The country genre’s hottest-selling song is heading to hot adult contemporary radio.
Interscope’s promotional team, which will be handling the crossover effort, confirms that Little Big Town’s “Girl Crush” will formally impact the Hot AC format on May 4.
While even the most high-profile country crossover efforts come with no guarantee of success, cause for early optimism definitely exists. San Francisco’s Alice@97.3 and Dallas’ 103.7 KVIL are already supporting the track.
A pop/Top 40 push is potentially on the horizon as well.
Long a source of critical acclaim and respectable sales, “Girl Crush” emerged as a legitimate water cooler topic last month. Noting its sluggish performance at radio, at least one DJ alleged that the song’s run was being thwarted by audience complaints over its lyrical content. Numerous media outlets picked up the story, and a controversy erupted.
Other outlets countered the claims, noting that complaints from listeners and objections from radio programmers were minimal.
Regardless of where the truth actually rested, the controversy thrust the song into the limelight, and it has been performing like a hit ever since. Currently in the rolling Top 20 on Mediabase’s country radio chart, “Girl Crush” just posted 2015’s best single week sales total for a country song.
Benefiting from ongoing momentum, exposure associated with a cover on last Monday’s “The Voice” and a high-profile performance during Sunday’s Academy of Country Music Awards performance, “Girl Crush” moved 97,459 US copies in the tracking week ending April 19. At the end of that week, its cumulative sales total stood at 521,911.
Tracking data suggests the song, which is currently #4 on the US iTunes store, will post an even bigger sales total this week.
— “Girl Crush” will not represent country’s only presence at Hot AC radio.
Sam Hunt’s “Take Your Time,” which is the reigning #1 at country radio, is in the Top 40 at hot adult contemporary. Florida Georgia Line’s former country radio #1 “Sun Daze” is in the Top 50.