Top 100 MOST POPULAR Songs of the 2010s: 20 - 1

Here we are! The top 20 most popular songs of the 2010s. We spent four days swimming through the memories of the songs that weren't quite big enough, but we've finally arrived to the list of heavy hitters. The songs that made the biggest impact on this past decade, at least in terms of chart performance. Given that there might be a number of people who check out this portion of the list instead of the other four sections, I'll spend a bit more detail explaining what this is for any newcomers. I've been referring to this project this week as the capstone to my Billboard Project that I've spent much of the past decade on. I started back in 1958 and went through each year and decade, creating lists of the most popular songs. Before I even started doing that, I was tracking this past decade we just finished, so revealing this list feels like a decades-long project that I've been super excited to share. And now I get to!

As far as methodology goes, this is me tracking just the top 10. And it's using my own tracking system where I give the No. 1 song 10 points, with a one-point sliding scale for the rest of the top 10. Is it the most efficient system? Perhaps not. In fact, I've recently created a new tracking system that I think gives more accurate results. But since I've used the same exact system on every other yearly list that I've posted on this blog, it only felt right to finish it off here. Regardless of what system I use, the top song will probably still be the same. In fact, looking at Billboard's "official" end-of-decade list for the 2010s, our No. 1 songs match. And most of the top 20 are also the same, including four of the top five, just in a slightly different order. So I don't think things would look too terribly different, so I feel comfortable with this. Personally I also weighted 2013-2019 differently since that's when Billboard implemented YouTube into their formula. That made songs last longer in the top 10. And songs that spanned two decades were included in the decade where they had the most points. But that doesn't apply to any of these 20 songs, just a few that showed up in previous sections. Anyways, I hope you've enjoyed this journey. If any questions arise about anything, feel free to let me know!

20- "One More Night" - Maroon 5


19- "All About That Bass" - Meghan Trainor


18- "Call Me Maybe" - Carly Rae Jepsen


17- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish


16- "Perfect" - Ed Sheeran


15- "We Are Young" - fun. featuring Jannelle Monae


14- "Sunflower (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse)" - Post Malone & Swae Lee


13- "We Found Love" - Rihanna featuring Calvin Harris


12- "Party Rock Anthem" - LMFAO featuring Lauren Bennett & GoonRock


11- "rockstar" - Post Malone featuring 21 Savage


10- "Without Me" - Halsey 


9- "God's Plan" - Drake


8- "Somebody That I Used to Know" - Gotye featuring Kimbra


7- "That's What I Like" - Bruno Mars


6- "Despacito" - Luis Fonsi & Daddy Yankee featuring Justin Bieber


5- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B


4- "Old Town Road" - Lil Nas X featuring Billy Ray Cyrus


3- "Shape of You" - Ed Sheeran


2- "Closer" - The Chainsmokers featuring Halsey


1- "Uptown Funk" - Mark Ronson featuring Bruno Mars

Top 100 MOST POPULAR Songs of the 2010s: 40 - 21

We're almost there! Either you're dying of anticipation to see what the final results are or you are cheering in celebration that I'm finally almost finished posting these. Hopefully it's more of the former, but who knows. If you're randomly jumping in right now and you've never come across any of my music posts before, a more detailed explanation is in the first part of this. But yeah, over the course of the past decade I went through all of the Billboard charts, creating lists for each year and each decade. This here feels like the capstone to all of that. Then I'll decided later what to do with this upcoming decade. For now this is looking at just the top 10. Since I don't have access to Billboard's official chart points, I created my own tracking system. Songs that crossed two decades are put into the decade where they had the most post, which comes into play again in this section. And songs from 2013-2019 are weighted more heavily since the implementation of YouTube into Billboard's formula in 2013 caused songs to stay around for longer. With that out of the way, let's dive into part four of this list!

40- "See You Again" - Wiz Khalifa featuring Charlie Puth


39- "Havana" - Camila Cabello featuring Young Thug


38- "Thrift Shop" - Macklemore & Ryan Lewis featuring Wanz


37- "Payphone" - Maroon 5 featuring Wiz Khalifa


36- "Rolling in the Deep" - Adele


35- "Blurred Lines" - Robin Thicke featuring T.I. & Pharrell


34- "E.T." - Katy Perry featuring Kanye West


33- "One Dance" - Drake featuring WizKid & Kyla


32- "Love Yourself" - Justin Bieber


31- "All of Me" - John Legend


30- "Sorry" - Justin Bieber


29- "Psycho" - Post Malone featuring Ty Dolla $ign


28- "Moves Like Jagger" - Maroon 5 featuring Christina Aguilera 


27- "Tik Tok" - Kesha


26- "Happy" - Pharrell Williams


25- "Sexy and I Know It" - LMFAO


24- "Dark Horse" - Katy Perry featuring Juicy J


23- "Royals" - Lorde


22- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott

21- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello

Top 100 MOST POPULAR Songs of the 2010s: 60 - 41

This week we're going through the most popular songs of the 2010s. Today's post sees us crossing the halfway point and begin the sprint towards the finish line. If you're jumping in halfway through, this is essentially the capstone to my major Billboard Project that I spent a good majority of last decade on. I have charts and lists for every year and decade in the archives of this blog for you to check out if you haven't already. In regards to methodology, today I will emphasize the fact that for songs caught between decades, I included the full run in the decade where they got the most post. That applies to the very first entry in this section. Yes, "Bad Romance" was released in 2009. But it got more points in 2010, which is it's here. Check out the first part for details on the other points. Yes, this only tracking the top 10. No, I don't have access to official chart points from Billboard, so I invented my own tracking system. And yes, 2013-2019 is weighted more harshly because Billboard decided in February 2013 to include YouTube views into their formula. That made a significant difference. With all of that out of the way, let's jump right into part three of five of this decades list.

