DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - October 20, 2018

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! In this weekly post, I cover three sections. First, I give my thoughts on the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100. Second, I give my thoughts on the songs that experienced significant gains below the top 10. Third, I give my initial thoughts on our new arrivals this week. I reserve the right to switch things up in the future, but for now this is what I'm sticking with. I've followed the Billboard charts for a long time now and this is a great way for me to express my thoughts to the world. I hope you enjoy!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B (=) -- I'm counting down the days until this song is NOT No. 1 on the Hot 100. And there will be much rejoicing when that happens. After Lil Wayne failed to top Maroon 5 last week, Juice WRLD yet again falls short in dethroning the sort-of group. And it's all because the radio won't let this die. Yes, it's down on radio, but only by 1 percent overall and thus now has led the radio charts for 12 weeks. That's the most by a duo or group this century (gross) and is coming way too close to matching the overall radio songs record which is held by Goo Goo Dolls' "Iris" with 18 weeks back in 1998. If "Girls Like You" is the song that breaks that record, I just might travel around to every radio station in the country and slap them all in the face for refusing to STOP playing this song.

2- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (+1) -- After a brief interruption by Lil Wayne, Juice WRLD is back at the runner-up spot. Unfortunately for me, both songs remained essentially even overall in terms of chart points this week, so Juice WRLD got no closer to dethroning Maroon 5. Let's hope those numbers fluctuate a bit more in the coming weeks so we can get rid of the travesty that is Maroon 5.

3- "Better Now" - Post Malone (+1) -- As I kinda expected, the release of the "Better Now" music video didn't really impact Post Malone's chart positioning. It was up 7 percent on streaming and 44 percent on sales, but neither of those metrics was remotely strong enough for Post Malone to even sneak into the runner-up spot. This song rose because of the disappearance of Lil Wayne. 

4- "Drip Too Hard" - Lil Baby & Gunna (+21) -- Ew, gross. Who let these two into the top five? Oh, an album they released which caused an album bomb for them this week. That makes sense. It also means that this is going to go away next week, right? Hopefully? I suppose I'll cover this album bomb to some degree, but I'll give much more focus to the soundtrack of "A Star is Born," which saw four additional songs debut on the Hot 100 in addition to "Shallow" soaring into the top five. And speaking of which...

5- "Shallow" - Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper (+23) -- Last week I had to admit that I had not seen "A Star is Born," so I refused to give my analysis of this song without knowing the context of the film. Since then I have repented and seen the movie, as well as the three previous versions, so now I can give you my official thoughts on the song. And four others from the movie that showed up in the new arrivals this week.

And yeah, I'm obsessed. To the point where there are moments in the day where I just sit there and listen to this song on repeat while I do other things. Lyrically this song is simple. It's a love song where Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga take turns saying how much they love each other and are ready to dive into this relationship. But even though the lyrics are simple, they are quite powerful and the two singers do a great job of selling their chemistry with each other. You can tell they are madly in love. For someone whose not a professional singer for his profession, Bradley Cooper does an excellent job starting the song off. But then Lady Gaga kicks in and blows it away. And all of that is the analysis of the song without the context of the movie. If you want to know a secret, while I refused to analyze this song last week, I had already become obsessed with it before seeing the movie. But when you add the context, this song is the central theme of the movie. It's the song that gets Lady Gaga's character famous. She sings the lyrics to Bradley Cooper in the parking lot on their first little get together, then on stage the next day, he reveals that he took her song and created a full-length duet out of it. He forces her to come sing the song with her on stage and after some initial hesitation, she does. And boom. The world loves as the performance goes viral. And it doesn't feel superficial or forced. It's a beautiful moment in the movie that sets the tone for the rest of the film. If this song hadn't worked so well, the movie may have not worked. But the movie works because this song is so great. And Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga did indeed record the song live on set in front of a festival audience. No lip-syncing in the movie, which makes it feel that much more real.

6- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (=) -- Do you want to know a funny story? For the first time in 37 weeks, Drake is NOT a credited artist in the top 10. That's since January 27 of this year. And I bring that up here because Drake has uncredited vocals in this Travis Scott song. Had Travis not been an idiot to Drake by leaving off his credit, Drake's streak could've continued. But on the records it's over even though Drake's vocals are still heard in the top 10.

7- "Youngblood" - 5 Seconds of Summer (+1) -- An overall win for 5SOS this week, I suppose. Last week this song was the fifth highest song not from Lil Wayne, but since three Lil Wayne songs debuted it front of it, it had to be content with the No. 8 spot. This week, all three of those Lil Wayne songs fell out, but two of them were replaced by other songs that soared into the top five, leaving "Youngblood" with just a one song rise. But hey, this is a decently fun pop song, so I'm glad it's at least sticking around. I hope it can get higher, though.

8- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille (+5) -- Here's a welcome entry to the top 10. This is Marshmello's first ever trip to the top 10 after being barely held out with "Friends," a collaboration with Anne-Marie, which peaked at the infamous No. 11 spot. This is also just the second time for Bastille being in the top 10, with the first time being their monstrous hit "Pompeii" in 2014. Granted, I think both artists have done better, but if this hit helps propel their careers forward and gives them more mainstream recognition, I think this is a win. Plus, an average Marshmello and Bastille song is still way better than most of the crap that has festered in the top 10 lately. So on that note, it's relieving to have a song in the top 10 that's not a smelly pile of dog crap.

9- "I Like It" - Cardi B, Bad Bunny & J Balvin (+2) -- I figured that this would return to the top 10 after being momentarily pushed out by Lil Wayne. But despite the two spot rise, this song is still on the downward track, which is good because this overstayed its welcome a long time ago.

10- "FeFe" - 6ix9ine featuring Nicki Minaj & Murda Beatz (+2) -- The other song that unfortunately, but unsurprisingly, returns to the top 10 after the Lil Wayne album bomb last week pushed it out. And while I'm not happy this is here, I'm happy that this doesn't seem to have a whole lot more momentum left because this should never have even hit the top 10 in the first place. The world needs to reject the awful human being that is 6ix9ine, not reward him with a career simply because he desperately collaborated with Nicki Minaj on what he himself admitted was a lazy effort. On a non-6ix9ine related note, I am happy that Kanye West's "I Love It" and Tyga's "Taste" failed to return. And I'm happy that Drake's "In My Feelings" finally tumbled out of the top 10.

Rising on the Hot 100:

12- "Love Lies" - Khalid & Normani (+4) -- There's a whole ton of songs in this region this week thanks to the floor disappearing out from under Lil Wayne this week, heavier than I even expected. Even though Lil Baby and Gunna got a minor album bomb and "A Star is Born" charted four additional songs, there still managed to be a lot of movement here as the charts reset themselves back to normal. So let's go through this pretty quickly. "Love Lies" returns to No. 12, but I'm mostly sad that this song's life in the top 10 was short-lived after it completed the extremely long journey to get there. I hope that this comes back, but I'm not crossing my fingers.

13- "Natural" - Imagine Dragons (+6) -- As the college footballs seasons continues, meaning ESPN still is playing this song during every commercial break, "Natural" manages to remain consistently in the teens. Although I'm a bit surprised that it hasn't had enough traction to crack the top 10. If it does, I'll be happy with it. But I won't be too disappointed if it doesn't.

16- "Trip" - Ella Mai (+4) -- Ella Mai is hoping to get a second entry in the top 10 after her previous smash hit "Boo'd Up" exploded. Unfortunately for her, she seems to be having a tougher time getting there with this, which I'm not complaining about.

19- "Nonstop" - Drake (+4) -- I keep expecting this song to sneak back into the top 10, but I'm happy that its momentum doesn't seem to be super strong because the world doesn't need any more Drake. I heard that the Michael Jackson song might be Drake's next single from "Scorpion." That's interesting. And I'm a bit surprised that he didn't try to mooch off that earlier, although I'm not a huge fan of this idea of taking advantage of an artist's death to boost your sales, which is the only reason Drake somehow managed to get away with including a Michael Jackson vocal recording in his song. But anyways, we'll talk about that more if the song ever gets here.

20- "Eastside" - Benny Blanco, Halsey & Khalid (+9) -- Hey, here's a song that I'm happy to see in the top 20, even though I still can't seem to let go of the annoyance of Benny Blanco being a credited artist when he's simply a producer who didn't contribute any vocals. There's hundreds of songs that Benny Blanco could've done like this, so why start now? I suppose I'll thank him for putting this together, though.

24- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes (+14) -- I'm disgusted that this keeps climbing. This song needs to go away, but will sadly probably be a top 10 hit because we always have to have an awful rap song towards the top of the charts.

26- "Yes Indeed" - Lil Baby & Drake (+5) -- Lil Baby's album release pushed this song up. I'm just happy that this couldn't get much traction in the top 10 when it was there.

27- "YG featuring 2 Chainz, Big Sean & Nicki Minaj (+5) -- I expected this song to soar into the top 10 after it gained a whole bunch of initial momentum. And I was ready to be upset. But I'm happy that it hasn't managed to actually do so because the world doesn't need this song around.

35- "High Hopes" - Panic! At the Disco (+14) -- I've been begging for this song to become a hit because the world really needs this song around. To see it soar 14 spots and land in the top 40 this week is super promising. I remember a time where this band called fun. charted at the top of the Hot 100. Imagine if, in 2018 or 2019, we let those times come back by having great songs on the top of the charts? That would be so great.

38- "Psycho" - Post Malone featuring Ty Dolla $ign (+6) -- I considered not including this because this song is not on the rise. It's just hear because Lil Wayne plummeted. But whatever. "Psycho" rose six spots. Enjoy it Post Malone fans. Because I don't think this song is going to last much longer on the Hot 100 given Billboard's rules for declining songs that have been around for a while.

