Soda Pop Music: Saja Boys, ‘Diet Pepsi’ & ‘Coca-Cola’ Have Filled Up 2025 With Buzzy Hits

This year finds artists quenching fans’ thirst for pop hits, literally.

On the latest, Sept. 20-dated Adult Alternative Airplay chart, St. Paul & the Broken Bones make a fizzy lift to No. 10 with “Sushi & Coca-Cola.” (It’s the act’s third top 10 on the tally and first since 2018.)

In February, Addison Rae earned her first top 10 on a Billboard radio chart — fittingly, Pop Airplay — with “Diet Pepsi.”

Meanwhile, Saja Boys’ addictive confection “Soda Pop,” from Netflix’s KPop Demon Hunters, has spent the last four weeks bubbling in the Billboard Hot 100’s top 10, reaching No. 5.

A year after Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso” became a buzzy smash, hitting No. 3 on the Hot 100, listeners’ musical tastes have segued to carbonated caffeinated treats.

Historically, other artists have had the moxie to make such hits.

In 1945, the Andrews Sisters enjoyed one of their biggest songs, the pre-rock era track “Rum and Coca-Cola.” (Coca-Cola hit the marketplace in 1886; notably, eight years before Billboard, whose own tag line in the 2000s was “Experience the Buzz.”)

The Beatles’ 1969 Hot 100 No. 1 “Come Together” includes Coca-Cola in its lyrics (though with a quite different accepted meaning).

Perhaps most famously, the New Seekers and the Hillside Singers poured concurrent hits on the Hot 100 in 1971-72 with “I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing,” with their versions climbing to Nos. 7 and 13, respectively. The song originated as a beloved Coca-Cola jingle “Buy the World a Coke,” sung by the Hillside Singers.

In 1979, Mel Tillis’ “Coca Cola Cowboy” chugged to No. 1 on Hot Country Songs.

In 1988-89, R.E.M. uncapped an Alternative Airplay No. 1 with “Orange Crush” (also not just about the drink).

Britney Spears’ debut LP, 1999’s …Baby One More Time, which ruled the Billboard 200 for six weeks, begins with three hit singles — the Hot 100 No. 1 title cut, “(You Drive Me) Crazy” and “Sometimes” — before fans were further introduced to her with her own “Soda Pop.”

By 2023, EXO’s “Cream Soda” added a sweet vanilla flavor to the Billboard Global 200, Billboard Global Excl. U.S. and World Digital Song Sales charts.

Plus, “If You Could Only See” hit No. 1 on Mainstream Rock Airplay and the top 10 on Adult Pop Airplay in 1997, becoming the signature song for (who else?) Tonic.

All charts dated Sept. 20 will update Tuesday, Sept. 16, on Billboard.com.

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