billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - may 23, 2020

I have to admit, this week turned out better than I expected. That normally happens after a bad album bomb starts to go away, but here it’s more pronounced because of everything that could have gone wrong. We could have had a Nav album bomb, but thankfully taste prevailed and we got Lil Durk and Kehlani instead. We got the expected rebounds, but it’s more of a mixed bag than outright terrible? And as for what was taking the top spot…

Well, apparently we’re now two weeks in a row where there’s trending controversy surrounding the Billboard Hot 100, specifically the #1 spot which got taken by ‘Stuck With U’ by Ariana Grande and Justin Bieber, debuting at #1. Now we’ll talk at length about this song later, but it’s important to discuss how it got here because Billboard themselves had to put out a press statement on it and their formulas - and really, I can’t stress how unprecedented this is, especially given they highlighted those people making predictions surrounding how the top ten would behave and had to distance themselves from it, especially when artists start taking those as gospel, which is an outgrowth of the Nicki Minaj conversation we had last week. So, ‘Stuck With U’ at #1 got there on good streams, okay YouTube, real radio growth, and solid but not incredible sales, which came as part of a charity bundle. Now there was an accusation made that mass single purchases done by their management accounted for a lot of these sales, but in Billboard’s statement they said they don’t count when labels do excess bulk purchases and apply extra scrutiny when that happens. Now the follow-up question is how much you believe that, because bulk buying of an album or single to boost chart position by the label has been a seedy tactic done since the chart’s inception - it primes the pump and will draw the curious who see a song or album on the rise - but I’d argue the biggest factor comes with consistency in all channels. Hell, I’d say that’s similar for ‘Say So’ by Doja Cat and Nicki Minaj at #2 - huge radio, sure, but the streaming and sales are there to back it up. But let’s get to the elephant in the room: at #3, ‘GOOBA’ by 6ix9ine, where the soundcloud waifu was trying so hard to go to #1 but fell short and threw an ‘exposure’ temper tantrum about it the same way Nicki did against Travis Scott in 2018. But here’s the reality and it’s the same damn thing I have to say to the k-pop stans: if you don’t play every channel, you’re going to lose the race here, as he has insane YouTube numbers and okay sales, but he wasn’t the top in on-demand streaming song and he had pitiful radio. And keep in mind YouTube’s total hits come from a global audience, not just the US, which is what Billboard counts - and really, if I wanted to be petty, I’d come here and say to 6ix9ine to maybe back off counting shady tactics unless you really want us to take a look at where your streams and YouTube really came from *botfarm*. Now here’s where this gets funny: none of these sales/YouTube blitzes are built to last, so what comes next week is an open conversation, and while I don’t think ‘Blinding Lights’ by The Weeknd is going back at #4 - it’s peaked on the radio and outside of a good streaming week is trending downwards - I’m going to go back to my prediction for ‘Savage’ by Megan Thee Stallion ft. Beyonce currently at #5. It might not get to the #1 next week specifically, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it makes the run in the next month on sheer consistency across the board. Now all this drama means the rest of the top 10 isn’t all that interesting: ‘Toosie Slide’ by Drake loses the album boost and slides to #6 even as the radio props it up; ‘The Box’ by Roddy Ricch goes to #7 because it’s fading naturally in all channels but still has a lot of inertia, ‘ROCKSTAR’ by DaBaby ft. Roddy Ricch actually gained to #8 because of solid sales, shipping it to radio, and still dominant in on-demand streaming - see, 6ix9ine, this is the area you should have won handily to take #1, but you didn’t - ‘Don’t Start Now’ by Dua Lipa continues to fade naturally at #9, and ‘Circles’ by Post Malone still clinging to amazingly stable radio at #10.

Now all of this makes the losers and dropouts actually pretty conventional to discuss: the only notable big one in the latter category is ‘Slide’ by H.E.R. ft. YG, which will be just on the cusp of making a year-end list, it’ll be close. And as for losers… outside of ‘All In’ by Lil Baby continuing to fall to 79, they’re all debuts from last week, the majority of them from Drake! ‘Chicago Freestyle’ fell to 46, ‘Pain 1993’ with Playboi Carti at 51, ‘D4L’ with Future and Young Thug at 77, ‘Desires’ with Future at 85, ‘Time Flies’ at 94, and ‘Demons’ with Fivio Foreign and Sosa Geek at 99. The only other loser off the debut is ‘Six Feet Apart’ by Luke Combs, but given it was a throwaway single, I’m not too surprised it’s at 90.

