Music Op - Billboard, iPods, and Tyler, The Creator

Hello, and welcome to the second edition of my monthly music journal Music Op, exclusively available on Sacred Spiral Studios. Hope you were able to vote and hope this goes well…

This is going to be a rather lengthy and list-y issue this month – in addition to my Top 10 Songs of October 2024, I will be discussing my top 10 favorite hit songs from the projected Billboard Hot 100 year-end list for 2024 (or at least what Billboard calls the year of 2024, more on that later). But before we get to that main topic, there are a few other things that happened this October that I’d like to address.

Send me your iPod!

Earlier this month, I did my first ‘iPod data recovery’ for someone, which I found quite enjoyable. After putting the word out via Instagram that I was looking for iPods to grave-rob, my friend Becca from the Drexel student newspaper The Triangle asked me if I could try and recover their videos from an iPod Nano Gen. 5 (the one with the camera). First off, this iPod is special to me; it was the first device I ever owned, and maybe the first thing I ever really ‘saved up’ for as a kid. 

My plan for this procedure was to extract the music files for my digital music collection, which I have been consciously building up over the past year or so, and grab the videos and whatever other personal memories I could find for Becca (in this case, two voice memos). Everything went well, and I was able to use a strategy I had learned last year in order to access the media without syncing the device to my computer and ultimately losing the data. The music hoard was amusing, but not a treasure trove so to speak; the complete Frozen soundtrack, NOW That’s What I Call Music Vol. 48 (Target Deluxe), Midnight Memories by One Direction, all CD quality. 

The experience made me wonder if this could ever be a lucrative skill, since there is likely an insane amount of devices containing soon-to-be lost personal media out there in the world. To be fair, the process is not that difficult for someone who knows their way around the Mac OS to an extent. Also, my method only works for Apple devices with a certain type of Disk Mode, which doesn’t include iPod Touch or iPhones. But anyway, the whole thing made me excited to look into more iPods and preserve more media, and if any of you readers have iPods you want investigated (or an iPod Classic Gen. 7 you want to sell me), leave a comment.

Tyler, The Creator’s Monday album drop

Tyler, The Creator’s new album Chromakopia was another point of interest for me this month, not only because I am a fan of his music, but because of the choice to release it on a Monday morning instead of the industry standard of 12 a.m. EST on a Friday. In an interview with Narduar at his festival Camp Flog Gnaw last year, Tyler has briefly talked about his feelings on the ‘New Music Friday’ format, and how he missed when the standard for releasing new music was Tuesdays instead. According to a VOX article from 2015, this change took place in early 2015, and was influenced by the notorious Beyoncé surprise album in 2013, which dropped on a Friday. 

I doubt this album release will influence any large scale changes in when music drops, but it was interesting to experience a big player such as Tyler doing something different. After working for a summer as a music news writer at WXPN, I learned that singles commonly come out on any day of the week, usually at noon so publications can receive press releases and construct announcement posts for the new music. But does it help to have an ‘industry standard day of the week’ for releases? Personally, I think it definitely helps more casual music fans hear about releases, especially in streaming times when ‘New Music Friday’ playlists exist and the releases are easily accessible from your home. However, it makes it harder to stand out and gain people’s attention amongst the swarm of new music battling for those playlist spots. 

As a small artist, it doesn’t really matter what day you drop on if you know the algorithms are gonna pass you by anyway. You might as well stand out a bit and drop on whatever day is special to you. For the mainstream, the Friday release date seems to be working very well, so I don’t see that changing soon. 

My favorite hit songs of 2024 

Now onto the main topic of the month; the best (my favorite) hit songs of 2024. It’s about the time of year when Billboard, the prominent music popularity charts for the US, ends their tracking year and generates a year-end Hot 100 list of the biggest hits of the year, according to their metrics. Other groups like the GRAMMYs or Oscars have tracking years like this too, which don’t exactly line up with the calendar year, probably since the ‘academies’ need time to whittle down their nominees, announce them to the public, and then book artists to perform at their ceremonies each year. Last year, Billboard changed its tracking year in order to line up with the Billboard Music Awards, which were moved from May to November. Personally, the Billboard charts (specifically the Hot 100) are one of the most interesting facets of the mainstream music industry.

I am no in-depth chart watcher, but I have followed many a pop music fan on Twitter back in the day and consistently watched Mark Grondin aka Spectrum Pulse’s ‘Billboard Breakdown’ YouTube series since around 2020 at least. I have learned that members of a chart watching community on the Pulse Music Boards are able to predict the year-end Hot 100 charts with a fair amount of accuracy each year by using similar calculations to Billboard. For my ranking, I used the predicted charts of community member Rockgolf and the renowned chart following group Talk of the Charts in order to determine which songs were eligible. 

