DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - December 15, 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- "thank u, next" - Ariana Grande (+1) -- Just like everyone who follows the Billboard charts predicted, Ariana Grande is back at No. 1 this week thanks to the arrival of her music video, which broke records on YouTube for views in the first 24-hours. Like I mentioned last week, Billboard only counts U.S. views from YouTube in its streaming formula, not all of the views, but the boost from the music video was enough to help Ariana soar to 93.8 million U.S. streams this week, boasting the highest ever weekly streaming total for a female artist, a record previously held by Taylor Swift with 84.5 million U.S. streams during the first week of "Look What You Made Me Do" in September 2017. Ariana also soars to 43,000 in sales (No. 2 this week) and 57 million in radio audience (No. 11 this week). Sales and streaming are going to plummet next week, but given the high streaming total this week, I still think she might have a chance at holding this No. 1 spot for another week or two, especially if radio keeps climbing.

2- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (-1) -- Yet if I'm being objective about things, "SICKO MODE" also gained in all categories this week with 43.3 million U.S. streams, 25,000 sales and 65.7 million in radio audience. And those numbers are going to fall a lot slower than Ariana's numbers, so Travis Scott is still in good position to go back to No. 1 if Ariana tanks too hard, which is an awful prospect to think of. I still have no idea why this song has such a strong appeal. But yet we are in 2018, one of the all-time worst years in the history of the Billboard charts when it comes to popular music.

3- "Without Me" - Halsey (+1) -- If Ariana falls hard, there's also a chance that Halsey takes the top spot as "Without Me" has 32.7 million U.S. streams (up 29 percent), 50,000 in sales (up 75 percent and good enough for No. 1 on sales for a third week) and 71.7 million in radio audience (up 10 percent). So it'll be a three-headed race for the top spot in the short term. Even though I'm not madly in love with this Halsey song, I'll be cheering for either this song to jump up to No. 1 or for Ariana to hold that top spot long enough for Travis Scott to start bleeding.

4- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille (-1) -- The loser in all of this, when it comes to the top five anyways, seems to be "Happier" as its momentum has seemingly stalled out. And I'm not too upset. Sure, I might put it a notch above "thank u, next" and "Without Me" in terms of my personal enjoyment, but it's not like it's the greatest song by either artist. I am still glad that it's here and I do hope that it holds on to enough momentum to stick around for a while because I'm not a huge fan of most of the alternatives.

5- "High Hopes" - Panic! At the Disco (=) -- This is the song that I would really love to see break out and hit that top spot. Unfortunately it seems that the song's sales and streaming numbers aren't doing it a whole lot of favors at the moment, which is why it remains stuck at No. 5 instead of going higher. It's still got that strong radio, though, so at least the radio people have their priorities straight because this is easily the best song around at the moment. At least when it comes to the top part of the charts.

6- "Going Bad" - Meek Mill featuring Drake (new) -- Meek Mill has a new album out titled "Champions" in which he gathered together all the popular artists that he could following his release from prison this year so he could take full advantage of the fame that being in prison brought him. Because, you know, when a rapper does something awful in 2018, society doesn't punish them like they do athletes and actors. Instead there's a double standard where awful living and prison-worthy acts get celebrated by society and the rappers get rewarded with successful careers. It's beyond disgusting, especially considering the B.S. controversy surrounding the Christmas song "Baby, It's Cold Outside" right now. So no, I'm not touching Meek Mill's album this week. I'll have the track listing below in the new arrivals, but that's it. This specific song is only here because of the Drake feature. And if there's one artist I want gone this year, it has to be Drake because he's a good contender for the most overrated artist in the history of music and it's a darn shame that society worships this useless piece of trash as a god.

7- "All I Want for Christmas is You" - Mariah Carey (+7) -- On a more positive note, I was a bit shocked to see Mariah Carey jump all the way up to No. 7 this week. A friend and I had a discussion after last week's post about how high Mariah would get this year. Last Christmas season she peaked at No. 9 with this song after hitting the top 10 for the first time. My prediction after looking at our current top 10 was that it would peak at No. 5. Last week the song was at No. 14, so I figured it might jump to No. 11 or maybe even sneak into the top 10. But it jumped seven spots up to No. 7, which is fantastic. And it has all sorts of momentum right now in all categories with 28.5 million U.S. streams (up 29 percent), 15,000 sales (up 28 percent) and 30.4 million in radio audience (up 11 percent). That radio number will remain the song's handcuff, but the streaming and sales momentum looks strong enough to blow away my prediction that it will peak at No. 5. This looks like a top three hit this season as there's at least two more weeks for the song to gain in points, with those two weeks being the weeks that the song will be the strongest. Can it get to No. 1? I'm not sure. Those streaming numbers for Ariana are incredibly high right now while Travis Scott and Halsey are also doing rather well. But I think the this can still sneak into that No. 3 slot, which has me excited.

8- "ZEZE" - Kodak Black featuring Travis Scott & Offset (-1) -- It's good to see this song fall a spot this week, but I'm upset that it isn't falling faster.

9- "Drip Too Hard" - Lil Baby & Gunna (-1) -- It's good to see this song fall a spot this week, but I'm upset that it isn't falling faster.

10- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes (-4) -- Well how's this for a pleasant surprise? I was worried that this might trade places with "High Hopes" this week, but instead it plummets down to No. 10. Merry Christmas to me! Now let's make it even better by kicking the song out all together. Perhaps replacing it with another Christmas song? Maybe Andy Williams or Brenda Lee? That would be great! In other good news, Maroon 5's "Girls Like You" is officially gone from the top 10. When I saw that news, I just about threw a party to honor the song's departure. Now that it's gone (and hopefully it stays that way), I can guarantee you that the world will completely forget that the song ever existed in a year or two from now. "Lucid Dreams" also exited this week, which I'm fine with. The song was pretty good, but it ran its course and didn't overstay its welcome.

Rising on the Hot 100:

16- "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" - Andy Williams (+5) -- I will make sure to keep you up to date on every Christmas song on the charts throughout the Christmas season, even if they don't rise high enough to qualify being included in this section. Because I created those rules, so I'm allowed to break them. But seeing this song's continued momentum this week into the top 20 was a great thing. And with the bottom half of the top 10 being extremely weak at the moment, I'm thinking, or at least hoping, that this song will claim a spot in the top 10 as early as next week.

21- "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" - Brenda Lee (+2) -- I would also love to see this song jump into the top 10, but it only climbed two spots this week, so I'm not feeling especially hopeful at the moment. But hey, the next two weeks on the charts are the prime week for Christmas and Christmas music, so maybe its fortunes will change!

22- "A Holly Jolly Christmas" - Burl Ives (+4) -- Can Burl Ives sneak past Brenda Lee? It's only one spot away at the moment. Personally I hope both songs will jump into the top 20 next week. I'm not concerned at which order the do so since both are great songs.

26- "Jingle Bell Rock" - Bobby Helmes (+7) -- Two more Christmas entries into the top 30 this week, so I'm very pleased. "Jingle Bell Rock" has always been a favorite of mine. It's just so catchy and contagious and does seem to have a bit more momentum at the moment than the two songs ahead of it, so I'm curious to see what's going to happen!

29- "The Christmas Song (Merry Christmas to You)" - Nat King Cole (+10) -- Our second new entry into the top 30 this week! And also well deserved. Out of all the Christmas songs this week, this had the highest gain, jumping 10 spots up to No. 29? Now I don't know how many Christmas songs we're going to get in the top 10 this year, but imagine how cool it would be if we could at least get them all into the top 20?

31- "Dangerous" - Meek Mill featuring Jeremih & PnB Rock (+17) -- How dare Meek Mill interrupt my Christmas list! I did listen to this song when it debuted and while not awful, it also wasn't that great. It's only getting a one-week boost due to the album bomb. It'll drop back down next week.

34- "Last Christmas" - Wham! (+9) -- Our final Christmas riser of the week sees Wham! scoring a top 40 hit. Hopefully it'll be onto the top 30 next week! But hey, this is not the last Christmas song that I'll be talking about this week. Head down to the new arrivals section to see my thoughts on two additional Christmas songs entering the Hot 100 for the first time, that being Gene Autry's "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" at No. 36 and Dean Martin's "Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow" at No. 41. Two additional Christmas classics. What other Christmas songs have the potential to enter or re-enter in future weeks? Well, on the Holiday 100 this week, the next five songs below our current entries are "Feliz Navidad" by Jose Feliciano, "White Christmas" by Bing Crosby, "Here Comes Santa Claus (Down Santa Claus Lane)" by Gene Autry, "Sleigh Ride" by The Ronettes, and "Blue Christmas" by Elvis Presley. I also hear that there are three versions of "Baby It's Cold Outside" that are gaining strong momentum in backlash to some radio stations banning the song, with Dean Martin's version having the most momentum. So I wouldn't be surprised to see that show up.

43- "MAMA" - 6ix9ine featuring Nicki Minaj & Kanye West (+15) -- I hear that 6ix9ine released his album mid-week instead of on Friday, which is the beginning of the tracking week. That means last week his album bomb was based on only a partial week while this week is the album's first full week of tracking. That's why three of the songs had strong gains this week. I don't expect them to stick around, though. Or at least I hope they don't. That would be gross.

44- "KIKA" - 6ix9ine featuring Tory Lanez (+15) -- See previous comment.

51- "WAKA" - 6ix9ine featuring A Boogie wit da Hoodie (+20) -- See previous comment.