Now like all post-album bomb weeks, we get the reset to what counts as equilibrium, which in this case seems kind of all over the place. I mean there’s not a lot of logic to our comebacks ‘Drinking Alone’ by Carrie Underwood at 89, ‘Sigues Con El’ by Arcangel and Sech at 92, ‘That Way’ by Lil Uzi Vert at 98, and ‘July’ by Noah Cyrus ft. Leon Bridges at 100, unless that last one is linked to her long-overdue album push in some way. But where things are interesting comes in our gains, and let’s start with off the debut, where yes, ‘One Margarita’ by Luke Bryan caught wind at 69, but ‘Don’t Rush’ by Young T, Bugsey, and Headie One also got a real boost to 84 - cool! Then we saw collapses reversed, some pretty bad like ‘BELIEVE IT’ by PARTYNEXTDOOR and Rihanna at 70, ‘OUT WEST’ by JACKBOYS and Young Thug at 67, ‘If The World Was Ending’ by JP Saxe and Julia Michaels at 61, and ‘Walk Em Down’ by NLE Choppa and Roddy Ricch at 52. But on the flipside we also saw ‘Pu$$y Fairy’ by Jhene Aiko rise back to 66, ‘I Hope You’re Happy Now’ by Carly Pearce and Lee Brice at 34, and ‘Level Of Concern’ by twenty one pilots at 47 - and we had ‘Dior’ by the late Pop Smoke at 53 and ‘Turks’ by NAV, Gunna and Travis Scott at 60, the one real boost his album release got him. Outside of that… well, country had a week, offsetting Sam Hunt picking up ‘Hard to Forget’ at 44 and ‘I Love My Country’ by Florida Georgia Line surging to 74 with ‘Bluebird’ by Miranda Lambert at 57, ‘After A Few’ by Travis Denning at 38, ‘In Between’ by Scotty McCreery at 72, and ‘Die From A Broken Heart’ by Maddie & Tae at 82. Outside of that… well, ‘After Party’ by Don Toliver is still here at 63, and I’m not going to claim I’m happy about ‘Sum 2 Prove’ by Lil Baby rebounding to 45 or ‘Before You Go’ by Lewis Capaldi breaking the top 40 at 37, but in the mix we also have ‘Ride It.’ by DJ Regard at 62, ‘Supalonely’ by BENEE and Gus Dapperton at 39 - not gonna lie, it’s kind of growing me a bit - and ‘WHATS POPPIN’ by Jack Harlow is surging to 32. Unfortunately, the one consistent gain is ‘Party Girl’ by StaySolidRocky at 48 - we should stifle this in the crib, people before this becomes a ‘Ran$om Pt. 2', now slower and crappier.

But now a reasonable list of new arrivals, starting with…

91. ‘Viral Moment’ by Lil Durk - so I’ll admit I’ve been on the outside looking in for Lil Durk for a while now - I’ve been aware of his involvement in the Chicago drill scene, but I honestly hadn’t seen the open for him to break through properly, but he’s had some real groundswell. So off his newest mixtape, we have… someone who really wants to hop on Rod Wave’s sound? Yeah, between the blend of rapping and slightly more melodic crooning off the piano and the watery horn and guitar, it's a pretty obvious parallel, except Lil Durk’s percussion sounds better blended if only because the trap skitter is more restrained. Hell, even the content falls in that lane - a lot of hard-won hustling in between the flexing and drug abuse, especially given his hood has plenty of folks who’ll never rise above that. Now I generally like this formula and sound, but I do feel this is missing the heartfelt core and detail that has made Rod Wave’s strongest moments - expensive jewelry and drugs don’t fill that gap in the same way. Not saying this is bad, per se, but it’s not great.

