Take the trip down memory lane as Shazam celebrates its 20th anniversary! The charm of the song recognition application has played a vital role in allowing local and rising artists to expand. So now, it invites fans to reminisce the beginning of Shazam with an exclusively curated playlist on Apple Music.
Shazam’s 2002 launch in the UK enabled it to identify songs using mobile devices. Users at the time could identify songs by dialling “2580” on their phones and holding it up as the music played. Then, they were sent an SMS message after telling them the song title and the artist’s name.
Shazam’s remarkable breakthroughs and firsts with talents globally make up its two-decade history, and its charts have also become a barometer for unexpected cultural moments. For example, the significance of Kate Bush’s 1985 song “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)” in “Stranger Things” resulted in an all-time high for the singer’s number of Shazams, and the song occupied the top spot on the Shazam Global Top 200 for ten days.
Nigerian artist, CKay, flourished when his 2021 song “Love Nwantiti (Remix)” became the second song to surpass one million Shazams in a week. In 2021, Shazam also played an essential part in helping to identify breaking like Masked Wolf whose song “Astronaut In The Ocean” was the most Shazamed track globally that year.
The special playlist from Apple Music features hits that reflect music fans across the globe over the past two decades, such as the first track to reach 10 million Shazams – Gotye’s “Somebody That I Used To Know” featuring Kimbra – and the most Shazamed song of all time with 41 million Shazams, Tones and I’s “Dance Monkey”. Check it out here!
Anis Sharina contributed to this article.
