DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - February 3, 2018

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! In this weekly post, I cover three sections. First, I give my thoughts on the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100. Second, I give my thoughts on the songs that experienced significant gains below the top 10. Third, I give my initial thoughts on our new arrivals this week. I reserve the right to switch things up in the future, but for now this is what I'm sticking with. I've followed the Billboard charts for a long time now and this is a great way for me to express my thoughts to the world. I hope you enjoy!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "God's Plan" - Drake (new) -- Last week I predicted that Ed Sheeran's "Perfect" would go back to No. 1 this week. While I was on the right track there, we'll get to that in a second, shortly after posting I saw the initial sales estimates for this song and I knew that Drake was debuting at No. 1. That sales number is 127,000 first week sales. And with a number that high for a rap song, you know that the streaming is going to be through the roof as well, because streaming is completely owned by rap music. And yeah, that streaming number for Drake is 82.5 million U.S. streams, which is the fourth highest streaming total ever, behind the first two weeks of "Harlem Shake" and T-Swift's "Look What You Made Me Do." The thing to follow for this song is what it does next week. Last year Drake also debuted two songs in the top 10, "Passionfruit" at No. 8 and "Portland" at No. 9, and they lasted two weeks and one week respectively, which actually surprised me because I thought at least "Passionfruit" would stick around. If "God's Plan" fails to gain traction moving forward, it could be gone in a month or so from the top 10. Or this could be like Drake's "One Dance" from 2016, which spent 10 weeks at No. 1. If I had to make a bet right now, I'd bet on the latter and tell you to prepare for a 10-12 week run here for Drake. I'll get into my opinion down below, but you might be shocked to hear that I don't mind this song.

2- "Perfect" - Ed Sheeran (=) -- When I said that I was on the right track when I said "Perfect" would go back to No. 1 this week, the tea leaves were telling me that "Havana" was going to drop as that's what usually happens the week after an album release, which was the reason the song got such a huge sales and streaming boost. And that fall totally did happen. "Perfect" went ahead of "Havana" again. It just so happens that "God's Plan" spoiled his return to the top, so instead "Perfect" stays put at No. 2 while "Havana" falls two spots. If "God's Plan" ends up being a one week wonder, "Perfect" could return to the top next week. Or this could end up being stuck at No. 2 for a while.

3- "Havana" - Camila Cabello (-2) -- Again, zero surprise that this fell. I would've been more surprised, although certainly not disappointed, if this had stayed ahead of "Perfect." But do know what? It may have been only for one week, but I'm really glad that Camila got her seven days as queen of the Billboard charts. In other Fifth Harmony news, it appears that Lauren Jauregui has also signed, or will sign soon, a solo record deal, which would probably spell the official end of the group. Not that they were able to do anything post Camila anyways, but it's worthy of mentioning. Now we'll see what Lauren can accomplish with a solo career, whenever that starts.

4- "rockstar" - Post Malone featuring 21 Savage (-1) -- It's good to see this fall a spot. But it needs to fall faster. The only reason this fell this week is because of Drake's debut. It's time the world is able to let go of this song, which was never interesting.

5- "Finesse" - Bruno Mars & Cardi B (-1) -- While normally I'd be happy to see "Finesse" NOT rising above the songs ahead of it right now, Bruno and Cardi performed this song at the Grammy's on Sunday, which will most assuredly give this a huge boost on next week's chart. The question will be how big? Will it be able to jump up all the way to No. 2 next week? Or even No. 1 if Drake to maintain momentum? Let's hope not, because this song is not a good song. And in case you missed my personal rant on Facebook following the Grammy's, I am furious that Bruno's album won the award for best album of the year. It might be the worst best album winner in the history of the Grammy's. And if you think I'm crazy, then find me a winner that's worse and we'll see.

6- "Bad at Love" - Halsey (-1) -- Halsey also essentially holds even from last week, which isn't encouraging, but at least it's not getting higher. If "Bad at Love" ends up with only week week in the top five, that'll make me happy.

7- "Diplomatic Immunity" - Drake (new) -- The other song that Drake debuted in the charts this week. With this being the lesser of the two songs in terms of sales and streaming numbers, I'd confidently bet that this only stays here for this week. Last year when Drake debuted two songs in the top 10, the lower of the two songs, "Portland," departed after that one week. And when Ed Sheeran also debuted both "Shape of You" and "Castle on the Hill" in the top 10, "Castle on the Hill" exited after one week while "Shape of You" was the one that stayed around. So this song is gone. I also don't hate this song, but it is by far the lesser of the two songs.

8- "New Rules" - Dua Lipa (=) -- I'm really encouraged that two new Drake songs debuted ahead of Dua Lipa, but she managed to stay put anyways. Meaning she essentially continued to rise this week. I'm guessing this song might have a hard time breaking the top five since the songs in the top five right now are pretty solid still, but I'd certainly be happy if it did. At the least, I now expect this to hang around in the bottom half of the top 10 for a while.

9- "Thunder" - Imagine Dragons (-3) -- It makes me super happy to see Imagine Dragons finally tumbling with three songs jumping ahead of "Thunder." This song never belonged close to the top five in the first place, so please let this be the final week!

10- "No Limit" - G-Eazy featuring A$AP Rocky & Cardi B (-3) -- It's equally as pleasing to me to see this also fall three spots. Let's bring in a few new songs into the top 10 next week. If "Meant to Be" (No. 12), "Let You Down" (No. 14) and "Love." (No. 15) were those three songs, I would be super excited! Although "Say Something" by Justin Timberlake will probably spoil that party as it's having first week sales numbers close to 100,000 sales. And I certainly hope Migos doesn't sneak one into the top 10 as their new 24-track album "Culture II" will probably find a huge presence on the charts next week as all their streaming numbers seem to be pretty solid.

Rising on the Hot 100:

12- "Meant to Be" - Bebe Rexha & Florida Georgia Line (+5) -- With Drake's two entries debuting in the top 10, it stalled our potential new entries for these rising songs, completely stalling out "Let You Down" by NF and "Love." by Kendrick Lamar. But amidst all the action, "Meant to Be" managed to rise five spots all the way to No. 12. That's a very encouraging sing that makes me confident that it'll make the top 10 next week. And I hope that's not just hopeful thinking on my part because I really enjoy this song. Bebe and FGL work great together.

31- "Roll in Peace" - Kodak Black featuring XXXTENTACION (+5) -- I'm upset that I have to bring up this song again this week. I really hope we can leave Kodak Black and XXX in 2017 and not carry their unfortunate success into 2018.

43- "Keke" - 6ix9ine, Fetty Wap & A Boogie wit da Hoddie (+21) -- I'm not surprised here. At least this song isn't as bad as "Gummo" and "Kooda." And at least both "Gummo" and "Kooda" took pretty big tumbles this week. So this week is a net positive with 6ix9ine mostly failing. Let's just please get rid of this song fairly quickly, too, and pretend that none of this 6ix9ine stuff ever happened.

51- "Outside Today" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again (+20) -- No! Let's not give YoungBoy a big hit. It's bad enough that this song debuted. We don't need it sticking around.

61- "No Smoke" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again (+17) -- What did I do to deserve TWO YoungBoy songs rising significantly this week? And why did both of them get such huge boosts? No more of this, please?

64- "Five More Minutes" - Scotty McCreery (+19) -- Is Scotty going to actually get a bonafide hit? He may have been a really popular American Idol winner who's had a few songs chart, but none of them really did much. So this would essentially be a first. While I'm not really happy about that as I've never thought Scotty was particularly talented, I suppose there's worse things that could be happening right now.

New Arrivals:

1- "God's Plan" - Drake -- I'm having a hard time remembering exactly what I thought of Drake's "One Dance" when it experienced it's monstrous reign on the Hot 100, but if I was angry at it, that anger has certainly subsided because in 2017 we have experienced a whole lot worse than Drake on the Hot 100. "One Dance" isn't a song that I voluntarily turn to very often, but it's an enjoyable enough song, at least when it comes to rap standards. I bring that up because "God's Plan" reminds me a lot of "One Dance." It has a continuous beat in the background that does a good job of carrying the song. Then I feel the rest of the instrumentation builds on that successfully throughout the song to make this have a really good flow. I've actually played the song on repeat while typing this post up, which is something I've never done with a Drake song. Lyrically I don't think this is anything inspiring as you might normally think with a song referencing God's plan for someone. I just think Drake is talking about how everyone wants him to fail, but he's not going away as God is going to help him succeed. Now personally I don't think God cares much for how successful Drake's rapping career is, but usually Drake feels very lazy with his rap and this time it seems like he actually tried.

7- "Diplomatic Immunity" - Drake -- You didn't think we were actually going to go two for two this week on Drake, did you? Now in comparison to most of the horrible rap of 2017, this song is very tolerable, which is why I said earlier that I don't hate this song. But mostly this is just boring. Even though the writing is on par with "God's Plan" in terms of it seeming like Drake kinda tried with both of these songs, we have the same beat in the background with a four-note progression that repeats itself throughout. And that's it. Nothing interesting happens musically like in "God's Plan." And the structure with Drake's rap is just four long stanzas. So even though the song is only a minute longer than "God's Plan," it feels like it's twice as long as I was tired of the song after a minute, yet it drags on for four minutes. So overall there's definitely been worse for Drake, but this is a song that I'll probably forget about in a few weeks.

