Is It Too Early To Say Asake Owns the Music Scene This Year?
If you would like to understand Asake’s chart performance over the past five months, look no further than the fierce reflex of a newborn’s griphold. Take a good look at the euphoric effects of the collaborative ‘REAL’ EP with Wizkid in January to the record-setting numbers in May. ‘REAL, Vol. 1’ headed straight to its No. 1 debut, crossing over 122 million on-demand streams (making it easily one of the most-streamed projects in the country). That was just the January release.
May came running in with ‘M$NEY’, and Asake delivered a 13-track project that was not only highly anticipated, but also became the project with the highest first and second opening week streams with 57.04 million on-demand streams (approx. 38,027 units sold) and 36.49 million on-demand streams (approx. 22,670 units sold), respectively. Nine out of the 13 tracks on the album ruled the roost and sat at the Top Ten in their debut week. It is the first project to debut with that amount of songs in the Top Ten since Davido’s ‘Timeless’ which had 8 tracks.
For ‘M$NEY’, the outstanding debut wasn't enough, the subsequent week came in stronger. ‘M$NEY’ spent its second consecutive week at No. 1 on the Official Nigeria Top 100 while simultaneously extending Asake’s record for the most No. 1 songs in the Official Singles chart history to 19.
We know Asake produces hit records, ‘Mr Money With The Vibe’, ‘Work Of Art’, and ‘Lungu Boy’ have made that evident. Back to the question, ‘Is It Too Early To Say Asake Owns the Music Scene This Year’, the aforementioned achievements might just be a drop in the ocean. The conversation now is about Asake’s influence because right on the heels of records set and broken by ‘M$NEY’ is “Chanel”.
“Chanel” by Blaqbonez, featuring Asake arrived barely weeks after ‘M$NEY’, yet is positioned to debut at No. 1 on the Official Nigeria Top 100 chart. If it eventually debuts at No. 1, it would become Blaqbonez’s first-ever No. 1 song despite his songs consistently reaching the Top Ten bracket. Before now, Blaqbonez’s highest-charting record remained “Bling,” which peaked at No. 3 back in 2023. Outside of that, his catalogue has largely lived within the mid and lower regions of the Top Ten.“Back In Uni” and “Despacito” both peaked at No. 5, “Louder” reached No. 6, while records like “ACL”, “Like Ice Spice” and “Follow Her” each peaked at No. 8. “HALLELUJAH” and “NYEM EGO” climbed to No. 9, while “Everlasting Taker” settled at No. 10.
History is about to repeat itself as the last time Asake featured on a song with one of his old schoolmates from Obafemi Awolowo University, “Bandana” with FireboyDML debuted at No. 66 before reaching a peak at No. 1. Today, “Bandana” is a 7x-certified Platinum record with over 109 million on-demand streams.
Although it may be too early in the year to say Asake owns the music scene in 2026, if an Asake song at No. 1 eventually gets replaced by another Asake-assisted song at No. 1, then the answer may be sitting right in front of us. With a potential 20th No. 1 entry on the Official Singles chart in sight, isn't that already telling of Asake’s mastery of leading charts, pulling unbelievable streaming numbers, and setting records?
