DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - November 16, 2019

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

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi (+1) -- It's not too surprising that Lewis Capaldi went back to No. 1 this week. I'm super happy that Selena Gomez got her first ever No. 1 hit last week, but it did get there due to it having a huge surge in its first full week of tracking. It's normal for songs to fall after a week like that. That opened the door for Lewis Capaldi to walk back to No. 1 with "Someone You Loved" and I'm happy this got a second week at the top. It's a song that deserves the spotlight. It's not a particularly strong No. 1, but it's managed to be consistent enough across the board to fend off Post Malone for the time being, which rises up to No. 2 this week. Post Malone has the slight edge on both sales and streaming, but Lewis Capaldi has a significant lead on the radio. As long as he can hold that margin, he has a shot at remaining at No. 1, but I don't imagine it will be too long before Post Malone gets there.

2- "Circles" - Post Malone (+1) -- As surprising as it may be, "Circles" isn't super dominate on sales and streaming at the moment, but the good thing for this song is that it has the right amount of positive momentum to sneak ahead of "Someone You Loved." And I'm aright with that. This isn't the worst thing Post Malone has done.

3- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (+1) -- It's been a solid run for Shawn and Camila here. Even though they only celebrated one week at the top, they've been in the top three with this song for 16 weeks. That's rather impressive.

4- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (+1) -- After coming stumbling down from that top spot recently, "Truth Hurts" stopped the bleeding a bit this week by rising a spot in the top five. Although this week's rise is more due to Selena falling a bit.

5- "Lose You to Love Me" - Selena Gomez (-4) -- I'm not surprised at this. Songs that have big debuts often suffer a second weekend drop. But now that Selena has her first ever No. 1 hit in her back pocket, it's time for this to gain traction and stay around for a while. As "Señorita" has shown this year, a song doesn't need to be No. 1 for a long time to be considered a success. "Señorita" only had one week at No. 1, but has become one of the top songs of the year anyways. That's what I hope for "Lose You to Love Me." I hope it sticks around for a long time because it's a good song and Selena deserves to have continued success with this song. Her other song that debuted last week collapsed even bigger this week, but that's OK. "Lose You to Love Me" is the one that they're pushing as a radio single, so it's the one that needs to be successful.

6- "Good as Hell" - Lizzo (=) -- I'm expecting Lizzo to eventually flip-flop with herself as "Truth Hurts" declines and "Good as Hell" sticks around. But this is not that week.

7- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (+1) -- Unfortunately I'm also not surprised at this. All of Kanye's songs thankfully dropped like a rock. And since "No Guidance" for some strange reasons has gained a lot of traction, it naturally jumps up a spot with Kanye's exit.

8- "Panini" - Lil Nas X (+1) -- Same thing goes for "Panini." It rose a spot because Kanye dropped out. Hopefully both "No Guidance" and "Panini" will disappear soon.

9- "Memories" - Maroon 5 (+2) -- I was wondering when this song was going to show up in the top 10. It got all the way to No. 11 and then got stuck. For some reason, No. 11 is the hardest spot to move up from. There's a lot of songs that will peak there and disappear. It's cursed. But "Memories" broke out of that and cracked the top 10. Now I have a feeling that it's here to stay because the radio loves Maroon 5 and this is certain to be one that gets stuck on the radio rotation. And I'm actually fine with that. This is a fairly inoffensive song. I prefer it over a whole lot of previous Maroon 5 stuff.

10- "10,000 Hours" - Dan + Shay & Justin Bieber (+2) -- Also making yet another return to the top 10 is "10,000." This song has enough traction that it just might float around in this general area. I don't know if it has enough momentum to get a whole lot higher, but I can see it sticking around between Nos. 7 and 15 for at least a few months. It might climb higher next week. It might drop out again, then show up again in three weeks.

Rising on the Hot 100:

11- "Hot" - Young Thug featuring Gunna (+24) -- I'm not sure why this got a huge surge this week, but let's not make this a thing.

19- "Only Human" - Jonas Brothers (+3) -- Jonas Brothers slowly climbing the charts. I'm not sure how high they are going to get, but most of the songs between Nos. 11 and 20 are going in the wrong direction, so this might float to the surface.

22- "On Chill" - Wale featuring Jeremih (+7) -- Not a fan of this, but I might prefer it ever so slightly more than that Young Thug thing that's at No. 11 right now.

23- "Dance Monkey" - Tones and I (+18) -- Another huge week for "Dance Monkey." I keep wondering if this is going to get stuck at some point because it gets harder and harder to continue to rise the higher up you get. But with the whole top 20 not being super strong at this point, the door might be wide open for this to become an absolute smash hit like it already has been in many countries across the world.

26- "Ballin'" - Mustard featuring Roddy Ricch (+5) -- This needs to go away.

29- "Playing Games" - Summer Walker (+5) -- I don't care about this one.

31- "Baby" - Lil Baby & DaBaby (+7) -- Lots of songs rising due to Kanye's disappearing act this week. This is one of the more frustrating songs to get a boost.

33- "Even Though I'm Leaving" - Luke Combs (+7) -- The top country riser of the week.

35- "223's" - YNW Melly & 9lokknine (+26) -- Why is the subject of murder and violence such a popular one in the hip-hop world these days? Make it stop!

36- "Dancing with a Stranger" - Sam Smith and Normani (+6) -- It's fun to see this rising up. But it had it's time in the sun. It just rose this week due to Kanye's drop.

39- "Heat" - Chris Brown featuring Gunna (+7) -- Make this go away.

40- "One Thing Right" - Marshmello & Kane Brown (+7) -- I initially typed Marshmello and Gunna with this song. That's a scary thought.

41- "Time" - NF (+8) -- Nope.

42- "Graveyard" - Halsey (+8) -- Halsey can rise higher. I can accept that. In fact, I'm kinda surprised that this isn't higher, but maybe people just haven't gravitated towards this specific single? If that's the case, Halsey will be back. She's proven to be fairly consistent in the pop realm.

43- "Lover" - Taylor Swift (+5) -- This is not becoming a hit. Taylor used to be good at selling singles AND albums. Now it appears that she can only sell albums. You've gotta think that one of her singles is going to eventually catch on, right?

45- "Hot Girl Bummer" - blackbear (+12) -- Make it stop.

46- "You Need to Calm Down" - Taylor Swift (+6) -- Another failed Taylor Swift single. Like "Lover," it's only here this week due to the Kanye drop.

47- "My Type" - Saweetie (+6) -- Make this go away.

48- "Camelot" - NLE Choppa (+7) -- Don't care.

49- "Prayed for You" - Matt Stell (+7) -- Eh. It's fine. But wasn't this higher at one point or am I making that up?

53- "What Happens in a Small Town" - Brantley Gilbert & Lindsay Ell (+13) -- ...stays in a small town. Right? So can we make this go away?

54- "The Bones" - Maren Morris (+15) -- Oooh! I'll accept Maren Morris. Even though "The Bones" isn't necessarily the best thing she's done.

56- "Hate Me" - Ellie Goulding & Juice WRLD (+12) -- This song confuses me. Is it going to become a hit or not? I want Ellie back in the spotlight. But at the same time, I wish she could chart a song without having a rapper attached to help her out. She released songs called "Flux" and "Sixteen" this year. Both are great songs. But neither even charted here in the U.S. So she released this back in June and it's spent the last five months deciding whether or not to be a hit. It's not even close to as good as the other two, but I suppose I'm fine with it being a hit so we can have more of Ellie's other stuff.

59- "Makes No Sense" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again (+11) -- What makes no sense to me is why people love YoungBoy so much.

63- "Enemies" - Post Malone featuring DaBaby (+11) -- I never listened to this one. It came out during Post's album bomb week back in September. Now is it going to become his next big single? I'm not sure if I like that idea... mostly because I still haven't listened to it. If it continues to rise, I'll give it a listen. There's just so much going on this week with the disappearance of Kanye that I'll wait.

64- "Leave Em Alone" - Layton Greene, Lil Baby, City Girls & PnB Rock (+14) -- Go away.

66- "Hot Shower" - Chance the Rapper featuring MadeinTYO & DaBaby (+17) -- Go away.

68- "Remember You Young" - Thomas Rhett (+13) -- This one can stay, I suppose. But I wish it was slightly better. For Thomas Rhett standards, though, this is acceptable.

69- "Slow Dancing in the Dark" - Joji (+19) -- It's funny that this song returns and starts rising around the same time that "Jojo Rabbit" is doing well in theaters. I'm a bit surprised seeing this song again, but I'm certainly not opposed.

72- "Kinfolks" - Sam Hunt (+15) -- Did I talk about this song? Because I forgot to write it down on my list. Either way, it's Sam Hunt and the only good Sam Hunt is the one that's my former roommate, not the country singer. The country singer can go away.

75- "Heartache Medication" - Jon Pardi (+10) -- Nope.

77- "What If I Never Get Over You" - Lady Antebellum (+17) -- Yes! Lady Antebellum can stay! Although they first charted this song back in June, so I'm a bit surprised to see it back and finally doing well. Let's hope it continues to gain traction.

89- "all the good girls go to hell" - Billie Eilish (re-entry) -- A notable re-entry that I decided to include. Mostly because I like Billie Eilish and I hope this re-entry means this song is going to start gaining traction and become Billie's next big single with "bad guy" now out of the top 10 after a phenomenal run. The music video for this song was released in early September and I thought this was going to show up back then, but it didn't. And now it has, so let's get the ball rolling!

