For this yr’s replace of our ongoing Best Pop Star by 12 months challenge, Billboard is counting down our employees picks for the highest 10 pop stars of 2023 all this week. At No. 1, we keep in mind the yr in Taylor Swift — who, fairly merely, spent all yr doing issues we’ve by no means seen a pop star do earlier than.
“9/24/23. Taylor was right here.”
So read the bio of the NFL’s official TikTok account on Sept. 24, as Taylor Swift attended her first Kansas Metropolis Chiefs residence recreation of the season because the particular visitor of her then-rumored beau, star tight finish Travis Kelce. Swift’s look at Arrowhead Stadium was greater information than something that occurred throughout 13 soccer fields that Sunday; even the reported condiments on the hen she was consuming in her visitor field spawned year-defining memes. And so, the Nationwide Soccer League – as highly effective, influential and deeply embedded a cultural establishment as exists in america of America – had no alternative however to simp for his or her new pop overlord. Taylor was right here.
Then once more, there have been only a few locations Taylor Swift wasn’t in 2023. Definitely not in North America, which she spent a lot of the yr criss-crossing on her culture-consuming Eras Tour, being feted with items, welcome movies, keys to town, avenue namings, metropolis namings and Taylor Swift Days in jubilant anticipation of her arrival. And if it wasn’t your metropolis she was coming to that weekend, likelihood is you continue to had a good suggestion the place she was headed, as a result of followers, the press and nearly everybody else was on Taylor Watch all yr – the form of full-time job that main media firms wanted to start out particularly hiring reporters for. When Swift was within the constructing this yr, no person else mattered as a lot; when she wasn’t within the constructing, her absence was nonetheless greater information than anybody’s precise attendance.
Billboard’s Best Pop Stars of 2023:
Introduction & Honorable Mentions | Rookie of the 12 months: Peso Pluma | Comeback of the 12 months: Miley Cyrus | No. 10: Drake | No. 9: Doja Cat | No. 8: Dangerous Bunny | No. 7: Olivia Rodrigo | No. 6: Karol G | No. 5: Morgan Wallen | No. 4: Ice Spice | No. 3: Beyoncé | No. 2: SZA
Plenty of pop stars – some new, some established, some all-timers – had nice years in 2023. We right here at Billboard simply wrote about 9 of them, with loads extra we want we might’ve given the total remedy; it was a notably nice yr for pop’s greatest and brightest. And but, the choice of who could be our No. 1 Best Pop Star has by no means been simpler. That’s really no disrespect to our runners-up; it’s nearly Taylor Swift having the form of yr that, as lately as late final yr – at the same time as we truly predicted in our No. 3 Best Pop Star of 2022 essay for her that she’d be “prepared to grab the crown proper again in 2023” – we by no means might have seen coming. It didn’t appear potential that anybody might have a yr this dominant: not this deep into the streaming period, not this lengthy after the oft-proclaimed demise of the monoculture, not when your entire trade appears to be in disaster over easy methods to seize and maintain onto listener consideration. It was a yr to not be judged in opposition to Swift’s 2023 friends, however in opposition to the whole lot of recent pop historical past.
Which isn’t to say that it got here completely out of nowhere, after all. The primary cause we have been capable of name such an enormous yr coming for Swift in 2023 was as a result of she’d already ended 2022 on a surprising new profession peak, 15 years into her superstardom. October’s Midnights launch had served because the climax-to-that-point of a 2020s the place Swift had made each proper transfer, beginning with the acclaimed alt-folk reset of Folklore and Evermore in 2020 and crescendoing with the triumphant first two Taylor’s Variations re-recordings (and the improbably Billboard Scorching 100-besting 10-minute revision of Crimson deep reduce “All Too Properly”) in 2021. We truly named her the Best Pop Star of that yr, too, saying that she’d been “making the kind of strikes inside and outdoors of her music that elevate an artist from famous person to legend.”
