The 20 Best R&B Radio Hits of 2022
Here's the Spotify playlist. I posted the rap and pop lists already, country and rock will follow later this week.
1. Beyonce - "Break My Soul"
#1 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #1 Hot 100
Last week my Spotify Wrapped informed me that the top 5 genres I listened to this year were rap, rock, pop, country, and disco. This amused me because those are the 5 genres I do these year-end singles lists for, but with disco in place of R&B. I'm not sure how that happened -- I don't listen to quite enough Chic to outweigh all the R&B I listen to -- but it felt appropriate since the biggest and best R&B album of 2022 was pretty much a disco record.
2. SZA - "I Hate U"
#1 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #7 Hot 100
SZA just announced that her album S.O.S. is out this Friday, and I breathed a big sigh of relief on her behalf, because it felt like such a needlessly long ordeal for her to finally release the follow-up to her huge 2017 breakthrough album Ctrl. With Kendrick Lamar fulfilling his contract and leaving to focus on his own company, SZA is now by far Top Dawg Entertainment's biggest star, but they seemed almost irrationally nervous to give her next album the green light, much to the frustration of SZA and her many fans. Since 2020 she's released three platinum solo hits ("Hit Different," "Good Days," and "I Hate U," which only came out because she uploaded it to Soundcloud without the label's involvement), plus features on hits by Doja Cat and Summer Walker. I hope the album the album was worth the wait, but even if it wasn't, TDE shouldn't have held her up like that, it's 2022, let artists release the goddamn music they've made.
3. Tems - "Free Mind"
#1 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #46 Hot 100
At one point in summer 2022, Tems occupied half of the top 6 spots on the R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart, all with music she recorded way back in 2020 before the Nigerian singer was known outside Africa ("Free Mind," Wizkid's "Essence," and "Higher," which was sampled on Future's "Wait For U"). It's pretty amazing to think that we haven't really heard what Tems can do now that she's leveled up and become a major label artist in America, she might just be getting started.
4. Lucky Daye - "Over"
#45 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #77 Hot 100
Almost exactly 20 years after Musiq Soulchild released "Halfcrazy" on his second album and it became the biggest hit of his career, Lucky Daye sampled "Halfcrazy" for his second album, and it became the biggest hit of his career so far. I will note that I'm a little baffled that "Over" only got to #45 on the Billboard's R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart back in the beginning of the year, because I've heard that song practically every time I got in the car for the last 8 months or so. Maybe it was just a sleeper hit or peaked in different regions at different times, but that was a serious hit, sometimes chart peaks can be deceptive. Either way, it was cool to see Lucky Daye breakthrough some 17 years after he competed on "American Idol" and started making moves in the music industry.
5. Muni Long - "Hrs And Hrs"
#1 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #16 Hot 100
Muni Long has been kicking around the industry almost as long as Lucky Daye, debuting on Top 40 radio a decade ago as Priscilla Renae with some really bad Benny Blanco-produced pop shit. But she rebooted her career with a new name and a #1 R&B hit and it's cool to see someone with clear talent find a lane that suits them better.
6. Brent Faiyaz - "All Mine"
#8 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #42 Hot 100
Brent Faiyaz becoming a serious star has felt like an inevitability since he sang the hook on Goldlink's modern classic "Crew" five years ago. And maybe Faiyaz took a little longer to make another hit on that scale because he didn't sign to a major. But I know that getting to #2 on the album charts with an indie release had to feel pretty good, and paid better.
7. Jazmine Sullivan - "Hurt Me So Good"
#13 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
It was a real feat when Jazmine Sullivan came back with some of the most critically acclaimed, commercially successful, and award-winning music of her career in 2021 when Heaux Tales was just an EP. And in 2022 she took a well deserved victory lap, adding a few new songs to a deluxe version to expand to a full-length album,
8. Beyonce - "Cuff It"
#1 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #13 Hot 100
These days it's common to see a song with an all-star cast of producers and/or writers that doesn't really sound like it reflects its pedigree. But Beyonce's incredible list of collaborators for "Cuff It" boasts legends from several generations, including Nile Rodgers, Raphael Saadiq, Sheila E., and The-Dream, and it absolutely lives up to that supporting cast.
9. Ella Mai - "DFMU"
#5 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #85 Hot 100
Ella Mai's 2018 debut was so big that I can imagine it would've been hard to do anything short of that on her second album that wouldn't feel a little like a sophomore slump. But I think she deserves some props, Heart On My Sleeve is an excellent album and "Not Another Love Song," "DFMU," and "How" all did pretty well on radio, as did her collaboration with the legendary Babyface, I think she's got the makings of a long career.
10. Monica f/ Ty Dolla Sign - "Friends"
#37 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
I adore Monica's voice and think she's made a lot of great music since her commercial peak in the '90s. But I have to admit that when "Friends" came out, I didn't rush to check it out, because I see a Ty Dolla Sign feature on a R&B song and assume it's some clubby thing with a famous sample. But "Friends" is actually an acoustic ballad and I love how they sing together on this, it's always fun to hear Ty really flex as a vocalist and remind people that he's actually not a rapper.
