Tame Impala Radio Songs Chart: Dracula Hits No. 1 as Loser Debuts

Two songs, one week, 48 places apart

For most of its 15-year run, Tame Impala has been a fixture of festival lineups and alternative radio, not the all-format airplay charts. That changed decisively on Billboard's Radio Songs chart dated Sept. 26, 2026. In that same week, the Kevin Parker project landed both its first No. 1 and its second-ever entry on the ranking. "Dracula," Parker's collaboration with Blackpink's Jennie, rose one spot to the top, while "Loser" entered at No. 49 on the 50-position chart21. These two songs are the only Tame Impala tracks ever to appear on the Radio Songs chart, so the act's whole history there now sits at the very top and very bottom of one list21.

The image is neat, but it shows something more significant than a chart oddity. Both songs come from Deadbeat, an album that many critics treated as a step down. A year after its release, it has produced the biggest American radio presence Tame Impala has ever had. The project is also moving into a phase where its singles are competing with each other.

How "Dracula" got to the top

The numbers for "Dracula" are consistent across outlets. The song reached 62.6 million in U.S. airplay audience during the Sept. 11–17 tracking week, according to Luminate, and it was the first Radio Songs No. 1 for both Tame Impala and Jennie1413. In the same chart week it climbed back to No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100, matching the peak that had already given both artists their first top 10 there1418.

The song took a long road to get there. Tame Impala released "Dracula" as a solo single on Sept. 26, 2025, as the third single from Deadbeat6. It debuted at No. 55 on the Hot 100, the act's first appearance on that chart after more than a decade of releases. Its first week brought 6.5 million U.S. streams, 1.7 million in radio audience and about 1,000 sales2. On radio, it started on rock and alternative formats, entering at No. 23 on Rock & Alternative Airplay and No. 31 on Alternative Airplay2.

The Jennie remix, released Feb. 6, 2026, turned a solid alternative hit into a pop hit. Coverage credits the remix and a viral TikTok trend with sending the song to new peaks1112. Billboard-sourced reports trace the climb through the formats. The song spent two weeks at No. 1 on Alternative Airplay and seven weeks atop Pop Airplay, and by the time it reached the top of Radio Songs it was in its ninth week leading Adult Pop Airplay1416. It also reached No. 2 on Adult Alternative Airplay and the top 15 on Adult Contemporary13. Earlier in the summer it became the first Radio Songs top 10 for both acts and peaked at No. 2 in July before reaching No. 116. It also placed No. 10 on Billboard's 2026 Songs of the Summer chart16.

The accounts do not fully agree on the details. Billboard and the outlets that repeat its reporting say "Dracula" was in its 37th week atop Hot Dance/Electronic Songs and its 19th atop Hot Rock & Alternative Songs1418. A widely read reference summary swaps or changes those totals, listing 37 weeks on Hot Rock & Alternative Songs and 27 on Hot Dance/Electronic Songs11. Billboard's own figures should be treated as the authoritative ones. Even so, the mismatch shows how hard it has become to track a song that has spent so long at the top of so many charts.

"Loser" and its second chance

The bottom of the chart is the less expected story. "Loser" came out on Sept. 3, 2025, as Deadbeat's second single, weeks before "Dracula"26. At first it did only modestly. It reached the top 10 of Bubbling Under Hot 100 without entering the main chart, and its best result was No. 14 on Hot Alternative Songs2. When the album came out, it entered the Hot 100 at No. 9110.

According to Forbes' Hugh McIntyre, the song took off after it appeared in the film Spider-Man: Brand New Day, which gave it a strong new run in the U.S.5. Columbia then sent it to pop radio as Deadbeat's second U.S. single at the format. Reference sources give the radio impact date as either Aug. 8 or Aug. 11, 20262622. By late August, "Loser" had reached No. 2 on Hot Rock & Alternative Songs, Hot Rock Songs and Hot Alternative Songs. In each case "Dracula" was the song holding the No. 1 spot5. Forbes described this as Tame Impala blocking its own path to new No. 1s, which fits the situation well5.

In the week "Loser" entered Radio Songs, it also set new highs of No. 22 on both Pop Airplay and Adult Pop Airplay. It reached Nos. 6, 7 and 15 on Rock & Alternative Airplay, Alternative Airplay and Adult Alternative Airplay, respectively21. It was in the top 10 of the Billboard Global 200 at No. 8, after peaking earlier at No. 3 on that chart215.

Why this matters for Tame Impala

The obvious reading is that the remix carried Tame Impala to the top, and that is partly true. Jennie's audience and the TikTok trend clearly helped move "Dracula" from alternative radio to pop radio11. But that explanation does not cover "Loser." It is a solo Tame Impala song, written and produced only by Parker, with no guest feature, and it is now gaining ground on its own at pop and alternative stations2621.

The more convincing reading is the one Billboard's writers offered when Deadbeat first came out. Eric Renner Brown called the act's chart breakthrough the result of Parker's decade-long move toward the center of pop1. Katie Bain suggested that Parker's role in Justice's "Neverender" built interest in a dance-oriented Tame Impala1. That collaboration gave Tame Impala its first No. 1 on Alternative Airplay and its first appearances on Pop Airplay and Adult Pop Airplay, where it peaked at Nos. 23 and 332. Parker had also reached the upper parts of the charts as a writer and producer, including Dua Lipa's "Houdini," which went to No. 7 on Radio Songs in 202414. By 2026, pop programmers already knew his work, even if listeners did not always connect it to the Tame Impala name.

The critical reaction makes this more striking. Billboard's roundtable pointed out that Tame Impala's mainstream success seemed to be growing just as its critical standing hit a low point. Some panelists called Deadbeat the weakest record in the catalog, while others thought critics were being unfair1. Opinions on "Dracula" were also split. Reviewers liked its pop hooks but criticized its lyrics11. The album still debuted at No. 4 on the Billboard 200 with 70,000 equivalent units, including the act's best vinyl week ever10. Since then, two of its songs have become hits at American radio, which is a slower and more conservative system than streaming.

The chart results so far support Parker's direction more than they support his critics.

Where the songs stand now

Billboard's charts dated Oct. 17 suggest the overlap is starting to change. "Dracula" appears at No. 6 on the Hot 100 after more than 50 weeks on the chart. "Loser" sits in the low 30s, below its No. 18 peak27. On Pop Airplay, "Loser" has climbed to a new high of No. 2029. On the Billboard Global 200, "Loser" ranks above "Dracula," which has dropped back from its No. 2 peak25. In Canada, both songs remain on the CHR/Top 40 chart24. "Dracula" now has major certifications in several markets, including platinum from the RIAA and four-times platinum from ARIA23.

The usual pattern in radio promotion is that a fading No. 1 frees up room for the next single. If that happens here, "Loser" has a clear chance to move up as "Dracula" loses airplay. It already has momentum on pop, rock and alternative formats2129. Whether it reaches the top of Radio Songs is still uncertain, but for now the outcome depends mostly on Tame Impala's own songs.

The two songs' positions are 48 places apart, but they come from the same development: after years of near-misses, Tame Impala has become an act that American radio programs at the pop level. The Sept. 26 chart is the first clear measure of that change.