Drake retained the top spot on Rolling Stone‘s Artists 500 chart for the week of August 9th through August 15th, while Trippie Redd and Rick Ross both cracked the Top Five.
Drake had another massive week, garnering 129.8 million song streams, thanks to his new compilation Care Package, which collected non-album cuts released as far back as 2011. While Care Package did drop from Number One to Number Seven on the RS Top 200 Albums chart this week, it still racked up 34.5 million song streams, as the rapper’s latest single “Money In the Grave” brought in an additional 15.2 million streams.
The Rolling Stone Artists 500 chart ranks the most-streamed artists of the week in the United States, taking into account audio streams across an artist’s entire catalog during the tracking period. The chart does not include passive listening such as terrestrial radio or digital radio. The Artists 500 is updated daily, and each week Rolling Stone finalizes and publishes an official version of the chart, covering the seven-day period ending with the previous Thursday.
Coming in behind Drake was Trippie Redd, who jumped from Number 35 to Number Two on the strength of his new album, !, which placed at Number Three on the Top 200 Albums chart. Along with netting 49,600 album units, Trippie Redd garnered 80.2 million song streams, thanks to album cuts like “Snake Skin” and “Mac 10,” both of which had 7 million streams.
Rick Ross, however, had the biggest rise of the week, leaping from Number 92 to Number Four with the release of his Number Two album Port of Miami II. The rapper’s LP pushed 73,800 album units as Ross racked up 68.9 million song streams with tracks like “Gold Roses,” featuring Drake, and “Summer Reign,” bringing in 6.6 and 4.9 million streams, respectively.
Fleshing out the rest of Top Five were chart mainstays Post Malone at Number Three (70.6 million) and Billie Eilish at Number Five (65.5 million). The rest of the Top 10 included more regulars: Chris Brown, Khalid, Ed Sheeran, Youngboy Never Broke Again and Taylor Swift. Just outside the Top 10, however, Megan Thee Stallion catapulted from Number 55 to Number 14 thanks to her Top 100 Songs chart-topper, “Hot Girl Summer,” which debuted at Number One with 17.8 million streams.