billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - august 18, 2018 (VIDEO)

Okay, a Travis Scott episode... but honestly, not a terrible one to put together, it just went a little long to put together.

Next up... ugh, let's deal with Nicki Minaj, stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - august 18, 2018

...look, it's the week of Travis Scott. Yes, there were other debuts and we'll be giving them a little bit more time, but this is the week Astroworld rolled over the Hot 100 thanks to much of the same sort of juicy Spotify payola - I mean I promotion that Drake got. But while this means that all seventeen songs from the album charted - pray for my soul - it's at least a better record than Scorpion was, arguably one of the better album bombs this year, and at the very least I don't expect it to last, especially given that next week Nicki Minaj will likely net some sort of chart success right behind him, and then Ariana Grande behind them!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - august 4, 2018 (VIDEO)

So this was... generally pretty okay, I think. Yeah, let's go with that.

Next up, Cody Jinks - stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - august 4, 2018

You know, I'm always hesitant about saying the charts are back to 'normal' at any point, especially in 2018 where we have album bombs every other week and especially in comparison to years where we got fewer entries... but outside of one new top ten entry in particular, this week was pretty typical. Not precisely great by any margin, but it doesn't appear to be that bad either...

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.