Shawn Mendes, 15-Year-Old Vine Celebrity, Makes Record-Breaking Debut On Billboard Hot 100

Bradley Stern | July 2, 2014 1:02 pm

Aussie femcee (and target of possible Nicki Minaj non-shade shade) Iggy Azalea just notched the longest run for a female rapper in Hot 100 chart history with “Fancy (feat. Charli XCX).” A historic feat fit for celebration, no doubt — but there’s a second record-breaking entry from this week’s Billboard Hot 100 that merits attention, if only because of the way it happened: 15-year-old Canadian singer Shawn Mendes just broke into the Top 25 of the Hot 100 without a lick of radio promotion, making him the youngest artist in history to debut in the Top 25 with a debut single — all because of his 2.7 million (and growing) fan base on Vine.

After picking up tens of thousands of fans with his covers of songs (and, for those who can bear to wait it out beyond 6 seconds, entire songs on YouTube!), Shawn caught the attention of Warner Music’s Andrew Gertler (now his manager) who, after passing off his videos, helped sign Shawn to Island Records in May. All that has led to this: “Life Of The Party,” a guitar-led, sweetly sincere us-against-the-world, YOLO-tastic power ballad that — as we reported last week — sold nearly 150,000 copies in its debut week without any radio promotion, landing him at #24 on this week’s Hot 100.

From Billboard: “The ballad starts with nearly all its chart points from sales, as it launches at No. 5 on Digital Songs with 148,000 first-week downloads sold. While no official radio promotion is planned for the song, according to Island president David Massey, 25 of the approximately 1,200 radio stations that report to the Hot 100 sampled the song last week, including adult pop WWFS (Fresh 102.7) New York. Streaming also accounts for a fraction of the song’s Hot 100 points; the release of its official lyric video on Monday (June 30) could aid its fortunes on next week’s charts.” Read on to find out more about the record-breaking debut.

“Life Of The Party” reportedly marks the largest opening week for an act’s debut since Phillip Phillips‘ debut single in 2012 and makes Shawn the youngest artist to debut in the Top 25 since Justin Bieber‘s “One Less Lonely Girl” in 2009, and the youngest artist to debut in Top 25 with their debut single…ever. Now, how’s that for the power of social media?

Is Shawn about to become the Justin Bieber of a new generation? Let us know what you think in the comments below.

Get an eyeful of even more pop music coverage, from artist interviews to exclusive performances, on Idolator’s YouTube channel.

Tags: