The Week in Number Ones: Linkin Park, Country music, and Queen
Welcome back to The Week in Number Ones, where all the biggest chart movers from the US and UK charts get condensed into one article. Last week, we went in on TikTok’s biggest song at the moment, ‘Boy’s a Liar’, and picked apart the difficulties of American country superstar Morgan Wallen before diving deep on John Lennon’s posthumous number one single, ‘Woman’.
Another week into 2023 and another round of Netflix making inexplicable decisions. This time, we get some actual pop music crossover because Ted Sarandos decided to bone over Damon Albarn and his collection of animated musicians that make up the world’s favourite virtual band, Gorillaz.
In case you didn’t know, Gorillaz were set to star in their own full-length animated feature film that would have debuted exclusively on Netflix. However, Albarn announced this week that the movie was now cancelled as Netflix has continued to purge much of its animated back catalogue. It’s a shame that we won’t be able to see 2-D and Noodle yucking it up with cinematic hijinks, but we do also have a new Gorillaz album out this week, so it’s not like we’re all starved for Albarn content at the moment.
This week, we jump into the post-Chester Bennington era of Linkin Park with their latest hit ‘Lost’ before openly wondering what the hell is going on with modern pop country storming the American charts. Then, we flashback to when Queen scored their first number one hit with ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’. All that and more as we round up the best chart news of the modern-day and recent past.
Current UK Number One: ‘Flowers’ – Miley Cyrus
Death is no longer a barrier to getting your music out there. It never really was: we have loads of artists who have produced posthumous singles, albums, and compilations. Eight artists have hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100 as either a lead or featured performer, including legends like Janis Joplin, Otis Redding, and John Lennon. Post-mortem music is actually quite a booming business, and the latest group to add their name to that distinctive list is electro-nu metal pioneers Linkin Park.
Linkin Park went on what seemed destined to be an indefinite hiatus when lead singer Chester Bennington took his own life in 2017. Bennington was such an essential part of the band’s sound that it seemed almost impossible for the band to continue without him. Co-vocalist Mike Shinoda confirmed that Linkin Park was basically done for good last year, but in the years since Bennington’s death, the band has still somehow continued to release new music.
That largely came from outtakes, demos, and remixes that Shinoda has helmed. ‘She Couldn’t’ was an outtake from Bennington’s earliest days with the band (when Linkin Park was still known as Hybrid Theory) that was released in 2020. That release wasn’t exactly a pop hit, but it did inspire Shinoda to keep at it. Now, another demo titled ‘Lost’ that was originally recorded for the band’s sophomore album Meteora is making a run up the UK Singles Chart, sitting at number 18 this week.
If this all feels a bit icky, especially considering how the band is profiting off a song that features a singer who doesn’t have a say in its release anymore, don’t worry: Shinoda swears it’s all for the fans. “For years, fans have been asking us to release something with [late frontman Chester Bennington’s] voice,” Shinoda claimed when the song was first released, “and I’m thrilled we’ve been able to make that happen in such a special way.” I’ll leave it up to you to figure out how you feel about this, but one thing is certain: death has no dominion on the pop charts.
UK Singles Top Ten (Week of February 22nd, 2023):
- ‘Flowers’ – Miley Cyrus
- ‘Escapism’ – Raye ft. 070 Shake
- ‘Boy’s a Liar’ – PinkPanthress
- ‘Kill Bill’ – SZA
- ‘Sure Thing’ – Miguel
- ‘Anti-Hero’ – Taylor Swift
- ‘As It Was’ – Harry Styles
- ‘Calm Down’ – Rema
- ‘Messy in Heaven’ – Venbee & Goddard
- ‘Creepin’ – Metro Boomin, The Weeknd, and 21 Savage
Current US Number One: ‘Flowers’ – Miley Cyrus
Well, here we are: it’s the second week in a row that I’m talking about pop country in this column. Don’t be mad at me – it’s all of you who have done this. A remarkable combination of nothing new appearing at the top tier of the chart and one genre making an unexpected surge toward the top has led us to one fundamental question that needs to be answered: what the hell is up with American country music?
It’s complicated. Just like every other genre of music, country has a rich history, a diverse array of sub-genres, and an interesting relationship with modern pop. There are some phenomenal modern country artists that you should be paying attention to at the moment: Kacey Musgraves, Sturgill Simpson, and Billy Strings are all doing wonderfully strange things by mixing country with pop, blues, bluegrass, and more. But you wouldn’t be able to tell that country music is as interesting as it has ever been just by looking at the pop charts.
To be fair, pop country has always been somewhat reviled by true believers of the genre. For every Johnny Cash or Dolly Parton who made moves on the pop charts, there were at least ten trend-chasing hacks with flimsy southern accents trying to recreate their singular talent. I’m not saying that every country artist in the top 20 right now is a hack… but I’m not not saying that either.
