The primarily Korean-sung Proof is the 15th all or mostly non-English #1 album in chart history and the third this year following chart-toppers from Bad Bunny and Stray Kids. According to Billboard, Proof’s 259,000 CD copies sold is the biggest week for CD sales since Adele’s 30, which moved 378,000 copies on CD last fall.
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But this band really should be as famous as, well, Demi Lovato (who was Disney famous long before they came out), and I’m hoping MUNA will get the band to that stadium-filling level.Ĭhris DeVille here with your weekly update on the Billboard charts.īTS score their sixth #1 album on the Billboard 200 this week with the mostly retrospective anthology collection Proof, which debuts with 314,000 equivalent album units including 266,000 in sales both totals are the second biggest of the year behind the first-week totals for Harry Styles. MUNA’s presence on an independent label - albeit one run by Bridgers, an indie singer-songwriter who is becoming a pop star in her own right - might serve to underline that alternative framing. Still, there is always a slight sense of “that’s ALTERNATIVE” when the mainstream media talks about these things, even when it comes to the most well-known acts. Dove Cameron has “Boyfriend,” and Hayley Kiyoko has “For The Girls.” Lil Nas X, of course, is another prime example of tearing through gendered boundaries in mainstream pop (and possibly facing industry exclusion because of it). We’ve also come a very long way in pop music when it comes to pronouns today, you see high-profile acts like Halsey and Demi Lovato adopting “they/them” (though Halsey still technically goes by “she/they,” while Lovato prefers “they/them”) and using same-sex pronouns in songs that play on the radio. Truly a great cinematic experience, please go watch it if you haven’t already. Upon joining forces with Bridgers, the group immediately released the “first-gay-kiss” anthem “Silk Chiffon” (co-written by Daniel Tashian and Ian Fitchuk, best known for working on Kacey Musgraves’ Golden Hour), which had a music video inspired by 1999 queer rom-com classic But I’m A Cheerleader. Ironically, their star seems to have risen higher upon being dropped by RCA and signing with Phoebe Bridgers’ Saddest Factory Records, an indie.
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It’s easy to feel a closeness to MUNA, so it’s really no wonder they have this reputation for speaking radical truth while outwardly representing the LGBTQ+ experience (McPherson is non-binary, and all three members identify as queer).īut RCA Records, home to huge names like Christina Aguilera, SZA, H.E.R., and Tate McRae, didn’t seem to know how to treat MUNA, who released 2017’s About U and 2019’s Saves The World via the major. Fans flocked to Gavin, Maskin, and McPherson for their crazy-catchy electro-pop bangers covering a spectrum of feeling: loneliness, isolation, joy, horniness, gender identity, lust, love, and coping with the worst stuff your mind tells you about yourself. Since forming while attending USC, MUNA’s rise has been slow but sure: amassing a loyal fan base among the LGBTQ+ community, getting a remix from Tiësto (2016’s “Winterbreak”), playing Lollapalooza the same year, opening for Harry Styles the next. But before I launch into a whole screed about why MUNA – aka indie-pop trio Katie Gavin, Josette Maskin, and Naomi McPherson - are on their way to becoming full-blown pop and fashion icons via their new, self-titled album, it’s important to look at all of the elements that had to come together in order to make this happen.
Three albums in, they’re finally getting their mainstream due, and it couldn’t come at a better time. It’s easy to forget that MUNA have been a band for nearly a decade.
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