“Propuesta Indecente”

Teoría de la Evolución (Desfile de Éxitos 2/11/17)

This week’s Pick to Click is right up front, so you can listen while you read about some… updates to Billboard magazine’s chart methodologies. Woo hoo! (Trust me, the song’s pretty.)

This week Billboard magazine changed the way it compiles some of its singles charts, including the Hot Latin chart. The magazine started including streaming data from Pandora, and it “rebalanced the ratio among sales, airplay and streaming, accounting for changes in music consumption patterns, i.e., increases in streaming and decreases in sales.” This rebalancing happens every once in a while, but figuring in the Pandora data is new. You might think we’d notice the Pandora effect on the Hot Latin chart, since Latin music is 11% of what gets streamed on Pandora, where 25% of users identify as Hispanic. It’s also worth noting that, in 2016, two thirds of Pandora’s most popular Latin songs were Regional Mexican, and that the list was dominated by hot young studs singing Sierreño: Ariel Camacho, Los Plebes del Rancho, Crecer Germán, and Adriel Favela‘s genre foray “Tomen Nota.” Teen idols taking over!

But if you compare this week’s chart with the one from three weeks ago (or with last week’s), not much seems to have changed. Shakira’s “La Bicicleta” abruptly disappeared from its place in the top 10, and Banda MS‘s “Tengo Que Colgar” now appears only on the Regional Mexican Airplay chart. (Good! Whenever I stream that song it makes my phone run slower.) But on the whole, songs that were climbing before have continued their trajectory, some older songs have dropped off, and Regional Mexican still occupies eight of the top 25 spots, a consistent ratio in recent weeks. Hot young Sierreño stud Ulices Chaidez has two songs in the top 25 — but he did last week, too. So maybe this continuity simply means Billboard got its rebalance right, and that its charts reflect music as it’s actually listened to.

While we’re talking chart data, the Top Latin Albums chart also got an update: it switched from a sales-only formula to “a multi-metric methodology, blending pure album sales, track equivalent album (TEA) units, and streaming equivalent album (SEA) units.” (The big album chart, the Billboard 200, has done this for a while now.) This created much more dramatic changes from last week to this week, mostly in favor of artists whose fans skew younger. Continue reading “Teoría de la Evolución (Desfile de Éxitos 2/11/17)” →

February 1, 2017 1

Desfile de Éxitos 1/23/16

While NorteñoBlog was away from the charts over Christmas, something unexpected happened. The listening public, perhaps because they were feeling unusually decent, STOPPED LISTENING TO “PROPUESTA INDECENTE.” Or at least they listened to it less. And because King Romeo’s ballad had spent more than one year on the Hot Latin chart, and because it had lately dropped to #5, and because Billboard writes you off the Hot Latin chart after a year if you drop below #5 — OUR LONG NATIONAL INDECENCY IS OVER!!!!! “Propuesta Indecente” ended its record 125-week chart run the week of January 2. We extend a hearty congratulations to King Romeo and all those who have swooned in his name.

(Alternate lead: “Propuesta Indecente” was destroyed January 2 when a small band of resistance fighters blew up its thermal oscillator, destabilizing the star-killing juggernaut and exiling King Romeo to his recording studio. In a prepared statement the King said, “Don’t worry, I’ll build another one,” and then chuckled with craven glee.)

Maybe coincidentally, the week of January 2 saw an enormous number of Regional Mexican songs climbing the Hot Latin chart: 14 out of the top 25, to be exact. (Usually the top 25 contains around 10 or 11.) Since that week the number has dropped to 13, many of which are holdovers from last year, but there are a few interesting things happening. Continue reading “Desfile de Éxitos 1/23/16” →

January 13, 2016 1

Desfile de Éxitos 11/28/15

A couple weeks ago Billboard reported that Ariel Camacho‘s “Hablemos” had debuted at #44 on its Hot Latin chart. This is the same “Hablemos” whose yearning, lovey-dovey video dropped in March of 2014, almost a year before Camacho died; it now has 48 million views. This week the song moves up to #14 Hot Latin and #9 on the airplay chart, and it’s also the title track of a new Camacho album. Hablemos (DEL) contains some previously released songs and some apparently unreleased ones that I wanna call “unearthed,” or “liberated from the vaults,” or maybe “scraped from the studio dustbin.”

