Paint the Town Red

"Paint the Town Red" is a song by American rapper and singer Doja Cat from her fourth studio album, Scarlet (2023). It was released on August 4, 2023, through Kemosabe and RCA Records as the second single from the album. The song was written by Doja Cat and produced by Earl on the Beat, Rubin, Jean-Baptiste, and DJ Replay. It is a hip hop track with a jazz-influenced beat that samples Dionne Warwick's song "Walk On By" (1964). In the lyrics, the rapper dismisses her critics and asserts her own identity following arguments with fans on social media. "Paint the Town Red" peaked at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 for three weeks, becoming Doja Cat's second number-one single, and her first as a solo artist. Outside of the United States, "Paint the Town Red" topped the charts in 18 countries, including Australia, Bulgaria, Canada, Czech Republic, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, New Zealand, Slovakia, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, as well as top five in Netherlands, Austria, Denmark, France, Belgium, Sweden, Norway, Germany and Malaysia. It also reached the top ten in South Africa, Poland, Finland, Paraguay, Taiwan and Bulgaria, the top twenty in Portugal, Italy and the Philippines and Russia, the top thirty in Indonesia and Turkey and the top forty in Nigeria. In the latter country, it became the first solo song by a female rapper to top the UK Singles Chart. It made history by becoming the first solo female rap song in Spotify history to top the platform's Global and US Top 50 chart and the fastest solo female rap song to amass 100 million streams. Background and composition A 2-second preview of the song was shared by Doja Cat on April 17, 2023, along with other tracks from her upcoming album. Doja would tease the song by continuously using the blood drop emoji, as well as putting a red filter over thumbnails of her previous music videos and album covers. She played the song in full length on July 18, while painting a white canvas in red. The painting would later turn out to be the single cover.