39- "Broken" - lovelytheband (+9) -- I've been really mad at 2018 for being an awful year for the popular song. But if this could continue to gain momentum, perhaps it's a sign that it's possible to have alternative songs like this actually do well? I'm not expecting a complete resurgence for the genre, but I do wish we had more variety on the Hot 100 instead of being spammed by endless amounts of rap and hip hop.

46- "Wake Up in the Sky" - Gucci Mane, Bruno Mars & Kodak Black (+5) -- Yuck on all three accounts with this trio. Make it go away. Although I remain happy that it only had a five spot gain. It certainly could've been worse.

47- "Beautiful" - Bazzi featuring Camila Cabello (+5) -- I think this song is officially done. It rose enough this week to be included, but it doesn't have any momentum to be a true follow-up hit for either artist.

48- "Simple" - Florida Georgia Line (+5) -- I'm also not sure how much momentum this song really has, but I'd be happy if it did do well because I think this is a fun song.

55- "Breathin" - Ariana Grande (+13) -- Is this the next single from "Sweetener" for Ariana? Excellent choice, girl. Out of the songs that charted during her partial album bomb, this was one of the more enjoyable songs. Now let's see if this can get some momentum because "No Tears Left to Cry" and "God is a Woman" proved to be a little more frontloaded than Ariana was probably hoping for. And the girl deserves to get a hit that gains traction and stays around. Let's make "Breathin" that song.

69- "Speechless" - Dan + Shay (+13) -- Not that great of a week for country as they didn't get too many noticeable rises on this long list of rising song. I'm sure the genre will recover, though. And I wouldn't be upset if "Speechless" became a country hit. It's not particularly great, but it's alright.

76- "Better" - Khalid (+11) -- Khalid can do much better than this. I even totally forgot this song existed and had to relisten to it to determine why I was unimpressed. That's not usually a good sign.

82- "Lost in Japan" - Shawn Mendes & Zedd (+17) -- This song was released back in April, but didn't have a very long chart life, which is strangely unfortunate because the moment Shawn Mendes puts out songs that are actually tolerable is the moment where he can't get a whole lot of traction. But this song is now back because there's this remix with Zedd. Now an upbeat groove from Zedd still doesn't make the lyrics any better, but since they were decently tolerable to begin with, an updated Zedd groove does make the song as a whole better. So if this song becomes a hit, I will be totally happy.

New Arrivals:

15- "Lil Baby & Gunna featuring Drake -- I lied. I don't feel like covering this Lil Baby & Gunna album bomb. If any of these songs gain traction, I'll cover them later. Or if there's any songs that you want me to cover, I'll listen to them and get back to you.

18- "Without Me" - Halsey -- Halsey has always been very hit and miss for me. She has a decent voice and given the right material she's a decent pop singer. But she has a habit of not tapping into that potential by giving a poor vocal performance or putting forth a lazy writing effort. But there's always hope with her. I just never know what Halsey is going to show up when I see a new Halsey song arriving on the charts. The answer is that this is Halsey responding to her very public breakup with G-Eazy, a relationship that seemed destined to fail. I think it's funny that they released that very boring love song "Him & I," but didn't last much longer after that. "Without Me" is certainly better than "Him & I," but that's because there's no G-Eazy in it and Halsey seems like she actually cares. Her vocals are alright in the song and the chorus is decent. But I think there could've been a lot more emotion in the song. She doesn't sound angry or sad. She's just kinda calmly singing about the breakup as if it wasn't that big of a deal, but she felt obligated to write a song about it. If she really was super brokenhearted or upset, she should've done a better job of showing it on the song.

25- "STOOPID" - 6ix9ine featuring Bobby Shmurda -- 6ix9ine probably thinks he's all cool and hip by spelling stupid with two O's instead of a U. But no. It's just... stupid. I don't know why we're still giving this criminal a career instead of ignoring him. But at least his follow-up to "FeFe," titled "BEBE," completely tanked after its debut. Hopefully this does the same because this is classic 6ix9ine trash. He's screaming at us about drugs, sex and killing people. It has a bizarre intro from some artists that sounded super drunk and high. And it features Bobby Shmurda, an artist who is currently in prison. And it sounds like his 10 seconds of song was briefly recorded from prison as it sounds like a muted, recorded phone call inserted in instead of a real verse. Brainless 6ix9ine fans will probably be drooling all over themselves as they desire nothing more than being yelled at about murder from this criminal. But anyone with a brain will rightfully label this is pure garbage.

28- "Close Friends" - Lil Baby -- I lied. I don't feel like covering this Lil Baby & Gunna album bomb. If any of these songs gain traction, I'll cover them later. Or if there's any songs that you want me to cover, I'll listen to them and get back to you.

36- "I'll Never Love Again" - Lady Gaga -- Excuse me while I go bawl my face off. I don't know if anyone ever doubted Lady Gaga's ability to sing, but if they did, I'm sure this song can convince them otherwise because Lady Gaga absolutely belts this song, delivering a powerful ballad that hits you to the core. However, unlike my deep analysis of "Shallow" that I gave up above, I'm not going to elaborate on the context of this one because it's the final number in the movie and doing so would require spoilers. Since there might be people here that have not seen "A Star is Born," I'm going to forgo and tell you to message me if you've seen the movie and want to know why I think this song is so great. Chances are, though, that if you have seen the movie, you probably won't need me to elaborate because, unless you have a heart of stone, this song probably made you bawl your face off, too, and thus will know exactly what I think of this song.

41- "Always Remember Us This Way" - Lady Gaga -- This one I'm able to analyze more because it's another song that falls towards the beginning of the movie rather than the end. And this is the song I call Lady Gaga's "The Man That Got Away" moment. If you've seen the 1954 version of "A Star is Born," you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. If not, go look this up. The song is Judy Garland's moment towards the beginning of the movie where Norman Maine discovers her and she's singing a beautiful moment that does a lot of foreshadowing for the rest of the movie. Now "Always Remember Us This Way" is nowhere near as powerful and strong as "The Man That Got Away." But that's alright. It's an absolutely solid song in its own right that does a great job of capturing the moment like a photograph. Regardless of what happens in the future, Lady Gaga is singing to Bradley Cooper that she's always going to remember them this way. Before the drama that comes with any relationship when they were madly in love and didn't have a care in the world. It's like capturing the Honeymoon phase of a relationship. Given that I'd seen the previous three versions of the movie, when Lady Gaga was singing this, the emotions got to me because I knew how this was going to end. This movie is super deep with a lot of layers and themes to discuss, which is why a song about remembering the simplicity of everything before the storm hits is so powerful.

54- "Off White VLONE" - Lil Baby & Gunna featuring Lil Durk & Nav -- I lied. I don't feel like covering this Lil Baby & Gunna album bomb. If any of these songs gain traction, I'll cover them later. Or if there's any songs that you want me to cover, I'll listen to them and get back to you.

61- "Business is Business" - Lil Baby & Gunna -- I lied. I don't feel like covering this Lil Baby & Gunna album bomb. If any of these songs gain traction, I'll cover them later. Or if there's any songs that you want me to cover, I'll listen to them and get back to you.

63- "Is That Alright?" - Lady Gaga -- I feel kind of embarrassed, but I don't remember this song in the movie. There's three songs that made a super memorable impression on me, "Shallow," "I'll Never Love Again" and "Always Remember Us This Way." The rest of the soundtrack did a great job of propelling the movie forward, but not all of them were the type of song that immediately sticks in your head afterward. That and I hear that there are songs on the soundtrack that didn't make it into the movie, but are still on the soundtrack. I'm not sure which category this belongs to in that, but nevertheless it is a really gorgeous love ballad that Lady Gaga is singing as a tribute to her husband in the movie. It's simple, yet effective. The impressive thing about Lady Gaga's performance in the movie is that when she rose to stardom, she didn't transform into Lady Gaga like I kinda thought she would. She became Ally. And Ally has a different set of music and personality than Lady Gaga does, so it was impressive that Lady Gaga was able to show off her versatility as a musician instead of just slipping into her own comfort zone. We don't often hear love ballads from Lady Gaga on her own albums, but I certainly wouldn't be opposed to her doing more of them.

80- "Belly" - Lil Baby & Gunna -- I lied. I don't feel like covering this Lil Baby & Gunna album bomb. If any of these songs gain traction, I'll cover them later. Or if there's any songs that you want me to cover, I'll listen to them and get back to you.

81- "My Blood" - twenty one pilots -- twenty one pilots released their new album "Trench" and I've been dying to listen to it, but haven't gotten around to it yet. I loved both "Jumpsuit" and "Nico and the Niners," which are the other two charting songs from the album thus far. "My Blood" isn't quite as upbeat and catchy as the two previously mentioned songs, but it does have a subtle groove to it that keeps me interested throughout. The voice of the song is a person speaking to someone, telling them that they don't need to run. Apparently there's a lot of theories out there about who Tyler is talking to or if it's even Tyler talking. A common Instagram theory is that the voice is Tyler's brother speaking to Tyler, which makes a lot of sense. But the song is mysterious and vague enough that it leaves it open for interpretation. It also feels like a smaller fragment to a greater whole. Thus I don't know how well this song really works on its own, but if it's a key part to the story of the album, then I'm totally cool with that. I just need to listen to the album itself to see how this all plays out and how this song fits it. So I suppose I'll get back to you on that if any of these twenty pilot songs gain traction, which I really hope they do. Although I'm not super confident.