New Arrivals:

6- "Going Bad" - Meek Mill featuring Drake -- As I stated above, I will not be covering any songs from Meek Mill's new album this week. Read my thoughts on this above if you are curious as to why. Also, in addition to what I said above, there are a total of 26 new songs on the charts this week, half of them being from Meek Mill. I deem it not worth my time to cover that many songs. With so many album bombs that consumed so much of my time this year, I began to wonder if it was even worth doing this post each week. I thought about discontinuing this. Instead, my compromise is to pick and choose what I cover. When it comes to album bomb weeks, my thought is to completely avoid them unless it's an album that I'm actually excited about. Most songs from album bombs don't stick around, anyways, so I figure that I'll let the dust settle for a week or so and if there's any of the songs that stick around, I'll talk about them in the rising songs section in future weeks. Ever since deciding on this plan, it's relieved a lot of stress and pressure, thus making me happier about the idea of continuing forward.

20- "What's Free" - Meek Mill featuring Rick Ross & JAY-Z -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

30- "On Me" - Meek Mill featuring Cardi B -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

36- "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" - Gene Autry -- I wasn't sure what to expect with the new Christmas songs this week. In fact, I thought there would be a few more re-entries that we've seen in previous years. I was not expecting Rudolph to show, but it was certainly a pleasant surprise. I mean, who doesn't love the story of Rudolph and this ensuing song? I think when it comes to Christmas songs, this one is especially popular with the younger crowd as every kid born on Earth since the song was written in 1949 has probably grown up loving it and singing it every Christmas. Although this song showing up did make me curious as to the history of Rudolph. A quick search helped me learn that the character of Rudolph was created by Robert. L. May in 1939. It was May's brother-in-law, Johnny Marks, who adapted the story into a song, which was first sung by Harry Brannon in November 1949, right before this specific version hit No. 1 on U.S. charts during Christmas 1949. It has since been recorded by a whole heck of a lot of people, just like with every other popular Christmas song, with the other most notable version being from the Burl Ives, who recorded it for the 1964 stop-motion animation special. That same special where Ives' "A Holly Jolly Christmas," currently No. 22 on the Hot 100 this week, comes from. Which version of "Rudolph" is better? Well, I don't know. They're both good. It would be fun for Burl Ives to have two songs on the Hot 100, but it's also cool that Gene Autry's version, which first popularized the song, is the one to chart. Better question, though. Which phrases do you say as echoes?

41- "Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow" - Dean Martin -- This was another surprise Christmas entry for me. For those curious, this song was written by Sammy Cahn and Jule Style in 1945 during a heat wave in California when the two were imagining cooler conditions. It was first recorded by Vaughn Monroe. But this time, it's Dean Martin's version from his 1966 Christmas album that showed up. This makes it 49 years since Dean Martin's last entry on the charts, which almost breaks the record for longest time period between Hot 100 entries for an artist. That record is set at 57 years when Louis Prima showed up on Kid See Ghosts' "4th Dimension" earlier this year. I imagine it might now have the record when it comes to being a lead singer as opposed to just being featured 57 years later on a random song. But Billboard didn't report that, so I don't know. In regards to "Let It Snow," this is more of a winter song than a Christmas song and thus I have a love/hate relationship with the idea of wanting to let it snow. I don't like the cold and I'm fine with warm Christmases. But hey, the song is certainly a classic as it's the first song (or one of the first) that will come to your mind when it does start snowing and you are one that's happy about it. That random tangent aside, the song itself is great. It puts warm images in your mind as the singer talks about cuddling up by the fire during the bitter storm. And of course Dean Martin brings such a warm, friendly charisma to the song. So you'd have to be a Grinch to hate the song.

46- "Pure Cocaine" - Lil Baby -- While I'm in the mood of skipping albums, I will also be avoiding Lil Baby's new album. Given that he's leading with the song "Pure Cocaine" as the top new arrival, can you really blame me?

54- "24/7" - Meek Mill featuring Ella Mai -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

55- "Intro" - Meek Mill -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

57- "Respect the Game" - Meek Mill -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

60- "Good Form" - Nicki Minaj featuring Lil Wayne -- Eh. There's a lot of awful hip-hop this week. Most weeks I would get a non-album bomb song like this over with. But I don't feel like it. These two rappers are trash anyways, especially when they team up.

61- "Trauma" - Meek Mill -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

62- "Time" - Lil Baby featuring Meek Mill -- A Lil Baby and Meek Mill crossover on a week where both get an album bomb? It's almost like it was planned that way. But no, I'm not covering this, either.

63- "Nuketown" - Ski Mask the Slump God featurng Juice WRLD -- Ski Mask the Slump God? With a rap name like that, the dude is begging me to ignore him. So I will.

64- "Calling My Spirit" - Kodak Black -- I don't care about Kodak Black.

66- "Ready" - Lil Baby featuring Gunna -- I'm not covering Lil Baby's album. But speaking of him and Gunna, didn't they just release a collaborative album together? So what's the point of this song existing?

67- "Nothing Breaks Like a Heart" - Mark Ronson featuring Miley Cyrus -- Buried in all the muck this week is actually a song worth covering. Surprise, right? I really hope this doesn't get lost in the mix because this is a solid effort from both Mark Ronson and Miley. In regards to Miley, she's a singer who shocked me last year with an album that was really good as she seems to have left her crazy life behind her while becoming an elegant woman writing good pop music. Thus I was curious as to where she'd go next with her music and a team-up with Mark Ronson is a great place. Lyrically this song is another breakup song that's not super unique. The lovers were once drunk in love, but now they're not and nothing can save them. What makes the song work, though, is Miley's voice as she powers through the lyrics with fire and emotion. Regardless of what I've thought of Miley over the years, what has remained consistent is that she's always had talent and potential. It's just a matter what she did with that and I'm glad that she's using it in the right ways now by creating solid pop songs like this. What also makes the song work is Mark Ronson's production. If you forgot who Mark Ronson is, he's the actual lead act in "Uptown Funk" as he provided the platform for Bruno Mars to explode with one of the biggest hits ever. And he again constructs a great song musically in "Nothing Breaks Like a Heart." There's a variety of instruments here from great use of various strings (violin, viola, bass, cello) to the implementation of the guitar, drums and piano. On Genius, Mark Ronson is credited for playing the piano. When they performed the song on the Graham Norton Show, he strummed along on the guitar. So maybe he did a little bit of both on the actual recording? Either way, good work for both of these artists and anyone else who contributed here to the music.

70- "Championships" - Meek Mill -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

72- "Tic Tac Toe" - Meek Mill featuring Kodak Black -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

73- "Almost Slipped" - Meek Mill -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

77- "Splash Warning" - Meek Mill featuring Future, Roddy Ricch & Young Thug -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

78- "Pay You Back" - Meek Mill featuring 21 Savage -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

81- "Foot Fungus" - Ski Mask the Slump God -- "Foot Fungus" by Ski Mask the Slump God. That is the most disgusting sounding title/artist combo that I've heard.

82- "Crush a Lot" - Lil Baby -- I'm not covering Lil Baby's album bomb.

85- "Oodles O' Noodles Babies" - Meek Mill -- I will not be covering Meek Mill's new album this week. Read above to learn why.

91- "Global" - Lil Baby -- I'm not covering Lil Baby's album bomb.

98- "Word on the Street" - Lil Baby -- I'm not covering Lil Baby's album bomb.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - December 8, 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- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (+1) -- Help me understand this one because I'm lost. I have no idea why this is No. 1. OK, yeah, as far as statistic go, it's consistent across the board and thus got here by default. But why do people love this song so much? I even re-listened to it just now AND I listed the remix with Skrillex. The best I can come up with is that it has a decent beat to it. Lyrically, though, Travis and Drake bring NO energy and NO fire to the track, which is unfortunate because the song is all about how awesome they are. If they actually sounded ominous and braggadocious, then maybe I can understand. But they sound bored and lazy. Heck, the first line of the song is "Sun is down, freezing cold; That's how we already know winter's here." Where's the intensity in that? I don't see it. In fact, it barely edges out Post Malone's "Psycho" as my least favorite No. 1 hit of 2018. And no, the Skrillex remix doesn't help the song out at all. It's just Skrillex inserting his super annoying robotic sounds into the song. The original mix actually has a better beat, which is kinda embarrassing for Skrillex.

2- "thank u, next" - Ariana Grande (-1) -- Ariana was falling fast compared to "SICKO MODE," so I'm not at all surprised she tumbled this week. In fact, I wouldn't have been surprised if she had tumbled to No. 4 or No. 5. And unless she's able to get some serious radio traction (the song is only at No. 23 on the radio charts this week -- up from No. 36 last week, granted), I have a hard time seeing this song stick around for very long in the top 10 given how much it's bleeding in sales and not being super steady on streaming. THAT SAID, it probably will go back to No. 1 next week since the music video debuted and broke all kinds of YouTube records. It's already had 128 million views since posting on November 30. Billboard only counts the U.S. views when it comes to the Hot 100, but that's still probably enough to get Ariana a fourth week at No. 1 next week. That's only a brief fix, though. I just hope it's enough to hold off "SICKO MODE" for a bit before we get a more consistent No. 1 hit.

3- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille (=) -- I thought that this song was destined for No. 1. Now I think it's destined to get stuck behind Ariana and Travis Scott. But hey, this is still a solid showing for Marshmello and Bastille as I didn't even think this song would get close to hitting top 10 when it debuted earlier this year. So I'm not complaining.

4- "Without Me" - Halsey (=) -- I'm curious about what this song is going to do. It also seems stuck right here. Halsey does have some radio momentum, but I'm not sure it's strong enough to get her over the hump for a No. 1 hit. But hey, if this song can hold it's place in the top five over the awful rap songs just below the top five, that will be a win.

