Monthly Report: March 2026 Singles
1. Greylan James - "Water At A Wedding"
Greylan James has been had some success in Nashville as a songwriter (Jordan Davis's hit "Next Thing You Know" and album tracks for Morgan Wallen, Blake Shelton, Kenny Chesney, Cole Swindell). But "Water At A Wedding" is his first song on the charts as an artist and it blew me away the first time I heard it, the kind of good old fashioned country lyric that tells a story so well that it feels like there's a whole screenplay there. James said it was actually inspired by his experience of going to an ex's wedding, although I imagine the dramatic reveal in the bridge was probably not part of the real story. I mean if it was, though, holy shit. Here's the 2026 singles Spotify playlist that I update every month.
2. Noah Kahan - "The Great Divide"
I never felt too strongly about the hits from Noah Kahan's massive 2022 album Stick Season, which is now quadruple platinum. But the first time I heard the lead single and title track from his forthcoming follow-up The Great Divide, it sounded fucking incredible on my car radio. For some reason it didn't hit the same when I streamed the song on my headphones, but that lyric, about an estranged friend and the unspoken trauma they were dealing with, is pretty compelling stuff that kept me coming back to the song over and over.
3. Bruce Springsteen - "Streets of Minneapolis"
I've done about 200 of these monthly singles lists over the years, and I'm reasonably sure this is the first time the top 3 songs were all by white men. But I don't feel too weird about it since one of those songs is pointedly anti-Trump. Not to lib out, but it does make me happy to see someone like Springsteen, who has historically tried to make his political songs feel as broad and universal as possible, get hyper-specific and name names in a song like this. It almost feels like he doesn't even really know how to do that as Bruce Springsteen and instead makes "Streets of Minneapolis" as a '60s Dylan song, which I think works pretty well.
4. Wolf Alice - "White Horses"
Ellie Roswell has always been the frontwoman in the spotlight in Wolf Alice, especially on The Clearing's lead single "Bloom Baby Bloom," which rebooted the band's sound with a piano-heavy groove. So I was a little surprised when one of the album's advance promo singles, "White Horses," was a guitar-driven track with verses sung by drummer Joel Amey. Amey sings the clunky phrase "my choice to choose" three times in the space of ten seconds, so I don't think I'd want him writing lyrics on a lot of Wolf Alice songs, but "White Horses" became a radio hit and really grow on me, really one of their catchiest songs.
5. Pinkpantheress f/ Zara Larsson - "Stateside (Remix)"
I put this on my year-end Remix Report Card for 2025 but I didn't know it was going to go on to bigger things in 2026. It was already spearheading a big streaming moment for Larsson at the top of the year, with the return of her decade-old hit "Lush Life" and Midnight Sun's brilliant title track. And then Alysa Liu skated to the "Stateside" remix in an Olympics exhibition, and it went supernova and just became Larsson's first top 10 hit in America, love to see the stars align like this.
6. T.I. - "Let Em Know"
I was a little surprised about just how immediately "Let Em Know" got a bigger reaction than than any T.I. song in a long time (over a decade since "About The Money," and even longer since he had a solo hit that wasn't boosted significantly by a feature). Maybe people are just a little more excited about Pharrell-produced rappity rap after the Clipse album, but "I'm Serious" is still by far the best T.I./Pharrell track. "Let Em Know" is good, though, I'm glad Tip stopped the weird standup comedy side quest and got some new momentum with music.
7. Meghan Patrick - "Golden Child"
I often talk about how slowly country radio moves, and what drives me crazy about that is that sometimes songs will kick around forever and still not get that big. The title track from Bowmanville, Ontario singer Meghan Patrick's 2024 album Golden Child was on Billboard's Country Airplay chart for 61 weeks, and finally dropped off recently after peaking at only #17, which was really disappointing, this was one of my most listened songs of 2025 and I thought it might finally go top 10 this year. But it was still Patrick's breakthrough on American country radio after 14 hits on the Canadian charts, so I hope to hear more from her.
8. Carly Pearce - "Dream Come True"
"Dream Come True" is kind of similar to "Golden Child" in that it's about how success in show business isn't all it's cracked up to be, but it's a much darker song, I was almost taken aback by how much of a bummer the ending is. But country music used to be a lot more about sad songs than it is now, and Carly Pearce is good at those, 29: Written in Stone was the best of the surge of divorce albums by country stars in the last few years.
9. Deftones - "Infinite Source"
My 16-year-old son is one of those kids who mostly listens to rap but wears t-shirts of hard rock and metal bands he doesn't listen to, so he has a Deftones shirt but I don't know if he's ever heard a Deftones song. Maybe I'll make him a playlist at some point. "Infinite Source" is my favorite single they've put out in a long time, love the guitar tone.
10. Mt. Joy - "Lucy"
Billboard's Adult Alternative Airplay (Triple A) chart features a lot of the same stuff from the main Alternative Airplay chart, along with some slightly mellower college rock fare like late period Wilco singles, so I kind of think of it as the place where bands like Counting Crows and Snow Patrol get put out to pasture after their peak commercial years. Mt. Joy, however, are a rare example of an AAA staple band crossing over, "Lucy" is their eighth AAA top 10 hit, but it has some cursing and has a bittersweet lyric about a friend who died young, so I guess it was just edgy enough to become their first Alternative Airplay hit.
The Worst Single of the Month: DaBaby - "Pop That Thang"
I know we say everything is a recession indicator now, but DaBaby having his first Hot 100 entry in like three years feels like a recession indicator.
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on Monday, March 16, 2026 at 11:11 AM.
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