| 100 - 81 || 80 - 61 || 60 - 41 || 40 - 21 || 20 - 1 |
| All 100 Songs |
40. D'Angelo “May I? Standing Unshaken”
D'Angelo loves Red Dead Redemption 2 so much that he refused to leave RockStar's offices until 5AM each night, playing the game until very late for weeks straight. Eventually the game creators were just like, "you know, if you love the game so much, why don't you go get married to it, or go write a song for it or something." Figuring D'Angelo would be like "lol, good one," he instead responds "well, that's quite a fine idea you got there, and I think I might do just that!" And the game creators said back, "Which one, get married to the game or write a song for it?" And then D'Angelo responds, "Both ideas are quite sharp. I'll get back to you on that." This is all verbatim and true, by the way. There is a 2019 version of this song floating around on streaming services that is not the original version posted to Youtube back in November 2018. The song feels a lot less complete without the long intro, similar to what usually would happen when radio stations would butcher the intro of "Really Love" (on the few R&B stations that bothered to play it early in 2015). Speaking of that, we have not forgotten D'Angelo saying Black Messiah was intended as a double-album, and that there's another LP of unreleased jams ready to drop at any given moment. Perhaps more videogame creators should give D'Angelo free shit in exchange for new songs since this is now officially the only thing left that motivates him. S.O.S. Plz halp. We need you D. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RajRfIG0mwo
39. Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats “Bedouin”
Unkie Sid dishes out another dope TRACK 7 for your spaced out enjoyment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7T8jI9Uxlts
38. Kids See Ghosts f/ Louis Prima “4th Dimension”
Most artists stick to the same lane when considering guest attributions, although Kanye is not most artists. His name appears alone throughout his very collaborative Yeezus LP. A few years earlier, MBDTF's metadata wisely omitted the exhaustive list of guests on "All Of The Lights."Despite Kanye's further notoriety for lifting samples without clearing licensing rights, the metadata applied to Billboard's chart stats list "4th Dimension" with an unusual guest-spot from Louis Prima. His Christmas song from 1936 supplies the song's haunting, jazzy foundation, and Kanye's guest-tag secured Louis Prima's current world record for the longest stretch of weeks between chart placements on the Hot 100.
"4th Dimension" also marks the return of Kanye's trademark "Jesus Walks" drums, long absent from his music since around the time of Man on the Moon: The End of Day. Without any other proof, we suspect "4th Dimension" experienced its creative genesis around the same era, possibly intended (alongside 2010's "Christmas In Harlem") as part of an abandoned Kanye holiday LP.
37. Charly Bliss “Heaven”
36. Dilly Dally “Sober Motel”
35. Doe “My Friends”
34. Jo Passed “MDM”
33. Swearin’ “Future Hell”
Whoever they get to curate Side A of the Angus 2 soundtrack now owes us several thousand dollars. We accept Western Union or Traveler's Checks ONLY. Four of these were released within a 3 week span at the start of the 2018-2019 academic school year. The kids really want this; they just don't know it yet.
32. Stove “Safe Guy”
NSFW
31. Unknown Mortal Orchestra “American Guilt”
30. Negative Scanner “Shoplifter”
29. Bali Baby “Backseat”
Q: Should "Baby Shark" be in this list?
A: Yeah probably.
28. No Age “Popper”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUy3oVM1Fzw
27. Ovlov “Grab It From The Garden”
Joining "The Great Alligator" and "Dumboy" in the Stovlov epics canon.
26. Rae Sremmurd f/ Pharrell “Chanel”
25. Robyn “Ever Again”
24. Windhand “Diablerie”
23. Stefflon Don “Lil Bitch (Intro)”
22. Beak> “King of the Castle” / Beak> “Harvester”
21. Sleep “Marijuanaut’s Theme”
| 100 - 81 || 80 - 61 || 60 - 41 || 40 - 21 || 20 - 1 |
| All 100 Songs |
Despite its designation as a frustratingly unexciting era for music and pop culture, August 2008 retroactively revealed some buried hints suggesting a desire to move young people away from the mid-2000s' sickening obsession with extravagant materialism. It's the month Kim Petras turned 16. It's also when MTV aired its last four episodes of My Super Sweet 16 in a block that included birthday celebrations for teen millionaires like Bow Wow and Sean Kingston. The stock market crashed just a few short weeks later. "I Kissed A Girl" was the biggest hit of the moment and marked a then-pinnacle of chart success for Dr. Luke, the song's ultimately despised writer and producer. We were reluctant to include "I Don't Want It At All" in our list due to Luke's involvement, but plainly stated: We really care about Kim Petras. We want Kim to blow up. She got what she needed out of that era and realizes she's ready to move onto bigger and better things. Looking back, the song structure itself is fascinatingly flawed, exposing elements that went into the process hit-creators relied upon throughout the "party like a rockstar" era. Everything about this is tongue-in-cheek. Fuck capitalism. 