60- "Bad Romance" - Lady Gaga

59- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille

58- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD

57- "Trap Queen" - Fetty Wap

56- "Grenade" - Bruno Mars

55- "Firework" - Katy Perry

54- "Can't Feel My Face" - The Weeknd

53- "I Like It" - Cardi B, Bad Bunny & J Balvin

52- "Fancy" - Iggy Azalea featuring Charli XCX

51- "Thinking Out Loud" - Ed Sheeran

50- "Starboy" - The Weeknd featuring Daft Punk

49- "Hello" - Adele

48- "California Gurls" - Katy Perry featuring Snoop Dogg

47- "Love the Way You Lie" - Eminem featuring Rihanna

46- "Just the Way You Are" - Bruno Mars

45- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi

44- "Someone Like You" - Adele

43- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo

42- "Locked Out of Heaven" - Bruno Mars

41- "Shake it Off" - Taylor Swift

Top 100 MOST POPULAR Songs of the 2010s: 80 - 61

This week we are diving back through the 2010s decade in music, revisiting the most popular songs that either enriched our souls or were the bane of our existence. If you read through the intro in part one of this post, you know the drill. If you're randomly joining the party here in the middle, let me quickly recap. This list is the capstone of my ongoing Billboard Project that I've spent the majority of this decade on. I started with 1958 and now here we are reviewing the 2010s. As far as methodology goes, this is only a tracking of the top 10. Since I don't have access to official chart points, I created my own one-point sliding scale where the top song gets 10 points. Songs that crossed two decades are included in the decade wherein they got the post points. And 2013-2019 is weighted differently than 2010-2012 since February 2013 is when YouTube views became part of Billboard's formula. If you want to a read a slightly more detailed version of that, go read my intro in the first post. But all those technicalities aren't the fun part. Re-experiencing all these songs are! So let's dive into part two of this list!

80- "Diamonds" - Rihanna



79- "Sugar" - Maroon 5



78- "Heathens" - twenty one pilots



77- "Work" - Rihanna featuring Drake



76- "Blank Space" - Taylor Swift



75- "Counting Stars" - OneRepublic



74- "Roar" - Katy Perry 



73- "Airplanes" - B.o.B featuring Haley Williams



72- "Set Fire to the Rain" - Adele



71- "Take Me to Church" - Hozier



70- "Some Nights" - fun. 



69- "7 rings" - Ariana Grande



68- "OMG" - Usher featuring will.i.am



67- "Give Me Everything" - Pitbull featuring Ne-Yo, Afrojack & Nayer



66- "Hotline Bling" - Drake



65- "Bodak Yellow (Money Moves)" - Cardi B



64- "thank u, next" - Ariana Grande



63- "What Do You Mean?" - Justin Bieber



62- "The Hills" - The Weeknd



61- "Nice for What" - Drake

Top 100 MOST POPULAR Songs of the 2010s: 100 - 81

As we move forward into this new decade, there's a lot of uncertainty in regards to what I want to do with this music blog. That said, I didn't want to pass on the opportunity of posting my list of the top 100 most popular songs of the 2010s. This is a capstone, if you will, to what I've spent a good portion of the past decade doing. I started back at the beginning of the Hot 100 in 1958 and went through each year, giving points based on performance in the top 10. Then I posted the results on this blog for each year and each decade, which was followed by me revealing the ultimate goal of posting the most popular songs of all-time, based on my personal tracking. If you're new, you can dig through the archives on the right and find all of that. However, this all felt incomplete without the 2010s being finished. I had to wait a few months for a few songs to finish their runs in the top 10, but now I'm able to final post the results. This gives us all a chance to reflect on all that the world of music brought us this past decade.

A few quick notes in regards to my methodology. Yes, this is a tracking of just the top 10. I recently came up with an expanded tracking system that I think is ultimately more accurate, but I will use that moving forward through this new decade and have not retroactively applied that to previous years as of yet. No, I don't have access to official chart points that Billboard uses, so I created my own simple system where the No. 1 song gets 10 points, with a one-point sliding scale for the rest of the top 10. In regards to songs whose runs were split between two decades, I've included their entire run into the decade where they got the most points. So you'll see some songs from 2009 in this list because they had more points in 2010. There's also a few songs released in 2019, like "Circles" by Post Malone, that aren't here because they got more points in 2020. I waited a few months to post this to specifically determine those cases. Finally, I decided to weight this decade differently. In 2013, Billboard implement YouTube into their streaming tracking. That made a significant difference in the staying power of songs on the charts, so 2010-2012 are weighted slightly different than 2013-2019 in this post. With all of that out of the way, I have this split into five sections. Here's part one!

100- "The Monster" - Eminem featuring Rihanna

99- "Need You Now" - Lady Antebellum

98- "Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You)" - Kelly Clarkson

97- "Watch Me" - Silento 

96- "Black Beatles" - Rae Sremmurd featuring Gucci Mane

95- "I'm the One" - DJ Khaled featuring Justin Bieber, Quavo, Chance the Rapper & Lil Wayne

94- "Wow." - Post Malone

93- "Rude" - MAGIC!

92- "Wrecking Ball" - Miley Cyrus 

91- "Don't Let Me Down" - The Chainsmokers featuring Daya

90- "Problem" - Ariana Grande featuring Iggy Azalea

89- "Cheap Thrills" - Sia featuring Sean Paul

88- "Bad and Boujee" - Migos featuring Lil Uzi Vert

87- "Panda" - Desiigner

86- "Break Your Heart" - Taio Cruz featuring Ludacris

85- "Cheerleader" - OMI

84- "In My Feelings" - Drake

83- "Talk Dirty" - Jason Derulo featuring 2 Chainz

82- "Can't Hold Us" - Macklemore & Ryan Lewis (feat Ray Dalton)

81- "Dynamite" - Taio Cruz

DrogeMiester's Top 30 FAVORITE Songs of the 2010s

How does one summarize an entire decade's worth of music into one single post? This is the task that I set out to do this week and it was a rather daunting one. Creating lists of things is something I find fun, if you couldn't tell. And I've made lots of different lists this past decade, especially since starting this particular blog about mid-decade. But this felt like something completely different. This is more than just me taking a group of songs from a certain year or era and putting them all together. This was an opportunity for me to reflect upon life and try to tell my story from the last decade through a series of songs that really represent who I am and the journey that I have gone through. Thus I took this super seriously. And in doing so, I took all of my end-of-year lists from the past decade and completely scrambled them, mashed them together, then moved things around more in order to come up with the appropriate group of songs that made the most impact on me this past decade. I don't know if anyone remembers specific orders of songs from past years' lists, but if you do then you might find yourself quite surprised at how things have shaken up here because it is quite a bit different. And that's perfectly OK in my mind because it shows evolution in taste.