Mainstream pop is not one of my most consumed types of music, but I do find it quite fun to broadly keep up with. That being said, these opinions are not terribly strong and are not backed up by countless listens. My honorable mentions go to “Die With A Smile” by Bruno Mars and Lady Gaga, “Yeah Glo!” by GloRilla, “Houdini” by Dua Lipa, and “Whatever She Wants” by Bryson Tiller. 

10. “On My Mama” by Victoria Monet

This song has been praised since its release for being a classy, boastful and clever pop song, and I agree. Also, this might be the best use of horns in recent pop music. 

9. “Type Shit” - Future, Metro Boomin, Playboi Carti, Travis Scott

Even with the star-studded cast here, it’s crazy that a song with this weird of a beat became such a hit. The crash cymbal is actually just late, and what are those bells? I enjoy this song because it boggles my mind a bit.   

8. “Agora Hills” - Doja Cat

The next two entrees are fairly similar, exemplifying my enjoyment of female cloud rap. Yes, Doja Cat’s first verse is great and definitely biting Coco & Clair Clair. Did they chart though? 

7. “Never Lose Me” - Flo Milli

If the Lil Yachty remix of this song was the official version on Billboard, this song would be higher. If “Ron Artest” by Babyface Ray and 42 Dugg was a hit, it would be lower than this song. Milli made it better, sorry. 

6. “Not Like Us” - Kendrick Lamar

I was not as enthralled by the rap beef that spawned this track as most, but I can admit that this is probably the best showing of rap on a hit song in 2024. Seeing a diss track this ferocious land in the top 15 of a year-end Hot 100 is historic though, and I respect that. 

5. “Good Luck, Babe!” - Chappell Roan

I am a bit numb to this song's chorus at this point, but the rest of the track still excites me since it is far less overplayed and honestly, just better. This and “Red Wine Supernova” are my favorite Chappell Roan songs so far, and I’m very excited to hear where she goes next.

4. Zach Bryan (“I Remember Everything,” “Pink Skies,” “28”)

Although I do not actively put on Zach Bryan’s music much at all, I think he is the best country artist the charts have seen in a long time, possibly my whole lifetime. This spot is for all three of his hits because they are all well produced and enjoyable, but I don’t have connections to any one in particular.

3. “we can’t be friends (wait for your love)” - Ariana Grande

Grande scored a sleeper hit with this song, in terms of its overall notoriety as well as with my enjoyment of it. I have a love for “late night party songs” that feel like they belong on the radio after midnight, and this song has that second wind energy to it (as well as a phenomenal post-chorus). 

2. “Espresso” - Sabrina Carpenter

Once Carpenter released Short n’ Sweet, I realized how great this song is. I was so used to hearing only the chorus online, but as a complete track, “Espresso” is undeniable. The amazing pre-chorus and vocal harmonies put this song over the other pure-pop bangers, and make me happy that I didn’t hear this everyday on the radio. 

1. “Taste” - Sabrina Carpenter

I don’t quite know how Sabrina Carpenter went from “Nonsense” to this, but “Taste” is easily my #1 pick here. It’s perfectly paced, produced, and playful, without inducing the same cringe as her past hits did. Carpenter’s voice can evoke a subtle country inflection, and it comes out in the right spots here. I never would have seen this coming in 2023, but from the moment I clicked play on Short n’ Sweet, this song connected for me and blew away my expectations for Carpenter. 

Please leave a comment if you passionately agree or disagree with any of these picks. I chose not to do a worst ranking because this took me long enough, and I didn’t feel like sifting through all the songs on the chart that I didn’t know, just to find something bad. 

My Top 10 Songs released in October 2024

And finally, here is a less-extensive look into my favorite new releases from the past month. Very solid month overall; MIKE or Mk.gee continue to be two of my favs currently working. Big shoutout to 2nd Grade’s Scheduled Explosions; this album was very cool and different in the way it presented itself, with many short tracks and a large variation of recording techniques. Aminé and Cameron Winter (Geese frontman) each impressed with surprise 2x-singles. I definitely need some more time to process the Tyler album as well. 

10. “Thought I Was Dead (feat. ScHoolboyQ & Santigold) - Tyler, The Creator

9. “Adam” - Aminé

8. “Pieces Of A Dream” - MIKE

7. “Evil Things” - 2nd Grade

6. “Hey Jane” - Tyler, The Creator

5. “ROCKMAN” - Mk.gee

4. “68 Comeback” - 2nd Grade

3. “Take It With You” - Cameron Winter

2. “Passenger Princess (feat. Smino) - Aminé

1. “Live From Missile Command” - 2nd Grade