billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - april 25, 2020

I think I’ve started off so many episodes of Billboard BREAKDOWN hoping that there’s some vestige of normal coming and I think that’s where I’ve channeled the majority of my anxieties surrounding where the hell we’re all going to end up in a few months. Granted, I know this probably won’t last here - a breather before we get the DaBaby album bomb nobody was asking for - but hey, small blessings?

Whatever, top ten, where to some surprise ‘Blinding Lights’ by The Weeknd reclaimed the #1, riding the top spot on the radio and sales, and not far behind at all on streaming. Again, this is a margins game, and it’s worth the comparison with how it dethroned ‘Toosie Slide’ by Drake down to #2, which has far better YouTube and stronger on-demand streaming. And it shows just how much more streaming you need to match a robust airplay margin, which is just slightly bigger between The Weeknd and Drake than the YouTube margin. This leaves ‘The Box’ by Roddy Ricch at #3 in an odd spot, because it peaked on the radio and while it had good streaming and leads YouTube, you can tell some of its time is fading. Then we have ‘Don’t Start Now’ by Dua Lipa at #4, seemingly stable across the board, even in streaming… but the radio is wavering a little and that could be telling going forward. What’s more telling is ‘Say So’ by Doja Cat up to #5, where she went on a radio tear to compensate for weaker sales and got the streaming to boot - again, consistently strong, it’ll stick around. I’m a little less certain about ‘Adore You’ by Harry Styles up to #6, though - great radio, but that’s all it has, and that makes it vulnerable if that starts to collapse. Then we have ‘Circles’ by Post Malone sliding back again to #7 - it’s on its way out despite a good sales week - and while we’re here, ‘Life Is Good’ by Future ft. Drake falling to #8, which despite stable streaming, you can tell the radio is kind of done with it. Unfortunately, that’s not also the case for ‘Intentions’ by Justin Bieber ft. Quavo at #9, which is in the middle of a radio push and seems otherwise stable - can we have this happen for ‘everything i wanted’ by Billie Eilish at #10 instead, which really just has radio and is slipping into freefall at this point?

Anyway, losers and dropouts, and in the latter group there isn’t much - the Rod Wave album bomb nearly all disappeared, and took ‘What A Man Gotta Do’ by Jonas Brothers and ‘Homesick’ by Kane Brown with it. But I’d argue country didn’t really have a good week as a whole: ‘Homemade’ by Jake Owen slid to 67, ‘What She Wants Tonight’ by Luke Bryan dropped to 77, even ‘you should be sad’ by Halsey which is country-adjacent underperformed to 65. Outside of that… well, ‘B.I.T.C.H.’ by Megan Thee Stallion continues to underperform at 97, ‘Turks’ by NAV, Gunna and Travis Scott is continuing down to 63 - looks like this will not have the staying power as some anticipated - and ‘Find My Way’ by DaBaby slipped off the debut to 51; it’s gonna rebound next week folks, yay?

Now we didn’t have many gains and returns here either - I guess for Megan it’s a nice sign that ‘Captain Hook’ is back at 95, and ‘B.S.’ is good for Jhene Aiko & H.E.R. at 99, but what perplexes me is ‘PTSD’ by G Herbo, Chance The Rapper, Lil Uzi Vert and the late Juice WRLD at 90… sign of the times, maybe? It certainly has that feel when we look at our gains and ‘If The World Was Ending’ by JP Saxe ft. Julia Michaels is continuing up to 73. Then outside of ‘July’ by Noah Cyrus and Leon Bridges getting an unexpected lift to 85, I guess we did get some country songs getting a modicum of success? ‘Here And Now’ by Kenny Chesney got a boost off his debut last week to 79, ‘After A Few’ by Travis Denning got a nice bump to 55, and ‘Beer Can’t Fix’ by Thomas Rhett and Jon Pardi got a bounce to 44… I’m not about to complain, as most of these aren’t bad, but the traction just seems sporadic and I question how much staying power they’ll really have, that’s all.

And now we’ve got a reasonably healthy list of new arrivals, starting off with…

100. ‘Boss Bitch’ by Doja Cat - the general buzz I’ve seen behind this single has been, ‘oh, thank god, Doja Cat finally has a legit good to great song on the charts’ - telling, which reinforces my suspicion that ‘Say So’ has less organic groundswell than it might seem. Which is kind of ironic because this is basically a Nicki Minaj song, from the clattering percussion to the thicker bass standing in for more melody to especially a lot of Doja Cat’s flow. Now that in and of itself isn’t a bad thing - I daresay I like this more than most of Nicki’s recent output, as the bars actually connect and the song doesn’t feel as phoned in as some of Nicki’s can be… but it also highlights how Doja Cat doesn’t quite have the expressive personality Nicki has either, which is becoming a consistent problem for all her work and has made me miss more of her sense of humor. That being said, this is still fine enough - I’ll take it.

