DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - September 28, 2019

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! This is a weekly post where I cover three main sections of the charts: the Billboard Hot 100 top 10, the songs rising on the Hot 100, and the new arrivals. As pertaining to the rising songs, in order to be included, a song has to rise at least two spots between Nos. 11 and 20, five spots spots between Nos. 21 and 50, or 10 spots between Nos. 51 and 100. As pertaining to new arrivals, I used to dedicate myself to covering every single song that debuted, but that started to burn me out, especially with the high number of album bombs, so I've been a lot more selective recently and so far I've received no complaints. However, if I skip a song that you want to hear my thoughts on, feel free to let me know. I'll occasionally mix things up depending on the week, like throwing in a notable re-entry into the rising songs section, but generally this is what I go with. Most of the data I give you comes from Billboard.com, usually Gary Trust's weekly article. If I pull from elsewhere, I'll generally let you know. With all of that out of the way, let's dive in and see what this week has to offer!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (=) -- With its fourth week at No. 1, "Truth Hurts" is now the longest running No. 1 hit by a female rapper without another artist attached to the song. And with so many qualifiers in that sentence, that stat probably means close to nothing. Especially since I don't even consider "Truth Hurts" a rap song. But it is what it is. If that record impresses you, then by all means. I think the bigger issue here is the lack of success that female rappers have on the charts making it so that wasn't a hard bar to jump over since the previous record was held by Cardi B's "Bodak Yellow" with just three weeks at No. 1. Lizzo reigns this week with help from radio, where "Truth Hurts" takes over as the No. 1 song, jumping "Señorita." However, "Truth Hurts" crashes down 12 percent in sales to 27,000 downloads sold, while only increasing 1 percent in streaming to 29.4 million U.S. streams. So outside the radio, it's not super strong. I don't know when the song is going to give up the throne given the competition right now isn't super strong right now, but I don't imagine the reign will last too much longer.

2- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (=) -- I would still say that "Señorita" has at least an outside chance of going back to No. 1, but Gary Trust, who writes Billboard's weekly article that I read for my information, must've got bored of reporting those margins because there were no reports of what the numbers are, so my saying "Señorita" has a chance is just a random stab in the dark with no current evidence to back it up. Perhaps it's also falling at a similar rate.

3- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (+2) -- Billie got bullied down by Post Malone last week, but she's now back up where she belongs, right there in the top three. Give this song a couple of weeks and it'll officially be the No. 2 most popular song of the year based on my personal tracking, passing "Sunflower" and only being behind "Old Town Road." That's extremely impressive and makes me very happy for Billie!

4- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi (+5) -- Oh hey there! This is a huge surprise. It took this song forever to finally hit the top 10, which made me think that it'll probably be the type of song that hangs out in the bottom half of the top 10 for a few weeks without getting much higher. That's what happened with "Sweet but Psycho" this year. Turns out the timing here was fantastic. I had a feeling it would jump up to No. 6 or No. 7 with all the Post Malone songs set to fall, but I had no idea that it would actually leapfrog both "Ran$om" and "No Guidance. I'm certainly happy about this. It makes for quite the excellent top four. This song has been a worldwide hit for quite some time, going top five and top 10 in many countries, as well as being No. 1 in Czech Republic, Ireland, Scotland, and The U.K. It's about time that we jump on board here. Now with "Truth Hurts," "Señorita," and "bad guy" not being super strong at the moment, could this actually contend for No. 1? I didn't think that was going to happen.

5- "Panini" - Lil Nas X (+9) -- Last week I talked about how "Old Town Road" is going to make Lil Nas X a one-hit wonder. By technical definitions, that is now an incorrect statement as "Panini" now vaults into the top five thanks to the remix with DaBaby. Last week's jump up to No. 14 was due to the official music video release. If I mixed those things up in my post last week, I'm now correct. Now I do think Lil Nas X still could end up being considered a one-hit wonder if you have a more loose definition of the term. Most artists that we put into that category did have a second or third song perform decently on the charts due to a sort of holdover effect, but history only remembers them for the one song. I mean, do you remember what the other hits for PSY and WALK THE MOON were outside "Gangnum Style" and "Shut Up and Dance"? In that light, I predict Lil Nas X will only ever be remembered for "Old Town Road," not "Panini." For better or for worst, "Panini" is not an earworm of a song like "Old Town Road." In fact, it's pretty boring and forgettable, with some awfully cheesy rhymes. If Lil Nas X had led with this song instead of "Old Town Road," no way this comes close to the top five. But it's only here now because it's the next single by Lil Nas X after "Old Town Road." Sure, maybe we need to come up with a better term than one-hit wonder, but I think you understand my point good enough. Lil Nas X is just a momentary flare.

6- "Ran$om" - Lil Tecca (=) -- I was bracing for this to return to the top five, but was pleasantly surprised to see it stay put. The two Post Malone songs expectedly dropped out of the top five, but they were replaced by "Someone You Loved" and "Panini" instead. Now if we could get this song to start dropping, that would be nice.

7- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (=) -- I'm also ready for this song to fade away and be forgotten about. It's being too stubborn, though. But at least it's not getting any higher, though. I can tolerate it hanging around No. 7.

8- "Goodbyes" - Post Malone featuring Young Thug (-5) -- This song was nearly dead in terms of its top 10 life before Post Malone's album dropped. Now I'm wondering how much longer it will stick around. It's a good contender to drop, but we don't have a lot of strong contenders to replace it.

9- "Circles" - Post Malone (-5) -- There's rumblings of a radio push here that could give this song some actual traction following the debut and the album bomb. Like "Goodbyes," I wouldn't mind if this song stuck around, even though I won't miss it when its gone. But it's been a bit surprising with these two songs that they haven't been as huge as some of Post's other songs. Could it simply be the fact that these two songs are more pop-leaning than usual have caused Post fans to not be quite as enthusiastic over these two songs as they were towards his more hip-hop heavy songs?

10- "Old Town Road" - Lil Nas X featuring Billy Ray Cyrus (+1) -- I may or may not have mentioned last week that I wasn't quite ready to celebrate "Old Town Road" falling out of the top 10 because I knew that it was headed back with Post Malone falling out. But it only managed to jump one spot to No. 10, meaning it actually might be gone for good within a week or two. And as a fun fact, due to it's plunge in recent weeks following its 19-week run at No. 1, it's going to fall well short of the No. 1 spot on the 2010s decades list according to my personal tracking as I only track the top 10. I have no idea what Billboard's official list will look like, but right now "Old Town Road" is only at No. 4 and is way short of of the top three, which is "Uptown Funk," "Closer" and "Shape of You."

Rising on the Hot 100:

11- "I Don't Care" - Ed Sheeran & Justin Bieber (+2) -- The rising songs section is huge this week due to the fallout of Post Malone's album bomb last week. So let's go through these quickly. "I Don't Care" almost rises back to the top 10, but just misses out. That means it's probably gone for good. Although I wouldn't be sad if it swapped places with "Old Town Road" next week for the sake of getting "Old Town Road" out.

15- "Sucker" - Jonas Brothers (+4) -- "Sucker" holding well on the charts. It ain't coming back into the top 10, but it's hanging around in the teens. Not bad.

16- "Beautiful People" - Ed Sheeran featuring Khalid (+7) -- Our first real song on the rising songs section. I could see this hitting top 10, especially since Ed Sheeran and Khalid are both officially out of the top 10 with their two recent hit singles.

18- "Money in the Grave" - Drake featuring Rick Ross (+3) -- I'm glad this is done with the top 10.

19- "Boyfriend" - Ariana Grande & Social House (+6) -- I think I forgot this song exists.

20- "Suge" - DaBaby (+6) -- I honestly did forget this songs existed. And so should everyone else.

22- "Hot Girl Summer" - Megan Thee Stallion, Nicki Minaj & Ty Dolla $ign (+6) -- I'm a bit surprised that this never cracked top 10, but I'm certainly not complaining. It still has a chance to do so since it hasn't been around too long.

25- "The Git Up" - Blanco Brown (+6) -- I'm really surprised that this never hit top 10. It was soaring up the charts and all signs pointed towards it being the next big dance craze in 2019, but then it hit a brick wall and never recovered.

27- "Baby" - Lil Baby & DaBaby (+5) -- This is only here because the two thugs who put the word "baby" in their rapper names wrote a song called "Baby." I didn't think it was funny. And I certainly didn't think it was clever. Just really stupid. So can the novelty if this stupidity wear off, please?

29- "How Do You Sleep" - Sam Smith (+10) -- I'm always fan with Sam Smith being around.

30- "Dancing with a Stranger" - Sam Smith & Normani (+5) -- Speaking of Sam Smith, this is probably the last time I'll be including this song in this post. It was a good song.

32- "Without Me" - Halsey (+8) -- "Without Me" has impressively made it to 50 weeks on the charts. Due to Billboard's rules, that means it has two weeks left before it disappears and becomes a part of chart history rather than chart present.

34- "Trampoline" - SHAED (+8) -- YES!!! This needs to rise even higher!

35- "On Chill" - Wale featuring Jeremih (+13) -- Still don't care about this, but I'm getting nervous. Also, how do you pronounce Wale? Should it be a French pronunciation with an accent, ala "Walé"? Or is it whale, as in the animal. I choose to believe the animal.

38- "Only Human" - Jonas Brothers (+9) -- Jonas Brothers' next hit slowly rising. I wish I cared more about it.

47- "I Don't Know About You" - Chris Lane (+7) -- The country riser of the week.

53- "Time" - NF (+11) -- Snooze.

55- "Ballin'" - Mustard featuring Roddy Ricch (+14) -- Barf.

57- "Prayed for You" - Matt Stell (+14) -- Thanks for praying for me, Matt.

