New Beginnings
Let us read you a little story. You put your copy of Pokemon Sword/Shield (pre-order now) into your Nintendo Switch (buy one, Karen the Skinny!) and load up the game. You leave your house and walk past your garden into the open field. Suddenly you breathe it in; fresh air. It reminds you that you're about to set off on a new adventure; new beginnings you call it. It's not unlike #PopIndustry. This season so far, we've had a new social platform, various new artists, new chart rules and of course - a brand new #1!
Perhaps one of the most impressive new beginnings of all, we look to the return of Iggy Azalea. Azalea is an industry veteran but her extent of high success was a #6-peaking solo single in 2014. Until today. Her comeback single 'best life' took the industry by storm - a chaotic one that got us all banned from Twitter - and it's only right that it takes the top-spot on this week's Hot Singles Chart. This also marks the first solo number-one by Azalea and Erika Jayne's management team. We congratulate them after 3 years of hard work and dedication to the music industry.
Someone else with dedication and hard work is none other than our pop princess Rihanna. No longer just a local Twitter resident - she's now a Mastodon resident too - Rihanna has had a string of hits due to her immense social prowess and being the only person to pretend to like Christina Aguilera, gaining her repeated plays on Republic's radio playlists. This week Rihanna proved her selling power with 'The Strawberry Kisses' [EP] topping both the Digital and Streaming Album Charts and becoming this week's official #1 album; her fifth to date.
Now, let's deviate from the idea of "new beginnings" a little bit and discuss Christina Aguilera. Nicknamed the queen of originality, Aguilera is so original that her success (or lack of) this week is completely opposite to our theme in every way; instead of having a number-one album for the first time ever, she manages yet another #2 record. How does she do it? Come to think of it, there is one original thing we attribute to Aguilera this week; instead of plagiarising someone else's song for her new single ('Kiss On My...'), she copies her own album track from 2013 ('Kiss My Ass'). Now that's originality!!!
Now, let's return to our new beginnings; we'll talk about Hyuna; the newest K-Pop artist on the block since Namie Amuro (at least... we think that was her genre, she doesn't live on Earth anymore so we couldn't reach her for comment). Hyuna's 'Hyunapatra' smashes to the #2 spot on the Hot 100 with a real hot-shot debut on the digital and streaming charts. It looks like things are all looking up for Hyuna with collaboration offers coming in left and right. A new beginning and perhaps a new ending, all in one week. That's new, at least.
Let's take a moment to congratulate our newest label executives; Ariana Grande and Troye Sivan as they lead Universal Music and Atlantic Records respctively. Sivan finally got the chance to put together a radio playlist and decided to attack all of his collaborators while doing so - the anti-Interscope label indeed! We can only wonder if Rihanna will sign to Interscope this year now. We haven't bothered asking for a comment because we don't give a fuck honestly. We would talk about Sivan's new single here but you know, same energy. Meanwhile, Ariana Grande got a new tattoo. Congratulations!
Speaking of formerly successful artists who have returned with new management, we look to Meghan Markle! Wait, that's not her name? Megan Hauserman? Megan McKenna? Meg from Family guy? Yeah, she kinda looks like her, so we'll go with that! Meg returns to the industry with a new album and a phoned-in Katy Perry-feature. Like Meg herself, no one remembered she had an album out and we don't even care to remember where it charted. Look it up, I guess! Her Perry collaboration surprisingly manages a top 10 debut at the #9 position. Somewhere, right now, Troye Sivan is crying to himself wishing he spent the anti-Katy payola bribes on a new Justin Timberlake-shaped dildo instead. 'Comeback' indeed!
On the subject of Justin Timberlake and Troye Sivan's prolapse, we're gonna finish this charticle looking into the other flops of the week. Taylor Swift does what Selena Gomez couldn't and ruins Perrie Edwards's top 10 streak with 'XOXO' - a song so irrelevant, Edwards completely forgot about it until its announcement. Halsey didn't look where she was 'Running' and crashed into Amelia Lily's 'Pink Bubbles' causing both to miss the top 15 for the first - and probably not the last - time. Finally, Karen Smith's solo critics choice awarded track, 'The Winner Takes It All', suffers from a lack of spins on two radio stations (despite a full score in their album reviews). If there is any lesson to be learned this week, it's this. Don't trust the judges. They're worse than Twitter!