#830-#826

#830. Stormzy (feat Headie One) - Audacity (#97, 2020)

80th of 2020

Just want to shout out the fact that this is one of the rare December released entries in the Hottest 100, and one that crosses across to a different decade as a result. It made the song feel especially quaint by the time it showed up, to say nothing of the fact that Headie One and Stormzy had a much more popular song in the same list. Also just want to point out that this comes from Stormzy's album "Heavy Is The Head". The actual Shakespeare quote is 'Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown', but it's been morphed so much over time that nearly everyone seems to get it wrong. Nick Fury gets it right in one of the Spider-Man movies though, the one that came out just before this album.

The title of biggest UK rapper is contentious and ever-changing. Stormzy definitely warranted it a couple of years before this. In 2017 he just about debuted his entire track listing in the UK top 75, something that tends to get overlooked after Ed Sheeran did something very similar one week later, and the UK Chart rules were forever changed as a result. Maybe if Stormzy, Drake and another waiting-in-the-wings rapper hadn't also done it, it wouldn't have created the crushing perpetuity of the occasion and warranted it. Maybe Ed Sheeran stole Stormzy's moment and thunder, but they must have been okay with it because the two of them collaborated on two different UK #1 hits a couple of years later. There's a familiar name in the writing and producing credits on both of those songs, or one who will be familiar once he starts showing up here again and again..

The UK rap scene is constantly locked down to a somewhat niche audience due to the US being perpetually hesitant to get on board. I actually do think there's an audience there but they're not powerful enough to beat the gatekeeping industry yet, aside from a handful of exceptions (one of my favourite fun facts is that M.I.A. has had a top 10 Billboard hit in three consecutive decades, each one much harder to name than the last). It does mean new boundaries are there to be broken though. Not long before this album with its very telling title, Dave released the song "Location" which over time has arguably become the biggest UK rap hit of all time. Stormzy cannot get complacent, there's a new generation of artists ready to smash all his upper limits.

If we take this album as Stormzy's means to re-establish his place on the throne, it's not a bad way to go about it here. It also came with one of those Ed Sheeran collaborations for crossover potential, but he did manage a pretty tidy top 10 peak in the UK with this song too. Latching onto Headie One is well timed after he'd had a pretty big breakout year. I can't help but wonder if he's showing up Stormzy on this song though. Stormzy's flow gets a little tiresome here, while Headie One still feels fresh and different. There are definitely limitations in his flow too, but for a small segment, he's a good fit here. Headie One's last UK top 10 hit was over two years ago ("Martin's Sofa", good song), while Stormzy had a #1 hit last year, so he's won the long game here. I just think he's dragging his own song down this time.

#829. Thundamentals (feat Peta and the Wolves) - Think About It (#82, 2016)

84th of 2016

In hindsight, 2016 was a fairly shaky year for Thundamentals. The years surrounding showed that they had no problem getting votes, but this feels like a serious underperformance for one of their most popular songs. Maybe it was released just a little too late in the year, or maybe they stunted their momentum with some less popular singles. They kicked things off with "Late Nights", a song with a blatant cribbing of Corey Hart's "Sunglasses At Night" that goes uncredited. It's one of only a small handful of songs they've had actually reach the ARIA Charts, but it's never made it onto an album and looks like it'll never go gold. "Sally" (#861) went 3xPlatinum last year. Next single "Never Say Never" has fared a little better, and actually made the Hottest 200, but clearly they needed a hit.

This is obviously that song, but I feel like they've overcompensated. It's almost afraid to actually be a Thundamentals song, as Tuka & Jeswon only have a single 30 second verse each, plus a short bridge, and the rest of the song is Peta and the Wolves hammering in that one safe, reassuring hook over and over again. The song even starts with the hook as well, which is a recipe for getting sick of it before you've even made it through to the end.

In case you were wondering about Peta and the Wolves, it sure sounds like the name of an indie group in the 2010s. It's actually just two people, Australian Peta and Swedish 'the Wolves', I suspect he wasn't the subject of that one song by that fully Swedish duo who will eventually appear on this list. 

Most of their social media has totally vanished in the ensuing years and they've left us with very little music. Their Spotify page retains a total of two songs, and there are only a couple more out there. Nothing has come close to the cultural penetration that this guest spot does, but also nothing comes close to sounding like it either. They generally seem to operate in a very slow, cold electronica environment that doesn't seem suited for crossover success. "Think About It" probably just isn't the right song to latch onto to try and build up what they were doing, but I guess you can't say no to that either.

#828. Peking Duk & The Wombats - Nothing to Love About Love (#50, 2020)

79th of 2020

Something that listening to triple j a lot will do is instil the weight of significance around the Hottest 100. It's not the only thing that matters, but it comes with a storied history behind it. It's a kingmaker for some of the biggest names in music past and present. Littered around all those big fish are always a bunch of smaller names, boosting their prestige by association. I always got the impression that for many of these bands, simply making the Hottest 100 is the highest pedestal they could imagine for themselves. It's giving themselves a place in history, and I reckon it'd be a cool thing to bring up in conversation. Trust me, it's been nearly 6 years and I'm still riding on the high of my half hour contribution to the Games Done Quick history books.