New Arrivals:

30- "Don't Start Now" - Dua Lipa -- We start off on a good note this week with Dua Lipa debuting at No. 30. That's encouraging. I'm glad people still like Dua Lipa enough to keep her relevant. "Don't Start Now" is typical Dua Lipa throwing shade at this dude who previously broke her heart. He wants back, but she now wants none of it. So this is nothing super original, but Dua's delivery gives this a solid punch to it. She has an excellent and likable personality with her "in your face" sort of pop music and she's good at sounding genuine and aggressive. I like. The song also has a fun groove to it. In the verses it does a great job of building up to what you think is going to be an excellent dance beat, but then it does a bait-and-switch by completely reversing direction on the chorus. Initially that caught me off guard, but I ended up liking it by the time I got to the end of the song. It gives it a bit of a unique flavor that is ultimately satisfying. And I don't know why, but it reminded me of an early 80's disco song. And now I can see Dua doing very well in that era if she was in her prime back then.

34- "Roxanne" - Arizona Zervas -- My mind went in a lot of funny directions with this song. A song called "Roxanne" feels like it belongs in the 70's or 80's. And it does because there's a song by The Police called "Roxanne" that I listened to before I listening to this one. Then I thought of Roxette and had to listen to "The Look." Eventually I got around to figuring out who the frack Arizona Zervas is and how he/she/them debuted a song at No. 34 despite never having notched an entry in the Hot 100 before. Turns out the correct pronoun here is "he." A 24-year-old he with a viral hit. And a rather annoying viral hit that's coated in all of the rap/hip-hop tropes of today's world. Too many annoying noises. Singing about money and partying with a shallow girl who only follows him when he throws a bunch of money at her. I don't know why this is so big, but I now want it to go away. However, I will thank Arizona Zervas for causing me to have fun listening to The Police and Roxette. But I won't thank him for his useless song that deserves to rot in the gutter.

55- "Immortal" - 21 Savage -- Nope.

70- "It All Comes Out in the Wash" - Miranda Lambert -- I don't normally do the country thing, as I'm sure you know, but I'm always down for some more Miranda Lambert. Perhaps this song isn't as emotional as something like "Tin Man," but this is the type of country song that makes you want to kick back, relax and enjoy. There's not a whole lot of substance here. In fact, when I examine the lyrics more closely, it almost makes me want to step back and second guess myself here. But then ultimately my initial reaction kicks in. This is a carefree song where Miranda says to go out and do whatever you feel like because it'll all come out in the wash. Metaphorically speaking. With a carefree song like this, Miranda has enough personality to make this a fun country jam. When I asked my Google Assistant how old Miranda Lambert is, I got my answer as well as a statement from Google stating, "By the way, she's coming to Salt Lake City on January 31." That would be a fun concert to go to for a late birthday present!

79- "Love Me More" - Trippie Redd -- Nope.

85- "In My Room" - Frank Ocean -- I don't know why I keep giving Frank Ocean a chance. It just seems like he should be a good artist, but I'm never interested in what he puts out. So I'm learning from past mistakes and not covering him this week.

88- "Ridin' Roads" - Dustin Lynch -- We continue our country groove with Dustin Lynch's first Hot 100 entry of 2019. Sometimes I wonder why country artists wait so long in between releasing singles. And apparently this is single from back in March of this year, as claimed by my Apple Music? That's interesting. Anywho, this is relaxing enough to work perfectly as a song to play on a long road trip. Or even maybe if you're in the mood to go waste some gas and drive around aimlessly on the empty roads for a while. I don't do that a whole lot because gas is expensive, but I admit it can be relaxing every once in a blue moon. And it's fitting that said event is what I first think of when I listen to this song because it's called "Ridin' Roads." So good on Dustin Lynch for writing a country song wherein the music actually fits the lyrics because a lot of country singers are really bad at that concept. This song isn't one I'll particularly remember that much, but I give it kudos for serving its purpose instead of feeling generic.

90- "For My Daughter" - Kane Brown -- I normally don't like Kane Brown. In fact, he's a country singer that almost makes me blow right past him whenever he releases a new song. But with one called "For My Daughter," I was hoping that this may be the one time where he gets it right by writing a country song that means something? And to a certain extent this almost works. Speaking of country singers not getting the right tone, Kane is usually someone who will have music that doesn't match the lyrics at all. But he managed to be restrained in this song, which is good for it being an ode to his daughter. He says he didn't grow up with a dad, so he's going to do his best to be a good dad to his daughter. I don't care enough about Kane to keep up with his personal life, but I assume this is genuine story. And it does feel like he cares. However, I do wish the song was a bit more acoustic with just Kane and his guitar. That would fit better. All his drums are quieter than normal, but they're still there. And he does get super twangy, so the delivery isn't exactly what it should be. But still, this feels genuine and emotional. It's probably the best that Kane Brown is capable of doing, so I have to give him props.

91- "Easy" - DaniLeigh featuring Chris Brown -- I don't know who DaniLeigh is, but her song has Chris Brown attached to it, so it's a no from me this week.

100- "Big Boy Diamonds" - Gucci Mane featuring Kodak Black & London On Da Track -- Do I even need to say anything? This speaks for itself.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - November 9, 2019

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

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10: 

1- "Lose You to Love Me" - Selena Gomez (+14) -- I realized last week that Selena Gomez debuted at No. 15 with only a couple of days of tracking, so I was expecting this to get a good boost this week after its first full week of tracking, but I absolutely wasn't expecting it to jump all the way to No. 1. Thus I was shocked to see this at No. 1 this week, but I am super ecstatic at the same time. I think Selena has really matured as an artist as of late. She spent a while trying to convince the world that she was a grown up adult, but she's now grown out of that and is focused on the focused on the music. I love this song because it really highlights her talents, both in terms of the quality of her voice as well as her ability to be appropriately restrained. Because of that, she delivers some solid, heartfelt emotion in what otherwise could've been a generic pop song as the subject matter isn't the most unique in the world. And that has now caused her to get her first ever No. 1 on the Hot 100 after first debuting in January 2009 with the song "Tell Me Something I Don't Know." The song gets here partially due to excellent timing as the current top songs weren't super strong, but also with a solid streaming push is it got 38.8 million U.S. streams to go along with 39,000 downloads sold, good enough for No. 1 on both of the sales and streaming charts. Now given the nature of huge debuts, this could very well fall down a few spots next week, but I hope this is able to maintain traction and stick around in the top 10 for a long while because I really like this.

2- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi (-1) -- It was a brief reign at No. 1 for Lewis Capaldi as he could only manage one week at the top after being pushed down by Selena, but it's very possible that Lewis could take back the top spot after Selena slips a bit. "Someone You Loved" did take over at No. 1 on the radio charts, meaning it should be able to stick around for a while longer, even though it did take a large 47 percent drop in sales after what I think was a sales discount last week. At also fell 4 percent in radio and 2 percent in streaming, so it's not like this is super strong. But that makes sense given that it took forever for this song to even get to the top 10, so it's already had quite the life on the Hot 100. And it's been pleasing seeing the song do well after having already become a worldwide phenomenon long before it caught fire here.

3- "Circles" - Post Malone (+1) -- I don't know the numbers for Post Malone this week because Billboard did report them in their article and the individual charts are hidden behind a paywall, but I'm going to blindly guess that this song is the one in a much better position to jump up to No. 1 if Selena falls next week. "Someone You Loved" has been around for a long time and is starting to lose quite a bit of momentum, while "Circles" seems to be gaining the necessary traction to become the next Post Malone mega hit. If it doesn't get to No. 1 next week, I'm sure it will get there eventually. It's just going to be a bit of a margins game next week as I imagine our three top contenders will fairly close. And I'm not exactly sure how it will all pan out. 

4- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (-1) -- It took this song a while, but "Señorita" was finally able to pass "Truth Hurts" on the Hot 100. The problem is so did three other songs. So it's too little too late for "Señorita" to spend more time at the time. But all is well. These two got their week in the spotlight and the song has held well enough to be one of the top songs of the year. "Truth Hurts" may have had more time at No. 1, but "Señorita" will get the last laugh as the higher ranking song.

5- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (-3) -- After an excellent run where Lizzo almost broke the record for longest time at No. 1 for a female rap song (she tied the record with Iggy Azalea), she now is being bullied out of the spotlight as the song looks like it might start a free fall here soon. But to be fair, Lizzo is participating in the bullying of her self as her next song is now right behind this one.

6- "Good as Hell" - Lizzo (+8) -- And the glorious week continues as "Good as Hell" rises into the top 10. It got an extra boost this week thanks to a remix with Ariana Grande. Despite Ariana helping Lizzo get to the region, Ariana does not get a co-bill on the song because the remix didn't get a high enough percentage of the song's overall chart points. Ariana does fit well enough on the song. Her and Lizzo have a similar enough musical style as well as a similar attitude and personality to mesh pretty well together. Ariana doesn't necessarily add anything to the song that the song didn't already have, but it's overall inoffensive enough for me to not be bothered. But again, I'm just glad this song is here. Of the two Lizzo songs in the top 10 right now, this is the better of the two, so I would be ecstatic if this song continued its momentum and hit No. 1.

7- "Follow God" - Kanye West (new) -- I knew Kanye was coming. He was making a huge impact on streaming following the release of his latest album. But I'm just glad to see that he only managed to debut at No. 7. I was worried he was debut at No. 1 with "Follow God," while getting a few other songs to crack the top 10. But that didn't happen. And I count that as a win. Instead, this is going to be gone next week, so I can tolerate it being here at No. 7 for a week. Overall, Kanye had a great week with 11 songs debuting on the charts, but you know me. I'm not going to cover a Kanye album. I will have some thoughts down below on the idea of Kanye releasing a Christian album that I was going to leave here, but I'll save those for down below.

8- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (-3) -- The influx of new songs in the top 10 this week caused "No Guidance" to topple down to No. 8. That's great news! I was getting increasingly annoyed seeing it in the top five, so I happy it got bullied out. Next step is to get this out of the top 10 altogether, although I'm predicting that might take another few weeks because for some reason this song has maintain solid traction.

