Tones And I’s Dance Monkey the most streamed song in the world
It’s the earworm that shows no signs of fading out, with hit song Dance Monkey becoming the most streamed song in the world and former Mornington busker Tones and I the first Aussie artist to top Spotify’s Global Chart.
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Mornington busker Tones And I’s Dance Monkey has become the first Australian song to top streaming platform Spotify’s prestigious Global Chart.
Tones, aka Toni Watson, revealed the hit song cost just $800 to make.
It has now had over 350 million streams on Spotify and has spent 11 weeks at No. 1 on the ARIA chart, making it the longest-running Australian chart topper in history, beating a record held by Daddy Cool’s Eagle Rock since 1971.
Dance Monkey is set to stay at No. 1 in the UK for a third week, despite a new release by Harry Styles, and has entered the US Top 100 at No. 96 and is No. 23 on the American Alternative Chart.
It has reached No. 1 in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Hungary, New Zealand, Norway, the Netherlands, Scotland, Slovakia, Sweden and Switzerland.
Watson went from working in retail at Southland to the old Jetty Surf in the Bourke Street Mall, and would watch musicians Tash Sultana and the Pierce Brothers busking out the front of the store.
“That was really inspiring. It took me a year and a half to get my own permit to busk there, but by the time the email came through saying I had my permit I was driving to Byron Bay to start busking up there.
“I did end up busking outside Jetty Surf, although it had turned into General Pants by then, it was Boxing Day the year before last. I sold my first ever demo CD on Bourke Street, to a German couple, for $10. It was so exciting. It had the first version of my first single J ohnny Run Away on it.”
In 2018 the musician moved to Byron where she went from sleeping in a van, to scoring free rent at a hostel in return for performing at the venue once a week — it was where Dance Monkey was premiered in January.
“Busking paid for everything, I didn’t have many overheads. Busking got my music out in the world. I never thought ‘One day I’ll tour the world’. I didn’t do it to be the No. 1 artist in the country, I thought playing on the streets might be my end game and I was happy with that.”
Dance Monkey quotes comments punters had made to her while she was performing on the streets and details the pressure to grab peoples’ attention.
It features on her first EP The Kids are Coming.
With UK, European and US shows locked in, as well as a return home for the ARIA Awards next month where she has scooped the pool with eight nominations, Watson says she still plans to keep busking where possible.
“I’m a busker, I don’t ever want to stray from that. I don’t want people to think I’m hard to reach or hard to contact. I don’t want people to think when you do well you turn into someone else. There’s already enough artists in the world doing that.”