In terms of the parameters of this list, these are new songs that debuted on the Hot 100 during the past decade, from 2010 to 2019. Why do they have to have had to debut on the Hot 100? Because otherwise this would be nearly impossible. There's probably thousands of songs that get written every year and I've only scratched the surface of what I've discovered. So I like having a tangible pool to work with. It makes the task manageable. And if you're curious, at some point this year I will reveal the final results of the most popular songs of the decade. I'm just waiting for a few more songs to finish out their runs in the top 10 so that I can determine what decade they belong in. If you're too impatient to wait for that, Billboard revealed their "official" list weeks ago. Go search it out on their site. My list will have plenty of similarities, but also some significant differences, so look forward to that. And finally, why 30 songs this time around when I usually do a top 10 with 10 honorable mentions? Well... that's just how it panned out this time. I was actually going for 25, but there ended up being a few songs that I just couldn't leave out, so I went 30. If you feel like letting me know what your favorite songs of the decade are, with whatever stipulations, I would love to hear!

30- "Shut Up and Dance" - WALK THE MOON


29- "lovely" - Billie Eilish & Khalid


28- "Glory" - Common & John Legend


27- "Wake Me Up" - Avicii


26- "Summertime Sadness" - Lana Del Rey & Cedric Gervais


25- "Don't You Worry Child" - Swedish House Mafia featuring John Martin


24- "Clarity" - Zedd featuring Foxes


23- "Alive" - Krewella


22- "Levitate" - Hadouken!


21- "Found / Tonight" - Ben Platt & Lin Manuel Miranda


20- "Rainbow" - Kacey Musgraves


19- "Praying" - Kesha


18- "Liability" - Lorde


17- "Somebody That I Used to Know" - Gotye featuring Kimbra


16- "Sail" - AWOLNATION


15- "Lights" - Ellie Goulding


14- "Prayer in C" - Robin Schulz & Lilly Wood & The Prick


13- "Rather Be" - Clean Bandit featuring Jess Glynne


12- "Head Above Water" - Avril Lavigne


11- "BURN IT DOWN" - Linkin Park


10- "Anything Could Happen" - Ellie Goulding


9- "Sweet Nothing" - Calvin Harris featuring Florence Welch


8- "Animals" - Martin Garrix


7- "The Sound of Silence" - Disturbed


6- "See You Again" - Wiz Khalifa featuring Charlie Puth


5- "Set Fire to the Rain" - Adele


4- "Stereo Love" - Edward Maya & Vika Jigulina


3- "Lazarus" - David Bowie


2- "Titanium" - David Guetta featuring Sia


1- "Chandelier" - Sia

DrogeMiester's Top 10 FAVORITE Songs of 2019

It's time for one of my favorite lists to do each year, my top 10 favorite songs of 2019. The first thing that I will say here is that those of you who checked out my least favorite songs of 2019 list will notice that I added an additional parameter. With that list, I said that in order to be eligible a song not only had to debut on the Hot 100 in 2019, but it also had to make Billboard's official year end Hot 100 for 2019. That's because I didn't want to filter through 200+ bad songs to come up with a silly list that 30 of my friends will quickly glance through and forget about 10 minutes later. No such additional parameter will be added to this favorite list simply because I enjoy going through all my favorite songs. There were 50+ candidates this year that I took a close look at. Yes, it took a long time to get it right. But it was an enjoyable process and I am proud of my final results. So all a song had to do in order to be eligible was to debut on the Hot 100 at some point during 2019. And it had to be a new song. Sorry, I didn't count "Jingle Bells" or "Blue Christmas," which both debuted for the first time. But everything else was fair game. So I hope you enjoy going through these songs because several of them didn't get the attention they deserved, which I think is a real shame.

10- "Miss Me More" - Kelsea Ballerini 


9- "Cornelia Street" - Taylor Swift


8- "Blinding Lights" - The Weeknd


7- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish


6- "Nice to Meet Ya" - Niall Horan


5- "Walk Me Home" - P!nk


4- "bury a friend" - Billie Eilish 


3- "homecoming queen?" - Kelsea Ballerini


2- "Soon You'll Get Better" - Taylor Swift featuring Dixie Chicks


1- "Rainbow" - Kacey Musgraves 

DrogeMiester's Top 10 LEAST FAVORITE Songs of 2019

In 2018, the Billboard charts nearly broke me. I had previously committed to covering every new song that debuted on the Hot 100, but given the huge amount of filth that kept flooding in, I came close to giving up on this particular blog as a whole because it didn't seem worth it. Instead, though, I decided to simply be more selective with what I cover. I no longer covered every song that debuted. Just the ones I felt like covering. After a whole year of this in 2019, I've received zero complaints, saved a lot of time, and had no decrease in viewership. It's been quite satisfying. However, that made the prospect of creating a least favorite songs of the year list quite tricky since I skipped a grand total of 244 of this year's 516 songs. And no way was I going to go back through them all. So I had a bit of a stroke of genius. I normally don't care to implement Billboard's official year end list, but for the sake of this list, I'm doing just that. But with my own little twist. In order to qualify for making this list, a song had to show up on Billboard's year end Hot 100 AND debut on the charts in 2019. That narrowed my field from over 250 songs down to about 30, which is a lot more manageable in my book. Thus I spent an evening going through all of those and this is what I came up with.

