twostepcubchart's Best of 2014: Part Six - #50 to #41....

I've reached the halfway mark on my recap of the top 100 tunes on my weekly personal music chart for 2014. You can catch up with the first five installments by clicking here...

#50 - "Talk Dirty" - Jason Derulo featuring 2 Chainz
         from the album Talk Dirty (2014)
         twostepcubchart peak: #10 (one week)
         weeks on the chart (in 2014): 20

Originally on my chart as a minor hit last year when the song was a European and Australian hit, the stripper-friendly jam finally caught on in America as the biggest single from his Talk Dirty album. Also, his first hit to have a guest rapper on it.

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#49 - "Love Never Felt So Good" - Michael Jackson & Justin Timberlake
         from the album Xscape (2014)
         twostepcubchart peak: #14 (one week)
         weeks on the chart: 23

The best of his posthumous releases so far was this holdover from 1983 co-written by Paul Anka that harkened back to his smooth Off The Wall days. Finally, a single that compares to his 80s work.

#48 - "Timber" - Pitbull featuring Kesha
         from the EP Meltdown (2013)
         twostepcubchart peak: #12 (two weeks)
         weeks on the chart (in 2014): 18

When this came out, I remarked that "Mr. Worldwide" heart the just-popular "Wake Me Up" by Avicii and told his management team to get a song just like it. Although this sways more to Rednex' "Cotton Eye Joe" than "Wake Me Up", it took Pitbull (and the undollarsigned Kesha) back to #1.

#47 - "Stay The Night" - Zedd featuring Hayley Williams
         from the album Clarity (Deluxe Edition) (2013)
         twostepcubchart peak: #4 (four weeks)
         weeks on the chart (in 2014): 17

While Avicii drew from folk music to change his sound, Russian-born DJ and producer Zedd enlisted rock singers like Foxes and Hayley Williams to toughen his EDM. He had the #3 song on my chart last year with "Clarity", and this time out is with Hayley, the lead singer of Paramore.

#46 - "Prayer In C (Robin Schulz Mix)" - Lilly Wood & The Prick
         from the Robin Schulz album Prayer (2014)
         twostepcubchart peak: #15 (two weeks)
         weeks on the chart: 24 (so far in 2014 - still charting)

2014 was a year many left-field international hits broke through in America, and most recently this dance radio hit that originally was a bootleg remix of a song from the French indie-pop duo from 2010.

#45 - "Latch" - Disclosure featuring Sam Smith
         from the album Settle (2013)
         twostepcubchart peak: #5 (one week)
         weeks on the chart: 22

Smith ended up with two concurrent top-ten hits sounding totally different from each other yet unmistakably his as this jam from the neo-house duo did even better in the U.S. than it did in their native Britain.

#44 - "Let It Go" - Idina Menzel
         from the album Frozen (Original Soundtrack) (2013)
         twostepcubchart peak: #5 (one week)
         weeks on the chart: 22

Think about it: I'm sure Disney was banking on Demi Lovato's teen-pop version of this song from their juggernaut Frozen was going to have the better chance on the pop charts. But in a just world Demi's was relatively rejected, and there's no question that Idina blows her out of the water with his song my nephew still sings over and over.

#43 - "Human" - Christina Perri
         from the album Head Or Heart (2014)
         twostepcubchart peak: #7 (two weeks)
         weeks on the chart (in 2014): 26

This emotive ballad, Perri's third top-40 hit in America, reminds me a lot of Sia's current work. And I'm glad in a pop landscape where women had to act out to get attention that this simple record got the attention it deserved, selling over a million copies.

#42 - "Secrets" - Mary Lambert
         from the album Heart On My Sleeve (2014)
         twostepcubchart peak: #4 (three weeks)
         weeks on the chart: 19 (so far in 2014 - still charting)

The "out" lesbian singer/songwriter celebrates and pokes fun at herself at the same time, with this extra-cute sing-a-long about acceptance that also topped the dance club play chart.

#41 - "Sing" - Ed Sheeran
         from the album x (2014)
         twostepcubchart peak: #2 (two weeks)
         weeks on the chart: 20

Fans of Sheeran's American breakthrough hits "The A Team" and "Lego House" who didn't listen to the rest of his debut were probably taken aback by the funkiness of this sophomore album's first single, but I wasn't. Pharrell Williams is along for the ride to produce this remake of the Doobie Brothers' "Long Train Runnin'" and with Ed's friend Taylor Swift's legion of rabid followers, he couldn't go wrong. Luckily, his talent matches the demand.

I'll be back on Friday with the biggest country song on my recap, along with pop's reigning diva, and another "out of the closet" artist.