98. ‘Girl Of My Dreams’ by Rod Wave - I’m always a little surprised when songs hit the charts post-album bomb, which normally imply they were a fan favourite that grew over time, which it looks like this has. I point that out because unfortunately it’s not really one of my favs - it’s got more chipmunk vocals playing off the thin acoustics, it’s way more dependent on its crooning hook to play in modern emo rap, and on that note, it does feel like a very tired ‘girl as both angel and devil’ riff that’s very stock in the genre. That’s not saying the hook isn’t catchy - it is - but it’s absolutely a lesser cut from the album… although I do expect to pick up traction, it does strike that note. Not terrible, but not particularly good either.

96. ‘Ride It.’ by DJ Regard - okay, you’re going to have to follow me on this one - so you do you remember Jay Sean? He was a Chris Brown wannabe from 2009, had two minor hits, generally forgotten by everyone since because he was mediocre. Hell, I remember him most for when his fanbase blitzed one of my earliest reviews of his album Neon in 2013, but anyway, in 2007 he put out a song called ‘Ride It’, which in 2019 was remixed by DJ Regard into this and it got the attention of TikTok. And what might be a better comparison to this is the ‘Roses’ remix from SAINt JHN, because not only is the tempo up, but we also have the vocals pitched down, so it kind of loses the forced slinky feel of the original for something that doesn’t quite feel as sexy as it’s trying to be. It’s kind of bizarre, especially as the vocals start running together on the wordy verses that are still trying to make this a bedroom jam… but the vibe feels more like a driving or dance song, which doesn’t really fit well with the melody. I dunno, I get the appeal, but a revival of a Jay Sean remix is not going to excite me.

93. ‘In Between’ by Scotty McCreery - I think I’m comfortable saying Scotty McCreery has outperformed all expectations for me - when he puts out albums, he usually gets at least two songs that I really love. So let me ask this: it’s been over two years since the last album, and yet you’re pushing this as the single and not ‘Home In My Mind’? Why would you make such a stupid decision? What’s frustrating is that this isn’t even bad - it’s pretty basic ‘caught between country and city’ that actually becomes more about questioning his own place and identity and I actually like how he admits he’s not quite ready for full-on marriage even if he wants a relationship, and the percussion gets more organic pretty quickly opposite a prominent and smooth guitar melody and some pedal steel. Basically, the song’s text might as well serve as metatext for the song too - it’s not bad, but it’s not really great either… just kind of in-between, and yet in response I can only find myself disappointed. Funny how that happens.

84. ‘DND’ by Polo G - I thought this was going in a completely different direction by the title and I actually kind of got excited… but no, Polo G is not making a song about Dungeons & Dragons, but keeping his phone on ‘do not disturb’ as he commits crimes. But I will say I actually quite like the production here - there some real bass smolder backing the trap beat, the piano captures the dark vibe, and Polo G ramps up his intensity well for the second verse; even if the content is pretty by the numbers, I like how Polo G doesn’t really shy away from the dark costs of everything he’s doing, and it sure as hell feels more interesting than him just going stupid. I will say I think some of those traces of sweet melody could have ramped up the bombast across the second verse and pushed this into heavier territory than just going back to the hook, but as it is, this is really damn solid - and on that topic…

80. ‘Die From A Broken Heart’ by Maddie & Tae - okay, I’m not about to place expectations on this. Frankly, I think it’s a miracle Maddie & Tae are charting at all, let alone with one of the best songs from that last album, which probably was what got them the boost here. I like that the song has so much warm acoustic texture from the mandolin and acoustics, the harmonies are rich, the entire mix has a supple richness accented by the pedal steel which is perfect to match the organic groove, and even if the lyrics feel kind of girlish in their heartbreak as they seek counselling from their parents when it all falls apart, it’s not really unrelatable. And I like the little details of the song - how they know they’re gonna laugh about this ex someday, how they question how much of it was ever real when it can fall apart so easy. In other words… I still like ‘Drunk and Lonely’ from that album a little more, but this is a close second and a good way to reintroduce Maddie & Tae to the mainstream - I’m okay with this being here, great song.

78. ‘Sigues Con El’ by Arcangel & Sech - hey look, it’s the reggaeton version of ‘Treat You Better’, this time with somehow less personality! And really, there’s not a lot to say about this beyond that description: watery tones with no distinctive tune behind the standard percussion, and both artists crooning about how they could do better for this girl than the meathead lunk she’s seeing who can’t get her off. I’ll admit this sounds less overwrought than ‘Treat You Better’, but it adds the problem of coming from two distinctive voices who repeat a lot of the same autotuned sentiments on their verses, and it blows the obvious opportunity to have them in competition for her, which could be a cool idea in commenting how guys caricature the ‘other man’ and it winds up being the same projection. Sadly, that would be trying a lot harder than this is, which just winds up really goddamn forgettable - and not remotely good.