5- "High Hopes" - Panic! At the Disco (+1) -- The absolute best news of the week is seeing Panic! break the top five. It gets a second week on top of the radio charts, and it's audience there is still climbing, which bodes well for this song's future. A dream of mine at this point is that "High Hopes" remains consistent enough while the four songs ahead of it start to drop, priming this song to be a No. 1 hit. I'm not going to bet on that, though. For now I'll just be happy that it made the top five and cross my fingers that it can hold its place in the region.

6- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes (+1) -- The good news here is that "Mo Bamba" doesn't seem to have a ton of momentum at the moment. It's holding its place in the top 10, but only rose a spot because "Lucid Dreams" collapsed. Unfortunately I could see it sneaking into the top five, I just hope it's not at the expense of "High Hopes."

7- "ZEZE" - Kodak Black featuring Travis Scott & Offset (+3) -- This song had it's music video debut. That's why it jumped three spots. Hopefully it will fall back down.

8- "Drip Too Hard" - Lil Baby & Gunna (+1) -- This song also rose simply because "Lucid Dreams" collapsed and "Girls Like You" continues to tumble. The fact that it's remained consistent enough to stick around in the bottom half of the top 10 is troubling, though.

9- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B (-1) -- I'm counting down the weeks until this drops out of the top 10. It only has a week or two left, which is super exciting. If Mariah Carey is the one to officially kick it out, that would be excellent.

10- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (-5) -- This shocked me. I mean, I know this song was losing momentum and wasn't going to stick around in the top five for much longer, but I expected a more gradual descend, not a week where it suddenly dropped like a rock.

Rising on the Hot 100:

14- "All I Want for Christmas is You" - Mariah Carey (+15) -- You know it's Christmas time when Mariah Carey is shooting up the charts with this song! We're only in the first full week of December and the song is already knocking on the door to the top 10. Last Christmas season, the song finally cracked the top 10 and peaked at No. 9. It's time to get it even higher this year!

21- "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" - Andy Williams (re-entry) -- And hey, more Christmas news. Mariah got here a week before everything else, but this week we see the rest of the annual Christmas entries, starting with Andy Williams, who earns a new high in terms of peak position. Does that mean we can get two Christmas songs into the top 10 this year? If so, this would be very much deserved as this is an absolute Christmas classic. In fact, this is more deserving of a top 10 appearance than Mariah is, in my opinion. But hey, we can have both, right?

23- "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" - Brenda Lee (re-entry) -- Our third Christmas song of the week is also in great position. Wouldn't it be great if we could even get THREE Christmas songs in the top 10? OK, I'm not holding my breath there. Just dreaming. Brenda Lee previously got to No. 14 with this song, so unlike Andy Williams, she didn't enter at a new high. But I think she has potential to beat her previous high, even if she doesn't get her top 10 entry. In terms of Christmas songs, this is one of the most fun and exciting Christmas songs out there, so I'm glad it's here each year.

26- "A Holly Jolly Christmas" - Burl Ives (re-entry) -- Like Andy Williams, Burl Ives is debuting this year at a new high, with a chance of at least getting close to the top 10, which is an exciting prospect. "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" and "A Holly Jolly Christmas" make a great duo, so it's good to see both of them debuting in the 20's.

29- "Better" - Khalid (+14) -- The only song interrupting our Christmas groove this week is Khalid as most of the other songs around this year either fell or stayed in the same general area as the previous week. And I'm fine with Christmas entries cause everything else to go stagnant. And I would've been fine with this being a song that also went stagnant since it's one of Khalid's more forgettable entries on the charts.

33- "Jingle Bell Rock" - Bobby Helms (re-entry) -- "Jingle Bell Rock" combined with "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" also make for one exciting Christmas duo, so I'm glad both of them are around. This song previously peaked at No. 29, so it also has a chance to beat its previous record. In fact, it's quite likely since that's only four spots away and we have the whole Christmas season in front of us.

39- "The Christmas Song (Merry Christmas to You)" - Nat King Cole (re-entry) -- I always forget that this is called "The Christmas Song." That seems like a fairly generic title. But the second you sing the first line, "Chestnuts roasting on an open fire," I know exactly what you are talking about. In fact, I kinda attribute it as the Chestnuts song. But this is yet another Christmas classic that is a joy to have around. It's previous peak was No. 37, so it's a great year all around for our Christmas songs.

43- "Last Christmas" - Wham! (re-entry) -- Our final Christmas entry is the one that's the lesser of the bunch. I don't necessarily love "Last Christmas" like I do all the others, but it's undoubtedly a catchy, fun song that'll get stuck in everyone's head once one person starts singing it. Thus it makes perfect sense that it's now part of the annual Christmas tradition. Overall, I'm glad it's around. It's previous peak was No. 41, so again, everyone is going to break their records this year. And I do anticipate some of our other entries at some point in December. In previous years we had "Feliz Navidad" and Pentatonix's arrangement of "Mary Did You Know?" show up, so I'm wondering if those two are going to make a reappearance this year. I believe Billboard just has rules that if an older song re-enters, it has to be a top 50 song in terms of chart points, which might be why some of the other songs aren't here yet.

61- "STOOPID" - 6ix9ine featuring Bobby Shmurda (+14) -- GROSS

65- "Be Alright" - Dean Lewis (+11) --  I expected to see more songs below the top 50 rise up this week, but I guess we had the Christmas songs dominate the top 50 and 6ix9ine dominate the bottom 50, so I suppose it makes sense. But out of all the songs that could've gained this week, I'm glad it's this one. Again, I look at this song and think that it's a country song since Dean Lewis is very much a country singer name, but no. This is an Australian singer doing his best Ed Sheeran impression. And since I love Ed Sheeran's style, I find myself really loving this song, too. If it can continue to gain momentum, I think this is a perfect song for pop radio to simply fall in love with.

New Arrivals:

58- "MAMA" - 6ix9ine featuring Nicki Minaj & Kanye West -- NOPE

59- "KIKA" - 6ix9ine featuring Tory Lanez -- NOPE

62- "TIC TOC" - 6ix9ine featuring Lil Baby -- NOPE

69- "Come Out and Play" - Billie Eilish -- Yes, I'm ignoring 6ix9ine this week. Maybe if he had only one song, I could bite the bullet and cover it. But five new 6ix9ine songs? Nope. You can't make me. That leaves an awfully short list of new arrivals for me to actually cover, with just Billie Eilish and Jacquees. Now when I saw Billie Eilish debuting last week, I was surprised that it was "Ocean Eyes," a two year old song, rather than "Come Out and Play." Not that I'm complaining. The more Billie Eilish, the better. But "Come Out and Play" is the song on that "Share Your Gifts" commercial/short film from Apple, which is why I have that video headlining the new arrivals. Now I'm not exactly sure what that video has to do with Apple, but it's a nice, little Christmas short about a girl being too afraid to share her gifts until her dog causes what she's been writing to blow out the window. She's nervous and wants to get them back, but is pleasantly surprised when people react positively to what she has written. Now there's an even shorter version of this that plays as a commercial, so I recommend you watch the whole thing above if you haven't. It's pretty good. As far as the song goes, it's the perfect backdrop to this video as Billie shows off her versatility by writing a smooth and toned-back pop song, gently encouraging people to come out of their bubble. On it's own, it's still a really good Billie Eilish song, but it's made even better with the video. 

71- "WAKA" - 6ix9ine featuring A Boogie wit da Hoodie -- NOPE

90- "You" - Jacquees -- If you don't know who Jacquees is, don't worry. You're not alone. He's only had two previous entries on the Hot 100, "B.E.D.," which debuted last year and "At the Club" with DeJ Loaf, which charted in February. Neither song was particularly memorable as I had to look them up myself before typing this. I recognized the name, but I didn't remember what exactly he had done. After jogging my memory, I can say I don't like "B.E.D.," and am not impressed with "At the Club," although the latter is the more tolerable song from Jacquees. And now as the third Jacquees song to chart on the Hot 100, we have "You," an extremely undescriptive and vague song title, which is fitting, I suppose, because the song isn't much of anything, either. It's not particularly bad and probably falls into the R&B genre, which is a genre I don't hate, but get mostly bored with. I will say that Jacquees has a decent voice that carries the song, but all he's doing in this song is hating on this girl for all the things that bother him, but then, in a very wishy-washy, not committal way, claims that he would rather be with her and all her B.S., which I don't believe would get him very far in whatever broken relationship this is. I'm not sure what he's trying to get at with this song, but he comes off as more of a jerk and thus if I were the girl, I'd say, "screw you" and walk out. Thus is why I'm not gravitating towards this song at all, even though it's not particularly bad, music-wise, minus the annoying water drops that are scattered throughout for some reason.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - December 1, 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- "thank u, next" - Ariana Grande (=) -- Ariana's really lucky right now that she got a third week on top of the charts. This song debuted two weeks ago at No. 1 with just five days of tracking. It stayed No. 1 last week after its first full week of tracking. And now in week No. 3 it fell hard in sales and streaming, but still managed to stay on top because it was so far ahead in the previous weeks. I'm not surprised at that. In fact, I'm more surprised that it stayed at No. 1 for a full three weeks. Next week I feel Ariana is destined to fall a couple spots on the charts, which makes me really nervous about what might happen next week given what's still in second place.

2- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (=) -- I don't understand this. I don't understand this at all. "SICKO MODE" is not particularly dominate in any category at the moment, but it's pretty strong in all three categories and is also maintaining steady across the board, even on radio. I don't know why any radio station would even touch this. And now because of this, Travis Scott is the biggest contender to go to No. 1 next week. If that happens, I would officially declare the song the worst No. 1 hit of 2018. And that's saying something since there's been several bad No. 1 hits this year.

3- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille (=) -- Pardon the continued puns, but I would be much happier if this song went No. 1 instead of Travis Scott. But sadly "Happier" has really struggled to jump ahead of "SICKO MODE" and at this point it looks like it's stuck behind it. Even though the radio remains super strong, the sales and streaming just aren't strong enough to get it over the hump. And that's sad.

4- "Without Me" - Halsey (=) -- I'm still fine with this sitting here in the top five. I'm not sure it has the momentum to jump ahead of the song right in front of it, unless of course Ariana takes a huge tumble. I would also really hope that "SICKO MODE" somehow falters and gives way to something better. But that doesn't seem like it's going to happen because our stupid country is too busy drooling all over themselves while listening to Travis Scott and Drake rap about how awesome they are.

5- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (+1) -- Hey look who's back in the top five? I don't anticipate that this will last too much longer. It's just here because the floor completely disappeared from under Maroon 5 this week, which is great news.

6- "High Hopes" - Panic! At the Disco (+2) -- In continued great news, "High Hopes" has jumped to No. 1 on the radio charts. And I can only hope that said radio momentum continues to be strong enough to keep this song around for a long time. With a few of the previously mentioned songs in the top five looking a bit vulnerable, it would be fantastic if this song could take its place in the top five and camp out there for a while.

7- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes (=) -- Meanwhile, let's keep this song far away from the top five. The last thing we need is for another stupid rap song to stick around.

8- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B (-3) -- It makes me so happy to see this song finally tanking. It deserved to be gone a long time ago. In fact, it never deserved to be this high in the first place. Hopefully we'll only have another week or two before it's gone for good. It's been 25 frustratingly long weeks with this in the top 10.

9- "Drip Too Hard" - Lil Baby & Gunna (+1) -- "Drip Too Hard" swaps places with "ZEZE" this week, making me angry that both songs are still here. Let's get rid of them.

10- "ZEZE" - Kodak Black featuring Travis Scott & Offset (-1) -- See previous comment.

Rising on the Hot 100:

14- "Wake up in the Sky" - Gucci Mane, Bruno Mars & Kodak Black (+3) -- Do we really have to make this song a thing? Stupid Bruno Mars. He's the big reason why this is here. I'd tolerate another boring Bruno song, but seeing him drag Gucci and Kodak with him is rather upsetting, especially Kodak Black. I don't know why we're making him a thing.

15- "Trip" - Ella Mai (+3) -- I thought that this song was going to take its place in the top 10 since it had a lot of momentum on its side. I suppose it'd be better to see this song instead of No. 7, 8, 9, 10 or 14. But I'm still kinda happy to have seen this song stall out a bit in the teens. We'll see what the future has in store for it.

16- "Sunflower (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse)" - Post Malone & Swae Lee (+6) -- Initial reviews for "Into the Spider-Verse" are in and people are singing the movie's praises. That makes me excited. I'm still struggling to see what this song has anything to do with the movie outside being a random, useless Post Malone and Swae Lee song to be used as background noise. But it's whatever. It's not the worst thing.

17- "Eastside" - Benny Blanco, Halsey & Khalid (+4) -- Halsey looks like she's comfortably camped out in the top five right now. And I'm fine with that. But then I see this song slowly rising in the teens and I'm reminded that I would rather see this song in the top five that Halsey's current one. Let's make it happen, America!

28- "Leave Me Alone" - Flipp Dinero (+9) -- Sigh. Why do I have to keep dealing with this song? Make it stop and make it go away!

29- "All I Want for Christmas is You" - Mariah Carey (re-entry) -- Mariah's annual return to the charts! That means Christmas season has officially begun and we can all start blasting our Christmas music, right? Last Christmas season we finally got this song to crack the top 10 as it peaked at No. 9. Think we can get it higher this season? I'd be totally down. I'm also curious to see what other Christmas songs make their way to the charts this holiday season. Anything beyond the regulars? I'll list them all here in the rising songs charts as they re-enter in the coming weeks!

33- "Speechless" - Dan + Shay (+5) -- It's nice to see the proper Dan + Shay song rising on the charts. Last week I was a bit nervous when "Tequila" made another gain. I thought we were done with the song. It's good to see that we might actually be. I'm still not madly in love with this song, but it's a much nicer Dan + Shay song.

43- "Better" - Khalid (+8) -- It's definitely been a great year for Khalid as he's shown up everywhere. Thus with all the songs of his to choose from, I'm disappointed to see this song doing well because it's one of his more forgettable showings.

49- "Arms Around You" - XXXTENTACION & Lil Pump featuring Maluma & Swae Lee (+11) -- BOYCOTT THIS.

80- "lovely" - Billie Eilish & Khalid (re-entry) -- I reserve the right to pick and choose which re-entries I include in this list. There's no rhyme or reason there. This song I'm including because I absolutely love this song. It's still one of my favorites of the year. I have no idea why it's back, but it gave me a lot of joy seeing it this week, so I had to include it because this deserves to be a huge hit.

New Arrivals:

81- "Take One" - Kodak Black -- I don't feel like listening to a Kodak Black song today. All his songs are trash. Why should I expect this one to be any different?

92- "Twerk" - City Girls featuring Cardi B -- If you're wondering who City Girls are, they're the duo who should have a No. 1 hit attached to their name as they were featured on Drake's "In My Feelings," but Drake decided not to list them as featured artist on the track, so they got screwed over. But now they turn to Cardi B to give them their first official Hot 100 hit. And I will admit that that the girls do have a decent sense of flow and they mix well with Cardi B. I can see this catching with the general public as a huge dance hit. The problem, though, is that I don't give them any credit for the beat in the song because they sampled the song "Choppa Style" by Choppa featuring Master P. Go listen to that song and you'll realize this whole song is simply that song regurgitated with City Girls and Cardi B adding their own lyrics. And said lyrics are all super trashy and awful, so I can't get behind this, nor can I give City Girls any credit. And of course Cardi is Cardi. She'll add a lazy verse or two onto any song that's requested of her. And they're all the same, so I don't know why people aren't tired of her yet.

97- "Ocean Eyes" - Billie Eilish -- In addition to being pleasantly surprised that "lovely" re-entering the charts this week, I was also surprised to see "Ocean Eyes" debut on the charts for Billie Eilish. I know her songs well enough at this point to know that this was one of the first singles she released two years ago, a month or so before she turned 15. So yeah, when you listen to this song, you have to keep in mind that it's performed by a 14-year-old Billie Eilish. And with that context, this is a dang good song for a 14-year-old. Yes, the lyrics are pretty simplistic, but as a simple pop song, it's rather soothing and effective. I'm sure if Billie performs it today, you'd be able to hear a bit more maturity in her sound, but as is she's still pretty good. I mean, how many young teenagers do you see that are writing and singing this effectively. She's a girl who has talent well beyond her years, so I'm excited to see where she goes with her career as she gets older. 

98- "Close to Me" - Ellie Goulding & Diplo featuring Swae Lee -- I was wondering when this was going to chart. A quick summary on my history with Ellie Goulding. I liked her breakout hit "Lights" back in the day. Like, a lot. But it was shortly after that on her second album that I completely fell in love. Both "Halcyon" and the deluxe edition "Halcyon Days" are incredible. In fact, I'd call that album one of my favorites of the 2010's. But then she released her third album "Delirium," which I found extremely underwhelming. Maybe I was a bit too harsh on it at the time, but I just had so high expectations for her music that it was super disappointing to listen to her dip down to generic pop that sounded more desperate than anything. But because I loved her so much before that, she became one of the few singers in which I actually subscribed to her YouTube channel. I don't do that these days with musicians. But I just never unsubscribed from Ellie, so I always see her new music right when it comes. The audio for "Close to Me" was released back on October 24th, with the music video getting released on November 14th. So this feels like old news to me.

That said, I think this is totally passable. And that was my initial reaction when I listened to it a month ago. Now perhaps I'm more tolerant of this than her music from her third album because of expectations. I accepted the fact that she's not going to replicate "Halcyon" again, so I didn't expect that when I listened to this song, whereas I probably did expect that when I listened to "Delirium." Now I did feel like teaming up with Diplo and Swae Lee was a bit desperate for attention, but Diplo provides a nice beat to the song and if we have to add a rapper to the song, Swae Lee is one of the more tolerable ones. Even though his lyrics aren't that great, he mixes well with Ellie. And Ellie's lyrics aren't all that wonderful, either, but their passable and the song has enough bounce to it to be a fun one to listen to. Now the question will be if this will catch on with the public because female pop stars haven't had the best luck as of late, with the exception of Ariana and Halsey. But hey, maybe 2019 will be nicer to pop. We do have several of them in the top 10 right now, so we shall see.

99- "Girl Like You" - Jason Aldean -- Really, Jason? "Girl Like You"? Can't you come up with a song title that's slightly more creative? I've had to deal with Maroon 5's "Girls Like You" for the last 25 weeks and now there's a "Girl Like You" on the charts. I think this song might be successful just because people still searching for the Maroon 5 song might click this one by accident. That said, this song is a lot more upbeat and exciting than "Girls Like You," not that that's a super high bar, but still. This has a strong enough groove to it that I can see country fans falling in love with it. And if you like Jason Aldean, I'm willing to bet that you'll love this song. Doesn't mean I'm necessarily a huge fan of it. I think most of the lyrics are your basic country lyrics developed straight out of the factory rather than being genuine and unique to what Jason Aldean is feeling. And I find a lot of said lyrics fairly cheesy. But it has a strong enough groove for it to be acceptable in books, so take that for what it's worth.