9- "Panini" - Lil Nas X (-3) -- This song needs to go. I'm glad it's back down at No. 9. But it was at this spot before and managed to sneak back up. I'm going to be rather upset if it does that again. So let's push this out for good and pretend it didn't happen.

10- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (-1) -- Considering the fact that "10,000 Hours" by Dan + Shay & Justin Bieber, "Ran$om" by Lil Tecca, and "HIGHEST IN THE ROOM" by Travis Scott all fell out of the top 10, while "bad guy" remains for another week, only falling one spot despite three songs shooting ahead of it, I'd say this is a pretty good week for Billie Eilish. Although I don't imagine her luck will continue for a whole lot longer. But if Kanye falls out of the top 10 next week, this could manage one more week in the region.

Rising on the Hot 100:

16- "Trampoline" - SHAED (+3) -- Due to Kanye's album bomb, there's not a lot of songs that did well enough to be eligible for this section this week. But I'm really happy that "Trampoline" managed to survive the onslaught to sneak up a few spots in the top 20. We'll play this by ear each week as I don't know how much momentum this song has left, but I of course would be happy to see this hit top 10.

41- "Dance Monkey" - Tones and I (+10) -- Despite Kanye getting 11 new songs in the Hot 100, with a good number of them debuting in the top 50, it's rather impressive that "Dance Monkey" managed to jump up 10 spots. The higher it goes, the harder it will be to continue it's surge, but the momentum of this song continues to be very strong.

44- "Thriller" - Michael Jackson (re-entry) -- Making its annual Halloween entry is Michael Jackson's "Thriller." It's always good to have Michael around. Even though this song literally gets played at every Halloween party in existence, it's a song I never get sick of. I always need my good dose of "Thriller" every October.

New Arrivals:

7- "Follow God" - Kanye West -- Kanye West is the most toxic, self-absorbed scum bag in the rap industry. And even though back in the day he wrote a few good songs (I still really like "Stronger"), for the majority of the past decade he's delivered nothing but smelly, awful trash while acting like an immature drama queen. All he cares about is the attention and the spotlight. So I apologize for not buying into the idea of him being sincere with this Christian album. I do try to be a good Christian myself and thus I am a sucker for Christian music. But Christian music only works if the singer is genuine and passionate about what they're singing. Maybe I shouldn't be judgmental. I don't know Kanye personally and I don't know his heart. What I do know is that a year ago he did an interview wherein he was asked if having a daughter changed his perspective on women. He said it didn't and that he still watches Pornhub. Pornhub appreciated the shout out and rewarded Kanye for his comments. Not much later, Kanye became a integral part of the first annual Pornhub awards. So how in the living frack do you go from that to writing and releasing a Christian album in just a year? It doesn't sit well with me. It's not a situation like Avril Lavigne's wherein she was struck with an awful illness and was on her death bed for months, causing her to turn to God and write the song "Head Above Water." That's a genuine turn that brings a lot of power. Kanye just seems to be doing this solely for attention, using Jesus and God to help boost his ego, get him attention, and earn him money. Granted, I can see someone having no idea who Kanye is and, without context, stumbling on this album and enjoying it. But me having dealt with Kanye's nonsense for years, I just can't get behind this and thus I'm not covering this album. Granted, I skip most album bombs these days, but even if I did have all the time in the world, this is not one I would touch.

17- "Closed on Sunday" - Kanye West -- I'm not covering Kanye's album bomb.

19- "Selah" - Kanye West -- I'm not covering Kanye's album bomb.

23- "On God" - Kanye West -- I'm not covering Kanye's album bomb.

27- "Look at Her Now" - Selena Gomez -- Yup, there's two new Selena songs on the charts at the moment. Even though "Look at Her Now" was only released a day after "Lose You to Love Me," the timing of both releases caused the latter to sneak onto last week's charts while this one debuted this week. I don't know how long this second Selena song will be around given that "Lose You to Love Me" is the one getting the push on the radio, but it's fun having two Selena songs here as they both preview an upcoming album, Selena's first since "Revival" in 2015. What I like about comparing both of these songs is that it shows a fair share of contrast. While the message of both of similar (overcoming a previous relationship), "Look at Her Now" is the more playful song of the two. Instead of being caught up in the sorrow with an emotional ballad, it's fun and upbeat. The song is more of a celebration of how far she's come. On a personal level, I'm a sucker for a well developed ballad, which is why I prefer "Lose You to Love Me" over "Look at Her Now," but this is very much a song I could get behind, even if it's not as beautifully polished. Neither song hits the heights of "It Ain't Me" or "Wolves," but I wasn't necessarily expecting that. Those two songs are special. Yet I am completely satisfied with what I've got so far and I look forward to an upcoming album.

33- "Everything We Need" - Kanye West featuring Ty Dolla $ign & Ant Clemons -- I'm not covering Kanye's album bomb.

36- "God Is" - Kanye West -- I'm not covering Kanye's album bomb.

37- "Use This Gospel" - Kanye West featuring Clipse & Kenny G -- I'm not covering Kanye's album bomb.

45- "Every Hour" - Kanye West featuring Sunday Service Choir -- I'm not covering Kanye's album bomb.

51- "Water" - Kanye West featuring Ant Clemons --I'm not covering Kanye's album bomb.

60- "Hands On" - Kanye West featuring Fred Hammond -- I'm not covering Kanye's album bomb.

63- "Jesus is Lord" - Kanye West -- I'm not covering Kanye's album bomb.

75- "Start wit Me" - Roddy Ricch & Gunna -- This is not a part of Kanye's album, but Roddy Ricch and Gunna? Count me out.

93- "What She Wants Tonight" - Luke Bryan -- Another non-Kanye sung snuck onto the charts this week. This one I will cover. Although I admittedly don't have a whole lot to say. The country people will probably love this one. Luke Bryan has a decent personality and this song has enough of a country groove to hit all the right notes for the country crowd. But for me, it also hits all the country cliches. He's going after the girl. He's drinking beer with her. He's singing in his strong country twang. The song has an overpowered southern rock vibe that doesn't really fit the lyrics perfectly. And overall there's no substance. Just Luke Bryan churning out another factory-produced country song for country radio to salivate over. This might be huge, but I don't care for it.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - November 2, 2019

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

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi (+2) -- I'm genuinely surprised right now to see "Someone You Loved" at No. 1. Pleasantly surprised, I might add. Granted, "Truth Hurts" has been bleeding quite a bit in the last few weeks, so I was expecting something else to rise up and top it, but I was at the point where I thought "Someone You Loved" had peaked and was going to fall down with "Truth Hurts" and "Señorita." In hindsight, "Someone You Loved" has been in the top 10 for a much shorter time than "Truth Hurts" and "Señorita," so this makes sense. And I had mentioned this fact in many previous weeks. It's just that it seemingly got stuck behind those two, and since Billboard in their weekly article gave up on posting specific numbers for "Señorita" and "Someone You Loved," while also throwing a lot of their other smaller charts behind a pay wall, I was forced to play a guessing game with this and I didn't think it was going to make it. But hey, all that allows for a pleasantly surprise. Granted, this also isn't the strongest No. 1 at the moment. It's No. 2 on radio with 106.5 million audience impressions (down 2 percent), No. 2 on sales with 24,000 downloads sold (up 41 percent) and No. 8 on streaming with 25.2 U.S. streams (up 2 percent). So I suppose we can say it got here because it remained consistent enough in all categories, and was helped this week by a spike in sales from some source. I don't know what that specific source is, though. It's also worth noting that "Someone You Loved" reached No. 1 in its 24th week on the Hot 100, which is the fifth leggiest journey to No. 1 of all-time. The record there belongs to "Amazed" by Lonestar, which took 31 weeks to get to No. 1, which it accomplished on March 4, 2000.

2- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (-1) -- Last week Lizzo tied Iggy Azalea for the longest running No. 1 ever for a rap song by a woman. This week the two ladies remain tied for that record. And now that Lizzo has been pushed down (for a second time in three weeks), I imagine they're going to have to share that record for a while. Because even though the margins for "Someone You Loved" and "Truth Hurts" are pretty close, "Truth Hurts" is sliding down a lot faster. It's No. 1 on radio with 111.9 million audience impressions (down 3 percent), No. 5 on sales with 17,000 downloads sold (down 15 percent) and No. 11 on streaming with 21.7 million U.S. streams (down 7 percent).

3- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes (-1) -- Although no numbers were reported for "Señorita," I imagine it also is falling at a similar rate as "Truth Hurts." However, both songs have been here for long enough to have already clinched high spots on the year end list. In my personal tracking, "Señorita" is No. 4 while "Truth Hurts" is No. 6. "Señorita" still has a significant lead over "Truth Hurts." And as long as they stay one spot away from each other, that's going to stay that way.

4- "Circles" - Post Malone (=) -- Although I have no data to back it up, I still think "Circles" might be in the best position at the moment in the top five. The three songs ahead of it have all plateaued to some degree, if not on the downward trend. "Circles" seems to have enough life in the tank to hang around for a while longer, though.

5- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (=) -- I really have no idea why this is still around. I want it to start losing traction already.

6- "Panini" - Lil Nas X (+3) -- Wait... what? I don't understand. I was thinking this might drop out of the top 10 this week, but instead it rises three spots. I is confused.

7- "HIGHEST IN THE ROOM" - Travis Scott (-1) -- I won't count this song out just yet. There was a point in time where "SICKO MODE" was in a similar spot as this song is and I thought it was going away. But then it stuck around for a long time and joined the 30 week club in the top 10. I'm hoping this will only be here for a small while longer, but I have no idea at this point.

8- "Ran$om" - Lil Tecca (-1) -- Make this go away.

9- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (-1) -- I think we only have a few more weeks left of Billie in the top 10. But what an amazing run this has been. If you missed my comments from last week, this has officially moved up to No. 2 on my personal tracking for most popular songs of the year, sneaking past Post Malone and Swae Lee's "Sunflower."

10- "10,000 Hours" - Dan + Shay & Justin Bieber (+1) -- OK. I'll take this. I knew that Juice WRLD and Young Boy Never Broke Again song was only going to last a week in the top 10 since it only got a boost due to the album. But I thought it was going to be Maroon 5's "Memories" that took its place in the top 10. Instead, "Memories" gets stuck at the illustrious No. 11 spot while "10,000 Hours" returns to the region. Maybe this is an early sign that this song might actually be gaining traction after its big debut a couple of weeks ago. And I'm good with that. I think this is a good song.

Rising on the Hot 100:

14- "Good as Hell" - Lizzo (+6) -- I'm still expecting "Memories" to hit the top 10, even though it didn't qualify for this list this week as it only rose one spot up to No. 11. But I certainly hope that "Good as Hell" will also rise. It's the better of the two top Lizzo songs and deserves to be in the top 10. If we have to send Billie packing, this is a fine replacement. I just hope we can kick out "Ransom," "HIGHEST IN THE ROOM" and/or "Panini" as well, because those are the ones that seem like they're on the way out.

19- "Trampoline" - SHAED (+2) -- This entered the top 20 a few weeks ago and then it got stuck. Now I'm thinking that it might just hang out in this region instead of entering the top 10. But we'll see. "Someone You Loved" managed to be consistent enough to not only get in the top 10, but also hit No. 1. With there being a lot of falling songs right now, this song just needs enough traction to remain consistent in its chart points.

20- "Only Human" - Jonas Brothers (+4) -- Jonas Brothers are back in the top 20. And right now I think we have a decent set of risers. At least when it comes to the risers currently in the top 20. That gives me hope that good weeks are ahead. We just have to survive the Kanye West onslaught that is coming next week.

32- "One Man Band" - Old Dominion (+13) -- I finally listened to this song. And conceded that it was fine enough. It's still not memorable enough for me to really care, but if this is our next big country song, I won't complain that much.

34- "Even Though I'm Leaving" - Luke combs (+5) -- I'm in about the same position with this song as I am with Old Dominion. I suppose this is fine enough.

49- "Love You Too Late" - Cole Swindell (+11) -- I'm not going to be quite as nice with this country song, though. It's not that much worse, but it also doesn't have any redeeming qualities to it in my book, so it's a country song that just kind of exists.

51- "Dance Monkey" - Tones and I (+24) -- Two straight weeks of 20+ gains and I'm beginning to be convinced that this could be as huge in the U.S. as it has been across the world. Although it's a lot easier to cruise through the bottom half of the Hot 100. It'll start facing its real test as it gets to the top half of the Hot 100. I hope that it continues to soar as it has all the ingredients of an extremely entertaining pop song, even though it also qualifies for being the most annoying song you've ever loved. My roommate calls it the Betty Boop song. I think that's a hilariously accurate title for it.

59- "Baby Sitter" - DaBaby featuring Offset (+13) -- This needs to go away.

79- "Rich as Hell" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again (+21) -- Why do we have YoungBoy songs rising this week. This one needs to fall with the rest of them.

81- "We Were" - Keith Urban (+16) -- This is one of those country songs that hasn't been able to make up its mind as to what it's going to do. I say let's send it up the country charts. Of all the country songs rising this week, this is the best.

New Arrivals:

15- "Lose You to Love Me" - Selena Gomez -- The top song of this week, and one of the only songs to debut in a rather quite week, is the new song from Selena Gomez, that previews a potential new album for her. And I'm always game for more Selena. I think she's matured quite a bit as a singer and has developed into one of my favorite female pop singers. "Lose You to Love Me" is a stripped down and somber break-up ballad. Even though it's not the most original song to ever be written, and is even quite a bit inferior to her recent songs like "Wolves" and "It Ain't Me," that Selena maturity still elevates this song into a solid pop song. Yeah, she singing about a toxic relationship that she had to get out of to find her self worth. That's nothing new. But she sells it with her vocals. And she's not belting anything. In fact, this is a fairly restrained song. There are times where the door is wide open for Selena to walk right through with some power, but she doesn't take it, instead letting the quality of her voice and the sincerity of her deliver carry it through and it works. It's a rather beautiful ballad. It's also a song that was released last Wednesday, the 23rd. If I have my tracking right, that means it debuted at No. 15 with only a partial week of tracking, so this could be in for a decent rise next week and I would love that because this is an excellent song. Perhaps I could've used a bit more substance on the chorus, but that's more of a nitpick than an actual issue I have with the song. And if this is a sneak peak of what a new album is going to sound like, I'm excited for that album! Selena also has another new song titled "Look at Her Now" that was released a tad bit later than this one. I'm assuming we'll get to that one next week because it didn't quite make the cut this week.

97- "Somebody" - Internet Money, Lil Tecca & A Boogie wit da Hoodie -- Nope. Not going to touch this one. Instead I'm going to facepalm at yet another extremely stupid rap name. Internet Money? Really?

98- "DHL" - Frank Ocean -- I've never really been that big of a Frank Ocean fan. He's one of those artists who I feel that I should like a lot more than I actually do. And this is another example of that. I'm assuming this is a song that a lot of people will like and I'm not going to be particularly angry at that. There's certainly a lot worse out there. This has a decent flow to it and an interesting key change partway through. And Frank's vocals are fine. It's just that there's not much in terms of content. I'm not sure what this song is about and there's nothing incredible about the music. It just kinda lulls me to sleep as Frank is rambling on about something. I don't know how big this song is going to be, but if it disappears, I probably won't remember it. And if it becomes a huge hit, I'll probably be more ambivalent towards it. So it's whatever.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - October 26, 2019

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

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (+1) -- Ah, that feels better. That Travis Scott thing had me really nervous because his song simply wasn't good at all. Granted, I'm not a Travis Scott fan, but still. Him reigning at the top was not a pleasant sight to behold. Yet I was nervous that his song would stay there for a while given how strong "SICKO MODE" ended up being. But as it turns out, the floor fell out from under him in week two and now he'll have to rely on his song to gain traction in order to stick around. More on that later, but that song's dip causes the charts to reset themselves to the natural order of things, which allows Lizzo to go back on top for her seventh week, tying Iggy Azalea's "Fancy" for the longest ever reign on the Hot 100 for a rap song by a female artist. If it can hold on for one more week, it'll have that record all to itself. As I've said before, I roll my eyes a bit at that record because I still claim that "Truth Hurts" isn't a rap song. It's a hybrid of a few genres, but I think it's primarily a pop song. So a pop song now has the record for longest female rap song. Eh. Whatever. Regardless of what we call it, I'm glad it's back at No. 1. But it's not going to be here for long because it continues to tank across the board, falling 29 percent in sales, 9 percent in streaming and 5 percent in radio.

2- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (+1) -- Likewise, "Señorita" moves back up to its No. 2 spot. Given how much "Truth Hurts" is falling, I can only assume that "Señorita" is falling equally as fast. Which means if there's a song that wants to jump up and take the top spot, the door is wide open.

3- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi (+2) -- You would think with the weakness of "Truth Hurts" and "Señorita" that "Someone You Loved" would be the song that sweeps in and takes the top spot. But last week when Travis Scott and Justin Bieber swept in with their songs, "Someone You Loved" got bullied down to No. 5, so it might not have the necessary traction at the moment to make the move.

4- "Circles" - Post Malone (+2) -- I wasn't sure exactly what Post Malone was going to do with this song, but looking at things right now, this song might actually be the song with the best momentum going forward. And it wouldn't be a crazy idea to thing Post Malone getting another No. 1 single. And I wouldn't mind it, either.

5- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (+2) -- This is just here because something has to be No. 5. I am surprised to see this song ahead of Travis Scott.

6- "HIGHEST IN THE ROOM" - Travis Scott (-5) -- As I've mentioned a few times now, I'm surprised to see this song fall so far in its second week. The problem here are those sales. There might be a few contributing factors here, but it tanked 87 percent in sales. That's a huge drop. It also dropped 37 percent in streaming, but still manages to be No. 1 this week in streaming with 37.2 million U.S. streams. And it's still very early on in radio. It's gaining in radio, up 61 percent, but that's only to 11.1 million in audience. So it's a long ways away from making a dent. If it's going stay around, it's going to need to somehow regain those sales and stop the bleeding in streaming. Personally I'm not convinced its going away, but I would love for it to do so.

7- "Ran$om" - Lil Tecca (+1) -- This only gains a spot because the Justin Bieber song fell out of the top 10. But let's hope we can get this song out of the top 10.

8- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (+1) -- With "bad guy" sticking in the top 10 for one more week, it officially moves past "Sunflower" for the No. 2 spot on the year in my personal tracking. Taking the No. 1 spot away from "Old Town Road" is out of the question, but seeing "bad guy" as the second most popular song of the year makes me really happy. There may have been a lot of unfortunate things that happened on the Billboard charts in 2019, but at least one positive was Billie getting her first huge Billboard hit.

9- "Panini" - Lil Nas X (+1) -- I don't think "Panini" is going to stick around in the top 10 for much longer, but it survives for one more week. And maybe it'll hang out in the bottom section of the top 10. That wouldn't offend me.