10- "Thotiana" - Blueface

9- "boyfriend" - Ariana Grande & Social House

8- "7 rings" - Ariana Grande

7- "Pop Out" - Polo G featuring Lil Tjay 

6- "Clout" - Offset featuring Cardi B

5- "Cash S---" - Megan Thee Stallion featuring DaBaby

4- "Shotta Flow" - NLE Choppa

3- "Pure Water" - Mustard & Migos

2- "Act Up" - City Girls

1- "Baby" - Lil Baby & DaBaby

Top 10 MOST POPULAR Songs of 2019

Another year has come and gone. This time it's a big one as the final year of the 2010's is now in the books. That means decades lists are coming your way in droves before too long. But first, though, we've got to get through 2019's lists, starting with the most popular songs of 2019. These, of course, are not my personal favorite songs of 2019, but rather the songs that performed the best on the Billboard charts, based on my own personal tracking, which is specifically focused on the top 10 instead of the entire Hot 100. The way I track things is that the No. 1 song gets 10 points, the No. 2 song gets nine points, all the way down to the No. 10 song getting one point. This is different than how Billboard tracks things. First off, they have official chart points to go off of and they track the entire Hot 100. Plus, they do this weird thing where their calendar year starts in December and ends in November. I find that weird and go from January through December, like normal human beings. Thus my point here is not to replicate Billboard, but to create my own version of this. And in case you're curious, I've done this for every year dating back to 1958, a project I started back in 2015. Given that this was a fairly interesting year, let's dive in and see how it all turned out.

10- "Sucker" - Jonas Brothers


9- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi 


8- "Wow." - Post Malone


7- "7 rings" - Ariana Grande


6- "Without Me" - Halsey


5- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo


4- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello


3- "Sunflower (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse)" - Post Malone & Swae Lee


2- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish 


1- "Old Town Road" - Lil Nas X featuring Billy Ray Cyrus 

DrogeMiester's LEAST FAVORITE Songs of 2018

Earlier this week, on New Year's Day to be exact, I released my top 10 favorite songs of 2018. That list is one that I worked hard on for nearly a week as I slowly whittled down my field of 80 songs to a top 10 list with 10 additional honorable mentions. Yes, it was a long process, but it was one I thoroughly enjoyed. Yet right after I posted that, my mind then started to focus on what naturally comes next. The list of my least favorite songs. And as I thought about it, I honestly wondered if it was even worth it. I don't know if you've noticed recently, but in my weekly Billboard Analysis segment, I have started to straight-up ignore a lot of the songs that I don't want to listen to from artists that I know I will hate. So yeah, you can say that the a lot of the songs in 2018 were so bad that it broke me. The idea of going back and carefully wading through all of that trash filled me with dread because doing so always gives me such a bad, disgusting feeling. Posting the videos of the songs also feels wrong because then I'm subjecting my viewers to content that is as close to porn as YouTube will allow. So in what might be a surprising twist of events, I'm not ranking my least favorite songs this year, which is why you noticed that words "top 10" are missing from this blog title.

So then what is this? Oh, this is actually quite fun. What you might not know is that every time I talk about a new arrival on my Billboard Analysis segment, I give that song a letter grade. But not publicly. I do it privately on in Excel sheet. Doing so helps me more easily organize all of the songs that debut, which then makes the end of year lists a lot easier. I thought about posted those grades in the new arrivals section, but I don't want people to get too focused on the grade and not on what I actually wrote about the song. But I still assign a grade for organizational purposes. Well, this list here is a list of songs that debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2018 that I gave a grade of a D- or an F to, ranked in alphabetical order. Doing this means that I am able to still complain about all the bad songs in a post like this without having to go back and re-listen to all of them to figure out how they actually stack up. But prepare yourself. There's 53 of them. For context, 598 songs debuted on the Hot 100 this year, a number heavily inflated by album bombs that just refused to stop coming.

- "31 DAYS" - Future
- "66" - Lil Yachty featuring Trippie Redd
- "Anybody" - Young Thug featuring Nicki Minaj
- "Armed and Dangerous" - Juice WRLD
- "Astronauts" - Future & Juice WRLD
- "Auto Pilot" - Migos
- "Ball for Me" - Post Malone featuring Nicki Minaj
- "Barbie Dreams" - Nicki Minaj
- "Bickenhead" - Cardi B
- "Big Bank" - YG featuring 2 Chainz, Big Sean & Nicki Minaj
- "Billy" - 6ix9ine
- "Blame It on Me" - Post Malone
- "BOOM!" - Lil Yachty featuring Ugly God
- "CUDDLE MY WRIST" - Future
- "Dinero" - Jennifer Lopez featuring Cardi B & DJ Khaled
- "Drip" - Card B featuring Migos
- "Drug Addicts" - Lil Pump
- "Emoji a Chain" - Migos
- "Eskeetit" - Lil Pump
- "FeFe" - 6ix9ine featuring Nicki Minaj
- "Final Fantasy" - Drake
- "Fine China" - Future & Juice WRLD
- "Fr Fr" - Wiz Khalifa featuring Lil Skies
- "Freee (Ghost Town, Pt. 2)" - KIDS SEE GHOSTS
- "going down!" - XXXTENTACION
- "Gucci Flip Flops" - Bhad Babie feaaturing Lil Yachty
- "Handgun" - YG featuring A$AP Rocky
- "HOUSTONFORNICATION" - Travis Scott
- "Huncho Jack" - Huncho Jack
- "I Know You" - Lil Skies featuring Yung Pinch
- "I Love It" - Kanye West & Lil Pump
- "I Thought About Killing You" - Kanye West
- "infinity (888)" - XXXTENTACION featuring Joey Bada$$
- "Jet Lag" - Future & Juice WRLD featuing Young Scooter
- "Let It Sing" - Kevin Gates
- "Life Goes On" - Lil Baby featuring Gunna & Lil Uzi Vert
- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes
- "Modern Slavery" - Huncho Jack
- "Motorcycle Patches" - Huncho Jack
- "Narcos" - Migos
- "NBAYoungBoat" - Lil Yachty featuring YoungBoy Never Broke Again
- "NC-17" - Travis Scott
- "New Freezer" - Rich the Kid featuring Kendrick Lamar
- "Rich & Sad" - Post Malone
- "Rich Sex" - Nicki Minaj featuring Lil Wayne
- "Same B------" - Post Malone featuring G-Eazy & YG
- "She Bad" - Cardi B & YG
- "Stoopid" - 6ix9ine featuring Bobby Shmurda
- "Takin' Shots" - Post Malone
- "TATI" - 6ix9ine featuring DJ Spinking
- "Ye vs. The People" - Kanye West featuring T.I.
- "Yikes" - Kanye West
- "Zack and Codeine" - Post Malone

