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January 3, 2026 | 12:39pm
A scene from "Stranger Things" Season 5
Netflix
MANILA, Philippines — Two songs by the late pop icon Prince are seeing a surge on audio streaming platform Spotify after they were included the final "Stranger Things" episode.
"When Doves Cry" and "Purple Rain," the bookends of Side Two on Prince's sixth album which served as the soundtrack of his 1984 "Purple Rain," were played in key moments of the "Stranger Things" finale.
The first song plays as the ensemble make their escape from the Abyss and the Upside Down. The title track meanwhile is the background song as the Upside Down falls apart, seemingly taking Mille Bobby Brown's Eleven with it.
According to entertainment magazine Variety, both tracks doubled its streaming number on Spotify after the final episode aired.
"Purple Rain" saw a 243% increase in global streams while "When Doves Cry" received a 200% boost.
Spotify also tracked a surge in the streams by Gen Z users: "Purple Rain" had a whopping 577% increase while "When Doves Cry" got a modest 128% uptick.
As a result, overall streams of Prince's catalog received a 190% jump, with Gen Z streams listening to The Artist going up by 88%.
The increase in numbers is reminiscent of the surge received by Kate Bush's "Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)" after it was featured in the fourth season of "Stranger Things."
Showrunners Matt and Ross Duffer had to acquire the rights from Kate, who is selective about allowing her music played in other media. The British singer fortunately gave her blessing, being a fan of the Netflix show.
It was a similar case for the songs by Prince — who passed away in 2016 — as the singer's estate generally do not let the "Purple Rain" album tracks be licensed out as it is so tied to the 1984 film.
"Once we came up with the idea that the record was going to be the trigger for the bomb, we knew we needed an epic needle drop, and so many ideas were thrown around," Ross Duffer told Netflix's companion site Tudum, adding nothing was more epic than Prince which "lined up perfectly" for them.
Ross and his brother explained they'd never discussed a song choice as much as they did for the destruction of the Upside Down, noting the strict allowance of the Prince estate.
"What is also very exciting about it is it just has not been used," Ross continued as he called "Purple Rain" a thrilling choice as it "summed up the emotion of the moment."
Matt noted that Kate allowing the use of "Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)" was a huge boost for acquiring the licenses for Prince's songs.
"We were told that it was a real long shot, so we just crossed our fingers. Thank God they agreed," Matt ended.
Spotify and Netflix have created an official "Stranger Things" playlist featuring all the music that appear in the series including "Purple Rain," "When Doves Cry," and "Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)."
Other licensed songs in the playlist are ABBA's "Fernando," Tiffany's "I Think We're Alone Now," Metallica's "Master of Puppets," The Beach Boys' "California Dreamin'," and David Bowie's "Heroes."
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