Not that Hablemos is a bad album. As Sierreño offshoots go, it’s better than the latest by Los Cuates, because Camacho’s guitar chops and his interplay with Omar Burgos’s tuba elevate his music to its own league. But aside from “Entre Pláticas Y Dudas,” a killer two-year-old corrido that’s this week’s Pick to Click, the whole thing feels a bit lethargic.

Continue reading →

November 18, 2015 0

Desfile de Éxitos 9/26/15

ROBERTO TAPIA GRAPPLES WITH FEELINGS, FENG SHUI ON BEACH:

If you’ve hung around NorteñoBlog for very long, you’ll know that when I fall for a Roberto Tapia banda single, I fall hard. So it is with his new tune “No Valoraste” — the waltz beat is stiffer than his previous “Me Enamoré” and “Mirando Al Cielo,” but the high-climbing melody sounds great in his upper range. Along with Friday’s brand new video, and having heard it on the radio a couple times last week, “No Valoraste” shoots into Pick to Click status. And by all means watch that video: it’s like Ingmar Bergman shot a novela on the beach using the castoff furniture from Return to Oz. See Tapia and his ex-mujer stalk one another in symbolically opposing color schemes, as they seek cold comfort from an absent God and/or Princess Ozma.

Tapia’s at #4 on the airplay chart, so the streams racked up by this new video should propel him onto the big Hot Latin chart next week.

ADRIEL FAVELA WALKS THE BOOTY BEAT:
Continue reading “Desfile de Éxitos 9/26/15” →

September 21, 2015 3

Desfile De Éxitos 6/27/15

Four new tunes from the NorteñoBlog milieu join this week’s charts. At the top of the heap, cracking the top 20 on the Hot Latin chart, is the latest mind numbing ballad from Banda MS, “A Lo Mejor.” You’re forgiven if you’ve forgotten “A Lo Mejor” since we last encountered it, because IT NUMBED YOUR MIND. But the video is entertaining twist-ending novela fare; you can tell it cost a lot, and that nobody shooting the video could remember the song they were supposedly depicting, either.

The other three new songs, all near the bottom of the Regional Mexican airplay chart, sound better to varying degrees. Arrolladora’s “Confesion” is faster and more minor-keyed than much of their recent output. Faint praise, but then, it’s been a while since these guys left an impression. Los Tucanes’ corrido “Suena La Banda” stomps along with guest stars Código FN. Several several members of Código are confined to standing around singing in their sparkly jackets without their instruments, but their tubist gets in some good licks, and both bands’ drummers find a way to coexist. Even better is the magic changes title track from Vete Acostumbrando, the latest album by psychedelic corridista and family man Larry Hernández. Lots of crammed-in words and snarling, which beats Larry attempting to croon.

It’d be this week’s Pick to Click if NorteñoBlog wasn’t a total sucker for Tito “El Bambino” and his attempts to sound like a more romantic Pet Shop Boys. Like the aforementioned Banda MS song, “Como Antes” enters the Hot Latin top 20. Unlike Banda MS, Tito plays majestic reggaeton synth pop with pounding drums and low voices comically interjecting things like “MAMACITA” every so often. Great vocal harmonies, too. The acerbic voice of Zion &/or Lennox appears midway through to scrape the plaque from your heart.

