We Can't Stop

On June 3, 2013, Miley Cyrus dropped "We Can't Stop" as the lead single from her fourth album, Bangerz. It was her first release under RCA Records after leaving Hollywood Records, and it announced her departure from the Disney Channel era with a thudding hip-hop beat and lyrics about a house party spiraling out of control. Mike WiLL Made-It produced the track, with writing credits shared among Cyrus, R. City, P-Nasty, Doug E. Fresh, and Slick Rick. The song samples elements of the 1985 hip-hop classic "La Di Da Di," which explains those last two names.

The song's sound blends pop, contemporary R&B, and electropop, but the production leans heavily on trap-influenced percussion and distorted vocal effects. Lyrically, it's a celebration of hedonism, with lines like "Everyone in line in the bathroom / Tryna get a line in the bathroom" drawing obvious drug references. Critics were split: many praised the slick production, while others found the rebellious posturing contrived. Regardless, it shot to number two on the Billboard Hot 100, tied with "Party in the U.S.A." as her highest-charting single at the time, blocked from the top by Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines." It topped charts in New Zealand and the UK and earned an eight-times platinum certification in the US.

The music video, directed by Diane Martel, arrived on June 19, 2013, and quickly became a cultural flashpoint. It racked up 10.7 million views in its first 24 hours, a Vevo record then, and hit 100 million in just 37 days. Both records fell to the video for her follow-up single "Wrecking Ball." The visual's imagery, from teddy bears to twerking, sparked endless parodies and debate. Cyrus's performance at the 2013 MTV Video Music Awards, where she twerked against Robin Thicke, turned the song into a defining moment of that year's pop culture. Billboard later named it one of the songs that defined the 2010s, crediting it with ushering in the "new Miley." [edit]