Four weeks away from 2021, 24kGoldn decided to end the year on a high note. The Bay Area rapper has had a banner 2020, scoring a spot in this year’s XXL Freshman Class and hitting the top of the Billboard Hot 100 with “Mood,” his collab with iann dior. Instead of resting on his success, the 20-year-old hip hop sensation has dropped “COCO,” a new track featuring another 2020 chart-topper (and 2019 XXL Freshman) DaBaby.
Similar to “Mood,” “Coco” sees 24kGoldn irritated by a relationship. “Oh my God, why is shawty tryna test me?” he raps, per Genius. “Too turnt up in the back of the jetstream (Yeah) / Can’t be cuffed, but she tryin’ to arrest me / Lyin’ to impress me, dyin’ to forget me.” That theme – ladies who wouldn’t give Goldn the time of day when he was starting out, but are suddenly his biggest fans now that he’s famous – returns in DaBaby’s verse. “Told her don’t call my phone with all that nice sh-t (Oh no) / Double C’s on the belt correlate the ice hit (Bling, bling) / Gettin’ to know me right now is highly unlikely / ‘Cause I still remember the days when people like you ain’t like me, b-tch.
Even if “COCO” doesn’t replicate the success of their previously released songs, consider it a victory lab for 24kGoldn (Golden Landis Von Jones) and DaBaby (Jonathan Kirk). “Mood,” like Goldn’s 2019 hit “Valentino,” blew up on TikTok, and will act as the first single of his upcoming album, El Dorado. “Mood” first debuted at No. 84 on the Billboard Hot 100, and spent ten weeks climbing up to the No. 1 position in late October. It stayed there from Oct. 24 to Nov. 28, save for the one week where it was usurped by Ariana Grande’s “Positions.” It even got so big that J Balvin and Justin Bieber wanted some of the action, and they jumped on the remix.
In a year where longevity was not en vogue, having a song spend more than a week on top of the Hot 100 was an accomplishment in itself. It’s a feat that DaBaby was able to pull off with “Rockstar,” his collab with another Hot 100 chart-topper, Roddy Ricch. “Rockstar” snapped a five-week streak where the No. 1 spot was a revolving door. The Scotts, Doja Cat ft. Nicki Minaj, Ariana Grande ft. Justin Bieber, Megan Thee Stallion ft. Beyonce, and Lady Gaga ft. Ariana Grande passed around the No. 1 crown until DaBaby snatched it for himself. He held onto it for a couple of weeks before 6ix9ine secured his first No. 1 hit, thanks to the Barbz, before DaBaby took the top spot back.
When “Mood” hit the top of the Hot 100, it did more than certify 24kGoldn as the next big thing. It also marked a generational shift. At No. 2 was “Therefore I Am,” by Billie Eilish, and for the first time in history, the top 2 positions on the Hot 100 were occupied by artists born in the 2000s. Billie was born in 2001, and Goldn was born a year before that.
As big as 2020 was for 24kGoldn, the next year seems even more promising. “I’ve been working on my album, El Dorado,” he told Notion. “It’s my first album. I feel like I’m almost done with it. There are a couple more slots that I wanna fill, but when you have ten really good songs, it’s so hard to fill those last three, because if the new songs aren’t as good or better than the ten I’ve made before, I gotta trash them.”
“There [are] definitely songs I make that I love and it might not be a hit and I still put it out,” Goldn said when speaking to Cool Accidents in May. “I have something to say or a certain emotion or a feeling or a scenario that I want people to think of or feel when they’re listening to my music and a project that you’re shuffling on Spotify or Apple Music, but when it’s a hit, you just know. I don’t want to make any music that I myself wouldn’t enjoy listening to and I feel like the people feel that same way because the songs that I like the most the people like the most.”