However Midnights took her to one more new stage, with 1.57 million items moved in its first week – almost three years right into a decade the place no different artist, even Adele, had even come significantly near clearing one million – and spawning the longest-reigning Scorching 100-topper of her profession with the four-quadrant smash “Anti-Hero.” Beforehand, Taylor Swift’s Best Pop Star Alive claims needed to be tempered with allowances that Adele bought extra, that Drake streamed higher, that The Weeknd and Ariana Grande had greater pop hit singles. Now all these qualifiers have been moot: Swift was dominating on each platform at each stage, and if anybody else was nearing her efficiency in a single or two aspects of superstardom, they definitely weren’t in all of ‘em. She ended 2022 the unchallenged No. 1 within the pop enviornment; the one cause she slotted at No. 3 in our Best Pop Star rankings for the yr (behind Dangerous Bunny and Harry Types) was as a result of she’d spent the primary eight months of the calendar principally dormant, recharging.
Getty Photos for TAS Rights Administration
John Shearer/TAS23/Getty Photos for TAS Rights Administration
There could be no such prolonged respites in 2023. Swift kicked off the yr nonetheless within the golden hour of the Midnights album cycle, with “Anti-Hero” spending the primary two-non-holiday chart weeks of the yr at No. 1, and second single “Lavender Haze” rising at pop radio. Over the primary two months of the yr, she launched a gently surreal video for “Haze,” picked up a Grammy for greatest video as director of All Too Properly: The Brief Movie and scored a high 5 album on the Billboard 200 for a Report Retailer Day launch of her Folklore: The Lengthy Pond Studio Classes assortment. However principally, she prepped for the Eras Tour.
It might be no exaggeration to name the Eras Tour the only most anticipated reside trek of the century. A part of that was only a numbers recreation: Taylor Swift had not performed a full live performance because the Repute tour in 2018, having to cancel her deliberate Lover Fest mini-world tour for 2020 – the COVID shutdown yr. Within the half-decade since that profitable reside run, Swift had launched 4 fully new albums, in addition to two Taylor’s Model deluxe re-recordings, and myriad in-between bonus goodies. All of that had mixed to make Swift considerably extra fashionable than she had been within the late ‘10s, when she was already one of many largest pop stars and reside attracts on the planet. Evidently, the followers have been prepared – a lot in order that Ticketmaster’s servers had confirmed woefully under-equipped to deal with the extent of demand as soon as Eras Tour tickets have been first launched to the general public the prior November.
And when Eras lastly kicked off on March 17, it was way over simply the tens of 1000’s of followers in attendance at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, AZ who have been watching. Curiosity within the tour was so excessive that phone-filmed bits of the present unfold by social media like wildfire, with some followers even live-streaming your entire expertise from their telephones. Consequently, regardless that no official stream of the kickoff live performance was provided, tens of millions of Swifties nonetheless noticed the entire thing, if solely in minute-long clips at a time. Eras was in some ways the primary occasion tour for the TikTok Technology – the app rising to world prominence throughout Taylor’s touring hiatus – and photographs of and reactions to the primary live performance quickly overwhelmed the service, finally reaching all corners of the web as followers pored over every track choice, every costume and set change, every little little bit of in-between banter.
The kickoff present was, in each manner, only the start for the Eras Tour. Opposite to 99% of huge pop excursions, nationwide curiosity in Eras hardly dropped in any respect after the primary evening, because the set’s rotating spot of two acoustically carried out “shock songs” gave followers cause to excitedly tune into the social chatter (and movies) from every new live performance. “I AM DONE WITH TAYLOR SWIFT” grew to become a recurring trending matter because the battle cry of faux-betrayed Swifties, irate that their private fav observe appeared within the setlist for a present once they weren’t in attendance. The superstar turnout at Eras gigs additionally grew to become a dependable matter of content material and dialogue, with everybody from Julia Roberts to Taste Flav getting in on the world’s hottest ticket.
One superstar who truly took the Eras stage with Swift was rising rapper and pop star Ice Spice, who joined Swift at MetLife Stadium in late Could to carry out their new remix to the set-closing Midnights reduce “Karma,” which had been launched earlier that day. The remix drew a combined reception, as the 2 artists’ types meshed slightly awkwardly, however the alliance was nonetheless a logical one for Swift, as Ice Spice coated the one space contained in the mainstream that she was now not actually capable of contact – the leading edge – and in addition simply lent a much-needed freshness to the no-longer-new Midnights single, serving to “Karma” to surge to No. 2 on the Scorching 100.