93- "Maybe It's Time" - Bradley Cooper -- I really like Bradley Cooper's songs in this movie. As I said in my main review on my other blog, one of the many impressive things about Bradley Cooper in this movie, in front and behind the camera, is that his main profession is not a musician, but an actor and filmmaker. Now I don't know how much prior experience he has in the music world, but I was impressed by the final result. If I played his rock songs to you blindly, without telling you who is singing and where they're from, there's a good chance that you'd be impressed and would ask me which band this is because they sound profession. This song is one that Bradley Cooper plays in the movie when the girls at the club ask him to sing something, in which Lady Gaga walks in mid-song and is very impressed. It's not a rock song, but rather has more of a country vibe. Maybe country pop. But it's a simple stripped back song with just Bradley Cooper and his guitar where he gets to show off his vocals. While watching the movie, the lyrics here didn't jump off the page at me, but looking at them afterwards, this is a pretty good song, talking about how nobody knows what waits for the dead, how nobody speaks to God anymore and a suggestion that maybe it's time to let the old ways die. If we're classifying this officially as country, this is certainly way better than most actual country singers that chart here, so props to Bradley Cooper for that.

97- "Deep End" - Lil Baby -- I lied. I don't feel like covering this Lil Baby & Gunna album bomb. If any of these songs gain traction, I'll cover them later. Or if there's any songs that you want me to cover, I'll listen to them and get back to you.

98- "I Am" - Lil Baby & Gunna -- I lied. I don't feel like covering this Lil Baby & Gunna album bomb. If any of these songs gain traction, I'll cover them later. Or if there's any songs that you want me to cover, I'll listen to them and get back to you.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - October 13, 2018

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! In this weekly post, I cover three sections. First, I give my thoughts on the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100. Second, I give my thoughts on the songs that experienced significant gains below the top 10. Third, I give my initial thoughts on our new arrivals this week. I reserve the right to switch things up in the future, but for now this is what I'm sticking with. I've followed the Billboard charts for a long time now and this is a great way for me to express my thoughts to the world. I hope you enjoy!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B (=) -- I'm mad at Lil Wayne right now. He has a huge album bomb with "Tha Carter V," tying Drake's record with 22 new songs on the Hot 100, while also becoming the first artist to debut two songs in the top five (he also ties Drake with four debuts in the top 10), but among all of that, he CAN'T manage to steal the top spot from Maroon 5. Adam Levine and his pretend band have the radio to thank for this one as the song charts the radio charts for the 11th straight week. The song is No. 8 on sales and No. 19 on streaming. So SOMETHING is going to top this soon, because that radio is slowly declining. But what? For now the song celebrates its third week on top after spending 14 weeks between No. 2 and No. 4 prior to that.

2- "Mona Lisa" - Lil Wayne featuring Kendrick Lamar (new) -- Lots of Lil Wayne down below, so I'll keep this brief. Lil Wayne teams up with Kendrick, which he actually did like four years ago, but could never release the song due to legal issues. The timing is certainly helpful to Lil Wayne's chart success with this song as four years ago there was no way in Hades that this song would come anywhere close to debuting at No. 2. But Kendrick got it there. The song itself isn't that good. Both of these artists are capable of a lot better. But I'll easily take it over most everything else rap related in 2018.

3- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (-1) -- With Lil Wayne dominating the charts, I'm not sure exactly what Juice WRLD's numbers are this week, but I'd take a guess that this has a shot at jumping up to No. 1 because "Girls Like You" is sliding quite a bit while "Lucid Dreams" is at the least remaining consistent. Will it get to No. 1 next week? I hope so.

4- "Better Now" - Post Malone (-1) -- Post Malone is also a good candidate to jump up on the charts. I don't think he has enough momentum to sneak past Juice WRLD, but I could see Maroon 5 falling below both of these songs. Although Post Malone did just barely release his music video for this song last Friday. I don't know if the view count thus far is enough to push it ahead (it has around 9 million overall, but Billboard only counts U.S. views in their formula), but that might give it a decent boost.

5- "Don't Cry" - Lil Wayne featuring XXXTENTACION (new) -- The second new Lil Wayne song. And this is the most frustrating song because XXXTENTACION was added to this song AFTER his death rather then this being something pre-planned prior to him getting shot. So this was done solely to cash in on X's death to get more streams and sales.

6- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (=) -- With two new Lil Wayne songs debuting ahead of this, this song staying equal from last week is a bad thing. That means it's the fourth highest charting song not from Lil Wayne, which means this has a chance to jump into the top five next week when Lil Wayne falls.

7- "Uproar" - Lil Wayne (new) -- Out of the four songs that debuted in the top 10 this week, this is the best of the bunch. It's nothing super special, but if this was pushed as the actual single from this album once everything falls after the album, I would totally accept that. Better this than other songs that have charted.

8- "Youngblood" - 5 Seconds of Summer (+2) -- This was great news for me this week. There's only two songs that ROSE on the Hot 100 this week and "Youngblood" was one of them. Jumping two spots when Lil Wayne debuted three songs ahead of it means that this is the fifth highest charting song not from Lil Wayne. Could it jump to the top five next week? I hope so!

9- "In My Feelings" - Drake (-5) -- It brings me much joy to see that Lil Wayne destroyed Drake this week. This song was losing momentum pretty quickly, so it was probably on its way out regardless. But Lil Wayne seems to have pushed it out the door. And that's great because the world could use less Drake at the moment. I wouldn't be surprised to see this stick around next week if the three Lil Wayne songs all fall out, but I would be ecstatic if this was in fact this song's final week in the charts.

10- "Let It Fly" - Lil Wayne featuring Travis Scott (new) -- Don't let the "Lil Wayne featuring Travis Scott" thing fool you as this is more of a Travis Scott featuring Lil Wayne. And Travis Scott's portion is awful and annoying. More on that below. But can we take a minute and celebrate the fact that Lil Wayne debuting four songs in the top 10 this week means that he pushed out "I Like It" by Cardi B, "I Love It" by Kanye West, "Killshot" by Eminem and "FeFe" by 6ix9ine? What a solid purge! Granted, some of those songs unfortunately might be back. But not "Killshot" or "I Love It." Both of those songs tanked hard. For the sake of curiosity, had Lil Wayne not debuted this week, No. 7  would be "I Like It" by Cardi B, No. 8 would be "FeFe" by 6ix9ine, No. 9 would be "Happier" by Marshmello & Bastille and No. 10 would be "Taste" by Tyga. That is, those are the next four highest charting songs on the Hot 100 not by Lil Wayne.

Rising on the Hot 100:

13- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille (+2) -- Yup. Only one song in the rising songs section of this week. And I'm pretty happy that it's Marshmello and Bastille. In fact, this song and "Youngblood" are the only two songs that rose at all this week. And as I just said above, "Happier" is the ninth highest charting song this week not by Lil Wayne. That means it has a solid shot at sliding into the top 10 next week. It would be a welcome entry to a top 10 that's struggled mightily in 2018 to provide us with quality.

New Arrivals:

2- "Mona Lisa" - Lil Wayne featuring Kendrick Lamar -- Before we begin this venture into Lil Wayne's new album "Tha Carter V," allow me to give my quick thoughts on Lil Wayne. For me he's a rapper who simply exists. He's like a chameleon who blends into his background in that he can be as good or as bad as whoever he is collaborating with that day. Honestly I don't hate his sound or his style as there have been plenty of songs where he's featured on where I think he's done an excellent job fitting in. Honestly I really love his parts on David Guetta's "I Can Only Imagine" as well as Kevin Rudolph's "Let It Rock." He can also drop in on other pop songs and fit in well as the featured rapper in the third verse. But then he'll have no qualms jumping in with Nicki Minaj and doing something as disgusting and perverse as "Rich Sex" from earlier this year. In fact, he has no qualms singing about anything or singing with anyone as he's a quantity over quality sort of guy. His 22 new songs this week puts his all time Hot 100 entries count up to 166 songs, which is third all-time behind Glee Cast (207) and Drake (188). So when you do THAT many songs and you're not inherently annoying with your voice or style, every once in a while something's gotta show up that's at least tolerable, right?

Onto the album, though. Which, by the way, this is my first time listening to an actual Lil Wayne album, so don't ask me how it compares to his previous albums. I have no idea. This song is one that intrigued me for the sole purpose that Kendrick Lamar is a featured artist. I figure if Kendrick is with Lil Wayne, then there's potential there. And, well, the rap is good from both parties. If you play this in a room as background music, I'll be able to tolerate it, which is a step above most rap these days. But this is a really long song where Lil Wayne and Kendrick are telling some sort of story about a mysterious girl. I tried to keep up with it, but I got lost as both of them just seemed to wander on a lot longer than they really needed to and I never fully understood what the point was here. So this is a song that just kinda exists, much like most of Lil Wayne's career, which is disappointing in the sense that Kendrick is capable of doing stuff that is super deep, personal and interesting. But I just got bored this time around. Do we chalk this up to the song being recorded several years ago? I don't know. But I wonder how different this would've been if it was recorded earlier in the year.

5- "Don't Cry" - Lil Wayne featuring XXXTENTACION -- How many more songs from XXXTENTACION are we going to get? If he has more songs that he was planning on releasing, then I think that's just fine. But this is an instance where I'm annoyed because X's part was added to this song AFTER he passed away. That feels like they were trying to feed off X's death to boost their sales, which I think is pathetic. Not Lil Wayne's fault, though. Apparently he didn't even know who X was when people came to him with X's part, suggesting to include it, so they did. And if it weren't for that verse from X, maybe I could tolerate this like I do "Mona Lisa," but said chorus is super annoying and loud. It feels like it was attached afterwards to use X's death to boost the song's sales. Lil Wayne's part, which is 95 percent of the song, is alright. But I watched Lil Wayne's interview with Jimmy Fallon where he talks about his writing process. And his process is that he doesn't write his music. He goes into the studio and raps about what is on his mind. With "Don't Cry," it feels like there was a lot on his mind the day he recorded this and there's no real focus as he's just bouncing around about various subjects that trouble him. Certain portions of those lyrics I found interesting. But the song as a whole isn't interesting and it's made worse by X's annoying chorus.