56- "Mine" - Bazzi -- I have no idea who Bazzi is and Google seemed equally as confused when I tried to do a search. I found out via Genius that this song is popular because of a viral internet meme it's included in as well as a fancy Snapchat lens you can download. So that's wonderful. Apparently we're still going to let dumb memes power songs in 2018. The song itself is barely a song as it clocks in just over two minutes and the lyrics are super generic as he's just saying that the girl is his. The Snapchat lens throws in a bunch of hearts and flowers on the screen combined with SpongeBob images when it hits the word "mine," so I guess it's a dumb little thing to post around Valentine's Day? Hopefully this means the song will be gone just as fast as it showed up.

65- "Sick Boy" - The Chainsmokers -- The Chainsmokers spent most of their career releasing individual, non-album singles before they finally caved and put together a debut album last year. The only songs they pushed from that were "Something Just Like This" and "Paris," two songs that they released before the album came out. Now it appears they've abandoned that album completely as they didn't push any other song from the album. I suppose that's a good thing because that album was horrible, but I just find it amusing because "Sick Boy" is again a non-album single. As far as The Chainsmokers go, I really enjoyed them... BEFORE they got super mainstream. After "Closer" exploded, they spent the rest of their career lazily copying and pasting "Closer" over and over with uninspired songs that weren't even set up to dance to. With "Sick Boy" I appreciate them doing something a bit more creative as this isn't just a retread of "Closer" or "Roses." We start and end with a simple piano ballad while building in the middle. Yet the song still lacks a drop, thus making it so you can't play this at dance parties like you could with most of their early songs. The lyrics are a bit more interesting than most of the stuff on their album. It seems like Andrew Taggart is trying to make some sort of statement on America or how the public views him, but it doesn't quite land. Taggart also needs to stop singing on his songs because The Chainsmokers are best when they feature someone who is actually a talented vocalist. So I don't hate this. But it also doesn't take The Chainsmokers back to their old form.

71- "Supplies" - Justin Timberlake -- I think I was one of the few who defended JT's "Filthy" from a couple of weeks ago. I think people were expecting another "Can't Stop the Feeling!" while forgetting the type of singer he is on his actual albums. And compared to his usual stuff, "Filthy" was a pretty decent song. This one I can't defend, though. The fact that it debuted at No. 71 instead of debuting in the top 10 like "Filthy" did or "Say Something" seems to be heading towards next week means that the rest of the country doesn't seem to be able to defend this either. This is choppy, slow and has some annoying sound effects repeating in the background. The song itself isn't that inspiring, either. Granted "Filthy" didn't have the greatest lyrics either, but this feels like a boring re-telling of how he met this girl and is promising her that he's the guy for her. He'll be the light when she can't see, the wood when she needs heat, the generator that she can turn and stuff like that because he's got the supplies. The album comes out this week, so we'll see quickly here if this album is actually worth anything. "Say Something" is a duet with Chris Stapleton and it's pretty decent, so that's two for three thus far. Hopefully "Supplies" will just be a small bump in the road.

82- "No Name" - NF -- I was really happy to see NF show up on the charts a little while back and I assumed it would be just for a few weeks, but now the song is knocking on the door of the top 10 AND we have a follow-up song charting as well. Is NF here to stay? That would be encouraging because it's a great change of pace to see rappers who actually put some thought into their lyrics doing well on the charts. "Let You Down" was a personal song song for NF as he reflects on his childhood and feels like he let himself down. "No Name" seems to be a reflection on his journey since "Let You Down" blew up on the charts. While most rappers would get lazy at this point and brag about how rich and famous they are, I really appreciate NF as it appears he is still focusing on being grounded and true to who he is while trying to become a better person. Now I've previously stated that NF is a Christian rapper and I suppose it's more fair to clarify that he is a Christian who is a rapper as his songs aren't necessarily all Christian songs. But the Christianity in himself definitely shows up as he has a few references to God in this song even though the song itself is more about his journey and not about God. If that makes sense. But I'm coming to really like this guy because, not only is he actually really talented with his rap, but he feels very personal and authentic. He's good at telling good stories about himself or other things he cares about rather than lazily rapping about a bunch of nonsense like a lot of other rappers today.

99- "Rock" - Plies -- Our final song comes from a rapper who I also hadn't heard of. Although unlike Bazzi, Plies is an actual rapper who seems to have had a career for a long time. He even had two top 10 hits around 10 years ago, with "Shawty" featuring T-Pain peaking at No. 9 in 2007 and "Bust It Baby (Part 2)" featuring Ne-Yo peaking at No. 7 in 2008. Although he hasn't really charted much since and I certainly didn't follow rap much 10 years ago, so can you blame me for this guy flying under my radar? Although after listening to this song, it doesn't appear that I was missing a whole lot. The beat is interesting enough and he's rapping about this girl being his rock, so this could be a lot worse, but on this song he doesn't spend much time finishing his words. He rarely pronounces the last consonant on the word and the song is super choppy, so I'm not a fan. But compared to most modern rap these days, this is tolerable, so if it kept a placeholder on the charts, I would be fine with that.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - January 27, 2018

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! In this weekly post, I cover three sections. First, I give my thoughts on the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100. Second, I give my thoughts on the songs that experienced significant gains below the top 10. Third, I give my initial thoughts on our new arrivals this week. I reserve the right to switch things up in the future, but for now this is what I'm sticking with. I've followed the Billboard charts for a long time now and this is a great way for me to express my thoughts to the world. I hope you enjoy!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Havana" - Camila Cabello featuring Young Thug (+1) -- Well here's a surprise. I've been counting down the weeks until Camila tied the record for most weeks at No. 2 without hitting No. 1. A record that she will now not be eligible for because she finally did it! She got over the hump and made it to No. 1! I will admit that it crossed my mind for a few seconds that maybe she could sneak ahead of "Perfect" with the debut of her new album, but I didn't seriously consider it, so this is a genuine surprise for me that I suppose I should've seen coming. Camila's new album, titled "Camila" was timed perfectly as that, along with an iTunes discount for the song, gave "Havana" enough of a sales and streaming boost to jump ahead of "Perfect." If history serves me right, the week after an album boost often causes a song to come back down to earth a bit, so I think "Perfect" has a chance of reclaiming the lead next week, but even if that's the case, I'm glad that Camila got her No. 1 hit, which is something she was never able to do with during her days with Fifth Harmony. "Havana" took 23 weeks to get to No. 1, which ties the record among female singers with Sia's "Cheap Thrills." Only six other songs have taken longer. Camila also simultaneously gets her first No. 1 on the Hot 100 and first No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with her new album, a unique accomplishment only achieved previously by Beyonce and Britney Spears.

2- "Perfect" - Ed Sheeran (-1) -- As previously mentioned, Ed Sheeran is down but not out as he could reclaim his title next week. Although after having had six weeks at No. 1 with "Perfect," I'd be fine with letting Camila stay in the spotlight. I'm a fan of sharing the glory rather than one song dominating for a super long time. Regardless of what happens with that top spot, Ed Sheeran certainly isn't going away as he still rules radio with now 151 million in total audience for the song while still having decent sales and streaming numbers. In fact, he narrowly edged out Camila on sales this week to also remain on top there, meaning it's the streaming that got Camila to No. 1. 

3- "rockstar" - Post Malone featuring 21 Savage (+1) -- Post Malone swaps spots with Bruno Mars this week. Although I have a feeling they will be swapping back next week. Or maybe that's just hopeful thinking on my part because I was ready for "rockstar" to leave the charts ever since it debuted. I'm still baffled as to how and why ANYONE is still listening to this boring piece of dumpster fire.

4- "Finesse" - Bruno Mars & Cardi B (-1) -- I mentioned last week that this song will be experiencing a second week drop this week after soaring to No. 3 last week after it's first full week of tracking. That always happens. The fact that this only dropped one spot is a good sign moving forward. It means it's probably here to stay. Compare that one-spot drop to Justin Timberlake's "Filthy" dropping 20 spots in its second week, going from No. 9 last week to No. 29 this week. Personally I prefer this song to "rockstar" as well as the three songs right below it, so if it stays in this region like I think it will, I will be happy for now, although I'd prefer it not jump ahead of "Havana" and "Perfect" as I think that's a good top two combo that I'd like to keep for a little longer.

5- "Bad at Love" - Halsey (+2) -- The radio is falling in love with Halsey. That's why this song has been holding steady after giving me false hope a few weeks ago that it was on its way out. I'm not sure why the radio has determined there's nothing else to play because I could think of quite a few songs below the top 10 that deserve way more radio play than this. But I suppose it could be worse.

6- "Thunder" - Imagine Dragons (=) -- Is it time yet to drop Imagine Dragons? They wore out their welcome a long time ago and I'm still shocked that so many people are clinging on to this boring, empty rock song.

