December is always extremely dead for new top 40 arrivals due to the lack of new releases, and all the Christmas music making it much harder to chart high. In fact the current #40 on the Hot 100 would be #12 without the Xmas stuff. So two songs it is, but they both give me a little bit to talk about…
“You’re Losing Me (From the Vault)” by Taylor Swift
Peak #27, Current #77
This is one of those things that should be a niche fandom event, but such is Taylor Swift’s popularity in 2023 that it’s ended up as a charting hit. This song was originally included on a limited edition CD last May and has been floating around the internet in pirated form since. Finally Taylor has uploaded the legit version to streaming services, with its delayed release still causing a major buzz.
The attention this has received stems from the fact that it concludes the Midnights narrative and provides more clues around Taylor’s breakup with Joe Alwyn. Midnights has lyrics that hint at relationship strain if you read between the lines, but they were ostensibly still a couple at the time of release, so things were played a little coyly. You’re Losing Me is the revealing, heartbreaking missing piece that lay’s Taylor’s emotions clear when things were falling apart. Further fuel has been added to the fire by Jack Antonoff revealing that this track was recorded back in December 2021, far earlier than the supposed breakup in early 2023.
And yeah, it would be fair to say Taylor’s lyrics here are pretty devastating. The overriding emotion isn’t anger or even sadness necessarily, it’s more like Taylor can feel the life draining out of her as the relationship drags towards its inevitable conclusion. I’m reminded of High Infidelity from the 3am edition: “There’s many different ways that you can kill the one you love, the slowest way is never loving them enough”. Two people who are no longer on the same page and the drifting apart is the most painful thing. I love the second verse in particular “Every morning I glared at you with storms in my eyes, how can you say that you love someone you can’t tell is dying?”. Taylor’s slow internal death that is met with a blank response, “You say you don’t understand and I say I know you don’t”.
Taylor does get a little more bitter in the bridge with some trademark barbs, “Don’t you ignore me, I’m the best thing at this party. And I wouldn’t marry me either, a pathological people-pleaser, who only wanted you to see her”. But then it all fades back to just the sound of her heartbeat and the computerised, melancholy vocals, which leads to a very abrupt ending, as if the life support this relationship was running on was suddenly pulled. Like I say, it makes all the sense in the world that this wasn’t included on the original Midnights, but it does feel like an extremely necessary conclusion to the chapter.
Now I will say that whilst lyrically this is an absolute gut punch, musically it doesn’t give me that much to return to. Clearly Taylor knew what she wanted to say with this and Jack provided some moody synths for her to write over, but no effort went into streamlining this as a memorable pop song. Which is fair enough given the context, but it does leave the song sounding a little directionless and without much of a strong tune. Again I can see why this is a bonus track and doesn’t quite fit on Midnights standard edition, which is a way more melodically robust album than some people give it credit for. Nonetheless, as a standalone cut this is still well worth hearing, tragic stuff.
8/10
“Everybody” by Nicki Minaj ft. Lil Uzi Vert
Peak #26, Current #39
There aren’t a lot of albums released in December, but this year Nicki Minaj gave us Pink Friday 2. I tried to listen to the album, but made it about halfway through before realising I would rather spend the lead-up to Christmas doing literally anything else. I think this track will end up getting surpassed as the biggest hit off the album, but right now it’s the highest charting of those that have broken the top 40.
I’ve seen this variously described as both the worst and best song on the album, which I guess depends largely on how you feel about the sample. PF2 was very heavy on the sampling, mostly for the worst, and this track is based around the early 2000s dance song Move Your Feet by Junior Senior. It never charted on the Hot 100, but Europeans like myself will undoubtedly be very familiar with it, it’s a great jam.
I’ve seen Everybody described as “Jersey club” which I can only assume is a genre characterised by chopping up samples in a very annoying way so that the song never develops any tune. Move Your Feet is a good song because of the infectious groove that comes with the bass, horns and chorus melody. This song just repeats the word “everybody” and the little four-beat lead-in to the chorus, but never actually drops the beat. The song is just one long tease, it’s infuriating to listen to. Just drop the beat for fuck’s sake, I’m hearing “booddyyy” 500 times without getting the breakdown, it’s driving me up the wall. And it’s not like Nicki and Uzi’s generic flexing that only uses one flow is a good substitute for the lack of tune.
Considering that a lot of PF2 (or the first half anyway, the bit that I actually made it through) was just quite boring, especially instrumentally, I can see why some people might pick this song out as a highlight. It does at least have quite a lot of energy. But the energy doesn’t translate to anything, it’s just a lot of stuttered sampling and aimless bars that don’t lead to any payoff. This is the kind of music you make when you’re really out of ideas. Now let me go listen to the original and finally get to hear that sweet beat drop.
3/10
December average: 5.5/10
Worth listening to: “You’re Losing Me”
🙂
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