Alex Warren lastly tops the Billboard Sizzling 100 with ‘Peculiar’ : NPR

With Morgan Wallen‘s I am the Drawback persevering with to dominate — it is No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart for a second week, by a large margin — the most important information belongs to singer-songwriter Alex Warren, whose blockbuster observe “Peculiar” ascends to No. 1 on the Sizzling 100 singles chart for the primary time. It is one of many few songs presently within the operating for “track of the summer season” standing, although the summer season of 2025 is admittedly (and fortunately) nonetheless younger.

TOP ALBUMS

Final week, Morgan Wallen’s I am the Drawback topped the Billboard 200 by a mile: It was essentially the most streamed album of the week, it posted the most important gross sales week of any report this 12 months, and 36 of its 37 songs cracked the Sizzling 100 concurrently. Everybody knew it might be a blockbuster and — ta da! — it is a blockbuster.

These tendencies proceed in I am the Drawback‘s second week. For starters, its “equal album items” quantity — referring to the cocktail of gross sales and streaming that Billboard makes use of to rank albums every week — dropped simply 42%, from 493,000 to 286,000. The decline could appear important at first look, however percentage-wise, it is an unusually small week-to-week dip from a high-profile debut; main albums usually profit from an enormous streaming surge upon launch, solely to plummet again all the way down to earth because the preliminary flood of curiosity fades. (For an excessive instance of this phenomenon, take into account Echo, the brand new album by Jin of BTS: It debuted at No. 3 final week and plunged all the best way to No. 122 simply seven days later.)

Actually, this week’s Billboard 200 brings Wallen a brand new little bit of bragging rights so as to add to his arsenal: For the primary time in his profession, he is received three albums within the high 10 concurrently. One Factor at a Time, from 2023, holds at No. 4, whereas 2021’s Harmful: The Double Album sits at No. 10. (His full-length debut, 2018’s If I Know Me, peaked at No. 10 shortly after the discharge of Harmful; it nonetheless sits at No. 73.)

Past Wallen, it is a sluggish week, as just one album — Joe Jonas‘ Music for Individuals Who Imagine in Love — debuts within the high 100 at No. 24. Playboi Carti‘s MUSIC leaps from No. 18 to No. 5 due to a cargo of deluxe bodily editions from the rapper’s webstore, whereas tourmates Kendrick Lamar (GNX) and SZA (SOS) proceed their long-term residencies within the high 5, however that is all there’s to report from the chart’s higher reaches.

TOP SONGS

Final week, Morgan Wallen locked down the Sizzling 100’s high three spots with “What I Need (feat. Tate McRae),” “Simply in Case” and “I am the Drawback,” delaying the inevitable ascent of Alex Warren’s “Peculiar” to No. 1. This week, buoyed by a surge in radio airplay — in addition to a high-profile slot performing the track on the American Music Awards — “Peculiar” lastly ascends from No. 4 to No. 1. “Peculiar” has skilled a gentle climb since getting into the Sizzling 100 16 weeks in the past, and now it is able to stake its declare to “track of the summer season” standing. (Extra on that under.)

In fact, Wallen’s largest songs did not fall far — in reality, the three every slid down a single spot in lockstep, with Kendrick Lamar’s “Luther (feat. SZA)” rounding out the highest 5 after topping the chart for 13 consecutive weeks earlier within the 12 months. And I am the Drawback, Wallen’s new album, nonetheless lands 31 of its 37 songs on the Billboard Sizzling 100. (Wallen even has a thirty second track on the Sizzling 100, as his Submit Malone collaboration “I Had Some Assist” nonetheless sits at No. 16 greater than a 12 months after it debuted atop the chart.)

With three of Wallen’s songs departing the highest 10, that leaves room for 3 previous standbys to return to acquainted perches. Drake‘s “Nokia” rebounds from No. 12 to No. 9, Benson Boone‘s “Stunning Issues” surges from No. 14 to No. 10 in its seventieth week on the chart, and Teddy Swims‘ “Lose Management” climbs from No. 11 to No. 8. “Lose Management” has now spent 63 weeks within the high 10 and 93 weeks on the Sizzling 100 — each all-time data. In the meantime, Shaboozey‘s “A Bar Tune (Tipsy)” rebounds from No. 9 to No. 6 in its 59th week on the Sizzling 100. Can we get some new hits, fairly please?

