billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - august 10, 2019 (VIDEO)

Okay, here we go - bit of a wonky episode, all things considered, but overall pretty good - enjoy!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - august 10, 2019

Am I the only one who thinks that this year has just felt like an extended cooldown from the chaos of 2018, where it felt like the chart was facing upheavals every other week? Of course, some of that stability on top has to trickle down, but some of it feels rooted in a summer that feels increasingly listless and bereft of impact releases, true album bombs to shake the charts - yeah, we got a few songs from Chance The Rapper this week, but not the tidal wave we would have seen last year.

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - november 3, 2018 (VIDEO)

Well, damn, that took way too long...

And judging what's coming up on Resonators, that might take way too long as well... as well as whatever's next on the schedule. Okay, might get tricky balancing what comes next, so stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - november 3, 2018

So this wasn't what I was expecting. I mean, sure, I knew there'd be some traction coming from Juice WRLD and Future's collaboration, but beyond that I'll freely admit that I wasn't expecting the same level of success from Khalid and Lil Yachty, or that none of them would result in the biggest new arrival this week! Again, it's impossible to see how much of this will last, but it does make for a slightly busier week than I was expecting.

video review: 'the mountain' by dierks bentley

Yes, I know this is late. Yes, I know I'm behind schedule again. I'm working through it, folks, just stay tuned!

album review: 'the mountain' by dierks bentley

So I'll admit it wasn't really my plan to review this. 

Well okay, that's not quite true, I was planning on adding this to my schedule naturally, but then nobody added the Kanye and Kid Cudi collaboration and given how quickly it attracted attention, I really had to stop everything and ensure it got attention. But even then, I still had other albums that would have come ahead of this... and yet the more listens I gave them, the less I had to say, with this becoming especially true for Lily Allen - where decent writing was squandered on utterly forgettable production - and Sugarland, which might have landed a few good hooks but was crippled by slapdash production, underweight writing, and the awful decision that they should try to rap.

And honestly, if I hadn't been aware that Dierks Bentley had intended The Mountain as a course correction, I would have been concerned similar tendencies could creep onto his work - it wasn't like he wasn't heading in that direction. He's always stayed a little adjacent to popular trends in the mainstream - which is one reason why he took off to make the bluegrass album Up The Ridge in 2010 - but several cuts on 2014's Riser took him perilously close to bro-country and Black was damn near a desaturated pop record, only saved by Bentley having better taste than many of his peers and deep cuts that tended to be of high quality - keep in mind that his song 'Here On Earth' made my top ten favourite songs of 2014 across all genres, he can be that good when he wants to be.

So yeah, I had high hopes with The Mountain - buzz was suggesting he was making a hard pivot towards heartland rock-tinged country and he was recruiting Brothers Osborne and Brandi Carlile to do so, and if there's a sound that could flatter Bentley's voice, it's that. I had every reason to believe this would be pretty damn solid at the very least - did he get there?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - april 14, 2018 (VIDEO)

Okay, that took WAY too long... but in the mean time, I think I'm finally ready to talk about Panopticon, so stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - april 14, 2018

...you know, there was a time when an album bomb happened it would at least slow existing traffic on the Hot 100. But since The Weeknd's new EP only had six songs - and seems like it's already vanishing from the cultural conversation given how flat and turgid it was - aside from every single song from it breaking we also had a pretty active week regardless - at least until the next album bomb with Cardi B, and I'd put a fair amount of money on that being far more disruptive.

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - april 29, 2017 (VIDEO)

So this week... as I said on Patreon, I'm not precisely pleased with the thumbnail, but I think the episode turned out okay, which is fine.

Next up, Deep Purple and then something I should have tackled a month ago - stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - april 29, 2017

If this was any normal week, I'd be inclined to say it was transitional, an otherwise regular week as older tracks rotate out in preparation for spring. Maybe even a little unexceptional, given that The Chainsmokers seem to have finally hit their fifteenth minute with no new songs from their debut album making a significant impact. But this is not an ordinary week, because with the monstrous streaming numbers that Kendrick Lamar's DAMN. is currently racking up, it's a more a question of which tracks will survive what's coming.