7- "No Limit" - G-Eazy featuring A$AP Rocky & Cardi B (-2) -- I'm certainly happy to see G-Eazy slip as he swaps spots with his girlfriend Halsey. I don't really like either song, but if I had to pick it would certainly not be this song. So I'll take it for this week. Let's continue to kick this song further down!

8- "New Rules" - Dua Lipa (+3) -- IT'S ABOUT FREAKING TIME!!! This is the 25th week on the charts for "New Rules" and I've been wanting it to become a top 10 hit for quite some time, but a part of me wondered if it was going to camp out there right below for forever. Dua first grabbed my attention in a huge way since providing the vocals and depth to Martin Garrix's "Scared to Be Lonely," a song I live. She's since released her album, which I think is a solid pop album, so I'm glad we're accepting her into the circle of stardom here in the U.S. as we could use more female pop stars getting attention after we unfairly kicked a whole bunch to the curb last year. We're a little late to the party as Dua already topped the U.K. charts back in September, but better late than never, right? Now let's please send this song even higher now!

9- "Too Good at Goodbyes" - Sam Smith (-1) -- I'm going to cling onto this song for as long as I can. I don't think it has too many weeks left as there's quite a few songs knocking on the door right below the top 10. But I'm glad it's gained a lot of traction by failing to depart even if it wasn't quite able to climb as high as it deserved to.

10- "MotorSport" - Migos, Nicki Minaj & Cardi B (=) -- Migos and their girlfriends stubbornly stick around for one more week at No. 10 as it was Justin Timberlake's "Filthy" that was the only song to depart the top 10 this week. Considering that "Gucci Gang" is sitting at No. 11 with "Gummo" at No. 13, I suppose this could be worse. But we also have "Love." by Kendrick Lamar at No. 12, "Let You Down" by NF at No. 14 and "Meant to Be" by Bebe Rexha and Florida Georgia Line at No. 17, so let's invite one of those, or all of those, into the top 10 and kick Migos out. They've overstayed their welcome. Although I will say I'm glad that this song didn't get any bigger as it peaked at No. 6 after only being in the Hot 100 for 12 weeks now.

Rising on the Hot 100:

13- "Gummo" - 6ix9ine (+6) -- I'm trying to figure out why this rose this week, but haven't been successful. I don't see a new album or a music video release, so I'm confused and worried. This song peaked around here several weeks ago and then thankfully started to drop, but now it's back up and I'm back to being angry. If you missed in, 6ix9ine claimed the top two spots in my worst songs of 2017 list and this was one of them. I'm convinced that all the people streaming this horrifically awful song aren't paying attention at all to the lyrics or else I would hope they would stop streaming it. Or maybe they wouldn't. Considering all the horrible rap music poisoning our charts today, I'm not sure anyone who listens to that genre ever pays attention to the lyrics they are listening to or even cares. And if that offends you, then so be it. Listen to better music. 

18- "End Game" - Taylor Swift featuring Ed Sheeran & Future (+18) -- It's really strange to me that this seems to be the song gaining Taylor Swift some traction after the other two songs have completely failed. There's several songs that I could pick out from "reputation" that deserve to gain traction if Taylor would release them as singles, but "End Game" is the absolute worst of the album, so I'm not happy. It's only here because of Ed Sheeran and his part in the song is completely wasted. It got such a huge boost this week due to the new music video, so I can only hope that it falls back down next week and starts to go away, but we shall see.

20- "I Fall Apart" - Post Malone (+6) -- I gain comfort in knowing that this is a slow riser on the charts, meaning I don't think it'll ever hit the levels of "rockstar" even if it does creep into the top 10. But please, for the love of everything right, lets keep this away?

30- "Never Be the Same" - Camila Cabello (+35) -- Camila's other song also gets a huge boost from the album release. By the way, I listened to the album and really enjoyed it. This isn't one of the better songs, but I enjoy it, but I'm not upset that it's doing well.

36- "Roll in Peace" - Kodak Black featuring XXXTENTACION (+9) -- I was hoping that we could leave these two in 2017. Let's discard this garbage and not let it get any higher.

40- "Lemon" - N.E.R.D & Rihanna (+10) -- If this song is going to be a 2018 hit, it's taking an awfully long time to get there. But at the same time, it has managed to gain consistency. This is a fun song. I'm rooting for it!

41- "Lights Down Low" - MAX featuring gnash (+6) -- This is a song that has been slowly rising. And I'd be a lot happier for this song if it was just MAX with his original and not the gnash remix which ruins the song because gnash totally doesn't fit into the context of the song and is just thrown in there to give the song popularity. But it's whatever. 

43- "Ric Flair Drip" - Offset & Metro Boomin (+5) -- Migos has a song rising on the charts that I surprisingly enjoy. Let's just focus on that one and not this Offset solo song.

55- "Nowadays" - Lil Skies featuring Landon Cube (+30) -- OK, this isn't the most offensive song on the charts when it comes to these untalented SoundCloud rappers that we're giving careers to. And this is the slightly better of the the Lil Skies songs, but let's not get too carried away. I would still prefer it if this song would go away.

59- "Written in the Sand" - Old Dominion (+10) -- The highest rising country song this week. And the only one that rise high enough to make this section this week. I'm not particularly happy, but there's worse things happening right now, so I'll move on.

60- "Stir Fry" - Migos (+12) -- This is the Migos song I enjoy. So let's drop "Ric Flair Drip" and any other Migos song and let this be the only riser. Although let's not push this too high because that means other Migos songs might follow it and I'm not convinced that this trio is capable of pleasing me twice in a row.

69- "Red Roses" - Lil Skies featuring Landon Cube (+29) -- No. I'm whatever with "Nowadays." But this song needs to go away and stay away because it's extremely boring and dull, even if it still doesn't cross over into offensive territory.

New Arrivals:

47- "The Champion" - Carrie Underwood featuring Ludacris -- This here is the song that Carrie Underwood will be singing to kick off Super Bowl LII. I'm really excited for that moment because this is the perfect song to get me in the mood to watch the Super Bowl! I also think this would work great if ESPN and other sports networks picked this up to advertise other sports games, like, say, March Madness coming up. This most recent college football season, ESPN used "Walk on Water" by Thirty Seconds to Mars to advertise their game of the week and that was perfect. I'm sad it never charted on the Hot 100 because I would've praised it to the high heavens. I also remember "Centuries" by Fall Out Boy being the perfect sports anthem, too. "The Champion" fits right along with those two songs as a great song to get you pumped up to either watch or play a game. If I'm going to play a basketball game, this will be the perfect song to play on my drive there. And being that this is more of a pop song closer to Carrie's Sunday Night Football song during the NFL regular season than her typical country stuff, the addition of Ludacris makes more sense. He fits in quite well with a motivational verse turning the word "champion" into an acronym. So let's bring on the Super Bowl! And go Eagles!!! 

64- "Keke" - 6ix9ine, Fetty Wap & A Boogie wit da Hoodie -- I had one stipulation for 6ix9ine before going into this song. Don't spend the whole song bragging out murder and gang rape and maybe I'll give it a slight pass. And to give him credit, he doesn't spend a whole lot of time talking about those. He only has a couple lines talking about his gun and he's not signing about rape in this song, so it's not nearly as offensive as "Gummo" and "Kooda." Granted, he is singing about sex, drugs and other stuff he's doing while in the hood, so I'm not giving this song a complete pass. But it's less offensive than the other two. This also happens to be a remix of 6ix9ine's "On the Regular" where we only have to deal with 6ix9ine for the first third of the song. Fetty Wap takes the second third and Boogie takes the final third. Those two aren't great by any means, but at least both of them have decent flow and are rapping at me instead of yelling at me. I'm not sure why they didn't keep the original title when they redid this song. "Keke" makes less sense than "Gummo" or "Kooda" when it comes to the titles and "On the Regular" is the line that's repeated throughout, so that title made sense. 

71- "Outside Today" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again -- In case you were curious, YoungBoy isn't going outside today. He's going to stay inside and enjoy all of his riches. This is a song from his upcoming album called "Until Death Call My Name." Let's hope I don't have to cover too much of that album when it drops because this song is useless. Granted, he's not mumbling and he doesn't spend too much time with his sound effects, but the song barely passes the two-minute mark and rappers bragging about how rich they are got old a really long time ago, so I give no credit when rappers make no effort to come up with something unique or original. It's just lazy.

80- "My My My!" - Troye Sivan -- It's been a while since we've had a Troye Sivan song on the charts. Well, he showed up briefly last year on a Martin Garrix song, but as a lead artist, it's been since 2015 since his debut studio album "Blue Neighbourhood" produced the song "Youth" shortly after "My Happy Little Pill" from an EP in 2014 became his first charting song. I remember enjoying "My Happy Little Pill," but I don't remember "Youth" too well and I didn't care to give it a re-listen. As far as pop goes, "My My My!" is not an awful song, but it's a lot more slow and boring than it should be and the lyrics are as empty as something that Shawn Mendes or Charlie Puth would write. Just an extremely generic love song that doesn't give me much hope for his upcoming second studio album that he will release at some point this year.

