Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:
1- "In My Feelings" - Drake (=) -- I often wonder if City Girls and Lil Wayne are upset right now that they got shafted out of having a No. 1 hit, since both acts are featured on the song in terms of vocals, but aren't given feature credit. I suppose Lil Wayne might care less since he's been there and done that plenty of times, but this could've been the launching pad for City Girls. If they were featured on a Drake song that went No. 1, they could've been the next big thing in rap music. But maybe it's a good thing they were left off because this song is tolerable when it's at the Drake parts. In fact, it even gets stuck in my head a lot. But the song crashes and burns when City Girls and Lil Wayne come in. And yeah, I'm still mad about this In My Feelings challenge that sparked this becoming so huge. Did I mention that a lot of the videos involving this challenge involve dancing Drake's dumb dance moves outside a moving vehicle or in oncoming traffic? I mean, the title of Will Smith's video when he did the challenge on YouTube is something to the effect of "Drake nearly killed me" because he felt the need to do something really dangerous to "complete the challenge." Yeah, dumb things like this is totally 2018.
2- "I Like It" - Cardi B, Bad Bunny & J Balvin (=) -- This song is still here. And remains No. 1 on Billboard's Songs of the Summer chart, one of their more useless creations on their website. And I don't have much else to say at this point. It's going to remain here for a long time, stuck at No. 2 after only getting No. 1 for a single week. And I don't feel sorry because it's already worn off its welcome, which is something that it never had much of in the first place from me.
3- "FeFe" - 6ix9ine featuring Nicki Minaj & Murda Beatz (+1) -- So I was at McDonald's on Monday evening and overheard some punk teenage kids talking about rap music and how this song was No. 1 this week. I about had a heart attack because I hadn't looked up the Hot 100 top 10 countdown yet at that point. Luckily those kids must've been talking about a different chart and not the Hot 100 because this is No. 3 this week, not No. 1. And it's here because this week is actually its first full week of tracking, meaning it debuted at No. 4 with only a partial week. In its first full week, it managed a disgustingly high 65.8 million U.S. streams. So how did it manage to get that high on streaming and only chart at No. 3? I mean, that's a streaming number that will usually guarantee one a No. 1 hit. Well, the answer, outside the fact that "In My Feelings" is still in the 90 million range without a video (the video recently debuted and will impact next week's totals), is that this song is completely M.I.A. when it comes to radio and only has 25,000 in sales in said first full week (although said number of sales is good enough for No. 5 on the sales charts, which proves how much sales have tanked in recent years). That means I can only hope that it crashes hard after this first full week of tracking.
4- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B (-1) -- I'd be happy that this song fell, although it only did due to the insanely high first full week of streaming for "FeFe" that I just mentioned. "Girls Like You" still rules radio with 123.7 million in audience, up 7 percent from last week, giving me zero motivation to get the radio fixed in my car because I would go crazy with this spamming all the pop radio stations. Given the fact that radio numbers remain extremely consistent when the song hits this high, that means this song is going to be sticking around for a long time, which will completely drive me mad given how dull and lazy this song is. I just don't understand.
5- "No Brainer" - DJ Khaled featuring Justin Bieber, Chance the Rapper & Quavo (new) -- Does anyone even remember the song "I'm the One" by this same gang from last year? Well, it was a No. 1 hit and remained in the top five for 13 weeks. Yet at this point a year later, I almost completely forgot that song existed. With "No Brainer," DJ Khaled thinks this song is going to be one of the biggest anthems in the world, which is what he told Beats 1 host Zane Lowe. And that's the problem with DJ Khaled. He seemingly has no sense at all for what good music actually is or how to create it because this song is insanely boring. If this were to drop out of the top 10 next week and never return, I actually might seriously forget that it charted. Yet this was the highest radio debut of 2018, so knowing my luck it's probably going to hang around in the top five for another 13 weeks or so. I mean, this is the same radio stations that are endlessly spinning "Girls Like You" at the moment, so are you really surprised? That's all you really need to know about my thoughts on the song, but I'll give more down below.
6- "Better Now" - Post Malone (-1) -- The only good thing about DJ Khaled debuting is that he knocked out Post Malone from the top five. But honestly this is a choose your poison sort of thing. I suppose neither song is as bad as 6ix9ine's "FeFe" at No. 3. And "Better Now" is a step up from "rockstar" and "Pyscho." But between "Better Now," "No Brainer" and "Girls Like You," there's a whole lot of boring nonsense in the top 10 at the moment to go along with the rest of the crap.
7- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (+1) -- Surprisingly this song might be a contender for the best song in the top 10 at the moment. I'd probably put it in a close second to "Nice for What," which is barely hanging on at No. 10. But if "Nice for What" falls out and is replaced by another trashy song, knowing my luck, Juice WRLD will win my personal honors for best song in the top 10. And that's kinda sad. I do enjoy the song, but it shouldn't be the best song in the top 10. That's how bad things are at the moment.
