Posted December 19, 20159 yr http://s13.postimg.org/yj69bpskn/top50.png Hi. I know I haven't been around these parts that much this year - all in aid of preserving the mystery for this year's countdown. (Not really.) Hopefully this thread can redress the balance ahead of a measured return to regular posting next year. Anyway, in this thread I will present a countdown of my top 50 songs from the year that has been 2015 - and each will be accompanied by a recommended listen, though these extra 50 are not to be taken as the rest of a top 100. They'd be in contention, sure, but I only nailed down a top 50 this year because I can only write so much, damn it! Anyway. First few coming up shortly, so stay tuned folks. Edited December 19, 20159 yr by randomfurlong
December 19, 20159 yr Author 50 | 'Bitch Better Have My Money' | Rihanna | B3eAMGXFw1o “Don’t act like you forgot / I call the shot shot shots,” trills Rihanna several times in her whirring, jittering comeback statement, the heralding of a return that immediately ceased action afterward. But *don’t* act like you forgot: Rihanna will do as she pleases. And so it is across this arrogantly casual trap-hop confection, her vocals spitting out her words in a wild variety of cadences, from the disdainful demand of the chorus to the pile up of words in the second verse. As ever, her chords sound strained sometimes, but this isn’t Rihanna reaching for the unachievable, it’s Rihanna not giving a f*** that she can’t reach it, because she has the money, and she’s gonna get more whether you willingly give it up or not. That is to say: Rihanna is a precarious place in her musical career, but this statement of intent still rang loudly across the year. Like this? Try... 'Bettie', Violet Chachki - for more uncompromising female attitude and aggression in music and video form.
December 19, 20159 yr Wonderful :D last year's countdown was great plus I noticed your 'best of 2015' playlist on spotify (the bjsc playlists lead me to it!!) so I think I'll like a good portion of the songs here
December 19, 20159 yr Author 49 | 'Hourglass' | Disclosure feat. Lion Babe m2z8Caoww44 Perhaps you need to see this live, with the ambisexual sight of Lion Babe’s Jillian Hervy gyrating in a sparkling leotard, her arms swinging to the post-chorus cacophony of noise, for you to love this as much as I do. I had the honour at the iTunes Festival, and hell, it really makes the title lyric sing: all eyes were indeed on that hourglass shape. Disclosure’s sophomore album didn’t hit as big as their first, but they’re still effortless purveyors of great dance music, their bouncing, echoing synth beats connecting to the soles of any feet within earshot, and Hourglass is them in peak form meeting a beautiful vocalist on the rise; the bridge, almost whispers, is the sensual foreplay to the frenzy of the chorus and the euphoric instrumental that follows. Like this? Try... , Janelle Monáe feat. Jidenna - for more utterly groovy swagger.
December 19, 20159 yr Author Wonderful :D last year's countdown was great plus I noticed your 'best of 2015' playlist on spotify (the bjsc playlists lead me to it!!) so I think I'll like a good portion of the songs here oops, spoilers! better hide that... glad you liked what you saw though! I've always thought we had pretty similar taste :D
December 19, 20159 yr Author 48 | 'Lost and Found' | Ellie Goulding | QxfJfZTEj_g Trust Max Martin to rescue Ellie’s bloated third album from the brink of uselessness; if we can’t get much by way of personality (and, in truth, this would still be superior with a singer who could actually be bothered to make the chorus come alive with the richness of pleasure it deserves), we at least get this joyous anthem that bounces along on a jolly little guitar baseline. The release of the chorus is bulletproof in how it allows Ellie to trill the end of her lines, becoming more another instrument than a slightly reedy vocalist. Like Martin’s best pop songs, it jangles with the delight of having discovered a really, really good beat, and thankfully doesn’t overload itself with synth except to pressurise for the explosion of the final chorus, a chorus of Ellie’s all crying out together. Like this? Try... , Jess Glynne - for more euphoric pop from a boring popstar. Edited December 20, 20159 yr by randomfurlong
December 20, 20159 yr Like all 3 of those (especially Hourglass which is one of my favourite's from Disclosure's new album) and looking forward to the rest of this countdown :heart:
December 20, 20159 yr Hello randomfurlong! Nice opening to this countdown, I like BBHMM if not many others do. On My Mind is a standout of Ellie's album too, wouldn't mind it getting a release next year.
