Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:
1- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B (+1) -- Two reasons to be happy that this song is No. 1 this week. First, Drake is no long No. 1 after spending a record-breaking 29 weeks at No. 1 this year. Second, a rap song is no longer No. 1. It's been 34 straight weeks that rap has been No. 1 in one form or another. I was more than ready for both of those streaks to end. Outside those two reasons, I'm not celebrating this, nor am I giving it much notice. If you want to know all the fancy accolades that Maroon 5 set by getting No. 1, feel free to look up Billboard's weekly article by Gary Trust. He lists a lot of them, as he does whenever we get a new No. 1 hit. For me I've simply concluded that Adam Levine sold his soul to the devil in order to get this here. Or, as I like to say, he made a deal with a crossroads demon. My "Supernatural" friends will understand and appreciate that. But seriously, what other explanation is there for why this boring, lame song from a lazy band who stopped being creative years ago is now No. 1? I don't understand. Yeah, I understand the numbers behind it. It's because of radio. And initial streaming numbers exploded because of that music video. But I don't understand why said numbers are so high or why they've stayed so high. This needs to go away and quick because I'm going to start getting increasingly angrier the longer this stays.
2- "In My Feelings" - Drake (-1) -- Objectively speaking, this is still a better song than "Girls Like You." But as I just said, I'm glad this is not No. 1 anymore because Drake has spent way too long at No. 1 this year. Specifically, the radio numbers for this song are crashing hard while the sales and streaming continue to deplete. I wouldn't be surprised to see this start a plummet down the charts.
3- "Killshot" - Eminem (new arrival) -- You know, I'm not even going to be upset at this. I've been begging for a new top three for weeks now after our previous top three annoyingly got stuck for way too long. This might be a subpar Eminem song and I'm genuinely surprised it debuted this high. But I'll take subpar Eminem over Drake, Maroon 5 and Cardi B completely monopolizing the top three. This will be gone next week, but at least it shook things up for now. And with the way Cardi B dropped this week, it won't be her that replaces Eminem next week.
4- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (+1) -- It will mostly likely be Juice WRLD that jumps up to No. 3 next week? That's encouraging. This song got to No. 3 before, but then Billboard shook up their formula and immediately caused the song to tank a bit. But now it's made it's way back up and I'm not complaining. I'm not madly in love with the song, per se, but it's a welcome breath of fresh air when compared to most other songs that have occupied the top five as a whole in recent months.
5- "Better Now" - Post Malone (-1) -- I'm also not upset that Post Malone remains in the top five, although he remains destined to camp out around the bottom half of the top five as he can't get any higher. I don't know how long this is going to last. I keep expecting it to slowly start to slip away, but with Eminem set to drop away from the top five next week, I'm guessing that this will go back up to No. 4 again next week, continuing it's see-saw between No. 4 and No. 5.
6- "I Like It" - Card B, Bad Bunny & J Balvin (-3) -- I was filled with much joy earlier this week when I looked up the top 10 countdown and saw that Cardi B had finally plummeted out of the top five. Now if Drake and Maroon 5 could follow suit, that would be greatly appreciated. Although again, objectively speaking, this will probably sneak up to No. 5 next week because I don't expect "Killshot" by Eminem to last multiple weeks in the top five. But at least this won't be the No. 3 song again.
7- "I Love It" - Kanye West & Lil Pump (-1) -- Why is Kanye West's Pornhub anthem still here?
8- "FeFe" - 6ix9ine featuring Nicki Minaj & Murda Beatz (-1) -- I'm also happy that this song is slowly slipping. But the fact that it never should've got here in the first place makes me still upset that it's remained here for so long. I could tolerate one week in the top 10 because we have a bunch of dumb teenagers in this country who slobber all over themselves whenever they here the sexual predator that is 6ix9ine either yell at them or mumble at them. But why it remained beyond that has me furious.
9- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (1) -- Seeing all these awful songs drop one spot is encouraging because it means that they might eventually leave the top 10. But they need to drop faster and be replaced by quality songs in the process.