84- "Tequila" - Dan + Shay -- A country song about drinking. Also super original. I remember enjoying Dan + Shay more than some country acts, but when I listened to this and discovered how generic and boring it was, I was disappointed. Whichever one of them is doing the singing here, he's saying that he can drink any drink or be with any girl, but for some reason it's tequila and only tequila that reminds him of his ex-girlfriend, that apparently doesn't even come to his mind when he's kissing another girl. Only drinking tequila reminds him that he wants her back in his life. Again, something that doesn't come to his mind at any point, proving that he doesn't actually need or want this girl back. So I don't know. The vocals are good. But the lyrics are boring.

91- "King's Dead" - Jay Rock, Kendrick Lamar, Future & James Blake -- Here's the second "Black Panther" track to chart after last week's "All the Stars" with Kendrick and SZA. After looking at the title, I thought I knew exactly how this is going to fit in. Black Panther was introduced in "Captain America: Civil War," where the King of Wakanda was killed, meaning that Black Panther aka T'Challa will take over as the new king. So this is going to be a song themed to that and will play towards the beginning of the movie, right? Well... sure. I guess? I examined these lyrics and I have no idea how they fit into the world of Wakanda or any superhero movie for that matter. First off, we have way too many voices for this and I don't think Future or Jay Rock got the memo that they are making a song for a Marvel movie because they are not on subject at all, which I suppose I can't blame them for because Kendrick isn't on subject either. Lot of references to girls, cars, new watches, lots of money. All that boring rap stuff that has nothing to do with T'Challa, Wakanda or any superhero stuff. It'll be the random rap song that means absolutely nothing that'll play during the movie and that's disappointing. I hope the movie will turn out better than this soundtrack is.

92- "IDGAF" - Dua Lipa -- As I previously mentioned with "New Rules" entering the top 10 this week, I like Dua Lipa and I think her new album is a solid pop album. But this isn't one of the highlights. It's not as annoying as "Blow Your Mind (Mwah)," but it might be second or third worst. While listening to this song when I covered the album, I was hoping this wouldn't be her next single, but part of me feared it might be. Dua is singing about a broken relationship. When he comes back to her wanting to get back together, Dua tells him that his time is up because it's too late and she's already spent too much time crying. She just doesn't give a... well... you look at the title and fill in the blanks there. This is not a bad song, but it's just not that interesting and it doesn't showcase her vocals like some other songs from the album. If you're curious, I prefer "No Goodbyes," "Homesick," "Be the One" and "Garden." 

98- "El Baño" - Enrique Iglesias featuring Bad Bunny -- In case you didn't know, "El Baño" is Spanish for "Bathroom." Enrique is telling this girl that they should go to the bathroom where no one can see them. Then he tells the girl if she doesn't know him, she can get to know him there. Examining the lyrics, I don't think Enrique goes as scandalous as he often does, so this can be a harmless Latino dance song. I do my best to focus mostly on the music and the beat when it comes to these Spanish songs since I don't speak the language. On those terms, Enrique is one who is known for the extremely catchy dance songs that really make you want to jump up and dance, regardless of what language he's singing in. This song isn't like that. It has the typical Latino beat to it, but it's not as upbeat as it could be and Enrique kinda sounds like he's bored in the song and I think he included Bad Bunny because featuring Bad Bunny in a Latino dance song is the cool thing to do right now. So this song feels lazy when it comes to Enrique standards. I appreciate that the lyrics aren't as dirty as they could be, but they also don't sound like he put a ton of thought into them, either.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - January 20, 2018

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! In this weekly post, I cover three sections. First, I give my thoughts on the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100. Second, I give my thoughts on the songs that experienced significant gains below the top 10. Third, I give my initial thoughts on our new arrivals this week. I reserve the right to switch things up in the future, but for now this is what I'm sticking with. I've followed the Billboard charts for a long time now and this is a great way for me to express my thoughts to the world. I hope you enjoy!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Perfect" - Ed Sheeran (=) -- So this is awkward. The song "Perfect" celebrates its sixth week at top, but Beyonce isn't invited to the party this time around. Billboard has reverted back to simply billing Ed Sheeran as the duet version with Beyonce is no longer contributing to the bulk of sales, streams or airplay. Apparently this isn't the first time temporary artist credit has been placed on a song when that version of the song is contributing heavily to the song's success. All version of "Perfect" will still contribute to its chart points, but we're apparently just billing Ed Sheeran now when his original version is getting the bulk of the success. So that's that. I mentioned in the last two weeks that Justin Timberlake could challenge for this top spot. He debuted at No. 9 this week instead. The actual contender comes with "Finesse" by Bruno and Cardi, which jumped 32 spots to No. 3 this week. I'm not sure when "Finesse" takes over, but it's looking like our next chart topper.

2- "Havana" - Camila Cabello featuring Young Thug (=) -- Camila celebrates her seventh week at No. 2. That means if she stays at No. 2 for three more weeks, she'll tie the record for most weeks at No. 2. You can take the glass half empty approach to that if you want, being sad that Camila won't make it to No. 1 with this song, but I'll take the glass half full instead because seven weeks at No. 2 is pretty darn good. How many artists can brag that they have the second most popular song in the country?

3- "Finesse" - Bruno Mars & Cardi B (+32) -- Part of me was surprised to see this jump so high, but then when I realized it debuted at No. 35 last week with just one day of sales and streaming and only three days of airplay. So this is the song's first full week of tracking. Which does mean it has the potential to experience a second week drop next week. If it survives next week without too much damage, then that's a sign that this is here to stay. I'll take it, I suppose. This is better than the next four songs that appear on this list. And as I said last week, this is also better than "24K Magic" and "That's What I Like." But my stance remains the same. This is a very shallow song. Bruno is bragging that he's with a really hot girl with that physical appearance seemingly being the only thing he cares about her. And Cardi B adds nothing to the song. She's there briefly at the beginning and end, proving that Bruno only brought her on to help with the song's success and not because she adds anything musically to the song.

4- "rockstar" - Post Malone featuring 21 Savage (-1) -- The good thing about "Finesse" jumping to No. 3 is that it knocked "rockstar" down another notch. Now seriously, why is this song STILL here? I'd predict that fans of Post Malone are even starting to get bored of this song after so many weeks, but who am I to judge? I was bored of this song after 30 seconds of my first listen. If you love Post Malone and consider this an epic masterpiece, I seriously question your taste in music.

5- "No Limit" - G-Eazy featuring A$AP Rocky & Cardi B (=) -- I'm glad this isn't going any higher. But I'd be even happier if this started to decline. Who on this planet cares about G-Eazy? The only reason he is this high is because the music gods knighted Cardi B as a superstar. Everything she touches turns to gold. G-Eazy and A$AP Rocky better be on their knees praising her because they had nothing to do with this song's success.

6- "Thunder" - Imagine Dragons (-2) -- I take it the previous wind of success for "Thunder" can be attributed to the holiday purchasing and year-end radio lists after all. After all that is going away, "Thunder" seems to be going away, too. Good. Let's speed up that process, please.

7- "Bad at Love" - Halsey (-1) -- It's also nice to see Halsey dropping a spot after soaring up to No. 6 last week. I was excited to see this song almost dropping out of the top 10. Let's get back to that.

8- "Too Good at Goodbyes" - Sam Smith (-1) -- It's still nice to see Sam Smith hanging around. I don't know how much longer this song will get in the top 10, but I appreciate the consistency as I'll take every week I can get.

9- "Filthy" - Justin Timberlake (new) -- I mentioned the last couple of weeks that Justin Timberlake has a great opportunity here. He has a new album coming out next month, two days before he performs at the Super Bowl LII halftime show. That sent Lady Gaga's sales soaring through the roof last year. So if this song fails, then it's all on JT not giving us a quality song to connect to. A debut at No. 9 is nothing to scoff at. While not nearly as good as the No. 1 debut that "Can't Stop the Feeling!" got in 2016, a debut anywhere in the top 10 is worth celebrating. Now the next few weeks will tell the real story here. Can this catch on and serve as JT's next huge hit, foreshadowing good will for his upcoming album? Or will this fade away, becoming a bad omen for JT's 2018? I don't know. It debuted with 79,000 sales and 15.8 million U.S. streams. Those aren't bad numbers. But those do mean that JT will have to rely on the song gaining traction rather than solely banking on his comeback pushing the numbers.

10- "MotorSport" - Migos, Nicki Minaj & Cardi B (-2) -- It's really refreshing seeing this song fail. With several songs knocking on the door, including Dua Lipa's "New Rules" at No. 11 and Kendrick Lamar's "Love." at No. 13, I really hope this is the final week for this song. It's time to really shake up this top 10. Also, can I quickly celebrate the fact that "Gucci Gang" got officially booted from the top 10 this week?

