Pre 2000s Artists in the Top 500 on Spotify

On Spotify, around 4/5 artists in the top 500 started their careers past the year 2000, can you name the bands and artists that have started their careers before this time?

Based on number of listeners 3rd of October, 2022

Grayed out artists released music prior to the 2000s but not as an offical album

This is not taken from any official list, this is data directly taken from my own research. Numbers change daily on Spotify.

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Last updated: October 5, 2022

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First submitted	February 25, 2021
Times taken	22,362
Average score	56.3%
Rating	4.78

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Listeners	Song	Artist(s)	Ranking
57,876,483	Yellow	Coldplay	9
52,901,342	Till I Collapse	Eminem	13
52,593,764	Rocket Man	Elton John	15
48,524,060	Hips Don't Lie	Shakira	27
39,347,385	Bohemian Rhapsody	Queen	46
36,715,683	...Baby One More Time	Britney Spears	53
35,207,253	Pump It	Black Eyed Peas	59
31,683,124	Smooth Criminal	Michael Jackson	73
31,305,819	Empire State of Mind	Jay-Z	76
31,138,478	Drop It Like It's Hot	Snoop Dogg	77
28,241,620	Babooshka	Kate Bush	100
27,974,463	A Milli	Lil Wayne	104
25,833,866	Let It Be	The Beatles	114
25,765,694	Californication	Red Hot Chili Peppers	115
24,562,309	Sweet Child O' Mine	Guns N' Roses	120
24,459,938	In the End	Linkin Park	121
24,383,811	Smells Like Teen Spirit	Nirvana	122
24,224,242	Highway to Hell	AC/DC	123
23,273,382	Nothing Else Matters	Metallica	135
23,043,442	Dancing Queen	ABBA	138
22,373,805	Dreams	Fleetwood Mac	146
22,330,700	DJ Got Us Fallin' In Love	Usher	149
21,697,845	Livin' On a Prayer	Bon Jovi	157
21,492,559	Basket Case	Green Day	160
20,395,778	Like a Virgin	Madonna	183
20,334,050	Start Me Up	The Rolling Stones	187
19,771,184	I Will Always Love You	Whitney Houston	198
19,697,696	Let's Get Loud	Jennifer Lopez	202
19,493,201	All I Want for Christmas is You	Mariah Carey	208
19,256,162	Por Amarte	Enrique Iglesias	212
19,127,991	Every Breath You Take	The Police	216
19,054,664	California Love	2Pac	220
18,502,387	Fortunate Son	Creedence Clearwater Revival	230
18,427,224	Piano Man	Billy Joel	233
18,161,610	Stayin' Alive	Bee Gees	239
18,136,707	Genie in a Bottle	Christina Aguilera	237
17,896,776	Get Lucky	Daft Punk	242
17,805,807	Creep	Radiohead	244
17,393,004	The Next Episode	Dr. Dre	250
17,309,023	Big Poppa	The Notorious B.I.G.	251
17,182,339	Sweet Emotion	Aerosmith	253
17,051,313	Hotel California	The Eagles	254
17,022,688	Sunday Bloody Sunday	U2	255
16,699,582	Suspicious Minds	Elvis Presley	264
16,631,932	Stairway To Heaven	Led Zeppelin	268
16,614,145	Ms. Jackson	Outkast	271
16,343,342	Everlong	Foo Fighters	277
16,194,502	In The Air Tonight	Phil Collins	284
16,117,235	Starman	David Bowie	288
16,114,839	Wonderwall	Oasis	289
15,866,266	September	Earth, Wind & Fire	298
15,837,806	Summer of '69	Bryan Adams	300
15,793,679	Don't Stop Believin'	Journey	302
15,665,093	Superstition	Stevie Wonder	305
15,532,757	Another Brick In The Wall	Pink Floyd	310
14,628,837	Waiting On The World To Change	John Mayer	334
14,588,385	Everybody Wants To Rule The World	Tears For Fears	337
14,404,404	Africa	TOTO	343
14,160,574	Livin' la Vida Loca	Ricky Martin	349
14,075,744	Losing My Religion	R.E.M.	354
14,053,272	Drops of Jupiter (Tell Me)	Train	357
13,921,759	Sultans of Swing	Dire Straits	361
13,850,935	All The Small Things	Blink-182	364
13,727,195	Three Little Birds	Bob Marley & The Wailers	369
13,555,758	I Want It That Way	Backstreet Boys	371
13,411,557	Boombastic	Shaggy	373
13,355,140	Dancing In the Dark	Bruce Springsteen	377
13,217,755	Pretty Fly (For A White Guy)	The Offspring	383
13,026,688	Oye Mi Amor	Mana	395
12,974,484	Rock And Roll All Nite	KISS	398
12,897,206	Ain't No Mountain High Enough	Marvin Gaye	402
12,868,729	Toxicity	System Of A Down	403
12,853,424	Faith	George Michael	406
12,712,532	Take On Me	a-ha	411
12,530,965	Rockstar	Nickelback	421
12,383,464	Friday I'm In Love	The Cure	429
12,268,567	It Was A Good Day	Ice Cube	433
12,235,618	Sweet Home Alabama	Lynyrd Skynyrd	436
12,174,271	Uprising	Muse	439
12,118,249	Zombie	The Cranberries	442
11,929,440	Island In The Sun	Weezer	452
11,857,784	Walking on Broken Glass	Annie Lennox	455
11,753,979	Man! I Feel Like a Woman!	Shania Twain	461
11,718,770	Girls Just Want to Have Fun	Cyndi Lauper	463
11,395,269	Fly Me To the Moon	Frank Sinatra	481
11,390,405	Rock You Like A Hurricane	Scorpions	482
11,263,747	Say My Name	Destiny's Child	491
11,241,101	Iris	The Goo Goo Dolls	492
11,229,257	You Make My Dreams Come True	Hall and Oates	493
11,129,875	My Heart Will Go On	Celine Dion	500

