Twostepcub's Biggest Hits of 2020: Part Three: #80 to #71...
It's time for the third installment of my countdown of the biggest "hit" songs on my weekly chart from the last year. You can catch up by clicking on part one or part two.
#80 - "Monsters" by All Time Low featuring blackbear
from the album Wake Up, Sunshine (2020)
Highest rank: #5 (one week)
Weeks on the chart: 19 (still charting)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: DNC ("bubbled under" at #107)
Billboard Rock Airplay peak: #1 (nine weeks)
Billboard Alternative Airplay peak: #1 (14 weeks)
Songwriters: All Time Low (Alex Gaskarth, Jack Barakat), Andrew Goldstein (FRND), Kevin Fisher, Matthew Musto (blackbear)
This pop-punk band from suburban Baltimore has had a big fanbase for years, scoring five consecutive top ten albums between 2009 to 2017, but it took to this year to finally land a radio hit. When they did, they went big, reigning on Billboard magazine's Alternative Airplay chart for fourteen weeks and counting. This angsty yet accessible bit of rock in the legacy of Sum-41 and Eve 6 features "blue-eyed" rapper blackbear, who survived where Demi Lovato (who also recorded a version with him and the band) saw hers shoved to the side. Normally you could count this as a lucky fluke, but with the band's history, it may just be the start to sliding into the mainstream.
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#79 - "Bluebird" by Miranda Lambert
from the album Wildcard (2019)
Highest rank: #10 (two weeks)
Weeks on the chart: 15
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #26
Billboard Country Airplay peak: #1
Songwriters: Miranda Lambert, Natalie Hemby, Luke Dick
The second single and album title-mentioning cut from Lambert's lucky seventh major-label studio album Wildcard was the charm, returning the singer to the top of the country radio chart for the first time as a lead artist in eight years (she was featured on Jason Aldean's #1 "Drowns The Whiskey" in 2018, which came in at #82 on my year-end that year). Maybe this happened because women were getting a relatively fairer shake on radio (fuck Bobby Bones and those machine guys), but the subdued and beautiful track about appreciating the positive in life definitely was a theme that unexpectedly carried a lot more weight this year. Along with Carrie Underwood, Miranda can definitely claim royalty in the field now.
from the album Everyday Life (2019)
Highest rank: #8 (seven weeks)
Weeks on the chart (in 2020): 12
Billboard Hot 100 peak: DNC ("bubbled under" at #106)
Billboard Rock Airplay peak: #1
Billboard Alternative Rock peak: #1
Billboard Adult Album Alternative (Triple-A Rock) peak: #1
Billboard Adult Top-40 peak: #28
Songwriters: Coldplay (Chris Martin, Guy Berryman, Will Champion, Jonny Buckland), Moses Martin
You know, I forgot this was even a hit in 2020, it seems like a forever and a half ago. Apparently that wasn't the case with the Grammy voting bloc, which has the British rock band's Everyday Life up for Album of the Year for 2021. The lead single here is pleasant and sing-alongable for ruling at the time, but so much has happened since it's truly hard to get back into the groove here. But it does deserve a place here for being my go-to rock anthem for the first sliver of this decade-long year.
#77 - "What If I Never Get Over You" by Lady A(ntebellum)
from the album Ocean (2019)
Highest rank: #10 (one week)
Weeks on the chart (in 2020): 13
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #40
Billboard Country Airplay peak: #1
Songwriters: Ryan Hurd, Sam Ellis, Laura Veltz, Jon Green
Well here's my (maybe controversial) take: Lady Antebellum would have been much better off not changing their name. To be truthful, I'm not the intended person to be asked about this, since even in my most woke-ness didn't even think about the "antebellum" term being offensive, but in the rash of public changes that also saw the Chicks lose the Dixie, this one was much more thornier due to the fact that when they did, the trio chose to do it by simply shortening it to "Lady A", which a:just seems like the equivalent of using the first letter to denote what everyone knows you're talking about, like F-word or N-word, and most importantly b: ended up with a name already used by blues singer Anita White for over a decade. An African American blues singer. And then sued her to keep the name for themselves. This is supposed to help fight racial discrimination? Really. I hope the band just changes their name to something else now, since now they brought up the "antebellum" thing when honestly there are much more agregious things to deal with in that subject.
Anyhoo, this song was the lead single from their most recent album under the Lady Antebellum name, Ocean, and it's a shame all this has overshadow such a nice slice of adult-pop that is real in its intent and such a good blending of Charles Kelley and Hillary Scott's vocals. The pair can definitely sell the desperation without oversinging, which happens so much in the genre today.
