Twostepcub's Biggest Hits of 2021: Part Seven - #40 to #31...
It's time to enter the top 40 in my recap of the biggest "hit" tunes on my weekly music chart for 2021. You can catch up with the rest of the series so far by clicking here. Now let's get going...
#40 - "Fire For You" - Cannons
from the album Shadows (2019)
Highest rank: #5 (one week)
Weeks on the chart (in 2021): 19 (was on for 3 weeks in 2020)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: did not chart
Billboard Rock Airplay peak: #3
Billboard Alternative peak: #1
Billboard Adult Album Alternative (Triple-A) Rock peak: #2
Billboard Dance/Electronic Songs peak: #9
Songwriters: Cannons (Ryan Clapham, Paul Davis, Michelle Joy)
Los Angeles-based electropop trio released this moody obsession track back in 2019, but is finally hit rock radio big at the start of this year. Michelle Joy channels her inner Lana Del Rey for this song, echoing again how she can't thinking about her (obviously toxic) flame. Like many on this list, would go great in a 1983 playlist.
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from the album TBA (2022)
Highest rank: #19 (two weeks)
Weeks on the chart: 25
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #53
Billboard Adult Top-40 peak: #12
Billboard Country Airplay peak: #15
Songwriters: Elle King, Martin Johnson
One of the most raucously fun hits of this year, this barnburner from firebrands King and Lambert sport just as must a hilarious music video. The song combines the rock stomper with the two-stepping drive of country in the best of ways. A sing-a-long for those sloppy nights at the bar.
#38 - "All I Know So Far" - Pink
from the album All I Know So Far: Setlist (2021)
Highest rank: #1 (three weeks)
Weeks on the chart: 19
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #74
Billboard Adult Top-40 peak: #8
Billboard Adult Contemporary peak: #9
UK Singles chart peak: #39
Songwriters: Alecia Moore (Pink), Benj Pasek, Justin Paul
Yes this is Green Day's "Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life)" redux, but Pink's defiant creed about sticking around in a fickle celebrity landscape, and its fatalistic lyrics, were quite fitting for this year's shenanigans. This reunites Pink with Pasek and Paul who wrote Dear Evan Hansen as well as The Greatest Showman, the latter of which Pink covered "A Million Dreams" from. Last year she made the "bubbling under" list at #110 with "Love Me Anyway".
#37 - "Leave Before You Love Me" - Marshmello featuring Jonas Brothers
from the stand-alone single (2021)
Highest rank: #8 (one week)
Weeks on the chart: 27 (still on the chart 12/17/21)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #19
Billboard Adult Top-40 peak: #5
Billboard Adult Contemporary peak: #6
UK Singles chart peak: #24
Songwriters: Christopher Comstock (Marshmello), Alessandro Lindblad (Alesso), Nicholas Gale (Digital Farm Animals), Everett Romano (Heavy Mellow), Richard Boardman (The Six), Pablo Bowman (The Six), Geoff Morrow, Christian Arnold, David Martin, Phil Plested, William Vaughan
So it says something that eleven men are credited for writing this two and a half minute song, though three of them are for its interpolation of the old Barry Manilow hit "Can't Smile Without You", which shocked me, since it sounds more like Wham's "Last Christmas" and Air Supply's "Lost In Love" to me. It succeeded on my list by basically outlasting a soft field. Last year Marshmello was on the recap at #98 with "Be Kind" with Halsey, while the Brothers were at #67 with "What's A Man Gotta Do".
#36 - "Making A Fire" - Foo Fighters
from the album Medicine At Midnight (2021)
Highest rank: #1 (three weeks)
Weeks on the chart: 20 (was still on the chart 12/17/21)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: did not chart
Billboard Rock Airplay peak: #1
Billboard Mainstream Rock peak: #1
Billboard Alternative Rock peak: #6
Billboard Adult Album Alternative (Triple-A) Rock peak: #3
Songwriters: Foo Fighters (Dave Grohl, Taylor Hawkins, Rami Jaffee, Nate Mendel, Chris Shiflett, Pat Smear)
By far my favorite of the trio of bangers from the band's stellar Medicine At Midnight set, this one is heavy on the biggest guitar hooks since the Rolling Stones along with backing vocals that evoke the pinnacle of 70's rock. Came in a hard-edged album version as well as a more organic Mark Ronson remix that I quite loved.