Continue reading “Desfile De Éxitos 6/27/15” →

June 19, 2015 0

Desfile de Éxitos 6/13/15

When Pitbull someday releases a career-spanning greatest hits album, it’ll be a monster. He’s got one hits album already: 2012’s Original Hits compiled his early stuff from TVT records and it looks good (I confess I haven’t heard all the songs), but since he released it in the midst of the Planet Pit/Voli Vodka world takeover, most of the world outside the 305 area code overlooked it. NorteñoBlog doesn’t often cover Pitbull because he has about as much to do with regional Mexican music as Rita Moreno does. (I confess I have even LESS of a connection to the format, but here we are.) But since he is possibly the most charming man on the planet — he needs to be loved slightly more than everybody else does — I will share my theory of Pitbull hits:

There are two tiers of Pitbull hits. The top tier includes such monster EDM smashes as “Timber,” “Give Me Everything,” and “Time of Our Lives,” and these songs are pretty good, just as the Planet Pit album was pretty good. That’s disc one of our hypothetical career spanning compilation. But the second tier, our hypothetical disc two of smaller hits… THAT’S where Pitbull hides his gold. I’m talking stuff like last year’s #23 hit “Fireball,” his astounding Ying Yang Twins feature “Shake” (included on Original Hits), 2010’s phenomenal, bilingual, featuring-Lil-Jon-and-everybody “Watagatapitusberry,” and the Pick to Click that climbs this week to #25 on Hot Latin, “El Taxi” featuring Sensato & Cuban oral sex freedom fighter Osmani Garcia. (“Chupi Chupi” was the too sexy song in question.) It’s really Garcia’s song — he originally received top billing and it’s more than a year old at this point, with 111 million Youtube views, but I assume it’ll appear on Pit’s forthcoming Spanish album Dale. “El Taxi” is lowdown and slinky. It features car horns beeping. I mean, come on.

Continue reading “Desfile de Éxitos 6/13/15” →

June 5, 2015 1

Desfile de Éxitos 5/30/15

On Tuesday the celebrated prog-corridista Gerardo Ortiz released his fifth album, Hoy Más Fuerte. Yes, prog: Ortiz insists he plays “corridos progresivos” and this new album goes on way too long. Unfortunately, Fuerte is NOT an instrumental concept album devoted to cartel bosses, along the lines of Rick Wakeman’s The Six Wives of Henry VIII. (“We are honored to release a recording of this magnitude,” said A&M’s 1973 ad in The Village Voice; I bet Del and Sony feel the same way about Gerardo.)

The album’s first single, though, is an ode to “El Cholo,” the work handle of incarcerated Sinaloa Cartel honcho Orso Gastélum Ivan Cruz, captured in March for the second time after escaping prison back in 2008. Ortiz already released the first verse of this song as a teaser back in January, when El Cholo was still at large, but it’s fun to imagine the guy bragging from inside his new prison suite — “Aquí van a respetar!” Canny timing and, since it’s the only new norteño song on the lifeless charts, this week’s Pick to Click! Despite my misgivings about the album, “El Cholo” is a pretty good song, with drums set to churn and an accordion that can’t quit spitting out licks. They make it all sound so easy.

In other news, probable best singer on the continent Julión Álvarez scores his fifth Regional Mexican Airplay #1 with a middling romantic ballad, and “Propuesta Indecente” notches its 95th week on the Hot Latin chart. I’m pretty sure that makes “Propuesta Indecente” older than my orange cat, now a fully grown terror who picks on my other 14-year-old gray cat. (Orange cat has always been at war with gray cat.) Go sing the song to someone you love, and maybe it’ll go away. If not, someone you love will.

These are the top 25 Hot Latin Songs and top 20 Regional Mexican Songs, courtesy Billboard, as published May 30.

1. “El Perdón” – Nicky Jam & Enrique Iglesias
2. “Ay Vamos” – J Balvin
3. “Propuesta Indecente” – Romeo Santos (95 WEEKS OLD)
4. “Fanatica Sensual” – Plan B
5. “Hilito” – Romeo Santos
6. “Hablame de Ti” – Banda MS (#3 RegMex) (snoooooozzzzzz)
7. “El Amor De Su Vida” – Julión Álvarez y Su Norteño Banda (#1 RegMex)
8. “Travesuras” – Nicky Jam
9. “Sigueme y Te Sigo” – Daddy Yankee
10. “Contigo” – Calibre 50 (#2 RegMex)

