The 20 Best R&B Radio Hits of 2021
I've already covered pop, rap, rock/alternative, and country, so we'll wrap up this year's genre lists here. I love how R&B is as big and amorphous as varied as rock or dance or any other genre, and even when things can seem a little homogenous on mainstream R&B radio, there's so many different sounds and vocal styles. And this year it felt like there was a lot of mixing between styles, artists from different eras and generations working together, people sampling and paying homage to soul music from different decades (although samples of '90s R&B remain particularly inescapable). Here's the Spotify playlist:
1. Giveon - "Heartbreak
Anniversary"
#2 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #16 Hot 100
I didn’t know what to make of Giveon’s voice or his songs at first – my favorite description was that he “sounds like a butler who works at a haunted mansion.” Like...he’s not British at all? He was born and raised in California? Weird. But “Heartbreak Anniversary” is a beautiful song, and I love how the torchy traditional vibe of it is undercut by the subtly digital production, the kick drum rolls and little gradually appearing details in the arrangement like the shaker that comes in on the second verse.
2. Jazmine Sullivan - "Pick Up Your
Feelings"
#2 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #75 Hot 100
There are always going to be great artists who don’t make the biggest records, and I try to be pragmatic about that kind of thing and root for people I like without trying to guilt the entire world about why they deserve better. And for a few years, it kind of felt like people just paid lip service to Jazmine Sullivan’s talent by way of complaining that she wasn’t a bigger star, and it had become a little annoying. So it was not just exciting but kind of a relief that she came back with a radio-friendly record that made great use of her voice and just felt perfectly suited to the moment. Sullivan’s 2008 debut album went gold, but “Pick Up Your Feelings” was the first gold single of her career, certainly something that felt overdue once it finally happened.
3. Wizkid f/ Tems - "Essence"
#1 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #9 Hot 100
A handful of Afrobeats or Afrobeats-adjacent songs (“Fall,” “Drogba (Joanna),” “Don’t Rush,” etc.) have broken through on American radio in recent years and it felt like it was heading towards the kind of presence in U.S. R&B radio that dancehall and reggae once had. And even though “Essence” had been out on Wizkid’s 2020 album Made In Lagos before the single entered the charts, once it started blowing up it immediately felt like that tipping point record that the genre had been waiting for (although the less said about the Bieber remix the better).
4. SZA - "Good Days"
#23 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #9 Hot 100
On Christmas it’ll have been a year since “Good Days” was released and kicked off a good year for SZA – it was her highest charting solo song, with Doja Cat’s “Kiss Me More” soon following as her highest charting collaboration. So why has TDE still not released the album and why is SZA putting songs on Soundcloud like an indie artist? I have no idea, man, that label seems like a mess these days.
5. Silk Sonic - "Leave the Door
Open"
#1 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #1 Hot 100
If it hadn’t been 5 years since the last Bruno Mars solo album, I don’t know if him forming a side project with the opening act from his last tour would have been the event that it was. But the more ambiguous expectations for Mars pairing up with Anderson Paak and having some fun with ‘70s Philly soul sounds gave their band a chance to take center stage, and I didn’t think a song that sounds like this would hit #1 in 2021. But it holds up well, I’m not big on retro soul moves but you can’t say they’re not thorough with the writing and production, I wish Bruno’s little “Girl I’m just waitin’ for you/ Come on over, I’ll adore you” bit on the fadeout lasted longer.
6. Ari Lennox - "Pressure"
#16 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
With so many current R&B hits sampling songs from the ‘90s and 2000s, it’s been kind of cool to see some younger artists get in in the studio with the writers and producers that ran things in that era, like Sean Garrett’s work on the new Summer Walker album and Jermaine Dupri and Bryan-Michael Cox producing Ari Lennox’s latest single.
7. T-Pain & Kehlani - "I Like
Dat"
#16 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #97 Hot 100
T-Pain has learned to play the 2000s nostalgia game well -- "I Like Dat" and Tory Lanez's "Jerry Sprunger" are his only two tracks to crack the Hot 100 in the last 7 years, and both sample hits from his first two albums. But “I Like Dat” manages to be so much more than an easy retread of “Buy U A Drank,” adding new drums and melodic hooks and a flip on the premise with Kehlani playing the woman who can buy her own dranks. We should be welcoming new T-Pain songs whether or not he samples his old songs.