88. ‘Me vs. Me’ by Moneybagg Yo - I’ll admit I’m still kind of surprised that Moneybagg Yo has been able to get another chart placement, as to be blunt I’d struggle to remember any single he’s dropped and I’ve covered, but apparently this is from the deluxe release of his new album, and… it exists? I’ll admit I didn’t mind the call-and-response thing he was doing with his adlibs on the hook and the creaking strings opposite the trap groove wasn’t bad, but then we get the line ‘I’m Dr. Seuss, give me cat in the hat’ and immediately I start struggling to take this seriously, especially on a song that has more than a few lines about blowing off some girl in favour of the streets. In other words, if I’m forced to compare this to any music from his ex Megan Thee Stallion… uh, Megan wins, because this might be just as forgettable again.

80. ‘Change Your Life’ by Kehlani ft. Jhene Aiko - I’ve already talked about this song in my On The Pulse review of Kehlani’s new album and my one issue with it: the vocal mixing just isn’t organic enough to make the most out of their interplay, and it winds up feeling kind of flat and metallic, not helped by the clicking percussion and leaden bass. It’s a shame because everything else about this is great - the vocal interplay between Kehlani and Jhene is excellent, what melody we get is a nice gentle compliment, and both of them singing about all the ways while working together they can make their partners’ life better without coming across as submissive or clumsy… it’s synergistic in the right way, especially as you can think each artist is singing to each other or the audience. Either way, it was the best song from the album, and just absolutely terrific across the board - highly recommended!

76. ‘Go Crazy’ by Chris Brown & Young Thug - I’m willing to be the majority of you didn’t know that Chris Brown and Young Thug put out a project together - mostly because its release was kind of a mess and the buzz both critical and otherwise seemed to evaporate pretty fast. But hey, they have a collab single where they’re trying to pull the ‘change your life’ card too… somehow I prefer it a lot more from Kehlani and Jhene, just saying, as this somehow feels even more clumsily blended and lacking organic presence off the piano! But this doesn’t surprise me: it seems like both artists want to shy away from their warmer, organic side seemingly because they want the music to sound more canned and cheap - which I get from Chris Brown, it’s been a problem for nearly a decade, but for you, Thugger, come on! What’s frustrating is that the melody and sample choice aren’t bad, and for the most part they’re on topic for once in the hookup jam… but Brown kills the intimacy when he has to brag about all the other hoes on his phone; again, self-sabotage by bad artistic instincts, so what could have been good winds up just mediocre - next!

68. ‘Toxic’ by Kehlani - okay, another Kehlani song with uncredited vocals from Ty Dolla $ign, and a pretty good one too, a frustrated musing about wanting to get back together with an old flame - it’s YG - even despite their connection being very wrong for each other. And I like how Kehlani can sell both the frustrated allure and self-awareness that would come in making the bad decision, especially against the spiky synths sliding around the bass rumble and leaden beat. So in other words, not really out of character for the album - even if I’d argue it’s a really odd opening track - but I do like this and see it working for what it is; nice stuff.

65. ‘Zoo York’ by Lil Tjay ft. Fivio Foreign & Pop Smoke - you know, I really want to be interested in the developing New York drill scene with more prospects popping up seemingly every month, but I’m stuck in the situation of just not liking a lot of it. That’s kind of the case for this song: Lil Tjay sounds like he’s drowning in his own autotune opposite a blubbery bass that doesn’t bring anything close to real groove, Fivio Foreign reminds me of Uzi in how much he’ll leave bars to hang disconnected from any full flow - this is the second week in a row where I’m not impressed by this guy - and as much as I hate to admit it, the late Pop Smoke does a lot of the same. And it’s not like the content does more to fill in the gap - gunplay, fucking your girl, designer brands, not only have we heard this, but the halting delivery makes it feel awkward and stilted, which doesn’t match all the bombast they keep trying to create. I dunno, I’m not going to call this terrible, but it’s forgettable and mediocre in a way it should be - next!

50. ‘Can I’ by Kehlani ft. Tory Lanez - I mean, I’m not surprised this is the Kehlani song that moved the most, especially given the feature with Tory Lanez… but I am going to call this pretty lousy all the same. Off-key squonks playing off leaden keys and a clunky hollow drum machine, where Kehlani tries to make this sound as sexy as she can - although saying she wants the bloopers of the sex tape is just weird - but she’s stuck crooning opposite Tory Lanez, who has a higher nasal vocal tone and approaches a sex jam with nothing close to convincing sensuality - he sounds like a horny teenager, for god’s sake! And that mismatch of energy and sound opposite not particularly good production makes this just feel unpleasant. So yeah, not good - next!

