billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - december 2, 2023

…you know, there’s a part of me that finds it telling that I completely forgot Drake was going to see a modest album bomb with the deluxe tracks - marketed as Scary Hours 3 - tacked onto For All The Dogs; it had an online moment reportedly with the wordplay being stronger and nastier, more what the diehard fans wanted. Granted, said tracks likely don’t have the same pop appeal so they don’t have the same chart impact, but it is at least a story this week…

And certainly a better one that in our top ten, where ‘Lovin On Me’ by Jack Harlow went to #1. Let’s make this clear, it got that top spot courtesy of streaming, an aggressive radio push, and the Hot 100 top position being weaker than ever, and it’s not going to hold that spot with the glut of holiday music surging up the Hot 100. But before we get to that, it did dethrone ‘Cruel Summer’ by Taylor Swift at #2, although with the streaming dropoff and radio slipping into freefall, it might have been inevitable. Now what’s interesting is that ‘Paint The Town Red’ by Doja Cat would stand to make up some ground at #3 - its streaming also fell off, but the radio isn’t quite dropping as quickly, and that’s a feasible margin… but let’s be real, what’s really going to make the charge is ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ by Mariah Carey, already up huge to #4 as the streaming is back in earnest; it’s gonna go to #1 next week, we all know it. This strands ‘Snooze’ by SZA at #5, where its margins are only getting more pronounced as the radio dumps it, which takes us to ‘I Remember Everything’ by Zach Bryan and Kacey Musgraves at #6, where it’s predominantly here on streaming, but it is starting to get a little bit of radio traction - too little too late, unfortunately! Now where things get interesting for me is ‘Greedy’ by Tate McRae up to #7 - with tangible pop radio momentum and okay streaming, and with an album dropping in December, she could make a play here or hope to ride out the next month to clinch the top spot in January, but I think timing will be everything with this one, the odds are against her. Hell, on that note ‘Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree’ by Brenda Lee makes a big return at #8, knocking back ‘Is It Over Now’ by Taylor Swift to #9 - though the streaming losses also probably had a lot to do with it too - and then we have a new top ten entry and one I’m actually happy to see here: ‘Water’ by Tyla at #10! It’s a good R&B song, the radio loves it, and streaming is starting to get onboard; no idea if it has a chance against the holiday glut, but we can hope?

This takes us naturally to our losers and dropouts, aka everything getting forced out by the combination of Drake and the holidays. In the latter category, we have the natural and expected exits like like ‘Daylight’ by David Kushner, ‘Barbie World’ by Ice Spice, Nicki Minaj and Aqua, ‘Seven’ by Jungkook and Latto, and ‘Single Soon’ by Selena Gomez, but we have a lot more losers here, nearly a third of the Hot 100! Let’s start with the losses off debuts, like ‘Houdini’ by Dua Lipa to 33 - she also saw a loss for ‘Dance The Night’ to 31 - and ‘Northern Attitude’ by Noah Kahan and Hozier to 79, and then let’s go to our few gains cut short, like ‘White Horse’ by Chris Stapleton muscled back to 27, ‘Everything I Love’ by Morgan Wallen at 69, and ‘Too Much’ by Kid LAROI, Jungkook, and Central Cee at 93 - Jungkook also saw ‘Standing Next To You’ fall to 73. Then we have a few more continued losers where Taylor Swift saw the brunt of it: ‘Now That We Don’t Talk’ at 56, ‘Slut!’ at 76, ‘Say Don’t Go’ at 81, and ‘Style’ at 91, but Bad Bunny saw a few hits with ‘Monaco’ at 38 and ‘Perro Negro’ at 82… and because Olivia Rodrigo can’t get any luck, ‘get him back!’ fell to 75. Then we got a few Travis Scott losers - ‘MELTDOWN’ with Drake at 94 and ‘I KNOW?’ at 54 - and now, the rest: ‘Bongos’ by Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion at 97, ‘LALA’ by Myke Towers at 89, ‘Rich Men North Of Richmond’ by Oliver Anthony at 85, ‘Great Gatsby’ by Rod Wave at 65, ‘Strangers’ by Kenya Grace at 64, ‘500 lbs’ by Lil Tecca at 62, and ‘Wild Ones’ by Jessie Murph and Jelly Roll at 60. Finally, ‘On My Mama’ by Victoria Monet hit 59, ‘Harley Quinn’ by Fuerza Regida and Marshmello hit 57, ‘‘Kill Bill’ by SZA hit 49 - joins other longtime hits getting nudged out like ‘Flowers’ by Miley Cyrus at 47 and ‘What It Is (Block Boy)’ by Doechii and Kodak Black at 45 - ‘My Love Mine All Mine’ by Mitski at 44 - I’m stunned she’s lasted this long - and ‘Fast Car’ by Luke Combs getting pushed all the way out of the top ten to 18!

