billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 13, 2024

It’s difficult for me to describe why weeks like this are so frustrating, but I think it’s rooted in the fact that there is an opportunity here that Billboard chooses not to take. See, all the holiday music just evaporated - it’s no longer on the Hot 100 - and that normally means that this would be an ideal time to release music, capitalize on an open window - and indeed, a bunch of that will be coming in the next week or two. Or hell, there’s stuff from last year that stuck around, I expect big rebounds. This just feels like a reset to the charts before the holidays including big returns - it doesn’t feel new or special, and while all of it actually did fit within recurrency rules and it does reflect how streaming has come out… I have to ask, was the fall of 2023 so good that the radio couldn’t aggressively start courting new material? Your format is dying and weaker than it’s been in years, this is a really bad way to maintain any shred of relevancy or credibility.

Nowhere does this feel more apparent than our top ten, where making its return to #1, ‘Lovin On Me’ by Jack Harlow - and I get it; despite the song being crap he has traction in all categories, proving that lazy sampling and hacky lyrics can still get traction, handily jumping over ‘Cruel Summer’ by Taylor Swift at #2 which despite it literally being the middle of winter it’s still dominating radio with a ridiculous margin with healthy streaming to boot! Then we have ‘greedy’ by Tate McRae surging to #3 - again, strong streaming and radio although airplay seems to be leveling off a bit - and ‘Paint The Town Red’ by Doja Cat at #4, which also seems to be coming to a radio peak and lags significantly on streaming. What isn’t lagging there is ‘I Remember Everything’ by Zach Bryan and Kacey Musgraves at #5 - streaming has been incredibly solid here, even over the holidays as the radio has been excruciatingly slow to get onboard - but then we see our first big return: ‘Snooze’ by SZA at #6. And it does make sense why it’s back, given the higher streaming and radio margins, but it’s also absolutely on the downswing, I expect it to be eclipsed by ‘Water’ by Tyla quite soon, which surged up to #7… albeit in this case more because of radio stability than any tangible streaming traction, which isn’t precisely surprising but is disappointing for a good song by a new artist. What’s more disappointing is ‘Last Night’ by Morgan Wallen still clinging to the top 10 at #8 because its streaming will not die even as the radio tries frantically to dump it - all the more bizarre compared to ‘Fast Car’ by Luke Combs which saw a ridiculous radio surge this week at #9 even as streaming is long gone! Finally, breaking into the top 10 we have ‘Agora Hills’ by Doja Cat at #10, where the radio has felt rather abortive even as the streaming is mostly decent… I guess RCA’s patience ran out faster than expected.

Anyway, we don’t really have any losers or dropouts this week - all the holiday music is gone, there were no real losses, so we need to focus on returns and gains, and let’s start with the former. I already mentioned ‘Snooze’, but it belongs to the first group of returns: older songs that are back because the recurrency window allows it for the top 50. And with that: ‘Flowers’ by Miley Cyrus at 15, ‘What Was I Made For?’ by Billie Eilish at 20, ‘vampire’ by Olivia Rodrigo at 21, ‘Need A Favor’ and ‘Save Me’ by Jelly Roll, the former at 22, the latter with Lainey Wilson at 28, ‘Dance The Night’ by Dua Lipa at 23, ‘fukumean’ by Gunna at 24, ‘Kill Bill’ by SZA at 31, and ‘Dial Drunk’ by Noah Kahan and Post Malone at 48. The second group are songs that are lesser hits or just never got proper traction getting a second wind, and I’m a little more forgiving of those - emphasis on little because we’re starting with Travis Scott with ‘I KNOW’ at 40, ‘FE!N’ with Playboi Carti at 79, and ‘MY EYES’ at 94. Then working our way down we have ‘Different Round Here’ by Riley Green and Luke Combs at 64, ‘Soak City (Do It)’ by 310babii at 68, ‘One Of Your Girls’ by Troye Sivan at 69 - apropos - ‘Perro Negro’ by Bad Bunny and Feid at 72, and ‘We Don’t Fight Anymore’ by Carly Pearce and Chris Stapleton at 73. Then we have a few Zach Bryan cuts - ‘Oklahoma Smokeshow’ at 75, ‘Burn Burn Burn’ at 93, and ‘Tourniquet’ at 96 - ‘Wondering Why’ by the Red Clay Strays at 76, ‘MmHmm’ by BigXThaPlug at 77, and then Olivia Rodrigo clawing back ‘bad idea, right’ to 80. From there… ‘Can’t Have Mine’ by Dylan Scott at 82, ‘Virginia Beach’ and ‘Slime You Out’ with SZA by Drake at 84 and 91 respectively, ‘Rich Men North Of Richmond’ by Oliver Anthony at 85, ‘Northern Attitude’ by Noah Kahan and Hozier at 86, ‘Now That We Don’t Talk’ by Taylor Swift at 87, ‘Mi Ex Tenia Razon’ and ‘Amargura’ by Karol G at 89 and 99 respectively, ‘run for the hills’ by Tate McRae at 90, ‘Better Place’ by *NSYNC at 92, ‘Turks & Caicos’ by Rod Wave and 21 Savage at 95, and ‘Y Lloro’ by Junior H at 97.