7- "Uproar" - Lil Wayne -- Wikipedia seems to think that this is the first single from "Tha Carter V." I tried searching to verify that beyond Wikipedia, but couldn't find anything. If that's true and this sticks around beyond the album bomb this week, I suppose I'll be fine with that. This is simple song that sounds like it was recorded live in concert. I'm kinda thinking it wasn't and that the crowd noises were added afterwards for the effect of it. That combined with the instrumentals from Swizz Beat make this a catchy song if you ignore the lyrics. And Lil Wayne doesn't destroy the vibe with his lyrics, but he also doesn't bring much to the table as this seems like it was intended as a simple party banger. In that context, it kinda works, so I'm going to say this song is totally fine, even though it's nothing super special.

10- "Let It Fly" - Lil Wayne featuring Travis Scott -- Our fourth song that debuted in the top five feels more like a Travis Scott song that features Lil Wayne as it's all Travis Scott until just under two minutes in when Lil Wayne finally decides to come in on his own song, that barely tops three minutes. So its a two-thirds Travis, one-third Lil Wayne ratio here. In that light, Travis Scott is a useless, untalented rapper going along with all of today's modern rapping trends that bug me. His part is nothing but bragging about money, fame, drugs and everything that goes with that. Thrown in there are a lot of echoes that drive me crazy. Thankfully Lil Wayne comes and saves me from Travis Scott as his verse at the end is at least void of all the echoes. But he doesn't really add anything. It sounds like he recorded a quick verse for a Travis Scott song where he put no effort into. He repeats the word mind a lot in his verse, adding a whole bunch of rhyming words to go along with, thus creating a near endless stream of I sounds. That was kind of annoying. But less annoying than everything with Travis Scott.

14- "Dedicate" - Lil Wayne -- Here's a song where Lil Wayne decides to pat himself on the back a bit. He samples a 2 Chainz song where 2 Chainz is praising Lil Wayne. The song also ends with a sample of a 2009 Barak Obama speech where Obama says that we can't all be LeBron or Lil Wayne. In other words, Lil Wayne is emphasizing his dominance and influence on the rap game while seemingly throwing shade at Migos. Not only is the song structured like a Migos song, with short, simple phrases (though thankfully without the echoes and sound effects), but there's a direct reference to "Walk It Talk It" by Migos. But whether Lil Wayne is throwing shade specifically at Migos or simply other rappers in general, he's seems to be trying to put them in their place by reminding them how much better and more influential he is than them. And it kinda works. But I got more distracted with how many s-words he dropped in the second and third verses. Since I listened to the clean version of the album, there was a lot of empty, censored spaces which I think made the flow of the song crash. But his bragging felt like it actually had a bit of weight to it. More so than most other rappers who spend all their time bragging. So take that for what its worth.

17- "Can't Be Broken" - Lil Wayne -- In dedicate, I felt that Lil Wayne's bragging had a bit of weight to it. This song feels the same as "Dedicate," but with less weight to his bragging. Although it's more of him saying you can't break what can't be broken. In other words, his haters aren't going to bring him down. But his two verses sound more like him rambling incoherently and it doesn't feel like he's responding to anything specifically, but rather is simply just talking about the subject for the heck of it. The verses are separated with a chorus that sounds like it was from the Chipmunks. I think it's a high pitch voice filter and the singer is Thomas Troelsen given the uncredited vocals, who helped write and produce the song. It's super distracting.

24- "What About Me" - Lil Wayne featuring Sosamann -- Initially this was supposed to be a Drake feature, but that fell through last second, so whoever Sosamann is, he got put on instead. I could've looked up who Sosamann is, but I don't really care since his verse is more of an afterthought anyways, just repeating almost verbatim what Lil Wayne says on his verse and chorus. But this song is actually pretty decent. Lil Wayne is sad that his girl is spending more time with another guy instead of spending time with him. The song is a bit overly simplistic as there's not a whole lot of depth or details on exactly what's going on or who this is about, but it's a slower song from Lil Wayne that almost sounds more like a lamenting pop ballad instead of a rap song, so I kinda like it.

26- "Dark Side of the Moon" - Lil Wayne featuring Nicki Minaj -- Of course there has to be a collaboration with Nicki on this album. And I was bracing for the worst because every time these two get together, it's usually to rap about a bunch of dirty nonsense. So why should this be any different? Thus you can imagine my surprise when this also wasn't a rap song. No rapping from either Lil Wayne or Nicki. This is a pop love ballad. I don't think this really them singing to each other, but they have great chemistry and it's a fairly sweet love ballad, even though I'm not sure what the purpose of the backdrop being an apocalypse where the world seems to be getting destroyed. I guess they're going for more of a "our love is intergalactic" sort of thing. Regardless of what happens, they'll always be together. As pertaining to Nicki, I've always said that I hate her rap, but when she delves into pop, she's a pretty good pop singer. She sounds a bit like Rihanna or Beyonce in this song as she has some great vocals. I'm trying to come up with negatives for this song, because I was ready to destroy it, but I think any complaints here are more superficial. It make take a while to truly sink in, but I think this is an excellent love ballad. Well done, Lil Wayne. 

27- "Take Taki" - DJ Snake featuring Selena Gomez, Ozuna & Cardi B -- There's three new arrivals this week that aren't Lil Wayne. This is the first of the bunch. I'm not surprised at all to see this song here as the lyric video was trending on YouTube for a while and the official video debuted two days ago. According to numbers by Kworb, it was the music video on YouTube with the most views in the last 24 hours, so there's good potential for it jump next week. Although in terms of YouTube, since Ozuna is part of the song, and DJ Snake has a pretty solid worldwide audience, a lot of those views won't count towards its Hot 100 streaming numbers as Billboard only takes into play U.S. YouTube totals. Pertaining to the song itself, Selena has been on fire for me of late, so I was excited when I saw it for that reason. But since this is more of a group thing, I don't blame Selena at all for this not being that great of a song. Don't get me wrong, DJ Snake has a great beat and since most of the song is Spanish, I can play the "I don't understand the lyrics" card here. But then Cardi comes in singing in English and her verse is trash while Selena's isn't a whole lot better, so I had to make myself accountable and look up the lyrics because I assumed the worst with Ozuna and I was right. This is super dirty and there's a line where Ozuna says "Your booty blows up like Nagasaki." If that's translated right, that's an awful thing to say. So I can't sleep well at night giving this a positive not. It's an awful song with a catchy beat.

28- "Shallow" - Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper -- Welcome to the Hot 100, Bradley Cooper! The acclaimed actor has a lot of excellent accolades on his resume and now he gets to add Billboard Hot 100 artist on that. This, of course, comes from the movie "A Star is Born," which Bradley Cooper directed in addition to starring. In fact, it's his directorial debut. And it's certain to get showered with all sorts of Oscar nominations, probably taking home a few. This will be an easy candidate for best original song at said ceremony. However, I have a confession to make. I have not seen the movie. The reason being is that I want to watch the three previous versions first so that I can do my due diligence in how this movie compares. I've now seen the 1937 and the 1954 versions. Once I get around to watching the 1972 version, it's off to the theater shortly thereafter. As such, I'm avoiding this soundtrack because I want to be introduced to the songs in the movie. Yes, I've listened to this song. It's the one they use in the trailer. And it's great. Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga play off each other well. Many props to Bradley Cooper for doing a solid effort himself when musician is not his career path. But I don't want to fully judge this song until I know the exact context of how the movie uses it. So get back to me in future weeks on this Billboard Analysis to see my full thoughts on the song. I sincerely apologize for that.

36- "Famous" - Lil Wayne featuring Reginae Carter -- I don't know much about Lil Wayne's personal life. I knew his name is Dwayne Carter. That's about it. So Reginae Carter must be a family member. And yeah, it is. It's his daughter. I had no idea he had a daughter. And she's... 19 years old? Wait a minute, how old is Lil Wayne? Oh, he's 36. I guess that makes sense since he's been around for a while. Anyways, Reginae is used as the pop chorus for this song and I think it's kinda cool that he collaborated with her. She's not given much to work with. Just a simple chorus that's repeated and not much in terms of lyrical content. But she has a nice voice. The song itself is not that interesting. Just Lil Wayne talking about being and all that entails. It has more depth than your typical rapper bragging about being famous, and the second verse here is pretty good. But overall not super interesting.

39- "Dope N-----" - Lil Wayne featuring Snoop Dogg -- I was initially intrigued about a Lil Wayne and Snoop Dogg collaboration. Until I thought that it was probably going to be nothing more than both of them rapping about smoking weed, then I became less excited. Although the final result is fine because both of them are competent rappers. I was surprised that this isn't a weed-smoking song, although it's referenced several times by both. However, I was more surprised at the fact that Snoop Dogg is barely in this song. He gets a quick chorus that is repeated twice and that was it. If you're going to bring Snoop Dogg in, at least give him a full verse to work with. I mean, Lil Wayne gave his daughter more time in their song than he gave Snoop Dogg in this song. The song is another song about Lil Wayne being famous and influential while being grateful he's not broke. I'm getting tired of this theme.

47- "Open Letter" - Lil Wayne -- What I gather from this song is that Lil Wayne woke up one day and the thought crossed his mind about what if he got shot and killed? So he wrote a goodbye letter to life. And I like how personal he gets as he contemplates what his purpose of life is and concludes at some point that he mainly wants to be a good father. And I appreciate that. In fact, on this album, "Open Letter" comes right before his collaboration with his daughter, so that's a good segway. But I'm not often a fan of the one giant verse structure, which is what this song. It gets to the point where I feels like he's just rambling as he dumps a whole bunch of thoughts about life into one giant verse instead of having a more interesting structure. And that does lead to him getting lost a bit in the song. But I do appreciate the emotion and genuine nature of this song.

