Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:
1- "7 Rings" - Ariana Grande (=) -- It's the week of Ariana as her new album "thank u, next" impacts the charts this week, giving her nine new arrivals as all 12 songs from the album have charted in the top 50. Regarding the top 10, Ariana is the first artist to monopolize the entire top three since The Beatles in 1964, who notably monopolized the entire top five on April 4, 1964. Now I said this when Drake had seven simultaneous top 10 hits last year and I'll say it again with Ariana's trifecta. I'm not impressed. We live in a day where streaming has completely changed the music industry and album bombs like this are the normal. Last year alone we had five different artists have three or more simultaneous top 10 hits. Prior to last year, only 14 artists in the history of the Hot 100 had accomplished that feat, 12 of them coming since 2002. This type of thing has become normal. So I'm not going to salivate at some sort of grand achievement that Ariana has pulled off because something like this happens with every new major album bomb. "7 Rings" would've remained No. 1 regardless, but the boost with the album bomb has pushed it up 10 percent to 63.5 million U.S. streams. That will come down next week, but not enough for anything else to take over the top spot, especially with radio continuing to catch fire, up 23 percent to 61.7 million audience impressions.
2- "Break up with Your Girlfriend, I'm Bored" - Ariana Grande (new) -- Entering in at No. 2 is Ariana's latest lifeless song. I'll give you a more detailed rundown of my thoughts below, but this song bows with 59.2 million U.S. streams as well as 36,000 in sales. Unlike "7 Rings," I don't expect this one to last in the top 10 for very long, unless Ariana decides to sabotage herself again by making this a fourth single from the album that she pushes to the radio. This rushed release pattern with her singles may have helped her gain a trifecta at the top this week, but it's going to hurt her in the long run as spreading the songs out in a more traditional release pattern would've helped maximize each song's individual potential. But Ariana probably doesn't care about that. Nor do I think she actually cares about this album. But hey, it helped her achieve huge success and that's what really matters, right? To heck with quality music. It's all about fame and fortune in 2019. And yes, give yourself a pat on the back if you detected the bitter sarcasm there. I hate what the music industry has transformed into today and what is required to actually gain popularity.
3- "thank u, next" - Ariana Grande (+4) -- "thank u, next" the song is another beneficiary of the "thank u, next" album bomb as it surges 52 percent to 36.8 million U.S. streams. But Ariana had already started to push this song out with her premature release of "7 Rings," so this is going to come crashing down again next week. I wouldn't be surprised to see it fall out of the top 10 altogether, but we'll see what happens next week.
4- "Without Me" - Halsey (-1) -- Halsey has actually positioned herself pretty well despite Ariana coming crashing in as "Without Me" only falls one spot this week despite two Ariana songs soaring in ahead of it. I think "7 Rings" is way too strong for "Without Me" to jump back to No. 1, but I would bet on this song jumping back to No. 2 next week and hanging out there until we get the next rotation of top five songs, whenever that is.
5- "Sunflower (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse)" - Post Malone & Swae Lee (-1) -- Like Halsey, Post and Swae are also positioned nicely as I'd say this song goes back up to No. 3 next week. After a long run in theaters, "Spider-Verse" is finally starting to fade away, but the movie will have one more boost this upcoming Sunday as it's likely to win best animated feature at the Oscars. That could help this song possibly even sneak ahead of Halsey. But after that final boost, I'm wondering if this song is going to start slipping away as the movie continues to slip away.
6- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille (-4) -- I don't have as much confidence regarding "Happier" as I do the two songs ahead of it. This song was on its way out before it got a random "Fortnite" boost. Now as that boost continues to fades away, I imagine this song's time in the top 10 will shortly come to an end.
7- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (-2) -- As much as I don't want it to happen, sadly I think its "SICKO MODE" that's going to jump back into the top five next week. But even so, this song has been here for a while, so I'm thinking its about time for our next wave of songs to show up, but I have no idea what those are or when they're going to come.
8- "High Hopes" - Panic! At the Disco (-2) -- I hope that Panic! also gets one final boost next week, but I really don't know. All this song has ever really had is radio. And I'm really happy that this became such a huge radio hit, but that radio is starting to slip away, even though it still managed to get a 13th week on top of the radio charts.