Rising on the Hot 100:

14- "Bartier Cardi" - Cardi B featuring 21 Savage (+5) -- The other song that got booted from the top 10 this week was "Bodak Yellow," which had a second life for two weeks with holiday sales and year-end radio lists. Speaking of which, all those songs that dominated this section last week are all gone or severely declining, meaning 2017 has finally given way and allowed for 2018 to start making its impact. And of course we have yet another Cardi B song heading for the top 10 as this looks to avenge the dismissal of "Bodak Yellow" from the region. Now listen, in addition to Cardi really needing to come up with better names for her own singles, this is just not good at all. "Bodak Yellow" grew on me a bit just because it was better than all the awful trash around it. I don't see this song having the same effect and I certainly don't want 21 Savage to find any additional success. No one on earth needs any more 21 Savage in their lives.

15- "Let You Down" - NF (+3) -- The next two songs give me hope, though. This is a Christian rap song that continues to stun me. After getting pushed away by all the holiday risers, this is back on its way up. It would be great if this could sneak into the top 10, at least for a few weeks.

18- "Meant to Be" - Bebe Rexha & Florida Georgia Line (+6) -- If I'm not mistaken, this is our top country song of the week and that makes me happy. It's the perfect country pop song, showing that Bebe Rexha has the perfect voice for country in choosing to dive into that genre a bit. She also has great chemistry with Florida Georgia Line. This combined with the previously mentioned "Let You Down" as well as "New Rules" (No. 11) and "Love." (No. 13), gives me hope that we can have some good music in the top 10. So let's make it happen!

31- "Sky Walker" - Miguel featuring Travis Scott (+7) -- I don't like the idea that this song has been slowly rising on the charts. It doesn't feel like it has quite enough moment to make any real impact, which is a good thing because this is a very unintelligent song. I really hope that's not just hopefully thinking on my part.

32- "River" - Eminem featuring Ed Sheeran (+13) -- It's nice to see Eminem recovering. But I was really hoping that "Walk on Water" would be the Eminem song that does well. This Ed Sheeran collaboration doesn't do it for me, but it's still better than most of the awful rap songs on the charts, so I'm not complaining.

39- "Marry Me" - Thomas Rhett (+5) -- I guess Thomas Rhett is gaining real traction with this song? I was hoping that it was going to be a fluke. But whatever. These types of country songs have a low ceiling that the song has almost hit, so I'm not too worried.

55- "Tell Me You Love Me" - Demi Lovato (+17) -- Oh this is encouraging! Demi's album was a mixed bag for me, but this here is classic Demi for me. To see it jump 17 spots this week makes me really happy. Let's make this a hit!

64- "This is Me" - Keala Settle & The Greatest Showman Ensemble (+19) -- Do I keep having to remind the world that I don't like "The Greatest Showman"? This is an empty, generic empowerment anthem written by a couple of privileged white boys who have never had the experience of being oppressed. And its use in the movie was a huge missed opportunity. But I guess this is going to hang around for as long as the movie is somehow still gaining huge traction at the box office. I'm just glad that this song lost to "Remember Me" from "Coco" at the Critics Choice Awards this past week. Let's hope the Oscars go down the same route as the Critics instead of being dumb like the Globes.

70- "Heaven" - Kane Brown (+12) -- Out of all the country songs to get huge gains last week due to end of year radio play I'm assuming, this is one that I'm unhappy seems to be experiencing actual traction on country radio. Kane Brown is a very unimpressive country artist for me.

72- "Stir Fry" - Migos (+17) -- I'm so used to rolling my eyes whenever I see a Migos song rising on the charts that it's going to take a bit of conditioning to remind myself that this is an enjoyable song from them. I won't be offended if this does go away, but if we have to have a Migos song doing well, I would definitely prefer this one!

86- "Best Friend" - Sofi Tukker featuring NERVO, The Knocks & Alisa Ueno (+14) -- I was wondering if last week's debut was going to end up as a one-week fluke for this, but it appears that this actually might gain real traction on the Hot 100? I'm happy about that! This is a creatively fun song. Some might be upset with how many different directions it goes or how many cooks in the kitchen there are, but it works for me. I just have to work on blocking the Animoji section of the commercial from my brain while listening to this song. Because, as a reminder, this got popularity thanks to that iPhone X commercial that started playing back in September.

New Arrivals:

9- "Filthy" - Justin Timberlake -- I've heard a lot of hate directed towards this song and I want to say that at least a portion of it is due to the fact that people were expecting something much different from Justin Timberlake. I think part of this was because in JT's album introduction video it sounded like he was about to deliver something completely different that maybe even had JT testing the country music waters. He also said that the album is inspired by his wife, his son, his family and where he's from (Tennessee). And with that introduction in mind... we get this? A song about him attacking his haters while asking this girl to put her filthy hands all over him? That doesn't sound like it's inspired by his family and his home. Especially not because it's an R&B song that sounds like he collaborated with Skrillex. So what's the deal JT?

The other reason people are a bit taken aback because JT's song "Can't Stop the Feeling!" is still on people's minds. I guess people were expecting more family-friendly, poppy, dance tunes from JT? Forgetting the fact that that song was not indicative of a new direction JT was going, but rather was a song specifically written for Dreamworks' animated film "Trolls." No, "Filthy" wasn't written for a kids audience like that song was. Are we forgetting that JT was one of the lead singers of the boy band NSYNC, was responsible for the famous Janet Jackson wardrobe malfunction at the Super Bowl halftime performance in February 2004 and released an album in 2006 called "Future Sex/Love Sounds" which featured the single "Sexy Back"? JT is not a musician known for his family friend music, thus his work on "Trolls" is more of an anomaly than anything.

So if we forget about "Trolls" and we forget about what he said in his album intro video, I think we can give "Filthy" a much more fair judgment. When I listened to it, it reminded me a lot of "Suit & Tie" and "Mirrors" from his previous album in 2013. Thus while many people were shocked that this wasn't what they were expecting from JT and hate it because of that, to me this sounds exactly like a typical JT song. As such, I'm not madly in love with it, just like I was never in love with "Suit & Tie" and "Mirrors," but it's also not a bad song. It has a nice, slow groove to it that continues to build as the song goes along. It's grown on me over the last week or so and I think it has the potential to grow on others as long as they are willing to strip themselves of the expectations they had going in and remember who this is that's singing. And I'm still quite intrigued by this upcoming album "Man of the Woods" because there's still the potential that we get the album he was talking about in his promotion.

43- "All the Stars" - Kendrick Lamar & SZA -- If you haven't heard the news, Kendrick Lamar has been put in charge of the soundtrack for Marvel's upcoming movie "Black Panther," which I think is fitting. We have a superhero movie with a predominately black cast being released during black history month and a black rapper with actual talent who is universally praised is in charge of the music. That gets me excited. This here is the lead single from that soundtrack and I think it's a solid introduction. Kendrick Lamar and SZA both get equal time in this song and they play off each other quite well with their respective verses. The central theme of the song is love as the first line is "Love, let's talk about love." Which is then followed up by the question "Is it anything and everything you hoped for?" We then get a narrative where it seems like when this specific couple managed to get closer to their dreams of falling in love that it wasn't what they were hoping for as both Kendrick and SZA feel angry and heartbroken. As far as Kendrick's side of things, this isn't as potent and sharp as his music from his own album last year. But on SZA's side of things, this is the best she's presented me with. But both are equally good. It's just that I've seen better from Kendrick and nothing interesting thus far from SZA. The final aspect of this is that I'm trying to think of how this song fits in with the "Black Panther" movie. But I suppose I'll find out next month!

82- "For You (Fifty Shades Freed)" - Liam Payne & Rita Ora -- Hey look, a second movie soundtrack for February. Now if there's one thing I'll give the "Fifty Shades" franchise credit for, it's that they've done a decent job with their soundtrack, with Ellie Goulding's "Love Me Like You Do" being an excellent example of that. That song is beautiful. And last year's big song "I Don't Wanna Live Forever" by Zayn and Taylor Swift wasn't bad, either. On that trend, we have another romantic song that works rather well on its own merits. At least for most of it. Rita Ora starts this off and she owns this song, almost bringing it to the level of "Love Me Like You Do." The problem is that she's paired with someone as uninteresting as Liam Payne who sounds as uninterested and bored as ever with lyrics that feel very much like a Liam Payne song. Then we bring Rita back in and she does a good enough job to make up for Liam's incompetencies. No this song isn't super deep, but as a song written for a romance film, it does its job. Too bad the movie itself won't do the song justice. But at least Rita tried and if this gives her a big hit, I'm OK with this as she has yet to hit top 50 on the U.S. Hot 100 in a song she serves as the lead. She definitely deserves better.

85- "Nowadays" - Lil Skies featuring Landon Cube -- I was hoping that we were going to leave these dumb SoundCloud rappers in 2017. But I suppose that was wishful thinking. As a general rule of thum, if I see a new rapper with the name "Lil" in front of some other word, that's a huge red flag. It works for Lil Wayne. It's dumb for everyone else, because it just sounds like they're trying too hard to be cool and hip. Lil Skies' real name is Kimetrius Foose and he's a 19-year-old rapper from Pennsylvania who exploded because of a few songs he released on SoundCloud and YouTube went viral. Now he has an album that was released on January 10 and we have two songs from that album charting. The positive thing about this kid is that he's not mumbling or loading his song with Migos-style echoes and sound effects. And he's not rapping about killing people or escaping prison. And this song actually has a decent flow. But you know it's been really bad recently when that bar is something I'm compliment someone on when they pass it because most of these SoundCloud rappers haven't. But that's as much praise as I'm going to get. He starts by saying that he's too cool for a girlfriend and that we should live like we'll die when the world ends, so it's alright every time we break a sin. Yeah, this sounds like an uneducated kid lazily writing a rap song that somehow caught on. It's not offensive. But it's just dumb and forgettable.

