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    The 15 Songs That Hit No. 1 This Year (So Far)

    Hear tracks by Shaboozey, Sabrina Carpenter, Kendrick Lamar and more.Shaboozey reached No. 1 on the Hot 100 this week for the first time with “A Bar Song (Tipsy).”Daniel PrakopcykDear listeners,It’s Caryn the editor here again, seizing control of the playlist one more time (don’t worry, you’ll have Lindsay back next week).On Monday, Shaboozey reached the top of Billboard’s Hot 100 with “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” making him the second Black artist to hit No. 1 on both the all-genre singles chart and Hot Country Songs. Somehow both milestones came this year: Beyoncé did it first with “Texas Hold ’Em.”The news got me scrolling through what’s topped the Hot 100 so far in 2024 — over the last 27 weeks, 15 songs have done it. And we’re going to listen to all of them in The Amplifier today.It’s always interesting to see how the official chart stacks up against cultural vibes. It may feel like the summer of “Espresso,” but Sabrina Carpenter’s Certified Bop hasn’t hit No. 1 in the United States (yet). It doesn’t just seem like Taylor Swift’s “The Tortured Poets Department” is dominating 2024: It is, with 11 straight weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 album chart. But only one of its songs — its opener, “Fortnight,” featuring Post Malone — has spent any time atop the Hot 100. Ariana Grande’s “Eternal Sunshine” has had two songs summit the singles chart; Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter” had the one. Billie Eilish and Chappell Roan haven’t hit No. 1 yet this year, but I wouldn’t count them out.The longest run belongs to “I Had Some Help,” by Post Malone featuring Morgan Wallen (six weeks, five of them consecutive). Two songs from the Kendrick Lamar vs. Drake beef hit No. 1; perhaps unsurprisingly considering the outcome, they were both Lamar’s.So let’s take a trip through the recent past together — and for fun (or counterprogramming), see how the biggest songs of the year (so far) compare to our critics’ best songs of the year (so far).We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Ariana Grande Beats Kacey Musgraves and Justin Timberlake on the Chart

    “Everything I Thought It Was,” Justin Timberlake’s first new album since “Man of the Woods” six years ago, opens in fourth place.Ariana Grande holds the No. 1 spot on Billboard’s album chart this week with “Eternal Sunshine,” beating out new releases by Kacey Musgraves and Justin Timberlake.“Eternal Sunshine,” Grande’s first new studio album in almost four years, stays at the top for a second time with the equivalent of just over 100,000 sales in the United States, including 115 million streams and 13,000 copies sold as a complete package, according to the tracking service Luminate.Grande’s total was down 56 percent from its opening week, giving it enough — by a thin margin — to succeed over Musgraves’s “Deeper Well,” which started with the equivalent of 97,000. “Deeper Well,” Musgraves’s second LP since winning album of the year at the Grammys in 2019 with “Golden Hour,” starts at No. 2 with 38 million streams and 66,000 copies sold. Those sales included 37,000 copies of the album’s nine vinyl editions — among them a picture disc showing cardinals in a tree and another featuring “scented sleeves.”“Everything I Thought It Was,” Timberlake’s first new album since “Man of the Woods” six years ago, opens in fourth place with the equivalent of 67,000 sales. It is Timberlake’s first solo studio album not to make it to No. 1 since “Justified,” which went to second place in 2002.Also this week, Morgan Wallen’s “One Thing at a Time” is No. 3 and Noah Kahan’s “Stick Season” is No. 5. More

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    Ariana Grande’s ‘Eternal Sunshine’ Is the Biggest Album of 2024 Yet

    The pop singer’s sixth No. 1 album opens at the top with the equivalent of 227,000 sales in the United States.Ariana Grande’s long-awaited new album, “Eternal Sunshine,” opens at the top of the latest Billboard chart with the biggest debut of the year so far, kicking off a season of expected blockbusters from Beyoncé, Taylor Swift and Dua Lipa.“Eternal Sunshine,” Grande’s seventh studio album and her first in almost four years, starts at No. 1 with the equivalent of 227,000 sales in the United States, including 195 million streams and 77,000 copies sold as a complete package, according to the tracking service Luminate. After a first single, “Yes, And?,” went to No. 1 in January, the full album arrived with Grande performing on “Saturday Night Live” and then — along with Cynthia Erivo, her co-star in the upcoming two-part “Wicked” film — appearing as a presenter at the Oscars.“Eternal Sunshine” is Grande’s sixth No. 1 album. All of her studio LPs have gone to the top except “Dangerous Woman” in 2016, which was held at No. 2 by that year’s juggernaut, Drake’s “Views.”Since her last album, “Positions” (2020), Grande has been shooting an adaptation of the Broadway musical “Wicked,” in which she will play Glinda the Good. Production on the film was delayed first by the coronavirus and then by last year’s SAG-AFTRA strike; the first “Wicked” film is now set to be released in November.Grande’s first-week numbers are the best for any new album this year by a decent margin, topping Ye and Ty Dolla Sign’s “Vultures 1” (148,000). More big figures are on the horizon for Beyoncé’s country pivot, “Cowboy Carter,” due at the end of this month; Swift’s “The Tortured Poets Department,” in April; and then Lipa’s “Radical Optimism,” in May.Also this week, Morgan Wallen’s “One Thing at a Time,” which hit No. 1 for the 19th time last week, falls to No. 2. Noah Kahan’s “Stick Season” is No. 3, “Vultures 1” is No. 4 and SZA’s “SOS” is No. 5. More