9- "Wow." - Post Malone (=) -- Logically speaking, you would think that this song is in great position as nearly everything above it is slipping away and this is one of the newer top 10 entries. But the song just doesn't seem to be having as much traction as some of Post Malone's previous hits, which I'm personally happy with since this is one of the worst Post Malone songs, which is saying something because Post Malone is one of the least talented superstars around. If this went away, I would be happy, but I think it will at least stubbornly stick around in the bottom section of the top 10.
10- "Eastside" - Benny Blanco, Halsey & Khalid (+1) -- I'm really happy to see this song back because it gives us another quality song in the top 10. In the process, it also kicked out "Girls Like You" as the latter falls to No. 12, which is worth celebrating. Lets just hope that Maroon 5 STAYS out because the fact that the song tied the record for longest time in the top 10 is an absolute stain on the music industry. But back to "Eastside," I don't know what the song's overall potential is. It could benefit slightly if the songs ahead of it continue to fall, but it's not been that strong overall, so I'm thinking this is only a temporary thing, but I hope I'm wrong.
Rising on the Hot 100:
13- "Going Bad" - Meek Mill featuring Drake (+2) -- There's not many rising songs this week given Ariana debuted nine new songs in the top 50, but "Going Bad" continues to inch its way back to the top 10 after debuting in the region several weeks ago. I'm glad that it never became a monster hit, but the song has had enough traction to make it stubbornly stick around for so long. If Ariana falls hard next week, I can see this song benefiting from that. And even though I won't be too happy about it, better this song hitting top 10 than Maroon 5 going back.
18- "Shallow" - Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper (+6) -- Did y'all see Gaga's performance of this song at the Grammy's? That's why this got a boost this week. If I'm being blatantly honest, I wasn't a huge fan of it. One of the things that made Gaga so good in "A Star is Born" is that, even though she was a singer playing a singer, her character of Ally was a much different pop star than Gaga is in real life. "Shallow" is very much a song by Ally and Bradley Cooper's character of Jackson Maine. Gaga turned it into a Gaga song at the Grammy's. That's not inherently bad. I like Gaga's music. But she sang both parts and went a little crazy on stage. That didn't fit the tone of the song. When she performs at the Oscars this week, I hope she's able to channel her inner Ally for the performance and do a duet with Bradley Cooper rather than going wild on stage. But we'll see.
21- "Imagine" - Ariana Grande (re-entry) -- I decided to include this song on the list this week in case anyone goes counting the Ariana Grande songs. Yes, there's 12 of them in the top 50. Nine new arrivals and her three previous singles leading up to the album release. This song had fallen off the charts, but is back this week. However, I imagine it will be back off the charts in a week or two.
59- "Murder on My Mind" - YNW Melly (+14) -- It's interesting that out of the two YNW Melly songs that charted a while back, the one that's sticking around is the older song from several years ago rather than the new song with Kanye West. Granted, I'm glad that Kanye didn't get any new traction. The more we keep him out of the spotlight, the better it will be for the rest of the world. But I hate how one of the current huge trends in the rapping industry is rapping about murder as if murder is the cool thing to do. No. Murdering another human being should earn you a lifetime trip to prison, not earn you a spot in the hip-hop spotlight. That just disgusts me.
68- "Close Friends" - Lil Baby (+31) -- Don't know why we continue to make Lil Baby a thing. I don't know if I've listened to this song, but I don't care. Get it out of here.
