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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Entertainment
Ben Beaumont-Thomas

Kate Bush earns first ever US Top 10 hit with Running Up That Hill

Kate Bush performing Running Up That Hill in 1985.
New heights … Kate Bush performing Running Up That Hill in 1985. Photograph: United Archives GmbH/Alamy

Kate Bush has earned her first ever US Top 10 hit with Running Up That Hill, 37 years after it was released.

The song is a key plot point in the new series of Netflix’s supernatural drama Stranger Things, and has exploded in popularity since the show debuted on 27 May. It is now at No 8 in the US, and reached the same position in the UK singles chart last Friday.

Running Up That Hill reached No 30 in the US when it was first released in 1985, her highest chart placing there until now.

It is currently the second-most played song globally on Spotify and Apple Music, behind Harry Styles’s As It Was and Future’s Wait For U respectively.

In the UK charts’ midweek sales update on Sunday, it had risen to No 2 behind Styles to put it in strong contention for the No 1 spot this Friday.

In a statement on her website, Bush said the song’s resurgence is “really exciting”, adding that it “is being given a whole new lease of life by the young fans who love the show – I love it too!”

Aside from Christmas songs which go back into the charts each year, it’s rare for an old song to re-enter the US Top 10. The last time was Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody reaching No 2 in 1992 after it was included in Wayne’s World, though Fleetwood Mac grazed the Top 10 with Dreams in 2020 after it was used on a viral TikTok video.

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