So what’s replacing all of them? Well, naturally it’s holiday music, so in our returns, let’s just rattle through all of those that came back right into the top 50, like ‘It’s The Most Wonderful Time’ by Andy Williams at 28, ‘Let It Snow’ by Dean Martin at 35, ‘Feliz Navidad’ by Jose Feliciano at 39, ‘Underneath The Tree’ by Kelly Clarkson at 42, ‘The Christmas Song’ by Nat King Cole at 43, ‘Sleigh Ride’ by The Ronettes at 46, and ‘Santa Tell Me’ by Ariana Grande at 48. Kind of a shame they’re taking up oxygen - as well as ‘Calling For You’ by Drake ft. 21 Savage sneaking back at 99 - because I think the much more interesting story is the abrupt return for ‘Surround Sound’ by JID ft. 21 Savage and Baby Tate thanks to going viral on Tiktok; really could have picked a better time of year to attempt a resurgence, but given how it’s one of the best rap songs of last year, I’m not about to complain that much! Now in our gains… outside of the top ten we got the expected jumps for ‘Jingle Bell Rock’ by Bobby Helms at 12, ‘Last Christmas’ by Wham! at 13, and ‘A Holly Jolly Christmas’ by Burl Ives at 16, but I’m more interested in the bounce for ‘Can’t Catch Me Now’ by Olivia Rodrigo up to 63. I don’t have a lot of faith it’s going to stick around outside of the Hunger Games movie run, but it’s a really solid song, I’ll enjoy it while it’s here. And not for nothing, we are in minor album bomb territory for Drake with the six new songs he charted, so outside of the top 40 and the best / worst… ‘Wick Man’ at 71, ‘Stories About My Brother’ at 58 - probably the closest to being good of the new Drake songs with the Joe Budden shots, some clever wordplay, and a really nice beat from Conductor Willaims, and ‘Red Button’ at 51.

Alright, this gives us a… well, rather interesting list of new arrivals, all the more strange starting with…

90. ‘I Swear, I Really Wanted To Make A “Rap” Album But This Is Literally The Way The Wind Blew Me This Time’ by Andre 3000 - …let’s be completely real: the only reason a song like this could even chart is because it’s credited to Andre 3000 and enough folks were curious at this being his first solo work… only to be greeted with a twelve minute fluttery ambient instrumental piece with ghostly percussion, chimes, where the first flute melody doesn’t slip in until nearly the three minute mark. It’s is unquestionably one of the strangest pieces to ever chart on the Hot 100 and one I do not see sparking any sort of trend, even in the context of the brief era when new age music could occasionally scrap out a week or two on the charts decades ago… but as I said in my review of the album, it’s one of my favourites on the album. I love how the tentative flutework is trying to feel out its place, which creates both a blur of wonderment and melancholy, steps taken into a strange new world that Andre 3000 is still trying to understand and a pang of regret for not doing what his audience wanted, even if I think the song kind of loses its way by the very end with its quirkier misadventures. Not something I’ll revisit often… but again, if I’m on my ambient bullshit, I wouldn’t be averse to listening to this - very good, if not great, and outside of the context of 3 Stacks’ run with OutKast deserves to be properly considered.

84. ‘Where The Wild Things Are’ by Luke Combs - I’m so happy there’s someone working with Luke Combs that is convincing him to choose good singles, to the point I’m legit shocked that he’s finally putting some muscle behind one of the best songs on his album that I never thought would be pushed! That warm driving groove, that anthemic hook, the fact that it’s damn near a story song that has Combs’ brother buying a motorcycle and taking off for California, where even Combs himself goes out to visit and party with him. But where the song gets interesting and takes a leap in my point of view is the final section - Combs recognizes he can’t live that kind of life and heads home to his family, his brother stays out there and dies in a motorcycle accident, and while this could have been spun as a tragic parable, that’s not how the song is framed; there’s grief but also an acknowledgement that he chased his dreams and found many of them, and if that’s how it all ends… well, it’s hard to fault a life lived exactly how he wanted, which is why the song still has some of that aspirational fervour; hell, on ‘Doin This’, Luke Combs made it clear that while his own path is different, he’d take many of the same risks. So yeah, one of the best songs on the album, and while it’s got an uphill battle to become a proper hit… please, let’s make this happen - excellent song!