43. ‘3 Headed Goat’ by Lil Durk ft. Lil Baby & Polo G - the second Lil Durk cut, this time recruiting walking charisma void Lil Baby - thankfully only here for the hook and literally three bars of a verse, although somehow the dickpiston found time to throw the r-word in - and Polo G to swing by and steal the entire song… except miss when he keeps falling off the damn beat. Honestly, the entire song has a weird unfinished feel - fractured verses, a promising but drowned-out melody and very spare drum machine, and even if I think both Lil Durk and Polo G have good verses in describing those who doubted them who they left behind in the trap, only Lil Durk manages to keep it stable and without the hook to properly space out verses, it just feels assembled in post. So yeah, this is a mess and isn’t good - kind of shame, at least from two of the rappers here I expected a bit more.

3. ‘GOOBA’ by 6ix9ine - you know, I would have been comfortable never having to talk about this snitch ever again, because from a musical level, what does he really add to the conversation that we can’t get from anyone else? Let’s be blunt: 6ix9ine was on his way out even before he went to jail - he was a one-dimensional troll who was more explosive personality than actual talent, and this is him leaning into all of it. And all the tricks are here - he’s shooting people, he’s insulting people, he’s calling other people clout-chasers, and while he tries to switch up his flow, he just does it to throw in references to the pandemic and half-formed Spanish to supposedly justify why he keeps throwing down the n-word. For god’s sake, his entire second verse is basically mocking everyone angry he’s out and trending and how him snitching got him even more success - what he wants is for me to get angry and curse him out. But I’ll be honest, there’s not enough here for me to do that - the beat build-up on the hook isn’t bad but with the barebones piano and percussion there’s nothing here in the instrumental, and very little of this is new or shocking from 6ix9ine; it’s not imposing, it’s just obnoxious. So while I’m just indifferent to negative on this - this isn’t even the worst thing I’ve heard this week - I do think he’s in for a very bloody accident if he keeps playing like this, because considering the people he’s pissed off, his fifteen minutes are about up, and his luck won’t last much longer.

1. ‘Stuck With U’ by Ariana Grande & Justin Bieber - so it seems like the general consensus around this song is that it’s basically Scooter Braun’s fault - taking advantage of a weakened chart atmosphere to push a quick single to ride on celebrity alone under the guise of charity. This, for the record, is the big reason why a lot of punks hate charity singles: transparent acts of self-promotion that even if they raise money for a good cause feel fundamentally insincere, and while I’m sure the money went to the right place, it doesn’t save the song from being remotely good. The common comparison that I’ve seen to this is the Ed Sheeran / Beyonce collaboration ‘Perfect’, but at least everyone on that song was mixed to sound their best - here after Ariana’s first verse, the hollowed out vocal production takes a nose dive because they need to make Bieber’s lack of personality sound credible opposite her, especially around his falsetto! It’s got the same problem as ‘Perfect’ in feeling unbalanced, although I will say I like the slightly rougher guitar beneath them and at least Ariana is trying here more than Beyonce did on ‘Perfect’, but as a whole it’s barely a song, a detached ‘guess I’m stuck with you so let’s screw’ that feels really flat and awkward opposite the soulful groove they’re attempting, most obvious on the final hook where Bieber goes low and just sounds checked out. So yeah, I’m not going to complain about this blocking 6ix9ine from the #1… but let’s not act like this matters, or will be memorable.

But truth be told, when putting together the best and worst of this week I’m a little surprised how much Kehlani dominates the conversation. For one, she’s got the obvious best with ‘Change Your Life’ with Jhene Aiko and I’m giving the Honourable Mention for ‘Toxic’… but she’s also getting the worst of the week for ‘Can I’ with Tory Lanez, which I really didn’t like on the album and I don’t like here - hell, she edges out ‘GOOBA’ by 6ix9ine, who winds up as the Dishonourable Mention because at least Lil Durk can wrangle decent verses and Lil Tjay can approach bombast in a field that’s tolerable. But next week… oh god, we’re going to get a Future album bomb, aren’t we? Well, stay tuned for that…