A moderately normal week - Hits 1 Weekend Countdown 4/12/24

Hi! Sorry I'm late again. I promise, my best and worst list of the year is coming in the next few days, as is my review of TTPD when it comes out. After the last few weeks have been... something else, this week was moderately normal. Except Hitbound. That's still... something else. Well, let's get into it!

Exits:

Tate McRae - Exes (20 weeks: Peak #3)

Taylor Swift - Is It Over Now (23 weeks: Peak #3)

Teddy Swims - Lose Control (30 weeks: Peak #2)

Countdown:

#30: Glass Animals - Creatures in Heaven (Debut) (1 week: Peak #30)

#29: Beyonce - II Most Wanted (Debut) (1 week: Peak #29)

#28: Imagine Dragons - Eyes Closed (Debut) (1 week: Peak #28)

#27: Madison Beer - Make You Mine (-4) (6 weeks: Peak #22)

#26: Benson Boone - Slow It Down (+4) (2 weeks: Peak #26)

#25: Meghan Trainor & T-Pain - Been Like This (+2) (4 weeks: Peak #25)

#24: Hozier - Too Sweet (+4) (2 weeks: Peak #24)

#23: Olivia Rodrigo - So American (+6) (2 weeks: Peak #23)

#22: Usher - Kissing Strangers (+3) (6 weeks: Peak #22)

#21: Twenty One Pilots - Overcompensate (+1) (5 weeks: Peak #21)

#20: Dasha - Austin (+2) (3 weeks: Peak #20)

#19: Luke Hemmings - Shakes (+5) (4 weeks: Peak #19)

#18: Girl in Red - Too Much (=) (6 weeks: Peak #18)

#17: Beyonce - Texas Hold Em (-4) (6 weeks: Peak #10)

#16: Olivia Rodrigo - Obsessed (+5) (3 weeks: Peak #16)

Countdown Extra: Ava Max - My Oh My

#15: Djo - End of Beginning (+5) (5 weeks: Peak #15)

#14: Sza - Saturn (+3) (6 weeks: Peak #14)

#13: Knox - Me Myself & Your Eyes (+3) (7 weeks: Peak #13)

#12: Selena Gomez - Love On (+3) (7 weeks: Peak #12)

#11: Shinedown - A Symptom of Being Human (+3) (3 weeks: Peak #11)

#10: Dua Lipa - Houdini (-7) (22 weeks: Peak #1 for 8 wk)

#9: Noah Kahan - Stick Season (-3) (18 weeks: Peak #6)

#8: Justin Timberlake - Selfish (=) (11 weeks: Peak #8)

#7: Renee Rapp - Not My Fault (+2) (16 weeks: Peak #6)

#6: Henry Moodie - Pick Up the Phone (+4) (14 weeks: Peak #6)

#5: Ariana Grande - We Can't Be Friends (+6) (5 weeks: Peak #5)

#4: Knox - Not the 1975 (-2) (21 weeks: Peak #2)

#3: Dua Lipa - Training Season (+4) (8 weeks: Peak #4)

#2: Benson Boone - Beautiful Things (+2) (11 weeks: Peak #2)

#1: Sabrina Carpenter - Feather (=) (19 weeks: Peak #1 for 3 wk)

Debuts:

Glass Animals are back with Creatures in Heaven. This is okay but could have been a lot better. The production is kind of boring and forgettable. Well, at least it's better than Heat Waves. Hopefully this song doesn't get way overplayed for the next two years like Heat Waves did.

Imagine Dragons also return to the countdown with their new song Eyes Closed. This is a typical ID song. It's really overproduced and weird-sounding but I guess it grew on me a bit since last week.

Now the best for last. I never actually expected this to debut, but Beyonce & Miley's collab II Most Wanted enters the countdown this week. This grew on me a lot since two weeks ago. It's one of my top five favorites on Cowboy Carter. It's got great lyrics, perfectly evolving production, and fantastic vocal chemistry between Beyonce & Miley. I still wish Hits 1 would pick up on Beyonce's cover of Jolene though.

Biggest Jump: Ariana Grande - We Can't Be Friends (+6)

Biggest Drop: Dua Lipa - Houdini (-7)

My recommendations for Hits 1: Laufey - Goddess, Beyonce - Jolene, Beyonce - Blackbiird, and Iron & Wine and Fiona Apple - All in Good Time

Hitbound:

Michael Marcagi - Scared to Start (2 weeks)

Dua Lipa - Illusion (Debut)

D4VD - Feel It (Debut)

OneRepublic - Nobody (Debut)

Benson Boone - Cry (2 weeks)

Mimi Webb - Mistake (Debut)

Girl in Red & Sabrina Carpenter - You Need Me Now (2 weeks)

People R Ugly - Dumb (Debut)

Doja Cat & Teezo Touchdown - MASC (2 weeks)

Artemas - I Like the Way You Kiss Me (Debut)

Sabrina Carpenter - Espresso (Debut)

Mark Ambor - Belong Together (Debut)

Vaultboy - You're My Moon (Debut)

David Guetta & OneRepublic - I Don't Wanna Wait (2 weeks)

Chappell Roan - Good Luck Babe! (Debut)

Ava Max - My Oh My (2 weeks)

Wow, there's seriously so many new songs right now that we had two 10-debut weeks in a row, yet somehow Hits 1 still refuses to pick up on one of my favorite songs of the year, Goddess by Laufey.