92- "I Miss You" - Clean Bandit featuring Julia Michaels -- Oh sure. I spend the whole year in 2017 hoping that "Symphony" charts for at least one week. But no. Nothing. It was a major hit everywhere else in the world, but we wouldn't even let it on for one week in the U.S.? Shame. But now we're less than a month into 2018 and this next song from Clean Bandit, which is far less interesting, has already made it on? Oh goodness. But oh well. At least we have something from Clean Bandit on the Hot 100. That means we're capable of having more. On record, if you missed my favorite EDM songs of 2017 list, "Symphony," by Clean Bandit featuring Zara Larsson was my No. 2 song on that list and it would've been around the same spot on my favorite songs of 2017 list had it charted on the Hot 100. "I Miss You" by Clean Bandit featuring Julia Michaels wasn't even good enough to get on the honorable mentions. But it's not awful. The instrumentation by Clean Bandit is interesting enough and Julia Michaels does a good enough job with her vocals. The lyrical content just isn't there. Julia is sad about her recent breakup. She misses him. That's it. Now again, I'm comparing this song to previous Clean Bandit songs like "Rather Be" and "Symphony." When put next to those, it doesn't hold up. But this is still better or at least on par with the other stuff on the charts right now, so I'm still happy it's here and I hope it has success.

98- "Red Roses" - Lil Skies featuring Landon Cube -- See the previous song from Lil Skies for more info on him. This one is apparently the one that actually got him famous on SoundCloud. And I have no idea why. This has two long verses separated by the hook. The first verse sees Lil Skies droning on about doing drugs and other things. Each line is the same melody repeated over and over, so musically this is extremely lazy and dull, which means I was bored after 30 seconds. Landon Cube at least has a bit more personality in his verse as Lil Skies just sounds like he's drunk and half asleep during his part. But said second verse isn't that interesting. I just hope that both of these songs go away after a week or two and we never have to hear from these untalented kids again.

DrogeMiester's Top 10 LEAST FAVORITE Songs of 2017

Continuing my annual tradition of end-of-year music lists, I now present to you my fourth list. If you missed the other three, the most popular songs of the year, my personal favorite songs of the year and my personal favorite EDM songs of the year, you can search those out in the blog archives on the right, starting in late December and moving onto this month. With this particular list, we will now be examining my least favorite songs of 2017. And believe me, there was A LOT of trash to pick from. In fact, there was so much trash that, in reminding you of my parameters that a song had to debut on the Billboard Hot 100 during 2017, I feel the need to emphasize that, yes, all of these songs ACTUALLY did chart last year, even though some of them you might not believe me. As such, I will give you the same warning I did last year. I don't recommend you listen to any of these songs or watch the videos I'll be posting. They're there if you are curious as to why I hate these songs so much. And we can discuss the specifics if you have questions about my personal reasons, but I feel these choices will be fairly obvious and non-controversial. The only surprises here might come with songs I left off. Believe me, there's a lot that I could've put here, but these are the worst of the worst.

10- "The Race" - Tay-K


9- "These Heaux" - Bhad Bhabie


8- "It's Every Night Sis" - Ricegum featuring Alissa Violet


7- "Cash Me Outside (#CashMeOutside)" - DJ Suede the Remix God


6- "Gucci Gang" - Lil Pump


5- "Peek a Boo" - Lil Yachty featuring Migos


4- "Privacy" - Chris Brown


3- "Look at Me!" - XXXTENTACION


2- "Gummo" - 6ix9ine


1- "Kooda" - 6ix9ine

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - January 13, 2018

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! In this weekly post, I cover three sections. First, I give my thoughts on the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100. Second, I give my thoughts on the songs that experienced significant gains below the top 10. Third, I give my initial thoughts on our new arrivals this week. I reserve the right to switch things up in the future, but for now this is what I'm sticking with. I've followed the Billboard charts for a long time now and this is a great way for me to express my thoughts to the world. I hope you enjoy!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Perfect" - Ed Sheeran & Beyonce (=) -- Last week I attributed holiday sales with gift cards and the like being the cause for sales numbers across the board to skyrocket. Those sales numbers have all come back down to Earth and, with the dust settled, Ed Sheeran and Beyonce remain at No. 1. There's other reasons why the most popular songs of 2017 have all seen rises for a second straight week but I'll get to that in our rather large section of rising songs. "Perfect," despite the drop in sales, does remain as the top selling song of the week 109,000 sales. The song had one week atop streaming, but has now dropped to fourth place, but still has solid streaming numbers with 36.4 million U.S. streams. The story of the week, though, is that "Perfect" has finally topped the radio, with stations having a bit of indecision as to which version of the song to play, which becomes a win for the song as a whole with both versions getting a lot of radio play. Last week I said Justin Timberlake might be a new contender for this spot. After hearing the song and the very mixed reaction, I'm not so sure about that anymore, but we'll see where JT lands when his song impacts the charts next week.

2- "Havana" - Camila Cabello featuring Young Thug (+1) -- After five weeks at No. 2 and four weeks at No. 3, "Havana" has finally jumped ahead of "rockstar." That's a total of nine weeks in that song's shadow. It also means that if it weren't for "Perfect," "rockstar" would've celebrated 13 weeks at No. 1 before being dethroned by "Havana." Let's thank the music gods that that never happened. But now "Havana" finds itself in a similar predicament that it was in five weeks ago. It's stuck at No. 2 with another huge hit in its way of getting to that coveted No. 1 spot. Although this time I don't think it'll overcome this challenge. But the song should camp out here for a few more weeks as I don't see what other song has potential of jumping to No. 2. If JT can't do it next week, Camila might end up challenging the record for most weeks at No. 2 without hitting No. 1. The current record is 10 weeks, which is shared by Foreigner's "Waiting for a Girl Like You" from 1981-82 and Missy Elliot's "Work It" in 2002-03. Camila currently has accumulated six weeks at No. 2, so the record isn't far away.

3- "rockstar" - Post Malone featuring 21 Savage (-1) -- The music gods may have prevented "rockstar" from getting 13 weeks at No. 1 thanks to Ed Sheeran, but it still managed 15 weeks in the top two, which is almost just as bad. I'm glad it's gone from the top two, but top three is still a problem. So is top five and top 10 for that matter. So let's get rid of this song.

4- "Thunder" - Imagine Dragons (+1) -- I was unhappy to see this return to the top five after dropping out. And now it's up to No. 4 again? Excuse me while I go barf. I just hope it got here because "No Limit" stalled out as opposed to a second wave of popularity.

5- "No Limit" - G-Eazy featuring A$AP Rocky & Cardi B (-1) -- Speaking of which, I was happy to see this drop a spot after last week made me worried that this would contend for a higher spot than just No. 4. Let's hope that said No. 4 peak will remain this song's peak and that this will start falling instead of rising higher.

6- "Bad at Love" - Halsey (+3) -- Halsey almost fell out of the top 10 and now she's recovered by jumping all the way to No. 6? I'm holding onto the hope that this rise is only due to the songs below her sputtering out, because I liked the idea of Halsey leaving this region. But I suppose that I'd prefer this song over "rockstar," "Thunder" and "No Limit" at this point, so even if this is continually heading upward, there's worse things that have happened recently, so it's whatever.

7- "Too Good at Goodbyes" - Sam Smith (+1) -- Sam Smith jumped ahead of "MotorSport" and "Gucci Gang" this week. That's a moment worth celebrating! He also unfortunately got jumped by Halsey, as previously mentioned, meaning he gets a net jump of one spot. But hey, I'm still encouraged by the fact that this is remaining extremely consistent in the bottom half of the top 10. Based on its slight underperformance initially, I thought this would be gone a lot earlier.

8- "MotorSport" - Migos, Nicki Minaj & Cardi B (-1) -- It's really encouraging to see this abomination falling. I'd be really worried if this had gained traction and started camping out in the top five. The world doesn't need anymore Migos.

9- "Gucci Gang" - Lil Pump (-3) -- It's even more encouraging to see this even greater abomination FINALLY on its way out. It was a shame on the music world that we even let this punk on the charts in the first place, so you can imagine how horrible its been to see him in the top five and top 10 for so freaking long. Let's send Lil Pump on his way and keep his garbage music in 2017.

10- "Bodak Yellow (Money Moves)" - Cardi B (=) -- I didn't expect to see Cardi B get a second week at No. 10 after returning last week. I thought we'd get "Love" by Kendrick Lamar or "New Rules" by Dua Lipa this week. I'm sad that we didn't get either as the former fell three spots to No. 14 and the latter only rose one spot to No. 11. But there's hope that one or both of them enter next week, so let's make it happen America!