56- "If I'm Lyin, I'm Flyin" - Kodak Black -- So the reason why we haven't seen much of Kodak Black this year is because he spent from January through August in prison. Police raided his home in January, arresting him for possession of marijuana, child neglect and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon after an Instagram video showed him with marijuana around his child. The latter two charges got dropped and he was able to get out early after he was initially supposed to spend a year in prison. But he's not off the hook yet as he's still waiting trial for sexual assault charges from October 2017. While he was gone, I certainly didn't miss him. He wasn't a talented rapper at all. This song here is his "I just got released from prison" song where he says prison changed him as God visited him and told him that he's gifted. Then he also goes on and talks about running out of money, loyalty, drugs and all that. For Kodak Black standards, this is certainly not the worst he's done. It's semi-tolerable. I just don't buy any of it. It seems superficial. If seven months in prison truly changed him, then let's see him prove it with his actions going forward rather than simply writing a quick obligatory song.

57- "Problems" - Lil Wayne -- One of the least interesting songs on this album so far. Lil Wayne spends a lot of time mumbling on this song as this sounds like a recording session where he was more bored with less interesting things to say, so he just talked about being rich and famous again. He also talks about the "problems" with being too rich, which in this case is more rubbing it in people's faces who aren't as rich as he is and that's dumb. This song also has a lot less structure to it, so not only does it sound like him lazily rambling on, it sounds quite messy, too.

59- "Hittas" - Lil Wayne -- Unlike "Problems," "Hittas" is a song that has more of a structure to it and less mumbling. It sounds like he tried to to create an actual song here. But what he didn't do was create lyrics that make any sense. I think the main idea is him doing more bragging about riches, but he goes in so many different directions that I don't even know what this song is about.

62- "Open Safe" - Lil Wayne -- I'm beginning to think that the deeper we get into this album, the less interesting content that there's going to be, which is certainly proving to be the case with these last few songs. Rappers really need to figure out that a 10-12 track album is often much more effective than a 20+ track album. Because with the latter, you often have so many tracks like this that are completely pointless and will probably never be listened to again by anyone and probably never performed at all by Lil Wayne. The beat in this song is interesting, but the song feels really long because Lil Wayne just has no good flow or emotion here and he has nothing interesting to say outside the usual cliche rap stuff with money, fame, girls, etc. that rappers automatically turn to when they have nothing else to rap about.

65- "Took His Time" - Lil Wayne -- The chorus in this song has a nice idea in it. Lil Wayne is referencing his mother again, as the album opens with a recording from his mother about how much she loves him. In "Took His Time," Lil Wayne states that "Momma said that God took his time when He made me." Now if only he were able to craft a song around that idea, perhaps focusing on his mother or something like that. But then he gets to the verses and drones on in mostly monotone about a whole slew of random things that have little or nothing to do with the songs itself. So I guess this wasn't one of Lil Wayne's best or most productive days in the studio when he conjured up this one.

74- "Mess" - Lil Wayne -- Unfortunately this word is a great word to describe the second half of this album this far. A mess. However, this song is a slight improvement over the last four songs from Lil Wayne. There's several times where he turns things up a notch in terms of the speed of his rap, which is pretty impressive, showing that he does have talent. But ultimately this mostly represents a bad day in the office for Lil Wayne as he laments about how his life is a mess and nothing seems to be going right. Which doesn't seem like an accurate portrayal of his life, but maybe it was a great portrayal of that specific day when he wrote this song. I don't know if all of his complaints feel super genuine and I kinda got bored of listening to him ramble on about how miserable his life is. Some of the things he complains about also make him sound a bit arrogant rather than me feeling bad that life isn't going well for him.

75- "Let It All Work Out" - Lil Wayne -- I'm not sure what to do with this song. The beat and the flow are alright, but each of the three verses are drastically different. The first verse is more boring bragging from Lil Wayne. For some reason he keeps thinking that the world is out to get him and he has so many haters that he needs to keep addressing them in each song to establish his dominance. In reality, I don't think he has that many haters. In the rap world I feel like he's one of the more well liked and well respected rappers, so all this nonsense of him attacking his haters feels empty unless he spends his days looking up mean tweets on Twitter. The second verse just kinda exists. Nothing awful. Nothing special. Then out of no where on the third verse he talks about the time he tried committing suicide when he was 12, but failed. And that was really good. But I would've rather had him put that in the forefront of the song and construct the lyrics around that instead of burying it towards the end of a five minute song. Although after he talks about his attempted suicide, he says that God came to him and made him a prophet. I rolled my eyes at that.

76- "Start This S--- off Right" - Lil Wayne featuring Ashanti & Mack Maine -- For some reason I feel like this should be the opening track of this album. Because, you know, the title. I feel this song was written to be a single from the album as I could see this being a popular club banger if it was promoted. Although maybe I shouldn't give Lil Wayne and his team any ideas because this is a garbage song to me. An empty club banger full of Lil Wayne talking about drugs and fame while bragging about his lavish lifestyle. Mack Maine starts us off with a swear-fest if listening to random people curse a lot gives you a rise while Ashanti is essentially used as nothing more than a backup singer with a quick chorus or two as a nice courtesy. So yeah, everything about this song is trash.

78- "Used 2" - Lil Wayne -- This album is so long that not even Lil Wayne fans will remember half of these songs. This is one that comes in right towards the end of the album and it seems like it's only there as an afterthought. A song Lil Wayne randomly recorded one day, but didn't put much effort into it, yet for some reason decided to throw it in for the heck of it to fill space. He kinda talks about things he used to do in the past and how he's evolved, but that's mostly on the chorus. On the verses I feel he just got distracted and wandered on through various subjects in a rather lazy way. I don't know why this is here. It'll be completely forgotten in a week or two.

81- "Demon" - Lil Wayne -- Rappers rapping about their demons always has a lot of potential because it requires them to dive deep into their soul and make themselves a little vulnerable. However, I was really disappointed to discover that Lil Wayne doesn't really talk about his demons on this song. There's one generic verse that's not really about anything and that verse is repeated twice. The rest of the song is filled with Lil Wayne repeating over and over that he's got demons on demand, but never really elaborates. It's as if someone told him to rap about his demons, so he tried, but came up completely blank as he had no idea what to say. So this song feels especially empty.

86- "Perfect Strangers" - Lil Wayne -- Unlike most of our recent songs, this is a song where it feels like Lil Wayne actually tried to make a decent song instead of lazily pumping out something dumb and generic. The song is constructed decently and the flow is nice. But the content mostly makes me roll my eyes. Lil Wayne is sad about his girl being gone, which is totally fine. But most of the rest of the song he's talking about all these other girls he's always with, not ever really knowing who they are as they're essentially just a string of one-night stands or something like that. It presents a side of the rapping industry that I find a bit disgraceful as a part of their lavish lifestyle. So I found myself having a hard time caring about the song as a whole.

90- "Dope New Gospel" - Lil Wayne featuring Nivea -- It's the final Lil Wayne song. We made it! And if you read all of this, then thank you very much. I really appreciate it. If you didn't, that's alright, too. It's a whole lot to cover and to read. I wish these rappers would learn to cut their albums in half by making 10-12 track albums instead of 20+ track albums. It might force them to be concise and focused, including only their best efforts as opposed to filling the album with a bunch of random filler just so that they can pad their sales and streaming numbers. But am I really surprised that money is the sole focus here with a lot of them since that's all they ever talk about? And I'm sorry. Lil Wayne has his moments on this album, but there's just way too much album and most of it is forgettable filler like this final song. It's just Lil Wayne padding his ego again by telling himself how awesome he is while making a whole bunch of Michael Jackson references, which always gets on my nerves. "I'm bad like Michael" is a phrase that we should just retire and never use again in any song or any genre. But yet Lil Wayne goes there, also calling himself the best rapper in the world. Yeah, I'll take a pass on this song. I'm also taking a pass on the album as a whole. Sorry if that hurts your feelings.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - October 6, 2018

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! In this weekly post, I cover three sections. First, I give my thoughts on the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100. Second, I give my thoughts on the songs that experienced significant gains below the top 10. Third, I give my initial thoughts on our new arrivals this week. I reserve the right to switch things up in the future, but for now this is what I'm sticking with. I've followed the Billboard charts for a long time now and this is a great way for me to express my thoughts to the world. I hope you enjoy!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B (=) -- Adam Levine gets a second week at No. 1 thanks to the deal he made with the Devil. Recently I went on a kick of listening to a lot of Maroon 5's old music after someone asked me why I didn't like this song. I miss that Maroon 5. If you want to know why I don't like "Girls Like You," just go listen to "Harder to Breathe," "This Love," "She Will Be Loved" or really anything from their 2002 album "Songs About Jane." Then go back and listen to "Girls Like You." That will tell you everything you need to know. But yet because we live in 2018, this song has now been No. 1 on the radio charts for 10 weeks now and it's not letting up. It's down 2 percent in overall chart points, though, because streaming and sales are bleeding pretty badly. The question becomes will the radio for "Girls Like You" be strong enough to outlast the streaming of "Lucid Dreams"? Because, as you now know, Drake disappeared from that No. 2 spot, meaning Maroon 5 has a new competitor in the runner up spot.

2- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (+2) -- I figured Juice WRLD would jump up one spot to No. 3 since Eminem was set to drop after debuting at No. 3 next week. But I didn't think it would also jump ahead of Drake to get to the No. 2 spot. In terms of overall chart points, while "Girls Like You" fell 2 percent, "Lucid Dreams" gained 5 percent. I don't know how much of a margin there is left, but it's worth noting that "Lucid Dreams" has nearly double the amount of streaming than "Girls Like You" does while "Girls Like You" in turn has about double the amount of sales and radio than "Lucid Dreams." So it's a big question of how much does streaming count in Billboard's formula that will determine if or when "Lucid Dreams" claims the crown. Helping "Lucid Dreams" is that said radio is climbing pretty high as it's No. 9 on the radio charts, which includes it being No. 10 on pop radio, which is why its been able to stick around for so long and now contend for the top spot, despite being in its 20th week on the Hot 100.

3- "Better Now" - Post Malone (+2) -- Not only did "In My Feelings" fall past "Lucid Dreams," but I was also surprised to see it fall past "Better Now," which means we have a bit of a revitalized top three with these two songs. I'm fine with that. Neither song is necessarily a masterpiece, and "Lucid Dreams" is way better than "Better Now," but both of these songs are acceptable. I'm totally fine with them acting as placeholders until we have something better coming around. Now we just need to get that Maroon 5 song out of the top spot and all will be better in the world.

4- "In My Feelings" - Drake (-2) -- It was rather therapeutic watching the floor fall out from under Drake this week because I was expecting it to hang out at No. 2 for several more weeks before slowly sliding down the charts. But now it appears its fall will be expedited, which is a great thing because we've had way too much Drake in 2018.

5- "Killshot" - Eminem (-2) -- I rather confidently declared that this song was going to tank this week, because that's what usually happens to big debuts, especially ones from Eminem as he's not been able to get any of his songs to stick on the charts. Even most of the songs from "Kamikaze" are mostly gone. But I was a little surprised to see this only fall two spots instead of completely tanking. I guess it had enough residual streaming from its huge numbers last week. At that lyric video on YouTube for the song has gone crazy. But for this to gain real traction, it's going to need to get radio and radio doesn't usually touch diss tracks like this, so I'm expecting to see this song continue to drop. And as much as I want something from Eminem to stick, this isn't the one I want around. Let's bring back "Lucky You" or "The Ringer" instead.

6- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (+3) -- I'm not sure what to think here. None of these next four songs are any good, so I suppose the order doesn't really matter. I'll take this over "FeFe" and "I Love It," I suppose. But I still would've preferred for this song to go away instead of jumping three spots.

7- "I Like It" - Cardi B, Bad Bunny & J Balvin (-1) -- It's good to see that, not only is Drake bleeding, but so is Cardi B. This was at No. 6 last week and I thought it was going to sneak back into the top five with the departure of Eminem. But not only did Eminem not leave, Cardi B fell a spot, which means that this song is really weak right now. And that's great because it's been here for way too long. Although Cardi's feelings probably aren't hurt since she's tagged onto that Maroon 5 spot, which is currently No. 1. But still, I'm glad that we're getting rid of one of her songs.

8- "FeFe" - 6ix9ine featuring Nicki Minaj & Murda Beatz (=) -- This song can't fall fast enough. In fact, it didn't fall at all. It just camped here at No. 8 while the other songs around it switched places. Why we let 6ix9ine into the top 10 in the first place still baffles. Why we let him stick around for so long is even more baffling.

9- "I Love It" - Kanye West & Lil Pump (-2) -- I was going to just repeat what I said last week. "Why is Kanye West's Pornhub anthem still here?" And that question remains true for this week as well. Why is this still here? But at least it dropped two spots, so there's hope that this will continue its downward progression instead of sticking around.

10- "Youngblood" - 5 Seconds of Summer (=) -- I'm glad to see that this song stuck around this week. But it would be great if this at least jumped ahead of the four songs above it that don't seem to have a whole lot of strength. Heck, I certainly wouldn't be upset if this jumped ahead of everything in front of it. 

Rising on the Hot 100:

13- "Falling Down" - Lil Peep & XXXTENTACION (+34) -- I'm crediting this to this song's huge gain this week to its first full week of tracking. And I hope that it has a huge drop in its second full week. The original song, "Sunlight On Your Skin," is a pretty good song. Go listen to it. The remix with X is significantly worse. Plus, word is that Lil Peep never wanted to work with X, so nothing like honoring the memory of both artists by releasing a song that would've never happened if they were both still alive, right?

15- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille (+16) -- Oh hey, welcome to the top 15 Bastille and Marshmello. Although my quick investigation into why this song jumped up 16 spots revealed that an official music video was just released, so that makes sense as to why this got so high this week. That means it might experience a bit of a dip next week. But I'll happily accept being wrong because I would love to see this in the top 10.

18- "Trip" - Ella Mai (+3) -- Ella Mai sneaking up the charts, hoping to get her second top 10. Meanwhile, I'm hoping this stalls out in the teens because I really don't care for this.

24- "New Patek" - Lil Uzi Vert (+14) -- Why is this going up this week? Because apparently people drool all over themselves listening to Lil Uzi mumble about all of his new watches and jewelry.

31- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes (+11) -- I think I'm getting convinced that this is continuing to gain momentum because the title of the song and the artist are pretty cool names. A dude named Sheck Wes writing a song called "Mo Bamba" should be an awesome song. But no. It's a piece of trash. Which is I guess why people like it.

46- "High Hopes" - Panic! At the Disco (+10) -- After a string of trash, at least there's one thing to be happy about. Give us a glimmer of hope. I can only hope that this continues to gain traction, because imagine this song all over the radio and on the top of the charts. That would be glorious!

53- "You Say" - Lauren Daigle (+11) -- Hey look, a second good song in a row! This song has had an interesting month or so on the charts. It keeps bouncing up and down the charts. Thus I have no idea what it's actually going to do each week, but if it can continue an upward motion, that would be really nice.

62- "Lie" - NF (+11) -- I wish I cared more about this song from NF because I've liked some of his stuff from the recent past. This song is more forgettable than anything. But I'll still take it over most of the other rap rising on the charts right now.

77- "Speechless" - Dan + Shay (+10) -- A much better effort from Dan + Shay than their recent hit "Tequila." A simple wedding song about them being speechless after seeing their brides walk down the isle. It still doesn't quite connect with me, though. The instrumentation doesn't quite fit the lyrics. I would've preferred a more stripped back piano ballad instead of the typical heavy drums and guitars that make it feel like they got lazy in constructing the song.

81- "Leave Me Alone" - Flipp Dinero (+15) -- I can barely remember this song and it was just last week when I covered it. An untalented rapper with an annoying voice whining about life. But of course it's going to become a hit.

83- "Noticed" - Lil Mosey (+17) -- I learned since last week that Lil Mosey is a 16-year-old kid. No wonder his song sucks. Now lets push him off the charts and encourage him to go back to school and get an education. At least finish high school. Otherwise he's going to drop out of school and be a punk idiot the rest of his life, writing awful rap music that makes it sound like he stopped paying attention in school shortly after leaving elementary school. That's not what we want, do we?

86- "Best Shot" - Jimmie Allen (+11) -- Almost a good song from Jimmie Allen. Certainly better than a lot of country songs that pass through these charts. I like his vocals, his genuine sounding nature, and his more simple-sounding music. I just wish there was a bit more substance in the lyrics because this is about as basic as it gets.

New Arrivals:

47- "No Stylist" - French Montana featuring Drake -- I almost forgot that French Montana was a thing. He's only shown up once this year and that was with 500 other people back in June on that "Welcome to the Party" song that I bet you already forgot about. I can guarantee you that the only reason he made an appearance with this song is because he conned Drake into joining him. Not that it's that hard to do. Drake is one of those losers that will lazily jump on a song with anyone, regardless of how talented they are, just so that he can keep adding more zeros to his paycheck. And that's all that he's doing here. Drake delivers one lazy verse where it sounds like he put no effort into and that's surrounded by French Montana bragging about all of his new fancy jewelry that he's wearing. That's literally it. The song doesn't necessarily grate at my ears, but it's one of the more lackluster, empty rap songs that I've heard lately. I don't know how people can be a fan of empty nonsense like this.

64- "Head Above Water" - Avril Lavigne -- I've loved Avril Lavigne ever since she started releasing music in the early 2000's. She's always had a unique style and a fun, energetic personality that is super contagious in her music. We haven't had an Avril Lavigne album since her self-titled album in 2013, meaning that she's had a five year hiatus from music. Since that album, the only song she's released was a 2015 single for the Special Olympics titled "Fly." When artists I like go on a hiatus after album releases, I don't often follow their story. I just wait patiently for whenever they have new music for me to listen to. And thus is the case here. I haven't followed what has happened to Avril Lavigne since 2013, but when I saw this lyric video trending two weeks ago on YouTube, I immediately listened to it and was blown away by the raw and emotion and power behind it. After then researching the story behind it, I learned that in the last five years, Avril Lavigne has been fighting a serious case of Lyme Disease, which had her so weak at times that she spent the good majority of two years in bed. There were plenty of moments during that where she was so weak that she honestly thought that she was going to die and even had accepted death. She shared one of those moments recently on her website, wherein she states:

"One night, I thought I was dying, and I had accepted that I was going to die. My mom laid with me in bed and held me. I felt like I was drowning. Under my breath, I prayed, 'God, please help to keep my head above water.' In that moment, the song writing of this album began. It was like I tapped into something. It was a very spiritual experience. Lyrics flooded through me from that point on."

Thus this song and the upcoming album was born. And that's why this song is so emotional and powerful. It was written while she was on her death bed, praying to God to let her live and to help her keep her head above water. After reading through that story, then re-listening to the song, I was completely overcome with emotion in realizing how close we were to losing one of my favorite singers. Then to hear her pleas on this song to God and hear about her deeply personal, spiritual experience as she was able to fight through this makes this song powerful. She mentioned that when she was healthy enough to sing, she was worried that her voice wasn't going to be very strong, but she was pleased to find out that her voice was better than ever as that break from music improved her singing abilities and you can tell that on this song as this is possibly the best vocal performance of her career in addition to being perhaps her most personal and most emotional song. And if you've ever gone through a life-threatening experience, or knew someone that has, I think this song has the power to speak right to your soul. I don't want to speak too soon, but this song is a strong candidate for song of the year for me. It's a song that's almost too good for the current state of the Billboard Hot 100, but of course I would love for it to catch on with the mainstream.

