The ballad, on Streamline/Atlantic/Interscope/ICLG, reigns with Greatest Gainer honors, up 10% in plays at the format Nov. 8-14, according to Luminate. The song drew an average of 77 plays per reporter playing it in that span (translating to a play roughly every two hours).
The Pop Airplay chart ranks songs by weekly plays on over 150 mainstream top 40 radio stations monitored by Mediabase, with data provided to Billboard by Luminate.
Notably, Gaga rules Pop Airplay for the first time since the chart dated April 9, 2011, with “Born This Way.” She rewrites the mark for returning to No. 1 after the longest break: 13 years, seven months and two weeks. (In between, she logged six top 10s.) Mariah Carey previously held the distinction, with a wait of nine years, four months and three weeks between “One Sweet Day” with Boyz II Men in 1995-96, and “We Belong Together” in 2005. (Last year, Miley Cyrus ended a nine-year, two-month and two-week break between the reigns of “Wrecking Ball” in 2013 and “Flowers.”)
Mars last led Pop Airplay with “Finesse,” with Cardi B, in 2018.
Gaga now boasts eight career Pop Airplay No. 1s and Mars, 10 – tying him with Justin Bieber for the most among solo males. Here’s a look at the acts with the most leaders since the chart began in October 1992:
13, Taylor Swift
11, Maroon 5
11, Katy Perry
11, Rihanna
10, Justin Bieber
10, Ariana Grande
10, Bruno Mars
9, P!nk
8, Doja Cat
8, Lady Gaga
8, Justin Timberlake
7, Beyoncé
Plus, Gaga becomes the fourth act to have topped Pop Airplay in the 2000s, ‘10s and ‘20s, joining Maroon 5, Taylor Swift and Cyrus. Gaga scored a career-launching-record six No. 1s on her first six tries in 2009-10, beginning with “Just Dance” featuring Colby O’Donis.
As previously reported, “Die With a Smile” crowned the Billboard Global 200 chart for eight weeks in September-October, the most for any song this year. It drew 119.6 million streams worldwide Nov. 1-7 and has tallied over 100 million streams globally in each of the last 10 weeks (through the Nov. 16-dated chart), the longest such streak since the survey began in September 2020.
Meanwhile, Gaga’s new solo single “Disease” holds at its No. 18 high on the Nov. 23-dated Pop Airplay chart (up 12% in plays).
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