Coldplay and BTS joined forces on "My Universe."
James Devaney/GC Images; Big Hit EntertainmentColdplay’s new collaboration with BTS, “My Universe,” launched at Number One on the Rolling Stone Top 100 Songs chart, dethroning Drake’s “Way 2 Sexy.” This marks both Coldplay and BTS’ first Number One on the chart, and BTS make history as the first Korean act to top the RS 100.
“My Universe” is a pop-funk love song — “You, you are, my universe/And I, just want to put you first” — with arena ambitions; it’s co-written and co-produced by the Top 40 luminary Max Martin. The track amassed just 8.5 million streams, but like many BTS singles, it sold an impressive number of downloads, over 136,000. Drake’s “Way 2 Sexy,” which features Future and Young Thug, earned roughly three times as many streams, but only 4,100 downloads, falling to Number Two.
Even as “Way 2 Sexy” ended its run at Number One, Drake still maintained four different songs in the Top Ten a month after the release of Certified Lover Boy: His Right Said Fred-sampling hit was joined by “Knife Talk,” “Girls Want Girls,” and “Fair Trade,” each of which pulled in more than 13 million streams. Lil Nas X enjoyed three Top Ten hits on last week’s chart, but this week only one remained — “Industry Baby” with Jack Harlow (Number Four, 20.6 million streams). The breezy, pop-radio-ready “That’s What I Want” fell to Number 12.
The Kid Laroi’s “Stay” — which has some of the same co-writers as “That’s What I Want” — held strong in the Top Ten as it has for several months. The same goes for Walker Hayes’ “Fancy Like,” which streams (13.3 million) and sells well (19,200), and Glass Animals’ “Heat Wave,” which cracked the Top Ten on last week’s chart after climbing for more than half the year.
NEWS
Paul McCartney welcomed around 50 fortunate fans into Abbey Road Studios on Tuesday, May 5, for an intimate preview of his upcoming album, ‘The Boys Of Dungeon Lane’. During the special listening session, he opened up about the inspiration and memories behind many of the songs featured on the project.
After attendees handed over their phones, they were guided into the iconic Studio Two, the same room where The Beatles famously recorded much of their catalogue. Before the event officially began, McCartney’s voice could already be heard from the control room as fans looked around hoping to spot the music legend. He later walked downstairs into the studio, where a cosy set designed like a personal living room had been arranged with vinyl records, framed pictures, and decorative pieces, including a street sign displaying the album’s title.
“Hello, welcome to Abbey Road,” McCartney greeted the audience as he settled into his chair. “I’m going to play the new album for you and try and think of stuff to say about it.” Over the next hour and a half, he reflected on moments from his childhood in Liverpool and the earliest years of his bond with his Beatles bandmates.
He explained that the album includes “quite a few” tracks that revisit earlier parts of his life and shared why he often finds himself writing about the past. “It occurred to me that that’s where your big bank of information is,” he said. “If you’re Charles Dickens, you’re gonna write about how your dad was in prison or something. [The past] is a very rich field of information.”
One of those reflective tracks is ‘Down South’, an acoustic driven song that recalls McCartney hitchhiking with George Harrison when the pair first became close. “It would be me who’d suggest to John [Lennon] and George, ‘Let’s go hitchhiking’,” he remembered. “I can’t see John doing that, or George. It was my thing.” He then jokingly exaggerated his Liverpool accent while recreating the moment, before sharing a story about getting a ride on a milk float with Harrison, who ended up sitting on the battery and burning himself when the zip on his jeans touched it.
“Memories are a weird thing,” he said while wrapping up the story. “I was talking to Olivia [Harrison, George’s widow] and she said, ‘Oh yeah, George told me about that and how you got the zip burn!’ I swear it was George!”
‘Days We Left Behind’, the first single from ‘The Boys Of Dungeon Lane’, includes references to Lennon, who McCartney admitted he still gets “emotional talking about” to this day. Another track, ‘Home To Us’, reflects on life growing up in Liverpool and the working class neighbourhoods McCartney, Harrison and Ringo Starr came from. “The three of us were raised in quite poor conditions,” he told fans, laughing that when he describes the housing estates to Americans, “it sounds like Downton Abbey”. “No matter how rough it was, it was home to us.”
The song also features Starr on drums and vocals, with the two musicians trading lines throughout the track. McCartney explained that Starr originally recorded the drum parts at producer Andrew Watt’s Los Angeles studio, though the drummer became frustrated after not hearing the recording appear anywhere. McCartney later asked Watt to replay the session and described the performance as “really good – very Ringo”, which motivated him to complete the song and send it back to Starr, telling him, “‘Here you are, this is what you wanted’”.
Paul McCartney credit: Sonny McCartney / MPL Communications
When McCartney later invited Starr to contribute vocals, the drummer only returned chorus parts, leaving McCartney unsure how he felt about the song. “I thought, ‘He must hate it!’” he admitted. After speaking directly with Starr, the pair eventually understood each other properly and completed what McCartney described as the first “Paul-Ringo duet”.
Elsewhere on the album, McCartney revealed that ‘The Boys Of Dungeon Lane’ includes the first song he has ever written about his parents, ‘Salesman Saint’, which centres on perseverance through difficult periods “because they had to”. Other songs include ‘Mountaintop’, inspired by the “hippy mood” surrounding Glastonbury, and ‘Ripples In A Pond’, written as a love song dedicated to his wife Nancy.
Throughout the listening session, McCartney enthusiastically mouthed the lyrics, pretended to play drums and guitar along with the music, and occasionally grabbed an acoustic guitar to demonstrate certain melodies for the crowd. While discussing ‘Life Can Be Hard’, he played the main guitar riff live. After accidentally hitting the wrong note, he laughed and admitted, “I haven’t been practising. You’d think if you knew you were doing this, then you’d have practised.” Smiling afterward, he added: “But I don’t care!”
‘The Boys Of Dungeon Lane’ arrives on May 29 and was produced by Watt across sessions in Los Angeles and East Sussex.
Just hours after the playback event ended, it was also revealed that McCartney will appear as a guest on The Rolling Stones’ forthcoming album, ‘Foreign Tongues’. The collaboration follows his contribution to the band’s previous release, ‘Hackney Diamonds’.