8. H.E.R. - "Damage"
#2 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #44 Hot 100
After releasing a series of EPs, which were collected on two compilations both nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammys, the expectations were sky high for H.E.R.’s proper debut album. And Back Of My Mind seems to land a little softly, with weak first week numbers and polite reviews. But she’s still got some nice songs on the radio and she still got another Album of the Year nom.
9. Jam & Lewis f/ Babyface - "He
Don't Know Nothin' 'Bout It"
#18 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
H.E.R.’s “Damage” sampled one of Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis’s old hits for Herb Alpbert, but Jam & Lewis were in the mix themselves this year, with their first album as artists and great singles featuring Babyface and Mariah Carey.
10. Brent Faiyaz f/ Drake - "Wasting
Time"
#12 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #49 Hot 100
It’s been almost 5 years since GoldLink’s “Crew” made Brent Faiyaz someone to watch, and while he didn’t immediately become a major star, he’s really laid some impressive groundwork for his career as an indie artist. He had 5 solo singles in a row go gold or platinum before this year’s collaborations with Tyler, The Creator and then Drake finally gave him his first Hot 100 hits since “Crew.” And “Wasting Time” also marked one of the best songs from The Neptunes’ recent resurgence as a production team, as well as a rare Drake/Pharrell collaboration amidst the Pusha T-related tensions that I assumed had kept them from working together more often.
11. Summer Walker f/ JT - "Ex For A
Reason"
#23 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #33 Hot 100
Still Over It set streaming records for an album by a female R&B singer, and was the first one to hit #1 on the Billboard 200 since Lemonade five years ago. And the album’s lead single didn’t even seem to have much to do with that, Summer Walker is just a major star with a huge following now. But I really dig the Ghost Town DJ’s vibe of “Ex For A Reason,” a really nice change of pace for her.
#13 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
As much as R&B radio has changed over the decades, veterans like the Isley Brothers and Charlie Wilson are still in the mix releasing new singles. But Earth, Wind & Fire, who faced the Isleys in Verzuz back in April, had a nice little comeback this year, with “You Want My Love” becaming EWF’s biggest radio hit in over 20 years, and the biggest of Lucky Daye’s career so far
13. Maxwell – “Off”
#47 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
In 2018, Maxwell released “Shame” as the first single from NIGHT and gave some false hope that he’d actually go less than 5 years between albums for once…and then he disappeared for 3 more years. But “Off” is excellent and I’ll happily take the album whenever Maxwell is ready to deliver it.
14. Normani f/ Cardi B - "Wild
Side"
#3 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #14 Hot 100
Pop radio has gotten a lot whiter over the last two decades, and Fifth Harmony’s only black member was a rare outlier during the girl group’s chart run. After Fifth Harmony broke up, Normani embarked on a mission to become America’s first new black girl pop star in, I don’t know, decades? Collaborations with Khalid and Sam Smith helped establish her on pop radio, but her great Ariana Grande-penned solo single “Motivation” wasn’t quite the launching pad it was designed to be, and Normani released barely anything for almost two years. When she re-emerged, she pivoted towards R&B radio with “Wild Side,” which is probably the right move for the current commercial climate, although it’s still kinda bullshit that she didn’t thrive on Top 40 radio. This year I made a list of my top 100 R&B singles of the 1990s, and I’m a little touchy about my #2 song on that list, Aaliyah’s “One In A Million,” being sampled. But Normani sings the hell out of Starrah’s lyric/melody so “Wild Side” on me after my initial resistance.
15. Robin Thicke - "Look
Easy"
#13 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
This year Robin Thicke released his first album in 7 years, finally bouncing back from the dizzying highs and embarrassing lows of the Blurred Lines/Paula era, and it felt right that he kind of reset things with a radio hit a little reminiscent of “Lost Without You.”