In fact, followers theorized about another excuse why the pairing was a shrewd one for Swift, and it needed to do with Matty Healy, frontman for veteran U.Okay. alt-pop fixtures The 1975. Healy and Swift had a friendship relationship again to the mid-’10s, and in January 2023, Swift had truly made a shock look at a 1975 present in London. Now, Swift and longtime paramour Joe Alwyn have been reportedly by, and rumors about her and Healy being in a relationship have been flying. It made for an unusually controversial matter of dialogue across the historically backlash-averse Swift, as her comparatively clear public picture made for a stark distinction with Healy’s longtime affinity for provocation – most lately, offensive feedback he’d made about Ice Spice throughout a podcast interview. Numerous followers voiced their disapproval and harm over Swift pairing with such a determine, and Ice Spice’s look inside her fold lower than a month later felt to many like an try and redeem her new beau’s status by proxy.
Nonetheless, Swift’s relationship with Healy grew to become top-tier tabloid fodder, and ensured that every one eyes remained on the Eras Tour because it wound its manner by the States through the spring and early summer time. The arrival of Eras in a brand new city each weekend introduced with it not solely an avalanche of hype, media consideration and near-groveling from the host cities, however sufficient touring enterprise to offer native economies a notable enhance. Cities like Las Vegas and Philadelphia had reportedly seen their tourism ranges rise to pre-pandemic ranges upon her visits, and analysis firm QuestionPro finally estimated that the tour might elevate as a lot as $4.6 billion for all its host cities mixed – even resulting in debate on The View over whether or not Swift was doing extra for the nationwide economic system than President Biden.
It helped that by that time, the tour had its personal hit single including to its promotion – and for as soon as, it was one which Swift herself couldn’t have deliberate or predicted. “Merciless Summer season,” a glowing album reduce off 2019’s Lover, had been a fan (and critic) favourite and common high-performer on streaming for years, however with its plum second-from-the-top placement throughout the Eras setlist – and with the climate heating up – consumption of the track kicked into excessive gear. In June, it reappeared on the Scorching 100 for the primary time in 4 years, and Swift quickly seized the second, saying its launch as an official single a number of weeks later. Radio shortly jumped on board – it finally spent 10 weeks atop Pop Airplay, her longest-ever reign on that chart – and in July, the track climbed into the Scorching 100’s high 10.
The overdue success of “Summer season” continued a development first began by the “All Too Properly” revival of two years earlier, the place even her ought to’ve-been-smashes from years previous have been being validated with the form of chart success they’d been largely ineligible for in actual time. “Summer season” particularly represented a type of fascinating hypothetical for Swifties, as a result of the lead single Swift had launched from Lover – the jarringly jejune and poorly obtained “ME!” – was an especially uncommon miscalculation, tainting your entire album period. With “Summer season” turning into the form of consensus-beloved smash 4 years later that “ME!” was by no means going to be, Swift not solely received to spice up her numbers for 2023, however she additionally received to belatedly redeem her narrative for 2019, fixing her previous whereas plotting her future.
And in fact, “Merciless Summer season” was simply the tip of the spear for the full-on streaming onslaught that the Eras Tour represented for Taylor Swift. For the primary eight weeks of her tour, her streaming numbers rose throughout the board in every body – finally resulting in a 79% complete enhance in her streaming efficiency, for numbers that have been already ozone-high. Her catalog-wide consumption was so huge that in July, she notched 4 albums concurrently within the high 10 of the Billboard 200, turning into the primary residing artist to perform that feat since Herb Alpert six a long time earlier. (By yr’s finish, she’d turn into the primary to get a full 5 directly.)
A type of 4 July albums was her first Taylor’s Model re-recording for 2023, of 2010’s Swiftie-beloved Converse Now. The set featured the same old barrage of bonus cuts, and a few significantly engaging collaborations with period-appropriate particular visitors like Fall Out Boy and Hayley Williams of Paramore. Better of the bunch was the slinking solo efficiency “I Can See You,” which sounded just like the plain radio smash that Converse Now by no means completely produced, the lone factor lacking from the album’s resumé. It grew to become the highest-charting track from the brand new Converse Now, debuting at No. 5 on the Scorching 100, because the album grew to become her third straight re-recording to bow atop the Billboard 200 – with a whopping 716,000 first-week items, the most effective quantity but for any Taylor’s Model, and in addition the most important quantity for any album launched to that time in 2023.