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - february 4, 2017 (VIDEO)

Well, this was absolute hell to put together. True facts, you never want to review or cover material, much less edit something, when you feel sick as a dog. And while things are getting better, this was still a miserable shoot all things considered.

And on that topic - okay, maybe not that bad, but still - stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - february 4, 2017

...look, they can't all be good weeks. But to quote a favourite critic of mine, often times the worst kind of bad is the absence of good, and the more I looked through the charts this week, the less I found that was all that promising, not just in our new arrivals but in the songs that took measurable hits. Now don't get me wrong, the Billboard Hot 100 has had worse - look to most of last year - but if 2017 has been characterized by a noticeable positive uptick on the charts, which I'd argue it has, this is not a good sign.

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - june 18, 2016 (VIDEO)

So I'm going to be experimenting a little with colour correction in my videos, add some richer hues, see if it looks any better. Thus far, turned out pretty sweet, I'm definitely pleased.

Next up, Maren Morris, then Dan + Shay and we'll see if the country streak will continue - stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - june 18, 2016

So you know how this week I'm aiming to focus more than normal on country music, given that by far it'll have the most new records dropping? Well, it turns out that the Billboard Hot 100 decided to follow suit, because especially when you take a look at our new arrivals, the big story is country music gearing up for the summer, and I can expect if songs from all those albums impact the charts, we might be seeing a fair bit more of it and I'm not really complaining.

video review: 'black' by dierks bentley

Sincerely hope this review finds an audience, given how many requests it got... but eh, given how much country I'm planning to cover this week, I can imagine it'll probably be one of the most viewed episodes.

On a different note, Jennifer Nettles review is also dropping later tonight, so stay tuned!

album review: 'black' by dierks bentley

I think Dierks Bentley doesn't get the appreciation he deserves.

Now that's a loaded statement, especially if all you know him for are the singles - most of which he himself would throw under the bus. Even though I was late to getting on board with Bentley, he's had a surprisingly interesting career, starting off the 2000s with some reasonably well-received records before making a hard left turn to crank out a bluegrass album. And while he's pivot back around to release albums like Home and Riser in the following years, he's always stood out from the pack. Sure, he's had his party songs or proto-bro-country tracks, but delve into his albums and you'll find a smarter, more inventive songwriter and one that doesn't need to cater to trends to crank out hits - and even when he does he tends to do it better! As much as 'Drunk On A Plane' is far from his best, there's still something about the detail in the writing and loaded bitterness of his delivery that adds bite to it. And again, that's him at his worst - at his best there's a subtle sort of emotive charisma to his voice that makes songs like the tribute to his late father and his crisis of faith on 'Here On Earth' some of the most powerful work you'll hear in modern country music and one of my top songs of 2014, hands down.

As such, I was prepared to give Dierks Bentley a lot of credit - sure, 'Somewhere On A Beach' was the sort of leering douchebaggery that's hard to stomach but even he had slagged the song as one he didn't write and not at all representative of his record, which was more of a concept album exploring complicated relationships. And given how true that was about his last record Riser and how Dierks Bentley has a reputation for working with the right people - he brought Maren Morris and Elle King on board for this album, always positive signs - I gave him the benefit of the doubt and dug into Black - was it worth it?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - february 13, 2016 (VIDEO)

As I said, better late than never.

Next up, Dream Theater - stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - february 13, 2016

So you know how I've been predicting things were going to get seriously unstable on the Hot 100 for a while now? Well, we've got a big one this week - major shifts in the Top 10 including a new number one, a ton of major shifts up and down, and a big crop of new entries... a shame more of them aren't better, but we'll get to that. Of course, Billboard also exacerbated the situation with a choice to shift their chart formula to better temper the impact of streaming, which they did by slightly shifting the balance in favour of sales. So how did that turn out?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 31, 2015 (VIDEO)

Overall, a pretty solid week - happy I was able to get this out before the convention kicked into high gear.

Okay, time to enjoy myself and maybe catch an album - or four - in between. Stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 31, 2015

So this was a pretty simple week on the Billboard Hot 100 - in that there were movements and changes that you could easily predict. And yet it was almost a deceptive week on the charts, where it might seem a lot happened - we even got a new song debuting in the top ten, and trust me, we'll get to it - but it's not exactly disruptive to the status quo, and if anything, its success is all the more predictable.