billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 8, 2022

I get the feeling that holiday music is going to take its time leaving the Hot 100 this year, which is one reason why this week feels so transitional. Everything is kind of in flux as the chart rebalances, and with The Weeknd dropping an album this Friday that’s bound to throw everything up in the air, so I’m not exactly placing a lot of weight in what we’re seeing, at least for now.

But when we look at our top ten, holiday music is not leaving without a fight as ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ by Mariah Carey is still clinging hard to that #1 - streaming will certainly help in that regard. But ‘Easy On Me’ by Adele is chasing right behind her - radio has picked up in a big way and sales are still good, this is likely going to retake the #1 comfortably next week. Then we’ve got a block of Christmas music: ‘Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree’ by Brenda Lee at #3, ‘Jingle Bell Rock’ by Bobby Helms at #4, and ‘A Holly Jolly Christmas’ by Burl Ives at #5 - all of these will fall back in due time, the interesting question will be how quickly. Because ‘Stay’ by Kid LAROI and Justin Bieber is not far behind rebounding to #6, especially with radio mostly stable… and that means ‘Heat Waves’ by Glass Animals also isn’t far behind as it jumped back into the top 10 at #7, basically because the radio has guaranteed this isn’t going away. Then we have ‘It’s The Most Wonderful Time’ by Andy Williams at #8 and that opens the door for ‘Shivers’ by Ed Sheeran to slip up to #9, which has persisted thanks to remarkably stable radio and solid sales as well. Finally, ‘Feliz Navidad’ by Jose Feliciano clings onto #10 - the sooner this is gone, the better.

On that note, losers and dropouts, where in the latter category it was pretty much just lesser holiday hits and all of that small Roddy Ricch album bomb, nothing really of notice. And outside of ‘Broadway Girls’ by Lil Durk and Morgan Wallen stumbling off the debut to 30, the rest of our losers here are Christmas songs: ‘Let It Snow’ by Dean Martin to 34, ‘Santa Baby’ by Eartha Kitt to 45, ‘It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas’ by Michael Buble at 47, ‘Merry Christmas’ by Ed Sheeran and Elton John at 67, and thankfully ‘Christmas Isn’t Cancelled (Just You)’ by Kelly Clarkson tanking off the debut to 93 - good.

But we did see a lot of gains and rebounds, and it’ll be interesting how many of these caught a fragment of year-end buzz versus those that’ll last longer, so let’s start with the latter category. Doja Cat in particular had a good week with ‘Kiss Me More’ with SZA back at 38 and ‘You Right’ with The Weeknd at 42, but ‘Essence’ by Wizkid, Tems, and Justin Bieber saw the biggest jump back at 36, with the rest being songs barely clinging to the charts with ‘Doin’ This’ by Luke Combs at 88, ‘half of my hometown’ by Kelsea Ballerini and Kenny Chesney at 89, and ‘Poke It Out’ by Wale and J. Cole at 90. Then when we go to our gains… it’s tough to gauge what’ll actually stick here, especially when we see the songs that rebounded from losses last week. I already mentioned ‘Shivers’, but then we have ‘INDUSTRY BABY’ by Lil Nas X and Jack Harlow at 12, ‘Need to Know’ by Doja Cat at 14, ‘abcdefu’ by GAYLE at 17, ‘Fancy Like’ by Walker Hayes at 33, ‘One Right Now’ by Post Malone and The Weeknd at 39, and ‘My Universe’ by Coldplay and BTS at 72. But after the slight boost off the debut for ‘Do It To It’ by Acraze and Cherish at 87, it’s kind of all over the place. Regrettably ‘Super Gremlin’ by Kodak Black seems way too stable up to 16, ‘Bad Habits’ by Ed Sheeran saw a soft rebound to 19, ‘THATS WHAT I WANT’ by Lil Nas X hit 35, ‘Oh My God’ by Adele looks to be the next single at 40, ‘Thinking About You’ by Dustin Lynch and MacKenzie Porter went to 44, ‘Better Days’ by NEIKED, Mae Muller and Polo G hit 46, and ‘Message In A Bottle’ by Taylor Swift got a light boost to 80. The one nice surprise was a decent amount of good country music getting a lift, with ‘One Mississippi’ by Kane Brown held up to 60, ‘Til You Can’t’ by Cody Johnson got a nice bounce to 70, ‘Freedom Was A Highway’ by Jimmie Allen and Brad Paisley went up to 73, and ‘Heart On Fire’ by Eric Church went up to 78 - again, no guarantees given that it’s Music Row and most of these are relatively low and we’ve got some weeks of turbulence ahead, but hey, nice to hope, right?

