Posted December 20, 201410 yr http://i60.tinypic.com/5vn67l.jpg Seasons greetings all, as we approach the last ten days of 2014, it's time for me to present my top 100 favourite musical moments of the year to you, in truth, I didn't think I'd reach 100 songs this year as I would say it's not overall been as fruitful as last year, but nonetheless there was plenty of quality stuff to be had which I hope you will agree with! This will pretty much run as last year's did with a section a day until New Years Day where I'll hopefully finish. I've got a little extra something to present prior to that and it's not albums as I've been shit with listening to them this year alas. Edited January 5, 201510 yr by Chez Wombat
December 20, 201410 yr Author To make this a bit more...animated per se than a standard countdown, I've added some 'awards' to give out to various songs within the countdown, giving them a unique category in the year just gone. They are both positive and negative. http://i61.tinypic.com/2nr29w1.jpg Best song (obviously) Best New Artist Most Unexpected gem Most unexpected gem considering the artist Best music video Best grower Favourite Buzzjack related discovery Favourite UK number 1 Best song title Biggest turnaround for an artist Best Movie song Most inspired use of an instrument Most refreshing surprise hit Gloriously atmospheric song Song So bad but so good at the same time Greatest concept artist Best song with the most indecipherable lyrics ever Best instrument Best foreign language song 'No words needed...' award for best instrumental Most weird but wonderful song Lifetime achievement award for most beauties released within the artists career http://i61.tinypic.com/2djb7kl.jpg Worst song Worst new artist Most disappointing new artist Most useless artist Worst lyricist Worst instrument Worst attempt at cultural commentary ever Biggest mess of a song Most vile yet desperate video/song combination 'Well you fucked that up' award for most irritating/disappointing execution of comeback Most cringingly desperate artist ever Lifetime achievement award for most turds released within the artists career I will obviously not be charting the negative ones so I will hopefully do them all tonight/before I start my countdown Edited January 5, 201510 yr by Chez Wombat
December 20, 201410 yr Those awards sound really good and looking forward to the negative awards tonight hopefully :wub:
December 20, 201410 yr can i just express my love for your banner, who knew we had a hockney in our midsts :wub:
December 21, 201410 yr Author can i just express my love for your banner, who knew we had a hockney in our midsts :wub: Thank you, though it took me about twenty minutes to even get it to that standard! -x- Let's get the bile out of the way then: http://i61.tinypic.com/2djb7kl.jpg Worst song: The Chainsmokers - #SELFIE Some tough competition for this category, but I think this awful excuse for a song wins in the end. On the surface, it's a rather bog standard dance song but what brings it to truly terrible level is it's so called play on the 'selfies' craze for social media culture, putting a hash tag in the title and making the lyrics the ramblings of a stereotypical drunk female fresher talking jargon before taking selfies. It's not only hideous to listen too but also uses a hideous unappealing stereotype in an attempt to appeal to 'youths'. No wonder we're looked on in such contempt if THIS is a representation of us. Worst new artist: Elyar Fox Literally no redeeming features. Most of his extreme vocal and charismatic shortcomings being made clear in worst song of the year contender, A Billion Girls and that other one that I can't remember at all. He's not exactly vile as a singer, but he is an extremely poor vocalist with absolutely nothing to make him stand out as a popstar, other than a pretty boy that some are naive enough to buy on just his looks. And the release strategy of a Billion Girls with dozens of different versions fans are forced to by show the desperation of and exploitative tactics that go on to try and make him happen if just for that five minutes. He represents the music industry at it's worst. Most disappointing new artist: Sam Smith This one wasn't tough either, I was so excited that Sam would be a refreshingly left field success story off the back of his collaborations with Naughty Boy & Disclosure. A success story he obviously was, but clearly left-field Sam wasn't much of a commercial prospect and male Emeli Sande was obviously judged to be the better song. Money on my Mind was alright but not what I really wanted and his next two that I can barely distinguish were even worse, and by the latter half of the year I was absolutely sick of him. I don't necessarily find him offensive and maybe there's better on his album, but thus far, he is easily the biggest case of wasted potential given how much I loved his two collaborations. Most useless artist: Tinie Tempah I used to be quite the fan of Tinie and Pass Out & Written in the Stars remain tunes four years on, so it's a shame then that I have to present him with this but in reality, has he contributed anything worthwhile in the past year? Going back to last year, Trampoline was a really half arsed effort and Children of the Sun couldn't scream 'Written in the Stars' knock off more, I don't remember the other one he did but I don't remember thinking positively of it either. This year, all he's done is ruin a brilliant dance instrumental that really didn't need the additional vocals and add an additional pointless rap to Cheryl's new single and thus getting two number 1d without really putting any effort in at all. I groan when I see his name as a 'feat.' as I know it's gonna be the same old YEAHHHH/Place names/generic rap verse and it's a right shame as I once really liked him :( Worst lyricist: Jason Derulo I'll let the lyrics speak for themselves here: http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/jasonderulo/trumpets.html Wiggle *shudders* Worst instrument: Trumpet If just because it's contributed fully to some songs I never want to hear again - Trumpets and Crazy Stupid Love, I tend to not look forward to a song with it in after hearing this. Worst attempt at cultural commentary ever: M.A.D - Fame & TV It's one thing for a generic boyband to release a yawn-inducingly generic song but it's another and completely laughable when they attempt to mock popular culture. This is apparent here. Some choice lyrics include 'we're all so obsessed and consumed with the celebrities we see in the news', 'another reality show', 'whatever happened to popping and locking now everybody's just party rocking', not only are these references incredibly dated but they make an absolutely pathetic attempt to be 'smart' and 'critical' when the chorus that follows is that of completely the sort of song that makes pop culture worthy of mocking and them themselves are hardly in the place to mock it given they are essentially a caricature boyband, I know Lorde did a similar thing but with her music she at least offered a new sort of sound, however pretentious it was. Overall, yeah I may be being a bit 'media student' here but this laughable attempt at critique just makes a terrible song even worse. Biggest mess of a song: Beyonce - 7/11 Yeah no, recording in random sounds doesn't really make a good record, Bey. Most vile yet desperate video/song combination: Jennifer Lopez/Iggy Azalea - Booty Where do I start with this? I won't link the video as I don't wanna make people regurgitate their dinner. The song which is little more than the lyrics 'big booty' repeated on loop with a pointless rap added from the then rather overexposed Iggy Azalea is coupled with a cringeworthy, incredibly cheap video of what was essentially soft porn. Now Nicki Minaj's Anaconda was of a similar subject matter per se and yes that was quite a terrible as a song too, but what stopped me from detesting it was the fact it didn't take itself too seriously and was at least...mildly creative in it's video, all Booty reeks off is desperation, the video is budget as hell and the sole responsibility of it's making seems to be 'OMG dis is so contrvershall!!!11 this will sell', the song rightly flopping emphasised this as a truly embarassing moment this was for them both. 'Well you fucked that up' award for most irritating/disappointing execution of comeback: U2 The best way to get people to hear your album is NOT FORCING IT ONTO THEIR LIBRARIES AND HEARING IT EVEN THOUGH YOU HAVEN'T BOUGHT IT. Even worse that it was for a very mediocre album that didn't have many highlights. I love U2 but this was incredibly annoying and I don't have much good to say about them this year :( I will give them The Troubles from the album though, it only just missed my top 100. Most cringingly desperate artist ever: Jessie J This is more a lifetime award as we've always known she's desperate but this year confirmed it more than ever. How do you reverse decline in the last career? By roping in two big names currently to sing on what would otherwise be a standard Jessie J song. She is still focused on America as apparently they 'treat her better' and she's more comfortable releasing generic American releases rather than being true to who she is or whatever. Never has there been such a wall of contradictions from an obnoxious persona and this desperate move and subesquent realisation that not much else will sell beyond this has made this a worthwhile and long awaited award for Jessie! Finally, for the Lifetime achievement award for most turds released within the artists career, Chris Brown released Loyal and New Flame this year and it added nicely to his back catalogue of music, here it is in visual form: http://i62.tinypic.com/517ta9.pnghttp://i62.tinypic.com/517ta9.pnghttp://i62.tinypic.com/517ta9.pnghttp://i62.tinypic.com/517ta9.pnghttp://i62.tinypic.com/517ta9.pnghttp://i62.tinypic.com/517ta9.pnghttp://i62.tinypic.com/517ta9.pnghttp://i62.tinypic.com/517ta9.pnghttp://i62.tinypic.com/517ta9.pnghttp://i62.tinypic.com/517ta9.png etc. His incapability of making something decent whilst still maintaining his persona of an arrogant arsehole makes me more than happy to present this award to Chris Brown, enjoy Chris! :cheer: -x- all in my humble opinion of course!!11 I will start the top 100 tomorrow (I did start writing this post before 12), this took quite a lot out of me :drama:
