billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - january 27, 2024

You know, I had expected this week to be slower - yes, it was going to be busy due to a fight for the #1 and 21 Savage’s album bomb, but the buzz seemed inconsistent to say the least - it was tough to assess how much was really happening. Turns out this is probably the first ‘busy’ week of the Hot 100 in the calendar year of 2024, and more importantly it’s interesting how the album bomb impacted the charts in this current state.

But before we get to that, the first big story in our top ten: debuting at #1, ‘yes, and’ by Ariana Grande. So I’ve been predicting this for some time now, it’s not surprising, but the margin was closer than I expected, mostly because while she’s got dominance on sales and streaming and is seeing radio traction, ‘Lovin On Me’ by Jack Harlow was holding his own at #2 with continued radio traction and sitting right behind her on streams and sales - odds are he’ll retake the top spot unless Ariana can close the radio gap. This nudges back ‘Cruel Summer’ by Taylor Swift to #3 - which is also very much on the downswing across the board - and ‘greedy’ by Tate McRae at #4, which is seeing sharper streaming losses but her radio decline is much slower. And this takes us to our second new arrival: debuting at #5, ‘redrum’ by 21 Savage, smashing through on massive streaming and precisely nothing else. Hell, it was enough to push back ‘I Remember Everything’ by Zach Bryan and Kacey Musgraves to #6, which has enough sales to not lose too much of its position, and ‘Paint The Town Red’ by Doja Cat at #7, which is bleeding airplay and saw an even sharper streaming loss. Then holding steady we have ‘Lose Control’ by Teddy Swims at #8 - yes, it weathered a streaming hit, but sales are still strong and radio growth is starting to pick up steam, it’ll probably get higher when the album bomb fades - which is not the case for ‘Snooze’ by SZA at #9, which at this point is in freefall in all channels. Finally, coming in as a second streaming-only hit we have ‘nee-nah’ by 21 Savage, Travis Scott, and Metro Boomin… again, we’ll get to this one later.

This takes us neatly to losers and dropouts, and man, we have a lot of them this week, although probably fewer dropouts than you might expect given how big this album bomb is. Yeah, there’s some bigger songs forced out like ‘Kill Bill’ by SZA, ‘I KNOW?’ by Travis Scott, ‘Hey Driver’ by Zach Bryan and The War and Treaty, ‘You’re Losing Me’ and ‘Now That We Don’t Talk’ by Taylor Swift, ‘bad idea, right?’ by Olivia Rodrigo, ‘Slime You Out’ by Drake and SZA, and ‘Can’t Have Mine’ by Dylan Scott, but honestly I expected more. That might be because the album bomb’s impact was a little more spread out, and with songs debuting later in 2023 it’s harder to directly force them into recurrence. Of course, that still meant we have over forty losses, so let’s start with the one new arrival that saw a blow being ‘Coal’ by Dylan Gossett at 99, and the only gains that fell back were ‘Mmmhmm’ by BigXThaPlug at 80, ‘Y Lloro’ by Junior H at 90, and ‘MY EYES’ by Travis Scott at 97 - let’s throw ‘FE!N’ with Playboi Carti at 86 as well here - likely a factor of streaming imploding. And now for the rest… let’s start off with lingering Drake, with ‘First Person Shooter’ with J. Cole at 38, ‘You Broke My Heart’ at 63, ‘IDGAF’ with Yeat at 68, and ‘Virginia Beach’ at 98. Then let’s handle the country, which saw a little more impact than I expected, starting with Jelly Roll for ‘Need A Favor’ at 34 and ‘Save Me’ with Lainey Wilsoin at 41, but also ‘TRUCK BED’ by HARDY at 49, ‘The Painter’ by Cody Johnson at 56, ‘Different Round Here’ by Riley Green and Luke Combs at 72, ‘Man Made A Bar’ by Morgan Wallen and Eric Church at 74, ‘I Can Feel You’ by Kane Brown at 77, ‘Save Me The Trouble’ by Dan + Shay at 78, ‘23’ by Chayce Beckham at 79, ‘We Don’t Fight Anymore’ by Carly Pearce and Chris Stapleton at 81, ‘Wondering Why’ by The Red Clay Strays at 84, ‘Oklahoma Smokeshow’ by Zach Bryan at 89, and ‘Rich Men North Of Richmond’ by Oliver Anthony at 94. Then we have a slew of Latin music, like ‘Monaco’ and ‘Perro Negro’ with Feid by Bad Bunny at 64 and 91 respectively, ‘Harley Quinn’ by Fuerza Regida and Marshmello at 65, ‘El Amor de su Vida’ by Grupo Frontera and Grupo Firme at 82, ‘Que Onda’ by Calle 24, Chino Pacas, and Fuerza Regida at 83, and ‘Segun Quien’ by Maluma and Carin Leon at 92. Next, the rest… let’s work from the bottom up: ‘Great Gatsby' by Rod Wave at 100, ‘Northern Attitude’ by Noah Kahan and Hozier at 95, ‘Standing Next To You’ by Jungkook at 87, ‘Can’t Catch Me Now’, ‘get him back!’, and ‘vampire’ by Olivia Rodrigo at 85, 61, and 42 respectively, ‘One Of The Girls’ by The Weeknd, JENNIE, and Lily Rose Depp at 73 - sidenote, I know I made a mistake misattributing this song a few weeks back, that’s on me, I think subconsciously I was trying to put a better song here - ‘500 lbs’ by Lil Tecca at 71, and ‘Strangers’ by Kenya Grace at 54. Finally, ‘On My Mama’ by Victoria Monet at 51, ‘Surround Sound’ by JID, 21 Savage and Baby Tate at 48, ‘Good Good’ by Usher, Summer Walker, and 21 Savage at 48 - interesting how he doesn’t cannibalize his guest appearances when he has album bombs - ‘exes’ by Tate McRae at 47, ‘My Love Mine All Mine’ by Mitski at 46, ‘Used To Be Young’ by Miley Cyrus at 45, and ‘FTCU’ by Nicki Minaj at 25.