And yet when we get to our gains… here’s where we encounter a roadblock, because outside of the returns, our new arrivals, and ‘Lovin On Me’, ‘Needle’ by Nicki Minaj and Drake, and ‘Lace It’ by the late Juice WRLD, benny blanco and Eminem, every song could be classified as a gain! It literally makes no sense for me to just list over half the Hot 100 as gains, that provides no useful context, especially when most of these gains are just filling in the space where holiday music was by jumping twenty to thirty spots! So what I’ll try to do is focus on the notable shifts and the absolute biggest gains, say… 33 or higher, if they jumped a third of the chart. Let’s start with rebounds, where Nicki Minaj did get a few with ‘FTCU’ at 17 and ‘Everybody’ with Lil Uzi Vert at 27, as well as ‘Standing Next To You’ by Jungkook bouncing back to 70. Then we have returns that saw a boost, like ‘Man Made A Bar’ by Morgan Wallen ft. Eric Church at 66 and ‘El Amor de Su Vida’ by Grupo Frontera and Grupo Firme at 67. Finally we have the continued uptick for Xavi with ‘La Victima’ at 55 and ‘La Diabla’ at 34 - again, this traction feels very real. Now for our biggest gains outside of those shifts - and this is still a hefty list - ‘Lose Control’ by Teddy Swims at 12, ‘Is It Over Now?’ by Taylor Swift at 13, ‘Lil Boo Thang’ by Paul Russell at 14, ‘Rich Baby Daddy’ by Drake, Sexyy Red and SZA at 16, ‘White Horse’ by Chris Stapleton at 18, ‘Stick Season’ by Noah Kahan at 19, ‘World On Fire’ by Nate Smith at 25, ‘Houdini’ by Dua Lipa at 26, ‘TRUCK BED’ by HARDY at 36, ‘Save Me The Trouble’ by Dan + Shay at 38, ‘Wild Ones’ by Jessie Murph and Jelly Roll at 41, ‘The Painter’ by Cody Johnson at 45, ‘Burn It Down’ by Parker McCollum at 53, ‘Feather’ by Sabrina Carpenter at 56, and ‘Hey Driver’ by Zach Bryan and the War and Treaty at 60. In other words a whole lot of country rode genre stability here, for better and for worse.

But for all of that, we only have five new arrivals - because again, this time of year is rather dire for new releases, so let’s get this started with…

100. ‘Wildflowers and Wild Horses’ by Lainey Wilson - you know, one thing I can respect from Lainey Wilson and her team is that they at least try to work late album singles, and considering this one only started a proper push in November of last year, it’s ahead of schedule to capitalize on a quiet week. And… you know, if there was a week for this to sneak onto the Hot 100 early, it might be this one, because this caught me off-guard in a really good way! The slow-burn tap builds up some credible smoky Western atmosphere behind the snarled guitars and touches of pianos that after the first hook seem to cut into something closer to a bluegrass shuffle as the tempo ramps up, including a pretty impressive acoustic solo after the second hook! I wish the reverbed atmosphere around her vocals blended better - you can tell audibly when they’re shifting from placing her near the front of the mix to deeper in the expanse - and the content feels a little lightweight; very much a stormy cowgirl song out on the fields that’s more about accentuating how awesome she is for multiple generations of hellraising rather than telling a story… but honestly, how often do women get to make this kind of song and make it sound kick-ass! A total swerve when it comes to a single, and while the success of ‘White Horse’ might give it a shot… I’m really not sure how much Nashville will take to it, but that’s an indictment on them - this is really damn cool, check it out!