December 21, 201410 yr That was such an amazing read :wub: #Selfie is terrible, Jason's lyrics are awful [especially that disgusting wiggle], I still need to delete that annoying U2 album from my library and Chris Brown really is an awful terrible artist
December 21, 201410 yr Author Just missing out on my top 100 (amongst quite a few others) are UK flop but still good number 1 SecondCity - I Wanna Feel, David Guetta's first really good, non generic song since Titanium, Dangerous, BJSC hits Deja - Heart & LIZ - XTC (of which quite a few more are still to come) and as mentioned, the one good U2 track from the album, The Troubles Also missing out is my award for Most Weird but Wonderful Song going to TASSEOMANCY - REALITY RdsbyKtmUgk Don't question it, just embrace it *.* Before I begin, here is my 2013 YE number 1, which I'm sure quite a lot of you would've never heard of it was that obscure so listen! SBK2AF-NdVA Edited December 21, 201410 yr by FrostytheWallaby
December 22, 201410 yr Author http://i62.tinypic.com/dfiolw.jpg http://i57.tinypic.com/r0p1ue.jpg 91. Erkka – Plastic Flamingoes Quirky by name and nature was this wonderfully odd BJSC discovery from back in September. It pounds up and down for a whole six minutes often in the same constant but it's strange yet slick production coupled with various distorted sounds effects ensures that your attention is always kept. http://i60.tinypic.com/2vvth4z.jpg 92. Kero Kero Bonito – Sick Beat IT'S KKB LET'S GO, I have literally never heard of this group yet this little slice of quirk has so many quotable moments that are weird and seem to be from the perspective of fourteen year old games geek but are still wonderful. The transition from English to Japanese lyrics often instantly works very well and when there are such shout outs to Windows 98, Tomb Raider and the whole instrumental sounds like a level up for a Mario game, you can't really not love it. I am awarding them my Most Promising Artist 2015 (which I forgot to include in my initial awards) in pure hope I hear more weird and wonderful stuff from them. Bear in mind Sam Smith probably would've got this last year, but we can hope there won't be a need for them to sell out to go commercial. http://i58.tinypic.com/2pqw706.jpg 93. Bakermat – One Day (Vandaag) Sampling Martin Luther King's famous speech does sound like a good formula for a hit which you wonder how most didn't pick up before. This sax-lead dance song was sadly only a minor hit here in the UK and may not quite be up to the standard of the other wonderful sax dance songs of this year, but it's still an infectious number and the speech is suitably cast in keeping a sense of emotion in the track. http://i60.tinypic.com/fw9c5.jpg 94. Sax – Pipedream Yay, more saxophones! Though of course this one wasn't a hit nor even something that Youtube knows about, a discovery from an Unknown Pleasures earlier in the year I believe. I did admittedly forget it's existence as the year went on, but, well it's a saxophone-electro led soaring instrumental, I see nothing wrong here. http://i62.tinypic.com/35nab7r.jpg 95. Haiku Salut – Los Elefantes I continue to be very enchanted by the music of Haiku Salut despite possibly being the only one on this website that knows more than one song by them (and I'm not convinced the vast majority will remember that one either). They are an instrumental trio from Derbyshire who describe their music as “Baroque-Pop-Folktronic-Neo-Classical-Something-Or-Other” which is fairly accurate listening to this track. I love the homemade feel of their tracks and this jaunty little number starts with a sad accordion, twinkling piano and sad harmonica before speeding up as the soft drums and soothing acoustic guitar to bring it to a relatively active finish. , if you have time http://i59.tinypic.com/15ojfh0.jpg 96. The Lonely Island feat. Tegan & Sara – Everything is AWESOME!! I had to put it here, The Lego Movie is probably the best move I've seen all year (yes I'm not afraid to admit it), outside of the movie, it does sound fairly ridiculous in every way and doesn't work very well as a duet considering how different the acts involved are, but within context, it really sounds so much better and enhances the movie. Now I always smile whenever I get the brief opportunity to hear it, I always smile. Honourable mentions must go to other movie songs - Ellie Goulding - Beating Heart, fairly unremarkable but working quite well in the context of the surprisingly good film, The Hanging Tree which, though I'm yet to see shamefully, still is quite a brilliant build up which I imagine sonds excellent in the movie & Ed Sheeran's I See Fire for last year's Hobbit, which is the only time you'll hear me mention him in this thread. http://i62.tinypic.com/23w1zj7.jpg 97. Imagine Dragons - Demons After the outright, anthemic sounds of Radioactive & the mellow acoustic vibes of It's Time, Imagine Dragons went full on power ballad mode with this. I doubt they'll find another Radioactive any time soon but Demons is effective as a U2-style stadium