Now I normally would have tried to find some shortcut going through all of this list… except because of this large album bomb, we have no tangible gains or returns this week, which means that all we have to focus on are the album bomb cuts that are outside of the top 20 and are neither the best nor worst. And since I already reviewed the album on my main channel, this falls out relatively quickly: ‘dark days’ with Mariah The Scientist at 70, ‘just like me’ with Burna Boy and Metro Boomin at 67, ‘see the real’ at 66, ‘letter to my brudda’ at 59, ‘prove it’ with Summer Walker at 43, ‘dangerous’ with Lil Durk and Metro Boomin at 35, ‘sneaky’ at 33, and ‘pop ur shit’ with Young Thug and Metro Boomin at 31.

So that gives us a much more reasonable list of new arrivals, starting with…

93. ‘Made For Me’ by Muni Long - okay, so I wasn’t impressed by Muni Long’s breakthrough single a while back, but I was willing to give her another proper shot, especially given how long she’s been in the industry, maybe it was just one song that didn’t work. And credit to her, I mostly like this more: yeah, I don’t love that whirring beep that overlays the drums and a really pretty delicate piano line, and when the subtler g-funk synths slip over the hook, I was onboard even if I think Muni Long may be a little too forceful with the hook; you’re selling a song about how much you love this guy, and it sounds like she’s trying to command it so, it feels a bit oversold. Honestly, it reminds me of a brand of R&B that feels like it could have been made in any time the past twenty years - and seeing Jermaine Dupri as one of the producers made all the sense in the world - but while I think I’m more lukewarm on this than anything, it’s still a good song, I’ll take it.

88. ‘02.02.99’ by That Mexican OT - okay, so ‘Johnny Dang’ was never as big as it should have been, but I’m happy to say That Mexican OT doesn’t seem like he’s slowing down, and with BigXThaPlug notching chart success, that Texas sound could have a bit of momentum. So I was rooting for this song to do well… and I’ll admit I’m a little surprised he swerved here, even if it does make a certain amount of sense. The colder synths and sharper percussion are much darker and more serious, and while I prefer That Mexican OT’s more wild, flavourful side, I get the impression he wants to prove he can sell menace too, and to my pleasant surprise, he can! His faster flow still bends in odd places, but it feels sharper, and the threats show some credible teeth as the punchlines flow together. I guess if I were to be critical, it feels like it’s chasing a lower ceiling, and it doesn’t have the magnetic hooks of his best, but I’d call it effective and solid - good song, worth hearing.

69. ‘J CHRIST ‘ by Lil Nas X - I’ve have a bad feeling about Lil Nas X this entire rollout for this song, and I’m not at all surprised that it’s underperformed like this. Part of it is the social media climate - playing the same provocation as 2021 and more on Twitter than TikTok feels like a misstep - but it also reflects an angle that we’ve already seen and heard; ‘MONTERO (Call Me By Your Name)’ didn’t just have the video, it was well-constructed pop rap and didn’t sound like much else in the mainstream at the time. Whereas ‘J CHRIST’… not only does the fizzy trap percussion against the staccato piano chords sound like a deliberate rip of ‘HUMBLE’ by Kendrick Lamar, to quote a colleague it’s an ‘I’m Back, Bitch’ single, all about the flex and being loud and famous and there’s just nothing that sticky or memorable to support it. Moreover, it’s a song trying to set up all the wild stuff Lil Nas X might do, but the song itself doesn’t do any of them - it’s trying to claim an event single on birthright without doing anything special, and it really doesn’t work. And I don’t know whose fault this is: this has the feel of the label defaulting to a known commodity rather than a bigger swing - like, say, that song he was quasi-teasing with Kesha that almost certainly would be better than this - but I also know Lil Nas X may have thought this was built to do more than it has, especially with the wildly overdone video, which does not bode well for any album rollout. As for this… it’s not terrible… but man alive, it should be way better.