59- "223s" - YNW Melly & 9lokknine (+28) -- Gross. Also, I think I learned that 9lokknine is pronounced like "glokknine," not "blokknine." Of all these dumb things of replacing letters with numbers, turning a "g" into a "9" one of the worst I've seen yet.

62- "Even Though I'm Leaving" - Luke Combs (+30) -- Did I like this one? I can't remember. And there's too much songs this week for me to really care.

74- "Good Vibes" - Chris Janson (+11) -- I probably didn't like this one.

82- "Right Back" - Khalid featuring A Boogie wit da Hoodie (+11) -- Boogie needs to go away. But if I'm remembering right, he's barely on this remix of the song. So Khalid is hoping his name alone will help sell the song as he didn't give him much of anything to do in this song that was already forgettable in the first place.

New Arrivals:

13- "Don't Call Me Angel" - Ariana Grande, Miley Cyrus & Lana Del Rey -- From the upcoming movie "Charlie's Angels," hitting theaters in November. Honestly I think the movie has potential, even though no one on Earth asked for a new "Charlie's Angels" remake and excitement level seems to be in the cellar. But that's a conversation to be expanded on at a different time. Honestly I think some people were more excited for this song than the movie itself. And this trio might be more exciting than the movie's trio of angels. Although if you diss on my girl Kristen Stewart, I slap you. And Naomi Scott? I mean, come on. Again, conversation for another day. The song, though? Yeah, no, I'm gonna pass on this one. It might be a bit of a clever juxtaposition with a song called "Don't Call Me Angel" being the theme song for "Charlie's Angels." But Ariana is trying too hard, Miley isn't trying hard enough, and Lana is in a completely different song. With Ariana's side, she's trying so hard to sound super sexy. A lot of sighs and cooing, with a very airy delivery, yet she's there for most of the song. It should be Ariana featuring Miley and Lana because the latter two show up for a quick verse and are gone while Ariana takes a verse and all the choruses. With Miley, I didn't feel any energy or passion from her. By the time the song ended, I had forgotten she was in it. Then for the whole song, I was almost nervously anticipating Lana's entrance. And if you wonder how she mixes with these two... she doesn't. The song completely shifts gears in an awkward way. Granted, I might be fine with a full length version of Lana's section that cuts out Ariana and Miley, but as is this was a weird section of song that felt out of place. And yeah, it's a soundtrack song, meaning it has no depth.

40- "Camelot" - NLE Choppa -- Nope.

45- "Graveyard" - Halsey -- I saw the music video for this a few days ago and was blown away. But not because of the song. The music video is a time-lapse of Halsey painting a huge self portrait and it's excellent. If there comes a point where this music thing isn't working out for Halsey, she could try her hand as artist because this girl can paint. I watched the music video again for this post and was again distracted by the painting job. I totally forgot there was a song I was supposed to be listening to, so I had to go back to my normal Apple Music to listen to this song so I didn't get distracted. And it's not the most mindblowingly amazing song. She says the word graveyard in a funny way and sometimes the song gets stuck on the same note for a bit too long, but it's peaceful and relaxing. It's actually a perfect song for that time-lapse video because it enhances the mood of what's happening. So if you need a nice song playing in the background for whatever it is you're doing, I think "Graveyard" is perfect for that. And sometimes you need a song that's simple and relaxing. I don't know if this is going to be Halsey's next huge hit. If it quickly fades away, it's one of those songs that I might forget exists, but if it sticks around and does, I'll certainly be accepting.

75- "Behind Barz" - Drake -- If this becomes huge, then sure, I'll give it a shot. But for now I don't feel like dealing with a Drake song that debuts at No. 75.

76- "Mood Swings" - A Boogie wit da Hoodie -- Boogie needs to leave me alone.

91- "Hot Girl Bummer" - blackbear -- I facepalmed so hard when I saw this. Obviously this is a play on "Hot Girl Summer," but... why?

97- "1, 2 Many" - Luke Combs & Brooks & Dunn -- This is a confusing artist listing. For the record, there are two acts here. The first is Luke Combs and the second act is the duo Brooks & Dunn. And this is the most twangy, southern, generically country song there is. I'm not even comment any more. Hardcore country fans are going to have fun with this, but this song exemplifies everything wrong about country for me.

100- "Remember You Young" - Thomas Rhett -- After listening to whatever the heck that last thing was, this latest song from Thomas Rhett was quite the breath of fresh air. Now Thomas Rhett is always a confusing artist to me. I never have any idea if a new song of his is going to be awful or if it's going to be really good. So I guess inconsistent in terms of quality is the best way to describe him. But this song is really nice. It has a smooth, gentle touch to it, and outside a few references to drinking tequila, there's no signs of country here. It's a pop song from Mr. Rhett that's very pleasant to listen to. I do get a bit conflicted in regards to the lyrics, though. If the song was a bit more focused with one subject that he's referring to, this could've been great. If it was a father wondering how his little daughter became all grown up or a story about a man falling in love with his childhood friend. Instead, each verse has a different subject that Thomas Rhett is saying he's always going to remember young. And thus when a song is about too much, it ends up being about nothing. Thus I can find songs that do this very thing a lot better. But still, musically speaking this is a nice tune to listen. And if country radio wants to jump on board this non country song that can also cross over to pop radio and make this a big hit, I'll be totally fine with that.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - September 21, 2019

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! This is a weekly post where I cover three main sections of the charts: the Billboard Hot 100 top 10, the songs rising on the Hot 100, and the new arrivals. As pertaining to the rising songs, in order to be included, a song has to rise at least two spots between Nos. 11 and 20, five spots spots between Nos. 21 and 50, or 10 spots between Nos. 51 and 100. As pertaining to new arrivals, I used to dedicate myself to covering every single song that debuted, but that started to burn me out, especially with the high number of album bombs, so I've been a lot more selective recently and so far I've received no complaints. However, if I skip a song that you want to hear my thoughts on, feel free to let me know. I'll occasionally mix things up depending on the week, like throwing in a notable re-entry into the rising songs section, but generally this is what I go with. Most of the data I give you comes from Billboard.com, usually Gary Trust's weekly article. If I pull from elsewhere, I'll generally let you know. With all of that out of the way, let's dive in and see what this week has to offer!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (=) -- Fending off a surge of Post Malone this week, thanks to Post's new album impacting the charts, is Lizzo with "Truth Hurts" as the song gets its third week at No. 1. After "Old Town Road" broke the record with 19 weeks at No. 1, we had a bit of instability at the top, which I personally prefer. But now it appears that "Truth Hurts" has helped the charts gain a little more stability. Although honestly I don't know how strong of a No. 1 this is. While it continues to slowly climb on the radio, rising 6 percent to 110.8 million audience impressions, narrowly behind "Señorita" on that level, which rose 2 percent to 111.9 million audience impressions, "Truth Hurts" plummeted on both sales and streaming, falling 19 percent and 16 percent respectively. Again, I think part of this is due to it gaining a huge boost last two weeks ago thanks to the VMAs, and thus it continues to float back down to Earth to where it was before that. Now I think it's steady enough across the board to stay in the top five somewhere for a good portion of the fall season, but if something comes around with a lot more momentum, I think "Truth Hurts" in primed to stumble. But the thing is, what is that song? Post Malone wasn't quite strong enough this week to pull off the feat with either of his songs, so we'll have to see what the charts look like in a week or two once the dust settles from the album to see what is actually gaining.

2- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (=) -- I'd say that "Señorita" is still a contender to go back to No. 1, but although it's ahead in radio for the time being, I don't know what its sales and streaming numbers are to compare them to "Truth Hurts" and what the percent change is. I rely on Billboard's weekly article for that and they didn't report that. I could look at the individual sales and streaming charts on Billboard, but when I opened them this week, I got a message saying, "Sorry, only for Billboard Pros!" I don't know what that's all about. But apparently Billboard's site is blocking some of their individual charts in order to get more people to sign up for their $12 a month subscription. Sorry, I'm not signing up for that. I guess that means we get to find out together what happens with "Truth Hurts" vs. "Señorita" instead of me pulling out my crystal ball out and examining the numbers and chart positioning.

3- "Goodbyes" - Post Malone featuring Young Thug (+7) -- With the boost of the album, "Goodbyes" launches up to No. 3 on the Hot 100. Before the album dropped, this song was in danger of falling out of the top 10, so I have no idea what the future holds for this song. I wouldn't be surprised to see it drop out of the top 10 next week once the album bomb wears off. But it does appear that the streaming numbers for the album continue to do well in the coming weeks. And I'm basing that off the fact that most of the songs are still towards the top of the Apple Music charts, a subscription I am signed up for. So it's possible that the album holds well enough to give this song a bit of a second wind instead of pulling a vanishing act like all of Taylor Swift's songs.

4- "Circles" - Post Malone (+3) -- Like with "Goodbyes," I have no idea what this song is going to do. It only debuted at No. 7, which was lower than I thought, and now it rises just three spots with the album bomb, with "Goodbyes" getting the bigger boost. I wouldn't be complaining if it stuck around. It's fine. And if it satisfies the hip-hop audience, I'd rather have a song like this in the top 10 than something else, even though this specific song isn't hip-hop at all.

5- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (-2) -- While "Truth Hurts" and "Señorita" survived the Post Malone invasion, "bad guy" wasn't so lucky as it gets pushed down to No. 5. And although I don't know what Post Malone's songs are going to do next week, I can see "bad guy" at least jumping ahead of them and back to its No. 3 spot.

