Tones And I Creates History as ‘Dance Monkey’ Clocks 3 Billion Spotify Streams

Tones And I has three billion reasons to smile.

The Australian singer and songwriter crushes a new streaming milestone on Spotify, as “Dance Monkey” passes three billion streams on the digital music platform.

Tones, a one-time busker, is the first female artist to climb that mountain.

In the small hours of Thursday morning (Feb. 29), “Dance Monkey” shimmied into new terrain as it ticked past its big target, joining a small, elite collection of hits.

Just eight songs have reached three billion streams on Spotify, the market-leading streaming platform. All are recorded by male solo artists from North America or the U.K., with the exception of Tones (the all-time leader is The Weeknd’s “Blinding Lights” with 4.092 billion streams). 

Since her career exploded with 2019’s “Dance Monkey,” Tones (real name Toni Watson) has made a habit of going where no other female solo artist has gone before.

The award-winning single clocked 24 non-consecutive weeks at No. 1 on the ARIA Chart, an all time record, and led the Official U.K. Singles Chart for 11 weeks, a record for a solo female artist.

In the U.S., “Dance Monkey” crashed the Billboard Hot 100, landing at No. 5 and securing for Tones top spot on Billboard’s Hot 100 Songwriters Chart.  The last single written solely by a female artist to crack the top 5 on the Hot 100 was Whitney Houston’s version of Dolly Parton’s “I Will Always Love You,” which reached No. 3 in March 2012 — eight years earlier — following Houston’s death.

Written by Tones and recorded with Brisbane producer Konstantin Kersting, the song has topped charts in at 30 territories, it cracked APRA AMCOS’ The 1,000,000,000 List in record time, established the all-time mark for Shazams, its official music video has passed 2 billion plays on YouTube, and awards — enough of them to fill treasure chest.

As “Dance Monkey” shuffles along, Tones is ticking a bunch of boxes.

Currently, she’s strutting her stuff on the biggest stages around the country with Pink, a route that will take in 20 stadium shows; a sync is locked in for the 2024 Paris Olympic Games; a pair of feature film syncs are in motion; and Tones is prepping for the release of her not-yet-announced second album.

The Rolling Stone AU/NZ cover star is the opening act for Pink’s Summer Carnival trek, which, when it wraps up March 24 with the second of two nights at Townsville’s Country Bank Stadium, is predicted to shift 900,000 tickets across Australia and New Zealand, a box-office record for a solo female artist. Live Nation is producing the tour. 

TikTokers are on board in big numbers, turning Tones’ video of her Nana dancing on stage at a packed Marvel Stadium into a viral moment.

@tonesandi

What a beautiful moment. Thank you @GG McG for capturing it #fyp

♬ original sound – Tones And I

Earlier this month, Tones dropped the new cut “Dreaming,” which will appear on her next album, due out later this year and the followup to 2021’s Welcome to the Madhouse, which opened at No. 1 on the ARIA Chart.

Tones co-wrote “Dreaming” with Sam Nelson of X Ambassadors and co-produced alongside Nelson and Randy Belculfine.