With his album KOD garnering 64.5 million streams in its first 24 hours in the U.S., J. Cole set a new record on Apple Music for most album streams in 24 hours, eclipsing Drake's Views by almost a million streams, according to Apple, while his album clocked a record 36.7 million first-day streams on Spotify in the U.S.

Apple Music's subscribers stream more hip-hop on average than do Spotify's more than 71 million paying subscribers; Cole now owns seven of Apple's ten most-streamed songs in a 24-hour period.

Helping Cole break Drake's record is Apple Music's fast-growing subscriber base, now at 40 million paying customers. When Views was released in 2016, Apple Music counted about 13 million paying subscribers.

Apple Music's subscribers also stream more hip-hop on average than do Spotify's more than 71 million paying subscribers.

The strong performance shows how streaming is helping some artists succeed without traditional record deals. Cole launched his own label, Dreamville Records, in 2007 alongside longtime manager Ib Hamad, and has since signed a half-dozen artists to the imprint. In 2014, Dreamville inked a distribution agreement with Interscope, and Cole himself brought his solo efforts to Dreamville/Roc Nation/Interscope after his deal with Columbia ended following the release of his third album, 2014 Forest Hills Drive, in December 2014.