6- "Ran$om" - Lil Tecca (-2) -- What I find impressive this week is that, even though Post Malone has a huge list of new songs that are all getting excellent streaming numbers thanks to the album, it's "Ran$om" that remains No. 1 on streaming this week. So for some reason a lot of people are still streaming this song. Either that or a lot of streaming services are forcing it on everyone who listens to hip-hop, which happens on services like Pandora or Spotify where people choose to listen to playlists of songs that are similar to what they like. On Apple Music, though, "Ran$om" is No. 17 right now. Post Malone's "Enemies" is currently No. 1. So it's not Apple Music's fault that "Ran$om" is getting a whole ton of streaming. Even though I say it's impressive that "Ran$om" kept at No. 1 on streaming, it's certainly not something I'm happy about. So whichever services are at fault here, I would love for them to stop.

7- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (-1) -- I suppose it's a good week for "No Guidance." Two Post Malone songs jump ahead of it and yet it only falls one spot. While I'm still not happy that this song is around, at least it's not getting enough positive momentum to get much higher than what it currently is at.

8- "Take What You Want" - Post Malone featuring Ozzy Osbourne & Travis Scott (new) -- Full disclosure. I'm not covering the Post Malone album bomb. I'll remind you of that again and get into more detail as to why in my rising songs section, but I will cover this one simply out of curiosity as to what the heck a Post Malone and Ozzy Osbourne collaboration sounds like. That opinion will be below. And I guess enough people had that same thought to make this song debut in the top 10 as the highest charting new Post Malone song this week. Luckily my Facebook friends are all smart enough to know that Post Malone didn't make Ozzy Osbourne famous, so I haven't had to deal with any of that. But I have had people on the opposite side pushing back against that silly notion, which has spawned fun memes that have amused me. Because, yeah, Ozzy Osbourne has been active in the music industry since 1967. The first Black Sabbath album was released in 1970 and Ozzy has been going strong ever since. His last solo album was in 2010, while Black Sabbath then released another album in 2013. Although Ozzy has never really been a mainstream artist for obvious reasons if you're familiar with him, not on his own or with Black Sabbath. So he's only ever had one top 10 entry and that was a collaboration with Lita Ford in the late 80's called "Close My Eyes Forever," which peaked at No. 8. Because of that, what Post has done for Ozzy is help him break the record for the longest time in between top 10 entries at 30 years and three months, narrowly beating Dobie Gray, who had a break of 30 years and two months. Dobie Gray hit the top 10 with "Drift Away" in 1973 and then again with Uncle Cracker's version of the song in 2003 that listed him as a featured credit.

9- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi (+2) -- I've been waiting for this song to hit the top 10, but I thought I would have to wait another week with the huge influx of Post Malone songs. But impressively the song managed to get here despite Post Malone. Instead of Lewis getting blocked, "Old Town Road," "Talk" and "I Don't Care" were all momentarily kicked out of the top 10. So even though it's only a two spot jump, Lewis jumped ahead of all three of them with "Someone You Loved," which puts the song in prime position depending on what happens to Post Malone next week. It could jump all the way up to No. 6 if all the Post Malone songs dropped out and no new songs debuted ahead of it. "Don't Call My Angel" by Ariana, Miley and Lana, from the upcoming "Charlie's Angel's" movie, and "Graveyard" by Halsey seem to be the only candidates for a big debut next week. We'll see how big those end up being.

10- "Sunflower (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse)" - Post Malone & Swae Lee (+4) -- Did you think that we would be getting one more week from "Sunflower"? Well, I did after seeing it at No. 14 last week while also noticing it was part of the album. But prior to noticing that I wouldn't have guessed it. Considering the song is in its 47th week on the Hot 100 and it's still here in the top section of the charts, it's been quite the remarkable run for this song, which is why it's at least going to be in the top three in any year-end list of most popular Billboard Hot 100 songs. In fact, the album boosting the song into the top 10 for one more week gives it week No. 33 in the top 10, which puts it in a three-way tie with "Shape of You" and "Girls Like You" for the longest run ever in the top 10. If it somehow can miraculously get one more week, it will have the record all to itself. But I think this is the song's final week for good now.

Rising on the Hot 100:

14- "Panini" - Lil Nas X (+15) -- I'm pretty sure this song got a huge boost this week because Lil Nas X released a remix with DaBaby. Because, you know, that's what Lil Nas X does. He releases remixes of his songs in order to boost their sales and streaming. Well, that and the music video above got released. He's trying desperately to get this song to be his second big hit, but "Panini" just doesn't have the same viral energy as "Old Town Road." So even if he gets the song into the top 10, I don't think "Panini" is ever going to be the viral earworm that "Old Town Road" was. Lil Nas X is the very definition of a one-hit wonder because it's not him that became hugely popular. It's his song that did. And even though this follow-up single has benefited a little bit from "Old Town Road," just like PSY had a bit of success with "Gentleman" after "Gangnum Style," Lil Nas X is going to disappear into irrelevancy before too long and we'll all look back at this time in history with embarrassment that we ever let him get center stage.

17- "Wow." - Post Malone (+10) -- The only other song that qualified for the rising songs section this week is "Wow." by Post Malone, which got a 10-spot boost due to the album. And this means that next week is again going to see a large percentage of the Hot 100 show up here. Then we might be able to get back to normal.

New Arrivals:

8- "Take What You Want" - Post Malone featuring Ozzy Osbourne & Travis Scott -- As I mentioned above, the only reason I'm covering this song is because I'm deathly curious as to what an Ozzy Osbourne and Post Malone collaboration sounds like. I'm not covering the rest of the album and I'll get to that in a second. But when I first saw this, I did a huge double take. Ozzy Osbourne? It's strange seeing him on the charts today, especially with Post Malone. Now apparently this happened because Ozzy wanted it to happen, which makes this an even stranger story. Now Post sometimes pretends he's a rock star. He even wrote a song about it, which I still think is stupid. But he's not. And none of his songs I've covered have come even close to being rock. But this is now his first actual time, as far as I know, to actually make a rock song. Because when Ozzy comes calling, wanting to collaborate, you do your best to make it work. And when compared to Post's normal style, this is quite unique and he does an alright job trying to be a rock star. There's some decent guitar and drum moments in this song, with a pretty sweet guitar solo from Andrew Watt, a frequent collaborator with Post who made this song happen. But I don't know, this song just doesn't have the energy and power it needs to make it work. It's good when you compare it to other Post songs, but when you compare it to other rock songs, especially if you go back and listen to some metal or heavy metal, this song feels more like a fake replica of a genre that can be pretty epic. And when you go listen to music from Black Sabbath or Ozzy's solo career, there's no way this even shines a candle to that. And I'm not even a Ozzy aficionado. But it doesn't take much to discern the difference in quality between the two parties. Thus having Ozzy on this song, even if it was his idea, feels more like a gimmick than anything. And lyrically, as I said last week when talking about "Circles," Post writes two types of songs. Flexing and sad break-up songs. This is the latter. So even though it's disguised as a rock song, it's almost the same exact song as "Circles" and "Goodbyes."

15- "Hollywood's Bleeding" - Post Malone -- As for the rest of this album, I'm not going to touch it. Now I fully realize that there could be good songs here. Or at least songs that are tolerable when compared to Post's past songs, especially considering the fact that I think "Goodbyes," "Circles" and "Take What You Want" are fine songs. But last year broke me when it came to these frequent album bombs. They take so much time and effort to do, yet I don't feel like anyone even cares. So I stopped covering album bombs. And that led me to be even more selective with songs I cover in general since there's such a huge flood of awful rap music that constantly drowns the Hot 100. So far I've received no complaints. Now occasionally an album bomb will come along that I am interested in, like Taylor Swift two weeks ago. But my desire to cover Post Malone is just not there. However, I'll make you a deal. If you do love Post Malone and there's a song or two that you think I'll like or you want my opinion on, let me know and I'll oblige. Experience tells me that won't happen, but I'm to there being a first for everything. Also, if there's future singles that come from this crop of new songs, I'll cover them when they get here. But for now, I'm taking it easy this week.

16- "Enemies" - Post Malone featuring DaBaby -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

18- "Saint-Tropez" - Post Malone -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

20- "Die for Me" - Post Malone featuring Future & Halsey -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

22- "On the Road" - Post Malone featuring Meek Mill & Lil Baby -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

29- "A Thousand Bad Times" - Post Malone -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

33- "I'm Gonna Be" - Post Malone -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

34- "Staring at the Sun" - Post Malone featuring SZA -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

37- "Allergic" - Post Malone -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

52- "Myself" - Post Malone -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

53- "I Know" - Post Malone -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

56- "Liar" - Camila Cabello -- There's a lot of Post Malone I'm skipping. But I will cover the pair of new Camila Cabello songs. Granted, when it comes to Camila, there's not a whole lot of variety that she brings to the table. She has a very specific style of sultry pop. She's always taking advantage of her good looks with her lyrics and her music videos, and she has a good enough voice to pull it off. Her songs might be empty and mostly fluff, but I don't know. I'm a lot more forgiving of pop music. This song isn't special by any means, but it's Camila doing what she does best and I she delivers. It's a fun, upbeat pop song that dips its toes a bit into the Latino vibe, making it fun enough to dance to. Even though I never liked Fifth Harmony, I've always seemed to enjoy Camila ever since she went solo. She's able to be herself. The song is supposed to be a bit sensual as she says she's tried to stay away from this guy, but the way he moves and talks keeps her coming back for me. The song treads the line of what's appropriate, but she doesn't sprint across it like Fifth Harmony always did. Thus there's a lot of teasing, but no dirty lyrics and the balance she finds there is fine with him. Long story short, this is essentially "Señorita" 2.0. And I'm fine with that.

58- "Internet" - Post Malone -- I'm not covering Post Malone's album bomb. See comment above as to why.

