
Peak
1
Weeks
47
Score
12,046
Chart Year
2019
A music video for "Bad Guy" was directed by Dave Meyers and was uploaded to Eilish's official YouTube channel on March 29, 2019. Additionally, Eilish released a vertical video on August 15, 2019. The video begins with a yellow backdrop while the opening track "!!!!!!!" from When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? plays. Eilish discusses taking out her Invisalign dental brace before laughing. She eventually kicks her way through a wall while wearing a yellow sweatshirt and sweatpants, and hands her dental brace to a man, Eric Lutz, on her right. Scenes showing Eilish dancing wildly are interspersed with her feeding pigeons, getting a nosebleed while wearing a white outfit in a blue room with a clock, pouring milk and cereal into a suited man's mouth against the backdrop of a red desert, riding on a miniature car with a gang of men on tricycles, wearing snorkel gear while men's heads float in plastic bags above her, and sitting on a wall in front of a group of overweight men who flex their bellies to the beat. The video ends sinisterly with Billie in a dark, red room, sitting on the back of a man who does push-ups. One comment to the clip on YouTube posted by Seth Everman, reading "I'm the bald guy", became the most-liked on the platform, gathering over three million likes as of November 2020. "Bad Guy" surpassed one billion views in November 2020; to celebrate, Google created an 'Infinite Bad Guy' interactive site that allowed users to switch between over 15,000 different covers of the song available on YouTube. The video was positively received by music critics. Uproxx's White called the use of "!!!!!!!" at its beginning "effective". James Rettig of Stereogum noticed elements of camp although he acknowledged the video was "still being emotionally sincere and vulnerable. This one features a lot of weirdo imagery ... in a way that's both goofy and genuinely unsettling". Chloe Gilke, writing for Uproxx, said the video takes several of the song's lyrics literally and that it is "awash in primary colors and black and white, Eilish's bold aesthetic". Rolling Stone's Jon Blistein noticed "a series of strange, grotesque and weirdly hilarious sequences", while Laura Dzubay of The Michigan Daily pointed out "strange dances, from a backward Exorcist-style crawl to a squatting sidestep to an energetic roll". Upon its release, the video was accused of "blatantly" plagiarizing photographs by Maurizio Cattelan and Pierpaolo Ferrari of Toiletpaper magazine. The video received significant attention online and was the subject of several memes. Melissa McCarthy parodied it on The Ellen DeGeneres Show in May 2019. On the January 16, 2020 episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, the show parodied the song as "Bond Guy", which references No Time to Die, where Eilish would provide the theme for the movie.[
This twitchy, bass-heavy banger finds Billie Eilish taunting her abusive lover. She tells him she's in control of their relationship as she enjoys playing the role of a docile girlfriend. I like it when you take control Even if you know that you don't Own me, I'll let you play the role I'll be your animal During the hook, Eilish accuses the dude of just playing tough when it's she who is really the "bad guy." I'm that bad type Make your mama sad type Make your girlfriend mad tight Might seduce your dad type I'm the bad guy Eilish has the power to make the important people in her lover's life upset. The song is Track 2 on the album, preceded by "!!!!!!!," a 14-second introductory skit about Invisalign in which we hear Billie Eilish joking about removing her aligner and getting her album done and drilled out. Her brother and producer Finneas explained to Vulture that his sister had to take her Invisalign out for recording sessions because it gave her vocals a lisp, but she became so used to wearing the aligner that she often forgot. He compared the noise she made to Lil Wayne's lighter flick sound featured on Tha Carter II songs such as the title track and "Fireman." "I have so much audio of her taking out her Invisalign that I was like, 'Billie, this is gonna be your version of the Lil Wayne lighter flick,'" Finneas said. "You know how when you listen to a new Lil Wayne song he's lighting up a blunt in the song? I was like, 'Bill, this is gonna be your signature sound.'" Finneas said that he and his sister decided to include the skit to lighten the mood on When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?. "When we were wrapping it up, I felt like the album was pretty dark and covered a lot of heavy stuff, with songs like 'Bury A Friend' and 'Listen ' and 'Ilomilo'" he explained. "The art that I like that is the darkest… if there's an element of humor in it, I think I take it even more seriously. It really resonates with me. It was really important with this album to find a sense of humor in the midst of all of this heaviness." On July 11, 2019, Billie Eilish dropped a remix of "Bad Guy" featuring Justin Bieber. Eilish has a well-documented history as a Belieber (she called him her "first love" in a Marie Claire interview). The pair exchanged tweets in March 2019 and finally met the following month during Ariana Grande's headlining set at Coachella. The updated recording stays fairly true to the original, save for a brand-new second verse and scattered ad-libs from Bieber. It was written by Eilish, Finneas O'Connell, the "What Do You Mean?" singer and his frequent writing partner, Poo Bear. The cover art for the Bieber remix shows a younger Eilish surrounded by posters of the Canadian pop star. After waiting patiently at #2 behind "Old Town Road" for nine weeks, "Bad Guy" finally toppled Lil Nas X's record-breaking song to reach #1. In doing so, it broke the record for the longest a song spent in the runner-up position before climbing to the summit. Three songs - OutKast's "The Way You Move," Justin Bieber's "Sorry" and The Weeknd's "Starboy" - spent eight weeks in the runner-up spot before they hit #1. On reaching the top of the Hot 100, Eilish became the first artist born in the 2000s to have a #1 hit. Billie