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| All 100 Songs |
60. The Shifters “Andrew Bolt”
59. Innumerable Forms "Punishment in Flesh" / Creeping Death "Trail of Confusion"
58. Nicki Minaj f/ Ariana Grande “Bed” / Ariana Grande “God Is A Woman” / Khalid f/ 6LACK & Ty Dolla $ign "OTW"
57. Satan’s Satyrs “Take It And Run”
At the final table of the 2018 World Series of Poker’s $1,500 seven-card stud event in June, Albini wasn’t wearing shades or showing off any tacky ink. But he did have on a black T-shirt featuring the name and logo of a Belgian punk band called Cocaine Piss. Albini works with the group. “We actually have a session booked in a couple weeks,” said Albini, the owner of Electrical Audio in Chicago. “They’re coming to record another album.” After he sported the tee, traffic to the Cocaine Piss Bandcamp page quickly jumped. https://www.theringer.com/sports/2018/7/2/17524632/steve-albini-poker-world-series-champion56. Bad Sports “Comes Close”
55. Mason Ramsey “Famous”
Mason Ramsey went to Walmart sometime prior to March 24th, 2018, and he decided to yodel. Someone took a video with their phone -- likely one of his parents. And they wisely tagged the video "Walmart Yodel Boy" to make it seem like the video was not taken by anyone in the yodeller's family. By March 31st, the uploaded video had an entry on knowyourmeme. By April 13th, Mason had been asked to perform at Coachella. Up until this point, the meme felt pretty annoying. However, it all became justified mere weeks later after a songwriting team of four people wrote him the outstandingly dope song "Famous." It was quickly recorded and released to Spotify on April 27th, later debuting at #62 on the Billboard Hot 100. It's not tough to quickly move on from an unremarkable meme-of-the-week, but a dope jam lasts forever. Also he kinda looks like Jordy.54. Three Keep Deep “Kingz Way”
53. Etran de L'Aïr "Etran Hymne"
The No. 1 LP is the winner of what would have been the Grammy for "Wedding Band Album Of The Year" if such a Grammy Award ever existed. A layer of field recording surrounds the atmosphere of this mysterious 2014 artifact, possibly taped with only one or two mics. Liner notes reveal that these distant captured sounds are an actual wedding, and that Etran de L'Air is one of Niger's most successful wedding bands. We would like them to play at every wedding forever, but that is impossible. So instead, just play the CD or vinyl. It'll be great. P.S. Why don't more wedding people get vinyl DJ's to spin at their weddings? Kinda sick of just seeing the one dumbass with the mic spinning the same dumbass songs for 5 hours.52. Stove "Mosquiter" / Stove “Nightwalk”
51. Otoboke Beaver “Anata Watashi Daita Ato Yome No Meshi”
50. David Nance Group “In Her Kingdom” / David Nance “110 Blues (I-80 Version)”
49. Travis Scott f/ Drake “Sicko Mode”
48. Beach House “Lemon Glow”
47. Windhand "Old Evil" / Windhand “Red Cloud”
46. Sleep "Sonic Titan"
For all practical intents and purposes, the fluid track listing of Dopesmoker finally congealed upon the release of its 2012 vinyl and streaming reissue: Track 1: "Dopesmoker (Parts 1, 2 and 3)" Track 2: "Holy Mountain (live in 1994)," Track 3: "Sonic Titan (live in 1992)." After lasting 20 years without any official studio release, "Sonic Titan" seemed destined to go down as a lost fan favorite. Without much warning, 4/20/2018 suddenly arrived with a Beyonce-style surprise drop from perhaps the most mythic stoner-metal band of all time. The Sciences had arrived.The record's two lengthiest jams - "Antarcticans Thawed" and "Sonic Titan" - both survived similarly long journeys from their 1992 genesis, written alongside "Dopesmoker" starting around the close of the Sleep's Holy Mountain sessions. Fully ripened in its official studio version, "Sonic Titan" now stretches well-past the 12-minute mark, fully formed beyond its 9-minute Dopesmoker version. The placement of the bass solo after its gigantic intro justifies every repetition. The Iommi-thirds accompanying its riff ascend straight into one of Matt Pike's wildest shredder solos.
[Incorrectly labelled as "Giza Butler" on Bandcamp.]
45. Kim Petras “Heart To Break”
44. Mister Goblin “Option Vampire”
43. Rolling Blackout Coastal Fever "Talking Straight"
42. Surface To Air Missive “Life is So Sad” / Surface To Air Missive "Phases"
41. 6ix9ine f/ Fetty Wap & A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie “KEKE”
We were bad.
| 100 - 81 || 80 - 61 || 60 - 41 || 40 - 21 || 20 - 1 |
| All 100 Songs |
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. 
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 
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