​Nickelback's "Photograph" Gets Huge Chart Bump After Trump Meme

BY Sarah MurphyPublished Oct 7, 2019

Nickelback got dragged into the hellscape that is Donald Trump's Twitter feed last week, but it turned out all right for the band. Not only did they successfully get the meme taken down by due to copyright issues, but the band's 2005 hit "Photograph" is back on the charts.
 
As originally reported, Trump shared the popular meme featuring Chad Kroeger holding up a photograph from the "Photograph" video on October 2. One of Trump's minions had Photoshopped the in-frame photo to be a shot of Joe Biden, his son Hunter and alleged Ukrainian oil executives.
 
Hilariously, a takedown request was filed, and it turns out it was done by Warner Music Group — the parent company to Roadrunner Records, which released Nickelback's 2005 album All the Right Reasons (featuring "Photograph"). As such, the meme is no longer available "in response to a report from the copyright holder."
 
Despite the meme disappearing, the song "Photograph" has had an impressive week on the streaming charts.
 
As Billboard reports, the song was streamed a whopping 772,000 times between October 2 and 3, a 38 percent increase from the 558,000 streams between September 30 and October 1. That number includes plays of the song on YouTube, Spotify and Apple Music, but doesn't take into account plays directly from Twitter.
 
"Photograph" also received a 539 percent boost in digital downloads since Trump posted the meme, though the number of downloads was fairly insubstantial at just 1,000 units.
 
Give it another burst of life by streaming the song below.
 
The meme ordeal also served as fodder for Saturday Night Live's "Weekend Update" segment this weekend.
 
"I also want to point out that Nickelback is Canadian," co-host Colin Jost said. "So Trump was still technically using foreigners to go after Joe Biden." 
 

 

Tour Dates

Latest Coverage