PNAU surges into Spotify’s global Top 100 Artists club

Australian dance act PNAU has this week made it into an elite group of artists who are generating the most streams on Spotify.

The streams are largely originating from the group’s ‘Cold Heart’ track featuring Elton John and Dua Lipa – currently #7 on the Spotify Global Chart – however band member Nick Littlemore told The Music Network that fans are now going deeper and discovering more of PNAU’s back catalogue.

PNAU was this week sitting at #88 on Spotify, with over 27 million monthly listeners.

Littlemore told TMN a combination of factors had seen ‘Cold Heart’ – a track featuring the amalgamated lyrics of four songs from the 1970s to the 1990s – go off globally, and it’s not just the Sir Elton John effect.

“I think it’s probably the combination,” he said. “Obviously Dua Lipa carries such a weight right now in the world, and it was just the right time for the right record. And it’s not an overdone record… It’s just ignited people in a nostalgic way, and I guess we’ve all had a lot of time to reflect over the past 18 months, and a song like this brings up all this nostalgia of our youth and of times long gone.”

Having the song act as a springboard for PNAU to reach millions of listeners is ‘surreal’, he said, noting the group is now being mentioned in the same breath as other world-leading artists.

“We feel incredibly grateful and it’s a privilege to work with Sir Elton and Bernie [Taupin], and any chance we get and to have Dua Lipa grace our record, it’s a dream come true,” he added.

The song went #1 in the UK and #2 here in Australia. At time of writing, it’s climbed to #15 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in the US.

So, what next? Littlemore said he wants to take this moment in time, this achievement and attention, and use it to nurture, spotlight and grow other artists who may not have had such opportunities yet.

“It is wonderful to be considered in this Top 100, and the main thing we really want to do, and I think it’s a lesson we’ve learned from Elton, is to lift up other artists on our shoulders now and highlight interesting artists from diverse backgrounds and see if we can help other people reach great heights,” Littlemore told TMN.

This is the driving force and guiding light for Lab78, the label founded by Littlemore and fellow PNAU member, Peter Mayes.

This includes working with artists such as Sumner, Djanaba, Vlossom and Ivy Rose, as well as Brain Flowers, a trans-Pacific collaboration between Littlemore himself and Toby Anagnostis.

“We want to find artists that the majors would overlook and we want to develop them, something that you don’t see so much of these days in the majors. Often you’ll develop up an artist to one or two singles and if it doesn’t go well, you drop them. We’re looking to develop careers rather than flashes in the pan,” Littlemore explained.

PNAU will be returning home to Australia at the end of the year for shows including the For Shore Festival in Sandstone Point on January 8, 2022, as well as the Wine Machine festival in Canberra and the Hunter Valley.