#35 - "Blinding Lights" - The Weeknd
from the album After Hours (2020)
Highest rank (in 2021): #29 (19 weeks) (was #1 for two weeks in 2020)
Weeks on the chart (in 2021): 28 (was on for 45 weeks in 2020)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1
Billboard Adult Top-40 peak: #1
Billboard Adult Contemporary peak: #1
Billboard Dance Airplay peak: #2
Billboard Dance Club Play peak: #44
UK Singles chart peak: #1
Songwriters: Abel Tesfaye (The Weeknd), Ahmad Balshe (Belly), Jason Quenneville (DaHeala), Max Martin, Oscar Holter
Billboard magazine proclaimed "Blinding Lights" the biggest hit of the rock era, and its not surprising, as is dominated two years of the American music scene, as their #1 Hot 100 hit from 2020 and #3 of 2021. It was #5 on my own recap last year, and it stuck around long enough to be this high on my list. What more can be said of this 80's throwback that still feels fresh and exciting.
#34 - "Cold Heart (PNAU Remix)" - Elton John & Dua Lipa
from the album The Lockdown Sessions (2021)
Highest rank: #1 (six weeks)
Weeks on the chart: 15 (still on the chart 12/17/21)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #11
Billboard Adult Top-40 peak: #5
Billboard Adult Contemporary peak: #5
Billboard Dance Airplay peak: #1
Billboard Dance/Electronic Songs peak: #1
UK Singles chart peak: #1
Songwriters: Elton John, Bernie Taupin, PNAU (Nick Littlemore, Peter Mayes, Sam Littlemore), Andrew Meecham, Dean Meredith
This was the comeback I didn't expect. Elton John, whose first top ten hit "Your Song" came back in 1971, nearly made the Hot 100 top ten (and still might) with this "mashup" jam with pop princess Dua Lipa. Fusing together his 1990 single "Sacrifice", 70's classic "Rocket Man", 1983 rocker "Kiss The Bride", and album track "Where's The Shoorah?" in a campy Human Centipede of neo-disco provided by Australia group PNAU. Was it necessary? Hell no. Did it bring me joy? Hell yes.
#33 - "Saturday" - twenty-one pilots
from the album Scaled and Icy (2021)
Highest rank: #2 (one week)
Weeks on the chart: 21 (was on the chart 12/17/21)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: did not chart ("bubbled under" at #104)
Billboard Adult Top-40 peak: #9
Billboard Rock Airplay peak: #5
Billboard Alternative Rock peak: #1
Billboard Adult Album Alternative (Triple-A) Rock peak: #26
Songwriter: Tyler Joseph
2021 was the year for whiteboy rock-funk, and the veterans of the game continued the success they had with last year's "Level Of Concern" (#11 for 2020) with this weekend jam that sported Joseph's meaty lyrics about coping in the world of COVID.
#32 - "Golden" - Harry Styles
from the album Fine Line (2019)
Highest rank: #4 (nine weeks)
Weeks on the chart (in 2021): 20 (was on for three weeks in 2020)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #57
Billboard Adult Top-40 peak: #8
Billboard Adult Contemporary peak: #18
Billboard Dance Airplay peak: #36
UK Singles chart peak: #26
Songwriters: Harry Styles, Tyler Johnson, Thomas Hull (Kid Harpoon), Mitch Rowland
The former One Direction member had two songs in last year's top ten with "Adore You" at #2 and "Watermelon Sugar" at #6. He continued with this breezy pop nugget that doesn't sound like anything else he had done to that point. A great driving song you don't have to be embarrassed blasting out the open windows. And not since America's "You Can Do Magic" from 1982 did "doo doo"s carry so much weight.
#31 - "Paradise" - Meduza featuring Dermot Kennedy
from the album TBA (2022)
Highest rank: #6 (two weeks)
Weeks on the chart (in 2021): 27 (was on for 3 weeks in 2020)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: did not chart
Billboard Dance Airplay peak: #2
Billboard Dance/Electronic Songs peak: #6
UK Singles chart peak: #5
Songwriters: Meduza (Luca de Gregorio, Mattia Vitale, Simone Giani), Dermot Kennedy, Joshua Grimmett (Goodboys), Dan Caplen (D/C), Wayne Hector, Gerard O'Connell (Ritual), Connor Manning
Italian neo-house trio Meduza teamed up with Irish indie-pop singer/songwriter Dermot Kennedy, whose "Outnumbered" just missed last year's top 100 sitting at #101, for this deep house international hit that was one of the few big European dance hits to break through in the States.
That's it for today's ten. I'll be back tomorrow with two from this year's big breakthrough artist, the gay rapper breaks the one-hit-wonder curse with a deal with the devil, and the British new wave version of the little train that could.
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