Rising on the Hot 100:

12- "Feel It Still" - Portugal. The Man (+11) -- For the rest of the charts, this week is a weird week. Last week saw the typical yearly jump in sales after Christmas gift cards impacted the charts. There's another thing that I failed to mention that I think has impacted the charts even more this week. Radio stations love playing their end of year lists just like all of us, myself included, like posting our own end of year lists. That's why all the most popular songs of 2017 all got boosts this week as the Billboard charts refuse to let 2018 take over. I'm not sure if this is the final week for that or if we'll get another week or two. The Grammy's are coming up soon, so the winners and performers there are also going to get boosts. The moral of the story is that all this has masked this section a bit as we have no idea which songs are actually rising on the charts. It'll be an interesting thing to follow in the next month or so as I anticipate a whole ton of movement for this section. With "Feel It Still" specifically, it's fun to see this as the highest riser this week below the top 10.

13- "Shape of You" - Ed Sheeran (+6) -- This was the top song of 2017 in just about every way you look at it. So it's no surprise to see it up at this spot.

15- "Sorry Not Sorry" - Demi Lovato (+5) -- This song peaked at No. 6 on the Hot 100. I was kinda hoping that Demi would make it into the top five, but that never happened.

16- "Believer" - Imagine Dragons (+9) -- I'm mad that this was such a huge 2017 hit.

17- "Him & I" - G-Eazy & Halsey (+7) -- Out of all the songs this week, this is one of the few that seems to be rising on its own merits rather than being a 2017 holdover since this has only had five weeks on the charts now. That means this is probably going to get shot up once all the 2017 holdovers go away.

25- "Despacito" - Luis Fonsi & Daddy Yankee featuring Justin Bieber (+5) -- 16 weeks at No. 1, but it stays at No. 2 for most lists because "Shape of You" managed to stay longer in the top 10. I don't think many will remember this song in the future.

32- "That's What I Like" - Bruno Mars (+5) -- A Bruno Mars song that Bruno Mars fans probably won't even remember five years from now. A shame that we made it the third highest song of the year and Bruno's biggest hit as a lead artist, remember that "Uptown Funk" was a Mark Ronson song that he was a feature on.

34- "Attention" - Charlie Puth (+5) -- An absolute shame that we let this song into the top five last year. I don't know why the radio continued its love affair with Charlie Puth.

40- "Let Me Go" - Hailee Steinfeld & Alesso featuring Florida Georgia Line & Watt (+15) -- This I think is a natural 2018 riser. This is its 15th week on the chart, but this is as high as it's gotten, so there's no end of year radio list that this made it onto. I have no idea what the future holds. We'll have to see what the next month does to this song.

42- "Unforgettable" - French Montana featuring Swae Lee (+5) -- You would never think that a French Montana and Swae Lee song would've made me this happy and I don't think it'll ever happen again. But I'm glad this song was a thing.

43- "What About Us" - P!nk (+5) -- This song peaked at No. 13. I'm really sad it never made it into the top 10. P!nk deserved a lot better.

46- "Like I Loved You" - Brett Young (+10) -- Country radio also sent a ton of country songs soaring high this week for I'm guessing similar reasons. End of year country radio lists? I think this one belongs in that category, but I'm not actually sure.

52- "Yours" - Russell Dickerson (+10) -- Another good country song that I'm glad to see got a good rise this week. Although this has only had 12 weeks on the charts, so I'm not sure what its future looks like. I hope it's a good one.

55- "Look What You Made Me Do" - Taylor Swift (+11) -- Taylor getting one final push before this song goes to the Billboard graveyard?

57- "Round Here Buzz" - Eric Church (+15) -- This song debuted back in October. And I don't like it. So I hope its future in the next one is a dim one.

62- "I Could Use a Love Song" - Maren Morris (+19) -- I do like my girl Maren Morris. This has spent 20 weeks on the charts and this is as high as it's gotten. And that's sad because I think this is a good one that deserves to be played on country radio.

63- "Losing Sleep" - Chris Young (+13) -- I might lose sleep if this goes anywhere. I don't like it. A lot of better country songs out there.

64- "Echame La Culpa" - Luis Fonsi & Demi Lovato (+10) -- I'm surprised this wasn't a bigger hit. Luis Fonsi was probably hoping for more after his Justin Bieber team-up was a major success. I'd be fine if this got a second wind and was a thing in 2018. Not a 16 weeks at No. 1 sort of thing, but this is just as good, if not a tad bit better than "Despacito," so it deserves a bit more attention.

66- "MIC Drop" - BTS featuring Desiigner (+16) -- Not sure what this is doing here. These Korean kids need to stay in Korea, especially with this atrocious Desiigner remix of this song. The original mix is annoying enough.

67- "You Broke up with Me" - Walker Hayes (+12) -- I forgot this song even existed. That's how forgettable and dull of a country song this is. Walker's girlfriend broke up with him. Boo hoo! Now can we all move on with life?

70- "Written in the Sand" - Old Dominion (+16) -- Old Dominion can go away. Although this was a December release, so it might be sticking around. Unfortunately.

75- "Krippy Kush" - Farruko, Nicki Minaj, Bad Bunny, 21 Savage & Rvssian (+13) -- This song left the charts after its initial debut at the end of the year. And I was happy about that. This song does a huge disservice to all involved and half of them weren't worth anything to begin with. Let's please not make this a 2018 thing.

78- "Five More Minutes" - Scotty McCreery (+11) -- The title of this song is about how long I want this Scotty song to remain on the charts. But this is also a December release, so it might be here for a while.

79- "Legends" - Kelsea Ballerini (+18) -- Kelsea can stay. I like her. In general, I like most of the female country singers. No coincidence there. I think the genre fits females better. But it's possible it's because I'm a male and prefer the voice of a female singer.

81- "Mayores" - Becky G featuring Bad Bunny (+10) -- This has been really up and down since it arrived. I have no idea what's happening to it, but I'd be fine with it having a longer chart life. Becky G does good with singing in Spanish.

86- "Too Much to Ask" - Niall Horan (+12) -- This song has only had 11 weeks on the charts. It's peak was at No. 66. I am fine with those numbers for Niall. All his songs are extremely forgettable.

90- "Juice" - Yo Gotti (+10) -- This is a December release that I would really love to stay in December and January. No one needs Yo Gotti in their life.

New Arrivals:

35- "Finesse" - Bruno Mars & Cardi B -- Bruno Mars is an individual who I have complicated feelings towards. He's one of the best performers I've seen as his stage presence is always through the roof. But the music itself from Bruno hasn't been good in quite some time. I give Mark Ronson the credit for "Uptown Funk," so if we remove that from the equation, what has Bruno Mars done recently that's been worth anything? His "24K Magic" album was mostly empty sex songs that were completely uninteresting. "Finesse" follows into that suit. He's bragging about how awesome they look together. Instead of being romantic and sexy, it's extremely shallow as he credits his confidence and her measurements as to why he loves being out in public with her. And in private? It's about the same. It feels like more of a one night stand situation where he enjoys sleeping with her because of how attractive she is, making no mention of her personality or how enjoys spending time with her. Then he tells the other guys to grab their lady IF their lady is fine. I'd put this song above "24K Magic" and "That's What I Like" simply because the song itself is more upbeat and fun. I'm sure it's a blast seeing him perform it live. But I'm still not impressed because of the empty, shallow lyrics.

And, oh yeah. Cardi B is on the song. The album version is just Bruno. This remix of the song charted because he added Cardi. Kinda. He gives her a verse to open the song where she brags about how sexy and rich she is. Then it's all Bruno singing his original song until he brings Cardi back on in the finale minute where she repeats over and over that they've got it goin' on. So in other words, Bruno added Cardi to the song, not because it made sense musically, but because adding her to the song will probably increase sales on the song. So Cardi is becoming the new Rihanna in that the only reason she exists in these featured roles is for sales. I don't like that.

80- "One Foot" - WALK THE MOON -- Did you know that WALK THE MOON released a new album? I did. But I don't think anyone else did because it's had very little buzz behind it. But I have it on my list of albums to get around to covering because I actually went to this group's concert around the time that "Shut up and Dance" was a huge hit and they put on a wildly entertaining show. This is a talented group. But yet unfortunately it's been looking like they'll be more of a one hit wonder as nothing they've done before or after "Shut up and Dance" has made an impact on the charts, which is why I was surprised to see this chart this week. In terms of finding their next mainstream success, I'm not sure this quite has the groove and fire to do it for them. But if Imagine Dragons can find success with meaningless songs like "Believer" and "Thunder," I would hope this would catch on because this song has the groove of an Imagine Dragons song with lyrics that actually mean something. The desert is a big theme for the album and it's represented with this song as the desert or wilderness they're in represents an empty slate. Even though I was initially confused as to why Nicholas was singing that he was the king of nothing and his girl was the queen of nothing, I kinda like the imagery because whatever journey they're going on, they don't have much behind them and they don't know what lies ahead for them, so they're just jumping into the dark while relying on each other to make it through.