64. ‘Broke In A Minute’ by Tory Lanez - you know, I don’t like Tory Lanez that much, but I’ll give him some credit for making a lot out of the lockdown situation through his IG presence and continuing to shovel out mixtapes, which got two songs on the Hot 100 this week. Now unlike his Chixtape series, this is from the set where he’s trying to be rougher or more gangsta… which I guess translates to brand name porn and fucking girls over a ‘Shotta Flow’ cadence - apparently this was originally a freestyle over that beat, and I believe it, given how undercooked this now sounds over the weird flattened synth flutters and the standard trap beat. Now I’ll give this to Tory, it’s better mixed than ‘Shotta Flow’ - hell, I might actually prefer this more - but at the same time, the flex is not doing enough to make Tory Lanez interesting here, so… pass?

59. ‘Boyfriend’ by Selena Gomez - there are two stupid things I want to highlight before I get into this song proper: one, this only exists because Selena Gomez released a deluxe edition of Rare and I still can’t possibly care about its mediocrity, and two, you know the only reason this is called ‘Boyfriend’ is because she wants to beat her ex Justin Bieber’s song of the same name from 2012 in search results. And all of this is more interesting than the actual song, which takes a similar groove to Kanye West’s ‘Fade’ and marries it to a very low-key Billie Eilish riff and since there’s a cowriting credit from Juila Michaels, we have Selena Gomez crooning about how much she wants a boyfriend even as she keeps striking out. What amuses me is that she’s trying to frame this as being playful… which would fine if she was able to sell a teasing or exciting air in her delivery instead of dead-eyed bleariness. The entire song doesn’t quite nail any sense of mood - the groove implies tighter sensuality but the delivery and content can’t match it beyond the most submissive and empty version imaginable. In other words… no, this isn’t good. Next!

54. ‘Stupid Again’ by Tory Lanez - I mean, if you give me a song with that title, the jokes write themselves, especially when it comes to Tory Lanez when I wind up questioning where ‘again’ came into the picture. But moving beyond this… this is actually okay - it tells me that Tory Lanez really wanted to go over ‘The Box’ production from Roddy Ricch with a smattering of Meek Mill, and that Jay-Z interpolation is flagrant, but for a pure dumb hype anthem with symphonic bombast behind the trap beat and Tory delivering a lot of energy, it’s credible, especially when you open up with that ridiculous Connor McGregor quote. And from there the song only gets more absurb, especially in the girl blowing his dick like a flute - which when you think about it just seems awkward - that he got the flu on a bitch - I have questions - that he passes her like hot potato - and how he calls out other guys for buying their women heels and taking them to dinner… I mean Tory, if you’re calling that simp behavior, you have a back catalog that might speak against you! So in summary… it’ll go off at the right moments, but again, this certainly lives up to its title.

23. ‘Level of Concern’ by twenty one pilots - so we’ve got another song made in the wake of the pandemic - but I will admit to being kind of shocked that twenty one pilots of people are making it. Not to complain about it - from what I can tell all the money is going to help a charity for folks who work in the concert industry and got laid off, and that’s a cool step - but twenty one pilots has always seemed to be in their own world, where a charity single seems like an odd choice. But okay, apparently the biggest step on this song was reportedly Tyler Joseph using an electric guitar instead of just bass… and you can kind of tell, given how buried a lot of the guitar rollick proper is in the mix, but I’ll admit this is still pretty good. On the one hand it does feel like a more conventional song in the retro-disco touches to the groove and keyboard melodies, but at the same time, twenty one pilots might be the one of the few mainstream bands who can include 'quarantine’ in a song and it not feel forced, and there’s enough melodic tightness here to be pretty catchy. And I get the anxious sentiment of the song, in looking for someone else to tell him that this is all going to be okay, just a reassurance in a world he doesn’t quite understand, especially when he just wants everyone to be safe. In short… yeah, this just works. In fact, if we don’t get any more quarantine songs, that’d be fine by me too!

So yeah, I’m actually give twenty one pilots this one for ‘Level of Concern’, just edging out ‘Die From A Broken Heart’ by Maddie & Tae for the best of the week while that will take the honourable mention. Worst… it’s kind of tough because there’s not an absolutely crap song here, but I think I’m gonna go with ‘Sigues Con El’ by Arcangel and Sech for being crap in a really boring way, with Dishonourable Mention sliding to ‘Boyfriend’ by Selena Gomez, a song that does more for everything else around it than on its own. Still, though, a pretty decent week… and watch it all get squandered thanks to a bad album from DaBaby, stay tuned for that!