Obviously, that change has a major impact on the chart, as last month there were no less than 46 British artists in the Music Moves Europe Artist chart, including five inside the top 10: dance act Silk City, soul-pop singer Arlo Parks, pop singer Alfie Templeman, R’n’B-star S1mba and indie dance artist Romy. If we would have published the whole top 100 this month, nearly half of the chart would have been new entries. Even now, inside the top 75, there is room for 23 new entries and 7 re-entries. Countries that have most benefited from this shake-up are Germany, The Netherlands, and France with four new emerging artists currently among the newcomers in the chart.
Spanish dance producer HVME takes the pole position, while his Goosebumps (Sony) is streaming and on radio all over Europe. So, in this light, it’s a wise decision for the ESNS Festival to pick Spain as the focus country for the upcoming festival in January. Other Spanish artists this month are reggaeton singer JuanFran at #26, dance-pop singer Paris Boy at #35, and reggaeton singer Chema Rivas at #63, but if you take into account the number of chart points per country and the number of entries per country, there is one clear winner, now the Brits have left: Germany!
Germany has at the moment three artists in the top 10: pop chanteuse Zoe Wees at #2, rapper Apache 207 at #5, and pop singer Ilira at #6. In total, there are 14 German acts inside the top 75, amassing together much more chart points than Spanish talents. A likely explanation for this German chart success is the popularity of German-language hip-hop artists, who are crossing over to German-speaking countries, but also Germany is exporting more and more pop acts singing in English like Zoe Wees. Also, Ireland is doing well, with 11 artists inside the chart, while France has 12 artists, but the French artists tend to be more toward the lower end of the chart with fewer chart points together than the Irish acts.
This column is not long enough to discuss all 23 new entries this month. So, let’s stick to the top 54 artists who would have entered anyway, even when we didn’t say farewell to 46 British artists… Of those five new entries inside the top 54, Austrian indie band Friedberg at #34 is the highest new entry. Friedberg singer Anna Wappel was born in Austrian town Friedberg, moved to the London music scene, and named her all-female band after her hometown. Two years ago, Friedberg had success with Go Wild (LGM), but now Yeah (Marathon Artists) is crossing over to ten counties.
Also new at #44 is young Norwegian rapper Musti, who teamed up with Swedish rapper Jelassi on Fuego (Sony) and crosses over to Sweden now as a result. German rap duo Miksu / Macloud is in at #50 thanks to collars with famous German rappers Bausa on XXL and Jamule on Frag Mich Nicht (‘Don’t Ask Me’, both Groove Attack), and is now streaming in the German-speaking countries. Dutch pop singer Froukje teamed up with Belgian singer Willem Ardui of hip-hop outfit blackwave. on Licht En Donker (‘Light And darkness’, Top Notch) and comes in through Belgian airplay at #53. Finally, German pop singer Jan-Marten Block won the German television competition Deutschland sucht den Superstar (‘Germany seeks the Superstar’) and made such an impression with Never Not Try (Universal), that he gained airplay in German-speaking countries.