83- "This is Me" - Keala Settle & The Greatest Showman Ensemble -- Oh, we're opening up a can of worms with this one. I have spent a good portion of the last two weeks arguing about "The Greatest Showman" because I rather passionately hate the movie while most of my friends seem to love. I don't understand why they all love it. They don't understand why I hate it. Yet I was ready to move on with my life and put this piece of trash musical behind me, but now this week's Billboard charts are making me bring it back up, which is sure to spark more arguments in the comment sections where all my friends are going to attack me for my negative opinions of their beloved musical. But oh well. When the sharpest words wanna cut me down, I'm gonna send a flood, gonna drown them out. I am brave. I am bruised. I am who I'm meant to be. This is me.

Haha, see what I did there? I took this generic empowerment anthem and applied it to myself as someone who has been rather bruised by all my friends for having a different opinion. It fits me rather well, right? And that's the problem. This is a loud, colorful, bombastic song with good vocals behind it, but if you strip it down, it really has no meaning or depth to it. It's generic. It's not specific. It doesn't tell a story about what's happening. You can apply it to every single person who has ever been oppressed by anyone for any reason and it's a one size fits all song instead of trying to apply to a specific instance or a specific group of people. You can tell that it was written by two privileged white guys who probably have no idea what it feels like to be oppressed and rejected by society. I love Pasek and Paul. They wrote the music to my beloved "La La Land" and I also hear the music for "Dear Evan Hansen" is fantastic as well. But they really dropped the ball here.

And that's not even including how this song fits into the movie. Minor spoilers ahead, but this comes in a scene where P.T. Barnum leaves his group of misfits in the dust and decides to party with his new group of fancy, famous people while not invited the others so they won't make him look bad. So in rebellion of him, the bearded lady leads the march into the room anyways... where they quickly march right back out. By the end of the song, we've moved onto something completely different. It could've been a powerful moment with strong themes, but instead the themes of standing up for yourself after being oppressed get glossed over rather quickly and are completely left in the dust after the song is over, never to be touched on again. Not to mention the real P.T. Barnum was more of a racist character who took advantage of these people's differences just for the sake of fame and fortune, so the story sets itself up to be something great. But instead, P.T. Barnum is sanitized and shown as an advocate of the oppressed and only has this small 30 second slip up where he didn't treat his friends as good as he should've. But they move on rather quickly, leaving me baffled.

85- "Rewrite the Stars" - Zac Efron & Zendaya -- If you read my review of "The Greatest Showman," there's a segment of the movie that really annoyed that I chose not to talk about because I instead focused on the worse parts. But since I'm given the stage here, how about we now talk about it? Zac Efron's character is a pure work of fiction. Zendaya's character is also a pure work of fiction. I suppose that's not a horrible thing. What is horrible is the romance between the two that came out of nowhere. There's literally no set up. The song talks about this Romeo and Juliet situation where there's this forbidden love between the two of them that Zac thinks they can break but Zendaya is hesitant about. But we know nothing about Zendaya's background and almost nothing about Zac Efron's background. Zac looks at Zendaya and the next scene they are madly in love and singing this song. Except Zendaya doesn't even reciprocate very much. It's more like Zac looked at her and was extremely infatuated because she's an attractive young girl. So after this lame attempt at a romance that's given very little time to develop, I'm supposed to care about this empty romance song that feels like it was written by Charlie Puth and Shawn Mendes? Just like "This is Me" is a generic empowerment anthem, "Rewrite the Stars" is a generic love song. The choreography in the scene was entertaining. Zac and Zendaya's vocals are good. But that's it.

88- "Never Enough" - Loren Allred -- One thing that I will give "The Greatest Showman" credit for is their use of dubbing. Most of our recent musicals have taken famous actors and actress with little singing experience and trained them to sing the songs. "The Greatest Showman" instead chooses to implement dubbing, which is what should happen when you want a specific person playing a character, but that person isn't good at singing. Rebecca Ferguson plays Jenny Lind in this movie and "Never Enough" is the operatic song that the whole world falls in love with. But it's not Rebecca Ferguson singing. It's Loren Allred. I have a lot of comments on the portrayal of Jenny Lind, but in terms of this specific moment, I found it rather amusing that she sang this song and got a huge standing ovation from all the critics in the room. Meanwhile, I was like, "That was a decent song." But I didn't feel the need to get up and applaud at all. I mean, Loren has a good voice, but that's all that's showcased here. The song has no depth. No meaning. Barely any lyrics. Feels like a mediocre song that came from "The Voice" and is forgotten about a week later. And "The Voice" is exactly where Loren Allred came from. She didn't even win. In fact, she got eliminated in the first week of the live shows, meaning she couldn't even crack top 10. And that was back in season 3. 

92- "Corazon" - Maluma & Nego do Borel -- We interrupt my ranting about "The Greatest Showman" to talk about Maluma. Now Maluma is a pretty big deal in the Latino music scene, but first crossed over to the U.S. charts last year with "Felices los 4" and as a featured role with Shakira's "Chantaje." If I'm strictly comparing the beat and rhythm of "Corazon" to those two songs, this is the lesser of the three Maluma songs to chart. It just kinda bored me as we went a long and I think is a lot more slow-paced than it needed to be. If you translate the lyrics, those aren't very inspiring, either. They aren't offensive by any means, but he's saying that he's happy that the girl broke his heart because now he can give his heart away to all the other girls. I won't be offended if this does well, but I don't think it will and I don't think I'll remember it.

95- "The Greatest Show" - Hugh Jackman, Keala Settle, Zac Efron, Zendaya & The Greatest Showman Ensemble -- Our final song from "The Greatest Showman" soundtrack that shows up is actually the only song that I really enjoyed. This is the opening number. It's loud. It's fun. It's bombastic. The choreography is great. Everyone does a great job. It reminded me of the opening number of "La La Land" because it was a big, fun number that got me pumped for the rest of the movie. Then the song faded into the actual opening sequences with Barnum as a younger kid and I thought that transition was a bit abrupt. The song isn't incredibly deep or emotional, but for an opening number it didn't need to be. It served it's purpose quite well. Once the song ended, I found myself fairly uninterested in the story of Barnum as a child and unfortunately the movie never recovered. It was all downhill from there. But at least we got a good opening number.

100- "Best Friend" - Sofi Tukker featuring NERVO, The Knocks & Alisa Ueno -- No more songs from "The Greatest Showman." Instead we get this song from that iPhone X commercial that's been playing non-stop since September. The commercial with that creepy "Animoji Yourself" sequence that I have no idea why Apple thought was a good idea. I mean, why would you want to turn yourself into an animated poop or unicorn emoji like the commercial presents? Why would you want to turn yourself into any emoji for that matter? Thus when the lines "Yo, you wanna meet me at the bar? Yo, you wanna meet me at the lounge? Yo, you wanna meet me at the club?" come up, I kinda cringe because of the animoji stuff. But overall this is a pretty fun song. It's been around on the EDM charts for as long as the commercial has been around, so I was wondering if it was ever going to chart here, especially since it's getting a lot of radio traction. It makes me laugh amusingly when it shows up on the radio and I got a pretty good kick when I saw it on the charts this week. It was in contention for my favorite EDM songs of 2017 list that I released on this blog yesterday, but it didn't make the cut in either the top 10 or the honorable mentions. But I'm fine with it being around because it's a really creative song that goes in a lot of directions. And if you're curious, Sofi Tukker is not an individual singer. They're a duo. Sophie Hawley-Weld and Tucker Halpern.

DrogeMiester's Top 10 FAVORITE EDM Songs of 2017

Last year as a part of my end of year music lists, I decided to add in my favorite EDM songs of the year. I follow the EDM charts just as often as I do the regular Hot 100 since it is my favorite genre, so why not throw together a list of my favorites from that chart? Even though that list didn't get as much attention as the other lists I had done, I had so much fun putting it together and looking back on it throughout the year that I had to do it again this year. So here we are. My personal favorite EDM songs of 2017. To be eligible for this list, the songs had to debut on Billboard's Hot Dance/Electronic charts during 2017. Like with my favorite songs of the year, the songs also had to be fairly new songs as well. Within reason. A remix of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" debuted this year around Halloween. I didn't count that. And I also didn't count all of Lady Gaga's music that debuted on the EDM charts after her Super Bowl halftime performance. My hope here, since you may not have heard many of these, is that you actually take the time to listen to these songs instead of just looking at the title. In addition, feel free to check out my list of most popular and personal favorite songs in the recent blog archives if you missed them and look forward to my least favorite songs coming soon!

10- "Light Beams" - Extasia & Zach Adams featuring Rony G


9- "Scared to be Lonely" - Martin Garrix & Dua Lipa


8- "Wolves" - Selena Gomez & Marshmello


7- "Something Just Like This" - The Chainsmokers & Coldplay


6- "Shooting Stars" - Bag Raiders


5- "It Ain't Me" - Kygo & Selena Gomez


4- "Sound of Walking Away" - Illenium & Kerli


3- "Speakerbox (F8 Remix)" - Bassnectar featuring Ohana Bam & Lafa Taylor


2- "Symphony" - Clean Bandit featuring Zara Larsson


1- "Recovery" - Kristii