57. ‘red sky’ by 21 Savage, Tommy Newport & Mikky Ekko - okay, this one confuses me - why are Tommy Newport and Mikky Ekko trying to pull off a bad Ryan Tedder impression from 2011 for that hook… actually better question, why does the arranged melody sound so ugly, flimsy, and also imported from over a decade ago to back up this stock trap percussion? It sounds like nothing else on the album in the wrong way, where I think the assumption was because 21 Savage is rapping on it, it can feel contemporary… but then we have the second line of the first verse, ‘live on the toilet, I stay on my shit’ - sounds like fibre is the answer, dude. And from there it’s stock gunplay, something you could hear in any other 21 Savage song, and when the content isn’t special or interesting, I wind up focusing on the bad production and worse hook… yeah, everyone should skip this.

40. ‘should’ve wore a bonnet’ by 21 Savage & Brent Faiyaz - See, this is what happens when 21 Savage spends too much time with Drake, he starts thinking it’s a good idea to make crap like this, where the conceit is that her hair is fucked up because she’s ‘running from him’ in bed. Now this is built on the belief that 21 Savage can sell this kind of material - and he can’t, this goes back to Issa Album, including how goddamn clunky his flow is, and Brent Faiyaz doesn’t really step up well to fill in the gap, but it’s also anchored in that chipmunked sample of K-Ci from an old Mary J. Blige track and it can’t create any atmosphere at all! I get that more of this song is about the flex than any sort of sensual encounter, but why get Brent Faiyaz to even make the attempt, the entire song screams of bad ideas held together on charisma that doesn’t materialize at all! Granted, given Drake these days I’m not sure he could have sold this either - utter crap, next!

23. ‘Igual Que Un Angel’ by Kali Uchis & Peso Pluma - So I haven’t reviewed the new Kali Uchis album yet - nobody put it on my schedule, and while I have heard it and liked it more than I thought I would, I’ve also come to accept this many albums in that she’s not really for me, and that’s fine. That said, this is one of the songs I liked from the project, a really slick slice of Latin pop with that supple nu-disco bassline and gleaming keys supporting her ethereal vocals, and Peso Pluma shows a subtlety and control I didn’t expect from him - he’s got decent chemistry with Kali Uchis, and that caught me offguard! And that heavenly gloss makes sense when you translate the lyrics, writing about a woman who had her heart broken but has kept a hold on herself, far out of reach of everyone trying to claim her - certainly fits the vibe, even if it doesn’t really create much in the way of drama within the piece, and I don’t love those offkey synths that bookend the track either. But yeah, this is very pleasant, very easy to like - not at all surprised it’s done well, good stuff.

19. ‘n.h.i.e.’ by 21 Savage & Doja Cat - 3/5 - So here’s something mildly amusing: this was actually intended for Doja Cat’s album Scarlet last year, and wound up getting cut and showing up on 21 Savage’s album instead, and because he’s on Epic and not RCA, the reject song had a better chance of charting high on streaming than the majority of Doja Cat’s album proper. What’s frustrating is that it feels like it was cut for a reason - the creeping guitar phrases around the stock trap percussion and Doja Cat’s adlibs do create some menace, but not as much as you’d hope, 21 Savage’s verse feels very stock outside of the line ‘I’ll pop at his ass, he a pimple’, and then Doja Cat kind of steals the show, as she dismisses going to weak men or falling beneath her idols… although I do question her line that she doesn’t start petty beef or her quasi-meta use of ‘ad-lib’, which isn’t even the first time she’s done it and feels more like a placeholder for something she’d put in later. Honestly, the track just feels like a throwaway, more disposable and unfinished than anything - not precisely bad, but nothing I’ll care about later.