But do you know what? Why stop there? Perhaps there were songs that I only gave a D grade to that deserved a D- or an F. So let's list off all of those, too, just to be fair.

- "1942" - G-Eazy featuring Yo Gotti & YBN Nahmir
- "4th Dimension" - KIDS SEE GHOSTS
- "5% Tint" - Travis Scott
- "8 out of 10" - Drake
- "92 Explorer" - Post Malone
- "A$AP Forever" - A$AP Ricky featuring Moby
- "After Dark" - Drake featuring Static Major & Ty Dolla $ign
- "All Mine" - Kanye West
- "APES---" - THE CARTERS
- "ATM" - J. Cole
- "Backin' It Up" - Pardison Fontaine featuring Cardi B
- "Barbie Tingz" - Nicki Minaj
- "Bartier Cardi" - Cardi B featuring 21 Savage
- "BB (Bad B------ Only" - Migos featuring 21 Savage
- "Be Careful" - Cardi B
- "BEBE" - 6ix9ine featuring Anuel AA
- "Big Shot" - Kendrick Lamar & Travis Scott
- "Bigger > You" - 2 Chainz, Drake & Quavo
- "Biggest Alley Oop" - Quavo
- "Black & Chinese" - Huncho Jack
- "Blue Tint" - Drake
- "Booty" - Blac Youngsta
- "BOSS" - THE CARTERS
- "CAN'T SAY" - Travis Scott
- "CAROUSEL" - Travis Scott
- "Casper" - Takeoff
- "CC" - Migos featuring Gucci Gang
- "Champion" - NAV featuring Travis Scott
- "Chanel (Go Get It)" - Young Thug featuring Gonna & Lil Baby
- "Change Lanes" - Kevin Gates
- "Chun-Li" - Nicki Minaj
- "CLOSE" - Rae Sremmurd & Travis Scott
- "Contra" - Logic
- "Cudi Montage" - KIDS SEE GHOSTS
- "Dame Tu Cosita" - El Chombo
- "Demon" - Lil Wayne
- "Diamond Teeth Samurai" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again
- "Dip" - Tyga & Nicki Minaj
- "Don't Cry" - Lil Wayne featuring XXXTENTACION
- "Dope New Gospel" - Lil Wayne featuring Nivea
- "Drip Too Hard" - Lil Baby & Gunna
- "Dubai S---" - Huncho Jack featuring Offset
- "Envy Me" - Calboy
- "Finesse" - Drake
- "Freaky Friday" - Lil Dicky featuring Chris Brown
- "Gang Gang" - Migos
- "Get Dripped" - Lil Yachty featuring Playboi Carti
- "Ghost Town" - Kanye West
- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B
- "Gotti" - 6ix9ine
- "Hardaway" - Derez De'Shon
- "Higher We Go (Intro)" - Migos
- "Hittas" - Lil Wayne
- "Huncho Dreams" - Quavo
- "I am Who They Say I Am" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again featuring KEvin Gates and Quando Rondo
- "I Do" - Cardi B featuring SZA
- "I Might Need Security" - Chance the Rapper
- "Ice Tray" - Quavo & Lil Yachty
- "I'm Upset" - Drake
- "Is There More" - Drake
- "Jamestown (Interlude)" - Post Malone
- "Japan" - Famous Dex
- "Kamikaze" - Lil Mosey
- "Keke" - 6ix9ine, Fetty Wap & A Boogie wit da Hoodie
- "Kevin's Heart" - J. Cole
- "Kids See Ghosts" - KIDS SEE GHOSTS
- "KOD" - J. Cole
- "Kream" - Iggy Azalea featuring Tyga
- "Last Memory" - Takeoff
- "Leave Me Alone" - Flipp Dinero
- "Let It Fly" - Lil Wayne featuring Travis Scott
- "Let Me" - Zayn
- "Look Alive" - BlocBoy JB featuring Drake
- "Lose It" - Quavo featuring Lil Baby
- "Lust" - Lil Skies
- "Majesty" - Nicki Minaj featuring Eminem & Labrinth
- "Make It Back" - Juice WRLD
- "March 14" - Drake
- "MIA" - Bad Bunny featuring Drake
- "Midnight" - Logic
- "Mine" - Bazzi
- "Mob Ties" - Drake
- "Money" - Cardi B
- "Money Bag" - Cardi B
- "Moonlight" - XXXTENTACION
- "Motiv8" - J. Cole
- "New Patek" - Lil Uzi Vert
- "NO BYSTANDERS" - Travis Scott
- "No Stylist" - French Montana featuring Drake
- "Notice Me" - Migos featuring Post Malone
- "Noticed" - Lil Mosey
- "Nowadays" - Lil Skies featuring Landon Cure
- "NUMB" - XXXTENTACION
- "Ocean" - TK Kravitz featuring Jacqueez
- "OKRA" - Tyler, The Creator
- "Open Safe" - Lil Wayne
- "Otherside" - Post Malone
- "Outside Today" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again
- "Overnight" - Logic
- "Paramedic!" - SOB & RBE
- "Pass Out" - Quavo featuring 21 Savage
- "Peak" - Drake
- "Plug Walk" - Rich the Kid
- "Praise the Lord (Da Shine)" - A$AP Rocky featuring Skepta
- "Preach" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again
- "Problems" - Lil Wayne
- "Psycho" - Post Malone
- "RACKS BLUE" - Future
- "Rap Devil" - Machine Gun Kelly
- "Ratchet Happy Birthday" - Drake
- "Red Roses" - Lil Skies featuring Landon Cure
- "Rerun" - Quavo featuring Travis Scott
- "Rondo" - 6ix9ine featuring Tory Lanez & Young Thug
- "Saint" - Huncho Jack
- "Shoota" - Playboi Carti featuring Lil Uzi Vert
- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott
- "SKELETONS" - Travis Scott
- "Southside" - Lil Baby
- "Spoil My Night" - Post Malone featuring Swae Lee
- "Start This S--- Off Right" - Lil Wayne featuring Ashanti & Mack Maine
- "Stay" - Post Malone
- "Stranger Things" - Joyner Lucas & Chris Brown
- "Sugar Wraith" - Post Malone
- "Supastars" - Migos
- "Supplies" - Justin Timberlake
- "Survival" - Drake
- "Talk to Me" - Tory Lanez & Rich the Kid
- "Talk Up" - Drake featuring JAY-Z
- "Taste" - Tyga featuring Offset
- "Tempo" - Chris Brown
- "That's on Me" - Yella Beezy
- "The Games We Play" - Pusha T
- "the remedy for a broken heart" - XXXTENTACION
- "Took His Name" - Lil Wayne
- "Top Off" - DJ Khaled featuring JAY Z, Future & Beyonce
- "Topanga" - Trippie Redd
- "Twerk" - City Girls featuring Cardi B
- "Used 2" - Lil Wayne
- "W O R K I N  M E" - Quavo
- "WAKE UP" - Travis Scott
- "Wake Up in the Sky" - Gucci Mane, Bruno Mars & Kodak Black
- "Walk It Talk It" - Migos featuring Drake
- "Warm It Up" - Logic featuring Young Sinatra
- "Wassup" - Logic featuring Big Sean
- "Watch" - Travis Scott featuring Lil Uzi Vert & Kanye West
- "What Would Meek Do?" - Pusha T featuring Kanye West
- "WHO? WHAT!" - Travis Scott
- "WIFI LIT" - Future
- "X" - ScHoolboy Q, 2 Chainz & Saudi
- "Yes Indeed" - Lil Baby & Drake
- "YOSEMITE" - Travis Scott
- "Yuck" - Logic
- "ZEZE" - Kodak Black featuring Travis Scott & Offset