8- "Boo'd Up" - Ella Mai (-1) -- It appears that Ella Mai is slipping as she swaps spots with Juice WRLD. I'm not too upset at this. This is also one of the better songs in the top 10 at the moment and I'm glad Ella got this achievement, but I've never been madly in love with this. I remember that it debuted on a week with two other new songs from new female R&B artists and I stated that this was the lesser of the three. And now the phrase "Boo'd Up" is becoming a popular terminology to use in the R&B and rap world, which is slightly annoying.
9- "Taste" - Tyga featuring Offset (+1) -- The fact that this song cracked the top 10 and "Delicate" didn't is still extremely upsetting to me. And, update, "Delicate" fell a spot to No. 13 this week and might end up missing the top 10. Yet the world eats up this horrible trash. Pun actually not intended when I typed up that sentence just now.
10- "Nice for What" - Drake (-4) -- I still wish that Drake would go away and I hope that he suffers from a case of overexposure, but I'll still be honest and say that he conjured up a really enjoyable hit with this song. It's most likely going to end up in the top five of the most popular songs of 2018 when the year is over. And even though we're preparing to have disastrously horrible list overall when it comes to said popular list, I'll be happy with this song's inclusion. It'll be one of the few highlights.
Rising on the Hot 100:
15- "Love Lies" - Khalid & Normani (+3) - Seeing "Love Lies" getting so close to the top 10 is exciting! I hope it can break through! Although I don't want to get too excited at this point because "Delicate" and "Friends" both recently got about this close, then got stuck, making it so No. 11-20 has usually been a much better list of songs this year. I would like us to break that trend so that good songs can make the top 10.
22- "Get Along" - Kenny Chesney (+13) -- Ladies and gentlemen, we're close to finally having a new top song on the country charts. "Meant to Be" by Bebe Rexha and Florida Georgia Line, a song that leans heavily on country pop rather than pure country, has been No. 1 for 36 weeks. And yes, there's only been 32 weeks in the year so far, meaning "Meant to Be" has ruled the entire year. Methinks that Billboard needs to adjust something on those individual charts. Based on momentum, "Get Along" seems quite likely to dethrone "Meant to Be." Not that I care too much about the country charts, but I'm fine with this. This is a decently fun country song.
44- "Eastside" - Benny Blanco, Halsey & Khalid (+8) -- Welcome to the top 50 Halsey and Khalid. And thanks for getting them there Benny Blanco, even though I'm still confused as to why you get a featured credit as a mere producer.
47- "Sober" - Demi Lovato (+9) -- It's good to see this song getting traction on the charts since it is an amazing song from Demi. I'm just sad at the circumstances that got here, that being Demi's overdose as this song re-entered after she overdosed. Thankfully she's doing well, but she gave us all a good scare there. Best wishes to her.
50- "Sunrise, Sunburn, Sunset" - Luke Bryan (+9) -- Given the extremely catchy hook for this song, I'm not surprised to see it hit top 50. It got stuck in my head for a while even though I'm not the biggest fan of it overall, so I imagine country fans really love it.
53- "I'm a Mess" - Bebe Rexha (+11) -- I wish I was happier for this song to be doing well. Given how much potential is here that's not quite utilized, I wonder how high this song can really get before people slowly start to forget about it. But eh, I'm not overly upset given that I think the song is good enough.
54- "Medicine" - Queen Naija (+11) -- I remain curious about Queen Naija. Is this song going to have a short life on the charts or is this going to become a genuine hit? I would love to see it continually do well and move Queen Naija into stardom, but I honestly don't know exactly what this is going to do.
59- "Level Up" - Ciara (+18) -- Ciara fans are probably excited to see this song jump so high following its debut. I suppose I'm not super angry myself. Better Ciara than a lot of other artists. But I can't quite get on board with this specific song, although I'm open to other Ciara songs doing well if they're a bit sharper than this particular comeback.
68- "Africa" - Weezer (+18) -- Here's the surprise of the week. I do think this is a solid cover of the classic song "Africa," but unlike "The Sound of Silence" by Disturbed or "Zombie" by Bad Wolves, it's not a cover than necessarily sticks with me and thus I wasn't surprised when it quickly fell off shortly after its debut. But now it not only re-entered last week, but shot up the charts and could become a legit hit? That's really strange, but OK. I'll accept it. It's fun seeing Weezer find success in 2018.
84- "Praise the Lord (Da Shine)" - A$AP Rocky featuring Skepta (+12) -- We're just going to ignore this song for now and cross our fingers that it doesn't actually become a hit. Right now it's only in the 80's, which means it's not quite time to panic.
New Arrivals:
5- "No Brainer" - DJ Khaled featuring Justin Bieber, Chance the Rapper & Quavo -- I really don't have a whole lot more to say about this song than what I already said above. DJ Khaled just simply got the band back together from "I'm the One" last year, minus Lil Wayne, and put together another boring rap song. And since DJ Khaled doesn't actually sing, he just yells his name along with "We the best music! Another one!" he's really no better than Benny Blanco and Murda Beatz getting featured credits as a producer. It confuses me as to why these guys are putting themselves on the songs as this song should just be Justin Bieber featuring Chance the Rapper and Quavo. With that, Justin Bieber handles the chorus, phoning in a song about this girl being a no brainer because she's so amazing, while Chance and Quavo thrown in a lazy verse each that's mostly on topic, but not always. I suppose the song is inoffensive, but I just find it extremely boring and lazy. A year from now, I'll have forgotten this song existed, just like I forgot "I'm the One" existed until I saw this song charted this week.