anthem and generally leaves them in a good place in my mind before new material follows. http://i62.tinypic.com/sc75li.jpg 98. Bloodgroup – Cut Out Your Tongue (Girl Unit Remix) All 8 (excluding Jaimeson as that was like, a 2003 release) of my BJSC entries made it into this countdown so another year of NO REGRETS etc. though this was definitely the one I fell out of love with the most, if just because I guess there's only so much you can like from an instrumental like this with not a whole lot of 'layers' per se before it gets old. But nonetheless, I did love this if only for a month or two, the strange thing is prior to me finding them, I saw a short film documentary on the group themselves at a film festival. Originally a folk rock and quite...aesthetic Icelandic group, the Disquiet EP offers mainly instrumental electro reworkings of their songs, Cut Out Your Tongue is no exception as the song is reworked into a building majestic electronic, instrumental which wouldn't sound out of place on the Drive soundtrack. http://i62.tinypic.com/106cvhy.jpg 99. Ellie Goulding – Goodness Gracious This bottom section mainly comprises of my loved 2013 artists that released a pretty good song in 2014 to just keep them in my affections, though in Ellie's case, this one that was a hell of a lot better than Burn ever was. The gloriously British titled pop song feels a lot more slickly produced and convincing than Burn which could've been sung by anyone. It just about convinced me that the extra tracks on Halcyon Days wasn't totally dull, almost. http://i59.tinypic.com/13zn7yc.jpg 100. Foxes – Let Go For Tonight :hi: Nelly, just about scraping in is Foxes with her follow up to Youth and indeed her only UK top 10 hit as it stands. Coming after such a wonderful song like Youth, the song had to be special and I don't feel this was special enough, I did grow to like it after a few listens and quite like it's explosive Florence & The Machine-esque style, but it's not aged particularly well at all already and the song that followed didn't interest me at all which didn't leave me much motivation to listen to the album. Unfortunate for an act I really thought was promising and by the end of the year, she wasn't far from my shortlist for 'Most Disappointing artist' if I'm being honest :'( This commentary's very negative isn't it? I LOVED YOUTH AND THIS IS QUITE A GOOD SONG http://i59.tinypic.com/2ns1e6p.jpg (haiku salut and bloodgroup pictured above and below btw) Edited December 22, 201410 yr by FrostytheWallaby
December 22, 201410 yr I really like one day, demons and let go for tonight. I also love/hate everything is awesome, it depends what mood I am in :) Great start Chez :wub:
December 22, 201410 yr let me complement you on your commentary, it's really insightful to read. keep it up *-* everything is awesome is indeed amazing, was hilarious to hear it in the charts but it is undeniably catchy. demons is probably my best imagine dragons single actually, just so anthemic :wub:
December 22, 201410 yr HELLO :o did not even see this properly until now. Gosh your concepts/layouts always put everyone elses to SHAME. That opening awards set was such a good read :heehee: I agree with a few of them, but not Sam Smith. His new music might be disappointing for those that expected him to be all DANCE-esque but really what he's done instead is still so good :( 7/11 is a HOT mess :angry: get it right. Poor Jessie J lol. Of the good things i need only to comment on one song: Everything is AWESOME !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :wub: :heart: i need to rewatch the film as i only saw it on a plane journey which isn't the same thing, but i STILL find myself randomly singing along to this. Should have been as big as 'Let It Go' :cry:
December 22, 201410 yr Author Thank you for the lovely comments, guys <3 It's always lovely to hear compliments about my style, I always think I ramble on too much that everyone scrolls through them! :lol: I won't be responding to all comments just to avoid constant 'Thanks!' when I don't have anything else to say but I appreciate them all, and I'm just glad that people are reading! I am glad with this response to Everything is Awesome :D I have just noticed I've included a duplicate of the song at 81 (wouldn't be my countdown if I didn't forget something/make some form of error!) so everything now moves up a place (so Tasseomancy gets a top 100 place *.*) 81-89 are coming later tonight hopefully! That opening awards set was such a good read :heehee: I agree with a few of them, but not Sam Smith. His new music might be disappointing for those that expected him to be all DANCE-esque but really what he's done instead is still so good :( I think had he set himself up to be an Emeli Sande-like figure, I wouldn't have minded as much, but it just wasn't really what I was hoping from him, but then again, what I want from a lot of hyped artists probably isn't a commercially viable option! (see Ellie Goulding pre-Halcyon Days :() Edited December 22, 201410 yr by FrostytheWallaby
December 22, 201410 yr Lol Tegan And Sara. Lol Idina is gonna be in this as well isn't she. Lol. You're wrong.