Have I made my point yet? Any questions as to why I don't want to spend time ranking these songs to come up with a top 10 or why 2018 almost broke me?

DrogeMiester's Top 10 FAVORITE SONGS of 2018

Those of you who have been following my weekly Billboard Analysis posts throughout 2018 will know that I've been doing a lot of complaining at the state of the Billboard Hot 100. I've even become so frustrated that I've stopped covering a lot of the new arrivals, especially since album bombs have flat-out plagued the Hot 100 this year like a rotten, smelly, destructive disease that almost caused me to give up on this whole weekly post. Truth be told, though, it's not been a bad year for music. It's just been a bad year for POPULAR music. There was a lot of great songs that charted. They just didn't do as well as I would've liked them to, which is what made this year frustrating. Point in case, a few weeks ago on my Facebook page, I created a top 10 list, with 10 honorable mentions, based on new entries on Billboard's year-end Hot 100. And I struggled to find 20 songs worthy of that list. But in doing this list here, I could've honestly done a top 50 and still been forced to cut songs I really liked. And out of those 20 songs from said list of year-end Billboard hits, only one of them made the final cut here, with a second one being included the honorable mentions. So yeah, that's the type of year it's been. Which is why I'm honestly excited to share this list of my favorite songs of 2018.

As far as my parameters here go, songs that are eligible to be included are new songs that debuted on the Billboard Hot 100  during the calendar year of 2018. So no, this is not based on Billboard's year-end Hot 100, nor do I consider just any song that was written and released to the public in 2018. Just the songs that debuted on the Hot 100 during 2018. I also had to include the additional parameter of it being a "new" song because I ran into a bit of a conundrum in 2016 when Leonard Cohen passed away, resulting in his original version of "Hallelujah" to chart for the first time. It didn't seem fair to include that in the list that year, even though it would've obviously been the best song. We've also had a yearly tradition recently of classic Christmas songs debuting on the charts during the holiday season. And while it would be fun to include "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer," "Sleigh Ride" or "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas" on my list this year, I didn't consider them as eligible because they're not new. I don't necessarily have a specific definition of what "new" means in this instance. I just take it case by case. So with all of that out of the way, I proudly present to you my top 10 favorite songs of 2018, with 10 honorable mentions in the comment section.

10- "I'll Never Love Again" - Lady Gaga 


9- "The Champion" - Carrie Underwood featuring Ludacris 


8- "Back to You" - Selena Gomez


7- "Shallow" - Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper


6- "Zombie" - Bad Wolves


5- "Sober" - Demi Lovato


4- "Always Remember Us This Way" - Lady Gaga


3- "lovely" - Billie Eilish & Khalid 


2- "Found / Tonight" - Lin Manuel Miranda & Ben Platt


1- "Head Above Water" - Avril Lavigne

Top 10 MOST POPULAR Songs of 2018

The year has come to a close and thus it's time to reveal the results of my ongoing Billboard project with the most popular songs of 2018. If you don't know what I'm talking about when I say "Billboard project," a few years back I got curious as to what the most popular songs of all-time were based on a formula I came up with to keep track of the Billboard charts. So I started in 1958, the first year that the Billboard Hot 100 was officially created, and I went week by week giving points to songs that made the top 10. The No. 1 song got 10 points, the No. 2 song got nine points, and so on until the No. 10 song got one point. After I finished doing that, I created this specific blog so I could have a place to post the results. So yeah, one week at a time I posted a new top 10 list for a specific year until I ran out of years to post about, which is when I then posted the final results. Said final results were posted last year. If you're curious about any specific year or that all-time list, you can search the archives of this blog or ask me and I can give you the links. But for now, here's the final results of how 2018 turned out, which was not a pleasant year for me when it came to popular music.

