Jill Scott and Erykah Badu’s Verzuz battle was one for the books. It was the first time that women participated in the virtual competition. Their music is now doing numbers following the epic celebration.
According to Billboard, the two singers collectively brought in 6.7 million US streams for their song catalogs, compared to 2.1 million streams the Thursday (May 7) and Friday (May 8) before the battle.
Badu’s highest streaming track was “On & On.” The single, which won the singer Grammys for best R&B female vocal performance and best R&B song, received a 129% boost in streams after the battle.
Scott’s highest streaming single was “A Long Walk,” which collected 220,000 clicks following the Live.
Over 700,000 viewers witnessed the Instagram Live battle, which is a new record for Verzuz. Both singers played some of their greatest hits including “Back in the Day,” “Slowly, Surely,” “On & On,” “Getting in the Way,” “Next Lifetime,” “Honey Molasses” and more.
The Verzuz effect is becoming more noticeable. Timbaland recently spoke to TMZ about how major networks have reached out to him and Swizz Beatz with interest in the popular battles.
“I mean, you know a lot of people contacted me and Swizz you know on a lot of things, but right now we just wanna keep it for the culture because it’s so organic,” he stated.
He continued, “We don’t wanna bring that part of the element in right away. We just wanna keep it where people are entertained because we living in a world where 16 million people lost jobs. We don’t wanna get into the politics of it. We wanna keep it natural and fun.”
Nelly and Ludacris will go head-to-head in the next Verzuz battle on Saturday, May 16 at 7 pm ET. You can stream all of the previous Verzuz battles on TIDAL.