The pair of videos that led off Beyonce’s I Am… Sasha Fierce–“If I Were A Boy” and “Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It”–are up for Video Of The Year at the 2009 BET Awards, along with Jamie Foxx’s cameo-studded “Blame It,” T.I.’s Rihanna-aided “Live Your Life,” and Kanye West’s Ralph Bakshi-inspired “Heartless.” Also, M.I.A. is up for two awards; Best New Artist (even though Kala is her second album) and Best Female Hip-Hop Artist (where she’ll face off against Lil Mama and Trina). Complete list of nominees after the jump. More »
Ed. note: Chris “dennisobell” Molanphy, our resident chart guru, looks at the upward, downward, and lack of movement on this week’s Billboard charts:
Lil Wayne is expected to triumph on next week’s album chart, but this week, he has locked up a remarkable percentage of the Hot 100 singles chart: seven songs, starting with his five-week No. 1 champ “Lollipop.”
This is the second time in three weeks that a single artist has laid claim to nearly a tenth of the chart; the other recent chart dominator was American Idol winner David Cook, who scored a mind-blowing 11 Hot 100 hits at the end of May. But Cook’s feat was short-lived–he was down to three songs last week and is down to only one this week.
What makes Lil Wayne’s feat impressive is not only that he could keep most of these seven songs on the chart for several weeks yet. It’s that, a little bit like all-time record-holder the Beatles, he earned it.
The Game’s upcoming album Lax–sorry, L.A.X.–has been pushed back two weeks from its original street date of July 8. His latest single, “Game’s Pain,” is actually his first top ten track on the Rap Singles chart since 2005’s legendarily awful “Dreams” (not to be confused with Big Dreams”), but it has barely dented the Hot 100. Maybe a Keyshia Cole hook isn’t enough to get listeners interested in the Game yet again filling a song entirely with references to other, more successful rappers. In this track we get direct references to Biggie, Will Smith, Nas, Luke, LL Cool J, Public Enemy, NWA, Ice Cube, New Edition, Naughty By Nature, Tony! Toni! Tone!, Wu-Tang Clan, Black Rob, DJ Kool Herc, DJ Red Alert, Jay-Z, and Big Daddy Kane. Cole even ends the song by shouting out to her blatant idol, Mary J. Blige. But how would the verse to “Game’s Pain” read if you took out all the offending couplets?
