album review: 'expectations' by bebe rexha / 'r.o.s.e' by jessie j / 'the color of you' by alina baraz / 'head over heels' by chromeo (VACATION)

Okay, this was a mess. Wish more of these were good...

One more vacation review up - stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - june 6, 2015

Man, this was a harder episode to get online than I thought it'd be. Doesn't help the majority of the songs were hot garbage, but you get those weeks.

Next up, A$AP Rocky - stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - june 6, 2015

And just like that, Taylor Swift is back on top.

There's honestly more to this week - a shocking amount more, really, looking at the charts you'd think it was outright chaos - but really, so much of this story revolves around Taylor Swift and 'Bad Blood'. Yeah, Kendrick Lamar plays a pretty major part too, but his verse is peripheral, a part of the machine that gave a new #1 single, a precisely timed marketing push that sent the song surging up radio, sales, streaming, and YouTube to take the top spot. And keep in mind that Taylor's not on Spotify either - the growth of 'Bad Blood' is nothing short of a minor phenomenon, and it really does eclipse most of what happened beneath it - which is kind of a good thing, because of that kind of sucked.

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - march 28, 2015 (VIDEO)

Oh wow, this took way too long to get online - again - but I'm overall happy for it, if only because it gave us 'Bills' by LunchMoney Lewis. Got to love it.

Next up... probably Modest Mouse or AWOLNATION, we'll see. Stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - march 28, 2015

You know, it's rare that I get to be surprised much when it comes to these charts. I mean, sure you get your weird stuff that'll show up every week, but seventeen weeks into Billboard BREAKDOWN, it takes a lot to really pique more interest. This week, however... well, I'm not really going to say I was surprised by everything that happened, but more than a few times I was perturbed enough to wonder if things were slightly out of the ordinary. Granted, going into next week given what I've heard about streaming data, I've got a good idea what's coming, but it's always kind of nice to be thrown off-guard a little.

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 10, 2015 (VIDEO)

Man, that took way too long to release. Glad to finally get it out there.

Okay, next up is... oh god, Rae Sremmurd? Seriously, there's nothing else?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 10, 2015

So one would think upon my return from vacation to take a look at the Hot 100 that things kind of went a little crazy this week. Not in the new arrivals to the charts - if anything, we have the least number of new entries to date, which hopefully means this episode will be a little shorter this week. No, the change was in what gained steam this week, because there were a ton of gains this week that seemingly came out of nowhere. Not only that, they were for songs that came out in 2014, some that had even fallen off the charts altogether! What gives?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 3, 2015 (VIDEO)

Yep, I'm aware of the glitch in the top ten. Damn fader settings get me every time.

So in case you all know, I'm going to be going on vacation - but never fear, I'll still be posting as soon as I get a stable internet connection, so stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 3, 2015

Today is the first official week of 2015 for Billboard - which is a little odd, considering they start their year and it still is December, but this was the year where we both got the long-awaited finale of The Voice that notched six new hits. And while J. Cole managed to hold a little more momentum, unsurprisingly, most of this week belonged to Nicki Minaj, for better or for worse.

video review: 'sweet talker' by jessie j

Ugh, I wanted this to be better too. It's what happens when your label rushes things, though, so I'm not precisely surprised.

Okay, that Florida Georgia Line album has been in my sights for a while... stay tuned!

album review: 'sweet talker' by jessie j

"This critic would like to begin this review with an acknowledgement that yes, he misinterpreted the song 'I Miss Her' on Jessie J's last record. It is not a song about a troubled same-sex relationship, but instead was about a family member suffering from a mental illness similar to dementia. No, he does not have the slightest idea how he could have messed that up, and he is very grateful to the many, MANY comments that felt the need to correct him on it. Now back to our regularly scheduled programming..."

I honestly wish Jessie J was more famous than she is, at least on this side of the Atlantic. By now she's built an impressive stable of hit singles, most of which I've liked, and yet there's a considerable number of music critics who brand her as a Katy Perry wannabe, especially early on. And to me, it's been interesting to watch their careers in parallel on the changing landscape of the pop charts. Because let's be blunt, as the charts have shifted to more R&B than pop, it has not been a great year for Katy Perry, with 'Dark Horse', her worst single from Prism being the best performer mostly thanks to crossover airplay thanks to Juicy J's awful guest verse. Because in comparison to the arsenal of singles from Teenage Dream, 'Unconditionally', 'Birthday', and 'This Is How We Do' have not really been smash hits, both critically or commercially.

But if anything, Jessie J has fared even worse. I thought Alive was a pretty decent album when I reviewed it last year, with good songwriting and performances but hampered by a lack of focus in instrumentation and production and some really sloppy guest appearances. But I'll be blunt, that record did nothing in North America, with most of the singles and chart success coming in the UK - and there's a reason for that, as the American version of the record was never released. Instead, a new album of material was thrown together in record time, featuring Jessie J's least number of writing credits to date. Now for me, that was grounds for a lot of concern - Jessie J's songwriting was one of the things I liked the most about Alive, and to see even more hands in the process for Sweet Talker was not exactly encouraging. But considering the shared opening single 'Bang Bang' with Ariana Grande has proven to be one of the strongest pop singles of the year, I figured it couldn't be that bad, right?

video review: 'alive' by jessie j

Man, this took way too long to get online. In any case, here's the new video talking about Jessie J, and the first of the last heavy wave of September releases. It's going to get crazy here, folks, stay tuned!

album review: 'alive' by jessie j

It really sucks to be branded a wannabe, particularly when it's not fair.

That's always been the thought that's played in my head whenever I think about Jessie J, who many critics very early on branded as a Katy Perry wannabe, and which I've always considered patently unfair. To this day, I still have a hard time understanding why Katy Perry got incredibly popular and Jessie J has not, and in the end have been forced to concede that it's thanks to Dr. Luke's gift for writing catchy hooks and good melodies for Miss Perry - because, let me tell you, it sure as hell wasn't for her live vocals or superb lyrics or strikingly original personality!

Jessie J, on the other hand, while she has worked with Max Martin and Dr. Luke, also takes a major hand in writing her own material and, unlike Katy Perry, has a personality and great voice away from the Autotune. Coupled with her real feistiness and her desire to connect with her fanbase, I've got a ton of respect for Jessie J and I genuinely like her music. Hell, I nearly put 'Domino', her big hit from early last year, on my year-end list of the Top Ten Best Hit Songs of 2012! I want her to be more in the modern pop landscape than the UK's version of Katy Perry, and I seriously think she's capable of getting there.

So, the question that I've always pondered is why doesn't Jessie J stick out more than she does already? Working the middle ground between Katy Perry and Pink, I've liked Jessie J's songwriting for the most part, but I suspect if I were to get a little closer on my issues with her, some of them might come down to the fact that she doesn't quite do enough to stand out from the pack on either a songwriting or instrumental basis. Sure, she's got some odd lines in her songs, but this is 2013, you can almost expect the weird, off-kilter lines in music these days. No, to me I think if Jessie J wants to distinguish herself, it'll have to come from the instrumentation, perhaps following along the line of Ke$ha and Natalia Kills going towards a rock style, or perhaps returning to the classier R&B of her roots. 

So, what do we see from Jessie J's sophomore effort, Alive?