Welcome to Listening Habits, a column where I share the music I’ve been fixated on recently. I did not write about it when it happened, but last year there was a bit of a manufactured crisis in rap ...

Yesterday, Billboard deputy editor and Stereogum buddy Andrew Unterberger published a piece with some confusing implications: On last week's Billboard Hot 100, there were no rap songs in the top 40.

We should address the elephant in the room: hip-hop did not have a strong year on the charts. In fact, rap music had its worst showing in years. Back in October, it made headlines when—for the first ...