10- "Bandit" - Juice WRLD & YoungBoy Never Broke Again (+1) -- This debuted at No. 11 last week and sneaks into the top 10 mainly because Justin Bieber fell out, so something had to fill up the last slot. The second week numbers on this song aren't that great. It fell 3 percent in streaming and 49 percent in sales. But I'm certain that fall would've been worse had it not been for YoungBoy's album this week giving it a boost. Granted, I don't know if this song is on the album, but I've still seen non-album songs from an artist getting a boost along with the rest of the album songs. So regardless, I still think this got a boost from the album. Which means I expect this to drop next week. If it does, that's good. And no, I'm not going to touch that album, but you knew that already, right?

Rising on the Hot 100:

12- "Memories" - Maroon 5 (+8) -- Anyone surprised at this one? The radio has a new Maroon 5 song to play on repeat for the next year. I'm just glad that this one doesn't annoy me. I expect it to be in the top 10 sooner rather than later.

20- "Good as Hell" - Lizzo (+4) -- It's great seeing this song continue to rise, even if it is on a slower basis. I guess it makes sense since it is an older song from Lizzo and not a brand new release. But I'm still glad that it's in the top 20 and I hope a trip to the top 10 is coming up next!

22- "On Chill" - Wale featuring Jeremih (+5) -- Go away.

32- "Hot" - Young Thug featuring Gunna (+6) -- Go away.

38- "One Thing Right" - Marshmello & Kane Brown (+5) -- Snooze.

39- "Even Though I'm Leaving" - Luke Combs (+10) -- I suppose I'm not too upset at this. It's one of those songs that I have to keep reminding myself that I didn't think it was awful. And I have to keep doing that because it's a song that just doesn't stick.

41- "Heat" - Chris Brown featuring Gunna (+6) -- Go away.

45- "One Man Band" - Old Dominion (+9) -- Is this my first time covering this song? It debuted back in September during Taylor Swift week and I skipped it then. But I don't know if I ever got around to talking about it. It's a song that's stripped down and mellow, so it's a pleasurable listen. I've not ever really cared about Old Dominion, nor have I paid much attention to them. But this is fine, I suppose. Nothing worth salivating over and not one that I will play for friends on a long drive. But if it shows up somehow, I don't think I'll be too upset.

46- "Time" - NF (+6) -- Meh. I'm not angry. But I'm not ecstatic with this, either.

48- "Good Vibes" - Chris Janson (+8) -- No good vibes from me.

50- "Self Control" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again (+48) -- Only rising this much due to YoungBoy's album that I'll be gladly ignoring this week. 

56- "F.N" - Lil Tjay (+28) -- Go away.

75- "Dance Monkey" - Tones and I (+21) -- So I don't know how many people closely follow my week by week commentary on every song that shows up or remembers what I said in previous weeks. If you don't, I don't blame. I often forget myself and I don't get too worried because I often treat each week as if there are new people reading through this who haven't read one of my music posts before. But last week I mentioned that I was nervous about showing this to people because I could envision people reacting in a very negative way. Now I can't speak for everyone, but I did play this for my roommate and, to my pleasant surprise, the reaction from him was quite positive. Looking in the comment section of this very bizarre music video taught me that this song is everywhere all over Europe. Granted, I figured that was the case when I realized how many countries it had become No. 1 in, but the comment section confirmed this. And now it celebrated a 21 spot jump in its second week on the U.S. charts. Yeah, I don't want to speak too fast because there's a lot of worldwide hits that don't connect as well in the U.S. for some reason, but this has all the ingredients to become a huge smash hit here as well. And I'm on board with that.

New Arrivals:

17- "Lights Up" - Harry Styles -- Well this is easy. Only one new arrival to talk about with a whole lot of nope coming after it. And the song that debuted is the one song that I expected to debut. We just had Niall Horan sneaking in a new song a week before his former One Direction band member. Speaking specifically about Harry Styles, his debut album was quite the shocker as he delivered what had the feel of a 70's rock album, which was insane coming from a dude straight out of a pop boy band group. With that shock in the rear view mirror, I most certainly elevated myself to the excited stage when it came to a new Harry Styles song. And this is another slick groove from Harry. I'm not going to try to pinpoint an exact decade with this one as it does have a different feel to it when compared to his first album. At this point I'm not sure what type of different it is for me, whether it be for bad or good, but simply calling it different is sufficient. It does hit a few weird notes on the chorus, like he switches to a minor key out of the blue or something like that. But overall this is still solid. It's a bit toned back, but it doesn't slide into ballad territory, but rather has a very subtle groove that keeps it moving forward. I like what they do with the piano in this. It added a good touch to the song. There's also plenty of other instruments layered in with a gospel-style backing vocal arrangement that all adds together to create a pleasant song. I'm not sure if I like the song as much as Niall song last week. But this is another good entry from Harry and I hope that both of their songs perform well in the weeks and months to come.

44- "Lonely Child" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again -- Nope.

57- "Makes No Sense" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again -- Nope. 

62- "Carter Son" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again -- Nope.

64- "Kinfolks" - Sam Hunt -- It's funny, I almost completely forgot to include this song. I almost published without it. So I'm including this last second. However, at this current time, I'm not in the mood to go back and listen to this. Sue me. It's Sam Hunt. He sucks. Why would this be any different? Nevertheless, this is bound to become a hit, so I'll talk about it next week.Or whenever it shows up in my rising songs section.

66- "Hot Now" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again -- Nope.

70- "All Dat" - Moneybagg Yo & Megan Thee Stallion -- Nope.

73- "In Control" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again -- Nope.

79- "Time I'm On" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again -- Nope.

100- "Rich as Hell" - YoungBoy Never Broke Again -- Nope.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - October 19, 2019

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

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "HIGHEST IN THE ROOM" - Travis Scott (new) -- I had a feeling we were going to get a new No. 1 before too long since "Truth Hurts" wasn't exactly the strongest No. 1. But this isn't how I envisioned it. I knew Travis Scott was coming because his new single was getting a lot of hype, but I was surprised to see it debut this high. It becomes his second No. 1 following "SICKO MODE" and the 35th song to debut at No. 1. It's the third song to do so this year following Ariana Grande's "7 rings" and Jonas Brothers' "Sucker." If you're curious, the first song to debut at No. 1 was Michael Jackson's "You are Not Alone" in 1995. Travis Scott hit No. 1 with 59 million U.S. streams and 51,000 downloads sold, which is No. 1 on streaming, but No. 2 on sales, behind our other top 5 debut that we'll get to in a second. The song didn't exactly register on the radio charts, but I'm sure that'll come around. Now the question will be what it does from here. After huge debuts, songs usually dip in their second weeks before either free-falling or gaining actual traction. Given how huge "SICKO MODE" was (it was in the top 10 for over 30 weeks), I'm guessing "HIGHEST IN THE ROOM" is going to be around for a while. With only 10 weeks left in the calendar year, it wouldn't be too crazy of an idea to predict that this finishes the year at No. 1, especially considering the competition right now isn't too terribly strong. But that would be predicated on the streaming and sales remaining consistent with it needing to also catch up on radio. So we'll see.

2- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (-1) -- If Travis Scott falls off the face of the cliff in the next week or two, it wouldn't be surprising to see "Truth Hurts" go back to No. 1. The song is still consistent across the board, even though its also peaked in all categories as well as its down 1 percent in radio (120.4 million), 8 percent in streaming (25.8 million) and 7 percent in sales (28,000). So yeah, Travis Scott is going to have to tumble quite a bit for "Truth Hurts" to go back to the top. That radio number will help her out, though, as she has over 100 million more audience impressions than Travis Scott at the moment.

3- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (-1) -- Having never been able to catch back up to "Truth Hurts," Shawn and Camila slide down to No. 3 with Travis Scott's debut However, "Señorita" is still ahead of "Truth Hurts" on my personal tracking for the year end list. And if it remains just one spot behind like this, it's going to take a significant number of weeks for "Truth Hurts" to actually get ahead. But with 10 weeks left in the year, anything can still happen.

4- "10,000 Hours" - Dan + Shay & Justin Bieber (new) -- I was extremely confused when I first saw this on the charts because all my brain saw was Dan + Shay. How in the world did Dan + Shay debut in the top five? For context, their highest charting hit is "Tequila," which peaked at No. 21. In fact, no duo or group who primarily records country music has ever debuted in the top five on the Hot 100. So this is quite strange. But then I saw the second name. Oh. That's how. This had nothing to do with Dan + Shay and everything to do with Justin Bieber. At first I thought it was a bit of a strange combination of artists, but mixing pop and country has worked wonders in the past, most notably with "Meant to Be," which teamed Florida Georgia Line with Bebe Rexha, resulting in one of the top songs of that year. Given that Justin Bieber is a malleable artist who will team up with just about anyone, he now adds a No. 1 hit on the Hot Country Songs chart to his resume, making him the only artist to have a No. 1 hit on the Hot Country Songs, Hot Dance/Electronic Songs, Hot Latin Songs, Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, Hot Rap Songs and Hot R&B Songs charts, while obviously also topping a whole bunch of pop songs charts. So yeah, it's been quite the career for Justin.

5- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi (-2) -- One of the losers this week is Lewis Capaldi, who gets bullied down to No. 5 this week. While previously being in good position to eventually take over the top spot, being that "Truth Hurts" and "Señorita" have been around for a lot longer, that now seems a lot more unlikely with the added competition of Travis Scott and Justin Bieber. But still, for a global hit that is new to the U.S., being here in the top five in the first place is an impressive feat. And this could still sneak up a bit in the top five if Travis and Justin fall off their debuts and/or if "Truth Hurts" and "Señorita" continue to tank when it comes to chart points.

6- "Circles" - Post Malone (+2) -- The big winner this week is Post Malone as "Circles" manages to rise two spots despite two songs debuting ahead of it. That's a solid sign moving forward, meaning that Post Malone might actually have a song that will gain real traction with "Goodbyes" taking a surprise exit from the top 10 this week following a run that, while not disappointing, didn't quite live up to previous Post Malone tracks. Maybe "Circles" will? It still has a long way to go if its going to overcome everything in its way, but it's still positioned quite well to finish off the year strong.

7- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (-2) -- Tumbling out of the top five is, thankfully, "No Guidance." We don't need any more Chris Brown or Drake, so it would be really nice if we could bully this song out of here.

8- "Ran$om" - Lil Tecca (-4) -- With Travis Scott getting huge streaming numbers, Lil Tecca was the big loser as all the services that force new songs onto people's playlists now have a new song to push. It's made zero sense to me as to how and why this song has had such huge streaming numbers. Certainly people aren't voluntarily listening to this song on repeat, right? Thus even though I'm not super ecstatic about Travis Scott being around, if he forces Lil Tecca out, that's at least something good.

9- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (-3) -- After a bit of a rebound last week, Billie again falls down due to this week actually being an active week for the Hot 100. "bad guy" has been in the top 10 for 27 weeks now, so I can't complain that its time is up. However, if it can manage just one more week in the top 10, it'll officially move past "Sunflower" on my personal year end tracking of the most popular songs of the year. I think it can do that. If not, a close third for the year is nothing to be upset about.

10- "Panini" - Lil Nas X (-1) -- Ladies and gentleman, the time has finally come. "Old Town Road" is OUT of the top 10 as it fell to No. 14 this week. And a bit surprisingly, "Panini" is about to follow suit. Even though Lil Nas X is an expert at promoting his songs, there's only so much he can do when he writes a song as boring and dull as this one. "Old Town Road" was an earworm that was easy to get stuck in your head. People might be singing that one for years to come. No one is going to ever remember "Panini."

Rising on the Hot 100:

16- "Playing Games" - Summer Walker (+59) -- In a strange turn of events, it's the week of Summer Walker as the music gods rather quickly expedited her into being a thing. The only reason she charted in the first place was because Drake remixed one of her songs. And now only a short time later, she has her own album bomb. So far I've not found her to be a bad artist, but more of a boring one. I can understand her appeal, but she's just not for me. Thus I'm not interested in spending my whole day covering her album. I'll wait to see which of her songs become hits and talk about them when the time comes. Speaking of which, this song is now a top 20 hit, but I imagine it will come crashing back down next week. Whether or not it will be able to maintain enough traction to become a real hit after that remains to be seen.

20- "Memories" - Maroon 5 (+9) -- For better or for worse, this song has got be on a "Canon in D" kick. I've listened to that so many times in the last couple of weeks, even putting it on repeat while I do things, which is an excellent way to help me keep focused. I've learned, though, that most of the crowd that usually hates or dislikes Maroon 5 stuff also is about equally unimpressed with this song, making me a bit unique in not hating it. But oh well. I certainly won't lose any sleep if it fails to gain traction. But I mean, come on. It's Maroon 5. The radio will endlessly play ANYTHING the release. So this is going to stick around.

24- "Good as Hell" - Lizzo (+6) -- Can we make this a hit? I would love to see this go into the top 10, especially if "Truth Hurts" is going to start declining. I think most people, even those who love Lizzo, will agree that this is the better song. Even though I'm not in the Lizzo fan base, I totally agree with the assessment that "Good as Hell" is better.

30- "Ballin'" - Mustard featuring Roddy Ricch (+23) -- Make this go away.

34- "Lover" - Taylor Swift (+11) -- Taylor Swift is hanging in there as "Lover" ever so slowly climbs up the charts. It still has a long way to go to get back to where it was when Taylor's album was released, but the momentum for it is currently positive, which pleases me. If this song does well, that means some of Taylor's future singles might also have hope. Even though her initial singles for the album were a bit rough, it turns out that there's a lot of good songs on her album that I would love to see become hits.

36- "Prayed for You" - Matt Stell (+10) -- Matt Stell praying his way up the country charts. I suppose I'm not upset. This song is fine.

44- "Graveyard" - Halsey (+16) -- I still contend that the time lapse music video for this song was more impressive than the song itself, but this is a serviceable song for Halsey. If pop radio needs something to play, they should give this one some spins.

47- "Heat" - Chris Brown (+10) -- Make Chris Brown go away.

49- "Even Though I'm Leaving" - Luke Combs (+9) -- I suppose this is better than some of the other Luke Combs songs that have been hits, but I still can't get too excited about this. The Matt Stell song I'm fine with. This one I'm indifferent towards.

56- "Good Vibes" - Chris Janson (+10) -- I'm also not on board with this one.

64- "What Happens in a Small Town" - Brantley Gilbert & Lindsay Eli (+21) -- It's a good week for country as country radio pushes it's new slate of songs. But I'm also not on board with this generic country song.

66- "Hot Girl Bummer" - blackbear (+10) -- NO!!! Make it go away!

85- "Higher Love" - Kygo & Whitney Houston (+10) -- Yes, please! This song hasn't been able to decide if it's going to be a fun novelty that quickly goes away or if it wants to be a legitimate hit. I'm totally on board with the latter. Let's give Whitney another hit! Sure, EDM isn't the best fit for Whitney's voice, but it's fine enough and a remix like this is probably the only way to bring Whitney back to the charts.

New Arrivals:

1- "HIGHEST IN THE ROOM" - Travis Scott -- OK, fine. Normally I ignore Travis Scott. But given that he currently has the No. 1 hit, I'll subject myself to this. In the most unsurprising turn of events, I don't like this. And I have no idea why Travis Scott has been knighted by so many as one of the most talented hip-hop artists in the business. Sure, he's fairly inoffensive comparatively. But that's not a very high bar to jump over when the competition is people like Lil Tecca, Juice WRLD, YoungBoy Never Broke Again, A Boogie wit da Hoodie, or Chris Brown. And I like the fact that Travis Scott at least sounds like a real name (even though his real name is Jacques Berman Webster II). All of these goofy rap names drive me crazy. But all Travis is doing in this song is talking about how high he is, discussing his relationship with his ex-girlfriend Kylie Jenner (who he broke up with two days before releasing this song), and doing some occasional flexing. All the bars are the same length and Travis' vocals never change beyond singing the same two or three notes for the most of the song, meaning the flow is boring and we also do the annoying thing of throwing in a whole bunch of echoes. So there's nothing to grasp onto with this. And now you know why I normally skip Travis Scott. 

4- "10,000 Hours" - Dan + Shay & Justin Bieber -- When I first saw Dan + Shay and Justin Bieber listed on the same song, I was initially quite confused as it seemed like a strange combination. The more I thought about it, though, the more it kinda made sense. Again, when we have country and pop crossovers, that's where we hit chart gold, like "Meant to Be" with Florida Georgia Line and Bebe Rexha. And as I stated above, the definition I came up with for Justin Bieber is malleable. He can jump on a Latin song like "Despacito" and fit in. He's good at balancing out a hip-hop song. I did a song with Ed Sheeran earlier this year where it was hard to tell the two apart. And he's a great fit for an EDM song. So why not dip his feet into country? It's especially helpful that Dan + Shay often lean into the more country pop realm anyways, so this is an easy fit. Now I'm not always madly in love with Dan + Shay. They can easily fall into country tropes that annoy me, which is most of "Tequila" for me. But then they have potential to step aside and do a nice wedding song, which is exactly what this one is. If you totally remove Justin Bieber from this song, this fits as quite a nice wedding song and one of Dan + Shay's better songs. It's simple in its lyrics, but it also feels genuine with the delivery and is toned back with the music. Throw in Justin Bieber and he mixes quite nicely with them. In fact, my biggest concern with the song is Justin fits in a little too well, making his inclusion fairly unnecessary. There's no reason to have him on the song as he doesn't add anything different to it. He's just doing his best Dan + Shay impression. At the same time, though, he doesn't do anything to retract from the song, so I'm not upset he's here. If his sole purpose is to push a nice wedding song to a much larger audience than Dan + Shay would've otherwise had, then I'd say this is a big win. Thus it parallels "Despacito." Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee didn't NEED Bieber on their song and he didn't add anything outside a bit of English. But he didn't detract from the song either and he helped them immensely with the sales.

11- "Bandit" - Juice WRLD & YoungBoy Never Broke Again -- This song did not crack the top 10, so I will gladly ignore it.  

42- "Come Thru" - Summer Walker & Usher -- As I stated above, I'm not interested in covering a Summer Walker album bomb. I have better things to do with my day.

61- "I'll Kill You" - Summer Walker featuring Jhene Aiko -- I'm not covering Summer Walker's album bomb today.

68- "Stretch You Out" - Summer Walker featuring A Boogie wit da Hoodie -- I'm not covering Summer Walker's album bomb today.

73- "Body" - Summer Walker -- I'm not covering Summer Walker's album bomb today.

79- "Drunk Dialing...LODT" - Summer Walker -- I'm not covering Summer Walker's album bomb today.

80- "Over It" - Summer Walker -- I'm not covering Summer Walker's album bomb today.

83- "Nice to Meet Ya" - Niall Horan -- Recently I've been thinking about where our One Directioners went. And this was because Liam Payne did one of those Wired autocomplete interviews. Then I saw that Harry Styles released a new song titled "Lights Up," so I was expecting a return from them, but Niall wasn't the one that I was anticipating. I thought we'd get to cover Harry or maybe Liam. Maybe they'll be in future weeks. For now we talk about Niall. If I'm being honest, Niall hasn't been the most interesting of the One Directioners in terms of their solo adventures. With songs like "Slow Hands" and "This Town," he's been the one that's sounded the most like One Direction, delivering simple, basic music that has nothing much to offer. Which is why I'm surprised a bit by "Nice to Meet Ya" because this has a solid groove to it. It's significantly different and it's super infectious. If I was a super nerdy music person, I'd dissect all the individual elements of the song, but I'm not actually good at doing that. But what I do hear is a solid mix of hand claps, piano and a bass guitar, with some excellently timed backing vocals and good drum work. I'm also trying to nail down exactly what era this sounds like its from. I'm almost thinking it reminds me of some 70's or 80's grooves. But maybe there's a bitter fit that's not coming to me at the movie. Either way, this song is a lot of fun and if Niall's second album is like this, bring it on. I didn't listen to his first album, but I'll check out his second album if it's this fun.