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    Popcast (Deluxe): What’s an Industry Plant Anyway? Plus: Ariana Grande

    Subscribe to Popcast!Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTubeThis week’s episode of Popcast (Deluxe), the weekly culture roundup show on YouTube hosted by Jon Caramanica and Joe Coscarelli, includes segments on:Popcast’s win at the 2024 iHeartPodcast Awards for best music podcastThe 2024 Oscars, including Ryan Gosling’s performance of “I’m Just Ken” and Diane Warren’s reported meltdownThe quick ascent of the downtempo R&B singer 4batz and what the “industry plant” conversation that he’s triggered gets wrongThe new Ariana Grande album, “eternal sunshine,” and how it’s an impressive and modest comeback in advance of her star turn in the upcoming film adaptation of “Wicked”Reports from the opening nights of the Olivia Rodrigo tour and the Zach Bryan tourNew songs from Yung Lean and Yaya BeySnack of the weekConnect With Popcast. Become a part of the Popcast community: Join the show’s Facebook group and Discord channel. We want to hear from you! Tune in, and tell us what you think at popcast@nytimes.com. Follow our host, Jon Caramanica, on Twitter: @joncaramanica. More

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    ‘SNL’ Riffs on the State of the Union and Republican Response

    The Republican rebuttal delivered by Senator Katie Britt already struck many viewers as parody, making Scarlett Johansson’s job look easy.It was inevitable that “Saturday Night Live” would sample heavily from the buffet of satirical potential offered by Thursday’s State of the Union. Perhaps the only question going into this weekend’s broadcast, hosted by Josh Brolin and featuring the musical guest Ariana Grande, was who would play Senator Katie Britt of Alabama, who delivered the much-discussed Republican response to President Biden’s speech.As it turned out, “S.N.L.” did not draw from its own cast for this role, but it didn’t look far to find someone: Britt was played by Scarlett Johansson, the two-time Academy Award-nominated actress, six-time “S.N.L.” host and — yes — wife of Colin Jost, the Weekend Update co-anchor.Following a brief introduction from Ego Nwodim as CNN’s Abby Phillip, the show began with Mikey Day, now the resident Biden impersonator at “S.N.L.,” taking his place in front of Punkie Johnson (as Vice President Harris) and Michael Longfellow (as Speaker Mike Johnson).“Folks,” Day said, “tonight I’m going to cover a lot. There’s going to be a lot of applause. So, Kamala, I hope you didn’t skip leg day, girl. You’re going to be up and down all night.” (Naturally, Johnson stood up and applauded; Longfellow did not.)Day continued: “Tonight, I’m also going to be talking about my predecessor,” he said. “Mainly because every time I say predecessor, Mike Johnson shakes his head, like he just accidentally caught 30 seconds of the show ‘Euphoria.’ Look at that weirdo.”After being booed by Heidi Gardner (who was playing Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene), Day threw to the Republican response: “I think she’s going to help me more than anything else I could say here,” he said. “Enjoy.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Ariana Grande’s Album ‘Eternal Sunshine’ Spins Heartbreak Into Gold

    The pop star sets the end of a romance and the start of a new one to a soundtrack awash in lavish atmosphere and adventurous melodies, with help from Max Martin.In 2019, the altitudinous-voiced pop star Ariana Grande released an exquisitely unbothered breakup song titled “Thank U, Next” — a light, chiming smash that mentioned several of her famous exes by name and then blithely banished them from her heart forever with a wink and a smile.But the heartache that fuels her seventh album, “Eternal Sunshine,” is of a considerably deeper variety; it even takes its name from Michel Gondry’s 2004 movie about the impossible fantasy of purging a past relationship from memory. “I try to wipe my mind, just so I feel less insane,” Grande, 30, sings on its skittering, mid-tempo title track. The potent melancholy that suffuses the song, and much of the album, tells you about how well that went.“Eternal Sunshine” is Grande’s first album in over three years, which is a considerable pause after a prolific stretch where she put out a hit LP nearly annually. She followed the poised, polished “Sweetener” in 2018 with two quickly produced albums that felt more off-the-cuff and conversational: the intimate and revelatory “Thank U, Next” and the love-struck but less consistent “Positions.”Since then, she got divorced from her husband of two years, Dalton Gomez, and started a romance with Ethan Slater, her co-star in the upcoming movie version of the hit musical “Wicked.” An overall narrative arc of heartbreak and new love unfolds on “Eternal Sunshine.” But, in a departure from her last several albums — one of which featured a song named for Pete Davidson, the comedian to whom she was then engaged — Grande stops short of explicit nods to autobiography and lets sweeping, wholehearted emotion tell the story.“Eternal Sunshine” is Grande’s most sustained collaboration with pop’s own Wizard of Oz, the Swedish hitmaker Max Martin, with whom she wrote or produced 11 of its 13 tracks. (Ilya Salmanzadeh, a longtime collaborator of both Grande and Martin, also helped write and produce much of the album.) Unsurprisingly, this is one of Grande’s most meticulously crafted and texturally consistent releases — it sounds as expensive as the gleaming treasures she sang about on “7 Rings” — though it lacks the whispered asides, rough edges and irreverent humor that made those last two albums so fun. Still, “Eternal Sunshine” is awash in lavish atmosphere, adventurous melodies and an emotional weight that brings a new sophistication to Grande’s songcraft.On a brief introduction subtitled “End of the World,” Grande expresses doubts about a relationship and pops a burning question in the glowing lower depths of her register: “If it all ended tomorrow, would I be the one on your mind?” The answer lies in the title of the following song: “Bye.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    How Ariana Grande’s ‘Yes, And?’ Relates to Madonna’s ‘Vogue’