If Taylor Swift’s yr had ended because the U.S. leg of the Eras Tour started to wind down in late July and early August, she already would have performed greater than sufficient to simply seize our No. 1 spot in these rankings. She even took a form of mid-season victory lap at September’s MTV Video Music Awards – which has basically served as Swift’s popular culture residence base, ever since she unwittingly performed a key function within the present’s all-time signature second again in 2009. With out performing, she was nonetheless the present’s point of interest all evening, as she frolicked with Ice Spice, gushed about presenters *NSYNC, Nelly Furtado and Timbaland, and picked up 9 awards, together with track and video of the yr for “Anti-Hero” – her second-straight win and fourth complete within the latter class, double the quantity of some other artist.
However Swift’s yr was nowhere close to performed – actually, the most important moments have been but to come back, as would turn into abundantly clear on that aforementioned Sept. 24 date. To the aid of untold numbers of Swifties, her fling with Healy had run its course months earlier, and now rumors have been starting to swirl about her and Kelce. The Chiefs star had turn into more and more coy in his feedback concerning the pop icon, saying he’d invited her to come back see him play a house recreation (after he’d seen her Eras present in Kansas Metropolis that July). She did certainly do exactly that on the twenty fourth, along with her presence at Arrowhead sending each the worlds of sports activities and popular culture right into a frenzy, and resulting in quite a few posts and movies of non-football-conversant Swifties sharing the game’s guidelines with each other, so they might higher perceive what was taking place in between the pictures of their hero in a personal field with Kelce’s mother Donna.
From then on, each Sunday (and a pair Mondays and Thursdays) of 2023 was overtaken with Taylor discuss: Would she be exhibiting up on the Chiefs’ subsequent recreation? What different celebrities would she be attending with? What sort of Kelce swag would she be sporting, and what would that imply about their relationship? What do you imply Kansas Metropolis is on a bye week? Whereas Swift’s quick relationship with Healy was extraordinarily controversial to Swifties and her lengthy relationship with Alwyn was largely uninteresting to everybody else, her love story with Kelce – a popular, unproblematic determine, a Tremendous Bowl-winning famous person as an athlete with sufficient of a Q ranking as a celeb to host SNL – was universally accessible, and located near-100% public approval. You didn’t want deep grounding in Swift Lore to know the connection, as a result of it simply felt proper: the All-American athlete relationship the All-American pop star.
As her second 2023 tour of America’s soccer stadiums continued by October, Swift additionally had a brand new challenge to advertise: Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour, the live performance movie documentary shot throughout her August dates at SoFi Stadium in California. Whereas such live performance docs have traditionally been fan-only fare, with restricted box-office ceilings, information of The Eras Tour was greeted as if it was the brand new Marvel blockbuster – and with business expectations to match, as insiders projected it might earn as a lot as $100 million in its opening weekend. Swift launched the film instantly by theater chain AMC’s screening and distribution, and even with the model beefing up its ticket gross sales programs to 5 occasions their common capability upfront of the Eras ticket pre-sale, they nonetheless crashed because of overwhelming demand. No enterprise might correctly quantify or comprise Swfitie enthusiasm in 2023.
Following a glammy L.A. premiere – together with an look from Beyoncé, maybe the one present pop star with the unimpeachable legacy and continued greatness to qualify as a “get” for such Swift occasions – Swifties descended upon the nation’s AMC theaters the weekend of Oct. 13 for the Eras movie debut. Followers sang (and filmed) alongside, numerous friendship bracelets have been exchanged, and the movie raked in $92.8 million – wanting the $100 optimistically projected (darn), however nonetheless sufficient to make it the highest-grossing live performance movie ever in simply three days of launch. In the meantime, Swift took the chance to care for some unfinished enterprise: With “Merciless Summer season” lingering across the Scorching 100’s high 5 for months however unable to assert the highest spot, she launched the three-song “Cruelest Summer season” pack to rejoice the track’s Eras-boosted success – “for old times sake” – with a brand new reside model and a brand new Giobbi remix of the track. Following the added consumption from the additional variations, “Merciless Summer season” lastly hit No. 1 the following week.