December 23, 201410 yr Author http://i62.tinypic.com/v4uh3a.jpg http://i60.tinypic.com/6ygth5.jpg 81. Yumi & The Weather – All We Can An Unknown Pleasures discovery which I think I gave maximum points to at the time but that almost completely turned on it's head and it's now the lowest of four wonderful discoveries from that contest. Not to do this any discredit as they were all great in their own ways - All We Can is a really soothing, hazy number that is definitely best suited for the good weather, with calm, whispery vocals that, accompanied with a wonderfully nature focused video of a single girl embracing the weather , really brings the chilling vibes before an orchestral segment accompanies it at the end. http://i57.tinypic.com/dvg02b.jpg 82. KYA (Christina Parie vs London Noise) – What I Live For And a discovery from the other contest now. I'm quite surprised how much I like this one to be honest considering female dance pop isn't usually the sort of thing that I go for, but this one stood out, if mainly for the rather great and dynamic drum'n'bass production to add to the song, though her vocals have just the right amount of attitude to make it a more memorable moment. http://i62.tinypic.com/eu4hox.jpg 83. Chase & Status feat. Jacob Banks – Alive Chase & Status overall haven't impressed me as much as their No More Idols but when that era was so good, that was always gonna be hard to beat. Still, Lost & Not Found was good and this one released at the start of the year was also good. Jacob's quite raspy vocals may divide some but I personally think they enhance the song a lot, accompanied by typically great production as ever from C&S, this was a great end to the campaign singles-wise. http://i61.tinypic.com/334hhde.jpg 84. David E Sugar – Pushing to be First A blog find that I don't really have a whole lot to say about nor the man himself who remains a complete mystery, but I do like quite a bit, obviously. I guess because I'd find it hard to categorise this, there's so many different things going on instrumentally on top of his vocals which sound like Ryan Tedder/Chris Martin. If you could imagine what would happen if you let their bands into a respective studio and 'experiment' a bit, I guess you have an answer for how this sounds. http://i60.tinypic.com/do75mr.jpg 85. ZHU – Faded I like ~mysterious~ artists and ZHU seems to fit into that, considering how little information is known about him and his extremely subtle electronic music, which as Jameela told us on the chart show numerous times, that he 'lets the music do the talking'. It's a little pretentious putting it that way but I'm still on board with him in general. Paradise Awaits which was sent to BJSC was a really unique and great song and Faded, being slightly more commercial but still not sounding that much like a hit, continued this. I predictably like this one the best out of all I've heard from him, a wonderfully atmospheric electronic number. http://i62.tinypic.com/2csfkw3.jpg 86. Hozier – Take Me To Church In similar guilty 'this grew on me when it became a big hit' fashion, Hozier is here too. This passed me by way back when it was entered into BJSC but it was definitely a slow grower and it took a while (almost a year in fact) but I do now love this a lot. A lyrically powerful slow piano led song with a strong religious feelings, a running metaphor with possible homosexual undertones as shown by the thought provoking video, it's rare that a hit song really floors you with the sheer power of the lyrics and the vocal emotion but this was definitely the case here (I know I should've seen it in BJSC, but..I didn't lol). http://i60.tinypic.com/2rwxhth.jpg 87. The Midnight – The Years (Prologue) A really quite beautiful BJSC discovery here, a wonderful 80s-inspired synth pop ballad that could easily come from an act like Ultravox or Bjork or...similar 80s act. Every one of those six minutes feels wonderful as the vocals and infectious bassline never let your attention loose. http://i59.tinypic.com/2ug1duc.jpg 88. Summer Heart – I Wanna Go/U Got All I’m Looking 4 I found out about him in Guardian New Band of the Day (which I've had to use as my replacement for blog finds now Guardian New Music has died, RIP :(), a Swedish dreampop artist who is quite appropriately named really as his songs have a very summery feeling and were sure enough lovely to hear around that time of year. U Got All I'm Looking 4 (also my flop BJSC entry) is a bright, happy and really catchy song which sounds like Owl City who may have been listening to a bit of Travis. I Wanna Go is similar, but more relaxed and chilled, despite the completely indecipherable lyrics which I don't know whether they were intentional or not, the sort of song made for a sunset-on-the-beach setting. I love both equally so I think they can share this position. http://i57.tinypic.com/15hob4h.jpg 89. Danny L Harle – Broken Flowers Another BJSC song in this quite BJSC-heavy section. A slightly 'minimalist' melancholic electro house song with an insanely infectious vocal loop to comprise with the gradually building bassline. It will not dislodge itself from inside your head, I can tell you that. http://i59.tinypic.com/11uuedk.jpg
December 23, 201410 yr Author Lol Tegan And Sara. Lol Idina is gonna be in this as well isn't she. Lol. You're wrong. Lol bye (maybe you'll find out when I finish it, not that you've done that before lolz :ph34r: ) Edited December 23, 201410 yr by FrostytheWallaby
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