TikTok’s digital music promotion and distribution platform SoundOn has been making a UK chart impact in recent months.
Now it could be about to secure its biggest hit to date with Show Me Love by WizTheMC and Bees & Honey (Bamboo Artists/SoundOn). As well as surging into the Top 20, where it has spent two weeks at No.14 on the main singles chart, the track by the rapper and songwriter has spent a fortnight as the No.1 independent single.
Weekly consumption for Show Me Love was up 6.5% to 19,274 units (Official Charts Company), based on around 2.3 million streams in the UK in the past week. It has consumption of 74,299 units since its release in February.
Show Me Love is the only independent track in the Top 20. By some measurements, SoundOn can claim to have the only track by a fully independent artist in the Top 40 (if you exclude distributors owned by major labels and Adele, who is no longer on an independent even if the catalogue track undergoing a revival is released via an indie).
SoundOn helps artists and labels to share and promote their music to TikTok's global community, and to all major music streaming platforms worldwide. It has seen recent chart success with tracks including Pink Lemonade (Str8 Reload) by LeoStayTrill & Mr Reload It (No.56 peak, 122,503 units) and Abracadabra by Wes Nelson feat. Craig David (No.37, 90,940).
Show Me Love, the latest SoundOn success story, is infused with Amapiano influences. WizTheMC was born in Germany and raised in South Africa.
Show Me Love became an instant hit with the TikTok community, who are captioning it as a song of the summer. The track now has over 2.7 billion video views and 1.6 million creations on TikTok, as well as 74m streams on Spotify (more than 140m across all platforms).
In the UK, by late March the track had seen over 200,000 video creations and 310m views on TikTok, and over 9.25m streams across all platforms. The track has also been added to the B list on Radio 1, as well as on Radio 1Xtra and Kiss.
WizTheMC has 12.8m monthly listeners on Spotify, where the track entered the Spotify Global Top 50 last week and is on Spotify's Today's Top Hits playlist. The track also made No.11 in Germany and is on the Billboard Global Top 200 at No.103.
Nichal Sethi, Head of SoundOn EMEA, spoke to Music Week last year following his promotion, outlining his ambitions for the service. It has since been nominated in the Label/Artist Services category at the Music Week Awards 2025.
“It's so great that TikTok has helped propel an amazing independent artist like WizTheMC not only into the German and UK charts, but also into the charts in 24 other countries, making it a truly global hit,” said Sethi of the latest chart success for an artist with SoundOn. “That Bamboo and WizTheMC trusted SoundOn to make this track such a big success is testament to the SoundOn team's growing – and well-deserved – reputation for breaking new ground, creating hits and supporting artists."
Josh Mateer, head of A&R EMEA, SoundOn, said: "When I first heard the track I thought it was a hit, then when it streamed over one million on its opening weekend, I knew something was connecting on a global level. From day one, the team has worked tirelessly to continue to push the boundaries of reaching the right global audiences for the song and there are still no signs of it slowing down any time soon."
Leander Kirschner, CEO of Bamboo Artists, said: "Hitimpulse, the producers behind the track, showed me the song when we were in LA at the same time. I instantly felt this was a song we wanted to release via Bamboo Artists and we started working with Wiz and the team. Then, we reached out to Josh [Mateer[ and got SoundOn on board as our global distribution partner, which was the best decision we could have made for the track."
Here, Nichal Sethi takes Music Week inside the campaign for WizTheMC and shares his ambitions for SoundOn…
How is this track blowing up particularly in the UK, but also globally? How is SoundOn helping with any organic TikTok virality?
“First and foremost, the track is a great piece of music, but what we noticed early on is that – despite the track being released in February – the UK audience at the start of March started creating a lipsync trend with captions centred around the weather and how the track was getting them ready for summer. The SoundOn team picked up on this early and started running campaigns centred around this, building on the virality and the sentiment of bad weather in the UK and the good weather to come."
How did SoundOn come to work with Wiz and Bamboo Artists on the track?
“The SoundOn team have been close collaborators of Bamboo Artists on an ongoing basis. Other lighthouse moments in this collaboration include last summer's hit record Around The World from Niklas Dee.”
What services is SoundOn providing, how are you helping to drive streaming on DSPs?
“SoundOn's ability to provide strategic direction on content for its artists, while optimising the way we run creator campaigns, was the primary way we supported and promoted this track. We made sure that both Wiz and the creators who used the sound were creating great content with the song that we knew everyone on TikTok would love.”
We made sure that both Wiz and the creators who used the sound were creating great content with the song that everyone on TikTok would love
Nichal Sethi
How significant is the impact so far particularly for an independently released artist?
“The impact has been hugely significant, increasing Wiz's followers on TikTok from 38,000 to 411,000 [+981%] and Spotify Monthly listeners from 383,000 to 12.5m [+3,436%]. Furthermore, he's currently sitting at No.1 in the OCC for independent singles, and as an artist he is now being recognised globally, being in the charts in over 26 territories.”
What are the ambitions for the track at this point? How will you maintain momentum, and are you planning any further releases, either new versions or new music?
“We always strive to drive things as far as they can go. Right now the track is a UK top 20, and a German Top 10. So our ambition is for a UK Top 10 and a German Top 5. When the track was a Global 100 on Spotify, our ambition was to get it to 50. Today it's No.38, so our ambition is 20. We've been playlisted across key UK radio too, and hope to move from B list to A list accordingly. We can't give too much away on features, remixes or collabs just yet, but the demand is definitely there globally.”
Given the impact so far, what does it say about SoundOn's ability to create hits with independent artists? How is the service establishing itself with a range of artists?
“The fact that SoundOn was the only distributor in the UK Top 40 with an independent artist last week speaks volumes about the ability of SoundOn to drive success for independent artists. With 2024 delivering multiple top 40s, spanning pop, hip-hop and dance, SoundOn is proving that it is a home for a wide variety of independent artists, no matter if it's one of your first ever releases, like LeoStayTrill's Pink Lemonade or Charlie Jeer's Her Eyes. or you've had success in the past as an established artist, such as M Huncho & Potter Payper's 36 Hours.”
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