Luckily, that also made this one of the most exciting years for singles on the charts and in our own personal playlists in recent memory -- one in which the biggest hits were also some of the most challenging and rewarding, and in which the more conventional pop songs that did break through on a massive scale felt fresher than they have in a long time. From the "Shallow" to "The Middle" to the highest of "High Hopes," music was captivating at all levels in Here are the Billboard staff's favorite songs of the year. An obvious Hot chart topper and delightful fixture on pop radio. Jessie Reyez, "Body Count". Young Fathers, "In My View".

Follow Billboard

1. Childish Gambino – This Is America
Guardian music writers have picked their favourite songs of the year — from UK drill breakthroughs to pure pop anthems — and put them all on a giant playlist. Mon 3 Dec K icking off our roundups of the best music of , polled from votes by more than 50 Guardian music writers, we count down our favourite tracks of the year — topped by a man who managed to unpick US racial politics, launch a thousand thinkpieces and reach No 1 in the US charts, all with a single track. Read about the top 20 below, and hear the whole top in playlists on Spotify and Apple Music. There are only two bands in this top 20, showing how the cultural dial at least among Guardian critics has continued to drift away from indie and rock. But this Melbourne quintet show that jangling guitars will never, ever stop being a joy, no matter how much tastes change. Mainland has a scrappy garage chug, tempered with the sweet breeziness of chillwave indie like Real Estate, and vocal harmonies that cock an ear to Teenage Fanclub — plus bags and bags of melody.
This is America: theories behind Childish Gambino's satirical masterpiece
The track, which spent eight weeks at Number 1 between April and June, takes the top spot on the chart of the year with a combined sales figure of 1. The song, which trailed his fifth album Scorpion, spent nine weeks at the helm between February and April. Drake may have just missed out on the top spot, but he bags two more spots in the Top fellow chart-toppers Nice For What and In My Feelings place at 7 and
When talking about so far at Billboard , it's hard to avoid the fact that the chart year has only had 24 editions of the Hot , and Drake has been No. It's the most that any one artist has dominated the listing's top spot in a year's first six months this decade -- though shout-out to Macklemore and Ryan Lewis' combined 11 weeks on top in the first half of -- and it essentially leaves the non-Drake part of the field wide open when it comes to discussing the year's best and biggest singles. But that's fine. Beyond the Drakening, has been a year of pleasant surprises on the charts: All-Star teamups we didn't see coming, previously unknown artists coming out with left-field hits, and a handful of big-name comebacks taking us to unexpected new places, all of which made the predictability at pop's highest level forgivable. And besides, those two Drake songs are pretty great too: You'll see them both below as we recount our 50 favorite songs of so far, with a Spotify playlist of all 50 at the bottom. The moment fans have been waiting for since Timberlake and Stapleton collaborated at the CMA Awards finally came in , and it's as special as that instant-classic performance.