Rae Sremmurd’s biggest hit just earned the Recording Industry Association of America’s loftiest certification. “Black Beatles” is now Diamond-certified by the RIAA, signifying 10 million units sold. It’s the first song from Rae Sremmurd, the duo of brothers Swae Lee and Slim Jxmmi, to reach that milestone.
“Black Beatles,” a 2016 team-up with Gucci Mane produced by Rae Sremmurd’s close collaborator Mike Will Made-It, was first released as part of the group’s album SremmLife 2 in August 2016. The song called upon decades-old Beatlemania to communicate the idea that Swae and Jxmmi are rock stars. “It was a dope phrase,” Swae told Rolling Stone at the time. “I’ve always loved John Lennon’s swag – I like his glasses.”
“Black Beatles” was one of the final tracks added to the album, just before the deadline, and it proved to be the hit Rae Sremmurd was searching for. The eerie, synthpop-infused hip-hop track caught fire in the ensuing months, first by word of mouth and critical acclaim, then by becoming attached to a viral video trend. In October of 2016, “Black Beatles” had picked up enough heat to enter the Hot 100. By November, it had become the unofficial soundtrack to the Mannequin Challenge viral video craze, which inspired contributions by celebrities from LeBron James to Hillary Clinton. Even one of the original Beatles participated in the frozen-scene phenomenon when Sir Paul McCartney filmed a video for the challenge captioned “Love those Black Beatles.”
But the “Black Beatles” bonanza lasted far longer than the Mannequin Challenge. The trend was dying out by the time the song reached No. 1 around Thanksgiving, and it stayed at the top of the chart for seven weeks, dominating the full holiday season. The song has continued to have staying power in the years since its zeitgeist-defining moment. Last fall, it reached one billion plays on both Spotify and YouTube.
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