Pop Sweep: December 22, 2012...

It's time to kick off today's five-part "chart sweeps", and this time out it's the newest in the pop world, with the latest songs making their way on to Billboard magazine's weekly charts.

On the big one, the Billboard Hot 100, Bruno Mars takes over at #1 with "Locked Out Of Heaven", making his fourth chart-topper.

The top debut this week got a little help from Santa Mother Monster Lady Gaga, as her tweeted support of the reality-show fodder Tamar Braxton's single "Love And War" spurred sales that brought it to #57 (and #12 on the sales chart). This is Toni's little sister's first Hot 100 hit as a solo artist (she went to #83 in 1997 with her sister act the Braxtons with "So Many Ways"), but she has had a top-40 R&B and dance hit of her own, "If You Don't Wanna Love Me". As for this song, it's pleasant and competant middle-of-the-road adult R&B music, but I have no idea what the uproar is over besides the sideshow factor. At least the "little monsters" are being exposed to soulful music...

(Click below to see the rest of the post)


Mars' album just dropped this Tuesday, and while his official single makes the #1 spot, another preview track from the album, "When I Was Your Man", jumps in at #69. His sophomore set Unorthodox Jukebox is on its way to my house now, and if this future smash is a sign, I'm gonna have this in my CD player for a while...

Adam Levine's stint on this season's The Voice is coming to a close (with a lack of his team in the finals, nonetheless), but his band Maroon 5 are back at #77 with the third single from their Overexposed album, "Daylight". Is it me, or this sound like a nicked Katy Perry song? Combine that with a vague "express yourself on social media" video, and you have a probably top-40 hit but unlikely chart-topper, though the video works 10x better than the song alone..

Speaking of The Voice, we're up to the (ugh) final three, and two of those finalists enter the chart with performances from the previous week. The first is Scottish rock singer Terry McDermott with a stripped-down cover of Foreigner's "I Want To Know What Love Is" at #87. Mind you, he is my least favorite of those left, with his average bar-band delivery and totally unoriginal song choices, but at least I can say this is trying to do something  an inch different in approach. But for his success, chalk that up to Blake's rabid fanbase and his tired "I'm doing this for my family" routine (doesn't anybody do any job for that?)...

Folk-rock trio the Lumineers are up at #4 with their long-running slow burner "Ho Hey" which went from Triple-A to alternative rock to mainstream rock to adult-top-40 to pop radio, and their followup, "Stubborn Love", arrives at #85. This song shows them at their Mumford-iest, and it's a fine addition to pop radio.

As Steel City rapper Wiz Khalifa's O.N.I.F.C. gets the top-debut nod on the albums chart (which I'll have Sunday), the third song from the set to make the chart, "Let It Go" featuring singer Akon, comes in at #87. Wiz of course topped the list back in 2010 with his football-co-opting "Black & Yellow", but the new album, with cameos from the Weeknd and Pharrell, takes a slight left turn from the usual chants pervading mainstream rap. (NSFW)

The second finalist single from The Voice is the homeless-looking Bill Withers tribute act that is Nicholas David with his take on the classic "Somewhere Over The Rainbow". Although his repetoire is as stale and predictable as McDermott's, his command of his voice, derivative as it is, puts him miles above the other two and I'm hoping for a win for him next week (the other finalist, proclaimed front-runner Cassadee Pope, surprisingly placed under the Hot 100.) Though it's pretty scary that a song from 1939 is his idea of a "stretch" in song selection...

The final entry on the Hot 100 is by rapper Future, who pops in at #99 with the fourth single from his debut album Pluto, "Neva End". It follows "Turn On The Lights", which made the top-50 here and #2 on the R&B chart. The single is helped with a remix featuring Destiny's Child Kelly Rowland, who brings some melody to the thumping dirge, albeit with a processed voice (?)....

Meanwhile, over on the Adult-Top-40 format chart, Maroon 5 linger for an eighth non-consecutive week with "One More Night"...

While California rockers Train promote the song "Bruises" to country radio (that'll be coming up on a later 'sweep'), their track "Mermaid" from their album California 37 is the top debut on this list at #36. The band has topped this chart four times, the last with "If It's Love" in 2010.  This new one follows their successful blueprint of snarky name-dropping lyrics, white-boy-funky backbeat, and hooks bought in bulk at Costco...

Rapper Flo Rida is no stranger to this gated-community-pop genre, having five previous hits make the chart, with two ("Good Feeling" and "Wild Ones") landing in the top-20. The fourth single from his Wild Ones album, the Brenda Russell-by way of-Bingo Boys hit "I Cry", which is in the Hot 100 top-10, comes in here at #39...

The last entry here is Alicia Keys, who places her fourth single on this chart as "Girl On Fire" featuring Nicki Minaj is at #40. Keys' "No One" reached #9 here in 2008...This song has grown on me (or rather, my ennui with "No One" caused it)...

Lastly, on the Adult Contemporary (or "Easy Radio") chart, Rod Stewart celebrates a third week at #1 with "Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow"...

Michael Buble's Christmas album from last year featured a version of "White Christmas" with Shania Twain that made the AC top-10. This year, he's back with another take with recycled vocals from song stalwart Bing Crosby at #12...Lord, that child-beater must be turning in his grave...

 
The other new entry on the AC chart is by Paul McCartney, who comes in at #27 with his version of "The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire)", from the mostly indie-rock-leaning Holidays Rule collection from Hear/Concord Records. Paul has topped the AC list one with the Beatles, three times with his band Wings, and two more times in duets from the 80s...This version is very very classy and makes up for the musical tragedy of "Wonderful Christmastime"...

That does it for the first sweep, I'll return with the latest on rock radio...