After an abbreviated version of "Landing Safely" appeared on the 
As Iggy Pop and Josh Homme pump "Smoko" on the reg, its "huge hit" status also earned The Chats a daunting grind: Their giant world tour now extends through the end of November, selling out medium-sized US venues in NYC and elsewhere. Seeming barely 21 in their no-budget viral videos, we would wager they'll never become self-aware before splitting up. They have another 2-3 years of youthful dgaf stored up, alleviating concerns for any future blandness traps. (Have they released any full length LPs yet? Will they ever?) We'd expect nothing less from a Bandcamp handle like 
Lizzo's busy thinkin' 'bout boys boys boys. So many kinds. Where do we start? We like them dumb and we like them smart. We like the ones with the pretty eyes. Well we like all kinds of guys. Two of those boys just might be Pharrell and Prince, who once upon a time slid suspiciously similar grooves under Kelis and Vanity 6 respectively. Wikipedia reveals Wallpaper handled production; 2012 was the last time we wrote about Wallpaper, when he appeared somewhere around #6 on our worst songs of 2012, mostly thanks to its lyrics. In "Boys," Lizzo's energy and charisma wipe away the vomit-flavored chuckle gummy and mixes in a tightly secret recipe for batches and cookies. TikTok trending status = Currently very strong.
Many of our favorite bands put out their 2nd best albums in 2018, and we're pretty sure all of these were the best since the breakthroughs that won us over in the first place. We knew No Age had to release at least one more classic record before the end of the decade, and Snares Like a Haircut delivered on our hopes. "Send Me" exemplifies a send-off for the decade, capping an era of indie-punk that feels ready to move forward.
One early take from "Muddy Waters" derived from its mysteriously unattributed 2nd vocalist. Why is the promo video's guest singer different from the live videos? Was she unable to get time-off for tour? After some digging and discussion, we learned that the band might locate one or two volunteer on-stage participants to fill-in this crucial guest verse and chorus, originally sung by someone who is not a full time band member. Jocko has toured on-and-off since this album's digital release (about a year ago), and we are jealous of anyone who gets to see them. Physical release came out in 2019, so we will likely use this as loophole for "Albums of the year" come January. The music video prominently features hockey and hackeysack, and (again) we will figure out a way to include it in "Best Videos of 2019" even though it came out in December 2017 because we no longer care about accurate chronology.
The greatest disco-country song of the decade from an album that literally won the Grammy for "Album Of The Year" has yet to receive any spins from iHeart's CHR format. Pop is burning down from the inside out and no one with any substantial power to generate a shift is doing anything to stop it. "High Horse" never charted, and it's capitalism's fault. Pop exposure and promotion has never experienced a more devistatingly flawed era, and it will be a VERY long time before we recover. "Things are different now" is not a good enough reason to repeatedly point the finger at those who don't give a fuck about Imagine Dragons. "If you don't like it, then you're too old." Sorry, but that's not how it works.
We remember a few dumbasses on Twitter circa November 2016 trying their best to find a silver lining by predicting a 4-year punk rock renaissance. We're not sure if this is what those people meant, but our lives have not been quite the same since crossing paths with the year's most ignorant jam. "Hackin' Of Da Mindz" was our introduction to Boston's 
In these sad times, bad music bloggers tend to avoid actual descriptions of sound in favor of lyrical analysis and irrelevant narratives. With under 48 hours to process "Thank U, Next," initial takes barely scratched the surface, unsurprisingly incapable of divorcing the song from Ariana's public life, thereby perpetuating even more poptimist celebrations of the ephemeral. 
Now that TikTok is the only true remaining hit-maker of the moment, "Womp Womp," also known as "Wamp Wamp" and "Sad Trombone," could live beyond its onomatopoeic definition, typically mimicked from a human mouth to indicate failures ranging from small to not-so-small. The Price Is Right might be the home of the all time classic Womp Womp, best exemplified by instances when both contestants overbid during the final showcase showdown, indicating an enormous trombone-flavored fail. In "Womp Womp," Valee sings about watching one such episode of The Price Is Right at home during a snow day. Radio should stop avoiding the true hits. Millions of kids sang this extremely fun song that still isn't getting any radio airplay. What does this tell us? Oh wait, we know. It means that iHeartRadio is racist. 
