Pink Floyd‘s first new song in 28 years arrives atop Billboard‘s Rock Digital Song Sales chart dated April 23.
Charity single “Hey Hey Rise Up,” which features vocalist Andriy Khlyvnyuk, starts with 10,200 downloads sold in the April 8-14 tracking week, according to Luminate, formerly MRC Data.
It’s Pink Floyd’s first No. 1 on Rock Digital Song Sales, which began in 2010. The band has appeared on the chart with three other titles: “Wish You Were Here” (No. 6 peak, May 2020), “Eclipse” (No. 24, September 2017) and “Another Brick in the Wall (Part II)” (No. 29, March 2012). The songs are originally from 1975, 1973 and 1979, respectively.
“Rise” also bows at No. 2 on the all-format Digital Song Sales chart, the band’s first appearance on the ranking, which began in 2004.
Concurrently, “Rise” starts at No. 22 on the multi-metric Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart, which launched in 2009. It’s Pink Floyd’s second appearance, following “Wish” (No. 9, May 2020). In addition to its download count, “Rise” drew 1 million official U.S. streams in its opening tracking week.
“Rise” also enters the Billboard Global Excl. U.S. and Billboard Global 200 charts at Nos. 138 and 165, respectively.
“Rise” was released in support of Ukraine amid Russia’s invasion of the country. It’s based on the 1914 Ukrainian song “Oh, the Red Viburnum in the Meadow.” Khlyvnyuk is the Ukrainian-born lead singer of BoomBox.
“My daughter-in-law is Ukrainian,” Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour recently told Rolling Stone of the new song’s origin. “It just struck me that here we are, with our name [Pink Floyd] and this platform, and we could use it more.”
Proceeds from “Rise” benefit the Ukraine Humanitarian Relief Fund.
The track marks the first new material that Pink Floyd — which formed in London in 1965 and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996 — has recorded since the sessions for 1994’s The Division Bell. The band’s 1973 classic The Dark Side of the Moon (which includes “Eclipse” as its closing track) has spent a record 962 weeks on the Billboard 200, most recently this February. It led the list dated April 28, 1973.
