Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:
1- "Old Town Road" - Lil Nas X featuring Billy Ray Cyrus (=) -- "Old Town Road" gets its 13th week at No. 1 on the Hot 100, meaning it's only three weeks away from tying the record for most weeks at No. 1, which is currently a tie between "One Sweet Day" and "Despacito." Four more weeks and it'll break the record. Notably this week, "Old Town Road" is now the longest-leading hip-hop song on the Hot 100, breaking away from "See You Again" by Wiz Khalifa featuring Charlie Puth, "Boom Boom Pow" by The Black Eyed Peas, and "Lose Yourself" by Eminem, all of which had 12 weeks at No. 1. "Old Town Road" is now one of 12 songs to rule for at least 13 weeks. In terms of its numbers, it actually wasn't as strong as I was expecting. Lil Nas X released his EP this week, which should've given a good boost, but instead only helped it remain stable in sales and streaming, falling 3 percent in streaming to 88.7 million U.S. streams and remaining mostly even in sales to 59,000 downloads sold. That means next week when the boost from the EP goes away, it's set to take a significant tumble on sales and streaming, just like it did this week in radio, falling 14 percent to 82.5 million audience impressions. That means the song as at its most vulnerable right now. Problem is we didn't have any major new releases this past Friday, so it will sleepwalk to a 14th week at No. 1.
2- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (new) -- Good effort from Shawn and Camila this week, but this spot is exactly where I was expecting this to debut. "Señorita" did have an excellent start on streaming with 46.7 million U.S. streams, thanks mostly to its YouTube numbers, and had a fine first week of sales with 50,000 downloads sold, but both of those were No. 2 behind "Old Town Road." The song also drew 23 million in overall radio audience, which is not bad for a first week on radio, but also way behind "Old Town Road." Last week's No. 2 debut, Taylor Swift's "You Need to Calm Down" plummeted all the way to No. 13 this week. That's about what I expect "Señorita" to do next week, which is a similar fate that Shawn Mendes' previous No. 2 debut "If I Can't Have You" did eight weeks back. That song is now holding steady in the teens (it's at No. 14 this week), but it hasn't yet been able to get back to the top 10. Mendes will hoping that the combined star power will be enough to overcome a similar fate.
3- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (=) -- With no new major debuts scheduled for next week, "bad guy" will again become the biggest competition for "Old Town Road." Honestly if the numbers for "Old Town Road" continue to tumble like they have the last couple of weeks, "bad guy" might eventually jump ahead of "Old Town Road" on the charts because it continues to be remarkably stable, but that's not going to happen within the next three or four weeks, so we're still relying on a new debut to come and knock out "Old Town Road" if the current record is going to stand.
4- "Talk" - Khalid (=) -- Khalid remains No. 1 on radio, rising 4 percent to 118.9 million audience impressions. But that strong radio presence hasn't been strong enough to get him bast Billie, but both songs will probably jump up a spot each next week as Shawn and Camila come tumbling down.
5- "I Don't Care" - Ed Sheeran & Justin Bieber (=) -- Out of all the new debuts that have failed to knock out "Old Town Road," this song has been the one to remain consistent enough to actually stick around in the top 10, which is fairly impressive. I don't think this song is going to rise ahead of Khalid or Billie, but it could jump up to No. 4 next week depending on what happens to "Señorita."
6- "Sucker" - Jonas Brothers (=) -- Let's hope that "Sucker" also manages to remain right behind "I Don't Care" next week. Because I'd really prefer that the rest of the top 10 doesn't get any higher.
7- "Suge" - DaBaby (+2) -- Gross.
8- "Money in the Grave" - Drake featuring Rick Ross (-1) -- Gross.
9- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (+1) -- Gross.
10- "Wow." - Post Malone (-2) -- Gross.
Rising on the Hot 100:
11- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (+3) -- I'm excited to see this song at No. 11 because that means it has strong potential to knock something out of the top 10 next week. Given that I want everything from Nos. 7 to 10 gone, I'll take what I can get.
18- "God's Country" - Blake Shelton (+3) -- This isn't going to get much higher than this spot, but the song's consistency is pretty impressive. And if I'm wrong and it does manage to break out of the teens, I won't be upset.
29- "The Git Up" - Blanco Brown (+22) -- Another huge rise for "The Git Up" this week as America's next huge dance craze seems destined for a top 10 entry sooner rather than later. Maybe this will be the song to eventually dethrone "Old Town Road." I won't bet on it doing so in time, but I think this has all the pieces in place to be a huge smash hit. Except for the radio thing. I haven't looked at the chart positioning for it, but it doesn't seem like the type of song to get a bunch of radio play. But who knows. We shall see.
39- "Cross Me" - Ed Sheeran featuring Chance the Rapper & PnB Rock (+7) -- I'm not a fan of this Ed Sheeran song, but it's managing to slowly gain traction, which is a positive note for Ed Sheeran with both of his songs holding well.
43- "Press" - Cardi B (+17) -- No thank you.
48- "Shotta Flow" - NLE Choppa (+19) -- Gross.
70- "It's You" - Ali Gatie (+27) -- Oh yes! I'll certainly take this! I mean, this guy is nothing too unique. He sounds a lot like Khalid to me. But it's still a solid song. So if he can gain traction and become 2019's newest rising star, I'm all for it.
New Arrivals:
2- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello -- I'm not really sure how people are going to take to this one. This could be the type of song that gets forgotten about in a month or two. But I don't know, I've found to be an extremely catchy. I listening to it shortly after it debuted a week or so ago and haven't been able to get it out of my head since. I think a big part of that for me is Camila. She has a habit of writing catchy enough pop songs that I've gravitated to. In terms of quality music, I think she's had a solid career post Fifth Harmony, even though her team has mismanaged her single release strategy. "Señorita" is another song that she simply owns. When Shawn comes in, he does a good job at harmonizing with her. They make a great musical pair. The lyrics? Eh. They're not good. But in this instance, I don't really care too much. This is a solid pop song to have playing in the background and has a good enough beat to dance to. If everyone else wants to tear it apart, I'm fine with that. I'm not going to sit here and defend the song as a musical masterpiece.
