Billions (song)

Last updated

"Billions"
Caroline Polachek - Billions.png
Single by Caroline Polachek
from the album Desire, I Want to Turn Into You
B-side "Long Road Home"
ReleasedFebruary 9, 2022
Genre
Length4:57
Label Perpetual Novice
Songwriters
Producers
  • Caroline Polachek
  • Danny L Harle
Caroline Polachek singles chronology
"Awful Things"
(2021)		"Billions"
(2022)		"Sirens"
(2022)
Music video
"Billions" on YouTube

"Billions" is a song by American singer-songwriter and record producer Caroline Polachek. It was released on February 9, 2022 as the second single from Polachek's fourth album, Desire, I Want to Turn Into You (2023).

Contents

Background and composition

Polachek played the song live on her Heart is Unbreaking US tour in late 2021, and on several fall 2021 festival dates before the single was officially released.

A September 2021 New Yorker profile on Polachek explained the song's backstory as follows:

[…] One day, Danny L Harle sent her a beat that he'd written, and Polachek heard a melody out of nowhere, oceanic and potent, and started jotting down psychedelic images: a headless angel, an overflowing cup, a pearl inside an oyster. The beat and the images became the song "Billions". [Polachek said she] "wanted something that captured the afterglow of a reopening." [2]

As the B-side of the single, Polachek released a reworked version of "Long Road Home", her collaboration with Oneohtrix Point Never from his 2020 album Magic Oneohtrix Point Never . [3]

Reception

The song was met with widespread critical acclaim. Pitchfork named the song a 'Best New Track', and in a review contributor Gio Santiago wrote that "Billions" is "a lucent pathway towards a new era for the pop auteur". [4] The Fader 's Jordan Daville wrote that, with "Billions", Harle and Polachek created "a kind of divine symmetry from its elements, channeling Pure Moods -era new age into something utterly splendid". [5] Kat Bouza from Rolling Stone described "Billions" as "a trip-hop inspired, hallucinogenic epic that finds the songwriter expanding upon the inventive production style perfected on her critically acclaimed 2019 album, Pang ." [6]

Year-end lists

Year-end lists for "Billions"
PublicationListRankRef.
Beats Per Minute The 50 Best Songs of 202229 [7]
Exclaim! The 25 Best Songs of 202224 [8]
The Fader The 100 Best Songs of 202265 [9]
Gorilla vs. Bear Best Songs of 20224 [10]
The New York Times The Best Songs of 202222 [11]
Paste The 50 Best Songs of 202228 [12]
Pitchfork The 100 Best Songs of 202220 [13]
The Quietus Top 50 Tracks Of 202244 [14]
Slant Magazine The 50 Best Songs of 202214 [15]

Track listing

Digital single [16]

  1. "Billions" – 4:57
  2. "Long Road Home" (featuring Oneohtrix Point Never) – 3:44

Charts

Chart performance for "Billions"
Chart (2022)Peak
position
UK Singles Sales (OCC) [17] 37

References

  1. ↑ Pitchfork Staff (December 13, 2022). "The Best Progressive Pop Music of 2022". Pitchfork . Retrieved December 20, 2022.
  2. ↑ "After a Year Without Crowds, Caroline Polachek Takes the Stage". The New Yorker. September 9, 2021. Retrieved December 4, 2022.
  3. ↑ Willems, Jasper (September 9, 2022). "CAROLINE POLACHEK CONTEMPLATES THE OVERABUNDANCE OF THE WORLD ON "BILLIONS"". Beats Per Minute . Retrieved September 9, 2022.
  4. ↑ "Caroline Polachek: "Billions"". Pitchfork. Retrieved December 4, 2022.
  5. ↑ "Caroline Polachek shares new song "Billions"". The FADER. Retrieved December 4, 2022.
  6. ↑ Bouza, Kat (February 10, 2022). "Caroline Polachek Surrenders to the Sublime on Esoteric Single 'Billions'". Rolling Stone. Retrieved December 4, 2022.
  7. ↑ "BPM's 50 Best Songs of 2022". Exclaim! . December 14, 2022. Retrieved December 18, 2025.
  8. ↑ "Exclaim's 25 Best Songs of 2022". Exclaim! . December 1, 2022. Retrieved December 18, 2025.
  9. ↑ "The 100 Best Songs of 2022". The Fader . December 15, 2022. Retrieved December 18, 2025.
  10. ↑ "Gorilla vs. Bear's Songs of 2022". Gorilla vs. Bear . December 4, 2022. Retrieved December 18, 2025.
  11. ↑ Pareles, Jon (December 7, 2022). "Best Songs of 2022". The New York Times . Retrieved April 24, 2023.
  12. ↑ "The 50 Best Songs of 2022". Paste . December 5, 2022. Retrieved December 18, 2025.
  13. ↑ "The 100 Best Songs of 2022". Pitchfork . December 5, 2022. Retrieved April 24, 2023.
  14. ↑ Clarke, Patrick (December 13, 2022). "Top 50 Tracks Of 2022". The Quietus . Retrieved December 18, 2025.
  15. ↑ "The 50 Best Songs of 2022". Slant Magazine . December 6, 2022. Retrieved December 18, 2025.
  16. ↑ "Billions – Single by Caroline Polachek". Apple Music (US). February 9, 2022. Retrieved December 4, 2022.
  17. ↑ "Official Singles Sales Chart Top 100". Official Charts Company. Retrieved November 4, 2022.
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