Twostepcublog

  Hey everyone, I'm back with the start of the top half of my (late) year-end countdown of the songs that went the highest and/or stuck around the longest on my weekly personal music chart for 2024. You can catch up with the rest of the series by clicking here. And with no further ado...   #50 - Illusion - Dua Lipa          from the album Radical Optimism (2024)          2scchart peak: #5 (two weeks)          Weeks on the chart: 20          Points: 1407 Dua seemed to have a harder go on the charts this year, but it would be tough to replicate the COVID-era success of her Future Nostalgia set. This was the better of the many bangers on her third release. (Click below to see the rest of the post)

    " All Falls Down " - Kanye West featuring Syleena Johnson from the album College Dropout (2004) Billboard Hot 100 peak: #7 (one week) Weeks in the Top-40: 14   Today's song comes from rapper/singer/producer/songwriter/future fascist Kanye West, who had landed his first hit as a lead artist in the beginning of 2004 with " Through The Wire ".  He also featured on rapper Twista's #1 hit " Slow Jamz ", also appeared on Kanye's debut album College Dropout . West's second proper single from the set was "All Falls Down". A throwback sounding track written by West, it uses an interpolation of Lauryn Hill's " Mystery of Iniquity " (giving her a co-writing credit), which in this case is sung by Syleena Johnson , who like Kanye also grew up in Chicago. Johnson, though, originally came under the wing of R. Kelly, signing to Jive Records and releasing her debut album Chapter 1: Love, Pain, & Happiness in 2001. Her firs...

    " Through The Wire " - Kanye West from the album The College Dropout (2004) Billboard Hot 100 peak: #15 (five weeks) Weeks in the Top-40: 15   Ed. Note : It's so disheartening to be objective for the promising start of a career that's become a joke at this point, but it is what it is.    Today's song comes from Kanye West, who was born in Atlanta but grew up in Chicago with his divorced mother Donda, who was a professsor. Leaving college to pursue a music career (which would inspire his debut album's title), West first was creating tracks for other acts as his own rap career stuttered at first. Coming under the wing of producer Ernest "No I.D." Wilson, West would first get recognized by helping to produce rap icon Jay-Z's seminal The Blueprint album in 2001, then with the sequel The Blueprint 2 , which included Jay's duet with future wife Beyonce Knowles on " Bonnie & Clyde '03 ", which Kanye produced. He also produce...

    Saturday's here, and it's time to run down my top "hit" tunes from the previous week. Billie Eilish spends a fourth week at #1, while tattooed bear Teddy Swims (pictured above) climbs a few notches in the top ten. Songs from the Jonas Brothers, Chris Stapleton, and Dua Lipa make the biggest jumps (moves of 10+ notches highlighted in red ), while former big hits from Olivia Rodrigo, Metallica, Tim McGraw, Russell Dickerson, and J. Brown drop off my chart. And under the list, everything is Spotify playlisted for 5 1/2 hours of the biggest in pop, rock, R&B, country, and dance music. And tomorrow I'll roll out my year-end chart of the 100 hits to place on my chart in 2023. Stay tuned and thanks for being patient! It's been a rough year. glad it's ending... This Week                   Song/Artist (last week's position in parentheses) ---------------------------------------------------...

    " Picture " - Kid Rock featuring Sheryl Crow or Allison Moorer from the album Cocky (2001) Billboard Hot 100 peak: #4 (three weeks) Weeks in the Top-40: 28   Today's song comes from Robert James Ritchie, who records under the alias Kid Rock , who after failing to have a hip-hop career in the mold of Eminem (or Vanilla Ice, for that matter), switched up to veer into the rock lane. In the spring of 2000, his ballad " Only God Knows Why " became a decent hit, reaching the top-20 on Billboard magazine's Hot 100. The album eventually sold over 11 million copies, and in the rush to come out with something to keep the momentum, Atlantic Records (paired with his original indie label Top Dog) remade tracks from his second and third albums before his fame, and added extra songs for the History Of Rock record, which ended up spending a week at #2 on the Billboard 200 sales tally and selling over two million copies. One of the new tracks, the Metallica-samplin...

    " Love Of A Woman " - Travis Tritt from the album Down The Road I Go (2000) Billboard Hot 100 peak: #39 (one week) Weeks in the Top-40: 1   Today's song comes from mulleted country singer Travis Tritt , whose seventh studio album, and first on Columbia Records, Down The Road I Go , proved to be a huge success, already scoring a pair of top-five country hits that made the top-40 on Billboard magazine's Hot 100 "big" chart, with " Best Of Intentions " and " A Great Day To Be Alive ".  The third single pulled from the record was the ballad "Love Of A Woman", written by Kevin Brandt and produced by Travis with Billy Joe Walker Jr.. The song has your basic platitudes for the female race, especially tied in to how they can "tame" their man. I mean, it's nothing that hasn't been sung before, but it's an effective product, and it has its market, and and Tritt's soulful voice carries it off. The melody is ...