#76 - "This City" by Sam Fischer
from the EP Homework (2020)
Highest rank: #38 (three weeks)
Weeks on the chart: 23
Billboard Hot 100 peak: DNC ("bubbled under" at #105)
Billboard Adult Top-40 peak: #13
Songwriters: Sam Fischer, Jimmy Robbins, Jackson Morgan
Fischer, a pop singer/songwriter from Australia, originally released this track in 2017. Three years later, thanks to a few high-profile nods (and TikTok), this "bad love" song to Los Angeles became a slow burner, sticking around on my list for almost half a year. Nothing fancy, a straight forward and melodically interesting song that never got old for me.
#75 - "If We Never Met" by John K
from the album Love + Everything Else (2020)
Highest rank: #16 (two weeks)
Weeks on the chart (in 2020): 15
Billboard Hot 100 peak: DNC ("bubbled under" at #113)
Billboard Adult Top-40 peak: #11
Songwriters: John Poulson (John K), Donte Blaise, Steph Jones, Adam Piccoli, Rob Zarilli
Another singer with a low-key adult-pop hit, this time from Floridian John Poulson, has him going on about how a crappy person he would be if he didn't meet her. Um, dude, that just makes you a red flag already! But it was inoffensive and as I mentioned earlier, at the beginning of the year there wasn't much competition. But the relisten now shows how much his phrasing is seeming to copy Ed Sheeran bigtime.
#74 - "One Margarita" by Luke Bryan
from the album Born Here Live Here Die Here (2020)
Highest rank: #31 (four weeks)
Weeks on the chart: 24
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #19
Billboard Country Airplay peak: #1
Songwriters: Michael Carter, Josh Thompson, Matt Dragstrem
Luke goes from his bro-country throne to stray again into Kenny Chesney's lane with this beachy boozy vacation-ready anthem. Listening to John Anderson's superb Years album definitely gave me the idea where Bryan gets his intonation inspiration from, and even though his voice is a bit overprocessed here, at least its not as nasal as he can get at time. At least it's not too corny that I would've felt fine playing this by the pool this summer.
#73 - "I Hope You're Happy Now" by Carly Pearce and Lee Brice
from the albums Carly Pearce and Hey World (both 2020)
Highest rank: #20 (five weeks)
Weeks on the chart: 17
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #27
Billboard Country Airplay peak: #1
Songwriters: Carly Pearce, Luke Combs, Randy Montana, Jonathan Singleton
This song was released back in October of 2019, a day before Pearce married fellow country singer Michael Ray. By the time the single made it to #1 on country radio the following June, she found herself divorcing Ray, an ironic twist to this breakup song that became Carly's second chart-topper and first top-40 hit on the Hot 100. A midtempo track that wasn't maudlin or self-pitying, but nevertheless bitter over the affair, pits her tale against Brice's counterpoint quite well. A deserved big hit that told a story that many can relate to, probably inadvertently herself as well.
#72 - "Novocaine" by the Unlikely Candidates
from the album TBA (2021)
Highest rank: #5 (one week)
Weeks on the chart: 17
Billboard Hot 100 peak: DNC
Billboard Rock Airplay peak: #2
Billboard Alternative Airplay peak: #1
Songwriter: Kyle Morris
The Unlikely Candidates, a Texan-indie rock band, were last seen way back in 2013 with their Triple-A rock radio hit "Follow My Feet". They finally return with a harder-edged sound (like a more acoustic Imagine Dragons) on this love comparison to the dentist drug. Rock radio was all over this, and while they haven't followed it up to any big success yet (a "two-hit" wonder?), it was an ultra-cool bad boy anthem admitting they aren't good enough for their girl.
from the album Van Weezer (2021)
Highest rank: #9 (two weeks)
Weeks on the chart: 18
Billboard Hot 100 peak: DNC
Billboard Rock Airplay peak: #1
Billboard Alternative Airplay peak: #1
Songwriter: Rivers Cuomo
The last time I had Weezer on the year-end list was two years ago, when their straightforward cover of Toto's 1982 soft-rock classic "Africa" places at #39. Since then, Rivers Cuomo and his band have had to delay the release of their next Weezer album Van Weezer multiple times due to the COVID-19 pandemic, to the point where the set's namesake Eddie Van Halen died in the process. This song, and the other hit from the set "The End of The Game" are not anything like Van Halen's gaudy hard rock, but rather the music for the downtrodden geeks and freaks (as opposed to VH's A-list kid audience) but with even more intensity. It's "You know I tried to be a hero but I was lying to myself I walk alone" chorus rings even truer in this age where kids are schooling from home.
And that's it for today. Come back tomorrow for some Bella Donna inspiration, a pop queen goes preggers, and an alt-dance group goes folkie.
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