source: Soundcheck, Wednesday, January 8 

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If you look back on 2013, not a single black artist scored a No. 1 single. Not J. Cole, Jay Z, Beyonce, or even Kanye West. 2013 marked the first-ever year since Billboard began charting Top 40 songs in 1958 that zero black artists made their way to the top of the singles chart.

The top spot on the Hot 100 -- today's version of the singles chart -- was dominated by white acts throughout the past year. Perhaps even more intriguing is the fact that white artists even sat atop the R&B and Hip-Hop Songs chart for 44 out of 52 weeks of 2013. Compare this to ten years ago, when every No. 1 Hot 100 single was performed by an artist of color. 

And in a final interesting twist, there are no living black artists being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2014 -- although Clarence Clemons will be inducted posthumously as part of the E Street Band. That's only happened once before in Rock Hall history. 

To try and understand how and why 2013 was so unprecedented, Soundcheck host John Schaefer talks to pop chart analyst and writer Chris Molanphy, as well as author and commentator for The Daily Beast and The Root, Keli Goff. 

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