16. Vedo - "You Got It"
#11 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #87 Hot 100
“You Got It” is kind a guy’s cheesy pep talk to a girl (“it’s time to boss up, fix your credit, girl, get at it”) but Vedo really sells it, I see why it became one of the rare R&B songs by a relative unknown to crack the Hot 100 in recent memory.
17. Blxst f/ Ty Dolla Sign and Tyga -
"Chosen"
#6 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #53 Hot 100
The people who I trust the least on R&B are people who only listen to rap-adjacent dude singers like 6lack and PartyNextDoor, and that’s the crowd that’s all in on Blxst as their new hero. That said, “Chosen” is pretty catchy and won me over, shame about that Tyga verse.
18. Chloe - "Have Mercy"
#7 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #28 Hot 100
Chloe x Halle made one of my favorite albums and one of my favorite singles of 2020, and then in 2021 the Bailey sisters took a break from the duo thing to establish their individual careers, Halle starring in the upcoming live action The Little Mermaid, and Chloe releasing her first solo single. “Have Mercy” is a hard swing away from the sort of arty Chloe x Halle sound towards something clubbier, and Chloe took a lot of criticism for pursuing a sexier image and sort of overtly following the blueprint of their mentor Beyonce’s solo career. But “Have Mercy” is a fun song that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and I was happy to see Baltimore club music fixtures Mighty Mark and TT The Artist get writing credits on a huge hit record.
19. Koryn Hawthorne - "Speak To Me"
#42 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
“The Voice” gets great ratings for NBC but is notorious for doing very little for the careers of the aspiring singers who perform on the show, outside of a handful of country artists. But Koryn Hawthorne has become a fairly big star in the gospel world since finishing in 4th place on “The Voice” in 2015, and her second gospel radio #1, “Speak To Me,” crossed over to secular radio a little bit this year.
20. Sevyn Streeter f/ Chris Brown and A$AP
Ferg - "Guilty"
#31 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
Sevyn Streeter is one of my favorite R&B artists of her generation, and it bums me out that what success she’s had has often been due to her association with Chris Brown. But even when she’s catering to radio with a sample of a familiar ‘90s R&B hit (Total’s “Can’t You See”) and features from Brown and perhaps the single worst rapper you could have on an R&B song, her voice still sounds great and it served the purpose of getting a pretty excellent album released.
The 10 Worst R&B Hits of 2021:
1. Summer Walker - "Body"
2. Chrissy - "Relax"
3. Hylan Starr - "Rounds"
4. H.E.R. f/ Chris Brown - "Come Through"
5. Tank - "Can't Let It Show"
6. Gene Noble - "Matching Tattoos"
7. Capella Grey - "Gyalis"
8. John Legend f/ Jhene Aiko - "U Move, I Move"
9. J. Brown - "Vibe"
10. Trey Songz - "All This Love"
#2 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #16 Hot 100
I didn’t know what to make of Giveon’s voice or his songs at first – my favorite description was that he “sounds like a butler who works at a haunted mansion.” Like...he’s not British at all? He was born and raised in California? Weird. But “Heartbreak Anniversary” is a beautiful song, and I love how the torchy traditional vibe of it is undercut by the subtly digital production, the kick drum rolls and little gradually appearing details in the arrangement like the shaker that comes in on the second verse.
#2 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #75 Hot 100
There are always going to be great artists who don’t make the biggest records, and I try to be pragmatic about that kind of thing and root for people I like without trying to guilt the entire world about why they deserve better. And for a few years, it kind of felt like people just paid lip service to Jazmine Sullivan’s talent by way of complaining that she wasn’t a bigger star, and it had become a little annoying. So it was not just exciting but kind of a relief that she came back with a radio-friendly record that made great use of her voice and just felt perfectly suited to the moment. Sullivan’s 2008 debut album went gold, but “Pick Up Your Feelings” was the first gold single of her career, certainly something that felt overdue once it finally happened.
