Shortest song to enter the US singles chart

On 3 May 2025, the 34-second movie hit “Steve’s Lava Chicken”, by actor, comedian and musician Jack Black (USA, b. Thomas Black), debuted at No.78 on the US Billboard Hot 100. The short-lived jingle features in a scene from the box-office smash A Minecraft Movie (USA, 2025) – starring Black as Steve (the original default character skin in the 2011 videogame) and Jason Momoa as Garrett “The Garbage Man” Garrison – in which we’re introduced to a contraption that cooks live chickens in lava. “Steve’s Lava Chicken” is also available as an “Extended Version”, as featured on the “I…Am Steve EP”, which clocks in at 1 minute 15 seconds.

“Steve’s Lava Chicken” is officially three seconds shorter than the previous record holder, “Beautiful Trip” by the American musician Kid Cudi (b. Scott Mescudi), at 37 seconds long, which debuted at No.100 on 26 December 2020. “Beautiful Trip” was, in turn, eight seconds shorter than “PPAP (Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen)”, by the Japanese comedian and TV personality PIKOTARO (b. Kazuhito Kosaka), which had held the record since its debut at No.77 on 29 October 2016.

A Minecraft Movie had grossed $815.9 million (£608.4 million) at the worldwide box office as of 30 April 2025, according to The Numbers.

On Spotify, as of 30 April 2025, “Steve’s Lava Chicken”, co-written by Black and Jared Hess (the film's director), had amassed 22,666,895 streams, with a further 1,295,811 plays for the “Extended Version”. Although timed at 34 seconds on streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music, the jingle ends at exactly 30 seconds with a guitar riff. “Have you ever wondered what happens when you mix hot lava and chicken?” asks Black to a stunned audience in the scene from A Minecraft Movie. “I did, and you’re about to find out…”