91- "Leave Em Alone" - Layton Greene, Lil Baby, City Girls & PnB Rock -- I have no idea who Layton Greene is, but give the other three acts on this song, this is also worth ignoring.

92- "Potential" - Summer Walker -- I'm not covering Summer Walker's album bomb today.

96- "Dance Monkey" - Tones and I -- The last thing to do this week is figure out who Tones and I are. As it turns out, Tones and I aren't a they, they're a she. One person. And she's a 19-year-old Australian singer-songwriter who released her debut single, "Johnny Runs Away" back in March, then followed it up with "Dance Monkey" in May. I haven't been as up to speed on my worldwide hits as I should, but "Dance Monkey" has been absolutely huge, having gone No. 1 in over 20 different countries. Like is always the case, the U.S. is behind everyone because we choose to shove a bunch of crappy hip-hop artists down everyone's throats instead of releasing quality music. But whatever. This is finally here and we'll see how people here take to it. Lewis Capaldi is currently in the top five after taking forever to finally crossover, so it can happen. As far as "Dance Monkey," I'll admit that this is a bit of a strange song, mostly because Tones and I has a unique vocal delivery that switches back and forth from being a normal pop voice to growling to singing in a higher-pitched baby voice. I like playing these more obscure songs for my friends on car drives and in other situations and I honestly don't how they're going to take to this one, but I'm awfully curious to try. Regardless of what people think of the vocals, the thing this absolutely does have going for it is a fun, dancy groove. Once I get used to the vocals, I can see this becoming a song that grows on me. The dance craze of 2020? Well, maybe not. But I could envision a world wherein that happens given that the rest of the world has already taken to it.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - October 12, 2019

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

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (=) -- It's a sixth week at No. 1 for "Truth Hurts." In previous weeks I've said this song is vulnerable. And I still think it is. But this week it actually rose in all three categories, with the biggest gain coming in sales as it increased 19 percent. I'm not quite sure what sparked this boost, but there must've been something that happened recently with it. We'll see what happens in the upcoming weeks. If you're on the train of thinking this is a rap song, then "Truth Hurts" is one week away from tying Iggy Azalea's "Fancy" for longest run at No. 1 for a female rapper. I actually don't think this is a rap song, so I don't put much weight on that record. I think this song is a hybrid of a few different genres, which is why I think it's here. If you're able to appeal to multiple different musical fan bases, then that's obviously going to help you out.

2- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (=) -- Billboard seems to have given up on reporting what the margins are between the top two songs. Then they decided to make people pay to see some of the charts. So I have nothing to report on here. When Billboard decides to tell me something, I'll relay the message.

3- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi (=) -- Same story here. Billboard didn't even report what the numbers are here. I would assume this is in good position to sneak ahead of the two songs in front of it, but I have no idea if its even rising or falling in the individual categories. If I learn something, I'll let you know.

4- "Ran$om" - Lil Tecca (=) -- People are still streaming this song like crazy. And I have no idea why.

5- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (=) -- Surprise! The whole top five is the same as it was last week. And I'm fine with the top three. But I'd really like it if Nos. 4 and 5 got knocked out.

6- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (+1) -- Oh my goodness! A song moved on the charts compared to last week! And it's Billie Eilish rising a spot due to "Panini" collapsing a bit this week. And I'm glad Billie stabilized after last week's fall.

7- "Circles" - Post Malone (+1) -- Post Malone also rising a spot thanks to "Panini" falling.

8- "Panini" - Lil Nas X (-2) -- Last week's fall was expected after it hit top five following the music video and the new remix. If there's anything I'll give Lil Nas X credit for, it's knowing how to take advantage of the system to boost his songs. But Lil Nas X can only do so much if he doesn't have a song that's really catching on. So it fell a spot last week. And now it fell two spots this week. To me that seems to say that this song is on its way out, but I'm going to go find some wood to knock on so me saying that doesn't cause it to reverse course and start rising again.

9- "Goodbyes" - Post Malone featuring Young Thug (=) -- This song is still here because there's NOTHING below the top 10 that seems to want to enter the region.

10- "Old Town Road" - Lil Nas X featuring Billy Ray Cyrus (=) -- Same thing here. The charts are stuck this week, meaning this song is only still here because nothing is rising fast enough. Let's hope that changes because I'm ready for some movement here.

Rising on the Hot 100:

13- "INTRO" - DaBaby (+4) -- I learned after my post last week that this song is actually a real song and not just some weird intro thing that somehow chart. DaBaby just decided to name it "INTRO," which is weird to me. But whatever. It only rose this week because of DaBaby's album bomb that I'll be ignoring. Next week will be the real test.

18- "Trampoline" - SHAED (+14) -- Oh, here's a better idea! Let's get "Trampoline" into the top 10 instead! I love that idea! I actually never believed that it would get there because this has been one of those really slow rising songs. And I'm not yet convinced that it'll get over the hump. There's a lot of songs that slowly rise, then camp out in the teens before hitting the top 10. I'm not sure what route this one is going to take. And if it does hit the top 10, I don't know if it will be there for just a few weeks like "Sweet but Psycho" or if it will randomly shoot up to No. 3 like "Someone You Loved." I obviously hope it's the latter, but at this point I'm just happy that its a top 20 hit because that means more and more people are realizing this song exists.

22- "Only Human" - Jonas Brothers (+6) -- Can Jonas Brothers get another top 10 hit? I'd be fine with that. Although top 20 is the more immediate goal, which I assume it'll hit next week. Then it has to work its way through the teens, which is often the toughest part of actually cracking the top 10.

23- "On Chill" - Wale featuring Jeremih (+6) -- I'm in a really dumb mood right now. I saw Jonas Brothers, then I saw Wale and suddenly I think it should be the Jonas Brothers collaborating with Wale instead of Jeremih? Why? Well, because Jonas is like Jonah and Wale is like whale. The whale didn't swallow Jeremiah. It swallowed Jonah. So it only makes sense, right? OK, I'll see myself out.

30- "Good as Hell" - Lizzo (+13) -- In addition to "Truth Hurts" rising in overall chart points this week, "Good as Hell" shoots up to No. 30. That makes me happy because "Good as Hell" is my favorite of the two songs. It also adds to my theory that Lizzo must've performed the two songs somewhere recently in order to cause both of them to get a boost. I do hope that leads this song to continue to rise.

38- "One Thing Right" - Marshmello & Kane Brown (+9) -- Meh.

46- "Prayed for You" - Matt Stell (+8) -- Thanks for praying for me, Matt.

New Arrivals:

19- "BOP" - DaBaby -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

21- "VIBES" - DaBaby -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

28- "TOES" - DaBaby featuring Lil Baby & Moneybagg Yo -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb. Also, Moneybagg Yo? What the heck? Let's never make this guy a thing because that almost takes the cake for dumbest rap name I've seen.

43- "iPHONE" - DaBaby & Nicki Minaj -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

47- "OFF THE RIP" - DaBaby -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

49- "POP STAR" - DaBaby featuring Kevin Gates -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

51- "RAW S---" - DaBaby featuring Migos -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

55- "GOSPEL" - DaBaby featuring Chance the Rapper, Gucci Mane & YK Osiris -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

56- "Writing on the Wall" - French Montana featuring Post Malone, Cardi B & Rvssian -- This is weird combination of human beings. And I'm not interested in hearing how it turned out.

63- "REALLY" - DaBaby featuring Stunna 4 Vegas -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

69- "XXL" - DaBaby -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

73- "PROLLY HEARD" - DaBaby -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

81- "Chicken Noodle Soup" - j-hope featuring Becky G -- Well this is awkward. Given that I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb, that almost gives me nothing to talk about. But there are two songs I will cover. The first of which is Becky G with... j-hope? I first thought that j-hope was some sort of Latino dude that I've never heard of. But turns out he's one of the 10,000 members of BTS. So we have an odd combination of Spanish and Korean, with both of them singing English every once in a while. And I know I skipped DaBaby's album, but I'm sure that there was probably some better songs from that album than this song because this is annoying. I don't care to translate any of the non-English lyrics, but I'd be willing to guess that they're as meaningless as the English, which doesn't even equate to anything. Then we get the chorus that repeats "Chicken noodle soup. Chicken noodle soup. Chicken noodle soup with a soda on the side." What? This better disappear ASAP because this is more of an annoying earworm than "Old Town Road" and "Baby Shark. And that's saying something.

84- "Heartache Medication" - Jon Pardi -- And we end the week with a country song. And Jon Pardi is singing about drinking at a bar while trying to get over his broken heart. In other words, you've heard this song a thousand times and it's as boring and generic as it comes. But do you know what? I just barely listened to "Chicken Noodle Soup," so this was a breath of fresh air simply because it's actually a real song that can be listened to. More than likely I'll forget this song exists when it leaves the charts. And if it becomes a huge hit, I might get annoyed. But this week I'm fine with it as it puts something else in my head. And it has enough of a folky touch to it to make it a decent song to dance to. So don't get too excited country friends, but this week I'm giving this song a pass.

86- "By My Lonely" - Kevin Gates -- I don't care about Kevin Gates.

89- "THERE HE GO" - DaBaby -- I'm not covering DaBaby's album bomb.

