On this week’s Scoreboard, Sam Smith tops the Billboard 200, while Maroon 5 take #2 on the same chart
Billboard Artist Top 10
For the magazine dated November 25, 2017
See the full chart at http://www.billboard.com/charts/artist-100
| Billboard Artist Top 10 | Name | Billboard 200 Album Rank | Billboard Hot 100 Singles | Highest Charting Single |
| 1 | Sam Smith | 1 | 2 | 4: Too Good At Goodbyes |
| 2 | Maroon 5 | 2 | 2 | 9: What Lovers Do |
| 3 | Ed Sheeran | 10 | 2 | 8: Perfect |
| 4 | Taylor Swift | 68 | 4 | 27: Call It What You Want |
| 5 | Imagine Dragons | 13 | 2 | 5: Thunder |
| 6 | Post Malone | 9 | 5 | 1: Rockstar |
| 7 | Blake Shelton | 4 | 1 | 58: I’ll Name The Dogs |
| 8 | Pink | 14 | 1 | 17: What About Us |
| 9 | 21 Savage | 5 | 7 | 1: Rockstar |
| 10 | Kenny Chesney | 6 | – |
As the holiday release season kicks off, the competition on the Billboard charts heats up. Just this week five new albums debuted in the top 10 of the Billboard 200, led by Sam Smith and his much-anticipated second release The Thrill Of It All. Behind Smith is Maroon 5, with Red Pill Blues, the band’s six studio album. @samsmithworld and @maroon5 finish in the same order on the Billboard Artist 100.
Over on the Hot 100, Post Malone and 21 Savage earn their fifth week at #1 with “Rockstar,” holding off Camila Cabello and Young Thug‘s “Havana,” which stays at #2. Read last week’s Scoreboard feature on Cabello’s hit here.
Blake Shelton surprised everybody when People named him 2017’s Sexiest Man Alive. His new album Texoma Shore starts at #4 on the Billboard 200 this week.
Sam Smith Thrills
Eight weeks ago Sam Smith returned to the charts with single “Too Good At Goodbyes” and this week his second album The Thrill Of It All tops the Billboard 200. “Too Good At Goodbyes” surges to #4 on this week’s Hot 100, helped by the album’s release, while promotional single “Pray” sits at #82. On the new album, @samsmithworld doubles down on the ballads, with “Too Good At Goodbyes” ending up as the album’s fastest-paced track. When Smith was teasing the album a few weeks ago to Billboard, he noted that while working on it he “wasn’t trying to make a big pop record” and instead was “trying to make something more personal and like a diary.” What we get on The Thrill Of It All is a lot of Smith’s diary, in which he emotes on every song, rivaling the melodrama of Adele.
Smith demonstrates that he can be an angry type of emotional on the new album. For example, on “Nothing Left For You” he grumbles about how “gave [his] heart to a goddamn fool.” Smith’s past relationship also haunts him on “One Last Song,” which at least carries some hope of moving on from a bad romance. And then there is “HIM,” a song about coming out as a homosexual, which is not autobiographical, but is dedicated to the LGBT community, a track with gravitas exceeding that of Macklemore‘s “Same Love.” “HIM” becomes the album’s most consequential track because Smith escapes his personal baggage to write something more universal. The Thrill Of It All is a powerful comeback statement for @samsmithworld, although its lack of having “big pop” singles may not give it staying power on the charts. It is strong enough to earn some Grammy nominations for next year and taking #1 already gives Smith the comeback win he needs.
Sam Smith will take The Thrill Of It All on tour to the U.S. in the summer of 2018
Maroon 5 Feel the Red Pill Blues
Maroon 5 first made it on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2003 with “Harder To Breathe” and the Adam Levine-led band has consistently generated hits since, earning three #1s on the Hot 100. The leadup to their latest, Red Pill Blues, relied on collaborations with hip-hop stars. “I Don’t Wanna Know” ft. Kendrick Lamar came out in October 2016 and peaked at #6; “Cold” ft. Future followed taking #16. For the latest single, @maroon5 teamed up with rising R&B star SZA. The outcome is “What Lovers Do,” an exhibition of Levine at his coo-iest, which reaches a chart peak of #9 this week. The album also includes collaborations with Lunchmoney Lewis and A$AP Rocky, whose appearance on “Whiskey” may be the most boring guest feature of his career. However, that is not the fault of @asaprocky. It appears that @maroon5 are happy to coast on Red Pill Blues, the edge of “Harder To Breathe” is long gone and instead we get Levine asking Julia Michaels to “Help Me Out.” With Levine having been a coach on The Voice for 13 seasons, he needs new hits to perform and with “What Lovers Do” at least @sza can have a shot at being a household name. Even when the new album has “blues” in its title, Maroon 5 shows that the likeliest outcome of taking the red pill is more predictable pop.
Maroon’s 5 Red Pill Blues is available to buy on cassette