10- "Youngblood" - 5 Seconds of Summer (+1) -- Listen, I'm glad that Tyga's "Taste" fell out of the top 10. But did it have to take Khalid and Normani's "Love Lies" with it? I was hoping that we could have both "Youngblood" AND "Love Lies" in the top 10 this week. Not just one of them. But OK, fine. I'm happy that 5SOS got into the top 10 because this is at least a decently enjoyable song, which makes it a huge step above just about everything else in the top 10 right now. The next step will be to get this song higher up, and drag "Love Lies," which is down at No. 11 this week, up with it, so that we can replace this horrendous top 10 with songs that are at least tolerable. Because most of the top 10, for almost the entire year, has been excruciatingly painful to deal with. When we look back at 2018, it will definitely be seen as one of the worst years for popular music by those who actually care about quality music.
Rising on the Hot 100:
13- "Lucky You" - Eminem featuring Joyner Lucas (+5) -- This is genuinely surprising. After album bombs, most songs progressively tank each week. That's exactly what I expected to happen to Eminem. And it did happen with every other song from the album that debuted. But this song rose back up to No. 13 this week after falling to No. 18 last week? Is it because Eminem released the music video, causing it to get a one-week rise or is this going to legitimately gain traction outside the debut? I would love for it to be the latter, because this was one of the better songs from "Kamikaze," but I suppose we'll wait and see what this actually does in the coming weeks.
15- "Nonstop" - Drake (+2) -- I'm not happy that this has gained enough traction to hang out in the teens for the last few months. But at least this has struggled to get back to the top 10 after it debuted there. The last thing the world needs is more Drake in the top 10. So let's make sure we keep it out of the top 10.
36- "I'm a Mess" - Bebe Rexha (+7) -- There's surprisingly not a lot of movement below the top 10 this week as we jump straight from Eminem and Drake just below the top 10 to Bebe at No. 36. I'm not super ecstatic that this is doing well, but I'm not super upset either. It's more of a forgettable song from Bebe, who is capable of much better. But it doesn't bother me, either. So bring it on.
42- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes (+12) -- I'd certainly take a more forgettable Bebe song over this. I'm not happy that Sheck Wes has gained enough traction to hit the top 50. Let's please not make him a thing. The less new awful rappers that we reward with successful careers, the better.
50- "She Got the Best of Me" - Luke Combs (+7) -- It's an off week for country songs this week as only song qualified for my rising songs section, but that one songs sees Luke Combs hit top 50 with this song that doesn't particularly make me upset. Yet at the same time I do have a hard time remembering it exists, nor am I going to remember it after it leaves the charts. But it could be worse.
67- "Thunderclouds" - Labrinth, Sia & Diplo Present... LSD (+11) -- I'm happy to see this song rising on the charts. But it's not rising super fast at the moment and I'm not convinced that it's going to become a major hit. But I keep seeing that commercial it's featured in quite a bit, so it's remained stuck in my head for the majority of the time that it's been released. And I'm OK with that. It's a fun song.
69- "That's On Me" - Yella Breezy (+12) -- When I saw that this song rose 12 spots this week, I had one reaction. WHY?
New Arrivals:
3- "Killshot" - Eminem -- OK, if you followed me when I covered "Kamikaze" two weeks ago when it charted, then you'll know I was rather amused with all of his shots towards today's rappers. Because they almost all suck, yet they somehow manage to infest the charts anyways because kids these days don't know what music is. In other words, I feel Eminem's pain even though I wasn't necessarily madly in love with his album from last year. Specifically, when he fired at Machine Gun Kelly, I had a ball Machine Gun Kelly is crap, which was proven by his awful comeback towards Eminem. But now Eminem needs to man up and let it go. Seeing him fire back at MGK a second time after MGK fired at him felt like he had the maturity of a 10-year-old arguing with a kid who insulted him. Even putting that aside, Eminem is usually a master lyricist with great flow and great rhythm to his rap. He has none of that hear. His string of insults this time around are almost as cringeworthy as MGK's last week. And his flow feels choppy and disconnected. I usually enjoy listening to Eminem's fire and passion, but this one hurts my ears almost as much as all the other rappers that Eminem spent his album complaining about, so now I just want both Eminem and MGK to sit in the corner and take a timeout because neither are acting like grown adults.