100- "Burn the House Down" - AJR -- I've spent the last few minutes scrambling to figure out where I know this song from. Did it show up on another chart that I looked at or covered somewhere? Did I listen to this album last year and forget? This doesn't seem like it's brand new, but I can't place it, so I suppose it might be. I can't find it on any of my Excel charts. I don't think I listened to the album, but if I did this comes from the deluxe version of the album that was released in September. So I'm at a loss. But I really enjoy the song. AJR is a band composed of three brothers who have a unique and creative style. I haven't dove too deep into their discography, but their songs are usually pretty different and fun. Speaking of groove, this song has a ton of groove with a lot of clever instrumentation. And it gets better once you know the song has some actual meaning to it. This could work just fine as an empty dance beat and I would still probably enjoy it. But the message here is actually pretty political. It's not specific enough to name names or dive into issues, but there's a section that says "Should I hang my head low? Should I bite my tongue? Or should I march with every stranger from Twitter to get stuff done?" That's the theme here. There's a strong sense of distaste in the lyrics the dive into the conflicting messages in one's head as you try to figure out if you should remain quiet or march forward and make some noise. Granted, you might argue that this song is a call for action, but doesn't provide action because it doesn't dive into specifics. But I feel that's more of a nitpick. I still think it's a fun, strong anthem with enough depth to make it solid effort from AJR.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - November 24, 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- "thank u, next" - Ariana Grande (=) -- I'm a bit surprised that Ariana was able to keep the top spot this week since songs that debut high usually take a big second week dip, but I'm not too surprised because "thank u, next" made No. 1 last week with only five days of tracking, so this week qualifies as the song's first full week of tracking. In doing so, the streaming is huge, increasing this week 63.4 million U.S. streams, up from 55.5 million last week. The sales crashed in half, but since sales are a lot lower overall than they used to be, the 43,000 sales it got this week was easily enough to stay at the top of the sales chart. The tricky thing for the song's long term potential will be radio play. While it was up significantly compared to last week's debut, Ariana's "Breathin" is now top 10 on radio and gaining strong traction. Usually artists don't have two radio hits at the same time. When all is said and done, I'm totally happy with this song being No. 1 this week, especially given what ended up in the runner-up spot.

2- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (+1) -- Yeah this is gross. I want this song to fall, but Travis Scott boosted it with an iTunes discount, which helped it this week. It also still has monster streaming and is also top 10 on radio for some strange, unknown reasons. Without Ariana, this would've been our No. 1 hit this week, so we dodged a huge bullet.

3- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille (+1) -- I was really wanting this to go No. 1 this week because I think it would be fitting for a song called "Happier" to be No. 1 on the week of Thanksgiving. But alas it was not meant to be. The fantastic news this week is that it DID go No. 1 on radio, dethroning Maroon 5's "Girls Like You" after the latter song's 16-week reign, which is tied for the second longest reign on the radio charts, behind only the 18-week run of Goo Goo Dolls' "Iris." I had accepted the awful reality of that record being broke, which is why I was very pleasantly surprised to learn that "Happier" stopped it short of the mark. Now "Happier" has stalled out a bit on sales and streaming, which is why it hasn't been able to get over the hump to that No. 1 spot, but consistent radio will keep it around and if Ariana and Travis eventually slip, said consistency could still give it the No. 1 spot. It's anyone's game at this point for the near future.

4- "Without Me" - Halsey (+2) -- So far in the top five we have "thank u, next," "Happier" and now "Without Me." Follow that up with "Girls Like You" up next and that means we have four pop songs in the top five and only one rap song? That's solid news. Maybe we can have a bit of a pop revival after the rap genre has had such a strong stranglehold on the charts of late. "Without Me" isn't the greatest pop song in the world, but it's certainly acceptable. And it's also the highest Halsey has hit on her own. She previous reigned for 12 weeks at top with The Chainsmokers on "Closer," but that was with her as a featured role, not a lead act. This is a great sign for her career moving forward.

5- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B (-3) -- It brought me so much happiness to see that this song completely tanked this week, falling down to No. 5 when I totally expected it to stay at No. 2. And as I previously mentioned, I'm super glad that the song fell short of tying or passing the radio record set by "Iris." Imagine a world where "Girls Like You" got that record. What a travesty that would be. It's bad enough that it hit second place on that list. It would give me even more joy, though, if this began a downward spiral for the song. The faster that this leaves the top 10, the better.

6- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (-1) -- It's been a solid run for "Lucid Dreams." It fell a spot this week, but at least it didn't completely crash like Post Malone's "Better Now," which you may have noticed is completely gone from the top 10.

7- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes (+2) -- Why is this still around? What appeal does this song have to people? I really don't get it.

8- "High Hopes" - Panic! At the Disco (+4) -- Out of all the great things that have happened so far, Panic! At the Disco hitting the top 10 is easily the greatest feat this week. This is the second ever top 10 entry for the band after "I Write Sins Not Tragedies" hit No. 7 in 2006 and what a well-deserved entry this is. I should note that referring to Panic! At the Disco as a band is no longer the most accurate statement since Brendon Urie is currently the only official member of the band, but eh, whatever. Whether it's just Brendon or a group of others with him, this has been one of my favorite songs of the year, which I thought meant it was doomed to do nothing on the Hot 100. But oh how happy I am to be wrong because having a song like this around certainly makes the top 10 a much better place. The song is struggling a bit on sales and streaming as it's mostly boosted up by strong radio, currently No. 3 behind "Happier" and "Girls Like You," so I'm not sure what the song's potential is, but I'm hoping that the radio is strong and consistent enough to keep it around.

9- "ZEZE" - Kodak Black featuring Travis Scott & Offset (-1) -- Well, at least this isn't rising. But it needs to fall faster because the world doesn't need this around.

10- "Drip Too Hard" - Lil Baby & Gunna (=) -- Why is this still No. 10 this week? Let's get it knocked off rather than letting it stubbornly stay in.

Rising on the Hot 100:

13- "Natural" - Imagine Dragons (+2) -- This song has managed to stick around in the teens for the majority of the college football season. I still hear it all the time in advertising and it still works great as a college football anthem. It's also now a part of Imagine Dragons' new album, which totally shocked me by coming out this month. They just barely did an album last year and now they already have their next one? If I get around to the album, I'll let you know what I think. But there is one new song from it on the charts this week that I'll discuss below.

14- "Breathin" - Ariana Grande (+7) -- Can Ariana manage to get two songs into the top 10 here soon? I would totally be down for that happening. As I noted earlier, this song's radio is get huge traction, entering the top 10 this week. And the recently released music video has helped its streaming numbers in a big way. So all signs point to continued momentum for this song.

28- "Lose It" - Kane Brown (+25) -- I was wondering where country went these last few weeks, so I'm not surprised to see the genre finally get a good week. Several of them got good rises this week, plus we have four new country songs that charted, so I'll be covering those down below. In terms of this song, I'm not surprised to see it doing well simply because a lot of people love Kane Brown for some reason. But I'm personally not impressed. This song doesn't offend me. It just bores me.

36- "Tequila" - Dan + Shay (+8) -- If we're going to have a Dan + Shay song do well, can we have it be "Speechless" and not "Tequila"?

38- "Speechless" - Dan + Shay (+7) -- Oh hey, speaking of "Speechless." Yeah, this is the superior Dan + Shay song. It still doesn't knock my socks off, but for country standards, this is decently solid.

52- "Topanga" - Trippie Redd (+38) -- A Trippie Redd album dropped, giving this song a huge boost and adding four additional new songs to the charts. And as you'll quickly find out, I couldn't care less.

75- "Burning Man" - Dierks Bentley featuring Brothers Osborne (+17) -- OK, this is a country song that really deserves to find success. I can nitpick it a bit, but this is one of the better country songs to chart this year and I give a lot of credit to Brothers Osborne, an act that I really need to check out more because both times they've shown up on the charts, I've been impressed.

77- "This Feeling" - The Chainsmokers featuring Kelsea Ballerini (+18) -- This song was performed live at halftime for Monday Night Football this week and it was a solid performance, mostly because Kelsea Ballerini is awesome. The Chainsmokers themselves looked and sounded a bit lost, but overall I'm fine with this doing well. It's a step in the right direction for The Chainsmokers and a great choice of a featured credit.

83- "Consequences" - Camila Cabello (+14) -- OK, this is a good first sign. I have a bad feeling that this song is going to fail because of Camila's strange release patterns with her songs this year. But I really hope I'm wrong because I want this to catch on and be a hit. It's one of my favorite songs from Camila's album.

New Arrivals:

16- "BAD!" - XXXTENTACION -- You know what? I'm getting really sick of people taking advantage of the death of XXXTENTACION to get sales and streaming money, whether it be other rappers or his own team looking to continue to release songs. I don't want to see any more of his songs show up on the charts with him in any role. And if they continue to show up, I will boycott them. Starting with this one. I refuse to listen to it.

44- "Armed and Dangerous" - Juice WRLD -- I'm also getting really tired of Juice WRLD. Yes, I'll still defend "Lucid Dreams" as a good song, but at this point I'm calling that lightning in a bottle that he hasn't been able to produce again and probably never will. I'm also tired of this trend that rapping about killing people is the cool thing to do. It's not. I don't condone murder and neither should anyone. Juice WRLD doesn't even sound vicious or angry on this song. He's just lazily rapping about murder in a very nonchalant sort of way because it's the cool thing to rap about and he's jumping on the bandwagon. I don't actually believe that he's murdered anyone or even believes what he's singing about. I suppose that's a good thing that I don't think he's a violent criminal who deserves life in prison. But it's a dumb thing that he's following stupid trends by releasing meaningless songs just to get more money since the world made him a thing. Because, yeah, that's all this song is. He's bragging about murdering people and flexing about how rich he is. I find absolutely nothing interesting about that.

