Girl Power: Rihanna And Meghan Trainor Both In Top Five On ‘Billboard’ Hot 100

Women still rule the music charts, at least Billboard‘s Hot 100. This week, Rihanna stays at No. 1 for an almost-record breaking nine weeks with “Work,” her collaboration with Drake. Billboard has the news.

“Rihanna’s ‘Work,’ featuring Drake, spends a ninth week at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 (dated April 30), pushing her past the Beatles for the second-most total weeks spent at the summit. ‘Work’ narrowly fends off Desiigner’s ‘Panda,’ which surges 5-2 on the Hot 100 and tops the Streaming Songs chart.”

Billboard adds that “Work” actually dropped to No. 2 on the Streaming Songs chart after spending eight weeks at No. 1 — this could be a signal the song is spending its last week at the top. Rihanna’s “Work” also falls from No. 3 to No. 6 on the Radio Songs chart. However, Rihanna’s latest hit tops Billboard‘s Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart for an 11th week.

Meanwhile, Rihanna’s album Anti, which many were quick to call a flop, has moved back from No. 6 to No. 5 on the Billboard 200 album chart. Given that Anti has been charting for 12 weeks, the album is a certified hit. Rihanna has been receiving overall great reviews for her tour in support of Anti. According to Vulture, the Barbados singer brought full defiance to her show at the Barclay’s Center in Brooklyn, and that’s a good thing.

“She opens her tour in peak DGAF form: Strutting in from the rear of the arena like a heavyweight champ entering the ring to defend a title — her face completely hidden by a white floor-length hooded coat — not to one of her dance-floor bombs, but to her best ballad, ‘Stay.’ For many, that song and its unveiling on SNL was the first inkling that Rihanna had been holding back, vocally, all along.”

A lot of critics have been praising Rihanna’s vocals on her Anti World Tour. Rihanna has always been known more as a pop star than a vocalist, but that’s starting to change. Even Glenn Gamboa from Newsday praises Rihanna’s “more soulful” vocals.

Rihanna certainly isn’t the only female artist making waves on the charts this week. Meghan Trainor has received mixed reviews for her single “No,” which many sites, including The Inquisitr, bashed for not being the big hit people expected when it first came out. However, the song eventually caught on and peaked at No. 3 last week. This week, it dropped to No. 4. However, since the song has been on the chart for six weeks, Trainor’s “No” can safely be considered a certified hit.

Meghan Trainor recently talked about her upcoming album Thank You to the Associated Press.

“I wrote ‘No,’ and he [label president L.A. Reid] was like, ‘Give me five of these.’ And we wrote five more songs. It was such a relief, like I could sleep at night knowing I finally found the single. That’s like the biggest stress for an artist, especially (for) album No. 2.”

The article reveals that before she recorded “No,” L.A. Reid didn’t hear a confident first single on her album, so Trainor went back to the drawing board. Hearing that from your label boss was probably very difficult for a singer trying to prove herself with her sophomore album, but it looks like Meghan Trainor handled everything well. Like Rihanna, Meghan Trainor knows how to take control of her career.

[Photo by Brian Killian and Roberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images]