On a personal note, this is the first time in over half-a-decade that our #1 comes from any act marginally resembling a rock band. The last time this happened was our embarrassing 2012 blunder awarding the honor to Japandroids' "The Nights Of Wine and Roses" (beating many of our future 
We love George Corpsegrinder. We would vote for him if he ran for office. Here are 6 things we learned about him when 
We LIKE that they ripped off "Been A Son." The world would improve as a whole of more bands did this. We want more "Been A Son" rip off songs. No Age's new album was not on Spotify for its first few months after release, which we later realized was a Drag City thing, although it would not have surprised us if it were a No Age thing. In the past, they've expressed similar anti-corporation pro-DIY alignment. Before this realization, we assumed the decision was made specifically for people like us who had strong intent to purchase a physical copy and sought an album preview without spending $9 on mp3s. Soulseek to the rescue. It's been years since we illegally downloaded an album before buying, which gave us nostalgia for back in the Nouns days. And yes, the album does completely rule, and we gladly shelled out real money for the record (their 2nd best!) because No Age is still the best band of the last 10 years, and they're fucking worth it. 
We probably could have placed other songs from Hero higher than this one, except this is one of the few that technically qualifies as a true 2017 jam since the single charted exclusively during that year. The wiki discography reports a few stations added "Rich" back in February 2018 (possibly pushed to radio as a precaution in case country fans opted to not fuck with "The Middle"). So is the Hero album cycle technically still happening? We're unfamiliar with the way country radio works, so maybe this is a normal thing. (Taylor Swift, for example, usually waits 4-6 months before a new song/video gets added to playlists, similar to how they used to promote mid-'90s blockbusters like Jagged Little Pill n stuff.) Either way, "I Could Use A Love Song" is fair game for 2017. She sings about how love songs are the same as drugs or something. It's great.
There are more devastating realizations than figuring out just after settling, after years of preparation, that the goal you've been working towards is not actually what you wanted at all. It might be a new job, or a college degree, or a marriage, or moving to a new city. After the exciting journey brings you to your happily-ever-after, where do you go from there? Ever since the similarly pensive "It's The Weekend" back in 2009, Jason Lytle's lyrics have gravitated more and more towards Plastic Ono Band levels of simplicity. "Mama don't go, daddy come home" repeated over and over again. Rigidly direct prose.
The 11K meme posted here has something to do with the value of Bitcoin but we didn't feel like reading into it. We just really wanted a picture of Eleven stealing Eggos to go along with "let gO Of my egO." Its 
"Fuck a fair one, I get mine the fast way. Ski mask way." Leikeli47's ski mask (shown in the pic to the right switched out with one of many various obscuring devices in the "Miss Me" video) expresses many things: alluring mystery, anonymity, anti-image, anti-patriarchy, a possible MF Doom nod. Also, she probably gets yelled at whenever she walks into 7-11. (At least that's what happens to us when we forget to remove our ski mask before grabbing some Big Gulp.) It actually surprises us that it's taken until now, roughly 40 years into hiphop's history, for a reasonably prominent underground rapper to own the ski mask as a crucial element of their aesthetic. More importantly, her flow is arguably the freshest from any class of '17 rapper, and she deserves to blow the fuck up today. Pharrell & Missy: Don't sleep on this.
The initial 3-4 month coping period after Trump's election affected Twitter users in some unexpectedly strange ways. For some bizarre reason, lots of people started overusing "bonkers" on Twitter between November 2016 and February 2017. During this era, the editors of Pitchfork opted to include this word in their headlines several times, but it has not appeared at all since then. People who used this word on the internet likely never uttered "bonkers" out loud, let alone in public, and many of them claimed that "bonkers" had always been heavily used in their normal everyday vocabulary. (Coincidentally, these are the same people who posted the Meryl Streep "yelling at the Oscars" meme multiple times.) Apparently, Animal Collective fell victim to this same bizarre trend. A true artifact of the era, "Kinda Bonkers" probably would have placed higher otherwise.
On the afternoon of November 17, 2017, we just happened to find ourselves at The Observatory in Santa Ana, California. Not far from our van, we spotted a bunch of lit candles inside of a small fenced off area in the parking lot. It seemed out of place until we realized it was left there from a candlelight vigil. The Observatory was Lil Peep's first cancelled tour date following his fatal ingestion less than 24 hours prior in Tuscon, Arizona. We had all been saddened by the news, and so we went to take some video of the remaining 20 or 30 candles with a freshly acquired Pixel. A mysterious bump suddenly sent the phone crashing onto a sharp section of the fence. Part of the screen was cracked, although the phone still worked ok. From that day forward, we felt the spirit of Lil Peep within that Pixel. (It was tough to forget the circumstances.) The crack enlarged about a month ago when we accidentally dropped a set of keys on the screen. The phone's been swapped out and replaced. We're guessing it was quickly refurbished and sold to a new owner who has no idea that a piece of one of the true emo-rap legends rests so close to them, protecting from certain doom. "Awful Things" is the song that Good Charlotte (his favorite band) was asked to perform at his funeral. We know he frequently sampled emo tracks from the early 2000s; yet despite "Awful Things" suspiciously Blink-193 intro, it's one of the guitar parts that Lil Peep wrote and recorded on his own. He was just getting warmed up, and likely had a bank of ideas stored and ready for Pt. 2. Tragic as fuck.