#1 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #9 Hot 100
A handful of Afrobeats or Afrobeats-adjacent songs (“Fall,” “Drogba (Joanna),” “Don’t Rush,” etc.) have broken through on American radio in recent years and it felt like it was heading towards the kind of presence in U.S. R&B radio that dancehall and reggae once had. And even though “Essence” had been out on Wizkid’s 2020 album Made In Lagos before the single entered the charts, once it started blowing up it immediately felt like that tipping point record that the genre had been waiting for (although the less said about the Bieber remix the better).
#23 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #9 Hot 100
On Christmas it’ll have been a year since “Good Days” was released and kicked off a good year for SZA – it was her highest charting solo song, with Doja Cat’s “Kiss Me More” soon following as her highest charting collaboration. So why has TDE still not released the album and why is SZA putting songs on Soundcloud like an indie artist? I have no idea, man, that label seems like a mess these days.
#1 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #1 Hot 100
If it hadn’t been 5 years since the last Bruno Mars solo album, I don’t know if him forming a side project with the opening act from his last tour would have been the event that it was. But the more ambiguous expectations for Mars pairing up with Anderson Paak and having some fun with ‘70s Philly soul sounds gave their band a chance to take center stage, and I didn’t think a song that sounds like this would hit #1 in 2021. But it holds up well, I’m not big on retro soul moves but you can’t say they’re not thorough with the writing and production, I wish Bruno’s little “Girl I’m just waitin’ for you/ Come on over, I’ll adore you” bit on the fadeout lasted longer.
#16 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
With so many current R&B hits sampling songs from the ‘90s and 2000s, it’s been kind of cool to see some younger artists get in in the studio with the writers and producers that ran things in that era, like Sean Garrett’s work on the new Summer Walker album and Jermaine Dupri and Bryan-Michael Cox producing Ari Lennox’s latest single.
#16 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #97 Hot 100
T-Pain has learned to play the 2000s nostalgia game well -- "I Like Dat" and Tory Lanez's "Jerry Sprunger" are his only two tracks to crack the Hot 100 in the last 7 years, and both sample hits from his first two albums. But “I Like Dat” manages to be so much more than an easy retread of “Buy U A Drank,” adding new drums and melodic hooks and a flip on the premise with Kehlani playing the woman who can buy her own dranks. We should be welcoming new T-Pain songs whether or not he samples his old songs.
#2 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #44 Hot 100
After releasing a series of EPs, which were collected on two compilations both nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammys, the expectations were sky high for H.E.R.’s proper debut album. And Back Of My Mind seems to land a little softly, with weak first week numbers and polite reviews. But she’s still got some nice songs on the radio and she still got another Album of the Year nom.
#18 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
H.E.R.’s “Damage” sampled one of Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis’s old hits for Herb Alpbert, but Jam & Lewis were in the mix themselves this year, with their first album as artists and great singles featuring Babyface and Mariah Carey.
#12 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #49 Hot 100
It’s been almost 5 years since GoldLink’s “Crew” made Brent Faiyaz someone to watch, and while he didn’t immediately become a major star, he’s really laid some impressive groundwork for his career as an indie artist. He had 5 solo singles in a row go gold or platinum before this year’s collaborations with Tyler, The Creator and then Drake finally gave him his first Hot 100 hits since “Crew.” And “Wasting Time” also marked one of the best songs from The Neptunes’ recent resurgence as a production team, as well as a rare Drake/Pharrell collaboration amidst the Pusha T-related tensions that I assumed had kept them from working together more often.
#23 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #33 Hot 100
Still Over It set streaming records for an album by a female R&B singer, and was the first one to hit #1 on the Billboard 200 since Lemonade five years ago. And the album’s lead single didn’t even seem to have much to do with that, Summer Walker is just a major star with a huge following now. But I really dig the Ghost Town DJ’s vibe of “Ex For A Reason,” a really nice change of pace for her.