Level 82

Sep 28, 2021

I like the quiz idea, but could use genres as an extra hint. Also, maybe go over the decades once more to check for typos? I can tell you that e.g. Metallica definitely had some albums in the 80's while the hint reads 90's. In fact, some people might even argue that they haven't released an album since the 80's...

Level 75

Sep 28, 2021

Maybe a specific album would be better instead of genres

+14

Level 81

Nov 2, 2021

Some of the song choices seemed a bit obscure, but great fun quiz :)

Level 78

Nov 2, 2021

The picture you've used for the quiz is of a statue at Liverpool's Albert Dock, and is of Liverpool musician Billy Fury, not Elvis as I assume you intended.

Level ∞

Nov 2, 2021

That's funny. Changed it to an actual Elvis statue.

Level 67

Nov 2, 2021

Omg really LOL

Level 76

Nov 3, 2021

I don't think Uprising came until 2009.

Level 67

Nov 3, 2021

Nor was Empire State of Mind, Rockstar or Drops of Jupiter. I wasn't trying to do songs just from before the 90s. I just tried picking something known from each artist.

Level 74

Nov 3, 2021

How is Prince missing? Shocking

Level 67

Nov 3, 2021

Yeah Prince is very close to the mark, just sitting around 9.68 million as of today

Level 85

Nov 4, 2021

And also surprised Van Halen is as low as they are, even below the Scorpions?

Level 63

Nov 12, 2021

Prince famously kept a lot of his music off of streaming platforms for a very long time, even posthumously.

Level 47

Nov 14, 2021

How is Phil Collins on it but Genesis are not? Seriously?

Level 24

Apr 27, 2022

In the Air Tonight is huge.

Level 74

Nov 5, 2021

I can't find any lists that match your rankings. What's your source?