60- "Shameless" - Camila Cabello -- Given that we have two Camila songs this week, I was ready to say let's cut and paste from the last song and not spend as much time. Because most Camila songs are the same, right? Well, she has me eating my words here a bit because, while this still is very much in Camila's lane, there is a significant difference between this song and the last. While "Liar" has her trying to get away from this guy and failing to do so, "Shameless" has her desperately wanting this guy, but being unable to get him. While "Liar" is upbeat and playful, "Shameless" has a feeling of dramatic desperation. It almost feels like a Sia song. Or Camila trying to be Sia, anyways. Sia has a much more powerful voice, allowing her to beautifully pull off an emotional song like this. When Camila goes for that in this song, she sounds a lot more strained, like she doesn't have the vocal prowess to knock it out of the park. But it's a solid double hit. And even though I can feel the emotion in her voice, the lyrics are about her shamelessly wanting this guy she can't have and that sentiment doesn't quite cut as deep. She sounds like she's in pain, but it feels a bit hollow. And the music the music isn't a dance number like most of her music. But when it comes to an emotional tune, it feels like it has a bit more static than it should. But all this is me being a bit nit-picky. I have "Chandelier" in my head as I listen to this, and thus I'm coming to terms with myself as to why this doesn't come near that, but for Camila standards this is pretty solid. Kudos to her for getting two songs out there that are different enough from each other to make it seem like I didn't cover the same song twice. 

68- "Self Control" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again -- This is not part of Post Malone's album, YoungBoy is one of those annoying rappers with an annoying name. I've never cared for him. All his songs are the same, anyways.  

82- "homecoming queen?" - Kelsea Ballerini -- We finish the week off with some Kelsea Ballerini. Because I'm certainly not covering the next song. Unlike Kelsea's last song that charted and performed decently, that being "Miss Me More," this is a new song. "Miss Me More" was from her 2017 album "Unapologetically," which I enjoyed. But if "homecoming queen?" is a sign that a new Kelsea album is come, I'm on board with that. And if this song is a taste of what we're getting, I'm excited because this song is excellent. This is the style of country, or country pop, that I enjoy immensely. This is a very stripped back, slow song where Kelsea dives into the emotions behind a homecoming queen who, despite looking perfect on the surface, is a lot more broken and damaged inside. Now the voice in the song has Kelsea talking to a second person. Like Kelsea is the bystander who is talking to the homecoming queen, asking her to show more emotion and let people in how she's really doing. She doesn't always have to put on the act, in fact it can be healthy to show how she's really feeling. I feel there's a lot of power in the lyrics, "What if I told you the world wouldn't end? If you started showing what's under your skin. What if I you let 'em all in on the lie? Even the homecoming queen cries." I also like how the song ends with a question. "Hey, homecoming queen, why do you lie? When somebody's mean, where do you hide?" Letting the song hang like that allows the emotion to sink in. The only slightly negative thing that crossed my mind is that I think the second half could've expounded a bit more as Kelsea essentially just repeats the first half of the song again, but overall I still really enjoyed this song. And even though Kelsea is talking to another person, I think it fits quite well if that second person was herself. But either way, I think this song successfully portrays the emotion that, even though people look perfect on the outside, doesn't mean they are perfect on the inside. You never know who is secretly struggling with life. And I even think that sentiment is expressed well in the title, as it's in lowercase with a question mark at the end. That's some subtle brilliance there.

87- "223's" - YNW Melly & 9lokknine -- YNW Melly released the song "Mixed Personality" with Kanye West earlier this year. That collaboration also caused a previous song of his, "Murder on My Mind," to chart as well. I wasn't impressed. Seeing him return with another new guy whose name I don't even know how to pronounce (is the 9 supposed to be a B?), makes me have zero interest in this. Especially since I'm pretty sure 223 is referring to a type of gun. I don't do songs about shooting people.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - September 14, 2019

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! This is a weekly post where I cover three main sections of the charts: the Billboard Hot 100 top 10, the songs rising on the Hot 100, and the new arrivals. As pertaining to the rising songs, in order to be included, a song has to rise at least two spots between Nos. 11 and 20, five spots spots between Nos. 21 and 50, or 10 spots between Nos. 51 and 100. As pertaining to new arrivals, I used to dedicate myself to covering every single song that debuted, but that started to burn me out, especially with the high number of album bombs, so I've been a lot more selective recently and so far I've received no complaints. However, if I skip a song that you want to hear my thoughts on, feel free to let me know. I'll occasionally mix things up depending on the week, like throwing in a notable re-entry into the rising songs section, but generally this is what I go with. Most of the data I give you comes from Billboard.com, usually Gary Trust's weekly article. If I pull from elsewhere, I'll generally let you know. With all of that out of the way, let's dive in and see what this week has to offer!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (=) -- After three weeks and three new No. 1 songs, we finally have a repeat at the top as "Truth Hurts" by Lizzo gets its second week at No. 1. While the carousel of new No. 1s was a fun thing, I'm actually glad we didn't have a fourth new No. 1 since said song would've been "Ran$om" by Lil Tecca. That song is already way too high as is. It would've be a travesty for it to go No. 1. So I'm content with "Truth Hurts" at the top. Last week it soared to the top for various reasons, the biggest being Lizzo's performance of the song at the VMAs. She also performed it as a part of a four set song on NBC's "Today" and there were two new remixes released. So that's why it doubled in sales. Naturally after a week like that, the song plummeted in sales, down 28 percent to 38,000 downloads sold. Yet despite that, it still managed to stay ahead of the rest of the pack as the second song on sales was Post Malone's new song "Circles" with 29,000 downloads sold. "Señorita" was somewhere behind that at No. 3. As far as the other categories, "Truth Hurts" and "Señorita" are about neck and neck on streaming, with "Truth Hurts" having a slight edge, but only gaining 1 percent to 34.7 million U.S. streams. "Señorita" leads on radio with 109.5 million in audience compared to "Truth Hurts" having 103.9 million. So yeah, the margins are pretty close here and "Truth Hurts" isn't exactly experiencing a lot of forward momentum. But rather, consistency across the board is what's helping the song. If the sales numbers stay high enough, this might have a solid run at No. 1 since "Señorita" isn't gaining much, either. Although next week it's not "Señorita" that "Truth Hurts" will have to worry about. Post Malone's album dropped recently and will be impacting next week's charts. So it's "Circles" or "Goodbyes" that have the best chance of skyrocketing to the top next week.

2- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (=) -- Even though "Señorita" remains camped out at No. 2 this week after only getting one week at No. 1, there is some positive news for Shawn and Camila. "Señorita" is now the No. 1 song on the radio. "Talk" by Khalid had that title for a while, then last week "I Don't Care" took it for a week. "Señorita" finally leapfrogged both of them, even though the song was up just 2 percent compared to last week. So really the title is because of "Talk" and "I Don't Care" finally starting their downward spiral on the radio, which is the only reason why both songs are still in the top 10 right now. Lizzo actually gained 6 percent in radio with "Truth Hurts" and the margins aren't super big, as previously mentioned, so that'll also be a story worth following. Can "Señorita" keep its radio lead?

3- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (=) -- At this point, "bad guy" is solidly behind both "Truth Hurts" and "Señorita" with no chance of that changing. But it's also been around for a lot longer, so that makes sense. But still, the song has consistent enough numbers for it still to hang out for longer in the top five. In fact, even though it only celebrated one week at No. 1, its consistency in the top five has resulted it being one of the top songs of 2019. In my personal tracking, it's currently at No. 3, behind only "Old Town Road" and "Sunflower." As long as it stays here in the top five, it should end up passing "Sunflower" before too long to be the No. 2 song of the year. It's also way ahead of "Truth Hurts" and "Señorita" on the list, so as long as it remains in close proximity to those two songs, it'll be hard for those two songs to catch up to it, especially since we're quickly running out of months in the year. 

4- "Ran$om" - Lil Tecca (+2) -- I was a bit nervous at what this song would do this week. I knew it would jump ahead of Taylor Swift and "Old Town Road" to get to No. 4. But would it break up our top three? The song is barely on the radar for the radio charts, debuting at No. 50 this week and is only No. 37 on sales. The thing that had me worried, though, is that Lil Tecca had an album dropped that impacted the charts this week. And with the song already having super high streaming numbers, around 50 million U.S. streams last week, would an album release boost it even higher, causing it to break top three? As you can see, the answer was no. But what kinda surprised me is the song didn't actually increase at all in streaming. It fell 1 percent to 49.4 million U.S. streams, which means it probably would've fallen a bit further if not for the album. So I'm breathing a sigh of relief that it appears the streaming for the song has finally peaked, which will hopefully get the song to start dropping on the charts.

5- "Old Town Road" - Lil Nas X featuring Billy Ray Cyrus (=) -- This needs to fall faster.

6- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (+1) -- Again, we're saved from this song not getting into the top five. But actually, if it means pushing Lil Nas X and/or "Ran$om" out of the top five, maybe I'd be fine with that? Although it's not going to happen next week as I'm certain that Post Malone's new album will cause "Circles" and "Goodbyes" to get a huge boost next week.

7- "Circles" - Post Malone (new) -- I'll get to my opinion of this song down below, but I'm a bit surprised that it only debuted at No. 7. I wasn't expecting a top three debut, but given that the song was released just a week ahead of the new album, I thought that would give it enough streaming power to debut ahead of "Ran$om," "Old Town Road" and "No Guidance." But nope. However, as I've said a few times now, it's going to get a solid boost next week. How high can it go? I have no idea. My plan is just to wait and see. But I'm thinking it should at least get somewhere in the top five, right?