52. ‘The Shoe Fits’ by Drake - let me start by saying that I mostly like the production on this song - the muted soul sample, spare percussion and fragmented backing vocal, it’s smooth as hell… shame it’s a backdrop to Drake perhaps not at his worst, but likely his least charming, mostly because this is industrial-grade concern trolling. It starts off on the hook clapping back at those who want him to go back to his old raps, where he disingenuously says ‘he doesn’t know how anymore’, lightly mocking that audience because he’s ‘grown’ and they haven’t, and the entire song from there is an extended, long-form riff on that audience. He starts with the women, who are so quick to not be grounded and follow their independent woman plans when they can instead date wealthy but insecure guys who treat them badly… or just fuck around on OnlyFans, as if Drake’s veneer of faux-class isn’t obviously paper-thin and that he hasn’t behaved as badly with as much pettiness, the condescension is just rancid. Not to worry, he’s going at the insecure guys just as much here - which is moderately more tolerable until you realize that most of this is just punching down at guys who don’t have the money he does to act flagrant, especially when the girl in that story moved on to fuck James Harden, which if you’ve watched any Clippers game recently it’s about the best performance Harden has delivered recently. I’m not gonna deny that Drake can craft a story, but when you recognize that despite the hundreds of millions Drake is just as petty and insecure as everyone involved here, it’s just obnoxious and way less classy than he thinks he’s being. In other words, it’s bad - next!

34. ‘exes’ by Tate McRae - alright, taking a break from Drake for Tate McRae’s next single to be pushed… and you know, after ‘greedy’ basically felt like lifting pages from Nelly Furtado’s Timbaland-era in its groove for a deliberate mid-2000s throwback, I was at least intrigued for where this would go… only to get a slice of trap pop that Camila Cabello could have dropped in 2018, come on! Seriously, the watery minimalist melody, the whirring cheap-sounding trap snares and hi-hats, how McRae is submerged in vocal effects to try and make a capricious kissoff song remotely convincing from her by draining any emotion from her delivery, and yet I’m still not buying it. More importantly, if you’re still keeping his jewelry and number, I think that puts a hole in any love-them-and-leave-them sentiment if you leave all those doors open. It just sounds so cheap and dated, where McRae said she threw this together as a hail mary in two hours and I absolutely believe it - I wish artists recognized that’s not a good thing, because I don’t think this is good at all, next!

26. ‘Evil Ways’ by Drake ft. J. Cole - so I’ll say it, I don’t think it does either Drake or J. Cole any favours to have another collab so early even if they’re now touring together; I don’t love ‘First Person Shooter’ by any means, but at least it felt a little special compared to this, where the tradeoff of bars over The Family Circle sample isn’t quite as tight as it should be, especially when it’s all about Drake being on his ‘evil ways’ with Cole as the stern moral force and I’m sorry, I can’t take either assertion remotely seriously. Part of this is how weirdly laboured J. Cole is in connecting his punchlines together, and Drake is still being a petty asshole in taking potshots at Pharrell because of his Pusha T connection and implying he’s going to hook up with ROSALIA - charming. Again, I don’t mind the warbling sample flip and crisp percussion, but again, it feels like something to recapture the spotlight after ‘First Person Shooter’ and it just doesn’t feel as special - just okay, I guess.

11. ‘You Broke My Heart’ by Drake - so initially I was surprised that this was the song that got the top spot of the new entries - the last cut on the EP, not Drake working with J. Cole? It’s not like the production is remotely better - the soul sample feels flimsy off the brittle percussion and Drake’s crooning doesn’t blend as well as it should - and when you look at the bars, it starts feeling like a complete refutation of all the attempts at maturity that Drake was trying to sell before. Why get the gun yourself when you brag multiple times that you could have Chubbs do it, if you represent the ‘down bad, sad boys’ why spend so much time dunking on them for not having as much money, and if this girl is not worth your time when you only dated her four months - not going to judge the length, but come on Drake, you should know better by now - why be so willing to air this shit out when you were putting her on blast for not having maturity, and last time I checked, she wasn’t saying anything! But no, that’s not why this blew up: it comes down to that bridge where he goes for a big crowd chant of ‘fuck my ex’… and because of the autotune, a lot of folks misheard it as ‘fuck my ass’ and it became a cheap meme, because hip-hop twitter always lives down to one’s expectations. And if you’re going to say ‘this is the moment where he can be honest and cut loose and be real’, I’d be willing to buy it… if not for the rest of this EP where there’s little to no self-awareness and it comes across petty, defensive, and empty, just with better production this time. It’s not the worst song on the album… but it’s not good, and given how much positive hype this EP was getting, I was expecting a lot more.

So yeah, that was our week… I’m more annoyed about this than I should be, and as a result Drake is getting both bottom spots, with ‘The Shoe Fits’ as the worst and ‘You Broke My Heart’ as the Dishonourable Mention. Best of the week is easily with Luke Combs ‘Where The Wild Things Are’, with Honourable Mention sliding to Andre 3000’s ‘I Swear, I Really Wanted To Make A Rap Album… etc’. Next week… we’ve got a few weeks of holiday dominance to come before Tate McRae and possibly Nicki Minaj throw it all into chaos, so stay tuned for that!