Dua Lipa is here with another magical banger, Illusion. This is just another fantastic dance song from Dua, I can't wait to hear how Radical Optimism turns out. I've noticed that I have very specific preferences when it comes to upbeat dance music. I don't want to talk for too long about it because we have so many debuts this week, but I've gone into detail about the factors of a good upbeat song in my review of Ariana's new album.

Hits 1 missed out on a great new D4VD song a few weeks ago called My House Is Not a Home. Instead they decided to pick up on his less great song, Feel It. This is okay but very forgettable and the production doesn't really evolve much.

Wow, two OneRepublic songs in the same Hitbound? That doesn't happen often. But they're back with Nobody. This is just a slightly better version of I Ain't Worried. It's pretty forgettable and the production isn't near as good as the fantastic I Don't Wanna Wait. Moving on.

Alright, now we have Mimi Webb returning with another wonderful song, Mistake. The production has really cool evolution, the lyrics are pretty good, and Mimi sounds great as always. 

People R Ugly earn themselves a second Hits 1 song this year with Dumb. This is better than Brain Dead. I like the jazzy production, everyone sounds great, and as Hippo said, the lyrics are "infinitely relatable". Fantastic song from them.

Artemas makes their Hits 1 debut with I Like The Way You Kiss Me. This isn't bad, but it could have been a lot better. I like this guy's voice, they sound like Alec Benjamin. But otherwise, it's a really forgettable song and I still don't remember what it sounds like.

We have another artist bringing a second song to Hitbound this week, Sabrina Carpenter with a song that's most likely gonna debut the countdown in two days, Espresso. This is okay but not as good as Feather, and definitely not as good as Nonsense. Sabrina sounds good and the lyrics are okay but the production just isn't as interesting as her two previous singles.

Mark Ambor is here with Belong Together. This is a fun little love song but the lyrics are pretty basic and it's also quite forgettable. I feel like I'm saying the same things about every song this week.

Now the two best debuts of the week for last. After Kaleidoscope dropped out of Hitbound last year, Chappell Roan returns with a much better song with a moderately strange title, Good Luck, Babe! This is super fun and catchy and Chappell sounds great.

Finally, my favorite debut this week. Vaultboy returns after one of the funniest songs of the past three years, Everything Sucks, now making an unexpected return with the less funny but still great song You're My Moon. The production here is slow but it evolves, the lyrics are amazing and Vaultboy sounds great. Fantastic song. (Also by the way I was the first person to chart this song on Crownnote)

Also, every song from this week's Hitbound is either one of this week's debuts or one of last week's debuts. All the rest dropped out.

Dropouts:

The Beaches - Blame Brett (8 weeks)

Teddy Swims - The Door (11 weeks)

Paul Russell - Eat Pray Love (1 week)

Haiden Henderson - Hell of a Good Time (4 weeks)

Tori Kelly - Thing U Do (1 week)

Porter Robinson - Cheerleader (3 weeks)

Nicky Youre - Part Time Lover (4 weeks)

Jagwar Twin - Bad Feeling (Oompa Loompa) (15 weeks)

Good riddance to Thing U Do, it's one of Tori Kelly's worst songs by far. Blame Brett was super forgettable, now it's apparently in the abyss. The Door lasted way longer than I expected, but it was alright and much better than Lose Control, and that's also in the abyss. Eat Pray Love deserved better, hopefully it pulls a Say Cheese. I don't know why Hits 1 even picked up on HOAGT in the first place. Cheerleader really should have been a hit. Part Time Lover faded on me so I don't mind it leaving. And Bad Feeling was great but maybe shouldn't have stayed longer in Hitbound than Vampire lasted on the countdown. (And I was not expecting every Hits 1 blogger to mention that I said that last week)

II Most Blurbed:

We lost Exes, Is It Over Now & Lose Control. Exes didn't deserve to exit from the top 5 this quickly. While I still think IION deserved to hit #1, it moderately faded on me, and just from the titles I have a feeling TTPD will be fantastic (I still plan on doing an album review for TTPD). And I was about to lose control if I heard Lose Control again, so that will not be missed.

Make You Mine fell back to the bottom 5 again. Honestly, this is fading on me a bit but it's still great.

Noooooooo not Texas Hold Em falling out of the top 15!!! Please jump 15 spots to #2 next week.

Good to see Shakes and End of Beginning finally doing something.

Can Saturn and ASOBH please enter the top 10 next week?

Looks like Houdini is on its way out. I'm alright with that, it's fading on me a lot.

Yessssss We Can't Be Friends is already in the top 5! Let's see this hit #1 next week.

That's all for now! Byeeeeeeeeee!