74- "This Feeling" - The Chainsmokers featuring Kelsea Ballerini -- After covering Avril's new song, I almost just want to call it a wrap and end with that. But we do have three more songs and so I will do my due diligence in covering them. This song was curious to me because I love Kelsea Ballerini, but The Chainsmokers have been mostly disappointing for me, so I wasn't sure which way this would go. Turns out this is alright. It's not quite as sharp as pretty much any song from Kelsea's album last year "Unapologetically," but her voice is a decent fit for the groove that The Chainsmokers add. The problem with the song is the problem with a lot of recent songs from The Chainsmokers in that Andrew Taggart thinks it's a good idea for him to sing. He should just stick to the production of the songs while letting other people sing because when he comes on, the song is underwhelming. But when it's Kelsea singing, the song is pretty decent. Nothing super special and deep, but a song that's comparable to "The Middle," with Zedd and Maren Morris, but with a tad more personality than that song. If this helps Kelsea get more into the mainstream's eye, I think that'll be a net positive.  

92- "Backin' It Up" - Pardison Fontaine featuring Cardi B -- And now we have to remind ourselves that we are still in 2018, a mostly awful year wherein Cardi B is everywhere. And everything she touches turns to gold in terms of chart performance. I mean, just ask what she did for Maroon 5 when they lazily added her to boring album filler song. I don't know who Pardison Fontaine is, and the internet isn't doing a good job of teaching me, but I can guarantee you that the only reason this song is here is because he got Cardi B to be a part of the song. For me though, I could hardly care less about Cardi B at this point. Granted, she's still better than Nicki, but that's not a very high bar. In this song, Pardison spends his portion of the song talking about how amazing Cardi is, getting a little to graphic for my personal taste. Then Cardi spends her portion of the song bragging about how amazing she is, as well as how good she is at backing up all the trash talk she speaks. I don't know, maybe Cardi fans will like this as they can't seem to get enough of her bragging about how awesome she is.

96- "Rich" - Maren Morris -- Speaking of Maren Morris, after taking a detour into pop and EDM with Zedd, which landed her one of the top songs of the year so far in "The Middle," as it camped out in the top 10 for 16 weeks after peaking at No. 4, she is now back on her own and I'm honestly curious to see if that song can boost her solo career. Although this specific song isn't anything new from her per se, just another cut from her 2016 album "Hero" that also delivered "My Church," "I Could Use a Love Song" and "80s Mercedes." I haven't listened to all of "Hero," but of these four songs, I prefer "I Could Use a Love Song." In fact, I think "Rich" might be the lesser of the bunch, but I still enjoy her brand of country pop. Her songs reminds me a bit of Shania Twain's older music. She has a fun personality and character to make her songs work. This song has her saying that if she got money every time this boy crossed her or broke a promise that she would be rich. She seems to be having a good time throwing him in the dirt. But I don't know. The song doesn't have as much fire to it and thus I'm a bit surprised that this is what Maren turned to after "The Middle." I'm curious to see what she comes up with when she gives us a new album, whenever that happens.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - September 29, 2018

The new Billboard charts have arrived and so it's time again for me to give you my thoughts! In this weekly post, I cover three sections. First, I give my thoughts on the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100. Second, I give my thoughts on the songs that experienced significant gains below the top 10. Third, I give my initial thoughts on our new arrivals this week. I reserve the right to switch things up in the future, but for now this is what I'm sticking with. I've followed the Billboard charts for a long time now and this is a great way for me to express my thoughts to the world. I hope you enjoy!

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B (+1) -- Two reasons to be happy that this song is No. 1 this week. First, Drake is no long No. 1 after spending a record-breaking 29 weeks at No. 1 this year. Second, a rap song is no longer No. 1. It's been 34 straight weeks that rap has been No. 1 in one form or another. I was more than ready for both of those streaks to end. Outside those two reasons, I'm not celebrating this, nor am I giving it much notice. If you want to know all the fancy accolades that Maroon 5 set by getting No. 1, feel free to look up Billboard's weekly article by Gary Trust. He lists a lot of them, as he does whenever we get a new No. 1 hit. For me I've simply concluded that Adam Levine sold his soul to the devil in order to get this here. Or, as I like to say, he made a deal with a crossroads demon. My "Supernatural" friends will understand and appreciate that. But seriously, what other explanation is there for why this boring, lame song from a lazy band who stopped being creative years ago is now No. 1? I don't understand. Yeah, I understand the numbers behind it. It's because of radio. And initial streaming numbers exploded because of that music video. But I don't understand why said numbers are so high or why they've stayed so high. This needs to go away and quick because I'm going to start getting increasingly angrier the longer this stays.

2- "In My Feelings" - Drake (-1) -- Objectively speaking, this is still a better song than "Girls Like You." But as I just said, I'm glad this is not No. 1 anymore because Drake has spent way too long at No. 1 this year. Specifically, the radio numbers for this song are crashing hard while the sales and streaming continue to deplete. I wouldn't be surprised to see this start a plummet down the charts.

3- "Killshot" - Eminem (new arrival) -- You know, I'm not even going to be upset at this. I've been begging for a new top three for weeks now after our previous top three annoyingly got stuck for way too long. This might be a subpar Eminem song and I'm genuinely surprised it debuted this high. But I'll take subpar Eminem over Drake, Maroon 5 and Cardi B completely monopolizing the top three. This will be gone next week, but at least it shook things up for now. And with the way Cardi B dropped this week, it won't be her that replaces Eminem next week.

4- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (+1) -- It will mostly likely be Juice WRLD that jumps up to No. 3 next week? That's encouraging. This song got to No. 3 before, but then Billboard shook up their formula and immediately caused the song to tank a bit. But now it's made it's way back up and I'm not complaining. I'm not madly in love with the song, per se, but it's a welcome breath of fresh air when compared to most other songs that have occupied the top five as a whole in recent months.

5- "Better Now" - Post Malone (-1) -- I'm also not upset that Post Malone remains in the top five, although he remains destined to camp out around the bottom half of the top five as he can't get any higher. I don't know how long this is going to last. I keep expecting it to slowly start to slip away, but with Eminem set to drop away from the top five next week, I'm guessing that this will go back up to No. 4 again next week, continuing it's see-saw between No. 4 and No. 5.

6- "I Like It" - Card B, Bad Bunny & J Balvin (-3) -- I was filled with much joy earlier this week when I looked up the top 10 countdown and saw that Cardi B had finally plummeted out of the top five. Now if Drake and Maroon 5 could follow suit, that would be greatly appreciated. Although again, objectively speaking, this will probably sneak up to No. 5 next week because I don't expect "Killshot" by Eminem to last multiple weeks in the top five. But at least this won't be the No. 3 song again.

7- "I Love It" - Kanye West & Lil Pump (-1) -- Why is Kanye West's Pornhub anthem still here?

8- "FeFe" - 6ix9ine featuring Nicki Minaj & Murda Beatz (-1) -- I'm also happy that this song is slowly slipping. But the fact that it never should've got here in the first place makes me still upset that it's remained here for so long. I could tolerate one week in the top 10 because we have a bunch of dumb teenagers in this country who slobber all over themselves whenever they here the sexual predator that is 6ix9ine either yell at them or mumble at them. But why it remained beyond that has me furious.

9- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (1) -- Seeing all these awful songs drop one spot is encouraging because it means that they might eventually leave the top 10. But they need to drop faster and be replaced by quality songs in the process.

10- "Youngblood" - 5 Seconds of Summer (+1) -- Listen, I'm glad that Tyga's "Taste" fell out of the top 10. But did it have to take Khalid and Normani's "Love Lies" with it? I was hoping that we could have both "Youngblood" AND "Love Lies" in the top 10 this week. Not just one of them. But OK, fine. I'm happy that 5SOS got into the top 10 because this is at least a decently enjoyable song, which makes it a huge step above just about everything else in the top 10 right now. The next step will be to get this song higher up, and drag "Love Lies," which is down at No. 11 this week, up with it, so that we can replace this horrendous top 10 with songs that are at least tolerable. Because most of the top 10, for almost the entire year, has been excruciatingly painful to deal with. When we look back at 2018, it will definitely be seen as one of the worst years for popular music by those who actually care about quality music.

Rising on the Hot 100: 

13- "Lucky You" - Eminem featuring Joyner Lucas (+5) -- This is genuinely surprising. After album bombs, most songs progressively tank each week. That's exactly what I expected to happen to Eminem. And it did happen with every other song from the album that debuted. But this song rose back up to No. 13 this week after falling to No. 18 last week? Is it because Eminem released the music video, causing it to get a one-week rise or is this going to legitimately gain traction outside the debut? I would love for it to be the latter, because this was one of the better songs from "Kamikaze," but I suppose we'll wait and see what this actually does in the coming weeks.

15- "Nonstop" - Drake (+2) -- I'm not happy that this has gained enough traction to hang out in the teens for the last few months. But at least this has struggled to get back to the top 10 after it debuted there. The last thing the world needs is more Drake in the top 10. So let's make sure we keep it out of the top 10.

36- "I'm a Mess" - Bebe Rexha (+7) -- There's surprisingly not a lot of movement below the top 10 this week as we jump straight from Eminem and Drake just below the top 10 to Bebe at No. 36. I'm not super ecstatic that this is doing well, but I'm not super upset either. It's more of a forgettable song from Bebe, who is capable of much better. But it doesn't bother me, either. So bring it on.

42- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes (+12) -- I'd certainly take a more forgettable Bebe song over this. I'm not happy that Sheck Wes has gained enough traction to hit the top 50. Let's please not make him a thing. The less new awful rappers that we reward with successful careers, the better.

50- "She Got the Best of Me" - Luke Combs (+7) -- It's an off week for country songs this week as only song qualified for my rising songs section, but that one songs sees Luke Combs hit top 50 with this song that doesn't particularly make me upset. Yet at the same time I do have a hard time remembering it exists, nor am I going to remember it after it leaves the charts. But it could be worse.

67- "Thunderclouds" - Labrinth, Sia & Diplo Present... LSD (+11) -- I'm happy to see this song rising on the charts. But it's not rising super fast at the moment and I'm not convinced that it's going to become a major hit. But I keep seeing that commercial it's featured in quite a bit, so it's remained stuck in my head for the majority of the time that it's been released. And I'm OK with that. It's a fun song.

69- "That's On Me" - Yella Breezy (+12) -- When I saw that this song rose 12 spots this week, I had one reaction. WHY?

New Arrivals:

3- "Killshot" - Eminem -- OK, if you followed me when I covered "Kamikaze" two weeks ago when it charted, then you'll know I was rather amused with all of his shots towards today's rappers. Because they almost all suck, yet they somehow manage to infest the charts anyways because kids these days don't know what music is. In other words, I feel Eminem's pain even though I wasn't necessarily madly in love with his album from last year. Specifically, when he fired at Machine Gun Kelly, I had a ball Machine Gun Kelly is crap, which was proven by his awful comeback towards Eminem. But now Eminem needs to man up and let it go. Seeing him fire back at MGK a second time after MGK fired at him felt like he had the maturity of a 10-year-old arguing with a kid who insulted him. Even putting that aside, Eminem is usually a master lyricist with great flow and great rhythm to his rap. He has none of that hear. His string of insults this time around are almost as cringeworthy as MGK's last week. And his flow feels choppy and disconnected. I usually enjoy listening to Eminem's fire and passion, but this one hurts my ears almost as much as all the other rappers that Eminem spent his album complaining about, so now I just want both Eminem and MGK to sit in the corner and take a timeout because neither are acting like grown adults.

28- "Drip Too Hard" - Lil Baby & Gunna -- I'm really mad at Drake for making Lil Baby a thing after including him on the track "Yes Indeed" earlier this year. But I was happy to see that song only manage to get two weeks in the top 10 instead of camping out there all year. And Lil Baby has tried so hard to be relevant on his own, only to come up short every time. But yet here he is again, teaming up with Gunna, who he featured on his song "Life Goes On" back in June. A fact I only remember because I keep track of all the new songs each week in an Excel file on my computer, so I have the luxury of quickly looking it up. I'm really mad that this debuted all the way up at No. 28 and I hope it just falls because this is a prime example of why rap is so awful in 2018. Here you have two lazy rappers coming up with a generic song about them being rich and famous, listing off all the luxury brands they own and bragging about the drugs they're doing and the girls they're sleeping with. There's absolutely zero creativity here and zero talent as they mumble their way through the whole thing. I only understood what they were saying because I was reading the lyrics on Genius as I was listening. If this were to drop off in a few weeks, no one would remember it existed. Even if it became a huge hit, no one will remember it by this time next year.

30- "Wake Up in the Sky" - Gucci Mane, Bruno Mars & Kodak Black -- I'm going to be doing a lot of repeating myself this week just by looking at some of these songs, so perhaps I'll keep these brief. If this were Gucci Mane and Kodak Black on their own, there'd be nothing to say here. Gucci's name says all you need to know about him and his style, while Kodak has never done an interesting thing in his life. The only thing that makes this thing even somewhat intriguing is that they dragged Bruno Mars along with them. But I'm one of those weird people who doesn't care much for Bruno's Grammy-winning album, so I wasn't convinced. Yeah, sure, Bruno is a better singer than Gucci and Kodak because he enunciates his words, but all he's singing about his being drunk, smoking and bragging about how "fly" he is. He does that on the chorus in between Gucci and Kodak throwing in their verses full of nothing interesting. If Bruno's name in this turns this into a huge hit, I'm going to be furious.

38- "New Patek" - Lil Uzi Vert -- In case you didn't know, Patek is a brand of luxury watch. Can I be done here? Or should I remind you that bragging about how rich you are is one of the laziest things that a rapper can do. Throwing in all the luxury brand names has never been interesting to me and never will. And Lil Uzi Very has never been an interesting rapper. So I'm going to be done now, because you get the point.

45- "Better" - Khalid -- After enduring through those last four songs, it was great seeing Khalid show up on the charts to give me a quick break from all the madness. Yet I didn't keep my hopes up too much because if I'm being honest, I'm a bit hit and miss with Khalid as a whole. When he's on, he's on. But sometimes he has poor choices of who to collaborate with. And other times he doesn't collaborate with anyone. Which is normally not a bad thing, but Khalid on his own without a good singer to balance him out has a tendency of become boring. And that's what this song is. It's boring. Khalid is extra mumbly because he has no one to sing with and it sounds like he got bored while recording after deciding to record a naturally slow song. And there's not really any substance here as is shown by the generic title of "Better." Recent examples of great Khalid is his collaborations with Normani and Billie Eilish respectively.

47- "Falling Down" - Lil Peep & XXXTENTACION -- This caught me by complete surprise. I didn't ever expect to see these two back on the charts, let alone on a song together. Lil Peep died of a drug overdose late last year and X was shot and killed earlier this year. So where in the heck did this song come from? Well, apparently Lil Peep and a dude who calls himself iLoveMakonnen recorded a song called "Sunlight On Your Skin" before Lil Peep died. After Lil Peep did, this song was remixed with X instead of iLoveMakonnen. Now that they've both died, iLoveMakonnen released this song as a sort of tribute to both of them. Which is fine and all, except apparently a lot of people in Lil Peep's camp where vehemently against this version because they felt that Lil Peep never would've worked with X due to what X stood for and all the allegations and crimes surrounding him. That makes this version really awkward to talk about because I'm not sure what to think about all of that. What do I say about a song featuring two late artists, one of whom potentially wouldn't have authorized this if he were still alive? What I will say is that I listened to both versions and the original song, "Sunlight On Your Skin" is actually a pretty good song. This version with X makes the song worse because iLoveMakonnen fits with Lil Peep way better than X does. So I'm going to recommend you listen to "Sunlight On Your Skin," while in the meantime I'm going to awkwardly step away from this and hope that I don't have to address it again in the future.

76- "Pretty Little Fears" - 6LACK featuring J. Cole -- With the awkwardness behind us, we're back to business as usual, this time talking about an artist whose name drives me crazy. He pronounces his name BLACK, but spells it 6LACK because apparently it's cool to replace the B with a 6 for some strange reason. Maybe because a 6 looks like a demented lowercase b. That aside, is the song good? Well, kinda. I feel like 6LACK is trying to rap/sing about something that he cares about rather than lazily talking about fame and riches like all of his other colleagues. The problem is that he's not super clear about what he's trying to say. The song is slow and chopped up. I think 6LACK is talking to a girl and wanting her to talk to him, but he doesn't do a great job with spelling things out. But then the second half of the song is J. Cole, who successfully does in the second half what I think 6LACK was trying to do in the first half as J. Cole is talking to his wife, wanting her to talk to him and express all of her fears since she's had a pretty rough time of late. That was really beautiful and J. Cole nails it. So I give high praise to the second half of the song, but I'm more bored with the first half of the song. 

96- "Leave Me Alone" - Flipp Dinero -- Another new rapper to deal with. I know nothing about Flipp Dinero, but after listening to this, I don't think I want to know much about him. He's yelling at a girl, telling her to leave him alone. So he comes off as a crybaby in the sound. And he sounds like he lost his voice when he recorded this in the studio. So I'm thinking that I would love for Flipp to go away and, well, uh... leave me alone.

97- "Best Shot" - Jimmie Allen -- I thought I was going to get away with not covering any country songs this week when I saw the lineup. But turns out Jimmie Allen is indeed a country singer, so country snuck one in this week. What I appreciate about this song is that it's not jam packed with an overabundance of heavy drums and guitars that don't match the lyrics. There's no mention of getting drunk or drinking at a bar. And Jimmie doesn't have a deep country twang. Instead this is a nice, smooth song where Jimmie is singing about a girl, but he sounds sincere about it and the soft, mellow music behind him actually matched the romantic tones to go with it. So I can see myself potentially enjoying this song as a nice background song during some sort of fancy event. The problem here is that the song is a bit too simple in terms of the lyrics. There's not much of a story behind the romantic words he's saying and I don't even know if he's singing about his wife, his girlfriend or a random girl he has yet to talk about. There's two very short verses surrounded by the chorus that repeats several times and a bridge towards the end that makes this such a basic love song that I could've written the lyrics and have it be generically talking about anything and any relationship. So I would've liked a bit more lyrically, but as a whole, this isn't bad at all.

100- "Noticed" - Lil Mosey -- Sure. Why not. Let's end the week with another untalented rapper who is rapping about... something. If you simply listen to the song, you'll have no idea what he's saying because he's implemented a combination of mumbling and incoherently pronouncing words. The beat in the song is alright. And apparently this is Lil Mosey remixing a previous song he had, which was also called "Noticed." But a semi-decent beat behind the song doesn't change the fact that Lil Mosey is just another garbage rapper worth throwing in the trash. Which means he's probably going to catch fire and be the next big thing. But let's hope not. And I haven't even mentioned the fact that we now have another "Lil" to deal with. Seriously, if I get any new rapper who names himself "Lil ______," I'm going to go crazy.