I think it’d be right to say that TikTok has taken the world by storm. It’s become immensely popular over the past few years, and a big part of that is because everyone has the opportunity to go viral and gain fame on the platform. One of the biggest industries this has impacted is the music industry – to put it into perspective, “Bad Habits” by Steve Lacey went viral earlier this year and the artist skyrocketed past his previous fame, with his concerts selling out in record times and tickets being resold for abysmal prices (I should know, as I wanted to go to his Toronto concert until I saw that tickets were $200 or more). TikTok has the power to make an artist’s career through viral and trending sounds… but is this the case for every artist that has a snippet of their music go big on the platform? Today, I’ll be looking at a few artists that have had their music trend on the platform, and see how going viral on TikTok has impacted their musical career thus far.
Doja cat
Doja Cat is one of the most famous examples of TikTok virality turning into stardom. Albeit already having some internet ‘hype’ after her song “Mooo!” went semi-viral as a meme, Doja Cat’s true claim to fame followed her song “Say So” being used with an insanely popular dance trend (created by @yodelinghaley on TikTok) that persisted on the platform for months and is known as one of the most popular dance trends to ever exist on TikTok. Since the song ‘blew up’, Doja Cat released a remix of the song with Nicki Minaj and it became the top song on the US Billboard singles chart, and she’s since maintained this fame as one of the biggest break-through artists of the 2020s.
Source: https://www.hiphopscriptures.com/doja-cat
Will Paquin
Will Paquin is an NYC-based musician whose song “Chandelier” was popular on TikTok for months in 2020 through a multitude of trends. Since 2020, the song has gone semi-viral many times, with tiktoks racking as much as a few million views featuring it (or sped-up variations). As of 2022, Paquin’s virality hasn’t quite turned into fame, with his music clips on TikTok not hitting the large numbers it did during the song’s spike in popularity, and his monthly listeners currently sitting around 1 million on spotify (compared to Doja Cat’s almost 50 million). His music is awesome – despite only having a few songs out – and unleashes a euphoric feeling within me whenever it comes up in my playlist. Feel free to give it a listen!
Source: https://open.spotify.com/
lis nas x
There are very few people that haven’t heard Lil Nas X’s 2019 song “Old Town Road”. Breaking conventional music ‘rules’ in one hit, Lil Nas X delivered a Rap and Country fusion that became known worldwide. The origin of this song hitting the spotlight was through TikTok- having run a popular meme account prior to his fame, Lil Nas X was able to utilize his skills to market and support the song’s virality once the platform became obsessed with it’s catchy chorus and beat. He released many (stress on many) remixes of the song with big artists such as BTS after “Old Town Road” went big, and has since maintained his fame through the controversial music video for “Call Me By Your Name” and ingenious marketing techniques that have left the star with a strong fanbase.
ethan bortnick
Ethan Bortnick is an artist that has had some consistent popularity on TikTok by utilizing trends to market his songs. In particular, he currently has a series in which he plays his music to random people through (what I assume to be) Omegle. His music is catchy and flashy, with his videos portraying his eccentric and dramatized manner of playing the piano. The song he’s marketed the most through TikTok, “Engravings”, has over 28 million plays on Spotify despite not being connected to any viral tiktok trends. Overall, he has around a million monthly listeners on Spotify, which I consider to be quite a feat with his lack of a trend on the platform connected to it! He’s approached TikTok in a different manner than the other artists on this list, but his consistency has led him to make a name for himself. Funnily enough, Bortnick also had a stroke of fame over a decade ago- at the age of 9, he opened for Jason Derulo (among other artists) for a Super Bowl party at Miami’s Eden Roc Hotel to raise money for a variety of children’s charities and was featured in an article in the Rolling Stone in 2010!
Sources: https://open.spotify.com/artist/0LyP0Zn0mXLb65AgGOS6EY
TikTok is unpredictable, and requires a lot of work to sustain any popularity one can gain through it. It’s scary how fleeting internet fame can be, but amazing to see how TikTok was utilized to boost some of the biggest names in the music industry today into their position!