I also do like pointing out each year that my point in this was never to recreate Billboard's official lists. As they do each year, they posted their top songs of 2018 early in December. If you want to go look at that list, head over to Billboard.com and check it out. They have all sorts of fancy lists from each year of the charts that are often fun to look through. If you do, you'll note that my list is quite a bit different from there's, especially this year. There's three reasons for that. First, they have access to actual chart points that I don't have access to. That's kinda of a big deal. Second, they keep track of the entire Hot 100. I don't do that because that would be extremely time-consuming, so I'm content with sticking to the top 10. Third, their tracking year starts in December and finishes in November so that they can post their list at the beginning of December. I think that's weird. My calendar year starts in January and finishes in December, so that's what I go by. I don't care if internet traffic is a bit slower after the holidays. It feels right to include December on the charts in the year that it actually belongs. So with all of that out of the way, let's take a look at the most popular songs of 2018.

10- "Better Now" - Post Malone 


9- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott


8- "In My Feelings" - Drake


7- "Nice for What" - Drake


6- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD 


5- "I Like It" - Cardi B, Bad Bunny & J Balvin


4- "Perfect" - Ed Sheeran 


3- "Psycho" - Post Malone featuring Ty Dolla $ign


2- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B


1- "God's Plan" - Drake

DrogeMiester's Top 10 FAVORITE ALBUMS of 2017

My final music list of 2017 is finally here! I wanted to get this out earlier, but there were a few more albums that I wanted to get to first. Surprisingly, this is the first time on this blog that I've put together a list of my favorite albums. I usually just declare my favorite album on my facebook page, but I listened to more albums in 2017 than I have any other year, so a top 10 list felt appropriate. The parameters are simple. The album had to be released in 2017. And it had to be a full-length album, not just an EP. I also disqualified "best of" albums, cover albums or things like that.  Original songs by the artist from this year is what I was looking for. That mainly means I eliminated "Synthesis" by Evanescence, the real best album of 2017. It just didn't seem fair to include it. And finally, it's probably impossible for me to listen to every album released in 2017, so I didn't try. I just listened to the ones that caught my attention for whatever reason. In essence, this list is representative of my favorite albums of 2017 of the ones that I have discovered and listened to up to this point. So let's dive in!

10- "Woodstock" - Portugal. The Man

Portugal. The Man is a little alternative rock band that almost literally came out of nowhere in 2017, unless you are deeply ingrained into the alternative rock world, to be a huge success worldwide. We can credit this success to the song "Feel It Still" being included in commercials for the Apple iPad Pro and Vitamin Water starting in June 2017. Once the world saw those commercials, they rightfully fell in love with the song because it's so upbeat and infectious. The song went all the way to No. 4 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 and top 10 in 20 other countries. So hey, why not check the entire album out? Sure, the whole album isn't quite as fantastic as "Feel It Still," or else this would be a lot higher, but it's still a really solid alternative album, inspired by frontman John Gourley stumbling on his dad's old Woodstock ticket and becoming obsessed with the 60's pop culture and politically charged music. "Woodstock" is the band's eight studio album and the first one I have listened to. After listening to this album, I'm excited to go dive into the rest of the band's discography to see what I discover.

9- "Unapologetically" - Kelsea Ballerini

Given my general distaste for most country music, you might be surprised to see a country album show up on this list. Truth be told, though, I find myself really enjoying country music when it comes from female singers. I especially like my country pop girls and Kelsea is a prime example of a girl from this genre who just melts my heart with her simple, yet heartfelt music. Much of this album consists of rebounding from breakups and the uncomfortable nature of transitioning from adolescence to adulthood. On paper that sounds like nothing special, but there's a sense of honesty here that I appreciate that reminds me of a young Taylor Swift or what Taylor could've sounded like today had she stuck with country pop instead of transitioning to pure pop or whatever genres she experimented with in "reputation." I think Kelsea especially excels on "In Between," "End of the World" and "I Hate Love Songs," the latter of which is just so darn clever. Kelsea is only 24 years old and thus has a long, successful career ahead of her and I hope she sticks to this country pop genre instead of wandering off.

8- "Rainbow" - Kesha

What a journey it's been for Kesha. There's no time here to dive into this whole situation with Dr. Luke, but regardless of what was truth from Kesha or what was her being a bit of a drama queen, it certainly translated into a shockingly mature and emotional album that I totally bought. I mean, the same girl that sang "Tik Tok," "Die Young" and "Timber" has now recorded songs like "Praying" and "Hymn" on this new album, a sign that she's either found Jesus or has a lot of emotions to express after years of abuse and frustration. But lest you think it's an album full of just pain and frustration, the second half of the album is what you call classic Kesha with her simply having fun with songs like "Boots" and "Godzilla." She even goes country with Dolly Parton on "Old Flames." And that's what I love about this album. It's half emotion and half Kesha sounding more comfortable than she's ever sounded. Even though I don't like the song "Woman," the rest of the album is more than good enough to make up for it. I just wish she would've had more chart success because she deserved it.

7- "The Aviary" - Galantis

The winner of the best EDM album of 2017 quite easily goes to Galantis. That means you now know what other artists didn't make the cut. Ever since The Chainsmokers were knighted as superstars, I've thought that there's another duo that was much more deserving and that of course is Christian Karlsson and Linus Eklöw, the Swedish duo that make up Galantis. I've been waiting for their big U.S. break after the phenomenal EDM songs of "Runaway (U & I)," "Peanut Butter Jelly" and "No Money," but it hasn't happened. The best they got was the latter of the bunch hitting No. 88, despite all three rightfully being major hits over in Europe. And maybe it would've helped if they pushed the right songs from "The Aviary" as singles, but oh well. It is what it is. They don't re-invent the wheel with this album, but they have quite a few solid dance songs here that would make crowds at dance parties go crazy. If you want to test me on that, try playing "Hey Alligator," "Love On Me" and "Pillow Fight" for your party friends and see how they react. Pure, solid fun. We could use more of that in this world. That's why I love them. 