18. ‘all of me’ by 21 Savage - the first track on the album - well, after the spoken word opening from 21’s mom - and… well, aside of the bass of the trap groove clipping the low end of the mix, I actually really like the Rose Royce sample flip with the strings, guitar, bells, and flutters of piano, and I think the patter of 21’s hook is alright; it’s not particularly memorable, but there’s a bit of pathos in being wanted so much despite the line of those who died in his wake. I really wish the verses were more introspective on that front beyond the flexing… or that second verse where he implies if a man asks a girl for money, he’ll be seen as less of a man because he’s not providing, and matter of fact, why is she involved in business at all, that’s not woman’s work! It’s weirdly regressive and comes out of nowhere - I get trying to provide for your family but the edge to this feels more rooted in conservative machismo where the song doesn’t have enough going on to ignore it. So yeah, the production and hook are fine… shame about the rest of it.

10. ‘nee-nah’ by 21 Savage, Travis Scott & Metro Boomin - I’m gonna say something nice about Travis Scott for once: he sounds like he cared more about this verse than I expected, pulling off his best Kanye impression and while there’s a few sleazier lines, he sounds tighter and more engaged in the driving flex through the elegant beat switch into the trap sound midway through his verse than I expected. And 21 Savage isn’t bad here either - the shout-out on the hook works, the threats are a little sharper on his verse, and I really liked the references to Usher and to Virgil’s disappointment that 21 is back on this shit again. If I have a critique here, it might be with Metro Boomin’s production - the melody feels flat behind the trap patter and spare piano, and I think there could have been more outside the beat switch to give this more punch, it just feels undercooked. But honestly… I get why it works, it’s decent.

5. ‘redrum’ by 21 Savage - …it’s my favourite song on the album, I guess I’m happy that the general public seems to have agreed? I really dig that Brazilian sample flip that feels damn near operatic that transitions into the creeping trap groove effectively, and 21 sticks to the narrow lane of gangsta threats and gunplay, full of venomous disgust for snitches and those who waste their time subtweeting those who keep it real - that last sentiment, I appreciate that. Honestly, there’s not a lot to say beyond that - the flows are tight, the production is really good, 21 Savage doesn’t drop any obvious toilet references, he’s focused… I can’t say it rises to the best of what 21 Savage did with SAVAGE MODE II, but it’s the closest to fitting in that lane, and that’s why I like it - definitely effective.

1. ‘yes, and?’ by Ariana Grande - …look, I really wanted to like this. I think positions is an underrated album that got screwed with a bad release window and slapdash single choices, and it’s been so long since we got a new Ariana Grande album, I was looking forward to something interesting. I didn’t love the fact that it was interpolating Madonna’s ‘Vogue’ - or that the music video was ripping off Paula Abdul with some of the laziest caricatures of critics I’ve seen in a while, which was weird because I don’t think she’s faced that sort of backlash to warrant that strawman - but if the song was great, I was ready to get onboard. And it’s not - as a lead-off single, it feels underwhelming, and part of that is knowing the context of the sample and interpolation; ‘Vogue’ was a cultural moment in the integration of Madonna’s mainstream high gloss glamour with house music, even if I personally don’t love the song, it’s iconic… which is precisely why when Beyonce remixed ‘BREAK MY SOUL’ less than two years ago, there was an interpolation of ‘Vogue’! This song doesn’t match that grandeur - not that it doesn’t sound well-produced or Ariana Grande doesn’t sound good on it, I actually like the vocal melody a lot and Max Martin brings his usual shine to the production, but the hook feels stilted and about the furthest thing from anthemic; it’s trying to be imperious in its dismissal but it’s giving no energy. I also don’t like how they chopped that sample that opens the song, or how the fizzy house percussion feels pretty stock against the keys and bassline, but I think what killed the vibe for me was the bridge and by extension, the lyrics. It’s trying to sell being so ‘done’ with everything, claiming a truth and then striding forth and owning it, but that runs at cross-purpose to the bridge which is all about deflection, which creates an odd tension that makes me think she just wants to control the narrative. And that would be fine… but it’s not an interesting focal point for a lead-off single especially when ‘thank u, next’ already showed the way to do it! Ironic this dropped the same day as Lil Nas X because it’s trying to ride on hype and celebrity but has very little to back it up; this is just more refined as a whole, but it’s also her weakest lead-off single to date, and suddenly I’m now worried about that next album; not a good sign.

And that’s our week… kind of odd in retrospect, because while 21 Savage is definitely getting the bottom two spots for ‘should’ve worn a bonnet’ with Brent Faiyaz as the worst and ‘red sky’ with Tommy Newport and Mikky Ekko as Dishonourable Mention, he’s also getting Honourable Mention for ‘redrum’… while the top spot is for ‘02.02.99’ by That Mexican OT, who in a standalone single kind of nailed the same gunplay and menace 21 was seeking but with more interesting flows and bars, go figure! Next week… the fallout of all of this, stay tuned for that…