New Arrivals:
2- "Break up with Your Girlfriend, I'm Bored" - Ariana Grande -- The last couple of months I've been avoiding the album bombs and doing so has made me really happy. But given that this is a pop album bomb from Ariana, I figured it would be worth going through real quick, mostly to see if there was anything worthwhile that Ariana put on this album since I do like her as a singer, even though I'm constantly frustrated with her inconsistent quality. But surely this can't be all bad, right? But in starting off with this song, I listened to it about a week or so ago when the music video debuted and the biggest thing I can say is that I was bored with the song. It's not as awful and trashy as her Cardi B impression with "7 Rings," but the content of the song just makes me facepalm. Now we'll ignore the fact that the music video spends more time with Ariana hitting on the girlfriend rather than the boy she's singing about, ending with the two girls about to kiss. That's just the music video being dumb. Sure, you could argue the girlfriend is Ariana herself and that she's telling her own boyfriend to break up with her so she can spend more time loving herself, but that's not what the lyrics actually say. She sees an attractive dude at a party and becomes disappointed in learning that he is dating someone else, so she expresses that she wants him to break up because she is bored and wants someone to love. Yes, you can write songs about this subject that are rather emotional. Seeing a person you love dating someone else is a heartbreaking sentiment and selfishly wanting them to break up is a real, human emotion that's not uncommon. But Ariana doesn't bring any of that emotion to the table in the same way that someone like Adele does in "Someone Like You." Ariana's song is just dull. Thus instead of feeling emotional and real, it comes off as classless and desperate.
14- "Needy" - Ariana Grande -- Next up for Ariana, she explains to us that she can be really needy. That's all there really is to this song. I like the honesty here as Ariana describes the emotional roller coaster she has been on and how she explains that it has led her to feel an over-obsessive desire to have love and attention. In an interview about this song, she explains how she thinks its OK to feel vulnerable and show emotion with how you're feeling. It's a bit of a contrast from society's common view today that we have to learn how to be independent. That causes a lot of female pop singers to emphasize how much they don't need any guys in their life. But here Ariana is being honest that she craves love and attention when it comes to a partner and I respect that honesty. I just wish there was a bit more to the song. I got a lot more from Ariana's comments about the song rather than the lyrics of the song itself. And the music is very stripped down to the point where it sounds like there's only two notes played throughout as Ariana sings about feeling needy. So there was a solid idea behind the song, but on its own it comes off feeling a bit empty and unfinished.
17- "NASA" - Ariana Grande -- "This is one small step for woman. One giant leap for woman kind." That's how we start this song off and I was wondering where it was going. Turns out Ariana simply uses a whole lot of cheesy space analogies to tell this guy that she needs space. The guy hasn't done anything wrong. In fact, she says that she still really cares for him. But she can't miss him if she's with him. And if she misses him, it'll change the way she kisses him. In other words, if I was the guy in this situation, I'd be really confused right now. In the previous two songs, she sings about how she is desperate for love and attention. But this song she has it, yet she decides to push the guy away so she can spend more time missing him. It's like she secretly enjoys the feeling of being alone and desperate for love while she gets bored with love itself. At this point in the relationship, I'd walk away and find a girl who is more willing to actually settling down rather than staying with the emotionally unstable girl.
22- "Bloodline" - Ariana Grande -- Continuing with the trend from "NASA," Ariana is again telling us here about her lack of desire for love. She's not looking to settle down or find her one true love. She's just out looking to have a good time. Now if we separate each song from the album as a whole, they all describe a very different feeling that a girl often feels about love. Each song can be relatable in its own way. But together as a whole, this project is really confusing. There's no running theme about what Ariana is going through in her life. In fact, it's the exact opposite. Each song directly conflicts with what the previous song is expressing. One song she describes how needy and desperate she is for love. The other song she expresses her desire for some space so that she can learn to love this guy more. And in this song she has no desire to find true love. She's just wanting a one-night stand or a brief fling where she can have fun. The lack of focus is frustrating. But I will admit that the music for this song is the best so far. Instead of sounding boring or lazy, this song actually has a groove to it. If it showed up on the radio, I might have a fun time jamming to it.
25- "Ghostin" - Ariana Grande -- We're switching gears again with Ariana's love roller coaster. This time around, Ariana is happily in a relationship with a guy, but can't help crying over a previous ex of her's. Despite the confusing nature of the album continuing, this is actually the best song so far. I was immediately impressed with the haunting nature of a song called "Ghostin." The song is a slower, more emotional song that fits Ariana's style much better in my opinion. You can feel the pain in her voice when she's lying on the bed thinking about this guy she is no longer with. You can also feel the guilt come over her as she feels bad that she's hurting her current lover's feelings by not being able to get over the previous guy that she obviously loves a lot more than the current guy. I think in previous songs, Ariana has tried to be honest and emotional, but everything instead came off as cheap, rushed and a bit lazy. "Ghostin" is a song that actually works. It feels like she put effort into. Or maybe she's just throwing everything at the wall right now to see what sticks and for me this is the one where she got luck and actually had it stick the landing. But regardless, I give credit where credit is due and say that I appreciate this effort from Ariana.
