The Charts and the Clubs Have Different Definitions of the Song of the Summer

Diamora Hunt didn't have to do much during the first stretch of her CultureCon Café set in early June. Organizers for the event recruited the Los Angeles-based DJ, who performs as Rosegawd, to keep the room from feeling static. For a while, she played background tracks while guests mingled throughout Sincerely Yours, a Black-owned art gallery and club in downtown L.A. Once everyone seemed comfortable, Hunt found the perfect moment to turn up the heat.

The crowd's attention had been split between each other and Game Four of the NBA Finals, where the New York Knicks were rapidly rebounding from a 29-point deficit against the San Antonio Spurs. With less than two seconds left in the match, the Knicks took the lead. In time with the final buzzer, Hunt dropped "Spend Dat," the Yung Miami hit released in April. "That room erupted in a unison of happiness," Hunt tells Rolling Stone . "They just took that moment to be talking about, 'Where are the scammers?'"

In the weeks since, "Spend Dat" has surged to certified summer soundtrack status with a Number 17 peak on the Billboard Hot 100. The chart's top 10 has been consistently occupied by blockbuster hits from Ella Langley ("Choosin' Texas"), Olivia Dean ("Man I Need"), Tame Impala ("Dracula"), and more. But the charts and the clubs don't always agree on the song of the summer. Playing a song in a car or through a set of headphones counts as a single stream, but what about a track dropped in a room full of hundreds of sweaty bodies?

"A lot of people would consider it as what's charting the highest and what's being played most on the radio," says Jacob Carnes, better known in the club scene as Jacobdior. "But now that I DJ and I'm out listening to music all the time, I feel like the song of the summer is what gets people moving. What song can you put on that makes the crowd go from zero to 100, everyone knows the words, and you just know it's a hit?" This summer, he's had "Spend Dat" on his rotation alongside viral hits like Trim's "Coconut Water" and BabyChiefDoit 's "Ghetto Love Story," which only just entered the Hot 100 a few weeks ago, plus older tracks like Amerie's "1 Thing" and Kehlani's "Folded." Editor’s picks The 250 Greatest Albums of the 21st Century So Far The 100 Best TV Episodes of All Time The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century

"Radio used to be able to tell you what to play in a sense of, 'Oh, this is what's hot.' You'll hear it enough. Either you like it or you don't," Hunt says. "Now it does depend on [a DJs] own algorithm." She remembers when the gap between what dominated on air and outside didn't feel so wide. Around the time Hunt started DJing in 2017, Cardi B set the summer on fire with "Bodak Yellow." It was inescapable, the kind of hit that signaled a definitive shift. "I could play that five times in a row and it would go up every single time," Hunt says. "There hasn't been a song that I could do that with since." Kendrick Lamar's "Not Like Us" might be the closest parallel — the rapper played it five times during his Los Angeles concert in 2024 and the single spent three weeks at Number One.

The summer of "Not Like Us" was also the summer of Sabrina Carpenter's Short n' Sweet and Charli XCX's Brat . Carpenter premiered "Espresso" at Coachella in April, while Charli previewed Brat with "Von Dutch" in February. They arrived at the just right moment, growing right as the coat check at the club was obsolete once again. "If you want something to really live in the summer, you may want to drop it in the fall or those later winters," says DJ Miss Milan , official DJ for Doechii. This strategy gives songs time to find an audience and take hold without being drowned out by an influx of summer releases. It worked like a charm for Ella Langley.

"Choosin' Texas" made its Hot 100 debut in October 2025 before hitting Number One on Valentine's Day earlier this year. The breakup hit simmered to the top so slowly that many who aren't avid country listeners missed its ascent entirely — even the DJs who have their finger on the pulse. "Ella Langley is having a historic moment," Rebecca Black says about the song, which has spent 15 weeks at the top of the chart. "I don't think I've ever listened to it once all the way through just because that's not my cup of tea." Black's music, like her upcoming album Age of the Exhibitionist, out in September, leans into the kind of pop that permeates queer spaces, while her DJ sets are geared towards blending pop with electronic music and dance. Related Content Matthew McConaughey Gives Ella Langley’s ‘Choosin’ Texas’ a Bluegrass Spin on ‘Fallon’ Michael Jackson Estate Wins Round as Judge Orders Arbitration in Cascio Siblings Trafficking Case Michael Jackson Keepsake Trading Cards are Back on Amazon’s Bestseller List Kathleen Hanna, Ad-Rock, Tom Morello, More Tapped for ‘Contra-ICE Vol. 1: ICE OUT’ Benefit Album

"There are so many spaces that exist now that can play exactly the kind of music that is — whether it's me or anybody else — that person's thing," Black says. "You can find that anywhere if you look hard enough. Some people just aren't interested in looking. They're happy to digest whatever is out there." Her songs of the summer have included tracks from Kim Petras' Detour , plus an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink blend of Slayyyter 's "Crank," Ninajirachi's "Fuck My Computer," and the Black Eyed Peas' "Boom Boom Pow." She'll even throw in a crunchy remix of "Crazy Frog," sometimes. "When you're building a show, you only get that moment of hearing something for the first time once, so I'm always trying to get back to that," Black says.

Black recently brought her eclectic mix to Day Trip Festival in LA, but made the executive decision to exclude a song other DJs latched onto this summer: Justin Bieber 's "Beauty and a Beat." "I think I heard literally every act before me play a remix of that song, and it did go off," she says. "It got to the po...

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