Anyway, we’ve got a reasonable number of new arrivals this week, unfortunately starting off with…

99. ‘23’ by Sam Hunt - …because this is what 2022 needs, more Sam Hunt, or for him to just actively engage with his career because people will give this guy hits on basically nothing. Anyway, this is actually not a song from Southside - thank the higher powers - where he’s reminiscing about an old relationship, of which I’d have less of an issue if the majority of his catalog hasn’t been very openly about his current partner and most often in a not all that complimentary way either. And I wouldn’t even bring it up if the content of this didn’t feel so weirdly possessive, a song where it’s very clear she’s skipped down and moved on with her life and likely someone new, but Sam Hunt really wants to get into her head and say ‘you might be sophisticated but you drink too much and you probably reminisce about me and everything I want to define about my connection with you’ - especially when this is all about being 23 and Sam Hunt is 37! Yes, he’s got that line where he says he hopes you’re happy now, but I’ve heard bro-country artists make the wistful song about their girl going to California before - Jake Owen did it masterfully with ‘LAX’ - and Sam Hunt doesn’t come across as reflective or sincere. The best thing I can say about this is that the actual production is kind of interesting - the groove is more refined and punchy off the warmer guitars, it’s almost playing to a nu-disco flavour of country, but why do I feel like Sam Hunt is playing catch-up to what Kane Brown, Thomas Rhett, and even with ‘7 Summers’ what Morgan Wallen has done the past few years? Look, I can take this in and say it’s nowhere near as bad as what Sam Hunt can do… but there’s something about his weirdly vacant delivery and certain lyrical details that no good groove will salvage, so while it might not be terrible, I don’t care for it.

96. ‘Beers On Me’ by Dierks Bentley, Breland & HARDY - at this point, the only way to view Dierks Bentley’s charting songs is as a mechanism for him to get enough money to work on the stuff he genuinely likes that’ll never become hits. It sucks as a fan of the guy that I don’t expect any of this to be good, but hey, if it means more Hot Country Knights down the line, we’ve got to take it, right? Well, at least this is tepid and forgettable, not outright bad - the percussion groove feels weirdly heavier off the guitars but at least carries a bit more organic texture, the sort of track that lumbers into place and just kind of squats there with limited effort from everyone involved, especially as it’s pretty much a barroom commiseration song that doesn’t have much in the way of distinctive presence. Seriously, even if I think the vocal mixing is a little rougher than it should be, neither HARDY nor Breland have much in the way of interplay or harmonizing with Dierks Bentley - feels more like a collab for the names and connections rather than making a song worth caring about. Maybe not bad, but I’m going to forget this exists in record time.

94. ‘Pressure’ by Ari Lennox - This might be the first time where Ari Lennox has seen some solo penetration on the Hot 100 - I mean, took Dreamville long enough to throw some serious weight behind her, given the persistent underground buzz for the past few years, but now it looks like they’ve got the single… and this one is tricky to evaluate. The production is pretty reliant on an old Shirley Brown sample off the guitar and slight touch of piano, but it makes for some interesting adlib… shame the hi-hat and percussion feels painfully stiff and mechanical, which I don’t think is a good compliment for Ari Lennox. That’s honestly where I’ve struggled a little with her catalog: she’s not all that tight or controlled with her delivery but she’s also got a lot of natural range and presence, which means you need the right production that gives her space and foundation, and I’m not sure this does - with how jittery the groove is, her vocals kind of tumble over everything. I’m also not sure I love the writing her either - basically it’s trying to walk the line of being hot as hell and having made it and wanting the attention, but also more on her terms, with a lot of mixed messaging in the give-and-take. That’s generally fine for this sort of R&B… but I dunno, I wish it felt a little more distinctive, or we got more than just one verse and bridge. Still, it’s interesting and I think it could grow on me, but compared to her early work, this hasn’t won me over, at least not yet.

92. ‘I Am Woman’ by Emmy Meli - this is one of those cases where I heard about the backlash before I heard the song, which apparently has gone viral on TikTok… and here I was thinking it was a cover of the old Helen Reddy song from fifty years ago, but go figure. Anyway, it’s tough to tell where Emmy Meli came from - she’s apparently signed to Disruptor and Arista, so I have no idea how long this was in development… because it certainly feels like something that comes out of a label trying to replicate an organic pop hit with no coherent idea on what that even is, because wow, this is rough. Emmy Meli sounds like the jerkier, more exaggerated version of Lorde-wannabes like Daya from the mid-2010s with some really wonky vocal mixing - I’ve heard demos sound better - but when you pair it with that oily guitar pick up, flat low-end synth, and all of the gauzy layers drizzled over it that can’t build any presence or groove, it sounds flat in a really ugly way, that can’t pretend to pay off that slightly rougher guitar they tack on at the very end. And I have to be honest, it kind of kills the empowerment anthem vibes very quickly for me - there’s no arc or crescendo that builds to it, and because I don’t think it’s ironic given how bluntly ridiculous the lyrics are, it feels like an attempt at earnestness that doesn’t translate. Maybe this works better for a younger audience who’ll embrace this sound, and Emmy Meli being the only writer of this does help it feel a little less committee-design, but it feels clunky and cloying and if this gets any sort of radio it’s going to get aggressively irritating. Not good, but I’ve heard worse in this territory, and it doesn’t bug me that much… yet.

