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Chart Beat

Billboard Canadian Hot 100 First-Timers: Texas Songwriter Livingston Debuts With 'Shadow'

The rising artist and TikTok creator lands on two Canadian charts for the first time this week, with his album A Hometown Odyssey also debuting at No. 92 on the Canadian Albums chart.

Livingston

Livingston

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Texas singer-songwriter Livingston is making a splash on the Canadian charts this week.

The 21-year-old has landed on the Canadian Hot 100 for the first time with his single "Shadow" debuting at No. 100. The ominous single, which finds Livingston warning about the dangers we pose to ourselves, shows off his belt and falsetto over keyboard stabs and jittery percussion. "Shadow" is also performing well on iTunes charts and has gathered over a million YouTube views since its Mar. 7 release.



Livingston's new album, A Hometown Odyssey, also found a spot on the Canadian Albums chart this week, debuting at No. 92. Livingston first gained popularity as a teenager on TikTok during the pandemic and signed shortly thereafter with Elektra records. His websites states that he "reclaimed his independence" from his major label deal a year ago, and Hometown Odyssey is independently released.

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Independence seems to suit Livingston well. Though he isn't charting on the U.S. Hot 100 or Billboard 200 yet, sometimes rising American artists — like Benson Boone — perform better in Canada before gaining steam south of the border.

Elsewhere on the charts, Ariana Grande is dominating this week, with 11 new entries on the Canadian Hot 100 following the release of her latest record, Eternal Sunshine, which took the top spot on the Canadian Albums chart. That said, her melancholy dance track "We Can't Be Friends (Wait For Your Love)" — which landed at No. 1 in the U.S. — couldn't unseat Benson Boone from the top spot in Canada, charting at No. 3 here.

In terms of Canadians artists, Ryan Gosling returns to the Canadian Hot 100 this week with "I'm Just Ken" re-entering the chart at No. 96 after Gosling's highly entertaining — and impressively precise — Oscars performance. OVO signee 4Batz made a big jump from No. 75 to No. 14 for "Act II: Date @ 8" with a new remix from Drake sending it up the charts.

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LU KALA's "Hotter Now" falls two spots to No. 48. Owen Riegling's "Old Dirt Roads" is up two spots to No. 75, Preston Pablo's "Dance Alone" holds steady at No. 76, Josh Ross' "Ain't Doin Jack" drops to No. 77, and Alexander Stewart's "I Wish You Cheated" is at No. 87.

Check out the full chart here.

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Théodora

Concerts

Francos de Montréal 2025 Highlights: One Language, A Thousand Faces

From June 13 to 22, Montreal transformed into a vibrant capital of Francophone music. From French rapper Théodora to local rockers Corridor, this year’s acts showed that the French language, far from static, is an endless playground.

In Montréal, June rhymes with music, and Francos de Montréal are the perfect proof. Once again this year, the festival celebrated the full richness of the French language in its most lively, vibrant, and above all, varied forms. While French served as a common thread, every artist inhabited it in their own unique way – with their accent, life experience, expressions, imagery and struggles. Between urban poetry, edgy rock and hybrid Creole, Francos 2025 showed that French has never been so expansive – or popular.

What Francos 2025 proved is that the French language is no fixed monument. It’s alive, inventive, plural. It can be slammed by a poet from Saint-Denis, chanted by an afro-futurist rapper, whispered by an indie band, or hammered out in Montréal neighbourhood slang. From Congolese expressions to Québec regionalisms, from playful anglicisms to Creole nods, the French language danced in every form this year. It was « full bon »!

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