album review: 'fan of a fan: the album' by chris brown & tyga (ft. ARTV) (VIDEO)

And to think there was still worse things that neither Jon or I could mention, like Tyga referencing OutKast when he has no business doing so or referring to a girl as 'Ass-zilla.'

I wish I was kidding. Next up, something better!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 24, 2015 (VIDEO)

You know, I actually thought this episode would be a quicker edit than it was. Go figure.

Okay, I think I'm ready for some Fall Out Boy now, bring it on!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 24, 2015

This week, things finally seemed to get back to normal - and to be honest, I was expecting the charts to get a lot worse this week thanks to an injection of new album tracks from reviews I did last week. Instead, it seems like the opposite is true, as no additional Rae Sremmurd tracks landed on the Hot 100 - thank God - and Meghan Trainor had losses across the board. In fact, for the first week ever on Billboard BREAKDOWN, we have no returning entries, just brand-new songs - granted, with more Chris Brown than is healthy for anyone, but hey, we're getting Jhene Aiko, another Fall Out Boy single, and a punk cover of Taylor Swift, I'll take it!

video review: 'young money: rise of an empire' by young money

Ugh, did not like this. Glad to get it out of my system.

Next up will be David Nail and then... hmmm, not sure. We'll see. Maybe Sundy Best, maybe Kylie Minogue, maybe finally take a crack at Real Estate. Either way, stay tuned!

album review: 'young money: rise of an empire' by young money

I should really be less surprised this album exists than I am.

Because honestly, I thought the 'Young Money' posse was effectively over, at least to the extent that any rap posse breaks up or rebrands itself. And I thought this happened last year with the new rap supergroup Rich Gang which released an compilation album that went nowhere. And thus, that was a sign we as a culture accepted Drake as the one mostly consistent break-out success and consigned everyone else to popular irrelevance, including Nicki Minaj and Lil Wayne who both did not have good years in 2013.

Turns out I was mistaken in that regard, because Rich Gang as a supergroup is more of the project of Cash Money Records, which is owned by long-time rapper Birdman and has been around since the 90s. Young Money as a group and as a label is owned by Lil Wayne - and all of the artists with him are also co-signed to Cash Money so there's a ton of overlap. What this means is that Young Money as a group never really went away as its own entity - and thus it makes a fair amount of sense that Lil Wayne is reinvesting some energy into the project.

And let say something I don't really like to admit: Young Money is probably one of the few hip-hop supergroups that has produced multiple high-charting stars. Between Lil Wayne, Drake, Nicki Minaj, and to a lesser extent Tyga, they've launched some pretty successful careers, and with the round of additional rappers finally getting launch albums through Young Money, it looks like Lil Wayne is set on recreating that success for the rest of the posse. Now I'm far from a multi-million dollar businessman, but if I were in Lil Wayne's shoes, I'd be more concerned with making sure my existing success stories remain success stories, because with maybe the exception of Drake, everything put out by Young Money, including from its flagship artists, has been wildly uneven in quality, especially from Lil Wayne himself!

In other words, I wasn't looking forward to another compilation album from the ever-growing Young Money ensemble, especially when there are guest stars called in from outside the label (doesn't that really defeat the purpose?). That being said, the last time they did this was in 2009 and it wasn't terrible, so how did it go this time?