1. Shawn Mendes - "If I Can't Have You"
Shawn Mendes's last album was fine, but I was disappointed by, if grudgingly respectful of, his choice to not make any songs that followed in the footsteps of "There's Nothing Holdin' Me Back," in my opinion by far his best song. So I'm glad that he finally returned to that song's urgent tempo with something that differs enough to not feel formulaic, adding a little falsetto and a little more pop groove to the sound. Apparently it was initially written with Dua Lipa in mind and I think it would've been great with her too but I really don't know which I would've preferred. Here's the Spotify playlist of 2019 singles that I add my favorites to every month. 

2. Yo Gotti f/ Lil Baby - "Put A Date On It"
People only really talk about rap choruses if they consider them too repetitive, if a phrase like "Versace" or "Gucci gang" is said at least 5 times in a row. But not enough praise is given to how intricate a lot of hooks are these days, how something like "Put A Date On It" has about 120 words in the chorus with no repeated lines, basically 8 bars of rapping that are repeated in between the verses. "Put A Date On It" is also a great example of how muting drums can really make a verse -- Lil Baby raps over 4 bars of just the hi-hat, then the full beat for 4 bars, and then the drums drop out entirely for the last 4 bars, and those little dynamic adjustments do a lot to make his verse sound more climactic than it would otherwise be. 

3. Kiana Lede - "Ex" 
This is one of those songs that I really enjoy and savor every time I hear it on the radio and was hoping it would blow up, great lyric and gorgeous production, but it seems to have stalled in the 30s on the R&B charts. Don't think the French Montana remix will help. 

4. Old Dominion - "Make It Sweet" 
Country radio never runs out of catchy, heartwarming songs that are just a little dopey, and Old Dominion has supplied a number of them in the last few years. I roll my eyes when they sing "I never gotta wonder where my honey be," but that's still a pretty great chorus.  

5. 2 Chainz f/ Ariana Grande - "Rule The World"
It's weird to think that we're now at the point where it's nostalgic to sample songs from the early 2000s, but here we are. On paper, Hitmaka aka Yung Berg sampling one of Rich Harrison's greatest tracks and adding less distinctive drums should be infuriating, but this works, in large part because Ariana gave it a new hook that sounds really great. 

6. Meek Mill f/ Ella Mai - "24/7"
Another sample from the 2002-2003 era, of "Me, Myself & I," which was always one of my least favorite Beyonce singles, but seems to be a widely held favorite now. It's a little weird to see Meek Mill turn into the modern version of east coast rappers from 20 years ago that are great at loud aggressive music but mostly get on the radio with mild R&B tracks, but the songs he's done it with have mostly been pretty good. 

7. BTS f/ Halsey - "Boy With Luv" 
BTS's American fanbase has been getting really weird and aggressive lately (like, I had to block a few dozen of them on Twitter because I liked a tweet from another writer about them harassment campaigns against American writers and publications, and things started to spiral out of control from there). But their success in America is still really interesting and historic, and I'm curious to see if they ever really break through to U.S. radio or if they'll remain a sales/streaming phenomenon. I'm much more interested in the k-pop groups that just sing, I don't really get much out of hearing rapping in a language I don't speak, but this song is one of their melodic singles and it's pretty catchy. Obviously putting Halsey on a track helps make them more accessible here, but what I like is that "Boy With Luv" is more of a straight up bubbly pop song than what Halsey usually sings, it goes surprisingly well with her voice. 

8. DaBaby - "21"
I think it's kind of nice that a rapper blew up with a song punning on 21 Savage's name and 21's response was to take them on his next tour as the opening act. I know it's not technically a curse word but it's still kind of surprising to hear a rapper really lean into the word "guns" on the radio. 

9. Jonas Brothers - "Sucker" 
The Jonas Brothers coming back and hitting #1 took me by surprise, only because I didn't think "Sucker" was that much better than "Pom Poms," the attempted comeback single they released 6 years ago that flopped and led to them scrapping their planned reunion album at the time. Even stranger, "Sucker" sounds more like a 2013 pop hit than a 2019 pop hit. But it's grown on me, that's a catchy little melody. 

10. YoungBoy Never Broke Again f/ Kevin Gates and Quando Rondo - "I Am Who They Say I Am"  
I have found NBA YoungBoy pretty disappointing musically, like the potential I heard on his early mixtapes hasn't really amounted to much, I thought he might be a young Kevin Gates, but hearing him next to Gates on their collaboration EP last year really highlighted that he's just not anywhere near that level. Still, YoungBoy is massively popular -- at some points this year he's been the #1 most streamed musical artist on all of YouTube -- and rap radio has been surprisingly slow to embrace him, it felt like they were throwing him a bone when they put a song with a familiar sample from a '90s Jay-Z track into light rotation. 

The Worst Single of the Month: Ava Max - "Sweet But Psycho"
It's odd to think that just as Lady Gaga has kind of entered this new stage of her career of dad rock ballads, we finally have a major hit from someone doing a really bad impression of early Gaga. I think the worst part of this song is that Ava Max has explained that the girl in the song is just strong and independent and she's being misunderstood and gaslighted, but there's nothing really supporting that in the text, it's just this poorly conceived song song about a girl being 'psycho.'

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 16, 2019 at 8:00 AM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.