The flipside of this coin is the discussion around triple j's adverse impact on the music scene. It's not supposed to act as the be all and end all of Australian music, but the lack of competition makes it inevitable. Bands and artists have been accused of shifting or even watering down their sound to tap into that triple j window. It's the sort of thing you'll only notice if you step outside of that world, but it does leave you wondering what else we could be getting. I'm not going to make that statement about any particular band here, certainly not those small handful who tend to become torchbearers for whatever subset they inadvertently spearhead. I will say though that this particular song cannot escape the perception to me that it was written for the express purpose of being a Hottest 100 song.

The whole situation isn't as grim as I make it sound though. The collaboration is very symbiotic for two bands that breathe through that specific triple j audience they've found. On paper it sounds odd, but with The Wombats sliding more into electro-pop, and Peking Duk's genre blend, they've got way more in common than you'd think. I listen to this song and it really is a perfect marriage of the two styles. It's almost a full collaboration too. Mostly written between Adam from Peking Duk and Murph from The Wombats, but the whole band do play on it.

Once you move past the gimmick though, is it worth the fare? I think the drums in combination with the main synth riff work together for a strong consistent rhythm. Murph is going a bit through the motions of the average Wombats song though. Calm and reserved in the verses, but exploding on the chorus, or rather, trying to explode. I think he's just a tad drowned in the mix here. It's to the point that when this landed in the countdown, triple j didn't even play a language warning despite a fairly prominent f-bomb in the chorus. In saying that though, I skimmed through the broadcast and only spotted that one very egregious song from the year getting the treatment.

#827. The Amity Affliction - All F**ked Up (#65, 2016)

83rd of 2016

From what I've heard, this might actually be The Amity Affliction's most radio friendly song they've ever put out. Joel is demoted to the background for the most part and doesn't really stick out until the very end of the song. But if the bridge of AFI's "Miss Murder" wasn't enough to scare away crossover potential, then this is probably just fine. The only problem being that they did all of this for the song whose title can't really get read out loud on the radio.

This is a recipe for disaster most of the time. A sonic pivot to grab an audience that isn't there, and destroying the one you've got. From what I can see though, the song seems to be fairly well received. The lyrical sentiment certainly helps. I'm not sure it's the most graceful way of going about to spread the message that you're not alone in your struggles, but it differs from person to person. Sometimes just being direct like this can really connect. If there's a problem to be had, it's that they don't explore it very much. The second verse is a whole two lines and the outro only has one more. It's close to getting there, but it just runs through its thesis statement so quickly without offering much more.

#826. Machine Gun Kelly (feat Bring Me The Horizon) - maybe (#69, 2022)

86th of 2022

I feel like "maybe" carries a little more baggage than the other mgk entries here for the simple reason that it's the one that comes from "mainstream sellout". That's an album whose reputation has landed with a thud, even among those who liked his first pop punk album. I've grown increasingly sceptical of these kinds of reactions, that just always seem to land on artists at a position to be very easy targets. There's nothing interesting about an opinion you can predict before anyone's even heard the thing.

I did my due diligence here out of obligation but also sheer fascination. What I found on the whole is that it definitely makes sense that the album was received the way it was. I think the singles roll out did it no favours with "ay!" and "emo girl", whose features drip with easy sources of cynicism (both will eventually appear on this list), but the latter especially just leaves the only lasting impression that most are going to have with the album. Arguably it makes the chorus sticky to a fault. I reckon if the song was kept in as a deep cut, it'd still get a similar reaction, but it's one that'd come after the album rollout, and could swing it back around as something that tricks people into listening to the album. A laughable dud 6 weeks in advance of the album just shuns people away from the project.

I think the record is potentially salvageable just because it opens pretty strongly. The first handful of tracks fall reasonably in line with what an mgk pop punk album should sound like. It's only after the first interlude that things start to fall apart, and mgk just can't help but give easy fodder for mockery. If there's any proof to this, it's that "maybe" is part of that opening run and generally feels like it's avoided the problems of being dogged by association. Otherwise I wouldn't be talking about it.

It does help a little bit to have Bring Me The Horizon on call though. This is the first time I'm talking about them but they've got 13 entries all up. I'm not about to blow all my thoughts on them here but I will say it's a pretty handy feature for them to get. This was their first ever song to crack the Billboard Hot 100, as the US has proven to be a difficult market for them to fully crack. They'd do it again the next year alongside another rapper who will eventually appear on this list.

All things considered, as far as the mgk songs that made the Hottest 100 go, we could certainly have done a lot worse. I'm not super enthused by this one either but it's got enough energy to spare. It also feels like a complete and finished song which I can't always say about some of his hits. This song isn't even his last song here, so still not ready to let him go.