8- "I Don't Care" - Ed Sheeran & Justin Bieber (+1) -- After celebrating one week on top of the radio charts, "I Don't Care" quickly gets its crown taken away by "Señorita." It also swaps spots with "Talk" in the top 10, but I don't think either song is going to last.

9- "Talk" - Khalid (-1) -- This song's weeks in the top 10 are numbers. I wouldn't be surprised if this week is its last week. But it still has a good radio presence, even if that is falling, so if it sticks around for a few more weeks, that'll be why.

10- "Goodbyes" - Post Malone featuring Young Thug (+2) -- Again, I'm surprised that this song hasn't been able to get enough momentum to get bigger than it has, given how popular Post Malone is right now. It only gets back into the top 10 this week because all of Taylor's songs came crashing back down to Earth following her album bomb week. And it should get a good boost with Post Malone's album impacting the charts next week. But after that? Yeah, I'm not sure how much longer this is going to last in the top 10. If it weren't for the album release, I'd say the song right behind it at No. 11 is in a good position to jump over it on the charts.

Rising on the Hot 100:

11- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi (+2) -- It's been a while since we've had an album bomb as big as Taylor Swift's last week. Thus, naturally, the week following an album bomb is where we deal with all the fallout, which results in a good portion of the charts ending up in the rising songs section. So let's go through this quickly. We start with Lewis Capaldi going back up to his No. 11 spot. I'd say this song is in a good position to finally break the top 10, but it might have to wait an additional week with Post Malone's album impacting the charts next week.

13- "Sucker" - Jonas Brothers (+2) -- This song had a good run. It only jumped up this week because Taylor fell.

14- "Sunflower (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" - Post Malone & Swae Lee (+3) -- Same story here as the previous comment. Momentary rise this week. It'll probably continue to hang out in the teens and slowly slide down until it hits its year mark, which is in six weeks from now. As a reminder, Billboard's current rules are that after a song hits 52 weeks, it gets booted from the charts, unless it's still rising in the top 25 or something like that. Billboard created those rules shortly after "Radioactive" and "Sail" both spent somewhere around 80 weeks on the charts. I think that's fair. Make room for more songs to be on the charts. But still, it's impressive that "Sunflower" is still at No. 14 after 46 weeks on the charts. Given how Billboard tracks things, I wouldn't be too surprised if this is their top song of 2019 on their year end list. It'll at least be No. 2 if "Old Town Road" takes that title. It might end up being No. 3 on my list since I only keep track of the top 10. Keeping points for the entire Hot 100 each week is just too much.

17- "Beautiful People" - Ed Sheeran featuring Khalid (+3) -- Slowly rising up in the top 20 is Ed Sheeran and Khalid. Given that both of them are about to fall out of the top 10 with their current individual songs, this song is timing itself quite well.

19- "Boyfriend" - Ariana Grande & Social House (+3) -- I would like to forget this song ever existed. I was a bit surprised to see it show up this week, but I guess Ariana still has enough momentum from her early year dominance to keep this around?

21- "Hot Girl Summer" - Megan Thee Stallion, Nicki Minaj & Ty Dolla $ign (+10) -- I was pleasantly surprised when this song failed to hit top 10. But I guess I'm not out of the woods quite yet. Given the names here, I can understand the appeal. These three are just not my cup of tea and I don't think that will be a surprise to anyone.

27- "Wow." - Post Malone (+8) -- Only gaining because of Taylor's drop. Although this could get a boost next week with Post Malone's album?

29- "Panini" - Lil Nas X (+11) -- Lil Nas X trying to maintain relevance. But let's admit it. "Old Town Road" was a fluke success for him that he's never going to repeat. The fact that "Panini" has been around for a while, yet still can't even hit the top 10, is proof of that. Lil Nas X will end up being the definition of a one-hit wonder.

35- "Only Human" - Jonas Brothers (+9) -- Jonas Brothers, meanwhile, do appear to be maintaining relevance. After the huge success of "Sucker," I was wondering if they were going to get a second song to stick around. I guess this is it.

36- "Cash S---" - Megan Thee Stallion featuring DaBaby (+6) -- Please go away.

41- "Good as Hell" - Lizzo (+11) -- I skipped this song last week because I decided to listen to all of Taylor Swift's album, which turned out to be a surprisingly enjoyable experience. But that took so much time that I just ignored everything else. So here we go playing catch up. This is not a song from Lizzo's album this year, but was released back on her debut EP "Coconut Oil" back in March 2016. I also learned that it was initially recorded for the movie "Barbershop: The Next Cut," which was released in April 2016. It's here three and a half years after its release because of Lizzo's performance at the VMAs, which I finally went back and watched and... yeah, she owned it. While I'm not the biggest fan of "Truth Hurts," it's totally fine, but not something that jumps out to me, this song is pretty fantastic, especially with her VMAs performance as context. Not only did she completely own the stage, but her empowerment speech during the performance was electric. It's hard to watch that and not be inspired to feel good about yourself. Maybe the song on its own is a bit simplistic, but it still works. Lizzo reminds me a bit of Megan Trainor in that Megan is always singing empowerment anthems, but Megan falls flat on her face every time as she's lyrically careless and quite hollow in her delivery. Lizzo does a similar thing, but she lands it, especially in this song. The "Coconut Oil" EP describes Lizzo's style as a combination of hip-hop, gospel-soul and club music. I think that's a better description than I've been trying to come up with in previous weeks. That combination of genres is why she's able to have a broader reach. "Good as Hell" certainly leans even more towards the gospel-soul element than than "Truth Hurts" as neither song really strike me as hip-hop, but "Good as Hell" certainly isn't. But if the hip-hop community wants to embrace this, then I'm cool with that.

42- "One Right Thing" - Marshmello & Kane Brown (+17) -- I'm not happy about this.

45- "On Chill" - Wale featuring Jeremih (+10) -- I still haven't listened to this one. Maybe I will one of these weeks. I just don't care enough about these two. 

48- "The Ones That Didn't Make It Back Home" - Justin Moore (+5) -- Not surprised to see this in the top 50. It'll probably continue to climb higher.

49- "China" - Anuel AA, Daddy Yankee, Karol G, Ozuna & J Balvin (+9) -- Gross.

50- "I Don't Know About You" - Chris Lane (+18) -- Boring country doing well. Yawn.

51- "Motivation" - Normani (+15) -- I'm fine with Normani sticking around and doing well. I like her. I just wish this song had more to it. It feels like a Fifth Harmony song to me and expect better from Normani, given her other solo outings.

55- "Lalala" - Y2K & bbno$ (+16) -- Get this out of here.

57- "Living" - Dierks Bentley (+16) -- I guess I'm fine with this?

60- "Time" - NF (+12) -- Nope. Not interested.

64- "Did It Again" - Lil Tecca (+35) -- Don't care. It only got this big of a boost thanks to Lil Tecca's album. He only had three new arrivals from said album that barely debuted this week. I praise the music gods for that lack of success.

66- "Southbound" - Carrie Underwood (+10) -- I like me some Carrie on the charts. Let's get this higher.

70- "Ballin'" - Mustard featuring Roddy Ricch (+13) -- Nope.

73- "Right Back" - Khalid featuring A Boogie wit da Hoodie (+20) -- This one confused me. I don't remember covering it all. I certainly don't remember a Khalid and Boogie collaboration. At first I thought I completely missed it. As it turns out, "Right Back" was a part of Khalid's mini album bomb back in April that I ignored. He released a remix of the song in August with Boogie added to it that re-entered recently and is just now gaining traction as a new Khalid single. And that's unfortunate. Khalid is one of those artists who I like as long as he's working with the right people. The problem is that he'll work with everyone who asks him to jump on a song with him. Boogie is certainly not the artist that will help his music be interesting. So I went and listened to the original. It's boring. I didn't miss anything by skipping it in April. The Boogie remix transforms it from boring to boring with a touch of annoyance since Boogie is a rapper we all should've rejected a long time ago, but somehow our deaf kids these days keep giving him a career by continuing to listen to his music. Although the weird thing is that Boogie is barely on the song. And he only gets a quick part at the very beginning instead of getting the typical third verse rap feature.

81- "Baguettes in the Face" - Mustard featuring NAV, Playboi Carti & A Boogie wit da Hoodie (+14) -- I still think this is one of the dumbest names I've seen for a rap song.

88- "Baby Sitter" - DaBaby featuring Offset (+10) -- Excuse me while I throw up.

New Arrivals:

7- "Circles" - Post Malone -- Full disclosure. If Post Malone has an album bomb as big as Taylor's was last week, I'm not covering it. If any additional songs show up in the top 10, I'll cover them. If future songs stick around, I'll cover them at that point. But there's 17 songs on that album. That includes "Goodbyes," "Circles," "Wow." and "Sunflower." Still, that means a potential for 13 new Post Malone songs and that's too much Post Malone for me. But with "Circles," this is another song from Post that's not bad. With both this and "Goodbyes," Post is leaning heavily into the pop side of his act. And I know people have claimed that he's always been pop and has never been hip-hop, but I've always disagreed with that, especially with all the empty flexing he's done on songs like "rockstar" and "Psycho." Or anything from his "beerbongs & bentleys" album. I got quickly annoyed with Post mumbling through all his empty flexing and turning into a superstar because of it. But even though I've mostly called him hip-hop, there's no hip-hop in "Circles" and there's no flexing. In fact, he just continues to be depressed about a breakup with his girl. That's the other thing Post does. If he's not flexing, he's singing breakup songs. And they're not that interesting. But they're a lot more interesting than his flexing, so I accept them. Although I think the problem with "Circles" is that it's almost the exact same song as "Goodbyes," so he's still lacking the lyrical creativity when he's pretending to be a pop star. And in terms of breakup songs, there's no personal responsibility on "Circles." He's acting like the victim here and waiting for the girl to do something as he then moans about their love going in circles instead of getting better. Again, this is fine. If we have to have a Post Malone song in the top 10 at all times, I'll take a song like this or "Goodbyes" over a lot of his other stuff, but I'm not going to remember this song too much after it goes away. "Sunflower" is still his best song and he still has Swae Lee to thank for that one.

