A few weeks ago, Marina Shifrin made a YouTube video to tell her boss she was quitting. Shifrin’s resignation went viral, granting her 15 minutes of inter-fame and the possibility of a future job. Good for her! But the video has also given an unlikely second life to its Kanye West soundtrack. “Gone”, from Yeezy’s 2005 classic Late Registration is at the top of the charts eight years after it first dropped.
If after watching I Quit Girl do her thing you found yourself listening to “Gone” over and over for the first time in years, you aren’t alone. Thanks to the video — which it should be noted has nothing to do with Kanye West — the song just debuted at number 18 on Billboard’s Hot 100. Here’s the breakdown of its impressive performance, courtesy of Billboard:
U.S. digital sales of “Gone” spiked from minuscule levels in the previous week to 9,000 in this week’s sales tracking frame, according to Nielsen SoundScan. Overall usage of “Gone” across these videos on YouTube pulled in 6.2 million U.S. streams for the song, according to Nielsen BDS, enough to send the title onto the Streaming Songs chart at No. 4.
That Kanye popped up at the top of the charts is an idiosyncrasy of how the charts are calculated these days. Billboard’s Hot 100 formula has included streaming music data since 2007, and back in February, Billboard started including YouTube streams in its charts. Here’s breakdown of how the metrics are assessed, according to Billboard:
As we wrote in January when YouTube data was added to the Hot 100’s equation: “Generally speaking, our Hot 100 formula targets a ratio of sales (35-45%), airplay (30-40%) and streaming (20-30%).”
And so “Gone” is back at the top of the charts, eight years later. That’s a lifetime in the music industry so it’s pretty remarkable. What a world! No matter what you think of I Quit Girl, it’s hard to argue with resurrecting some of Yeezus’ early miracles. [Billboard via Stereogum]