Level 73

Nov 5, 2021

Spotify, probably. They show the listeners of each artist on their profile and the rankings of those in the top 500. Since the data was taken a month ago and the listener counts update daily, you won't be able to see the exact same numbers again, although it should (mostly) be pretty close.

Level 67

Nov 7, 2021

Yeah there's no source I just have a sheet of names I will check every update. Since it changes everyday it's hard to keep track. Last time I checked only one artist was missing from the top 500 last time I checked.

Level 63

Nov 9, 2021

I'm surprised that Elton John is ranked #2 on this list. I know the movie Rocketman came out like 2 years ago and then there's the Lion King but still surprising, especially when I look at lower entries.

Level 62

Nov 12, 2021

He's just released a new album and had a number 1 single in the UK (with Dua Lipa) so his new stuff has propelled him up the rankings.

Level 58

Nov 12, 2021

Nice quiz, I would accept SOAD for System of a Down though

Level 71

Nov 13, 2021

Seconded

Level 68

Nov 26, 2021

Same remark here :)

Level 87

Nov 12, 2021

So like me...I got one only 28 % get (Toxicity), but missed one 85% guess (All I want for Christmas...). ;)

Level 80

Nov 12, 2021

I'm going to use this list for some music listening today. There's some really good songs there.

Level 71

Nov 12, 2021

If the song is Islands in the Stream, then you should also accept Kenny Rogers, since the song is actually a duet.

Level 67

Nov 13, 2021

As much as I love Roger's music, that would defeat the purpose. Besides this is probably the most famous song that Dolly was in besides maybe Jolene.

Level 31

Nov 13, 2021

I actually got Dolly from typing it as the answer to I Will Always Love You. XD

Level 79

Mar 21, 2022

Same lol

Level 73

Nov 13, 2021

instructions are a little confusing - it says 'decade is based on what decade the album came out...' but there's no reference in the quiz itself to decade, i'm guessing this was removed? in which case please change the hint to explain how the song was chosen for each artist. and i'm still unclear on why some are already filled in.

(also please accept eurhythmics, given you accept eurythmics?)

Level 71

Nov 13, 2021

But Eurythmics is the band name and Eurhythmics is not/ could still be added as a common typo I suppose.

Level 49

Nov 14, 2021

Nice quiz! Easy 5 points for me

Level 57

Nov 15, 2021

Surprised not to see Daft Punk on here

Level 63

Nov 16, 2021

I feel like now that they've split up people will listen to their old stuff a lot because it's kind of nostalgic. I've seen a video about their usage of samples recently and I'm impressed.

Level 55

Nov 17, 2021

Can you please also put in the date they were made, if you can?

Level 67

Nov 17, 2021

Are you asking when they entered the top 500 or what date I compiled the data from?

Level 55

Jun 15, 2022

I kept retyping TLC for Creep thinking I was someone misspelling 3 letters. Oh, Radiohead, duh. 🤣

Level 65

Jun 22, 2022

Might have to add the legend Kate Bush now. Haha

Level 67

Jun 23, 2022

Holy crap, she definitely might make it once I revisit it again in October

Level 89

Jul 28, 2022

NGL, absolutely floored about the love for Nickelback.

Level 65

Oct 6, 2022

I love torturing my wife with playing and singing Photograph. I think it's so bad that it is good, but she disagrees.

Level 78

Oct 6, 2022

The band is not "The Eagles". It is just "Eagles". They made this official for legal or tax reasons.

Level 67

Oct 6, 2022

And nobody really cares

Level 65

Oct 7, 2022

Nice one.Thank you.

Level 67

Oct 8, 2022

Thank you :)

Level 80

Oct 13, 2022

In some cases, the song listed might account for most if not all of the plays

Level 36

Apr 20, 2023

Disappointed that Rick Astley wasn't on this list

Level 45

May 27, 2023

This is such a great quiz!!! I was kicking myself at the end, I can hum the tunes of almost all of these to memory but I guess I have no mind for artists!

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