26- "Fake Smile" - Ariana Grande -- Here's a bit of a twist. This is song where Ariana isn't talking about her emotional romance roller coaster. Instead, she seems to be talking about all the pressure of what everyone is saying about her getting to her head, causing her to emotionally fall apart. I don't know, maybe it's rude of me to say this, but I don't really buy this. There's a lot of singers who sing about all their haters and how they're reacting to it. Taylor Swift's recent album "reputation" was all about this. In all honesty, I think Taylor had a great reputation until she started singing about how bad of a reputation she has. Thus her singing about her bad reputation is the only thing that hurt her reputation. That's kinda the vibe I'm getting from Ariana here. I will give her credit that she's willing to show emotion here. Most people when they sing about their haters are telling us that they don't care about the haters. Ariana is saying that she reads what they write about her and hears what they are saying on the TV and sometimes it hurts her. This is an instance where it's good to remember that celebrities are humans, too. Angry YouTube comments and fiery Twitter posts can be upsetting. So I like that element of the song. It's just that it feels a bit superficial in this instance because I honestly don't think Ariana gets a lot of hate. She's singing about all of her haters that don't really exist. She's a well liked, well respected pop star at the pinnacle of her success. It just seems like she wrote this song because she felt it would connect with people rather than writing based on personal experience.
27- "Bad Idea" - Ariana Grande -- Back to Ariana's love roller coaster, this time around she has a bad idea. That bad idea is that they should take some time away. Which sounds a lot like what she was saying back in "NASA." But then in the next part, she's talking about the bad idea being that she wants him to cover over and numb the pain. We go back and forth between those two ideas without giving a whole lot of detail as this is a super repetitive song that doesn't dive deep. The only context we get is a brief part in the middle where she admits that this is a bad relationship that she wants to get out of, but can't get herself to do so. Something like that. I actually like how the music is put together in this one. It has a bit of a darker touch to it that dives into some interesting places musically, which fits well with Ariana's voice in the song. I just wish the lyrics made a little more sense. It seems like there's more of a story here that could've been told, yet Ariana skims over it in favor of a repetitive chorus.
38- "In My Head" - Ariana Grande -- One thing I haven't touched on yet is that most of these songs have introductory quotes at the beginning that are played before Ariana starts singing. This song's quote is from Doug Middlebrook, who says, "Here's the thing. You're in love with a version of a person that you've created in your head that you are trying to, but cannot, fix. The only person you can fix is yourself." I really like that quote. It causes me to actually ponder. I just wish the song that followed were as interesting as the quote. Ariana gets a little too fancy with this song as she does a lot of weird things with her vocals and it doesn't blend together very well. There's a skeleton of this initial idea from the quote, but not one that's fleshed out very well.
44- "Talk" - Khalid -- We briefly interrupt the Ariana show to bring you a song from Khalid. Despite it not being credited, this is Khalid collaborating with the electronic duo Disclosure, who have been mostly MIA on the Hot 100. They got a top 10 hit with Sam Smith in "Latch" back in 2012. Then "Omen," also with Sam Smith peaked at No. 64 in 2015. And that's hit. They've been rather huge in the U.K. and have also shown up quite a bit on the EDM charts in the states, but the U.S. Hot 100 hasn't been their thing. And it'll continue to not be their thing unless Khalid decides to list them as a featured act, which so far doesn't appear to be the case. But they do turn what is mostly a basic song into a decently upbeat tune. Khalid in his lyrics is asking his girl if they can talk about their relationship since they're moving a lot faster than he was expecting. Granted, if that were the case, I would hope they would already be talking because communication is how relationships work, which is why the lyrics don't really work for me that well. But I've always felt that Khalid's vocals work really well when combined with an electronic act or producer and that's exactly why this song works. It's not upbeat and dancy enough to be a hit on the dance floor, but it has enough of a groove to be a perfect song to be playing quietly in the background during a nice evening, perhaps during the dinner before a fancy dance party, if that makes sense.
