YES HYSTERIA! One of the greatest Muse singles! And since you seem to love the Final Fantasy songs so much, what are your thoughts on Electric de Chocobo from VII? :D

YES HYSTERIA! One of the greatest Muse singles! And since you seem to love the Final Fantasy songs so much, what are your thoughts on Electric de Chocobo from VII? :D

I regret to say I've never played FFVII! FFX (and X-II) is the only one I've really had time with. I would like to play FFVII next though but I've been waiting for the remaster and whether or not it's sufficiently good. RPGs are quite an investment :lol:

70. The Cloud Room -

(2005)

 

There's a very interesting feature article on Pitchfork detailing the history of this song. It's a fascinating look into the often unpleasant reality of bands & musicians who were pushed to the mainstream in the landfill indie era. It's also interesting to read about the failings of what very well could have ended up an enduring anthem but is now totally forgotten. Forgotten is an apt word in this situation too, because while a lot of stuff that is labelled as such is either A. Far more remembered than you'd realise, or B. Never particularly known in the first place, I don't think either really applies to this song because I do genuinely remember it being everywhere. By everywhere I mean it was on the radio and also on an ad. In fact I recently learned that just a year after that article was published, this song actually cracked the top 40 digital chart in Australia (not the main chart though as rules dictated that a physical single was required at the time). It just feels like another part of the song's destiny to never properly catch on. Of course, I don't list this song here because of all this, but rather because it really is something special that was lost in the shuffle. Everything about the song is just a rush of good feelings.

 

69. The Butterfly Effect -

(2008)

 

I remember when I was making these initial ranks that this was something of a surprise to me. I rather liked "Final Conversation" when it was out as a nice follow up to the album's lead single, but it was firmly behind the singles that it came between. The beauty of re-examination with time is a fascinating one though, because going back to all those tracks, I realised that this song just scratches a nice itch that the other two songs ("Window and the Watcher" and "In These Hands") didn't quite reach. I think a lot of this is to do with the guitar. It's very similar to Muse's song "Glorious" which I mentioned earlier in this list with this peculiar throttling effect it has going for it. Well that and the fact that their lead singer has a voice that can be both powerful and tender. This comes from their 3rd and as of yet last album, although the band recently reformed and have been in the studio recently, so maybe there's more to come. It seems like so many of my favourite hard rock bands from the mid to late 2000s have been returning lately, it's always a nice surprise.

 

68. LCD Soundsystem -

(2002)

 

It's always amusing to me how often a song's message falls by the wayside. I'm inclined without evidence to think that the average roadman type is not at all offended by "Man's Not Hot" and instead treats it like another anthem, or for another aspect, I often get the feeling that the people who are most mad about Eminem's new album are the same kinds of people who hate the SoundCloud rappers and the like that much of it is rallying against. I can't decide if that's better or worse than declaring it a beacon of hope in rap music because of it. Eminem is a good example to bring up in light of this song though, because this is a song that (jokingly) is all about that intense internal frustration that you're getting older and all your past credentials are being erased because 'the kids are coming up from behind'. There are many different angles you can look at this, but the main one that the song goes for is all about how the ease of music distribution in the 21st century means that anyone can very easily access all the music and information that used to require scouring, or simply being there. It's like it's making fun of places like RateYourMusic, where this older, experienced figure is outmatched by an internet music nerd who can name every good song by every good group from 1963 to 1968. Towards the end of the song, it descends into existential dread as the narrator seems to lose his mind over the fact that his experiences are being made redundant - his life is being made redundant. It's such a brilliantly specific and yet potent concept that I suspect doesn't really get through to the sorts of people who could use it.

 

67. Interpol -

(2007)

 

This song was another surprise when I was making my original annual lists that comprise this one. My first experience with Interpol was their third album "Our Love To Admire" in 2007, which I encountered with no real knowledge of their credentials like how their debut album was lauded as one of the very best of the decade. To me they were just another rock band albeit one with a distinctive vocalist, and I generally liked their songs that I heard. My profound familiarity with this song leads me to believe that it got plenty of radio airplay at the time but I never took proper notice of it. However when I hit play on this song it was an instant rush of all those memories. Any Interpol song that isn't on one of the first two albums is instantly underrated because it's not on one of those two albums, but my god this song deserves so much more credit. The guitar riff on this song pokes out in a more melodic way than is typical for Interpol and it creates so much crushing power because of it. In addition to that, there's the haunting synth riff that sounds like something out of a video game, and also a delightfully packed guitar solo near the end.