11. Diddy & Bryson Tiller - "Gotta Move On"
#3 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #79 Hot 100
Sean "Diddy" Combs is nobody's idea of an R&B purist -- in fact he may, for better or worse, the single figure most responsible for inextricably linking modern R&B to hip hop. So it was a little strange when Diddy decided to repeatedly ask the question "who killed R&B?" while promoting his latest single, a collaboration with a younger rap/R&B fusionist, Bryson "TRAPSOUL" Tiller. But "Gotta Move On" was a pretty nice little track, sort of continuing in the Diddy-Dirty Money formula of letting the singer take center stage while Diddy's appearance feels like a glorified cameo (rapping a quick 8-bar verse and saying "get in your bag, stay in your bag" a few times in the song's final seconds).
12. Muni Long f/ Saweetie - "Baby Boo"
#27 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
This one didn't make nearly as big an impact as "Hrs And Hrs," but I thought it was just a delightfully fun track, the song took a big obvious sample of a classic song ("My Boo" by Ghost Town DJ's) but added some melody and personality of its own.
13. Silk Sonic - "Smokin Out The Window"
#2 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #5 Hot 100
Silk Sonic got so overexposed just off of "Leave The Door Open" that Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak removed themselves from Grammy contention this year. But An Evening With Silk Sonic continued to spin off hits in 2022, with "Smokin' Out The Window," "After Last Night," and their cover of Con Funk Shun's "Love's Train" all getting R&B airplay.
14. Mary J. Blige - "Good Morning Gorgeous"
#6 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #83 Hot 100
Personally, I thought Mary J. Blige's 2017 album Strength Of A Woman was her late career masterpiece that deserved more love. But Good Morning Gorgeous is the album that surprisingly got showered with six Grammy nominations last month, including her first nod for Album of the Year. But hey, better late than never, and it's a pretty good album too, I particularly like the title track, which got a nice remix with H.E.R.
15. Yung Bleu f/ Kehlani - "Beautiful Lies"
#6 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #65 Hot 100
Kehlani's Blue Water Road is one of my favorite R&B albums of 2022, and I think it has some pretty radio-friendly songs on it, but for whatever reason, it didn't really get a drop of R&B radio play. But she did have a nice hit dueting with Yung Bleu, a kid from Alabama who's been making that transition from 'melodic rapper' to full-on singer over the last couple years.
16. Marzz - "Countless Times"
#28 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
I really dug Louisville singer Marzz's breakthrough single, but I kind of hated hearing it on the radio because there's an f-word right at the beginning of the song and the local stations censor it really awkwardly in a way that fucks up the whole flow of the song.
17. Giveon - "For Tonight"
#17 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #61 Hot 100
"Heartbreak Anniversary" was my #1 song of 2021, and it felt Giveon was on the cusp of major stardom when he released his first proper album Give Or Take in June. Instead, the album seemed to land with a thud as his buzz quickly dissipated, charting lower than the compilation of EPs that "Heartbreak Anniversary" appeared on. Still, "For Tonight" was a strong single, hopefully he can regain that momentum.
18. Summer Walker f/ SZA and Cardi B - "No Love (Remix)"
#8 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, #13 Hot 100
This was a real moment, a duet between the two biggest new female R&B singers of the last few years, remixed with this biggest new female rapper of the last few years.
19. The Isley Brothers f/ Beyonce - "Make Me Say It Again, Girl"
#9 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
Beyonce must have recorded her Isley Brothers collaboration under the condition that they'd keep it under wraps until she released her new album, because it came out less than 2 weeks after Renaissance. But the track, a new version of "Make Me Say It Again, Girl" from 1975's The Heat Is On, is a fantastic duet, with Ronald Isley sounding shockingly good at 81 years old.
20. Tink f/ 2 Chainz - "Cater"
#20 R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay
In addition to the blitz of new music from Beyonce, there was a wave of hits tapping into nostalgia for her earlier work. Tink's "Cater," Saucy Santana's "Booty," Fivio Foreign's "What's My Name," and Latto's "Pussy" all either sampled old Beyonce or Destiny's Child songs or sampled songs that she sampled. And I was happy to see Tink land a good-sized hit a few years after her deal with Timbaland kind of turned out to be an overhyped bust. She's a super talented rapper, but I don't mind her focusing on singing and turning the rapping over to guests like 2 Chainz.
The 10 Worst R&B Radio Hits of 2022:
1. DVSN - "If I Get Caught"
2. Blxst - "About You"
3. Tory Lanez - "It Doesn't Matter"
4. Chris Brown - "Under The Influence"
5. Queen Naija f/ Big Sean - "Hate Our Love"
6. Atozzio - "Feel Better"
7. Tank f/ J. Valentine - "Slow"
8. J. Brown f/ Tank - "Don't Rush"
9. Chris Brown - "Iffy"
10. Stokley f/ KIDI - "Woman"
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