55- "1400 / 999 Freestyle" - Trippie Redd featuring Juice WRLD -- There's four new Trippie Redd songs debuting this week from his new album. And I don't care to listen to any of them. Based on this title, I'm guessing this is a freestyle rap. If you have talent, freestyle is impressive. If you are as bad as Trippie Redd, freestyle rap is beyond garbage because the songs end up being even more incomprehensible and unfocused. If this isn't freestyle, OK. I don't care either way.

73- "Love Scars 3" - Trippie Redd -- Nope. Not going to listen to this song.

79- "Bad Liar" - Imagine Dragons -- I was rather shocked to see Imagine Dragons releasing yet another album this month. Their last album was released just last year. It adds to my theory that Dan Reynolds and the band no longer care about quality. They're just churning out a whole bunch of songs and albums for the sake of quantity. That's my initial thoughts on the album release, anyways. I suppose I can't judge this album specifically until I listen to it, but I'm not excited to dive in. However, I do still enjoy "Natural" because it's a fitting college football anthem and there's also a new song called "Zero" that plays during the credits of "Ralph Breaks the Internet." That song is very unique for the band and I really hope it charts.

"Bad Liar" doesn't have context for college football or for "Ralph Breaks the Internet," so I wasn't confident it was going to be great, but I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of the song. I think my biggest problem with Imagine Dragons lately is they've been churning out empty, meaningless songs that felt and sounded very lazy. This song, though, feels like it actually means something to Dan Reynolds as he dives into how much he's struggled this year with the failing relationship with his wife. It was announced back in April that they were getting a divorce, but a recent interview suggests that they are back together again? Regardless of the final outcome, it's obvious that there's been tension and that's what he's singing about here. The content of these lyrics suggests he's finally come to terms with the idea that he's never going to be enough for her, so instead of lying to her that he will be better, he's being honest with himself and perhaps with her that he might not be what she wants him to be, so he's letting her go. There's actually a lot of power in that. This is also a more held back, mellow song where the soft instrumentals fit the tone and feel of the song instead of being a heavy rock song that conflicts with the lyrics. Adding to it all is that his wife (or ex-wife?) Aja Volkman is the one providing backing vocals in the song. That's a solid touch. So yeah, I'm pleasantly surprised with this. Solid effort from Dan Reynolds here. Maybe I should be more optimistic about the album as a whole?

89- "Negative Energy" - Trippie Redd featuring Kodie Shane -- I'm not going to listen to this Trippie Redd song, either.

91- "Sixteen" - Thomas Rhett -- OK, now we're going to finish this week off with a string of country songs, beginning here with Thomas Rhett. Now mostly I'm fairly Negative towards this guy because he doesn't put out a whole lot of quality. Most of his songs are empty and forgettable. But I didn't mind the song "Life Changes," so maybe there was hope here? And, well, yeah, this isn't bad either. The song has a nice mellow groove to it that feels like he actually tried to put out a meaningful song rather than churning out the factory-built country-pop songs that he usually produces. And I like the sentiment here of reflecting back to your childhood and wishing you were 16 again. What I didn't like is how he doesn't commit to that. If this was specifically a song about him wishing he were 16, I would enjoy that to some degree. But in verse two he starts singing about wishing he were 18, then in verse three he's singing about wishing he were 21. I think the song would've been better if he were to commit to a lane here. But as is, this isn't awful, so I'll accept it.

93- "Good Girl" - Dustin Lynch -- For some reason I thought Dustin Lynch had charted this year, but nope. "Seein Red" and "Small Town Boy" were last year. "Good Girl" is his first song from this year. I didn't mind the former, but wasn't a fan of the latter. "Good Girl" falls into the latter category as well being that it's a forgettable song. This is one of those factory-built country songs I was talking about. Dustin is talking about how happy he is that he's got a good girl. He doesn't tell us much about her or dive into their relationship. And there doesn't seem to be any emotion or originality in the song, so this doesn't sound personal at all. It just seems like a basic, formulaic country songs that any of these singers could produce when they ran out of ideas.

95- "Last Shot" - Kip Moore -- This is also the first song this year from Kip Moore. The difference here is that last year Kip Moore's song was "More Girls Like You," which is an absolutely fantastic country song. In fact, it's still the song that I start singing every time I see Maroon 5's "Girls Like You" on the charts. "Last Shot" comes from the same album as "More Girls Like You," which was released last year. That makes me wonder why it took Kip Moore so long to release another single from the album. As soon as that song started fading, logic says he should've released this one, which is another solid country song. Now in fairness to the other guys, the lyrics here aren't the most inventive. This is still basic country stuff. But the difference here is that Kip Moore has a whole heck of a personality as he sounds like he cares rather than sounding desperate for a hit. I also really love his voice. I don't if husky is the right word, but that sound combined with his passion and the upbeat tune make this a very enjoyable song to listen to even if it doesn't have quite as catchy of a groove as "More Girls Like You."

96- "Millionaire" - Chris Stapleton -- Chris Stapleton did have a song this year, but it wasn't with him in a featured role. It was him joining with Justin Timberlake on "Say Something," which I thought was solid. I'm also not quite sure why he didn't take advantage of the moment and release a single shortly after that song, especially since "Millionaire" comes from his 2017 album "From A Room, Volume 2." So the song was already there and ready to be released. It just took Chris and his team a long time to send it out to the radio. And like both Dustin Lynch and Kip Moore, Chris is singing about his love for a girl. But again, the difference in quality is the emotion and passion behind the song. Dustin doesn't sound like he cared about his song, while Kip and Chris do. And Chris specifically is singing this slowed down love ballad that he's singing with his wife Morgane Stapleton as she's providing the backing vocals here. That's the second time that's happened this week, which is an interesting coincidence as singers don't usually bring their spouses on with them. But in both cases this works. When it comes to a love ballad, the most important thing is for the couple to sound like they love each other. Chris and Morgane pull that off. I suppose Chris doesn't get credit for the lyrics as this is a cover, but he does get credit for singing it well.

98- "Toxic Waste" - Trippie Redd -- An accurate description of Trippie Redd's music. So why would I waste my time?

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - November 17, 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- "thank u, next" - Ariana Grande (new) -- Do you know how good it feels to look up the Hot 100 and see that Maroon 5 is NOT No. 1? Thank you, Ariana! And I suppose a congratulations is in order for Ariana's first ever No. 1 hit. Some would say that it's about time. I'm certainly happy for her, but I wish it would've come on a better song as this feels more like a lifetime achievement award rather than an accolade that this specific song deserved. It's like those times when the Academy finally gives a certain filmmaker an Academy Award out of obligation than anything. Said filmmaker may have had better work in the past, but the Academy awarded them on a lesser piece of work because they were long overdue for something. In situations like this, you can't help but be happy for the person, even though you wish it would've come in on a film more deserving. That's kinda how I feel here. Except Billboard isn't an organization that gives out No. 1 hits. It's all about the numbers and Ariana hit the sweet spot with this surprise hit. She managed to get 81,000 in first week sales and 55.5 million U.S. streams, which blew the competition out of the water. There's also a few things worth noting. First, a pop song replaced a pop song. Second, this is the first time since Ed Sheeran's "Perfect" back in January where a rapper isn't present on the No. 1 hit in either a lead or featured role. Third, this is the first woman to debut at No. 1 since Adele's "Hello" three years ago. All of those make me happy, although I wish there was more of a female presence on the charts. Nearly 80 percent of the artists in the top 10 this year have been male and this is only the third week that a solo lead female has been No. 1, which is the lowest year on the Hot 100 since 1975. I find that troubling.

2- "Girls Like You" - Maroon 5 featuring Cardi B (-1) -- I'm glad that this song is no longer No. 1. But we have a few more things to still worry about. One, we have to hope that this DOESN'T go back to No. 1 next week if Ariana falls off. Two, this song is still at No. 1 on the radio charts for a 16th consecutive week. That ties for the second longest streak ever, with "Iris" by Goo Goo Dolls holding the all-time record at 18 weeks. Third, the fact that this song is still in the top 10 at all is troubling. Let's get rid of this altogether. It'll make the world a better place.

3- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (-1) -- Why is this still here?

4- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille (-1) -- Billboard spent their whole weekly article talking about Ariana. And rightfully so since it's her first ever week at No. 1. But they didn't clue me in on what the numbers for this song are, so we'll just have to see what happens next week. Songs that debut at No. 1 usually drop in their second week. That combined with the fact that "Happier" has been gaining in overall chart points while "Girls Like You" and "SICKO MODE" have both been falling mean that this could still sneak ahead and grab that No. 1 spot. We'll just have to wait and see as I'm just as much in the dark as everyone else is.

5- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (-1) -- I'm still sad that this never dethroned Maroon 5. But since Ariana managed to pull off the feat, I don't have to be too sad anymore.

6- "Without Me" - Halsey (+3) -- Halsey looks to be positioning herself rather well. While everything else is dropping, she's on the rise. Keep up this momentum and she'll have herself another top five hit. With "Girls Like You," "SICKO MODE" and "Lucid Dreams" all sliding, maybe she even moves up to No. 3 before too long?

