The song, initially serviced to radio in 2018, grew in 2019 after going viral on TikTok.
Absofacto claims the first new No. 1 of the 2020s on Billboard's Alternative Songs airplay chart, rising to the top of the Jan. 18-dated tally with debut entry "Dissolve."
The artist, real name Jonathan Visger, is the first act to snag a first Alternative Songs No. 1 since Lana Del Rey, whose "Doin' Time" first ruled in September 2019. He's also the first to reach No. 1 with an initial charted title since Dominic Fike, with "3 Nights," the same month.
Absofacto's path to No. 1 was winding. Atlantic Records originally serviced "Dissolve" as a radio single, mostly to the adult alternative format, in early 2018. While the song didn't reach a radio-based chart at the time, it returned over a year later, not because it was getting a renewed radio push (at least to that point); rather, it was one of the first success stories of the music-based app TikTok, with the song going viral after users began soundtracking their uploads with the song en masse.
Last June, "Dissolve" debuted on Alternative Songs at No. 38, and this week it completes a 30-week climb to No. 1. It wraps the fifth-longest trip to the top in the chart's three-decade history, three weeks short of the all-time record, set by Fitz and the Tantrums' "Out of My League":
Longest Rises to No. 1, Alternative Songs
33 weeks, "Out of My League," Fitz and the Tantrums (reached No. 1 on Oct. 12, 2013)
32, "Mountain at My Gates," Foals (March 19, 2016)
32, "Animal," Neon Trees (Oct. 2, 2010)
31, "1901," Phoenix (Feb. 20, 2010)
30, "Dissolve," Absofacto (Jan. 18, 2020)
Concurrently, "Dissolve" bullets at its No. 4 high on the all-rock-format Rock Airplay tally, earning a new weekly best of 7.1 audience impressions, according to Nielsen Music/MRC Data.
Absofacto has also charted for the past three months on the Emerging Artists ranking, currently placing at No. 31.