DrogeMiester's Billboard Analysis - October 5, 2019

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

Billboard Hot 100 Top 10:

1- "Truth Hurts" - Lizzo (=) -- "Truth Hurts" holds at No. 1 for a fifth week thanks to its increased lead on radio, up 3 percent to 119.4 million audience impressions, as well as good enough numbers on sales and streaming, down 5 percent in sales to 26,000 downloads sold and down 6 percent in streaming to 27.5 million U.S. streams. Again, I don't think this is that strong of a No. 1 hit right now. Despite leading on the radio, it fell to No. 2 on sales and is at No. 7 on streaming. It's just holding the fort until something stronger comes around. And I'm not upset at that.

2- "Señorita" - Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello (=) -- Shawn and Camila hang out at No. 2 again this week. Although Billboard gave up several weeks ago on reporting what the song's numbers are, so your guess is as good as mine as to how for behind "Truth Hurts" it is. At this point, I'm guessing it's not doing well enough to overtake it.

3- "Someone You Loved" - Lewis Capaldi (+1) -- Honestly the song that seems to be in strong position to take over for "Truth Hurts" at No. 1 is this song right here, judging solely on the fact that it's only been around for a few weeks in the top 10 while the other two songs ahead of it have been around significantly longer. But again, Billboard didn't report what the numbers on this one were, so we'll have to wait and see. The song did take forever to hit the top 10, so if it's hit its peak, I wouldn't be too surprised.

4- "Ran$om" - Lil Tecca (+2) -- We really need to stop streaming this song. I don't get the appeal. But that's what it's back at No. 4. That and some of the songs ahead of it fell.

5- "No Guidance" - Chris Brown featuring Drake (+2) -- Chris Brown gets his first top five hit since 2008 while Drake collects his 15th career top five. And I couldn't care less about either artist and their achievements this week. I'm just happy the song hasn't blown up too much, but I'm equally as annoyed that it hasn't started losing traction.

6- "Panini" - Lil Nas X (-1) -- We'll have to wait and see what this song ends up doing. At this point, I currently have no idea. It shot up to No. 5 last week due to the arrival of the music video. Now it's fallen one spot. It would be nice if it continued to fall.

7- "bad guy" - Billie Eilish (-4) -- Ouch. That's quite the tumble for Billie this week. But the song did spend 19 weeks in the top five and is at week No. 25 in the top 10, so I guess it was inevitable that it would fall at some point. It's currently the No. 3 song of the year according to my personal tracking and it's sneaking up behind "Sunflower" for that No. 2 spot. Whether or not it catches it will depend on how long it manages to stay in the top 10. If it has anymore tumbles like this week, that might not be very long.

8- "Circles" - Post Malone (+1) -- Post Malone remains stagnant with his two remaining top 10 hits. They just switched spots, which infers that "Circle" may be gaining traction? We'll have to see it if can get any stronger momentum and actually climb higher.

9- "Goodbyes" - Post Malone featuring Young Thug (-1) -- After a surprisingly disappointing run compared to previous Post Malone singles, "Goodbyes" might be finally on the way out since it has nothing else to prop it back up and "Circles" seems to be the new single that's being pushed.

10- "Old Town Road" - Lil Nas X featuring Billy Ray Cyrus (=) -- One more week for "Old Town Road." Mainly because there's nothing too strong below the top 10.

Rising on the Hot 100:

16- "Money in the Grave" - Drake featuring Rick Ross (+2) -- This isn't going anywhere. It's just kinda coasting here in the teens, rising up and down based on what the songs around it are doing.

18- "Suge" - DaBaby (+2) -- DaBaby has an album set to impact the charts next week. So unfortunately we might see this get a huge boost next week.

20- "Hot Girl Summer" - Megan Thee Stallion, Nicki Minaj & Ty Dolla $ign (+2) -- I'm a bit surprised that this song hasn't gained enough traction to make much of an impact, but it snuck back into the top 20 this week.

21- "Baby" - Lil Baby & DaBaby (+6) -- DaBaby's presence here might help this surge next week thanks to his album. And that's unfortunate.

28- "Only Human" - Jonas Brothers (+10) -- Jonas Brothers are getting a second big hit following "Sucker." Good for them, I suppose.

38- "223's" - YNW Melly & 9lokknine (+21) -- Make this go away.

39- "I Don't Know About You" - Chris Lane (+8) -- Eh.

43- "Good as Hell" - Lizzo (+7) -- I'm a bit surprised this is still around given how old it is. But I'm not complaining. Out of the two Lizzo songs charting right now, this is certainly the better of the two. So if it can continue to gain traction, I'll be happy.

44- "Lover" - Taylor Swift (+5) -- Taylor really needs a win with this song. She had an excellent week when her album debuted, but it was rough before that and it's continued to be rough after that. If "Lover" doesn't gain traction, she's going to be in danger of falling into obscurity.

47- "One More Night" - Marshmello & Kane Brown (+5) -- This one refuses to go away.

71- "Baby Sitter" - DaBaby featuring Offset (+10) -- Again, thanks to DaBaby's album, this will probably do quite well next week. And that's upsetting.

74- "Playing Games" - Summer Walker (+20) -- I skipped this song when it debuted because it was Taylor Swift week that week and I decided I'd spent too much time on that charts with covering all of Taylor's songs. But I promised I'd get back to it if it started rising and I'm keeping to my word. And, well, turns out I wasn't missing anything. Granted, I've never been much of an R&B person. I don't hate the genre, I just find it mostly boring. That's the most accurate word to describe this song. Boring. It's too chopped up and really slow. There's not much in terms of content and it barely lasts more than two minutes. So if you're an R&B person and you love this, then I'm happy for you. It's just not my thing. It's not horrible or offensive, just dull and forgettable.

76- "Tip of My Tongue" - Kenny Chesney (+12) -- I can't even remember this song.

79- "Hot Girl Bummer" - blackbear (+12) -- Gross. Why are we making this a thing?

85- "Remember You Young" - Thomas Rhett (+15) -- Yes. I might've been a bit nitpicky here when I covered this song last week since it could've been a lot better. But as is, I'm still happy it's around and I'm more than happy if it becomes a pop country hit.

New Arrivals:

17- "INTRO" - DaBaby -- As I've said a few times now, I'm bracing for a DaBaby album bomb next week. I'm not going to cover any of the songs, but I'm expecting it to happen due to the strong presence the songs have on the Apple Music charts at the moment. Yet I'm really confused as to why this song showed up this week and why it's even here in the first place. Intro songs shouldn't exist on the charts. But whatever. If you're into nonsense like this, enjoy yourself, I guess.

22- "Memories" - Maroon 5 -- It's funny, yesterday Gwen Stefani did one of those Wired autocomplete interviews. She talked about "The Voice" for a second and it made me reflect on how refreshing it is to not have any Maroon 5 songs on the charts (although I would LOVE for more Gwen Stefani). I guess I forgot to knock on wood because then today I see this. Although I got 15 seconds in before I had to pause it and figure out what the heck the name of that classical song is that they interpolate here. Yes, I love classical music, but I'm not enough of a classic music nerd to always remember the names of the songs. And Googling doesn't ever help because they don't have lyrics. Luckily Genius helped me out and told me that "Memories" interpolates "Canon in D" by Pachelbel. So before returning to "Memories," I enjoyed myself some "Canon in D" on YouTube. I think the best version is when it's piano and cello combined. Brooklyn Duo has a beautiful version of that if you want to go treat yourself.

Back to the song "Memories," though, I suppose if you want me to not hate your music, interpolating "Canon in D" is a good way to do that. It makes for a soothing, reflective Maroon 5 song, which fits quite well into the themes of the song, with Adam singing about all the memories from the past and how said memories consequentially bring back this girl that he'd previously forgotten about. The song certainly doesn't break any ground for this group that for some reason still call themselves a band, but I'm personally a bit shocked that I'm not upset at this song's existence. Usually I'm upset at Maroon 5 because they put out nothing but boring, generic pop music with zero personality that the pop radio stations across the country completely salivate over. And that's disappointing because Adam has a unique voice and they were once a really cool rock band. So I'm still trying to digest this current song. I don't know if I'm happy because the song is actually good or if it's simply tolerable in contrast to all of their other boring nonsense from the past decade. I guess I'll update you on that as the weeks go by because I'm assuming this will be around on the charts for the majority of the next year due to how much the radio loves Maroon 5. 

86- "Adicto" - Tainy, Anuel AA & Ozuna -- I was going to just skip this song, but since there's only five new arrivals, I humored these three and gave it a shot. And it was about as boring as I expected. Tainy and Ozuna are tolerable enough, but they don't sound too interested in the song and Anuel AA just gets on my nerves, as always. I used my strong deductive skills to determine that "Adicto" translates to "Addicted." That's apparently 100 percent correct. So I translated the chorus and apparently this girl wants nothing to do with him, but he refuses to give up because he is addicted to her... skin? I mean, if you speak Spanish, please inform me if "piel" means something different. If not, then this is an extremely shallow song. He doesn't want her back because he still loves her or wants to be with her. She's just too attractive to let go.

93- "Stuck in a Dream" - Lil Mosey & Gunna -- Nope.

96- "Loco Contigo" - DJ Snake, J Balvin & Tyga -- There was once a point in time where I liked DJ Snake. But it's been a while since he's done anything worthwhile. Instead he's settled with collaborating with people like this that will help him become popular rather than trying to make good music. In fairness to this song, it's slightly more upbeat than "Adicto" as it at least has a background rhythm from DJ Snake this is kinda catchy, but no, this is another useless reggaeton song that has J Balvin sounding quite bored despite singing about how crazy he is for this girl. Tyga comes in and does something, although he seems more confused and out of place than anything. There's no reason for him to be here and it feels like he knows that, but gives them some sort of semblance of a useless verse anyways. And I'm sorry I translated the lyrics because then I found the line, "You beat it like grandma's oatmeal." What?