#13 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
As much as R&B radio has changed over the decades, veterans like the Isley Brothers and Charlie Wilson are still in the mix releasing new singles. But Earth, Wind & Fire, who faced the Isleys in Verzuz back in April, had a nice little comeback this year, with “You Want My Love” becaming EWF’s biggest radio hit in over 20 years, and the biggest of Lucky Daye’s career so far
#47 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
In 2018, Maxwell released “Shame” as the first single from NIGHT and gave some false hope that he’d actually go less than 5 years between albums for once…and then he disappeared for 3 more years. But “Off” is excellent and I’ll happily take the album whenever Maxwell is ready to deliver it.
#3 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #14 Hot 100
Pop radio has gotten a lot whiter over the last two decades, and Fifth Harmony’s only black member was a rare outlier during the girl group’s chart run. After Fifth Harmony broke up, Normani embarked on a mission to become America’s first new black girl pop star in, I don’t know, decades? Collaborations with Khalid and Sam Smith helped establish her on pop radio, but her great Ariana Grande-penned solo single “Motivation” wasn’t quite the launching pad it was designed to be, and Normani released barely anything for almost two years. When she re-emerged, she pivoted towards R&B radio with “Wild Side,” which is probably the right move for the current commercial climate, although it’s still kinda bullshit that she didn’t thrive on Top 40 radio. This year I made a list of my top 100 R&B singles of the 1990s, and I’m a little touchy about my #2 song on that list, Aaliyah’s “One In A Million,” being sampled. But Normani sings the hell out of Starrah’s lyric/melody so “Wild Side” on me after my initial resistance.
#13 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
This year Robin Thicke released his first album in 7 years, finally bouncing back from the dizzying highs and embarrassing lows of the Blurred Lines/Paula era, and it felt right that he kind of reset things with a radio hit a little reminiscent of “Lost Without You.”
#11 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #87 Hot 100
“You Got It” is kind a guy’s cheesy pep talk to a girl (“it’s time to boss up, fix your credit, girl, get at it”) but Vedo really sells it, I see why it became one of the rare R&B songs by a relative unknown to crack the Hot 100 in recent memory.
#6 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #53 Hot 100
The people who I trust the least on R&B are people who only listen to rap-adjacent dude singers like 6lack and PartyNextDoor, and that’s the crowd that’s all in on Blxst as their new hero. That said, “Chosen” is pretty catchy and won me over, shame about that Tyga verse.
#7 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #28 Hot 100
Chloe x Halle made one of my favorite albums and one of my favorite singles of 2020, and then in 2021 the Bailey sisters took a break from the duo thing to establish their individual careers, Halle starring in the upcoming live action The Little Mermaid, and Chloe releasing her first solo single. “Have Mercy” is a hard swing away from the sort of arty Chloe x Halle sound towards something clubbier, and Chloe took a lot of criticism for pursuing a sexier image and sort of overtly following the blueprint of their mentor Beyonce’s solo career. But “Have Mercy” is a fun song that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and I was happy to see Baltimore club music fixtures Mighty Mark and TT The Artist get writing credits on a huge hit record.
#42 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
“The Voice” gets great ratings for NBC but is notorious for doing very little for the careers of the aspiring singers who perform on the show, outside of a handful of country artists. But Koryn Hawthorne has become a fairly big star in the gospel world since finishing in 4th place on “The Voice” in 2015, and her second gospel radio #1, “Speak To Me,” crossed over to secular radio a little bit this year.
#31 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
Sevyn Streeter is one of my favorite R&B artists of her generation, and it bums me out that what success she’s had has often been due to her association with Chris Brown. But even when she’s catering to radio with a sample of a familiar ‘90s R&B hit (Total’s “Can’t You See”) and features from Brown and perhaps the single worst rapper you could have on an R&B song, her voice still sounds great and it served the purpose of getting a pretty excellent album released.
1. Summer Walker - "Body"
2. Chrissy - "Relax"
3. Hylan Starr - "Rounds"
4. H.E.R. f/ Chris Brown - "Come Through"
5. Tank - "Can't Let It Show"
6. Gene Noble - "Matching Tattoos"
7. Capella Grey - "Gyalis"
8. John Legend f/ Jhene Aiko - "U Move, I Move"
9. J. Brown - "Vibe"
10. Trey Songz - "All This Love"
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