83. ‘Hrs And Hrs’ by Muni Long - honestly, there’s a part of me that just wants to talk about who Muni Long actually is, because while you might not know this pseudonym, you might recognize her name Priscilla Renea, under which she’s put out two albums - one in 2009, one in 2018 - and also cowrote a lot of songs… and it’s a mixed catalog, to put it lightly. On the one hand, we have Pitbull’s ‘Timber’ and Rihanna’s ‘California King Bed’ and Ariana Grande’s ‘Popular Song’… on the other hand we have Fifth Harmony’s ‘Worth It’ and Chris Brown’s ‘Don’t Wake Me Up’ and Florida Georgia Line’s ‘New Truck’, so I didn’t know what the hell she was putting out here, especially as she’s had a tendency to flit across genres even in her own music. But this is pure R&B, calling back to all the songs she wrote with K. Michelle and Tamar Braxton with the liquid guitar behind the spare percussion and supple bassline… and I mean, she’s an expressive singer, but the vocal mixing and effects tacked on to clean up the rougher delivery is obvious and doesn’t flatter a song all about intimate time spent together. And there’s something about the song that feels like a draft of an idea that needed a little more - repeating ‘hours and hours’ might give you a few good rhymes on the first verse, but as the song continues it has the feel of trying to stretch an idea and it feels longer than it is. Don’t get me wrong, this is not bad and I get why it went viral…. but she’s made better, and I hope under this rebrand she can showcase that.

79. ‘Christmas Tree’ by V - I mean, what am I supposed to expect from a Christmas song made by a member of BTS, and not one with a lot of solo credits? He’s had a bit of solo traction with some cuts collected with BTS, but I didn’t really know what to expect for a Christmas song predominantly in English that’s apparently being incorporated into a Korean TV series. So what might be more surprising is that I actually like this a decent bit - predominantly acoustic until they bring a very low key synth a drum machine near the end, it’s most focused on V’s huskier singing and longing for a former lover where he couldn’t say everything he wanted to and is still very much in love, and that translates effectively when it feels this subtle and spare. It’s not a song trying to do a lot - and for as over-the-top as BTS can be, it reflects a level of restraint I wish they could balance more effectively - but as their better ballads and j-pop side has proven, BTS can play in this territory and V delivers well here. So yeah, good song, certainly more of what I like around the holidays than most, I’ll take it.

54. ‘Surface Pressure’ by Jessica Darrow - what is it with songs this week and pressure - it’s the new year, I’d like a moment or two to relax a bit. But in this case - and indeed for the last two songs on this list - we’re talking about soundtrack cuts from the newest Disney film Encanto. Full disclosure, I haven’t had the time to see it as of yet, but if reviews and my timeline are any indication, it seems quite good and further stacked the deck on the music by getting Lin-Manuel Miranda to write like he did for Moana. And… well, with this one, I’m not sure I’m onboard, even if conceptually it’s not bad: the eldest sister who has to hold the pressure for the younger siblings and who starts to buckle under all of it, to the point where it starts to blur whether she needs that pressure. But I’m not sure the song flatters Darrow’s range - it feels a little low for her as it sounds like she’s trying imitate Miranda’s delivery - and that wiry synth and faint twinkles behind the fizzy, programmed percussion feels oddly unbalanced in the midrange in comparison with the more dominant groove. Overall it feels like a character song but one that could do more than it actually does - just lukewarm on it at best, have to be honest.

50. ‘We Don’t Talk About Bruno’ by Encanto Cast - but okay, this was the song that got a lot of folks excited, with many calling it a highlight and predicting a really high streaming debut as more of an ensemble piece. And… okay, it’s a good story song to set the scene, highlighting the precognitive powers of Bruno and laying seeds for the arcs of characters down the line, and I think the more textured Colombian groove sets the mood as the song keeps the secretive vibe building across the family and ensemble. And while I do appreciate how the musical motifs slip in for Isabela’s part, there’s a stiffness to this composition that just doesn’t click for me. It’s something I’ve noticed with Lin-Manuel Miranda’s compositions for Disney, I’ve rarely been impressed with how his arrangement have built to crescendos or sold the drama, and in this case, the stakes of the scene don’t ramp up as powerfully as you’d expect. Which could make sense for a film all about a family squabble, but if you’re got larger than life characters, you’d think you could do more with it. I’m not saying this is bad, but it’s a composition that gains its momentum and power based off of the film rather than standing alone, so encountering it for the first time here… yeah, it’s fine, but I’m not wowed by it.

And that’s an odd note to end this week… where honestly I think V gets the best of the week with ‘Christmas Tree’, with Honourable Mention going to Ari Lennox with ‘Pressure’… just the most there that I think I like, I’ll bet on that. With the worst, though… I’d argue it’s a toss-up because there’s slight redeeming factors for both, but ‘I Am Woman’ by Emmy Meli is getting the Dishonourable Mention because there’s something about ‘23’ by Sam Hunt that skeeves me out - good groove, unpleasant song. Next week, though, the Christmas material falls back, and who knows what’ll take its place!