All I’m saying is that 1/4th of the top 20 this week are country songs – bad country songs. If the names Morgan Wallen, Kane Brown, Luke Combs, and Bailey Zimmerman mean nothing to you, I envy the choices you’ve made in life. There’s a particularly putrid run from number 15 to 18 that features Combs, Wallen, and Zimmerman all sandwiched between Chris Brown’s ‘Under the Influence’. How we’ve gotten to this cursed collection of songs is anybody’s guess, but this is what you get when you stray away from the familiar top ten.
Billboard Hot 100 Top Ten (Week of February 25th, 2023):
- ‘Flowers’ – Miley Cyrus
- ‘Kill Bill’ – SZA
- ‘Creepin’ – Metro Boomin, The Weeknd, and 21 Savage
- ‘Boys a Liar, Pt. 2’ – PinkPanthress & Ice Spice
- ‘Last Night’ – Morgan Wallen
- ‘Unholy’ – Sam Smith & Kim Petras
- ‘Die For You’ – The Weeknd
- ‘Anti-Hero’ – Taylor Swift
- ‘Cuff It’ – Beyoncé
- ‘I’m Good (Blue)’ – David Guetta & Bebe Rexha
This Week in Number Ones: ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ (#1 on the Billboard Hot 100, February 23rd, 1980)
Nobody could hold Freddie Mercury back. The flamboyant lead singer of British glam rock gods Queen had already taken America by storm with his unique take on stadium rock. Queen themselves had been through quite a transformation throughout their first decade, from their initial roots as a progressive hard rock act to a more twee British sensibility with albums like A Night at the Opera and A Day at the Races. By the time the 1980s rolled around, Mercury was ready to explore a new area: pop superstardom.
In order to get there, however, Mercury had to look back into history. While re-examining his love of old-school rockabilly from Elvis Presley, Mercury began to absent-mindedly strum a guitar. Mercury was, by his own admission, a novice on the instrument, but the push and pull of rockabilly compelled him to gravitate toward the six-string. With a tune in his head, Mercury went about crafting a new song, ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’.
“‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ took me five or ten minutes,” Mercury told Melody Maker in 1981. “I did that on the guitar, which I can’t play for nuts, and in one way, it was quite a good thing because I was restricted, knowing only a few chords. It’s a good discipline because I simply had to write within a small framework. I couldn’t work through too many chords, and because of that restriction, I wrote a good song, I think.”
Queen were in the midst of recording their 1979 album The Game in Germany when ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ erupted out of Mercury’s brain. While he became known for complex arrangements and operatic structures, Mercury’s flash of inspiration caused him to focus on recording the song as quickly as possible. Guitarist Brian May didn’t even arrive in time to record the backing track, causing Mercury to step in and record his first guitar contributions to a Queen song. Mercury even took a swing at the song’s guitar solo, which May replaced during the overdub sessions.
Although it was moulded after a style of music that had vanished from charts more than two decades prior, ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ has such an obvious pop hook at its centre that Queen couldn’t resist earmarking it for the album’s first single. The band had quite a few near-misses in America when it came to hits. Although Queen had nabbed seven top ten singles in their home country before the release of ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ (including launching ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ to number one), the group had only had two top ten hits in the US and no number ones. ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ peaked at number two, while ‘We Are the Champions’ stalled out at number four.
In America, Queen was known for bombastic arena rock. ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ was consciously small and throwback in its DNA, being easily recreated with just a singer strumming a guitar. But that simplicity turned out to be exactly what Queen needed to jump to the top of the charts. Having survived nearly ten years of frequent changes, Queen had finally scored their elusive first number one in America.
Although it didn’t have the same commanding presence as some of the band’s other live favourites, ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ quickly became a staple of the band’s performances. If you go back to the band’s classic concert films from the era, you can feel how audiences react to the song. It’s pure jubilation that can only come from a great pop song. While most of Queen’s material took their audience on journeys, ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ was an immediate shot of adrenaline straight to the brain. It was unlike anything else in the band’s catalogue, and it had a permanent place as one of the band’s best-known songs.
Just a few months after scoring their first number one in America, Queen nabbed their second and final chart-topping hit in America with ‘Another One Bites the Dust’. Although they remained one of the biggest bands in the world, Queen would never again threaten the Billboard charts with a top-ten single (their duet with David Bowie, ‘Under Pressure’, would hit number one in the UK, but it stalled out at number 29 in America). The closest Queen would get to another top-ten hit in the US was with 1982’s ‘Body Language’, which hit number 11 in the summer of that year.
Billboard Hot 100 Top Ten (Week of February 23rd, 1980):
- ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ – Queen
- ‘Do That To Me One More Time’ – Captain & Tennille
- ‘Yes, I’m Ready’ – Ten DeSario With K.C.
- ‘Cruisin’ – Smokey Robinson
- ‘Rock With Me’ – Michael Jackson
- ‘Longer’ – Dan Fogelberg
- ‘On The Radio’ – Donna Summer
- ‘Desire’ – Andy Gibb
- ‘Coward of the County’ – Kenny Rogers
- ‘Sara’ – Fleetwood Mac
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