"There are tall ships, there are small ships, but there's no ship like Friendship". So the saying goes. There, of course over the years have been songs about friendships, and being there for others. You can start with the obvious: "I'll Be There For You", the theme from the TV show friends, which landed in the top 20 for The Rembrandts in 1995. Bon Jovi also offered to be there for you back in 1989 as well. Elton John made the top 40 with "Friends" which was from a soundtrack to an obscure movie back in the early 1970's. The Beach Boys and Bette Midler also had songs with that title as well. War asked "Why Can't We Be Friends" in 1975, and three years later, Andrew Gold exclaimed, "Thank You For Being A Friend", which later became the theme to another situation comedy, The Golden Girls.
Which brings us to the here and now...or should I say hear and now. Three friends songs appear on the SNS 100 this week. Leading the way are The Revivalists, which sit at #1 on the Billboard Triple-A list, and take a big leap from 54 to 18 with "All My Friends". Lovelytheband moves 73-63 with "These Are My Friends", while Foster the People---who hit #1 on my list back in 2014 with "Best Friend", have "I Love My Friends", dropping down to #82 in it's 21st week after peaking at #15.
It's good to know that in this dog-eat-dog world, there are still some awesome songs out there that tout friendship!
QUEEN MISSAL: Donna Missal still holds the top spot on the SNS 100 with "Keep Lying" which slowly expands its lead over Elle King's "Shame" and James Hunter Six's "I Don't Wanna Be Without You". A check on the Billboard charts still does not show anything by Ms. Missal, but the buzz continues. Sirus XM's "Alt Nation" channel's specialty show "Advanced Placement"---a list of up and coming songs to check out---lists Missal's "Transformer", alongside more established acts like Metric, The 1975, and Dreamers. Keep your eye on the Jersey girl...my gut feeling is that momentum is building and it just a matter of weeks before she hits either the Alternative and/or Triple-A chart. You heard it here, first.
Personally, despite myself knowing her aunt and her growing exposure, she remains somewhat of an enigma. But some controversy of sorts is brewing...this week there was a Billboard article on her, which you can click on here:
https://www.billboard.com/articles/news/pride/8477115/donna-missal-sexuality
Meanwhile, Elle King is doing well at rock radio with "Shame", as it inches up to #4 on Triple-A and 26 to 21 on the Alternative list. Will it be as big as "Ex's and Oh's"? Probably not, but it should make her a regular in the rock world and not a one album flash. "Shame" actually inches ahead in points of Hunter's "I Don't Wanna Live Without You"; but all three songs still bullet, and are distancing themselves ahead of the rest of the pack.
Elsewhere in the top 10, Shannon Marsyada's "Tough Girl" advances 10-6. As I mentioned last week, she is collecting funds for her new album Oceans, and is about a third of the way to her goal. Again, here is the Kick Starter link. I assure you, she is worth the investment:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1166979169/shannon-marsyada-oceans?ref=user_menu
Also making big strides are King Princess' "1950" (18-8) in high rotation on the Sirius XM channel, The Kooks' "Four Leaf Corner", 15-9 , a return to form for them, and their first top 10 SNS songs since "Is It Me" reached #2 in 2012; and Jeff Rosenstock's "9/10" moving 16 to 10 for his second top 10.
RAP SHEET: Looking to the Billboard Hot 100 (which hasn't been a pretty sight this year), we find Maroon 5's "Girls Like You", knocking out Drake's 10-week run of "In My Feelings". It thus ends a 34-week string of rap songs going back to the beginning of the 2018 when Ed Sheeran's "Perfect" had a six week run at the top (and also hit #1 here on SNS). Since then it's been all rap, and most of it unlistenable, and I avoided it at all possible. I broke down and added Drake's song a few weeks back as friends were chanting the opening line, "Kiki do you love me?". The song still bullets to #60 here this week, four notches behind "Girls Like You", which was already on my list. This is the first time that two Billboard number one songs back to back are on my list in a whole year. In September 2017, "Despacito" by Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee, was replaced by Taylor Swift's "Look What You Made Me Do"; both songs were on SNS. Since then, only "Perfect" made my list, until the two current songs.
And technically, Maroon 5's song features female rapper Cardi B in the middle of the record, so in a sense, the rap streak sort of continues.
KEEP 'EM COMING: Some really good tunes continue to pour onto my list this week with a few of them debuting high. When I was in my car last week, I had the Sirius XM station on and they played a new song by a band called Winnetka Bowling League. It was a cool rock song, perfect for that station. When it was over the DJ mentioned that this band was the brainchild of one Matthew Koma. Yes, that Matthew Koma the electronic music producer and DJ and the mastermind behind many songs in that genre, not to mention several SNS top 10 hits in that genre (and being friends with a friend of mine as well). In the pop world, although he has yet to appear on the Hot 100, he worked with Zedd featuring Foxes' "Clarity" which reached #17 here and #32 on the Hot 100. As a solo artist, he's done quite well here, with "Parachute" (#5), "One Night" (#13), both in 2013, and "Hard to Love" (#11) in 2017. He was also featured on The Knocks' "My Taylor Swift" (#6) in 2017.