98. ‘Murder On The Dance Floor’ by Sophie Ellis-Bextor - Alright, my fans in the UK are already well-familiar with this song, given that it was first released in 2001, but for those who don’t know, Sophie Ellis-Bextor is a pop artist who was originally in the indie rock back Theaudience, and this is from her debut album. Over the last twenty years her work has been pretty received by some in the know, but this is one of her bigger hits off that debut album, produced by Gregg Alexander of the New Radicals, that just so happened to get featured in the film Saltburn last year, which caused a quick burst of virality. And as someone who knows a decent bit of UK pop of this era - Girls Aloud was my shit and I unironically love S Club 7 - this is playing to a lot of late 90s disco flair with the strings hits, the glossy synths, chimes, ridiculously tight bassline, and occasional distant squonk of guitar. And yet I don’t quite love this as much as you might think - Sophie Ellis-Bextor brings the right sort of breathy sultriness to sell it, but the intended tension of ‘murder’ even if it’s just in a playful dance-off feels like it needs a bit more lyrical edge, or the guitars a bit louder. It’s certainly good, and if more pop sounded like this in 2024, I would not remotely complain, but I know a lot of folks who consider this a classic… I get it, I’m not fully there.

81. ‘Rompe La Dompe’ by Peso Pluma, Junior H & Oscar Maydon - so my concern with Peso Pluma was always going to be how he’d continue his momentum with the regional Mexican sound - if it’s going to be a thing on the Hot 100, capitalizing on momentum would be key. So with this song, dropped very late last year with Junior H and Oscar Maydon stepping up for the assist - although Junior H still has no personality to speak of and Oscar Maydon isn’t much better - I’ll admit at least the production has steadily gotten better. The horns still fart around and the choppy acoustics feel brittle as hell, but the bassline is better balanced and there’s a more interesting melodic hook in the acoustic line that builds a bit more distinctive swagger. And the lyrics… kind of get there? The song is named for an expensive bottle of champagne - the Don Perignon, as it is - and while Junior H seems to imply he’s post-breakup and wants this girl to get away from him, the other guys seem more accommodating of the danger, be it from them, gangs or cops. Again, I appreciate more regional Mexican songs developing a distinctive melodic identity, but if I think two of the three artists aren’t adding much to it, it’s hard to recommend.

71. ‘23’ by Chayce Beckham - oh, I’ve know this was coming for a while. For those who don’t know, Chayce Beckham is the winner of Season 19 of American Idol - I think the surprise for me is not that the zombified show is still on, but that anyone coming from it can chart! Now looking at the songs he performed on the show, he appears to have pretty good taste, especially in and around country, and this was the original song he wrote and performed… three years ago, which has been steadily seeing some chart success in Canada last year but has finally crossed over. And I feel like I want to like this more than I do - Beckham’s got a pleasant, indie country-esque growl in his delivery and I like that there’s more storytelling in this song, from his rougher early family years to his band on the road to the relationship that blew up in his face because they both drank way too much and he’s trying to pull his life out of the bottle. That’s… genuinely alarming when he’s that young, but touring leads to a lot of hard living, and with that fast-picked acoustic rollick that builds more interplay and staccato electric strumming, I bought into it. But man, this is a place where Ross Copperman’s attempt at a more polished mix does him no favours - that fizzy tap that persists alongside the heavier kickdrum, honestly the entire drum kit feels poorly micced, give this song a proper groove and Beckham would have something special. As it is… it’s hard to escape the feeling that the mainstream is giving this a push because they want their cut of what Zach Bryan and the indie coutnry stars found organically - which sucks for Beckham, because he wrote this and he’s a good singer… it’s just not as good as it should be. Speaking of which…

59. ‘I Can Feel You’ by Kane Brown - Look, I heard about the sample before even listening to the song, I was prepared for the worst with this. I don’t know why Kane Brown thought it was a smart idea to go for a big obvious sample when he’s got the pipes and presence to clean up with neotraditional tones - you know, the big reason he got signed in the mid-2010s - but hey, why not suck all the bombastic power and ominous atmosphere out of Phil Collins’ drums interpolating ‘In The Air Tonight’, blend in a fizzy trap progression on a drum machine and an utterly unconvincing at bombast before the final hook, pile on the pitch correction and weak backing vocals, and deliver this underpowered nothing of a bro-country leftover that should have been left to Dustin Lynch in 2014! What I find so obnoxious with this is that you can take out the Phil Collins interpolation and this becomes the sort of faster-paced dance/hookup song that Kane Brown shovels out routinely - the sample is only here for the cheapest of pops and maybe a DJ blend - and Dann Huff’s production can’t give this anything close to bombast, and considering with that guitar solo they’re trying desperately to make it go off… no, I don’t buy it. I don’t even know why I’m disappointed, but I am - this sucks.

And yeah, easily the worst of the week, with the best… I know folks think I might go for Sophie Ellis-Bextor, but I’m picking ‘Wildflowers and Wild Horses’ by Lainey Wilson, that was a real surprise and I hope it gets some traction. Next week is primed to be get busier - gonna be slow to ramp up, but we’ll have to see…