Yeah, could be an improvement (Week of 7/19/2025)

 

Hello everyone, welcome to another post. Sorry this is over a week late, I was moving to a new house a block away from the old one last week and I had no time to do my post until recently. Let's just get into it, here are our exits:

Sza/ Kendrick Lamar- 30 For 30 (#28 last week)

Drake- Nokia (#30 last week)
Lady Gaga- Abracadabra (#13 last week)

Doechii- Anxiety (#18 last week)

Countdown:

30. AJR- Betty (Debut)

29. Olivia Dean- Nice To Each Other (Debut)

28. Justin Bieber- Daisies (Debut)

27. Blackpink/ Diplo- Jump (Debut)

26. Jonas Brothers- No Time To Talk (-7)

25. Audrey Hobert- Sue Me (+4)

24. Morgan Wallen/ Tate McRae- What I Want (-4)

23. Charli XCX- Party 4 U (=)

22. MGK- Cliche (=)

21. Jessie Murph- Blue Strips (+4)

20. Lewis Capaldi- Survive (+6)

19. Alessi Rose- Same Mouth (+2)

18. Maroon 5/ Lisa- Priceless (-1)

17. Tate McRae- Just Keep Watching (+10)

16. Alex Warren/ Rosé- On My Mind (+8)

15. Jonas Brothers- Love Me To Heaven (-11)

14. Miley Cyrus- Easy Lover (+1)

13. Myles Smith- Nice To Meet You (=)

12. Ravyn Lenae- Love Me Not (+4)

11. Benson Boone- Sorry I'm Here For Someone Else (-5)

10. Sabrina Carpenter- Busy Woman (+1)

9. Sombr- Undressed (+1)

8. Ariana Grande- Twilight Zone (+1)

7. Alex Warren- Ordinary (+1)

6. Miley Cyrus- End Of The World (-1)

5. Benson Boone- Mystical Magical (+7)

4. Rosé- Messy (+3)

3. Role Model- Sally When The Wine Runs Out (-2)

2. Sabrina Carpenter- Manchild (+1)
1. Ed Sheeran- Azizam (+1)

Countdown Extra: Kpop Demon Hunters- Golden
Last year's #1: Sabrina Carpenter- Espresso

#1 Two Years Ago: Jonas Brothers- Waffle House

My Favorite Song Last Year: Crash Adams- Hotel Party

My Favorite Song Two Years Ago: Morgan Wallen- Last Night

#1 Recommendation For Hits 1: The Chainsmokers/ Beau Nox- White Wine & Adderall

Up first, we have AJR's latest, Betty. Between this and Yung Gravy's song of the same title, I can't exactly decide which one is better because both of them are equally good in their own right. And as for AJR's song, this has a decent beat and Jack Met sounds pretty good per usual, and this seems to be about wanting to make a relationship, specifically one with a girl named Betty, work out. So yeah, I'm excited for this EP, if this song is any indication.

And here's where it gets questionable... we have a complete rando named Olivia Dean completely bypassing HB with very little airplay prior to debuting and not even being on Mediabase called Nice To Each Other. I should be nice to her, but I'm not going to be nice to this song. The beat is rather generic and somewhat slow and while the message is delivered decently, it's not delivered in a memorable way. Don't know where they even found this, but I should've covered it in Hitbound first.

It thankfully gets better after that, because next up, we have Justin Bieber's first song on here in three years, this is called Daisies. This is kind of cool. The swung beat is kind of cool and Justin Bieber sounds quite good per usual. Good to see him back.

Lastly, on the topic of artists/ groups who haven't been on the countdown in three years, Blackpink has reunited and teamed up with Diplo for Jump (by the way, Lisa and Rosé still have solo songs on the countdown while this is debuting). Wow, this is really good for Blackpink standards, it might even be my favorite song from them. All four of them sound really good and Diplo's production is wild AF. Yeah, I'll easily take this as a Blackpink comeback single.

Hitbound:

Alessi Rose- That Could Be Me

Alex Warren- Eternity (Debut)

Pink Pantheress- Illegal

Jonas Brothers- I Can't Lose (Debut)

Conan Gray- Vodka Cranberry

Katseye- Gabriela

JasonTheWeen/ D4vd- Summer Uptown

Jessie Murph- 1965 (Debut)

Thomas Day- She Got A Thing Bout Her

Renee Rapp- Why Is She Still Here (Debut)

Alessi Rose- Everything Anything (Debut)

FlowerOvLove- New Friends

Maroon 5- California (Debut)

MGK- Vampire Diaries

Haven Madison- Castle (Re-entry)

People R Ugly- Better

Our first song comes from Alex Warren's latest album, this is called Eternity. This is so good. It joins Before You Leave Me, Carry You Home, Bloodline, and On My Mind as my favorite songs by him. It's in Bb major, it has amazing melodies, and it seems to be about someone he hasn't seen in a long time. I'm glad this is the song from the album they picked up on.

The Jonas Brothers are also back with new music. This is good, but Love Me To Heaven and No Time To Talk are both better. It has a fun beat and both Joe Jonas and Nick Jonas sound good, that's all there really is to say here. 

Oh great, I did not want to talk about more Jessie Murph, but alas, here I am talking about her new song 1965. Again, this is better than I thought it would be. The skit at the beginning is rather unnecessary, but aside from that, this is mostly tolerable since it is upbeat and she sounds decent enough. I'll give her this for now.

Now I have to talk about a new Renee Rapp song, this is called Why Is She Still Here. This is alright. It has a slower tempo but Renee Rapp sounds pretty good so this is tolerable for me. It could even grow on me in the future, who knows?

Umm, no one was asking for two Alessi Rose songs on here despite one of them being good. Today, she has Everything Anything, and this basically sounds like everything else I've heard from her, mainly IKYK from the beginning of this year. Essentially, it's generic though good, but I'd like for them to stop picking up on her music.

Maroon 5 has a new album coming soon, and their song California is here. Mikey Piff compared this to their classic She Will Be Loved, which is good, but this new song is just decent. There isn't a whole lot going on productionwise, but Adam Levine sounds fine and this seems to be about a breakup that happened in California, and now he wants to go back to California and make everything right. So it's fine as is, but I'm hoping the rest of the album is better, especially since I have seen that Sexyy Red and Lil Wayne will be featured. 

Lastly, Castle by Haven Madison re-entered. Unneeded.

We lost Golden, Mad, Folded, and Following The Sun. Golden is in the abyss, and I'm late enough to know that this does end up debuting next week. I couldn't care about Mad or Folded, but it would have been interesting to see if Following The Sun would do something.

Blurbs:

Our exits were 30 For 30, Nokia, Abracadabra, and Anxiety. 30 For 30 never quite figured out what to do, and Nokia definitely did not know what to do besides rot in the bottom 5 for way too many weeks. As for the other two, they both had good runs and will be missed.

Sue Me is finally starting to jump. That's good to see.

I'm okay with Just Keep Watching rebounding.

Hopefully, On My Mind makes the top 15 next week.

Love Me Not is still climbing. Happy about that.

Sorry I'm Here For Someone Else got replaced in the top 10 by Mystical Magical. 

Of course Manchild is now #2. And since I got this out after the next countdown aired, I know that this does hit #1 then, but I'll have more to say about that in my next post. But for now, we have Azizam as our new #1. I'll easily take this here. It makes me happy that he is still somewhat relevant, and it's a bit of a relief that this was able to be #1 before Manchild.

I guess that does it for me on this post, see you guys for the next one.