Well, the lists start off strong - the Premiere really was fun to hang with y'all, might have to do that again soon... Also, just addressing this here because some people are bitching about me interjecting some relevant social commentary: a.) if you're angry about me calling Juice WRLD a misogynist and are instead throwing out the 'he's a confused kid just expressing how he feels', otherwise known as the 'boys will be boys defense, the problem is you; b.) Lil Dicky is not funny, and I can make the credible argument he's never been funny. And frankly, I don't care that it's been years since what Chris Brown did - I have a long memory and I don't have to forgive him or like his artistic output, and considering he references his own life in the song, I'm well within my rights to bring it in; c.) If you think Kavanaugh's confirmation wasn't anything but a gross abuse of procedure, bastardized political flailing, a compromised investigation, and the continued enablement of the lack of accountability for rich, spoiled frat boys, maybe consider the fact that he's now on the Supreme Court, and Christine Blasey Ford can't still return home. I'll insult that beer-soaked abuse of privilege for all its worth, especially because the same dismissive defenses of him come from the exact folks who think Lil Dicky is worth defending. Next up, the list of the best hits of 2018 - stay tuned!
So I'm not going to mince words or waste your time here: 2018 was not a good year for the Hot 100. Perhaps not as bad as 2016 given how many songs were outright atrocious that year, but 2018 was not only an eventful and exhausting year, but it was one where the Hot 100 as a singles chart didn't even seem to matter. And yes, success on a manipulated ranking scale like the Hot 100 is always a bit of a shell game that most discerning artists recognize, but on some level we convince ourselves that it matters - you know, like the Grammys. But here's the funny thing: as much as I've characterized 2018 as the year of the album bomb, where thanks to playlist payola - no jokes anymore, let's call it what it is - an entire album will overrun the Hot 100, the songs rarely last, which means when it comes to making the year-end list you run into a weird split: the streaming hits that cling to relevance just long enough, usually hip-hop and trap, and the pop- and pop-adjacent songs that receive regular radio and sales promotion that hold up long enough to weather the storm. And of course there is some overlap, but I was actually a little surprised how despite streaming hits getting so much media attention, there's still a traditional pop structure that'll get hits on the year-end list. We'll get into the unfortunate side effects of this in the next year-end list, but it is absolutely a shifting ecosystem, and there weren't many who could navigate that storm. But make no mistake, the ability to have charting success has never been proportional to the talent of the artist, and with trap being an oversaturated mess and most radio hits defaulting to the safest possible options for relevancy in a year where Cumulus and iHeartRadio were on the cusp of bankruptcy, it was a rough year. And while I was more faintly embarrassed about the junk from 2017, 2018's bad stuff is in a different league - and keep in mind this is just the stuff that debuted on the 2018 year-end Hot 100. So let's take out the trash, starting in no particular order with our Dishonourable Mentions...
Heh, this turned out WAY more controversial than I expected... eh, it happens. Next up, something way better than everything I'm talking about here - enjoy!
You know, given how the past week has been it's been very tempting of me to just step up in here, say the Billboard Hot 100 shit itself inside out like most of the rest of this year - and let's not mince words, it's about as bad as I've seen it in the past few years - but hey, it could have been worse, right? We didn't get a full album bomb from XXXTENTACION, and while I sure as hell don't think our replacements are anything close to good, I have to keep reassuring myself with the thoughts that this could be a much more miserable experience than it is.
And here we go - took a lot of processing power to get it out the door, but it turned out pretty well as I still keep tweaking my camera. Next up, looks like Young Fathers - stay tuned!
...so I said last week that most of my general predictions surrounding the week came true about the expected activity, and while I also did say that I expected Meghan Trainor to break through this week, I also made the statement that I didn't expect much else to happen. And boy, was I wrong in the worst possible way, as despite a few very select gems, XXXTENTACION and Chris Brown of all people showed up to remind me that the charts might just be at their most intolerable since 2016, and there's far from enough good songs to save them!
So I'm not saying this week was crazy busy or anything - it really wasn't, and outside of some notable shifts, most of our new arrivals feel pretty minor. But for the first time in some time I have the feeling that the charts are actively starting to shift in response to major releases, and I expect with weeks to come we'll probably see even more of it...
Overall not a bad week, and I have to say, it's going to be interesting in the days ahead here, especially given all the coming shakeups. But on the topic of one of those shakeups not quite going according to plan... well, stay tuned!
This is one of those weeks where I'm increasingly unsure where the hell the Billboard Hot 100 is going, and not just because we've got a few albums bombs in the making that are going to be dropping over the next few weeks for further destabilize things. And while part of it is also linked to the headlong race for what'll make the year-end lists, the larger point is that as a whole, songs that you'd expect to not seem fragile feel increasingly perilous, especially when you take a look at the top ten.
So yeah, another pretty rough week here... but on the plus side, I've got an interesting record on the docket next (in fact, a fair few of them) so stay tuned!
Do you ever have the feeling looking at the Hot 100 that no matter what happens, it's not going to be a good week? Yeah, that was my gut feel going through the Hot 100 this week - which yes, did slow down a bit as things settle in for the summer with no major releases, but at the same time, looking at some of these new arrivals... well, we'll get to it.
Well, this episode got a LOT of conversation... huh, a little surprised, to be honest, especially with so many mediocre tracks. Oh well. Next up... ooh boy, it's Logic. Stay tuned!
So I think it's fairly obvious that we live in uncertain times, and while music critics and cultural anthropologists will debate how much the music that charts will reflect the world around us, I think you could make a case for the Hot 100 being the most unsettled it's been in some time. Because while you could make a story about Katy Perry collaborating with Migos, or the fight for dominance between One Direction members, or that Gorillaz for no discernable reason failed to sell enough to chart this week, the big story is for the third time in three weeks, we have a new #1... and like with the others, there's no clear indication of how long it'll last.
This was the sort of week I didn't expect - on the one hand it's the aftermath of J. Cole's big debut so inevitably there was going to be a pretty major course correction... but that wasn't the only thing that happened, because Christmas music came back in force to compete with a pileup of hip-hop that I don't think anyone was asking for. And yet that's not the biggest story of this week... because we have a new #1.
Man, computer problems couldn't have come at a worse time... goddamn, this has been tough to get out, especially considering I flubbed part of the audio editing the first time round. But whatever, next up... well, you all asked for it, let's talk about Carly Rae Jepsen. Stay tuned!
So let me give you all a quick recap of my past few days. I get home from vacation, put up my big recap video, get ready to set up the Travis Scott review and then Billboard BREAKDOWN today... and then my editing computer loses multiple cores and experiences systemic hard drive failure. Now I've been having computer troubles for the past few weeks so I knew this was coming - hell, I've got a new machine in transit right now - but given the insane album release schedule of the next few weeks, I was hoping to save the transition for a slower period and not have to work with a machine that's on its last legs. No such luck - hell, I'm just thankful Billboard BREAKDOWN seems a little slower this week, giving me a little more time to prepare for the shift.
Whew, this was an interesting little thing to film/edit on vacation. Overall, pretty damn pleased how it turned out, especially with how many takes we got to put it all together. Next up, let's knock off that Cody Johnson review before we get into the rest of the week, shall we...
