Atlanta hip-hop king T.I. vaults 70 places into the No. 1 spot on Billboard‘s Hot 100 this week with “Whatever You Like,” a sing-songy, smudgy Xerox of his classic 2006 hit “What You Know.”
With this move, Clifford Joseph Harris Jr. scores his first No. 1 as a lead artist (he was credited two years ago on Justin Timberlake’s chart-topper “My Love”) and sets a new Hot 100 record for biggest leap to the top spot. T.I. takes the record away from Maroon 5, who set it just 16 months ago when “Makes Me Wonder” leapt from No. 64 to No. 1 in a single bound. They, in turn, had stolen the record from Kelly Clarkson, whose only No. 1 hit, “A Moment Like This,” held the record for about four years, after she leapt from No. 52 to the top in 2002.
Before Clarkson, this record was held for 28 years, by the Beatles’ “Can’t Buy Me Love” (No. 26-No. 1 in 1964). The fact that a record held for three decades has been broken thrice in the last six years says less about these songs’ popularity and more about the quirks of the modern charts and the sometimes dysfunctional relationship between sales and airplay.
And it means T.I. shouldn’t gloat for too long–this record’s likely to be broken again.
Last Friday, one of the regular commenters on my “100 and Single” column poured cold water all over my prediction that Estelle’s “American Boy” might finally creep into the U.S. Top 10. Noted regular reader ukidol, “Estelle’s song has been removed from iTunes since the start of the week, so she’ll drop sharply in the next chart. Think they’re hoping for a Kid Rock-style album boost.”
We won’t find out how Estelle fared until the new Hot 100 appears later today, but yesterday’s release of SoundScan figures bears out ukidol’s prediction. “American Boy,” which the prior week was the sixth-best selling digital song in the country, fell to 64th, as its sales took a 78% tumble from 86,700 copies to 19,100 copies. (Presumably, virtually all of those 19,100 copies sold in the first day or two of the tracking week before the song got pulled from iTunes.)
As of last week, “American Boy” was at No. 11 on the big chart. While the radio half of the Hot 100’s sales-plus-airplay formulation might keep the song from falling out of the Top 40, no amount of radio growth will keep it from dropping at least a double-digit number of slots–if not this week, then the next.
No matter how vile you may find Kid Rock, there’s something endearingly genuine about him. Maybe it’s his penchant for extraordinarily white-trash altercations at Waffle House or his unorthodox rejection of iTunes, but he’s just plain amusing sometimes, like some sort of wayward uncle that’s good for a few laughs at family reunions, but who you’re glad you don’t have to see more than once every few years. In a recent interview with CMT the blustery rap-rocker rattled off his thoughts on music and politics with his familiar colloquial gusto.
Kid Rock has refused to put his Warren Zevon/Lynyrd Skynyrd homage “All Summer Long” on the iTunes Store as an a la carte download, and it’s paid off for him in a few ways: This week, his album Rock N Roll Jesus (which features the track) hit the double-platinum mark, and he’s gotten a ton of… More »
Kid Rock responded to Bob Lefsetz’s theorizing on why Rock N Roll Jesus was selling so well with a missive on why his fans connect with him, as opposed to artists like “Brittney” (sic) Spears and Mariah Carey. Guess what: It’s not because he’s refused to put his summer-song contender “All Summer Long” on iTunes! Instead, follow along with me as I retell the story of a young man who’s become disillusioned with the world at large, and reillusioned with himself:
In one of the stranger promotional teasers in recent memory, CAA managing partner Rob Light disclosed a list of acts that should be touring the States next year to HITS. Among them: Wal-Mart favs AC/DC, who haven’t toured since 2003, and KISS, who might creak around arenas once again. More »
The Great Miley Cyrus/Sugarland Battle of ’08 continues with today’s chart projections from Hits. Little did we know that Miley had a trick up her sleeve (on those days that she actually wears sleeves, anyway).
Kid Rock has received the bill for his Waffle House punch-up from a DeKalb County court: His immediate future will be smothered and covered by six hours of anger-management training, a $1,000 fine, and a year of probation. What, no court-ordered recording of a Waffle House theme song? More »
Kid Rock has received the bill for his Waffle House punch-up from a DeKalb County court: His immediate future will be smothered and covered by six hours of anger-management training, a $1,000 fine, and a year of probation. What, no court-ordered recording of a Waffle House theme song? More »
iTunes holdout Kid Rock tells Bob Lefsetz how his iTunes avoidance is working for him: “Why sell a million downloads (at a dickweed penny rate) that u say equals a 100,000 records when I’m selling well over a hundrend thousand records every 2 weeks? And I’m helping my heros sell records too???? More »