    "This Time Around" - Hanson from the album This Time Around (2000) Billboard Hot 100 peak: #20 (one week) Weeks in the Top-40: 3   Today's song comes from the pop group Hanson , whose major label debut album Middle Of Nowhere in 1997 had sold millions and spun off three hits with " Where's The Love ", the top ten " I Will Come To You ", and their #1 breakthrough " MmmBop ". With a rabid young record-buying fanbase, their record company, Island, took advantage, quickly spinning off an album of early recording Three Car Garage as well as a holiday album Snowed In , both of which reached the top ten on the Billboard 200 sales tally in America and selling over a million copies each. A concert set the following year, Live At Albertane , made the top-40 on that list and sold a half million as well.  The young brotherly trio - Isaac, Taylor, and Zac, returned in 2000 with their sophomore effort This Time Around . Still not old enough to...

    "How Do You Like Me Now?!" - Toby Keith from the album How Do You Like Me Now?! (1999) Billboard Hot 100 peak: #31 (two weeks) Weeks in the Top-40: 8 Today's song comes from Toby Keith (Covel), who grew up in Oklahoma, where he worked in the oil drilling business as well as a semi-semi-pro football player (coincidentally in that sham of a league called the USFL that Mango Mussolini was involved in) while he was trying to gain momentum with a music career with a band called Easy Money. Eventually Toby moved to Nashville, and was signed to Mercury Nashville in the early 1990s. There he recorded his self-titled debut album which came out in 1993. The lead single from the set, " Should've Been A Cowboy ", made him a star instantly, going all the way to #1 on Billboard magazine's Country Singles chart on his first try, as well as popping on to the "pop" Hot 100 chart at #93. Including that one, four of the album's cuts reached the top 5 ...

    "Only God Knows Why" - Kid Rock from the album Devil Without A Cause (1998) Billboard Hot 100 peak: #19 (two weeks) Weeks in the Top-40: 12   Oh, man.   I knew the day would have to come that I would have to cover this cretin. Thankfully this living cold sore only made the top-40 three times, so there's that. But the timing of this with his sit-down comrade-fest with fascist Nazi Tucker Carlson is weird.   Sooooo.   Today's song comes from Robert James Ritchie, the rich son of a local Michigan car dealership magnate that decided that he loved the hip-hop in his McMansion in the far suburbs of Detroit. Dubbing himself "Kid Rock", he came under the wing of DJ/producer Derrick "D-Nice" Jones of the seminal rap group Boogie Down Productions, who helped him sign with Jive Records in the late 1980's. He released his debut album Grits Sandwiches For Breakfast in 1990, which I'm positive is something he has never ate or had his butler make, ...

It's not that the CEO of a company has a personal opinion that I don't agree with. For real, going down that road, Dan Cathy insulted not only the GLBT community, but anyone else who isn't married to their first wives. Remember, he boasted about that as the centerpiece of his nefarious self-righteous quote that grew this meme. But that just means that a great amount of people in line today for a fried sandwich are oblivious that he basically thinks you're trash. But whatever. Lots of people who run business are self-righteous loons. Hell, look at the crazy dolt who runs Whole Foods, John Mackey . He's been much more vocal about his opposition to healthcare reform, unions, and all that other Libertarian bullshit, and tons of gay people still sashay around that organomart. What's got me and a ton of others' panties in a knot is the blatant use of company profits and resources to campaign, promote, and insert themselves into the equality debate . Organizat...

This week's Cee U Next Tuesday winner, for female excellence in the male-dominated field of douchebaggery, is Carole Aichele (pictured above for her "happy school librarian" pic), Pennsylvania's Secretary of the Commonwealth (their hoity-toity way of just saying "Secretary of State"). As such she's also responsible for enforcing the recently-passed Voter ID law in the state, which requires specific state-issued photo IDs to be able to vote. This has created a maelstorm of controversy, since figures touting the amount of people who would be disenfranchised by the law seem to be fudged, and the effect of voter fraud greatly exaggerated. And of course a Republican promoter of the law was caught saying that this law would win Pennsylvania for the party. The department of Justice has been looking into this and holding hearings. Now you can argue either way on the validity of suppression claims, as well as the threat of fraud (which the state has yet ...

This week's Cee U Next Tuesday winner, given for outstanding female accomplishment in the male-dominated field of douchebaggery, is South Carolina governor Nikki Haley, who after trying to "soften" the republican image on the View by saying that "women don't care about contraception" (well, maybe unless when you're fucking your employees ), now is going that extra step to send women's health back to the Dark Ages by eliminating the budget of rape crisis center s in her state. And this is her money quote... serve a portion of our population for which we extend our sympathy and encouragement, but nevertheless, it is only a small portion of South Carolina’s chronically ill or abused.” Haley said the $453,000 designated for the South Carolina Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault’s rape crisis centers “distract[s] from the agency’s broader mission of protecting South Carolina’s public health.”  Wow. That's like her saying ...

It's time to dole out my Cee U Next Tuesday award for the week, which glorifies excellence by women in the male-dominated field of douchebaggery. This week's winner happens to be last week's runner-up , the Mormon answer to Marie Antoinette, Ann Romney. Mother Romney (pictured above), if you remember, is riding a non-coffee high for having her prancing horses qualify for the Olympics. Because nothing says you've pulled yourself up by the bootstraps than cultivating a herd of million-dollar horses that would be partially paid for by...yes YOU the American taxpayer (yay, freedom!). And of course she married old Willard without her parents being allowed in the church, and had her father, an avowed atheist, posthumously converted to their religion. But don't go criticizing the Earth Mother, or the media circus will take you to the shed . It doesn't matter that her idea of "roughing it" is " living off their investment income ", and that ...