The excitement of the 2026 FIFA North America World Cup final halftime show shook the music charts.
Billboard reported on the 21st (local time) citing Luminate data that streaming numbers for songs performed at the final halftime show on the 19th surged across the board. The lingering effect of the stage that heated up the New York New Jersey Stadium was directly transmitted to the music market.
The most notable achievement was undoubtedly BTS's 'Dynamite.' The day after BTS took the halftime show stage as a complete group and sang this song, streaming numbers increased 13% from the previous day, recording 160,000 streams. It was a moment that once again impressed the global audience with K-pop's presence on the world's biggest sports event stage.
The song with the largest increase was Justin Bieber's 'Everything Hallelujah.' Thanks to Bieber's passionate performance on stage with his guitar, the song's streaming surged 34% from the previous day, recording 130,000 streams. The official tournament theme song 'Die Die' by Shakira and Burna Boy saw streaming increase 25% on the final day, reaching 979,000, while Madonna's 'Music' recorded 33,000, up 6%.
Separate from the halftime show, the most dramatic comeback story created by this World Cup belongs to someone else. British rock legend Oasis's 'Wonderwall' made a comeback to the Billboard Hot 100 for the first time in 30 years, reaching number 27. This is the first time the song has appeared on the Hot 100 chart since 1996.
'Wonderwall' was re-examined as it became England's unofficial national team anthem at the tournament. Particularly, after England's 4-2 victory over Croatia in their first group match on the 17th of last month, players and thousands of fans sang the song together, drawing worldwide attention. U.S. streaming numbers that week surged 73% from the previous week to 8.7 million, and radio broadcast frequency also increased 41%, recording 2.2 million plays.
Noel Gallagher of Oasis said in an interview with local media, "This song belongs to everyone," expressing his emotion as a "magical moment between fans and players." The World Cup once again proved that it is a true festival that unites not just football but also music.
