Today (August 31), Chart Data announced that Doja Cat’s latest hit “Paint The Town Red” earned its biggest streaming day on Spotify with over 6.3 million plays, nearly four weeks removed from its initial August 4 release. This is just the latest major accomplishment for the song, which peaked at No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100 this past week.
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On top of these accolades, “Paint The Town Red” also became the fastest solo female rap song to reach 100 million Spotify streams, and the first-ever solo female rap song to reach No. 1 on the Spotify Top 50 – USA chart. Consider the town painted red.
As the second promotional single for Doja’s impending fourth studio album Scarlet, slated to release on September 22, “Paint the Town Red” is ascending despite widespread pushback, as many listeners took issue with the “satanic imagery” in the song and its accompanying music video. With hummed lyrics like she the devil, she a bad lil’ bitch she a rebel, and scenes of her dancing with the grim reaper and a demon-like figure in the visual, the song has either captivated or angered folks in all corners of the industry. But, how did the song first come together?
Earlier this month, American Songwriter sat down with Earl On The Beat, one of the four producers of the track. Coming off placements with Drake and 21 Savage on “Privileged Rappers” and Megan Thee Stallion and Nicki Minaj on “Hot Girl Summer,” Earl described how he approached “Paint The Town Red,” which came to life after he met Doja at a party earlier this year.
“I was kind of in the dark with it, because I was just coming off the Drake thing, the ‘Privileged Rappers’ thing,” he said. “And it’s like, I like Doja Cat, but at the time, I wasn’t in the mind of her… So when I meet her I’m like, ‘Okay I gotta send these beats.’ But in my head, while I make every style of beat, I’m thinking, ‘I don’t have anything for her at this exact moment. Everything I’ve been making has been Drake.’ So I was just thinking, ‘Let me get on my shit and let me just get right.’ So I sent some (beat) packs I thought would be best and here we are now.”
Included in this beat pack was the eventual instrumental for “Paint The Town Red,” which Earl had crafted two years prior. Containing a brass instrument loop and smooth, rhythmic claps, Earl tweaked the beat quite a bit before sending it over to Doja, and it would appear that these edits paid off.
“I made that beat two years ago and sometimes as a producer, you have to be ahead of the wave,” he continued. “You have to be ahead before the sound catches up if that makes sense. So sometimes you may make certain records that may be years ahead, but they can’t get off right then and there… I reworked that beat a little bit, and added some new things to it. That was literally one of the first ones I chose to send. I make everything, but at that moment, I didn’t necessarily have anything for her, but I knew I had that… I love what she did over it.”
At midnight ET on Friday (September 1), Doja will follow up the Earl-produced bop with “Demons,” the third single for Scarlet. Continuously building on the spooky aesthetic of the LP, her newly-introduced mix of rap and pop will surely come to life once again on “Demons,” just weeks after she perfected it on “Paint The Town Red.”
Photo by Jacob Webster / RCA Records
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