7- "Better Now" - Post Malone (-2) -- This song had a great life in the top 10 and now it looks like that's going to come to an end. I'm not upset since it's run has been good, but I'm also not celebrating because I learned to tolerate this.

8- "ZEZE" - Kodak Black featuring Travis Scott & Offset (-2) -- Why is this still here?

9- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes (+1) -- Why is this still here?

10- "Drip Too Hard" - Lil Baby & Gunna (-2) -- Why is this still here?

Rising on the Hot 100:

14- "Wake up in the Sky" - Gucci Mane, Bruno Mars & Kodak Black (+12) -- I'm really upset that "High Hopes" wasn't able to crack the top 10 this week. Instead it fell a spot to No. 12 thanks to Ariana's debut while "Youngblood" by 5 Seconds of Summer slid to No. 11. And now knowing my luck, I'm probably going to have to deal with this song getting to the top 10 first. What a horrible turn of events that would be.

21- "Breathin" - Ariana Grande (+11) -- It's an all-around great week for Ariana as this official single charges up to No. 21 following the recent release of it's music video. Now I'm hoping that the momentum continues because this is the real Ariana song that deserves to be getting praised and played everywhere.

33- "Bohemian Rhapsody" - Queen (re-entry) -- I'm kind of upset that "Bohemian Rhapsody" is the ONLY Queen song to chart this week. I was hoping for an onslaught of Queen songs this week to show up after the Queen biopic named after this song is now dominating at the box office. You can stroll over to my movie blog to get my opinion of the movie, but I of course love this song and am glad that it's here. No, it's not my favorite Queen song. But that's beside the point.

41- "Leave Me Alone" - Flipp Dinero (+14) -- I wish that this song would leave me alone.

45- "Speechless" - Dan + Shay (+5) -- We've had a lack of country in the last few weeks, so I've been waiting for something to step up. And I'm fine with it being this song. I'm still surprised that there's not more country songs, though.

63- "Dip" - Tyga & Nicki Minaj (+20) -- Of course this song would become a hit. Because the world hates me right now. Why are we continuing to give Tyga a good career in 2018? The world was a better place when he was out of the picture.

New Arrivals:

1- "thank u, next" - Ariana Grande -- Yup, more Ariana talk now. This time we discuss the actual song instead of diving into the feat of Ariana hitting No. 1. And I don't know, this song is harmless. I don't think it needed to be an explicit song as Ariana decided to randomly drop a few f-bombs, so find the edited version on whatever streaming service you subscribe to for the best experience here. What I do like about this song is that it feels like Ariana is being genuine and honest with how her love life has gone. And she gets specific by name dropping all of her exes, so I know the song means something to her rather than being another cliche break-up song. It's also a more hopeful song as, instead of creating a diss track where she's tearing all of her exes down, she's telling us how each of them have helped her out in a different way, helping her become the person she is today. She hopes to get married one day, but until then she's choosing to recognize how each of her exes have helped her out in her life. I like that sentiment. And I think the slower, more mellow flow to the song fits the tone of the lyrics. So it's a nice song. It's just not a song that grabs me and makes me want to listen on repeat as it doesn't have the strong emotional weight or the powerful vocals that Ariana is capable of bringing on her songs. Not that every song has to have this, but given that this song is the one that finally got Ariana her No. 1, I find myself feeling obligated to bring it up anyways since this is more of a solid change of pace song rather than one you would envision as a chart topper, if that makes any sense.

38- "Don't Come out of the House" - Metro Boomin featuring 21 Savage -- I don't care about this new Metro Boomin album. I'm not going to give it a listen.

42- "10 Freaky Girls" - Metro Boomin featuring 21 Savage -- I don't care about this new Metro Boomin album. I'm not going to give it a listen.

51- "Space Cadet" - Metro Boomin featuring Gunna -- I don't care about this new Metro Boomin album. I'm not going to give it a listen.

62- "Overdue" - Metro Boomin featuring Travis Scott -- I don't care about this new Metro Boomin album. I'm not going to give it a listen.

72- "Dreamcatcher" - Metro Boomin featuring Swae Lee & Travis Scott -- I don't care about this new Metro Boomin album. I'm not going to give it a listen.

79- "No More" - Metro Boomin featuring Travis Scott, Kodak Black & 21 Savage -- I don't care about this new Metro Boomin album. I'm not going to give it a listen.

86- "Ella Quiere Beber" - Anuel AA & Romeo Santos -- Hey look! It's a song that's not by Metro Boomin, so I suppose I'll cover it. Although I'm not sure my opinion here is going to mean much since I couldn't quite crack the translation. "Ella Quiere Beber" may or may not mean "She Wants to Drink." Although this song is a remix as the original was without Romeo Santos and was called "Quiere Beber," which might mean "Wants to Drink"? If I cared enough, I would go to my Spanish friends for an exact translation. As far as the content of the song, it appears to be about a girl who wants to drink in order to forget about her ex-boyfriend. And I'm assuming Anuel AA and/or Romeo Santos have a goal to take advantage of her pain to be the new man in her life. But don't quote me on that. As far as the music itself, it feels like a very safe song for Romeo Santos. He has a nice voice that I don't mind. But I don't think he's able to quite capture the romance in this song that he often has been able to do in the past. And whenever Anuel AA comes in, I just found myself being annoyed because it felt like he does more of a mumble Spanish. I don't like his voice, so I didn't care much for the song. The only tolerable parts are when it's just Romeo and even that's simply acceptable.

97- "Consequences" - Camila Cabello -- I'm not sure what Camila Cabello's plan is with her single release. She released an album earlier this year that got her a huge No. 1 hit with "Havana." Then she followed that up with "Never Be the Same," but instead of pushing that song, she tried to push "Sangria Wine," a non-album single with Pharrell. That blew up in her face. Then she jumped on with Bazzi with "Beautiful," which has done alright. And now nearly a year later, she finally remembers that she has more songs from that album that she could release as singles? Why didn't she simply give "Never Be the Same" a stronger push followed by releasing this as a single a couple months later? Then she could've maximized her Billboard performance because I think this is a solid choice for a single. It feels like a natural progression after "Havana" and "Never Be the Same" as those two are the fun, upbeat pop hits while this is a solid bittersweet love ballad. I actually listened to the whole album shortly after it was released and my three favorite songs were "Never Be the Same," "She Loves Control" and "Consequences," so I was happy to see it show up. Unlike Ariana's song this week, this is a fairly generic breakup song without specifics, but she does a great job of letting us feel the emotion by giving us a soft, sweet love ballad before throwing out the bait-and-switch that she's actually in pain, helping us feel the bitter to go along with the sweet. I hope this song becomes big because I really like it, but I fear that Camila's single release patter this year might hurt this song's overall performance. 

99- "Casper" - Takeoff -- Haha, you really expect me to put much effort into a Takeoff song? Yeah, no. I'm just amused right now that he tried releasing an album, but even his target audience of dumb people who weren't born with proper earbuds ignored him. You would think this would be the type of album that ends up being a streaming monster, but instead it barely charts one song last week and one song this week. I will give Takeoff credit for the album only being 12 tracks long as other rappers release albums that average 20 tracks a piece and that drives me crazy. But that's all the credit he gets because it doesn't seem like Takeoff put a lot of effort into this, that based on the fact that "Last Memory" was a dumb song last week and "Casper" is a dumb song this week. He's not quite as annoying as his other two friends from Migos, but there's still nothing to this song, both in terms of flow of the song and the content of the lyrics. If Takeoff's project does indeed fail like I think it's going to, in a week or two I will have completely forgot that it existed.

100- "Up to Something" - Metro Boomin featuring Travis Scott & Young Thug -- I don't care about this new Metro Boomin album. I'm not going to give it a listen.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - November 10, 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 (=) -- Why is this still No. 1? It's been seven weeks at No. 1 now and that is seven weeks too long.

2- "SICKO MODE" - Travis Scott (=) -- Why is this still the No. 2 song?

3- "Happier" - Marshmello & Bastille (+1) -- Hey look! Here's something to cheer for! While "Girls Like You" and "SICKO MODE" both fall by about 5 percent, "Happier" is on the rise by about 3 percent overall. From what Billboard reports, the margins are pretty close and the balance in tipping in favor of "Happier." I feel like it's been a while since I've truly been happy about a No. 1, so hopefully the momentum keeps going.

4- "Lucid Dreams" - Juice WRLD (-1) -- I'm a bit sad that this was never able to unseat "Girls Like You." But oh well. Life moves on.

5- "Better Now" - Post Malone (=) -- I also would've been totally fine with this getting more momentum and hitting No. 1. But that also didn't happen.

6- "ZEZE" - Kodak Black featuring Travis Scott & Offset (=) -- Why is this still stuck at No. 6? Let's get it to fall down.

7- "Youngblood" - 5 Seconds of Summer (=) -- Why is this not going higher? I would love for this to camp out in the top five, ahead of some of the more awful songs ahead of it.

8- "Drip Too Hard" - Lil Baby & Gunna (=) -- Why is this still stuck at No. 8? Do people really care that much about these two or do the immature teenage boys who listen to this crap really have this much influence over streaming numbers?

9- "Without Me" - Halsey (+3) -- You know what? I'll take this. It's not the best Halsey has ever come up with, but in compared to some other songs in the top 10 right now, like the song directly above it and the song directly below it, this is certainly tolerable. The music video gave it a bit of a boost this week, so I'm not 100 percent sure about it's long-term staying power in the top 10, but we'll see.