28- "Drip Too Hard" - Lil Baby & Gunna -- I'm really mad at Drake for making Lil Baby a thing after including him on the track "Yes Indeed" earlier this year. But I was happy to see that song only manage to get two weeks in the top 10 instead of camping out there all year. And Lil Baby has tried so hard to be relevant on his own, only to come up short every time. But yet here he is again, teaming up with Gunna, who he featured on his song "Life Goes On" back in June. A fact I only remember because I keep track of all the new songs each week in an Excel file on my computer, so I have the luxury of quickly looking it up. I'm really mad that this debuted all the way up at No. 28 and I hope it just falls because this is a prime example of why rap is so awful in 2018. Here you have two lazy rappers coming up with a generic song about them being rich and famous, listing off all the luxury brands they own and bragging about the drugs they're doing and the girls they're sleeping with. There's absolutely zero creativity here and zero talent as they mumble their way through the whole thing. I only understood what they were saying because I was reading the lyrics on Genius as I was listening. If this were to drop off in a few weeks, no one would remember it existed. Even if it became a huge hit, no one will remember it by this time next year.
30- "Wake Up in the Sky" - Gucci Mane, Bruno Mars & Kodak Black -- I'm going to be doing a lot of repeating myself this week just by looking at some of these songs, so perhaps I'll keep these brief. If this were Gucci Mane and Kodak Black on their own, there'd be nothing to say here. Gucci's name says all you need to know about him and his style, while Kodak has never done an interesting thing in his life. The only thing that makes this thing even somewhat intriguing is that they dragged Bruno Mars along with them. But I'm one of those weird people who doesn't care much for Bruno's Grammy-winning album, so I wasn't convinced. Yeah, sure, Bruno is a better singer than Gucci and Kodak because he enunciates his words, but all he's singing about his being drunk, smoking and bragging about how "fly" he is. He does that on the chorus in between Gucci and Kodak throwing in their verses full of nothing interesting. If Bruno's name in this turns this into a huge hit, I'm going to be furious.
38- "New Patek" - Lil Uzi Vert -- In case you didn't know, Patek is a brand of luxury watch. Can I be done here? Or should I remind you that bragging about how rich you are is one of the laziest things that a rapper can do. Throwing in all the luxury brand names has never been interesting to me and never will. And Lil Uzi Very has never been an interesting rapper. So I'm going to be done now, because you get the point.
45- "Better" - Khalid -- After enduring through those last four songs, it was great seeing Khalid show up on the charts to give me a quick break from all the madness. Yet I didn't keep my hopes up too much because if I'm being honest, I'm a bit hit and miss with Khalid as a whole. When he's on, he's on. But sometimes he has poor choices of who to collaborate with. And other times he doesn't collaborate with anyone. Which is normally not a bad thing, but Khalid on his own without a good singer to balance him out has a tendency of become boring. And that's what this song is. It's boring. Khalid is extra mumbly because he has no one to sing with and it sounds like he got bored while recording after deciding to record a naturally slow song. And there's not really any substance here as is shown by the generic title of "Better." Recent examples of great Khalid is his collaborations with Normani and Billie Eilish respectively.