Yachty is currently the only artist in hiphop who collaborated with Kehlela, Charli XCX and Carly Rae Jepsen throughout 2017. It took us a minute, but we eventually realized his presence was crucial throughout this year, and "Priorities" was the song when we finally "got it." "Fuck school / Fuck the rules." He directly descends from Lil B. Now it all makes sense. "Priorities" is also among the moments that came closest to the essence of the album title Teenage Emotions. Of course, it took until we heard a deep cut on his major label debut before deciding "Soundcloud rap is now a good thing." We don't think it was entirely Yachty's fault that the album suffered. After all, this was Lil Yachty's first major label album. "Getting signed" is a responsibility that Lil B has yet to accept. He never had to deal with record companies fronting the cost of recording and publicity, breathing down his neck and forcing terrible songs onto what could have otherwise been a pretty dope record. Lil B's worst songs are the ones that HE made that way. Big-business has nothing to do with his decisions. He can wear his Bernie 2016 shirt as much as he wants for that very reason. He can portray himself anyway he wants. Yachty seems to have entered 2018 rightfully frustrated with the music business, quickly recording and self-releasing the dark and in-your-face Lil Boat 2 mixtape. Perhaps it's turned him cold, and he's grown unhappy with the fun-loving, youthful experimentation and exploration of "Priorities" or "Shoot Out The Roof." They might be the two best rap songs he'll release for a while.
Red House Painters is cool, but hasn't that Sun Kil Moon asshole already gotten enough props in the past 5 years? Aside from any "Deftones on valium" takes regarding the Cloakroom album as a whole, we'd say the RHP comparisons are definitely all coming from people who've never heard Space Needle, a.k.a. the most underrated Rhode Island band of all time. It's a more subdued sound for Cloakroom, but we did not expect it to immediately make us say, "Holy shit, these guys definitely love Space Needle." It's the intersection of 
At this point, we're totally fine with any reasonably decent indie bands who are down to sell the fuck out and sneak some shockingly listenable minor hits back into the lower stretches of the Billboard Modern Rock chart. Lord knows (and Lorde knows), the format's refusal to budge on their strict "no '90s throwbacks" policy has nearly destroyed itself from the inside out, despite that kids and adults across the country have expressed longing to hear loud crunchy guitars on the radio again. To make matters worse, the modern bands that currently receive the most airplay have virtually nothing in common with the college-rock crossovers that initially helped formulate KROQ's very existence. Under normal circumstances, "Something In The Way," Twenty One Pilots, "Runaway Train" and Fitz and the Tantrums should have nothing in common with each other and typically would not share playlist-space for most Spotify users. But for whatever reason, that exact 4-in-a-row is now entirely common (minus iHeartRadio's requisite ad interruption). Any opportunities for legit-decent bands like Bear Hands to disrupt modern rock's abysmal plunge into irrelevancy should be celebrated in 2016. Inoffensive and catchy. We'll take it. 
It wouldn't surprise us if "Desperado" were among the first completed Anti songs from closer to when the sessions began in early 2014. It feels less avant and more like "classic" Rihanna than anything else nearby in its sequencing, almost like a transitional jam from a hypothetical 2015 record (alongside "Bitch Betta Have My Money" and "FourFiveSeconds").
The long-awaited conclusion to the "Goin" trilogy that began with with 1993's "Goin Home" and their Kiss cover "Goin Blind." (Not kidding.)
Feelin' these lyrics: "There's only one thing in this world I love more than being with you, and that's four or five chunks of juicy pork heaven covered in maple syrup dripping straight into my throbbing femoral artery." The video and the VMAs performance took place at a '50s diner, and it surprised us that all the extras were not wolfing down mile-high piles of salty glistening sizzlers. All the while, Krusty The Clown could have been way in the back of the soundstage receiving heart surgery. Now THAT's a video.
Directly descending from Public Enemy and NWA. We feel like one of those two groups utilized the same "rap singalong chorus" from "Police Get Away," but for some reason we're (probably incorrectly) convinced that this derives from Leaders Of The New School: 
