Beyoncé debuts at No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart and makes history

Originally Published: 20 FEB 24 16:09 ET

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN

(CNN) — Beyoncé’s new song “Texas Hold ‘Em” debuted in the top spot of Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart on Tuesday, the publication announced.

Beyoncé’s other new country song “16 Carriages” ranks No. 9 on the chart.

Marking her first-ever No. 1 single on the country charts, Beyoncé becomes the only other solo woman with no accompanying artists to achieve the feat next to Taylor Swift, whose songs “Love Story (Taylor’s Version)” and “All Too Well (Taylor’s Version)” hit No. 1 in 2021, according to Billboard.

She is also the first woman to have topped both the Hot Country and Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs charts since the lists began in 1958. Morgan Wallen, Justin Bieber, Billy Ray Cyrus and Ray Charles are the only other artists to have reached No. 1 on both charts.

Both “16 Carriages” and “Texas Hold ‘Em” were released on Feb. 11 after Beyoncé teased the release of new music in a surprise Super Bowl ad for Verizon, accompanied with eye-popping visualizer videos on YouTube.

The ad spot, titled “Can’t B Broken,” featured “Veep” actor Tony Hale challenging Beyoncé to break the cellular service company’s 5G capabilities, and she accepted the challenge in glorious fashion.

At the very end of the spot, the star is heard saying, “Ok, they ready. Drop the new music,” after she is seen going through various outlandish attempts to “break” Verizon’s network.

Moments later on her official website, the Grammy-winner and Texas-native posted a clip of “Texas Hold ‘Em” and full versions of both songs were then released on music streaming platforms, along with the announcement that her eighth solo studio album “Renaissance Act II” would be released on March 29.

Beyoncé’s illustrative cowgirl-inspired fashion choices at recent appearances had offered clues of the her next sonic phase, the reality of which marks an exciting development in the music industry as a whole.

And while the singer’s country music era may come as a surprise to many who are still dancing and singing along to her 2022 more disco-centric “Renaissance” album, Beyoncé loyalists – known as the Beyhive – have come to expect change and evolution from their Queen Bey.

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