBO Max series adaptation of DC Comics’ Peacemaker has become a big streaming hit over its first two seasons — with a large part of the appeal coming from its hair metal- and ‘80s arena rock-inspired soundtrack. In the first season, that soundtrack not included such classic L.A. groups as Faster Pussycat and Hanoi Rocks, but revivalists like Bang Camaro and Wig Wam — the latter of whom provided the theme to the show’s viral credits sequence, featuring the John Cena-led cast in a coordinated dance number. 

Now, season two of the show has also come and gone, and as the show continues to grow in popularity, so do the streaming spikes it provides its featured songs. Revivalists Steel Panther and Cruel Intentions saw official on-demand U.S. streaming gains of 915% and 2,764%, respectively, for their songs “F–king My Heart in the A–” and “Reckoning” after they were used in the Oct. 13 season finale, with the two songs combining for 84,000 streams over the four days after, according to early data provided by Luminate. Meanwhile, early-’90s hitmakers Nelson saw similar gains for a later-period song, 2010’s “To Get Back to You,” which rose 5,933% to 63,000 streams over the same period. 

But of course, the biggest numbers were reserved for the season two credits theme: Foxy Shazam’s “Oh Lord.” The song, originally from the Cincinnati glam metallers’ 2010 self-titled album, has been rising in streams for the last eight weeks — up 2,793% to nearly 967,000 weekly streams since the tracking week ending Aug. 21 — and rises once more post-finale, up 54% to 837,000 streams for the Oct. 10-13 period. – AU

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Hayley Williams’ Stirring ‘Tonight Show’ Performance Converts Several Hundred Thousand “True Believers” 

Last week (Oct. 9), Hayley Williams took to The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon to perform “True Believer,” a proudly political standout from her latest LP, Ego Death at a Bachelorette Party. Marked by a moving arrangement featuring a “Strange Fruit” interpolation, as well as a set peppered with visual nods to Nina Simone’s “Mississippi Goddam,” Williams’ performance quickly dominated social media conversations in the following days. On YouTube, the official performance clip boasts just under 750,000 views. “True Believer” is also the album’s most popular visualizer, with nearly 480,000 views. 

According to early data provided by Luminate, “True Believer” logged 402,000 official on-demand U.S. streams in the four-day period following Williams’ Tonight Show performance (Oct. 10-13). That marks a whopping 99% increase from the 201,000 streams the track pulled the same period the week prior (Oct. 3-6). 

Released on Aug. 28, Ego Death reached No. 33 on Independent Albums and spawned the singles “Glum” and “Parachute.” While none of the album’s individual tracks have reached a Billboard chart, if it maintains its momentum, “True Believer” very well could. — KD 

There’s a saying that time is a flat circle, and that has applied to music as well, with songs from over a decade ago recirculating and trending on TikTok for a brand new generation.

Kid Cudi is the latest recipient of a Gen-Z boost, as his 2008 track “Maui Wowie” has exploded on TikTok and received a boost on streaming platforms like Spotify.

The “Maui Wowie” challenge has taken off in recent weeks, which was seemingly started by TikTok user @aaronxbrownn, who hung off a crosswalk street sign while rapping along, “Going back to Honolulu just to get that/ That Maui Wowie, that Maui Wowie.”

Thousands have participated in the challenge, hanging from various street signs and traffic lights, and Kid Cudi joined in on the trend himself earlier this week.

“Yeeaaaaaaaaa Thank u to everyone for posting my song and havin fun and showing love!!! 17 years old and timeless,” he captioned the clip, which finds him in front of Progressive Field in his hometown of Cleveland.

“Kid cudi so tuff he participates in his own trend,” one fan commented.

“Maui Wowie” landed on Cudi’s A Kid Named Cudi debut mixtape, which arrived in July 2008. The breezy track is produced by Plain Pat, and its revival has even found a way to the charts.

The track debuted at No. 24 on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart and the ode to smoking hit No. 2 on the Bubbling Under Hot 100.

Fans shouldn’t expect much new music from Cudi, as he announced his plans to step away and pursue other creative endeavors following the release of “Once.” “It’s gonna be a while between now and the next Kid Cudi album,” he said. “So I wanted to leave you with a little something that could motivate you, uplift you… I made it earlier this year, just f—ing around in the studio.”

Watch Kid Cudi’s addition to the “Maui Wowie” challenge below.

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Janelle Monáe and The Wondaland Arts Society are transforming Los Angeles into a spooky Halloween destination.

Monáe unveiled the full lineup for Wondaween 2025 on Wednesday (Oct. 15), which blends together fashion, music, art and film events across Los Angeles for the next month. While highlights of the festival include a Wondaween Game Night and intimate discussions about horror, sound and costume design with Danny Elfman, Akela Cooper and more, the biggest draw is undeniably the inaugural Vampire Beach music festival. The festival will host a mere 1,000 “Wondaweenies” for a fun, costumed celebration of music, food and other surprises. The fest will take place on Oct. 30 at a secret location.

The jam-packed festival should come as no surprise, considering how much of a passionate Halloween lover Monáe has always been. Every year, her Halloween costume becomes the talk of the internet. Last year, she shocked the world when she dressed up as E.T., doing so with some unbelievable prosthetics and makeup.

“E.T. has lurked in my mind since I was a baby,” Monáe told Vogue last year. “From Spielberg’s writing to the cinematography, the story of E.T. and Elliot has touched my heart deeply. This movie always leaves me in tears. The bond Elliot and E.T. had was a display of the best parts of us: pure love and allyship. We need more of that. I’m always praying we can all impact each other’s lives like they did each other’s.”

Check out Janelle Monáe’s reveal of Wondaween 2025 below. Tickets and RSVPs are available now on the Wondaween website.

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