Eilish had no expectations for the song, as the chorus doesn't have a hook. Said the singer to Billboard: "My brother and I actually sat in his room trying to write something else over that but we couldn't do it because nothing else worked." Speaking to 102.7KIISFM, Billie Eilish explained that "Bad Guy" pokes fun at the way people (including herself) try to present themselves as rule breakers. "The initial idea for the song is like people that have to tell everybody that they are a certain way all the time? They're not that certain way... In general, I feel like you will never catch a bad bitch telling everyone she's a bad bitch. It's on - it's you. If you're going around all the time saying like, 'Yeah, I'm bad, I'm always breaking rules, and doing this and doing that.' You're not. I know that because I used to say that and I wasn't. Bad kids, bad boys, bad bitches, whatever, they do that s--t and they don't even know." This won Best Song at the 2019 MTV European Music Awards. Eilish also took home from the ceremony the trophy for Best New Artist. Billie Eilish half-whispers the lyrics. Yeah, I'm a bad guy Ain't no holdin' back guy Come off like I'm mad guy Eilish admitted to Billboard they were strange words to hear coming out of a female mouth, adding, "In any movie or children's book, there's always a bad guy. Even if it's a girl, the title is the bad guy. I wanna be that." "Bad Guy" was named the best song of 2019 by Billboard magazine. The song is divided into two parts, with the second half 50% slower than the first half. Eilish told Rolling Stone she got the idea for the two parts by listening to tracks by rappers JID and Isaiah Rashad. "I had been inspired by this song called 'Never' by JID and this song called 'Stuck in the Mud' by Isaiah Rashad that kind of stop for like five seconds in the middle and then start this new song that's shorter. I thought it was so interesting," she said. Eilish and Finneas ended up using an old song they'd previously recorded for the slower closing bridge and outro. "Bad Guy" was music critics' favorite song of 2019. In a chart compiled by the BBC combining various end-of-year lists published by 30 different music magazines, blogs, newspapers and broadcasters, it ranked #1. The track itself topped seven of the 30 end-of-year lists. This won Record of the Year and Song of the Year at the Grammy Awards in 2020. Eilish also won Best New Artist, and When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? won Album of the Year, Best Pop Vocal Album, and Best Engineered Album. Finneas took the trophy for Producer of the Year. At 18, Billie Eilish became the youngest artist to win Grammy Record of the Year, topping Kimbra for "Somebody That I Used To Know" with Gotye and Sam Smith for "Stay With Me." Both won the honor aged 22. Eilish also became the youngest artist to win Album of the Year. The previous record holder was Taylor Swift, who was 20 when her LP Fearless won the prize. Eilish and Finneas performed this from their living room couch as part of the "Living Room Concert For America," which was broadcast on March 29, 2020. The virtual benefit concert raised funds for the First Responders Children's Foundation and Feeding America. It also offered words of hope and encouragement from a number of stars, including Elton John, who hosted the event. The song was partly inspired by rappers who present a false image of their wealth and lavish lifestyles. So you're a tough guy Like it really rough guy Just can't get enough guy Chest always so puffed guy I'm that bad type Said Eilish: "'Bad Guy' is more about people that are always lying about themselves. A lot of it is about a lot of artists right now, a lot of rappers. I feel like pretty much all the rappers right now are lying, about how much money they have and about their house and their clothes etc. It's like, 'Shut up, you don't have this.' It's just annoying. And it's so easy to see through people when they talk about their money. They have nothing else, so that's all they talk about." "Bad Guy" (or at least a soundalike) was used in a 2022 commercial for Peloton titled "Reasons."
Hmm, da-da-da-da-da Da-da-da, hmm Da-da-da-hmm (yeah, yeah) Oh, ah White shirt now red, my bloody nose Sleepin', you're on your tippy toes Creepin' around like no one knows Think you're so criminal Bruises on both my knees for you Don't say "thank you" or "please" I do what I want when I'm wanting to My soul so cynical So you're a tough guy Like it really rough guy Just can't get enough guy Chest always so puffed guy I'm that bad type Make your mama sad type Make your girlfriend mad tight Might seduce your dad type I'm the bad guy Duh I'm the bad guy I like it when you take control Even if you know that you don't Own me, I'll let you play the role I'll be your animal My mommy likes to sing along with me But she won't sing this song If she reads all the lyrics She'll pity the men I know So you're a tough guy Like it really rough guy Just can't get enough guy Chest always so puffed guy I'm that bad type Make your mama sad type Make your girlfriend mad tight Might seduce your dad type I'm the bad guy Duh I'm the bad guy Duh I'm only good at bein' bad, bad (Ahh) (Ah) I like when you get mad I guess I'm pretty glad that you're alone (so icy) You said she's scared of me? I mean, I don't see what she sees But maybe it's 'cause I'm wearing your cologne (let's go) I'm the bad guy (damn right) I-I'm the bad guy (aw, yeah)
| Week | Chart Date | Position | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Apr 13, 2019 | 7 | 119 |
| 2 | Apr 20, 2019 | 11 | 115 |
| 3 | Apr 27, 2019 | 9 | 117 |
| 4 | May 4, 2019 | 9 | 117 |
| 5 | May 11, 2019 | 9 | 117 |
| 6 | May 18, 2019 | 9 | 117 |
| 7 | May 25, 2019 | 4 | 122 |
| 8 | Jun 1, 2019 | 3 | 123 |
| 9 | Jun 8, 2019 | 2 | 124 |
| 10 | Jun 15, 2019 | 2 | 124 |
| 11 | Jun 22, 2019 | 2 | 124 |
| 12 | Jun 29, 2019 | 3 | 123 |
| 13 | Jul 6, 2019 | 3 | 123 |
| 14 | Jul 13, 2019 | 2 | 124 |
| 15 | Jul 20, 2019 | 2 | 124 |
| 16 | Jul 27, 2019 | 2 | 124 |
| 17 | Aug 3, 2019 | 2 | 124 |
| 18 | Aug 10, 2019 | 2 | 124 |
| 19 | Aug 17, 2019 | 2 | 124 |
| 20 | Aug 24, 2019 | 1 | 125 |