11. “Mi Verdad” – Maná ft. Shakira
12. “Me Sobrabas Tu” – Banda Los Recoditos (#5 RegMex)
13. “Nota de Amor” – Wisin + Carlos Vives ft. Daddy Yankee
14. “Pierdo la Cabeza” – Zion & Lennox
15. “Malditas Ganas” – El Komander (#4 RegMex)
16. “Te Metiste” – Ariel Camacho y Los Plebes del Rancho (#17 RegMex)
17. “Perdido En Tus Ojos” – Don Omar ft. Natti Natasha
18. “Solita” – Prince Royce
19. “La Gozadera” – Gente de Zona ft. Marc Anthony
20. “Lejos De Aqui” – Farruko

21. “Bonito Y Bello” – La Septima Banda (#8 RegMex)
22. “Mi Vicio Mas Grande” – Banda Los Recoditos (#10 RegMex)
23. “Un Zombie A La Intemperie” – Alejandro Sanz
24. “El Cholo” – Gerardo Ortiz (#12 RegMex)
25. “Calla y Me Besas” – Enigma Norteña (#6 RegMex)

¡Adios!
“Inocente” – Romeo Santos
—————–

7. “El Que Se Enamora Pierde” – Banda Carnaval
9. “Levantando Polvadera” – Voz De Mando

11. “Soltero Disponible” – Regulo Caro
13. “Que Aun Te Amo” – Pesado
14. “Si Te Vuelvo a Ver” – La Maquinaria Norteña
15. “Como Tu No Hay Dos” – Los Huracanes del Norte
16. “Cuando La Miro” – Luis Coronel
18. “Mayor De Edad” – La Original Banda El Limón
19. “Que Tal Si Eres Tu” – Los Tigres Del Norte
20. “Debajo Del Sombrero” – Leandro Rios ft. Pancho Uresti

¡Adios!
“El Quesito” – Omar Ruiz”
“Dime” – Julión Álvarez y Su Norteño Banda

May 22, 2015 0

Desfile de Éxitos 5/16/15

The charts, and thus NorteñoBlog’s life, are in tumult this week. This is a good thing! Though of course, just looking at the top 10, you might be fooled into thinking the chart remains a tepid pool of stagnancy and age. King Romeo’s blockbuster hit is closing in on two years of proposing indecencies to its poor neighbors, one of whom happens to be King Romeo’s NEW blockbuster hit. (“Propuesta Indecente” has always been at war with “Hilito”?) And yes, the Julión Álvarez ballad going top 10 on Billboard‘s Hot Latin chart is some weak sofrito — but, on the other hand, it’s Julión Álvarez. NorteñoBlog likes him. Just a week ago, he dropped the official video for “El Amor De Su Vida,” and already it’s got three and a half million views. I won’t begrudge him his success with necking music, and I encourage him to release “El Aferrado” as a single cuanto antes.

Further down the list, things get more interesting. Ariel Camacho’s “Te Metiste” is up to #14 overall and #12 on Regional Mexican airplay; not bad for a posthumous ballad played by a sparse, deliberative trio configuration used by nobody else on the radio. El Komander’s “Malditas Ganas” continues to climb, and two songs that are new to the overall list — Enigma Norteño’s racing quartet tune “Calla Y Me Besas” and La Séptima Banda’s swanky, Tower of Power-ish “Bonito Y Bello” — bring as much energy as the songs they replace. Down on the Regional Mexican airplay chart, Recodo’s “Mi Vicio Más Grande” is their skippiest hit in who knows how long.

The Pick to Click is another one that’s new to the airplay chart: “Debajo Del Sombrero” by Leandro Rios ft. Pancho Uresti, whose new career seems to be guesting on everyone else’s songs. It’s two guys talking big to the father of their beloved, trying to convince him their humble ranchera ways render them worthy of his daughter’s affection. It also takes as much pleasure in the act of rhyming as any random song by Sondheim. Although, going through my Spanish rudiments, I’m disappointed the song doesn’t take place in enero, and why doesn’t our heroic caballero own a perro?