80- "One Day" - Logic featuring Ryan Tedder -- Honest question. What in the heck is Logic doing? He released an album early this year titled "Bobby Tarantino II" that album bombed on the charts. And now he's releasing a new single that's NOT from that album? I mean, granted the album is terrible. The second worst album bomb of the year for me after Post Malone's "beerbongs & bentleys." So I suppose I'm not complaining that we're not going another single from there. But still. It's strange to me. Apparently, though, "One Day" is going to be part of a soundtrack promoting his new book? Does Logic know that books don't come with soundtracks? And if he's using a soundtrack to promote a book, why is this particular song about bragging about being rich and being better than all the other rappers? That doesn't seem to connect with the themes of a book that he's releasing. Unless said book is all about how he became rich and famous. If so, count me out when it comes to reading that one. Sure, you could also say the song is about dreaming, but according to these lyrics Logic's dreams include being even richer and more famous than he currently is. So none of this computes in my brain. At least Ryan Tedder is on point with his chorus. He's seriously one of the more talented musicians and performers around right now. So his presence makes the song tolerable overall. I just want to hear a version of this that is just Ryan Tedder.
87- "Side Effects" - The Chainsmokers featuring Emily Warren -- I remember a day when The Chainsmokers were a duo who made great music. I loved bragging to my friends at how great their songs were and was satisfying seeing their reaction to songs like "Roses" and "Don't Let Me Down." But then "Closer" happened, and although the song itself was enjoyable, that was the point where The Chainsmokers were transformed into superstars given that "Closer" became one of the top songs of all time in terms of how well it performed on the charts. Said popularity got to The Chainsmokers' heads and from there on out, their music got really lazy, with "Something Just Like This" being the anomaly given how good that song was. All this has made me feel betrayed and hurt by a duo I once loved. And now I'm like everyone else, cringing every time a new song from them shows up. I suppose "Side Effects" is a step in the right direction, though, as the song has a really strong groove to it and they brought on frequent collaborator Emily Warren to do the vocals instead of Andrew Taggart doing it himself. However, said groove is still not quite on the level of their early stuff as they go for more of a funky groove rather than well-crafted dance hit. That's certainly not a horrible direction, but the result is not quite as lively as it should be. And although Emily Warren's vocals are good, the lyrical content is garbage. She's drunk and it's 4 a.m. Instead of going to bed, she goes to be with her lover to have some more late night love-making. It's not interesting at all. As a whole, the song is acceptable and better than previous efforts, but I would still love for the old Chainsmokers to come back.
92- "That's on Me" - Yella Beezy -- Yella Beezy? Seriously? Can't any of these punk rappers come up with a rap name that makes them sound even somewhat intelligent? Apparently not. Thus based on this name, I assumed the worst here and I was right in doing so because this song is trash. All I here is him repeating the title of the song over and over with an n-word coming it about every other word. In between all that is him mumbling something about designer clothes, girls all over him, diamonds and every other cliche rap nonsense you can think of. So yeah, this song is about as dumb as this guy's name. Thus you can probably count on this blowing up on the Hot 100 because America loves untalented morons like this with their awful garbage they call music.
99- "Handgun" - YG featuring A$AP Rocky -- As bad as "That's on Me" is, it's no where near as awful as this song is. "Handgun" is straight up intolerable as YG mumbles about buying a handgun and assumingly using it on a whole bunch of his enemies before lounging around in all of his expensive accessories and making love with his girl. What makes it intolerable is that YG wasn't able to come up with much content, so for filler he repeats "Uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh," which makes a trashy song extremely annoying. I didn't even make it to A$AP Rocky's verse, but reading his lyrics leads me to conclude that he's not much better.
100- "Drunk Me" - Mitchell Tenpenny -- I suppose I'll take a bland country song over two awful rap songs, but why does nearly every country song have to be about drinking? It's like rappers and their flex rapping about how rich and famous they are. Said content in both cases will immediately turn me off, regardless of talent, because it seems like the artists ran out of ideas, so they're resorting to the absolute basics of the genre. I'll say, though, that at least Mitchell Tenpenny has a good voice and he shows some passion during parts of this song. And the song starts off nice as he rather honestly dives into why different people sober up and stop drinking. I thought he was going to go deep and emotional, but the meat of his song is him admitting that he got sober, not for the right reasons, but because a girl broke his heart and it hurt a whole lot more when he was drunk. Well, I'm glad you sobered up, Mitchell, even if it was for a strange reason. But the content of your song is still boring. And part of me doubts that it means anything, anyways. Sometimes I feel like these country singers come up with some generic content that's very much not personal just to pander to the country audience that apparently loves hearing country singers sing about drinking.
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