59- "Doin' Time" - Lana Del Rey -- An album I am curious to check out is Lana's new album, although I am kind of annoying with the cursing in the title, even though it is censored as "Norman F*****g Rockwell." I'll just go with the other abbreviation on the cover art of "NFR!" Oddly enough, the title track doesn't even use that phrase in the song. But anyways, we're not talking about that title track, nor the album. Just the lead-off single "Doin' Time." Now I was a bit confused at this. First off, Lana was singing about a relationship with her girlfriend not working out, despite Lana having several boyfriends in the past. If she was bisexual, that's totally fine. It just surprised me. But the other thing is that the song's tone and lyrics don't exactly match. Lana uses her typical somber, depressed tone, but the lyrics appear like they should be more upbeat as they talk about partying and having fun, despite the fact that this relationship just isn't working out. Distracting yourself from the real life sorrow by partying. So using a sad, depressed tone for the whole time didn't seem to fine. And suddenly everything made a whole lot more sense when I learned that this song is a cover of the 1996 song of the same name by the band Sublime. I listen to that one and it's a guy singing about a girl and the song is upbeat. It has a fun, 90's groove to it while having a hint of sorrow. So when Lana covered it, it's not necessarily her revealing that she's bisexual. She just didn't switch the lyrics. What she did do is switch the tone of the song, which I don't think worked. I imagine that there are songs on the album that are good and I want to go check them out. But this song just doesn't do it for me.

69- "Babushka Boi" - A$AP Rocky -- Babushka? I was curious enough to look up what that word meant. According to the dictionary, it's either a triangularly folded kerchief for the head, typically worn by people from Russia or Poland. Or it's an elderly Russian woman. So points for being slightly unique there. I haven't seen many rap songs talking about a babushka. But I'm immediately taking those points away for purposely misspelling boy. I'm also not listening to the song since I've never cared about A$AP Rocky. I usually avoid people with dollar signs in their names, anyways.

77- "Heat" - Chris Brown featuring Gunna -- I'm certainly not giving Chris Brown and Gunna the pleasure of one additional stream counted towards their numbers.

80- "Out of Luck" - Lil Tecca -- Don't care about Lil Tecca's new album.

84- "Shots" - Lil Tecca -- Don't care about Lil Tecca's new album.

89- "Bezerk" - Big Sean featuring A$AP Ferg & Hit-Boy -- Big Sean with another dollar sign person in A$AP Ferg and... Hit-Boy? Don't care about the first two. And the new rapper with a dumb name doesn't help. Also the title. Too close to Eminem's "Berzerk." I re-listened to that instead, just for the heck of it. It's not even one of the better Eminem songs, but I'm sure it's better than this.

90- "Good Vibes" - Chris Janson -- This song had one job. If you're going to call yourself "Good Vibes," then you better have... good vibes. And I suppose it's upbeat enough to qualify for that. You can jam to this song as you're driving down the road listening to your country music. But it also probably requires a passion for the genre to enjoy this, which I do not have. For me, this song has no depth or soul to it. And it belongs with all the other fake country. Heavy drums and guitars that counts as country because Chris Janson sings with a twang. And he's singing about ignoring reality and just enjoying life instead of, you know, doing something to make the world a better place. But whatever. Country radio will probably overplay this and the audience will enjoy it. It's fairly inoffensive and will be easy for me to ignore.

94- "God Only Knows" - for KING & COUNTRY -- I was curious about this one since I've never heard of for KING & COUNTRY. My initial guess is that it was a country song from a new country group I've never heard of, but I wasn't 100 percent sure. Turns out that's a wrong guess. The correct answer is that for KING & COUNTRY is a Christian alternative rock duo composed of brothers Joel and Luke Smallbone from Australia. They initially called themselves Austoville, then Joel & Luke, before deciding on for KING & COUNTRY in 2009. "God Only Knows" comes from their third album "Burn the Ships," released in October 2018. Apparently these guys have done very well on the Christian charts, which I admittedly don't follow, but this is their first crossover to the Hot 100. How did this hit the mainstream nearly a year after its release? Well, back in June there was a Timbaland remix that adds Echosmith to the song. And while I'm sure that version helped, the best answer is that there was a second remix released August 29 that adds Dolly Parton. But on the charts on the moment, neither Dolly nor Echosmith get a credit here, so I think I technically have to talk about the original song.

In terms of said original song, it's a simple song that has a lot of heart to it. With Christian music, it's honestly pretty easily to get generic. You can be singing Christian words without meaning them or realizing what you're saying. But with this song the two brothers do great at bringing a sincerity to the song and the mellow, alternative rock really helps. It's more than just your traditional Christian piano ballad thing, but the rock elements aren't overdone. In terms of the remixes, I'm not sure I'm a huge fan of what I guessing Timbaland did with the music. There's a bit of extraneous things going on in that one and I prefer the more stripped back, acoustic. However, I think the girl from Echosmith really brings a lot. Her combined with the two brothers is the perfect mix that keeps the song interesting as the original does drag on a bit. Now take away Timbaland's remix and throw in an old fashioned, yet subtle country groove to the song and Dolly's version is also very well done. I don't think Dolly mixes quite as well with the brothers as the Echosmith girl does, but for crying out loud, it's Dolly. She's a legend. So all three versions have their positives and negatives, but overall I think all are solid. Whichever version it is that gets chart credit, I hope the song does well. If Lauren Daigle's "You Say" can stick around for forever, this can, too, right? 

96- "The Bones" - Maren Morris -- Only two new country songs this week. Even though Chris Janson is not my lane, I usually like my country girls. Maren, specifically, seems to ride the country pop line pretty well and thus I'm curious to check out her album "GIRL" from earlier this year as I enjoy the title track "GIRL" that charted earlier this year and has done decently. But this follow-up single feels a bit empty to me and I can't quite put my finger on it, but there just doesn't seem to be much passion and energy here. And there are a lot of moments in the song where things are stretched out a bit too much and a bit too choppy. The message of the song is fine. She's comparing a relationship to a house. Even if the paint peels or the glass shatters, as long as the bones are strong, the house can survive. Although if I'm being picky, a house doesn't have bones. I think a strong foundation is what would've made the house metaphor better, but I understand what she was going for. Maybe that's the problem here. If I'm using her metaphor, the foundation of her song is not very strong. If that was in place, maybe the rest of the song would come together better. 

97- "Love Me" - Lil Tecca -- Don't care about Lil Tecca's new album.

98- "La Cancion" - J Balvin & Bad Bunny -- I've heard too much from these two. Where there's J Balvin in 2019, there's also Bad Bunny. In fact, Bad Bunny is attached to most Latin songs that chart these days and I'm getting sick of it. He's the Drake of this Raggaeton genre because he's everywhere and he manages to suck the life out of everything he's on, so I don't know why he's so popular. Knowing these two, I had a feeling I knew exactly what this song was, so I almost skipped it. But I listened to it anyways. And yeah, it is what I thought it was. With a little extra boring adding in. There's no flow and no groove to this song, so I don't understand this.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - September 7, 2019

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! This is a weekly post where I cover three main sections of the charts: the Billboard Hot 100 top 10, the songs rising on the Hot 100, and the new arrivals. As pertaining to the rising songs, in order to be included, a song has to rise at least two spots between Nos. 11 and 20, five spots spots between Nos. 21 and 50, or 10 spots between Nos. 51 and 100. As pertaining to new arrivals, I used to dedicate myself to covering every single song that debuted, but that started to burn me out, especially with the high number of album bombs, so I've been a lot more selective recently and so far I've received no complaints. However, if I skip a song that you want to hear my thoughts on, feel free to let me know. I'll occasionally mix things up depending on the week, like throwing in a notable re-entry into the rising songs section, but generally this is what I go with. Most of the data I give you comes from Billboard.com, usually Gary Trust's weekly article. If I pull from elsewhere, I'll generally let you know. With all of that out of the way, let's dive in and see what this week has to offer!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (+2) -- Three weeks and three new No. 1 songs. But not just that, it's three weeks with three artists getting their very first No. 1 hit on the Hot 100 as neither Billie Eilish, Shawn Mendes or Lizzo had a No. 1 hit to their name prior to three weeks ago. Again, this is the fun we can have when we don't have one song dominating for months at a time. Billboard pointed out in their article this week that the last time this phenomenon happened was in July of 2000 when Vertical Horizon, matchbox twenty and *NSYNC each got their first ever No. 1 hits in three consecutive weeks. Honestly, "Truth Hurts" is probably my least favorite of the three recent No. 1 songs. It's not really my cup of tea, but I also don't mind it. And I imagine Lizzo has had huge success with this song due to it riding the line in terms of what genre it belongs in. If you're able to write a song that has cross appeal among different musical fan bases, that certainly increases your chances of doing well in terms of chart points. Specifically, what helped Lizzo this week was her performance at the VMAs, which was something that was totally not on my radar when I wrote my article last week. I like award shows, but music award shows are something I don't really care for, outside maybe the Grammys if I'm not doing anything else that day. Even though both "Truth Hurts" and "Señorita" were performed at the VMAs, it was "Truth Hurts" that had the much greater impact as it increased 23 percent in overall chart points compared to "Señorita" increasing 2 percent in overall chart points. Sales was the biggest benefit for "Truth Hurts" as the song more than doubled its sales as compared to the previous week, while also rising 21 percent in streaming. Radio was about even.

2- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (-1) -- Given that the VMAs is what helped "Truth Hurts" soar up to No. 1, I have no idea what's going to happen next week, which makes this exciting. "Truth Hurts" could continue its upward track after a boost from the VMAs and stay at No. 1. Or it could come crashing back down to earth to where it was the week before. "Señorita" is still ahead on the radio and only slightly behind "Truth Hurts" in streaming. So it's those sales numbers that are the key.

3- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (-1) -- With "Truth Hurts" jumping up to No. 1, "bad guy" slides down to No. 3. This would've probably happened even without the VMAs as "bad guy" has been here significantly longer, but I still think the song has a lot of life left in it, so it's not going to disappear too quickly.

4- "You Need to Calm Down" - Taylor Swift (+10) -- It's the week of Taylor Swift as all 18 tracks from her new album are currently on the charts. It's been a while since we've had a true album bomb like this. That's what pushed this song back into the top 10 for only its second week. After it debuted in the top 10, the song has floated around in the teens ever since. If I'm making a guess, I think it'll fall back out of the top 10 next week since it hasn't been able to gain a whole lot of traction.

5- "Old Town Road" - Lil Nas X featuring Billy Ray Cyrus (-1) -- This needs to fall faster.

6- "Ran$om" - Lil Tecca (-1) -- I would celebrate "Ran$om" falling out of the top five this week, but unfortunately Lil Tecca released an album this past weekend that will give this song a huge boost on next week's charts. I don't think Lil Tecca is going to enjoy an album bomb week as the individual tracks don't seem to be doing that well on streaming, but it'll definitely give "Ran$om" a huge boost." At the very least this will jump ahead of "Old Town Road" and naturally ahead of Taylor Swift since she's going to be crashing back down next week. At best, I wouldn't be surprised if this shoots up to No. 1, but I'm crossing my fingers that something will block it because I have no idea why this song is even on the Hot 100 at all, let alone still camping in the top 10. It's one of those awful trap songs that is an annoying little cockroach that won't die. No one is going to remember this song a year from now, but that doesn't make me feel better.

7- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (=) -- At least "No Guidance" seems to be stuck at this point. Although remaining where it's at on the charts when Taylor soared ahead of it means it had a decent week as it looks like it will stick around for a while. But it doesn't look like it has enough momentum to get a whole lot higher.

8- "Talk" - Khalid (-2) -- I think this one is going to be gone here soon. Maybe not in the next week or two, but I don't see it lasting much longer after. All it has is radio and that's starting to die out as it has now relinquished it's No. 1 radio spot to our next entry.

9- "I Don't Care" - Ed Sheeran & Justin Bieber (-1) -- Yep, "I Don't Care" is the No. 1 song on the radio this week. I don't know how long it will keep that title as it only got there because it managed to be slightly more stable than "Talk."

10- "Lover" - Taylor Swift (+9) -- Taylor's second entry in the top 10 this week. Her getting two songs into the top 10 this week pushed out "Goodbyes" by Post Malone and "If I Can't Have You" by Shawn Mendes. I think "Goodbyes" will be back next week and I hope Lewis Capaldi's "Someone You Loved" also makes an appearance as the latter would've made it in this week if it weren't for Taylor Swift's album. However, Post Malone's new song "Circles" is set to debut next week, so Lewis Capaldi will have to jump ahead of either Khalid or Ed Sheeran in order to make it in. And even though "Lover" won't stick around as it's not the song Taylor is currently pushing as a single, the fact that it made the top 10 means that Taylor now has 25 top 10 entries to her name, which ties her with Elvis Presley for 10th most in Billboard history. Not that said mark really means anything since the culture on the Hot 100 is much different today than it was in the 50's and 60's. Plus, Elvis' career pre-dates the Hot 100, meaning he would've had a whole lot more if the Hot 100 had existed for his whole career. But still, anytime you're in the same sentence as Elvis with anything has to be considered impressive to some degree. For the sake of curiosity, Madonna still holds the record for most top 10s with 38, while Drake, The Beatles, Rihanna, Michael Jackson, Mariah Carey, Stevie Wonder, Janet Jackson and Elton John are the other artists in the region.

Rising on the Hot 100:

11- "ME!" - Taylor Swift featuring Brendon Urie (+47) -- A one week boost thanks to the album. It's surprising how poorly this song has performed considering it was the lead-off single AND had Brendon Urie attached to it. I guess that's what happens when you write a song that no one seems to care for.

21- "My Type" - Saweetie (+14) -- Not many songs survived the Taylor invasion this week, making this section shorter than normal. I suppose it's not surprising that the two that did are both rap songs. But a short section for an album bomb week means this section should be quite large next week, which could be interesting.

38- "The Archer" - Taylor Swift (re-entry) -- I usually don't put re-entries in, but I wanted to showcase where all of Taylor's songs are this week and of the four songs she released to promote the album, this is the one that had dropped off the charts.

70- "F.N" - Lil Tjay (+17) -- The other rap song that survived the Taylor invasion.

New Arrivals:

23- "The Man" - Taylor Swift -- Lot's of Taylor Swift today. Her new album "Lover" is 18 tracks long and has every track from the album on the charts this week. Given that four songs charted in previous weeks, that means there's 14 new songs to talk about and I've decided to cover them all. I usually ignore album bombs these days, but that's because most of them are from rappers that I don't care about. A new Taylor album is worth covering, in my mind. This particular track is Taylor's feminism anthem. She goes on a long rant about how amazing she would be if she was a man and how fed up she is lack of women's rights. This is not the first time from this album where Taylor gets political as "You Need to Calm Down" is another one. I'm just glad that these types of political songs aren't everything that's on the album because she's not good at them.

28- "I Forgot That You Existed" - Taylor Swift -- This is the album opener. It's a simple, basic Taylor Swift song that ends up being exactly what you think it is when you look at the title. After spending so long thinking about this person, Taylor Swift says that magically she forgot that said person existed. I'm assuming this is a breakup song, but technically there's not a whole lot of detail here that specifies one way or another. In theory it could be about anyone that upset her or gave her a hard time that she has now forgotten about, not just a former lover. But given that "Lover" is the title of the album, I'm going to assume it as about a former lover. In which case, this can be a relatable song of sorts that people turn to once they feel they've moved on from a former lover. If I'm being nitpicky, though, it's a bit contradictory to say that you forgot someone existed, then speak of how you feel now that you have forgotten about them. If you literally forgot someone existed, you wouldn't know any different and thus you wouldn't be speaking or talking about them. That's also a sentiment that doesn't magically happen in one night. It's more of a process. But eh. Whatever. I don't think the lyrics are meant to be taken literally. She's just singing about how she has finally moved on emotionally and how she now feels. So it's fine. But her feelings towards this person that she speaks of on the chorus might be how I feel about this song. It's not love, it's not hate, it's just indifference. And I might eventually forget this song ever existed.

29- "Cruel Summer" - Taylor Swift -- OK, I'm not going to get super nitpicky about all of these songs like I just did with "I Forgot That You Existed," especially since there's a lot of them to get to, but this one has me conflicted. On one hand, this is the type of Taylor song I really enjoy. She feels calm and comfortable. She's not trying to do something crazy or different. She's just being herself. I love the sound of her voice in this and I love the flow of the song. But the lyrics of the song are something that I have to piece together as most of the lines seem very disconnected from the lines next to them. It almost felt like a Migos song where there's just a bunch of random words and phrases that have zero rhyme or reason. I mean, if I take a step back and think of the song as a whole, I get the picture of a cruel summer where she's falling for a guy but things aren't working out. But it's when I take a close look at the lyrics that my brain gets confused. And give that many of the previous songs on the album seemed to be a bit careless lyrically, I'm not going to spend too much time trying to figure this one out.

45- "Paper Rings" - Taylor Swift -- I don't know what Taylor's plans are with her future singles from this album, but I found one that I think would work quite well. This is an uptempo song that I can see people jamming to, either at a party or as they're going for a drive in the car. It doesn't find Taylor trying too hard or getting out of her comfort zone. Rather, she feels relaxed and carefree. It sounds like she's having fun while singing this song. There's nothing about the lyrics that drive me crazy or feel like Taylor quickly breezed over them while writing. Everything makes sense. Granted, this isn't a deep, emotional song that connects with me on some deep level, but I think all the elements here come together to create something that's simply fun and infectious. 

49- "Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince" - Taylor Swift -- In contrast to the song I'll get to next on this list, "Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince" goes for a more smooth and melodic tone and because of that, it's the song that connects with me the most on this album so far. It's another song like "Cruel Summer" where it feels like Taylor is in her most comfortable lane, musically speaking, but this time she also connects on the lyrics, making this a very well rounded song. She has an idea here of this bittersweet love wherein she feels deeply about this person, perhaps more than ever, but with that comes a lot of sorrow and pain. And she takes that idea and builds an effective song around it where I can feel her passion and care towards this person, while also understanding her pain, thus this song cuts deep and is effectively emotional.

51- "I Think He Knows" - Taylor Swift -- "I want you, bless my soul. But I ain't gotta tell him, I think he knows." Haha, that might be the theme song of every girl out there. In which case, girls, you probably SHOULD tell him. Even if you think it's obvious that he knows. Because he might not. So yeah, those lyrics make me chuckle and roll my eyes a bit. That aside, the flow of this song is very chopped up and bouncy. I don't know the exact musical term that's most appropriate here, but the first thing that came to my mind is that it felt like there were a lot of staccatos on the notes. And perhaps that fits the feel of the song being that she's quite love-struck as her heart is skipping down 16th Avenue. But it just didn't gravitate towards me personally.

