Finally got around to compiling the chart data for Red Velvet's singles. This chart shows you how long a song stayed on the GAON Digital Top 100 chart. (Note that this only tracks digital performance - streams, downloads, etc., not physical album sales.) The solid lines are for "Red" style tracks, and the dashed lines are for "Velvet" style tracks. Zimzalabim is weird, so it gets it's own pattern.
Red Velvet Singles charting 23 Jun 2021.png
Note: For those who may not know or who may be confused between GAON and Melon, GAON is the official record chart for the music industry of Korea. Melon is just one of the digital streaming platforms in Korea, albeit the most popular one. A good analogy would be GAON = Billboard, while Melon = Spotify. GAON combines data from all the major Korean digital music platforms, including Melon, Flo, Genie, Bugs, Naver, Kakao Music, etc.
Here's the breakdown of how long each track stayed on the Top 100:
| Song | No. of weeks on Top 100 chart |
| Happiness | 7 |
| Be Natural | 1 |
| Automatic | 2 |
| Ice Cream Cake | 17 |
| Dumb Dumb | 28 |
| One of These Nights | 5 |
| Russian Roulette | 37 |
| Rookie | 28 |
| Red Flavor | 64 |
| Peek-a-Boo | 26 |
| Bad Boy | 31 |
| Power Up | 21 |
| Really Bad Boy | 9 |
| Zimzalabim | 12 |
| Umpah Umpah | 10 |
| Psycho | 50 |
Average number of weeks for all Red Velvet singles = 21.75 weeks on chart
Average for "Red" tracks (not counting ZZB) = 26.5 weeks on chart
Average for "Velvet" tracks (not counting ZZB) = 17.71 weeks on chart
Things I noticed while doing this:
- Red Velvet tracks are hard to predict. There are some tracks which drop like a rock, and some which do average to great. There was a clear peak in Red Velvets' discography from about Russian Roulette to Power Up where they were doing very well, the pinnacle of which was Red Flavor. But early tracks charted poorly, and later tracks also charted poorly (with the exception of Psycho).
- In general, there seems to be a preference for "Red" concept tracks over "Velvet" concept tracks.
- Red Flavor's behaviour on the charts is quite interesting in that it hung around the 40s to 60s range for a very long time... more than half its' lifespan. I've also noticed that whenever Red Velvet released either a disappointing track or even just a Velvet track that was mildly okay, Red Flavor would rise in the charts again (even in the 100 to 200 chart positions). It seems like a lot of people would turn to Red Flavor as their go-to song for whenever Red Velvet's latest song didn't match their preferences. It's clearly Red Velvet's signature song.
- I'm wondering whether the huge difference in chart performance may have something to do with the composers / producers behind the tracks, but I haven't gotten around to matching the different tracks to the producers yet to see if there's a pattern.
What about you Reveluvs out there? Are there any other interesting patterns you spotted?
let's not troll