6- "Something to Tell You" - HAIM

I felt rather proud of myself when I discovered this band in 2017. Traditionally rock bands are male-dominated. Even the select few with female lead singers often have men at the guitars and drums. And I don't inherently have any problems with that. There's a lot of great male rock bands. But I really love it when we break tradition by having an all-female rock band. And not for politically correct, progressive reasons. Female rockers are just awesome. HAIM is a trio of sisters, Este, Danielle and Alana Haim. And dang are these girls talented. I don't know if there's one particular song that jumps out at me as being spectacular, but I really enjoy all 11 of the songs from this album. Finding consistency like that is rare as artists will often have 3-4 great songs with the rest serving as album fillers. But not here. The whole album is extremely enjoyable. As I listen, I feel like I am transported back to the 80's or 90's where this genre was on fire. Now I'm just waiting for them to crossover onto the Hot 100 with something, but sadly they're probably too good for that chart. I hope I'm wrong, though.

5- "Younger Now" - Miley Cyrus

No one shocked my world more than Miley did in 2017. When "Malibu" was first released, I pressed play on my tablet with a "let's get this over with" mindset. Yet as the song played, I was speechless. I think I listened to the song 10 times in a row in that moment just to digest what I was hearing and I've loved the song ever since. But can the whole album be that good? Absolutely! In fact, she went back to her Tennessee roots and made a full out country album, becoming the second lady on this list to collaborate with Dolly Parton. And it is all so wonderful. The title track, "Younger Now," gives the sentiments that, while she doesn't regret what she did in her past, she's moved on and has become a more mature adult. I mean, the same girl that was riding naked on a wrecking ball not too long ago has most recently walked on the stage at the Grammy's last month wearing a stunningly gorgeous ballroom gown while singing a duet with Sir Elton John. I don't know what the future holds for Miley, but I started 2017 hating her. And now I absolutely adore her. And for that she gets a standing ovation.

4- "Beautiful Trauma" - P!nk

The seventh studio album from P!nk was received with much more resistance than I think she really deserved. While I don't care much for what music critics say since music is extremely personal, I get the feeling that people were wanting P!nk to be more fiery and in your face, like she has in the past with songs like "So What" and "Raise Your Glass." While I also like fiery, angry P!nk, I love her softer self just as much, if not more. I mean, her duet with Nate Ruess, "Just Give Me a Reason," is one of the most beautiful love duets I've heard. And it's more along those lines that "Beautiful Trauma" runs in terms of style and tone. She's more calm and toned down. But dang does this girl have a voice and that's what I love most about her. She has one of my all-time favorite female voices and she doesn't hold back in "Beautiful Trauma" as the album is full of beautiful ballads where she just unleashes her vocal power while also knowing exactly when to stay controlled. I mean, did you hear her perform "Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken" at the Grammy's? It's like that. But the whole album.

3- "Harry Styles" - Harry Styles

I spent most of my time with One Direction making fun of how boring and useless of a band they were. Empty love songs with five guys all singing in unison. Some of the songs were catchy, but the songs I actually enjoyed from them were few and far between. So naturally it makes perfect sense for their lead man to break off and turn into a 70's rock star. Wait what? Yeah. This was not the album I was expecting from Harry. But I'm really glad we got it because this is the exact type of music that we need. None of that boring nonsense that Zayne, Liam and Niall have delivered in their solo careers. Let's bring back the 70's with songs like "Carolina," "Only Angel," "Two Ghosts," "From the Dining Table" and of course "Sign of the Times." My only criticism is that none of the songs stand out as modern classics, but together as a group this album is quite the surprisingly entertaining ride if you like the music from the good ol' days. I'm just annoyed that Harry couldn't find more traction on the charts while the other previously mentioned three could. I suppose that's why we can't have good things in this world.

2- "Wonderful Wonderful" - The Killers

There were two Vegas/Utah rock bands that came out with new albums in 2017 and I find it a shame that Imagine Dragons was the one that the music gods and the American public fell in love with while The Killers were mostly ignored. Imagine Dragons' new album is full of empty nothingness while this fifth album from The Killers is a deep, thought-provoking album full of emotion. Brandon Flowers really outdid himself here as he speaks of his personal journey from prideful rock star to a humble family man and how this whole thing effected both him and especially his wife. When I first listened to this, I had to stop and carefully analyze each song and how they all fit together and what I discovered when I did so was a near masterpiece of an album. He starts with the voice of his old self, transitions into the voice of his wife and how she felt, then goes back to him as he responds to that, showing how far he's come as a human being. That's all just scratching the surface. Each song was a rich experience that contributed to this beautiful story. I really wish we had more albums like this.

1- "Melodrama" - Lorde

There were a lot of really good albums in 2017, yet none of them affected me like "Melodrama" did. I was quite impressed with Ella's debut album "Pure Heroine," released two months before her 17th birthday in 2013. In the nearly four excruciatingly long years where I very impatiently waited for this sophomore album, she grew from a teenage girl to a grown adult as she celebrated her 21st birthday a few months ago. That's a really difficult transition for any normal human being and Ella was able to perfectly capture that in this album. "Liability" brings me to tears when I listen to it as I feel like it's such a raw, personal song about how lonely Ella has felt in life during these years. Although "Liability" is the best song of the album, the other 10 songs have nearly just as much emotion and passion in them, making this album very special and unique. It's probably no coincidence that my favorite movie of 2017, "Lady Bird," also dealt with similar difficult themes of transitioning from adolescence to adulthood, so this is a very personal choice for me. But hey, it's my list, so I'm allowed to be subjective with it.