10- "Mo Bamba" - Sheck Wes (+6) -- Haha, I learned why this is called "Mo Bamba." It's named after rookie center Mo Bamba, who played college ball in Texas and is now playing for the Orlando Magic. Apparently him and Sheck Wes were good friends growing up, so Sheck named a song after him. Although the song isn't really about Mo Bamba. It's an empty rap song about mostly nothing that mentions Mo in a line towards the beginning. And you should know by now that I'm angry that it is now a top 10 hit.

Rising on the Hot 100:

11- "High Hopes" - Panic! At the Disco (+10) -- This is such good news! The No. 11 spot always makes me nervous because so many good songs have made it to this point and peaked, so we'll certainly have to take this week by week. But if this can break through and hit the top 10, I'm going to be so happy! This is still one of the best songs to chart this year so it's great to see a quality song do well for a change.

13- "Money" - Cardi B (+41) -- Cardi wrote a song about money. Super original on her part. And this week is the song's first full week of tracking, hence the huge jump. I'm crossing my fingers that it will fall back down next week like some songs do after huge debuts. But knowing Cardi's history recently...

18- "Eastside" - Benny Blanco, Halsey & Khalid (+2) -- If we're going to bring a new Halsey song into the top 10, I'd prefer this song over the one that's in the top 10 at the moment because her and Khalid have a great connection in this song, but I'll take what I can get, I suppose.

26- "Wake Up in the Sky" - Gucci Mane, Bruno Mars & Kodak Black (+13) -- Kodak Black already seems to have "ZEZE" stuck in the top 10 at the moment, so I would really appreciate it if this song stops gaining momentum as we certainly don't need any more Kodak at the moment. And we certainly don't need more of Bruno or Gucci, either.

31- "Thriller" - Michael Jackson (re-entry) -- "Thriller" is only here for this week thanks to Halloween streaming and sales impacting the charts this week, but it's always fun to see it here. Even though it's one of the most overplayed songs in the history of like, ever, especially during Halloween, I've actually never managed to get sick of it. It's an absolute classic and I'll gladly welcome it with open arms every Halloween.

32- "Breathin" - Ariana Grande (+9) -- Ariana's not rising quite as fast as I would like her to, but at least this song is gaining some momentum. It's a solid single from Ariana that deserves to be heard and played.

40- "Ring" - Cardi B featuring Kehlani (+5) -- If we're going to popularize a new Cardi song, can we please choose this song instead of that "Money" trash that jumped into the top 15 this week?

48- "Lost in Japan" - Shawn Mendes & Zedd (+14) -- It's great seeing this song in the top 50. Let's keep it going upwards. I would love to see Shawn and Zedd get a hit. In fact, Shawn has done fairly well for himself recently, so it's sad that he's not doing quite as well as when he only delivered empty, boring songs. Sometimes the world is mean.

62- "That's on Me" - Yella Beezy (+24) -- Why does this exist? Make it go away!

81- "Backin' it Up" - Pardison Fontaine featuring Cardi B (+14) -- I forgot that this song was even a thing. And it's only a thing because of Cardi B, so Pardison Fontaine better be on his knees thanking her for making him a thing.

New Arrivals:

28- "Arms Around You" - XXXTENTACION & Lil Pump featuring Maluma & Swae Lee -- Is there no shame in the music industry? I'm sick and tired of artists taking advantage of the death of XXXTENTACION to shamelessly boost their sales numbers. It's pathetic. Because of that, I'm boycotting this song. I'm not even going to give it a listen and I hope it drops like a rock in future weeks.

54- "Last Memory" - Takeoff -- Hey look! It's the Migos member that everyone seems to have forgotten about. I mean, Quavo and Offset seem to get all the feature credits, but we don't see Takeoff that much. In fact, this is only his second solo appearance on the charts this year. And I'm totally fine with us keeping it that way. Sure, it would be better if we ignore all of Migos, but I'll take what I can get. Apparently Takeoff has a solo album coming out that I plan on ignoring, especially if it's anything like this. He's lazily bragging about his riches and unoriginal Migos fashion. Snooze.

76- "TAlk tO Me" - Tory Lanez & Rich the Kid -- Is Tory Lanez a thing people care about? I forget. Quite frankly I was tempted to flat out skip this song after I saw that it was officially stylized like that. But I subjected myself to it anyways. I suppose Tory's voice is better than most, but he's still only talking about being rich and wanting girls to hop out of their clothes for him, so there's no substance to this. However, he does make himself look fantastic in contrast to Rich the Kid, who comes in spouting gross lyrics and mumble rapping like he was drunk in studio. It makes the song as a whole super awful, but it does make me appreciate Tory slightly more, so take that for what it's worth.

80- "Topanga" - Trippie Redd -- After listening to this song, I learned there's a song called "It Ain't Over" by Maurette Brown Clark that Trippie Redd samples. That's a solid gospel song with great vocals from Maurette Brown Clark. But holy freaking cow does Trippie Redd make an awful choice by messing with the audio in the song with his sample, effectively making her sound like a chipmunk. And that chipmunked sample plays throughout "Topanga" is just awful. I couldn't even focus on whatever was happening in the lyrics. Something about taking the girl to Topanga, a city in California, to protect her from all the gun violence. Trippie kinda lost focus there, so I'm not sure what he was getting at. But I don't really care because all that was going through my head is that I want the sample to stop. But go check out the original song, though!

83- "Dip" - Tyga & Nicki Minaj -- Nicki Minaj's 100th appearance on the Hot 100. The first woman to cross that milestone. And I'm not giving an applause because Nicki is pure garbage about 90 percent of the time. But that's a significant stat worth pointing out for those who care. And speaking of garbage, this is a pretty worthless song with Tyga and Nicki lazily rapping about everything boring and unoriginal. A pretty pathetic song for such a big milestone. But I suppose it does a good job representing Nicki's career as a whole. Pure trash. If this ends up as popular as Tyga's "Taste," I'm going to throw a fit.

89- "Waste it on Me" - Steve Aoki featuring BTS -- Believe it or not, BTS collaborating with Steve Aoki sounds rather redundant on paper since BTS usually has an EDM dance vibe already, like a lot of K-Pop music. Steve Aoki's influence gives them a bit of a unique flavor, but not much. The most surprising part of the song is that there's no Korean spoken at all in this song, so I'm not sure what the point of bringing BTS in and making them only sing English is, especially since the lyrics here are is generic as they come with pop love anthems and you can barely tell when one BTS singer stops and when the other starts. They all blend together to sound like one boring pop singer with a generic Steve Aoki beat on the backdrop. So yeah, this is a lazy song done solely for the sake of sales and money on Steve Aoki's side, not because he thought it would make sense on a musical basis. The song is not particularly awful, it's just that if it falls away next week, I'll have already forgotten that it existed.

90- "A Million Dreams" - P!nk -- I'm trying my best to erase "The Greatest Showman" from my memory. That movie caused me so much pain, both in terms of my viewing of the film as well as how persecuted I felt for not liking it. So imagine my frustration when I learned there's a new soundtrack coming out called "The Greatest Showman: Reimagined" with famous musicians singing the boring, empty pop songs that the musical provided. If it fails to impact the charts whenever it's released, I'll be thankful. But so far the two songs that have been released are "The Greatest Show" by Panic! At the Disco and this, "A Million Dreams" by P!nk. And well, despite my disdain for both the movie and its soundtrack, those are the two songs from the movie that I actually didn't mind, probably because they're both from the beginning of the movie before things started to quickly nosedive downhill. That Panic! At the Disco cover of "The Greatest Show" is actually rather wild and fantastic. I kinda like that way more than the original. And this P!nk cover of "A Million Dreams" also does a great job of taking a decently sweet song from the movie and giving it a lot of power. I mean, P!nk is the type of pop singer that can get away with singing a generic song and making it seem fantastic simply because she has the vocals and presence to make anything work, but still. This is the one song from the movie that actually has something in terms of content, so giving it to P!nk is a match made in heaven because she takes it and runs with it. We might as well toss the original in the trash and call this a P!nk song now.

94- "Be Alright" - Dean Lewis -- Here's an international hit that's finally crossing over to the United States. "Be Alright" is from Australian pop singer Dean Lewis and hit No. 1 in Australia earlier this year. It's also hit top 10 in at least 13 other countries so far. It makes me jealous of other countries actually having good songs in their top 10 because I would like that over here, too. Because, yeah, this song is excellent. It's a super sad song about Dean Lewis coming to the harsh terms that a girl he once cared for has moved on and now he has a friend in the song telling him to stop trying to pursue because doing so is not going to do anything. Breakup songs are certainly not a unique thing to sing about, but I think this one stands out because it feels so personal and specific rather than being generic lyrics written to please a crowd. Because of that, I feel like I can relate to the song quite a bit and I think many other people will, too. But it's not just a sad song about that feeling that overcomes you when you realize it's officially over between you and a former lover, there's a strong message of hope that everything will be alright in the end. Sometimes the best healer is that of time. Once you give yourself time to overcome something difficult, you can then move forward and realize there's other people out there and other opportunities available that will make life better. This is a really deep and meaningful song that I can see myself really connecting with even more as time moves on.

97- "Kamikaze" - Lil Mosey -- Hey, we were on a roll there for a bit! Unfortunately we have to end on a bit of a sour note with Lil Mosey thinking he's Eminem with this song's title. Although there's certainly no fire or rage present like on Eminem's album this year. Just a boring, dull rap song from a punk kid who thinks he's super cool and for some reason is getting rewarding with a career. And when I say kid, I mean that literally. Lil Mosey is only 16 years old, so let's please collectively choose to ignore him. If he gets any bigger, I'm going to throw a fit.