It’s that time of year again! The final Hot 100 of the year is out, so it’s time for us to take our annual look at what songs topped the charts this year.
It’s been an odd year for pop music, to say the least. We have 16 songs that made #1 this year, among them a Hollywood soundtrack song for the first time in decades, a new longest-running #1 of all time, and a new record for the longest stretch between a song’s release and its topping the charts.
Pick your favorite, and in a few days we’ll use this and the data from the previous polls to pick a new best #1 of the 2010s!
I have only heard of one song in the list, namely “All I Want For Christmas Is You.” And to my credit, I was surprised that it came out in 2019, because I thought I remembered it from a year or two ago.
So I looked it up; it came out in 1994. But for whatever reason, this was the first year it hit #1.
By the way, I have heard of about half of the artists in this list, but I would not be confident in identifying more than three of them if I met them unexpectedly in line at Walmart. Maybe a couple more if I saw them singing on TV.
Selena Gomez, I’d recognize her. She’s on my short list for prettiest woman in the world.
As far as I can tell, it’s streaming plays (which are becoming a bigger and bigger part of how the Hot 100 is calculated) that brought it to #1 this year. Christmas songs in general are charting higher than they have in the past; on this week’s chart, “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” is at #1, with “Have a Holly Jolly Christmas” at #6 and “Jingle Bell Rock” at #9, a scenario which has never happened before. It’s going to be interesting to see if Christmas #1s start becoming a big deal in the US in years to come, as they have been in the UK for decades.
I voted for “7 Rings”, because the whole “drowning myself in material excess so I can ignore how depressed I am” theme of it really speaks to me (and because it amuses me that Rodgers & Hammerstein have a writing credit on a #1 pop song in 2019). I could also have voted for “Old Town Road” or “Truth Hurts”, because they’re both catchy as hell.
My sole reason for opening this thread is to see if I’ve heard of any of the songs on the list. It looks like just one: “Shallow”, and only because of the connection to the film.
“Old Town Road” was #1 for 19 weeks, breaking the 16-week record held jointly by Mariah Carey & Boyz II Men’s “One Sweet Day” and Justin Bieber, Luis Fonzi, & Daddy Yankee’s “Despacito”.
All I Want for Christmas is You is absolutely huge in the gay male community and I do remember seeing tweets on #GayTwitter to try to get it to number one by streaming it.
Sophia says “Sunflower”. I would’ve voted “thank u, next” as Ari was a thing in our house the first half of 2019 but I voted for TY,N last year so disqualified the song for that reason. Deep down, I do think the Ponch8 music rating system probably has this one right… but I’m gonna support my kid: “Sunflower” it is.
The Christmas song counts, but kinda doesn’t, so it was easily dismissed. Were it new for this year, it would get some consideration.
Lil Nas X so shamelessly begged for his song to break the record, even to releasing minor variations of it to keep it fresh, so I gotta discount flagrant abuses of the system.
In a few days, after New Year’s, the winner of this poll and the last nine polls will be going into the Best of the Decade poll. If you haven’t voted in any of the 2010-2018 polls yet, use the links in the OP to pull them up and make your call. There are a few tie votes as of now, and as per the rule I’ve applied in the past, if there’s a tie when I make the poll, then both songs will be considered winners and go into the poll.
I’ve heard of most of the artists here but I can’t say I’ve heard any of the specific songs on this list, with the exception of Old Town Road and AIWFXMIY, and I haven’t specifically heard them all the way through: even the Mariah Carey song I’ve apparently filtered out as just more generic Christmas music such that I can’t really differentiate it.