Is Digi-Pop the Newest Hyperpop Wave?

What’s initially most striking about Pupsies’ “Misery” is the song’s sonics: a buzzing, blaring, synth-bass hum matched with a lo-fi melody that could soundtrack an 8-bit video game. While Pupsies’ favorite part kicks in later — a dramatic, crunchy guitar hook from co-producer Goetia that accompanies her wailing vocal climax — it’s this early, beatless section that helped the song take off on TikTok.

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Cindy Kamgaing, the 19-year-old from North Carolina better known as Pupsies, has been building an internet following since 2023 for her kinetic, therapeutically revealing digi-pop jams, but had yet to really unlock a mainstream crossover until “Misery.” Following its March release, the emotionally overflowing (but “cute”-­sounding, as Kamgaing proudly puts it) single went viral, taking off with animation edits (like a Steven Universe one that Kamgaing found particularly delightful), and with users jokingly referring to it as a “LARP” song (an abbreviation that traditionally means live action role playing but has come to refer to anyone seen as playing a specific part).

“I think people started saying it because the song is kind of like, ‘I’m depressed, I’m a girl,’” Kamgaing says. So far, the song about a no-good relationship has reached a No. 50 high on the Billboard Hot 100 — and is one of the first true chart hits of a movement that started almost a decade ago: hyperpop. Since emerging, the subgenre has undergone countless permutations but has retained the same frenetic energy, unguarded emotion, lo-fi production and DIY aesthetic of its musical precursors, while producing streaming hits of various degrees by Penelope Scott (“Rat”), C–tsniffer (“Meant to Be”) and Laydownrot (“Perfect Face”), among others. But with “Misery,” hyperpop could enter its next phase this fall.

“I think, especially post-COVID, more people are more online,” Kamgaing says of why hyperpop is finally starting to bubble over. “People used to say, ‘It’s just the internet,’ but I think now we’ve come to a position in society where the internet is so intertwined with the real world, and it’s sort of got this symbiotic relationship. So I think it is possible that something that was very niche becomes more mainstream.”

And while “Misery” is helping the latest flavor of hyperpop continue its mainstream ascent, Kamgaing admits that “I don’t listen to the genre of music I make.” She says she’s more interested in mixing a variety of music styles into her digital-sounding productions: “I want to show people that you can do whatever you want to, you can express yourself however you want to.”

This story appears in the Aug. 22, 2026, issue of Billboard.