16- "Panini" - Lil Nas X -- As I mentioned before, Lil Nas X's new EP "7" impacted the charts this week. It included both the original and the Billy Ray Cyrus remix versions of "Old Town Road" as well as five other songs. Two of those new songs charted this week. I was curious enough to check them out. I'm mostly convinced that Lil Nas X will end up as a one-hit wonder as he's far from being the best part of "Old Town Road." Billy Ray Cyrus and the Nine Inch Nails sample are the two things that make "Old Town Road" work. So what's a follow-up song going to sound like? Well, it has no personality to it and no flare. It's not a country/rap combo song that's dumb enough to become a huge meme. And if Lil Nas X wants to be taken seriously as a country artist, he's doing a bad job at that with this song because this has no country elements to it. Not even a twangy voice or other hollow things that trick people into thinking some non-country songs are actually country. Granted, this song isn't pure awful. It doesn't hurt my ears. It's just boring and dumb. And the lyrics make me laugh. "Hey Panini; Don't you be a meanie; Thought you wanted me to go up; Why you tryna' keep me teenie?" That's how the song starts. The only other thing that might keep the song afloat is that it interpolates Nirvana's "In Bloom." I didn't necessarily pick up on that right away, but I did notice a Kurt Cobain writing credit on the song, which surprised. As it turns out, Lil Nas X said he's never even listened to Nirvana's album "Nevermind." That shocked me, especially because that album has "Smells Like Teen Spirit" on it. Thus of course I can't give Lil Nas X any credit for the interpolation of "In Bloom." If he'd never heard of it, I guess that means someone else did that for him and he just went with it. Kinda like him admitting that he had no idea "Old Town Road" interpolates Nine Inch Nails.
20- "MEGATRON" - Nicki Minaj -- Nope.
22- "Rodeo" - Lil Nas X & Cardi B -- After "Panini," I almost decided to just skip this one. But I listened to it just for the heck of it. And yeah, I'm not really sure what to make of this. If anyone cares about Lil Nas X being country, he does his twangy voice in this as he raps. If you want to call that country, then whatever. It's not. It's another rap song and I can't even really decipher what it's about. It's titled "Rodeo," but I don't know why. Something about not wanting his girl to leave him, but nothing he says in his verses makes a whole lot of sense, then Cardi comes in and gives a verse saying she'd rather kill her ex than see him with another girl. Because, you know, I guess murder is the cool thing in rap nowadays. The only credit I'll give her is that she sounds more interested in the song than Lil Nas X does. Again, the song itself isn't awful like other rap songs. It's just boring and lifeless. Unfortunately I could see this song gaining more traction given the Cardi feature and Lil Nas X doing his twangy thing. I hope not that. Finally, in continuing the trend of sampling, this song samples "Pump It" by The Black Eyed Peas. Which, oddly enough, is the second time I'm mentioned them in this post.
57- "One Thing Right" - Marshmello & Kane Brown -- Marshmello just keeps showing up on the charts. I'm guessing it's starting to annoy some people, but for me it's just whatever. Mostly it's just harmless. And as I said whenever his lost song charted, he switches back and forth from featuring a mainstream act and featuring an obscure act. Here's him featuring a mainstream act. Unfortunately for me, this time it's Kane Brown, one of the more uninteresting country acts who for some unknown reason to me is a huge in the country realm. Lyrically this song is about as uninteresting as anything else that Kane Brown has written. More boring country nonsense. The only thing that makes it somewhat tolerable is that Marshmello doing an EDM country thing is a significantly more interesting than any country beat that would be on a normal Kane Brown song. So I guess that makes this song alright. But nothing I'm going to remember. If it were to disappear in a week or two, I might forget it ever charted.
72- "Out the Mud" - Lil Baby featuring Future -- Nope.
98- "Cash S---" - Megan Thee Stallion featuring DaBaby -- Nope.
100- "Summer Days" - Martin Garrix featuring Macklemore & Patrick Stump -- It was a pleasant surprise seeing Martin Garrix on the charts this week. When it comes to DJs, he's always been one of my favorite ones. However, I won't lie. Seeing him teamed up with Macklemore and Patrick Stump of Fall Out Boy caused me to raise an eyebrow. That's an interesting trio of artists. In seeing how this all plays out, I decided that Martin Garrix and Fall Out Boy is a good combination. Patrick Stump's personality fits well with Martin Garrix's groove. But whoever wrote these lyrics didn't do a very good job. I get that it's supposed to be a simple, relaxing summer groove, but lyrically this just feels empty. Then Macklemore comes in during the middle of the song and just kills whatever groove this song had with a lackluster double verse that comes with zero energy. It makes me sad because ever since Macklemore and Ryan Lewis parted ways, Macklemore just hasn't been interesting at all. So maybe in a future song, Fall Out Boy and Martin Garrix could write a an awesome song together. But this experiment here didn't really work. The groove almost gets there, but not enough to over-compensate the empty lyrics, then Macklemore just kills any bit of momentum the song had. I'd probably prefer it slightly over the Marshmello and Kane Brown song that I just covered as this song isn't outright bad. It's just underwhelming and mostly forgettable.
However, there is a Tiësto remix of this song that's legitimately boss. But that's not the version of the song that charted, so that's mostly irrelevant to this discussion. Just thought I'd mention that, though, in case you feel like checking it out.
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