These are the top 25 Hot Latin Songs and top 20 Regional Mexican Songs, courtesy Billboard, as published May 16.

1. “El Perdón” – Nicky Jam & Enrique Iglesias
2. “Ay Vamos” – J Balvin
3. “Propuesta Indecente” – Romeo Santos (93 WEEKS OLD)
4. “Hilito” – Romeo Santos
5. “Hablame de Ti” – Banda MS (#2 RegMex) (snoooooozzzzzz)
6. “Contigo” – Calibre 50 (#1 RegMex)
7. “Travesuras” – Nicky Jam
8. “Fanatica Sensual” – Plan B
9. “Mi Verdad” – Maná ft. Shakira
10. “El Amor De Su Vida” – Julión Álvarez y Su Norteño Banda (#3 RegMex)

11. “Nota de Amor” – Wisin + Carlos Vives ft. Daddy Yankee
12. “Sigueme y Te Sigo” – Daddy Yankee
13. “Me Sobrabas Tu” – Banda Los Recoditos (#6 RegMex)
14. “Te Metiste” – Ariel Camacho y Los Plebes del Rancho (#12 RegMex)
15. “Pierdo la Cabeza” – Zion & Lennox
16. “Solita” – Prince Royce
17. “Malditas Ganas” – El Komander (#7 RegMex)
18. “Lejos De Aqui” – Farruko
19. “El Que Se Enamora Pierde” – Banda Carnaval (#5 RegMex)
20. “Dime” – Julión Álvarez y Su Norteño Banda (#14 RegMex)

21. “Un Zombie A La Intemperie” – Alejandro Sanz
22. “Calla y Me Besas” – Enigma Norteña (#4 RegMex)
23. “Inocente” – Romeo Santos
24. “Perdido En Tus Ojos” – Don Omar ft. Natti Natasha
25. “Bonito Y Bello” – La Septima Banda (#10 RegMex)

¡Adios!
“Juntos (Together)” – Juanes
—————–

8. “Levantando Polvadera” – Voz De Mando
9. “Soltero Disponible” – Regulo Caro

11. “Que Aun Te Amo” – Pesado
13. “Si Te Vuelvo a Ver” – La Maquinaria Norteña
14. “Como Tu No Hay Dos” – Los Huracanes del Norte
15. “Cuando La Miro” – Luis Coronel
16. “Mayor De Edad” – La Original Banda El Limón
17. “Que Tal Si Eres Tu” – Los Tigres Del Norte
18. “Mi Vicio Más Grande” – Banda El Recodo
19. “Debajo Del Sombrero” – Leandro Rios ft. Pancho Uresti
20. “El Quesito” – Omar Ruiz”

¡Adios!
“Todo Tuyo” – Banda El Recodo
“Se Me Sigue Notando” – Chuy Lizarraga y Su Banda Tierra Sinaloense
“Eres Tú” – Proyecto X
“Lo Hiciste Otra Vez” – La Arrolladora Banda El Limón
“Qué Tiene De Malo” – Calibre 50 ft. El Komander

May 8, 2015 2

Desfile de Éxitos 5/2/15

Some NorteñoBlog favorites are climbing the Billboard charts this week, and so NorteñoBlog is happy, even as “Bailando” doble “El Perdón” continues at #1. Ariel Camacho’s love song “Te Metiste” is either laconic or intense, possibly depending on whether in it you hear echoes of his signature song “El Karma,” which grows stranger with every spin on the radio. “Te Metiste” is at #19 on Hot Latin and nowhere on the airplay list, indicating support from mostly streams and downloads, but give it time — regional Mexican radio knows to respond to listeners’ whims, so all those clicks could yet translate into another weird radio song.