After which, the capper. Whereas Swifties had ravenously consumed every of Swift’s three Taylor’s Model re-recordings, there was one which was anticipated above all others: 1989, the 2014 mega-blockbuster that totally accomplished her crossover to pop superstardom and was nonetheless treasured by followers because the defining album of that pop period. Swift had introduced the discharge of her new 1989 onstage on the last present of her Eras Tour U.S. leg in August, and in late October, it was lastly set to be launched. Nevertheless, following a full yr of Taylormania, relationship again to Midnights the prior October – and solely three months after Converse Now (Taylor’s Model), two weeks after the Eras Tour movie, and with “Merciless Summer season” nonetheless holding atop the Scorching 100 – some needed to surprise: Has it been an excessive amount of Taylor? Will followers actually have the capability to come back out in full drive for an additional album of re-recordings?
The primary-week numbers for 1989 (Taylor’s Model) answered these questions with a definitive no and sure, respectively. The re-recording debuted with a near-unthinkable 1.653 million items, together with 1.359 million in pure gross sales: each numbers passing each different Taylor’s Model, passing Midnights, even passing the debut week for the unique 1989. (Passing each different launch of the 2020s as effectively, although Swift beating everybody else had ceased to be as spectacular as besting her personal marks.) The set’s 5 new bonus tracks have been additionally well-received by followers and critics, significantly “Slut!,” which provided a brand new take a look at Swift’s vulnerability below the height media glare of the 1989 period, and “Is It Over Now?,” which debuted atop the Scorching 100, turning into her third track to hit No. 1 in 2023.
Swift’s yr wound down along with her scoring six nominations for the 2024 Grammys (together with album of the yr for Midnights and track and report of the yr for “Anti-Hero”) whereas resuming her Eras touring in South America. Sadly, tragedy struck at one in every of her Brazil dates in November: a fan died at her present, with many pointing to excessive temperatures and a shortage of obtainable water (and guidelines prohibiting followers from bringing in their very own) as a possible trigger. Swift shared her condolences over Instagram, saying she had a “shattered coronary heart,” and canceled her Brazil present the following evening because of continued “excessive temperatures” and security issues. (Native authorities introduced that free water could be made obtainable in any respect future reveals.)
The Eras Tour lastly wrapped for the yr in late November, with Swift scheduled to choose issues again up in Tokyo in February. Official Field Rating numbers have but to be reported for the tour’s 53 dates to date, however Billboard initiatives the whole quantity to be upwards of $900 million – already sufficient to zoom previous Elton John’s present mark for the highest-grossing North American tour of the Field Rating period, along with his Farewell Yellow Brick Street trek taking in $567.7 million over 135 reveals – and that she would possibly double that quantity along with her 2024 dates. In actual fact, between her music gross sales and streams, tour receipts and field workplace returns, Billboard estimates that Swift made almost $2 billion in 2023 alone, numbers which don’t even account for her monetary wins from synchs, sponsorships and merchandise.
Nonetheless, whereas the staggering numbers definitely counsel the enormity of Taylor Swift’s 2023, they don’t completely seize it. It’s additionally about going to any airport, any metropolis heart, wherever with a big gathering of individuals – not even essentially music followers – and seeing a number of Eras Tour tees and hoodies. It’s about watching a TV present just like the critically beloved The Bear, and getting blindsided by the emotional energy of an unlikely character having a cathartic singalong to “Love Story” (Taylor’s Model, no much less). It’s about memory-testing quiz web site Sporcle making a class only for user-submitted Swift exams, the one artist moreover The Beatles with their very own. It’s about no much less authoritative and aggressive a pop authority than Drake – Drake!! – admitting on report that he delayed a challenge’s launch to keep away from her crossfire: “Taylor Swift the one n-–a that I ever rated/ Just one might make me drop the album just a bit later.”
And it’s about wanting on the present pop panorama and seeing Swift’s influence completely in all places. It’s within the breakout of singer-songwriter Noah Kahan, who’s acknowledged that the pandemic-era popularity of her Folklore and Evermore albums helped open a mainstream lane for his model of alt-folk. It’s within the sophomore success of Olivia Rodrigo, who’s been following within the Taylor Swift profession mould so effectively by her first three years of recording that she even simply launched an eerie Starvation Video games ballad. It’s within the first-ever Scorching 100 hits for apparent acolytes like Lizzy McAlpine and Gracie Abrams. It’s even within the latest triumphs of stars like Zach Bryan and SZA, whose musical timber don’t department as much as Swift, however who’re definitely benefiting from the raised business ceiling she’s allowed for artists whose emphasis is at the start on detailed, private songwriting.
