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.
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