A little further down, Alfredo Ríos El Komander’s shambolic breakup song “Malditas Ganas” is at #24, making it his second biggest solo hit after last year’s “Soy De Rancho.” In fact, in the third verse Ríos offers to serenade his lost love with “Soy De Rancho,” but he still ends the song lonely. The same thing happens to me whenever I serenade my wife with “Soy De Rancho.” This song’s been kicking around the Mexican chart all year, so let’s roll out the welcome mat. And while we’re at it, let’s welcome Los Tigres’ bouncy pickup line “Que Tal Si Eres Tu” to El Norte’s radios. The second single from Realidades is wonderfully spry, especially when you consider Los Tigres are basically at the same career point as the Stones when they released A Bigger Bang.

In non-norteño news, #3 “Propuesta Indecente” is now 91 weeks old; I propose it stick some tennis balls on its walker before it scratches up my floors. And at #5, Wisin et al’s entirely decent “Nota de Amor” would like an order of paella from one clad in yellow underwear. At the Singles Jukebox, Juana Giaimo reasonably asks, “Why don’t you do it yourself?”

These are the top 25 Hot Latin Songs and top 20 Regional Mexican Songs, courtesy Billboard, as published May 2.

1. “El Perdón” – Nicky Jam & Enrique Iglesias
2. “Ay Vamos” – J Balvin
3. “Propuesta Indecente” – Romeo Santos (91 WEEKS OLD)
4. “Hablame de Ti” – Banda MS (#2 RegMex) (snoooooozzzzzz)
5. “Nota de Amor” – Wisin + Carlos Vives ft. Daddy Yankee
6. “Hilito” – Romeo Santos
7. “Contigo” – Calibre 50 (#1 RegMex)
8. “Travesuras” – Nicky Jam
9. “Mi Verdad” – Maná ft. Shakira
10. “Fanatica Sensual” – Plan B

11. “Sigueme y Te Sigo” – Daddy Yankee
12. “Pierdo la Cabeza” – Zion & Lennox
13. “El Amor De Su Vida” – Julión Álvarez y Su Norteño Banda (#8 RegMex)
14. “Me Sobrabas Tu” – Banda Los Recoditos (#11 RegMex)
15. “Qué Tiene De Malo” – Calibre 50 ft. El Komander (#18 RegMex)
16. “Lejos De Aqui” – Farruko
17. “Dime” – Julión Álvarez y Su Norteño Banda (#14 RegMex)
18. “Solita” – Prince Royce
19. “Te Metiste” – Ariel Camacho y Los Plebes del Rancho
20. “Soltero Disponible” – Regulo Caro (#3 RegMex)

21. “Lo Hiciste Otra Vez” – La Arrolladora Banda El Limón (#6 RegMex) (Oh dear, this is not good. Not just sap — meandering sap.)
22. “Juntos (Together)” – Juanes
23. “El Que Se Enamora Pierde” – Banda Carnaval (#5 RegMex)
24. “Malditas Ganas” – El Komander (#13 RegMex)
25. “Inocente” – Romeo Santos

¡Adios!
“Disparo Al Corazon” – Ricky Martin
“Yo También” – Romeo Santos ft. Marc Anthony
—————–

4. “Calla y Me Besas” – Enigma Norteña
7. “Levantando Polvadera” – Voz De Mando
9. “Que Aun Te Amo” – Pesado
10. “Eres Tú” – Proyecto X

12. “Como Tu No Hay Dos” – Los Huracanes del Norte
15. “Se Me Sigue Notando” – Chuy Lizarraga y Su Banda Tierra Sinaloense
16. “Todo Tuyo” – Banda El Recodo
17. “Si Te Vuelvo a Ver” – La Maquinaria Norteña
18. “Bonito Y Bello” – La Septima Banda
19. “Cuando La Miro” – Luis Coronel
20. “Que Tal Si Eres Tu” – Los Tigres Del Norte

¡Adios!
“No Te Vayas” – Fidel Rueda
“Eres Una Niña” – Gerardo Ortíz (#13 RegMex)
“El Karma” – Ariel Camacho y Los Plebes del Rancho (#11 RegMex)

April 24, 2015 0