47- "Falling Down" - Lil Peep & XXXTENTACION -- This caught me by complete surprise. I didn't ever expect to see these two back on the charts, let alone on a song together. Lil Peep died of a drug overdose late last year and X was shot and killed earlier this year. So where in the heck did this song come from? Well, apparently Lil Peep and a dude who calls himself iLoveMakonnen recorded a song called "Sunlight On Your Skin" before Lil Peep died. After Lil Peep did, this song was remixed with X instead of iLoveMakonnen. Now that they've both died, iLoveMakonnen released this song as a sort of tribute to both of them. Which is fine and all, except apparently a lot of people in Lil Peep's camp where vehemently against this version because they felt that Lil Peep never would've worked with X due to what X stood for and all the allegations and crimes surrounding him. That makes this version really awkward to talk about because I'm not sure what to think about all of that. What do I say about a song featuring two late artists, one of whom potentially wouldn't have authorized this if he were still alive? What I will say is that I listened to both versions and the original song, "Sunlight On Your Skin" is actually a pretty good song. This version with X makes the song worse because iLoveMakonnen fits with Lil Peep way better than X does. So I'm going to recommend you listen to "Sunlight On Your Skin," while in the meantime I'm going to awkwardly step away from this and hope that I don't have to address it again in the future.
76- "Pretty Little Fears" - 6LACK featuring J. Cole -- With the awkwardness behind us, we're back to business as usual, this time talking about an artist whose name drives me crazy. He pronounces his name BLACK, but spells it 6LACK because apparently it's cool to replace the B with a 6 for some strange reason. Maybe because a 6 looks like a demented lowercase b. That aside, is the song good? Well, kinda. I feel like 6LACK is trying to rap/sing about something that he cares about rather than lazily talking about fame and riches like all of his other colleagues. The problem is that he's not super clear about what he's trying to say. The song is slow and chopped up. I think 6LACK is talking to a girl and wanting her to talk to him, but he doesn't do a great job with spelling things out. But then the second half of the song is J. Cole, who successfully does in the second half what I think 6LACK was trying to do in the first half as J. Cole is talking to his wife, wanting her to talk to him and express all of her fears since she's had a pretty rough time of late. That was really beautiful and J. Cole nails it. So I give high praise to the second half of the song, but I'm more bored with the first half of the song.
96- "Leave Me Alone" - Flipp Dinero -- Another new rapper to deal with. I know nothing about Flipp Dinero, but after listening to this, I don't think I want to know much about him. He's yelling at a girl, telling her to leave him alone. So he comes off as a crybaby in the sound. And he sounds like he lost his voice when he recorded this in the studio. So I'm thinking that I would love for Flipp to go away and, well, uh... leave me alone.
97- "Best Shot" - Jimmie Allen -- I thought I was going to get away with not covering any country songs this week when I saw the lineup. But turns out Jimmie Allen is indeed a country singer, so country snuck one in this week. What I appreciate about this song is that it's not jam packed with an overabundance of heavy drums and guitars that don't match the lyrics. There's no mention of getting drunk or drinking at a bar. And Jimmie doesn't have a deep country twang. Instead this is a nice, smooth song where Jimmie is singing about a girl, but he sounds sincere about it and the soft, mellow music behind him actually matched the romantic tones to go with it. So I can see myself potentially enjoying this song as a nice background song during some sort of fancy event. The problem here is that the song is a bit too simple in terms of the lyrics. There's not much of a story behind the romantic words he's saying and I don't even know if he's singing about his wife, his girlfriend or a random girl he has yet to talk about. There's two very short verses surrounded by the chorus that repeats several times and a bridge towards the end that makes this such a basic love song that I could've written the lyrics and have it be generically talking about anything and any relationship. So I would've liked a bit more lyrically, but as a whole, this isn't bad at all.
100- "Noticed" - Lil Mosey -- Sure. Why not. Let's end the week with another untalented rapper who is rapping about... something. If you simply listen to the song, you'll have no idea what he's saying because he's implemented a combination of mumbling and incoherently pronouncing words. The beat in the song is alright. And apparently this is Lil Mosey remixing a previous song he had, which was also called "Noticed." But a semi-decent beat behind the song doesn't change the fact that Lil Mosey is just another garbage rapper worth throwing in the trash. Which means he's probably going to catch fire and be the next big thing. But let's hope not. And I haven't even mentioned the fact that we now have another "Lil" to deal with. Seriously, if I get any new rapper who names himself "Lil ______," I'm going to go crazy.
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