‘Baby Shark’ Makes It Onto ‘Billboard’ Hot 100
Anyone who has children, or family members with children –or who come into any contact with children belonging to anyone else — has heard the infectious “Baby Shark” song. Although the track has been around for a while, it only went viral last year.
How viral, you ask? So viral that it has actually made it onto the Billboard Hot 100. As reported by the New York Times, the song entered the charts this week, debuting at the number 32 spot on the list.
Pinkfong, the South Korean educational brand — and band — who wrote the song. can now officially rank themselves amongst the top music creators in the industry. The group has explained that the song was created on the basis of a “traditional singalong chant.” The song, written for children, includes a dance routine to get kids moving about. “Baby Shark,” of course, has also gotten adults dancing.
To date, it has been viewed over 2.1 billion times on video sharing platform YouTube, and more than 4.9 million people have liked it. Given how repetitive the song is, it may come as no surprise that it also has over 1.8 million dislikes — and plenty of comments from users critiquing the song.
It’s taken nearly three years for the song to actually go viral, with the original having first been shared to YouTube back in November 2015. It was revamped and given a completely new beat before the group reposted it in June 2016, a year before it really took off.
The Billboard Hot 100 chart is usually the home of music's biggest stars — and songs. But this week a baby shark swam right onto it https://t.co/OZQPgVAY9O pic.twitter.com/cCWuAR0lPb
— CBS News (@CBSNews) January 11, 2019
The song’s incredible fame has resulted in Pinkfong actually translating the song into 11 different languages, so that people all over the world can enjoy it.
Once someone picked up the song in the U.S., a challenge went around trying to convince people to record themselves dancing to the song. Given all of the dangerous challenges teens have been taking on as of late — from eating Tide pods to spoonfuls of cinnamon — this fad has been quite innocent and cute by comparison. The sing-along and has even attracted the attention of various celebrities, giving the tune a one-way ticket to stardom.
So far, the song has made it to numerous other charts around the world — but has only just made its debut on the Billboard Top 100.
Bin Jeong, the chief executive of Pinkfong USA, has issued a statement saying that the unexpected success of the song has caused the company to find other ways to capitalize off the track — including creating all sorts of merchandise such as toys, books, and diapers.