    Madonna’s 1990 hit “Vogue” has enjoyed a recent renaissance. Ariana’s Grande’s first solo song in three years leans on its sound, but the similarities end there.There was never a question that Madonna’s 1990 pop-house classic “Vogue” was a tidal wave. But over the past year and a half, the song that helped bring the sounds of underground queer culture to the mainstream has continued to create powerful ripples.Since 2019 — when the track’s release was chronicled on the FX drama “Pose” alongside discussions about authorship and authenticity — the hit has been experiencing a slow, steady resurgence. In 2022, Beyoncé mashed it up with her ballroom-referencing “Break My Soul,” updating Madonna’s rap to pay tribute to Black pop icons, and starting last year, the remix was given prime placement on both Beyoncé’s and Madonna’s tours. Ariana DeBose performed a heavily memed adaptation of “Vogue” at the 2023 BAFTA Awards, and “Vogue” even garnered the ultimate symbol of 2020s relevance: It was sampled by the Puerto Rican superstar Bad Bunny on his album “Nadia Sabe Lo Que Va a Pasar Mañana.”Now “Vogue” is the animating reference on “Yes, And?,” the comeback single by Ariana Grande, who has spent three years out of the pop spotlight filming the movie version of “Wicked.” Like the original, written and produced by Madonna and Shep Pettibone, Grande’s song — credited to Grande, Max Martin and Ilya Salmanzadeh — features snappy synth drums; bright, syncopated stabs of piano; and a spoken-word bridge. But “Yes, And?” isn’t an invitation to the dance floor; it’s a rebuttal to Grande’s critics. So while it sounds superficially like “Vogue,” it doesn’t really feel like it.In the first part of her career, Grande was mainly a classicist with roots in hip-hop soul, ’90s R&B and brassy show tunes. Her fifth album, “Thank U, Next” from 2019, introduced a shift: Adopting the cadences and textures of contemporary rap, Grande provided raw, up-to-the-minute commentary on her personal life.“Yes, And?” attempts to marry the two sides of her music, providing a throwback musical canvas that she embellishes with her responses to those gossiping about her looks and her latest relationship, with her “Wicked” co-star Ethan Slater. While its bones are unmistakably rooted in “Vogue,” the song takes some turns: A pitched-up vocal sample makes the track feel busy, and Grande, a gifted singer, can’t resist the impulse to fill its empty spaces with high trills and flowery runs. When she approaches the final chorus, she belts the song’s title phrase as if she’s the world’s most effusive improv enthusiast.Paying tribute to an iconic song is risky business — just ask the many stars who have interpolated or sampled recent hits, only to come off like craven impersonators — and “Vogue,” in particular, is a masterpiece of elegance and restraint. Unlike many Madonna singles, “Vogue” is a remarkably selfless endeavor; it was inspired by the bold, creative queer pioneers of New York’s ballroom culture, and pays tribute to the scene without laying claim to it or assuming its struggles.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More

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    Lil Nas X, Ariana Grande and 21 Savage Kick Off 2024

    Subscribe to Popcast!Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon MusicThis week’s episode of Popcast (Deluxe), the weekly culture roundup show on YouTube hosted by Jon Caramanica and Joe Coscarelli, includes segments on:Lil Nas X’s comeback single “J Christ,” a continuation of his trollcore pop narrative, with its ostentatious video and punchline-heavy media rolloutThe new 21 Savage album “American Dream,” the first blockbuster hip-hop album of the year, with many high-profile features and some reckoning with the immigration case that nearly derailed his careerThe sonic shift in Ariana Grande’s new song, “Yes, And?,” her first solo single in three yearsNew tracks from Bizarrap featuring Young Miko, and Jastin MartinSnack of the weekConnect With Popcast. Become a part of the Popcast community: Join the show’s Facebook group and Discord channel. We want to hear from you! Tune in, and tell us what you think at popcast@nytimes.com. Follow our host, Jon Caramanica, on Twitter: @joncaramanica. More