48- "Make Up" - Ariana Grande -- And the final Ariana song this week is a straight-up sex song. She says it right in the first line. "I like to ---- with you." Then she goes on to essentially describe how bad of a relationship this really is because she's always mad at him. But she loves to make up with him so they can really make it right in the bed at night. Because, you know, nothing's more healthy than a broken relationship that's taped together with some good love making. Now I'm no love expert, but that seems like the type of relationship that's built on both parties thinking the other person is super attractive rather than the relationship being built on them loving each other as human beings. But eh, it's whatever. Probably one of the worst songs on the album, but it makes me facepalm more than it makes me angry. Overall, this album does have some good tracks on it, but it just feels like Ariana threw a whole bunch of ideas together quickly to see what sticks. Given how quickly this was released after her previous album last year, I think it could've benefited by her spending a little more time on it, but what do I know? Based on these first week numbers, this is her biggest album to date and it'll unfortunately probably teach her that quantity is better than quality when it comes to music. It's sad that that's the era we live in.
56- "Who Do You Love" - The Chainsmokers featuring 5 Seconds of Summer -- It almost seems like forever ago when The Chainsmokers were a huge thing. But the "Closer" era wasn't that long ago for them. Problem is, they've kinda slipped into oblivion as people stopped caring. They get plenty of songs to chart, but they can't replicate the success that they once had. But they continue to try and now their latest attempt at relevancy comes with them teaming up with 5SOS, hoping to ride off that group's success following their smash hit "Youngblood." I always find it funny when I look at a song like this and find on Genius that it has 12 different writing credits because the song itself is extremely simple. 5SOS are taking turns accusing their girlfriends of cheating on them. That's all there is to the lyrics. The beat that's added by The Chainsmokers is a very basic groove. So why did it take 12 people to write this song? I mean, it's not bad. It's a tolerable song from The Chainsmokers and I always give them props when they bring someone else on to do the vocals because Andrew Taggart is NOT a good singer even though he thinks he is. But if this song were to fail to get traction on the charts, I would probably forget it exists rather quickly, so by no means is this a return to form.
98- "Rainbow" - Kacey Musgraves -- I was rather shocked when I was watching the Grammy's and it was revealed that Kacey Musgraves won best album with "Golden Hour." I was certain that it was going to either Cardi B, Drake, Post Malone, or the "Black Panther" album, since it was those albums that were the biggest. But nope. They gave it to Kacey Musgraves and I was stoked simply because it meant that everything else lost. I hadn't listened to "Golden Hour," just like there were a lot of albums from last year that didn't listen to. But I decided to fix that after the album's win and I immediately became obsessed. I wasn't sure which song was going to chart for Kacey as "Butterflies" won best country solo performance while "Space Cowboy" won best country song, but it turns out that her performance of "Rainbow" during the Grammy's was the most impactful as said performance is what got Kacey to finally chart a song on the Hot 100 for the first time since 2013, which is a real shame after finally diving into her music. Kacey is the type of country girl that the world needs and "Rainbow" is an absolutely beautiful song. Kacey said she wrote it about six years ago and was the final inclusion on the album that made everything feel complete. She initially wrote it for herself, but said that it can apply to anyone going through a hard time. The song paints a picture of someone going through an awful time. It's pouring outside and they are having a hard time staying above the rising water line. But then Kacey tells the person that if they could see in themselves what she sees in them, they'd be blinded by the colors of this rainbow hanging over their head. I love the imagery she paints and the strong feeling of optimism that comes with the song as she successfully portrays that life is better than we often give ourselves credit for. I hope this sticks around for longer than one week at No. 98, but if not, you can count on this remaining one of my favorite new arrivals of 2019 because it doesn't get much more beautiful than this when it comes to music.
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