WORTH NOTING

Bear in mind the summer season of 2024? Collect ‘spherical your grandpappy’s knee and he’ll let you know the story of one thing we referred to as “Brat Summer season” — but it surely wasn’t simply Charli xcx! There was Chappell Roan! Sabrina Carpenter! Followers had been nonetheless rocking latest albums by Taylor Swift and Beyoncé! Kendrick Lamar was profitable his diss-track warfare with Drake! Submit Malone and Morgan Wallen fashioned a country-pop Voltron that truly seemed like summer season! Up-and-comers like Benson Boone, Teddy Swims, Tommy Richman and Shaboozey turned stars — or at the least hitmakers — earlier than our eyes!

At this time? There’s lots much less… newness to select from.

By some means, a lot of 2024’s zombified stays are nonetheless shambling round close to the highest of the charts. Even with Wallen’s new album crowding the Sizzling 100, 9 of the highest 16 songs have been on the chart for greater than six months, and 5 of these — Shaboozey’s “A Bar Tune (Tipsy),” Swims’ “Lose Management,” Boone’s “Stunning Issues,” Billie Eilish‘s “Birds of a Feather” and Submit Malone’s “I Had Some Assist,” that includes Wallen — have charted for greater than a 12 months apiece.

There isn’t any regulation that claims a track of the summer season needs to be new; keep in mind 2022, when Kate Bush‘s 1985 traditional, “Operating Up That Hill,” stormed the charts all summer season due to its placement on Stranger Issues? However the songs of this summer season should not simply be the undead remnants of final summer season, both.

This week, Billboard revealed its inaugural Songs of the Summer season chart for 2025. Their rating makes use of a wide range of elements — radio airplay, streaming and gross sales, all computed cumulatively because the summer season rolls on — to find out which songs most exemplify that 12 months’s summer season playlist. Within the 2024 chart that lastly declared a single winner after 14 weeks, Submit Malone’s “I Had Some Assist (feat. Morgan Wallen)” narrowly edged out Shaboozey’s “A Bar Tune (Tipsy),” not that you just wanted a chart to let you know that these had been final summer season’s largest hits.

It is humorous to peruse this 12 months’s first Songs of the Summer season chart, principally as a result of it scans like an alternate-universe Sizzling 100 by which they imposed modest time period limits. (Titles that appeared on final 12 months’s Songs of the Summer season chart, or which peaked earlier than or throughout final summer season, aren’t eligible.) And, as a result of it roughly coincides with the discharge of I am the Drawback, eight of the brand new chart’s 20 songs are by Wallen. Actually, absolutely half are nation or country-adjacent, with BigXthaPlug‘s “All of the Approach (feat. Bailey Zimmerman)” and Riley Inexperienced’s “Worst Approach” additionally making the reduce.

That is to be anticipated; nation jams have contended for “track of the summer season” standing since “track of the summer season” first emerged as an idea. However it’s putting, when scanning the remaining 10 songs, how long-in-the-tooth a few of them are. Chappell Roan’s “Pink Pony Membership” actually matches the invoice for a Pleasure Month-friendly pop banger, but it surely’s been on the Sizzling 100 for 50 weeks now. (It truly first got here out in 2020, however that is one other story.) Girl Gaga and Bruno Mars‘ “Die With a Smile” turns up, too, and it has been on the Sizzling 100 for 41 weeks.

Maybe it speaks to the second that the chart additionally consists of rapper Doechii‘s breakout hit “Anxiousness,” which nods to Gen-Z nostalgia — it interpolates Gotye‘s inescapable early-2010s sensation “Anyone That I Used to Know” — whereas additionally capturing a second when so many people are feeling confused in regards to the world. If that finally ends up being 2025’s track of the summer season, it’d make a good bit of sense.

Nonetheless, it is onerous to not discover the vacuum that exists for these seeking feel-good summer season pop jams that — in contrast to “Pink Pony Membership” or “Die With a Smile” — aren’t but sufficiently old to eat strong meals. Benson Boone’s actually making an attempt, if followers and radio stations would simply cease spinning “Stunning Issues” lengthy sufficient to hear. Jessie Murph and Lola Younger have been ready within the wings for some time, hovering simply exterior the charts’ higher reaches alongside up-and-comers like neo-soul superstar-in-waiting Leon Thomas and high-cheekboned pop singer-songwriter sombr. Here is hoping a number of of them break into the highest 10 — the earlier, the higher.