Apparently Koma started out as a rocker, and perhaps it was time for the Long Islander to revisit his rock roots. WBL's debut tune, "On the 5", is actually more of a "dream pop" direction, but still way different from his EDM material. The song reminds me a bit of "Life In A Northern Town", the 1986 hit from the aptly-named Dream Academy. The video is cool as well, as it featured a different-looking Koma swimming and dancing around. The song is the Top Debut at #51 this week. Incidentally, Koma and his current girlfriend, actress Hilary Duff, are expecting a child this year.
MORE TENNIS, ANYONE: It took me well over half a year to discover Tennis' most recent full-length album Yours Conditionally, released in March 2017. So many awesome songs from it, I had to pull four songs out of the album, all reaching the top 10: "Ladies Don't Play Guitar" (#7), "In the Morning I'll Be Better" (#2), and the #1's "Modern Woman " and "My Emotions are Blinding". As it turns out, the husband-and-wife duo released an EP in November 2017, We Can Die Happy, along with two singles from it. The first, "No Exit", comes on the list at #58. It pretty much picks up right where they left off, with an appealing pop-rock-soul romp. They always seem to manage time after time to come up with something catchy for sure.
Another artist to watch is Rex Orange County. "Loving Is Easy" was heard on an Internet radio station that I talked about last week which delivered Real Estate's "Time". This is actually a pseudonym for Englishman Alexander O'Connor. This one seems to echo more of an easy-listening 1970's vibe crossed with almost a laid-back lounge style. The lush production echo's Barry White's in a sense. It enters at #70, one notch ahead of AJR's "Burn the House Down". The band consists of three brothers, Adam, Jack and Ryan Met (hence the acronym). They are from New York City and have been around since 2010. They made the Billboard Hot 100 in 2013 with "I'm Ready" (#65) but not here on SNS. Their second full-length album, The Click, released in 2017 has already yielded "Sober Up", which featured Weezer's Rivers Cuomo, and hit #1 Alternative, and #24 SNS; this rhythmic romp is currently #2 on the Alt chart and comes in here at #71.
Also entering are the latest from Bishop Briggs ("Baby"), Imagine Dragons ("Natural", the current Alt #1), and Christina Taylor's "Loser", the latest attempt for the up-and-comer to crack the country charts.
Scenes ‘n’ Soundwaves 100
September 23,
2018
| This Week | Last Week | ARTIST-Title | Weeks on List |
| 1 | 1 | NUMBER ONE: 
"Keep Lying"
Album: This Time
(3 weeks at #1)
|
7 |
| 2 | 2 | Elle King - Shame | 6 |
| 3 | 3 | James Hunter Six - I Don't Wanna Be Without You | 5 |
| 4 | 4 | Weezer - Africa | 11 |
| 5 | 6 | Greta Van Fleet - When the Curtain Falls | 8 |
| 6 | 10 | Shannon Marsyada - Tough Girl | 6 |
| 7 | 5 | The Regrettes - Come Through | 18 |
| 8 | 18 | King Princess - 1950 | 9 |
| 9 | 15 | The Kooks - Four Leaf Clover | 6 |
| 10 | 16 | Jeff Rosenstock - 9/10 | 5 |
| 11 | 7 | Franz Ferdinand -Paper Cages | 10 |
| 12 | 8 | Portugal. The Man - Tidal Wave | 10 |
| 13 | 14 | Metric - Dark Saturday | 7 |
| 14 | 9 | Courtney Barnett - Charity | 12 |
| 15 | 17 | Ed Sheeran - Happier | 6 |
| 16 | 11 | St. Paul and the Broken Bones - Apollo | 10 |
| 17 | 21 | TOP 20 IMPACT OF THE WEEK: 
"Crazy For You"
Album: Freedom
|
6 |
| 18 | 54 | The Revivalists - All My Friends | 2 |
| 19 | 12 | Two Feet - I Feel Like Drowning | 19 |
| 20 | 13 | Vance Joy - Saturday Sun | 14 |
|
|
Songs
with the greatest increase in favorite points over the prior week.
● Songs
with 25 or more plays on my iPod.
▲ Songs with 50 or more
plays on my iPod.
The “Scenes ‘n’ Soundwaves 100” is a list
of current and recent song playlist which I am listening to.
