The Top 20 of the most listened to artists of the past year leaves no room for doubt: male and French-speaking rappers are, very clearly, the artists most acclaimed by the French public. This is revealed by the results of French musical production in 2022, revealed this Tuesday by the National Union of Phonographic Publishing (Snep).
Among the 10 most listened to artists last year, all are men, nine are French-speaking and seven are rappers. The podium is occupied by Jul, Ninho and Orelsan (in that order), followed by PNL and Lomepal who close the Top 5. Johnny Hallyday, in sixth position, is the only artist dead in the Top 20.
underrepresented women
The first international singer, the Canadian The Weeknd, ranks 10th in this ranking. Only three other non-French-speaking artists managed to break into the Top 20: Queen (11th), Imagine Dragons (12th) and British superstar Ed Sheeran (twenty).
You have to go back to post 14 to find the first woman (angela). farmer mylene16, is the only other representative of the fairer sex who keeps him company.
Rap accounts for more than half of the top 200 best-selling albums
The Top 20 best-selling albums of 2022 paint a similar picture: 17 albums by French-speaking artists, 11 by rappers. Another woman manages to prevail between Angèle and Mylène Farmer: it is Clara Luciani, thanks to her album Heart.
The genres are diversifying in the Top 200, since the category “rap and urban music” represents only 57%, that is, the same, more than half. In terms of total music consumption, it occupies only 34% of plays.
A French exception
This trend, although it has been confirmed over the years, is not new: already in 2018, the Top 10 was completely French-speaking and largely occupied by rap or R&B artists: Dadju, Gims, Orelsan, Damso or even Soprano. . Urban music occupied 48% of the Top 200 records, 9 points less than in 2022.
Snep points out that this tendency to consume local is typically French: according to the report, France is “number 1 in Europe in listening to the local repertoire (…) all musical styles combined.”
Source: BFM TV