52- "Good as Hell" - Lizzo -- Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe this was also one of the Lizzo songs that she performed at the VMAs in what I think was a medley of several of her songs. But I'm focusing on Taylor this week, so I'm going to skip this for now.

57- "Cornelia Street" - Taylor Swift -- As we get into the middle of this Taylor album, thankfully we start hitting a positive streak. "Cornelia Street" comes right after "Paper Rings," which in turn comes right after "Miss Americana." If you've read all of this, both of those songs are pretty good and so is this one. Now I'm not sure why Taylor picked the name Cornelia Street for this road because that's quite the mouthful with four syllables in Cornelia. If that's an actual name of a street she lived, then I suppose that would makes. But that's not a criticism of the song, just a bit of commentary. What I like about this song is that it actually takes you on a journey. Instead of having one emotion or one idea that's present throughout, it feels like Taylor is telling a story that has a beginning, middle and end. It caught me a bit off guard because I wasn't expecting that. I had to start over once I figured the song out and then I really enjoyed the journey. There's a few bridges in the song that are emotionally satisfying, then a spot towards the end where Taylor pauses for a bit, as if she got emotional in the studio. In reality, that was probably purposely planned out as she paused for effect, then slowly took us through the final part of the song. But it worked. And the song also has an infectious chorus that separates the story into sections, giving the song an excellent flow while also implementing a part that will get stuck in people's heads.

62- "London Story" - Taylor Swift -- This song is an oddly specific song. Usually Taylor and other pop singers like going the more generic route with their love song lyrics, but this song is about how much she loves her London boyfriend. She starts by talking about how much she loves her home country, but then admits that, when they say, "Home is where the heart is," that's not where her heart is. Her heart is in London. Then the rest of the song is filled with a lot of London references. As I was listening, I was thinking to myself that Taylor better have had a London boyfriend or else this song would be a bit random and ridiculous. With most of these songs I haven't looked anything up as there's too much to cover for me to do a deep dive into every song, but I had to look up this one. And yeah, her current boyfriend is still Joe Alwyn, who is a British actor. So that means this song is super specific and personal, which I appreciate. Yeah, sure, if they ever break up it means that this song might be a hard one to come back to as it has the danger of not standing the test of time. Hence is why a lot of love songs are more generic. But in a longer, 18-track album, I'm totally fine with her writing at least one song that specifically dives into her current situation.

63- "Soon You'll Get Better" - Taylor Swift featuring Dixie Chicks -- Dixie Chicks on the charts? What decade is it? The Dixie Chicks haven't released an album since 2006 and haven't had any charting songs of any sort since 2007. So I had to also look this one up to see what was going on here. Did Taylor actually get the Dixie Chicks on her song or did she just credit them because she interpolated one of her songs? Yes, the Dixie Chicks are on this song. Kinda. Natalie Maines is providing backing vocals on the chorus while Martie Maguire is on the fiddle and Emily Strayer is on the banjo. So it's kinda strange to bring them back from obscurity to provide somewhat minuscule roles that could've been done by a lot of different people. However, there's a different story here altogether. When I was looking up the song to figure this out, I saw the quote on Genius where it said that this song is dedicated to Taylor's mother who got diagnosed with cancer in 2015 and again in March of this year. Taylor almost didn't include the song on the album because it was so personal. My exact reaction was, "Oh no." After going through the rest of this album, I wasn't emotionally prepared for this one. Yeah, this song will bring you to tears. There's so much raw emotion here as Taylor sings to her mother that soon you'll get better... because you have to. She doesn't want to make this about herself, but what is she supposed to do and who is she supposed to talk to if her mother is gone. And even though I don't necessarily think the Dixie Chicks had to be on this song, their harmonies, as well as banjo and fiddle playing, provide a nice touch to add to the emotion of the song. I don't want to make any absolute statements about this song, but this may be one of the best songs Taylor has ever written. If you're not at least choking up when you hear this song, you might not be human. 

67- "Death By a Thousand Cuts" - Taylor Swift -- This song comes directly after "Cornelia Street." Compared to that song, the experience with this song isn't quite as magical, but here we have a breakup song that feels a lot more realistic than, say, "I Forgot You Existed," which feels a bit fake and unrealistic. First off, it's absolutely clear that this is a breakup song. She's talking about a former lover and how it hurts to wake up and realize she's not with him anymore. And instead of saying she magically woke up one day and forgot he existed, she talks about a pain that doesn't go away. And even though they boarded up the house to their love, she still takes a look into it and sees flickering lights and admits that she can't pretend that it's OK when it's not. Pretending it's OK felt like "I Forgot You Existed." This song feels like the reality of the situation and there's a lot of imagery here that beautifully expresses that pain. And I love the last little stanza in the song that says, "I take the long way home; I asked the traffic lights if it'll be alright; They say, 'I don't know.'" That's a perfect ending to this. Granted, I don't know who Taylor is singing about in this song. From what I can remember, she's still in her current relationship with her longtime boyfriend that the album description on Apple Music talks about. But I suppose she's had enough boyfriends in her life to be able to know what this feels like, even if this song isn't describing a specific situation.

75- "Afterglow" - Taylor Swift -- I took a marriage prep class in college and learned there what the term afterglow meant. Our professor told us that, with the context of that definition, he thought it was a bit strange that there was an LDS musical group named Afterglow. So I have to be honest, because of that class, I saw this title and thought, "Oh dear. What are you doing here Taylor?" Turns out this song wasn't as awkward as I thought. The next song I'll talk about, "False God," takes that title. In this song, Taylor is trying to build up a broken relationship and is begging the guy to meet her in the afterglow. That's innocent enough. And I suppose the dictionary definition of afterglow is a bit more broad. It refers to good feelings lingering after a pleasurable or successful experience. Taylor is just trying to bring this guy to that experience so they can remember the good. She's taking full credit for pushing him away and causing harm in their relationship, so she's trying to do her best to apologize and fix things. There's so many songs in this industry where the person is blaming everything on the partner in a very prideful and stubborn way that it's refreshing to see the tables switched. And the song is very gentle and earnest, so I can appreciate this. I'm not really sure who she's singing to. As I've said a few times, it's a bit weird having an artist write a breakup song when they're in a good relationship in real life. It doesn't feel as personal in context. 

77- "False God" - Taylor Swift -- It's a bit awkward going straight from "Soon You'll Get Better" to "False God" on the album, but that's what happens. We go straight from a raw and emotional song about her mother having cancer to a sensual and provocative song. It's not dirty or explicit, but Taylor does that annoying thing where you use religious metaphors for a very non-religious and sensual song. The best comparison I have is "Take Me to Church" by Hozier, which is certainly not about missionary work, if you know what I mean. Taylor talks about her hips being the alter and religion's in this guy's lips. Even if it's a false god, they'd still worship this love. Later she says she knows Heaven is a thing because she goes there when he touches her and Hell is when they fight. Musically speaking this isn't bad. If Taylor is going for sensual, she does a good job at it. The saxophone in the background helps add to that atmosphere. But I don't know, it just makes me feel more uncomfortable than anything.

87- "Playing Games" - Summer Walker -- Summer Walker's previous song only showed up because of Drake, so I'm surprised to see her here on her own. But there's so much Taylor this week that I'll get to this song later in future weeks.

89- "Daylight" - Taylor Swift -- This is a nice song to end the album on. I'm trying to pinpoint the exact Taylor Swift song that this reminds me of, and it'll probably hit me after I publish this post, but my first thought is "Wildest Dream" or "Blank Space" from "1989." But with an album titled "Lover," it's nice to end the album on a smooth, mellow, optimistic love song. She starts off by briefly mentioned how cruel her love life has been to her, but then saying how happy she is now that she's found this person because she only sees daylight. Often when I greet people, I jokingly say "Good morning!" at all times of the day, even late at night. I don't really know what my reasoning is, but I do like the symbolism of what morning or daylight can be. The darkness is behind you and all you see is the brightness of the upcoming day in front of you. That's the sentiment Taylor is going with here. And as the final song of the album, this lingers on for a while. As opposed to the song right before it, which is only 2:30, this song is 4:53, but it doesn't overstay its welcome. In fact, it's quite relaxing in the way it slowly tapers off. If you're listening to this album from beginning to end, this is a very pleasant conclusion. And I also like the spoken outro that finishes things off wherein Taylor says that she wants to be defined by the things that she loves rather than the things that she hates or is scared of, because you are what you love. We have one more song to talk about if you're reading this in order, but as the final song of the album, I'll say that this album was a pleasant surprise. It has its rocky moments, but I think the positive here ends up outweighing the negative, so I'd give it a good recommendation.

91- "One Man Band" - Old Dominion -- I just listened to so much Taylor this week that I'm not going to bother with Old Dominion right now. I'll cover this if it rises up in future weeks. But I've never really been a fan of Old Dominion, so don't expect much.

92- "It's Nice to Have a Friend" - Taylor Swift -- This might be the most simple song on the album lyrically. It's also one of the shortest as it comes in at just 2:30. But there's a lot of things going on musically that I found interesting. At first it sounded a bit... oriental. Then we have some steel drums, a trumpet, a bell that rings, and probably a bunch of other things that I'm not picking up on first listen when it comes to the instruments. The song also provides a sample of "Summer in the South" by The Regent Park School of Music Youth Choir which adds a dreamy undertone. So I like the creativity here. And the simplicity of the lyrics is really nice. The first verse talks them playing together as kids. The second verse mentions in the end that something gave him the nerve to touch her hand. Then the third verse talks about church bells and wedding stuff. In between, the chorus was a simple, "It's nice to have a friend." Because that's the most important part of a relationship, right? When you put aside all the romantic stuff, it's important to have the desire to simply spend time with your partner. It's nice to have a friend. This doesn't end the album, but it's a nice second to last song.