All of this raises the apparent query: The place does Taylor Swift’s 2023 rank among the many biggest years any pop star has ever had? Was it higher than The Beatles’ 1964, Michael Jackson’s 1983, Britney Spears’ 1999, Beyoncé’s 2003, or Adele’s 2011? It’s definitely on that all-time shortlist, however it’s additionally exceptionally laborious to check to a lot of the people on there – largely as a result of each different artist’s mega-year on that checklist was outlined and pushed at the start by unavoidable, culture-defining hit singles, which have all the time served because the lifeblood of pop success. However whereas hits definitely performed a component in Taylor Swift’s 2023 – she did have three No. 1s, in any case, and 53 complete Scorching 100 entries – they weren’t actually what powered her success. None of her No. 1s have been even correctly from this yr; “Anti-Hero” was a 2022 holdover, “Merciless Summer season” was a 2019 reclamation, and “Is It Over Now?” dates again a complete decade in origin. In fact, the hits have been extra impact than trigger for Swift’s pop mega-success: She might have had none of them and nonetheless dominated simply over these rankings this yr.
It’s not completely clear how her yr pertains to the previous, however what’s abundantly clear is that Swift’s 2023 will now be the yr that every one future pop stars can be measured in opposition to. Swift has proven that as highly effective as a viral hit will be, it’s completely nothing in comparison with a viral tour, a viral catalog, a viral… the whole lot. Actually, Taylor Swift spent 2023 in a perpetual state of virality – one thing that seems like it might be unsustainable if not outright harmful for many pop stars, however one thing that after 15 years within the highlight, she appeared completely prepared and recreation for. Consequently, she is on a stage of pop stardom proper now that no different up to date artist is even approaching, and remarkably few would be capable to maintain onto in the event that they ever received there.
You’ll be able to ask whether or not that’s a superb factor for pop music, and even for Taylor Swift. When an artist’s success turns into divorced from their want for typical hits, it may end up in inventive complacency; simply ask Drake superfans how they really feel about his final 5 years of output, after it grew to become clear he’d dominate the charts with each new album and single it doesn’t matter what form of consensus they held about its high quality. And high 40 has additionally lengthy thrived on the greats at the very least having believable up to date rivals who pushed them to increased heights: The Beatles had The Rolling Stones and The Seaside Boys, Michael Jackson had Prince and Madonna, Britney Spears had your entire TRL teen-pop dynasty. With out that stage of wholesome competitors, everybody suffers.
You’ll be able to ask whether or not it’s a superb factor for pop followers, too. Definitely the general public urge for food for Swift stays huge, and has been well-earned following her decade and a half of constant pop excellence. However one star can maintain that stage of approval for under so lengthy – and who is aware of what number of music followers proper now have already begun to hit their fill level with how a lot Swift they’ll deal with of their lives. Plus, with the Eras Tour set to proceed on by all subsequent yr, and with two remaining Taylor’s Variations nonetheless to go – to not point out what different new materials could possibly be on the best way – there’s no apparent break from the Taylorverse coming anytime quickly. It’s not inconceivable that we could possibly be again right here this time subsequent yr, speaking about how as huge as her 2023 was, we by no means might have predicted how a lot greater nonetheless her 2024 was going to get.
However if you happen to do have at hand it to Taylor Swift’s 2023 for one factor, it’s this: Pop historical past is affected by irritating what-if tales. Artists who made a significant miscalculation with a track or album, artists who received in mattress (actually or metaphorically) with the incorrect individuals, artists who modified their sound or model too quickly (or not quickly sufficient), artists who took a pair years off on the worst potential time, artists whose private lives overwhelmed their musical output or vice versa. And there’s something not simply awe-inspiring, however deeply satisfying, about watching an artist who made each single proper determination for years and noticed all of it come collectively in a single yr of complete untouchability. There is no such thing as a wasted potential with Taylor Swift, no what ifs – the prospect was there for her to have one of many biggest years any pop star has ever had, and you realize that she grabbed it. Taylor was right here. Nobody who was round for her 2023 will ever neglect it.