December 20, 20159 yr Rihanna's song is so underated I wish I charted it *.* Disclosure's song is a fave on the album :heart: Ellie's Lost and Found is good but not a fave of mine *.*
December 20, 20159 yr Author 47 | 'Make Me A Bird' | Arcane Station feat. Marianne Hekkilæ JLip1UCsFBY This song makes me want to clear a room and sit hunched on the floor, staring balefully out of the window at an empty sky. It is a song full of so much sorrow and regret that it burrows straight to the darkest recesses of your heart. Marianne Hekkilæ’s despairing vocals reverberate hauntingly, ghostlike, as she cries out, helpless, guitar notes and indistinct synths swooping at her like the bird she wishes to be, drums beating against the walls around her. Halfway through already and she declares that “this is the end of this sad song”, but she can’t halt one last violent cry for help, before the songs just ends, falls away, as suddenly as it had begun. Like this? Try... , Kacey Musgraves - for more spare, reflective simplicity. Edited December 20, 20159 yr by randomfurlong
December 20, 20159 yr Author 46 | 'No Words' | Erik Hassle | 3O2qp-uKWlI As nimble and sprightly a pop song as you’re likely to come across. Erik Hassle has always felt underappreciated as a singer - you’d hesitate to call him a popstar - but few of his songs have rung with such emotional clarity and vibrant musicality as this one. All this from a song that mentions a funeral in its opening lines. The internal tension of a song about having no words - a woman making Erik speechless, dazzled by love - makes itself apparent when he breaks down into staccato sounds at one point, actually tripping over his own vocals. It’s a neat trick in a song that is mostly just a clean, straightforward but joyously direct pop song. Like this? Try... , MNEK & Zara Larsson - for more simple and energetic Swedish pop (sort of).
December 20, 20159 yr Author 45 | 'Warrior' | Laura Marling | AGltZC5ep_0 I absolutely adored Laura Marling through her first two albums; her youthful precocity made her soft but passionate songcraft sing with honesty and freshness. She lost me, somewhere, but a chance listen of ‘Warrior’ - thanks, Spotify Discover! - has reunited us. I’ll always be drawn in by echoing vocals and floridly dramatic instrumentation, and Marling nails those basics here, her voice surer and more distant than I remember it, the type of a seasoned folk singer who picks up their guitar for an impromptu tune on a train, or something. The ghostly folk tale seems like that of a wizened storyteller, a narrator, until Marling’s voice suddenly lifts, taken away with the wind of the reverb gusting behind her. The unanswered question of the title is the tactic of the finest storytelling - a thought, always lingering, the music ever present. Like this? Try... , Cilia - for more swirling tales of the outdoors (skip to the last minute tbh)
December 20, 20159 yr Author 44 | 'America' | XYLØ | 4qRkm70vHMY Newcomers XYLØ have specialised in a kind of precious despair this year, and the best of the lot is still their debut ‘America’, a perfectly pitched swirl of limpid sorrow from the moment the low drum beats kick in. The American Dream is implicitly skewered, an iconic ideal stripped back to its contorted illusory status, the solitude of the vocalist apparent in the constancy of her tone, a soft, smooth sadness that doesn’t even lilt for her cries of “oh”. The soundscape behind her is a spare emptiness, drum beats barely bothering to keep their time, synths in the chorus dripping like useless tears. The echo almost makes the song a hollow shape for the listener to climb inside, a sinking liferaft to cling onto. Like this? Try... , Oh Wonder - for more beautiful desolation with no answers.
December 20, 20159 yr Author 43 | 'Drive' | Halsey | 2oI-BsWbIg4 I promise this countdown will cheer up soon. For now, though, buckle in for my favoured moment on Halsey’s somewhat blackbirded debut album, another tale of being adrift in America, albeit one that seems more disaffected than rejected as in XYLØ’s. Halsey’s play with vocal effects is at its subtlest and most beautiful here, and the sound effects, if obvious, create a real narrative to a standard length of song, the eerie keyboard refrain immediately conjuring images of a dark American desert highway, Halsey’s vocals rising and falling with the momentum of forward motion as she moves along the open road. It’s atmospheric songs like these - songs that can transport you to a very specific time and place no matter what mundane space you occupy - that so often capture my heart. Like this? Try... , Solomon Grey - for more downbeat momentum.
December 21, 20159 yr Adore Halsey and love Drive :heart: My favourites from her album are Ghost and New Americana though!
December 28, 20159 yr Author Okay, need to start zooming through this! 42 | in time | FKA twigs | bYU3j-22360 (skip to 7:11) I didn't really feel twigs' M3LL155X EP as much as I did LP1, but it's slowly working its eerie charms on me. Highlight is definitely 'in time', where she merges her usual soft, sensual vocals with the sharp, staccato talk-singing that sounds like the song's dominant rhythms - but then that gorgeous echoey wave of synths comes in, and I'm all at sea again. Typically stimulating wildness from her. Like this? Try... , TÃLÃ & Sylas - for more diffuse sounds and a vocalist making sex at your ears.
December 28, 20159 yr Author 41 | My Gun | Tove Lo | 1ftTte3YYew The first track proper of Tove Lo's poptastic debut really sets out the stall for what's to come: it's fast, playful, effortlessly catchy, unconventional, and sung with an lightness and charm that makes the whole thing a blast to listen to. She's the popstar we really need: she feels grounded, but immensely talented, and is able to make everyday life and the currency of youthful life into songs that really connect. Like this? Try... , Sam Dew - for more offbeat rhythms inside triumphantly catchy pop.
December 28, 20159 yr Author 40 | I'm In It With You | Loreen | NDdI5hZiPa0 Alright, alright, so she really needs to work on her diction. But as ever with Loreen, the emotive quality of both her vocalisation and her lyricism is exceptional - the pained cries really get me, every time, as does the echoing soundscape. Like this? Try... , Hellberg feat. Cozi Zuehlsdorff - for more emphatic Swedish girlpop. Albeit with a bit more of a donk on it.
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