Country & Pop Remain Tied on Top: The State of the Hot 100’s Top 10 Through Q3 2023

What were some of the most notable trends on the Billboard Hot 100 songs chart over the first three quarters of 2023?

Hit Songs Deconstructed, which provides compositional analytics for top 10 Hot 100 hits, has released its Q3 2023 State of the Hot 100 Top 10 report.

Here are three takeaways from Hit Songs Deconstructed’s latest in-depth research.

Country Remains Tied With Pop on Top

Over the first nine months of 2023, country and pop tied as the most common primary genres in the Hot 100’s top 10, each contributing to 21% of all top 10 hits. Country and pop shared the lead in Q1 2023, at 26% each, and at midyear, each with 23%.

“Country was the big gainer, surging from just 4% of songs in 2022 to 21% YTD 2023, its highest level in over a decade, largely thanks to Morgan Wallen,” Hit Songs Deconstructed’s report notes. Wallen’s haul has been led by “Last Night,” which first topped the Hot 100 in March and reigned for 16 weeks, the longest command for a non-collaboration in the chart’s history.

As for pop, despite its shared domination with country, its 21% share of all Hot 100 top 10s in the first three quarters of 2023 continues a decline for the genre, from 35% in all of 2022; a leading 39% in 2021; 40% in 2020; and a winning 47% in 2019.

“Pop dropped to its lowest level of prominence in over a decade,” according to Hit Songs Deconstructed. (At the same time, as Hit Songs Deconstructed noted earlier this year, while country has ascended in the Hot 100’s top 10, driven by Wallen’s hits, among others, the genre boasts notable similarities to pop songs.)

Below country and pop, two other primary genres scored double-digit shares of Hot 100 top 10s from January through September: hip-hop at 19%, and R&B/soul at 15%.

Hip-hop’s presence, like pop’s, continued to fall among Hot 100 top 10s, with its 19% take, and its third-place rank among primary genres, over Q1-Q3 2023, down noticeably from a first-place 38% finish in 2022; 34% in 2021; a leading 41% in 2020; and 34% in 2019.

R&B/soul’s share so far in 2023, conversely, nearly doubled from 8% for all of 2022.

Smaller Songwriting Teams (Sort Of)

“While songwriting teams of five-plus writers are still most common, they’ve seen a significant drop so far in 2023,” Hit Songs Deconstructed’s report indicates. Such groups accounted for a leading 38% of all Hot 100 top 10s over the year’s first three quarters, though down from 60% for all of 2019.

Songwriter groups of three (22% of all Hot 100 top 10s) and four (19%) ranked second and third, respectively, over Q1-Q3 2023.

Notably, while only 8% of Hot 100 top 10s in that span were penned by a single writer, one hit No. 1, for two weeks in August-September: Oliver Anthony Music’s self-written and -performed “Rich Men North of Richmond.” (In each of those frames, Luke Combs ranked at No. 2 with “Fast Car,” his update of Tracy Chapman’s likewise self-authored 1988 classic.)

Jersey in the Club

Among sub-genres/influences, Jersey club claimed an 8% share of Hot 100 top 10s in the first three-quarters of 2023 – following no presence between 2019 and 2022.

“Leading the way was Lil Uzi Vert’s ‘Just Wanna Rock,’ followed by Ice Spice and PinkPantheress’ ‘Boys a Liar, Pt.2,’” recaps Hit Songs Deconstructed. “Bad Bunny followed with ‘Where She Goes,’ and Ice Spice, Nicki Minaj and Aqua kept the trend going with ‘Barbie World.’”

Among other standout sub-genres/influences in the Hot 100’s top 10 in the latest research period were psychedelic/retro, via SZA’s No. 1 “Kill Bill”; Afrobeats, thanks to Rema and Selena Gomez’s “Calm Down,” which hit No. 3; and classical, as heard in JVKE’s No. 10-peaking “Golden Hour.”