 

66. Metric -

(2005)

 

This song is something of an oddball in Metric's discography. I imagine it sounds especially jarring if you're mostly familiar with their 4 most recent albums. In some regards this is probably the heaviest sounding song they've ever put out, and it goes completely off the rails in terms of making a simple, coherent melody. It actually has a borderline noise rock guitar solo towards the end (actually not too dissimilar to that last Interpol song), and the entire time Emily is delivering the lyrics in a rather aggressive way. When I want to go on a Metric marathon session, I'm often quick to go to this song because it fills a role that not much else can.

 

65. The Gaslight Anthem -

(2008)

 

It would be really nice if I were to put this at #59 but it's not to be. The Gaslight Anthem are sometimes noted for sounding just a little bit like their peers, specifically their fellow New Jersey peers Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band. Given recent music news, it's probably not the best time to compliment a band while also calling them derivative of classic rock. This is another song which I really enjoyed long before I understood any of the lyrics, I wish I could remember my terribly mangled up version of the chorus.

 

64. LCD Soundsystem -

(2007)

 

I probably didn't get the best introduction to LCD Soundsystem. It almost feels like they intentionally lead listeners in with this because no matter what year you first come across them, the first song you hear about from each album is the awkward attempt at a pop hit of some sort, "Daft Punk Is Playing At My House", "North American Scum", "Drunk Girls". The 2nd one was my instance, though the band did warm on me a little more as the other singles were a bit more interesting. This is one that's really stuck with me. Just the titular lyric itself is something of a marvel for being a rare non-rap phrase in music that has a memetic quality to it. If that's not dumb enough, then I also think that this ballad mode of James Murphy has him sounding just a little bit like Kermit The Frog (I was probably influenced by the video I linked to think that). Nonetheless it really is a beautiful track, I love all the different imagery used in the lyrics.

 

63. Sarah Blasko -

(2006)

 

A big part of me getting into music was triple j having their own top 20 music video countdown every Saturday, which was partly revelatory for being something that got me out of bed before 11am then. I mentioned this show last time I talked about Sarah Blasko here but this is a more potent example because that was where I heard this song. It entered the chart for one week, then disappeared never to be acknowledged again, and I don't recall ever hearing it on the radio. I might have forgotten it if not for the fact that I was regularly taping it on VCR at the time and would watch it back so I could hear songs again and also memorise the countdown and its movements. I liked this song a lot back then but coming back to it years later was a remarkable moment. This is from her second album which often gets overlooked as the albums before & after it were considerably acclaimed but (perhaps admittedly owing to the timing of my experience) I think it's her best album. There's still a certain amount of rough edge retained from the first album, but balanced out with some beautiful arrangements. It shows in this song with the verses sounding rather moody only for the chorus to be wonderfully uplifting. It's part of why to this day I find her to be one of my absolute favourite vocalists.

 

62. Metric -

(2003)

 

This is a bit more in line for Metric than "Patriarch On A Vespa". It's instead from their first album which for many fans remains their best (for me that would have to be "Fantasies"). I will admit that there's the sound of a band still finding their footing in this song and it can be a bit underwritten at times, yeah, yeah, yeah. As far as synth-driven rock though, this goes down an absolute treat. The instrumental outro in particular is like a rock version of Dr. Dre's G-funk era.

 

61. Interpol -

(2002)

 

I've repeated a lot of artists in this post but incidentally I wrote the first half of this on Friday so (unintentionally) it hasn't quite been that sort of 2nd single from Men At Work's 2nd album for me. "Obstacle 1" is a song I've had a decent amount of history with. It goes back to when it was included in Guitar Hero and though I liked Interpol, I found it hard to be enthused with the song, particularly as it was very easy to play. Over the years I'd hear it every now and then and like it a bit more, but ever since I went to finally listen to their debut album I saw it for the stellar moment that it was. This song is basically guitar porn. Not to say Paul Banks isn't emoting the hell out of the song, but I love just how much mileage and variation the song gets out of what are effectively just 3 different guitar lines. There's the gradual introduction of elements, the dueling riffs in the pre-chorus, the big cathartic rush of the chorus, and then the big finish. And stuff.

60. Nas -

(2002)

 

2018 has been quite a prolific year for rap beef, and yet it all still pales in comparison to the long stretch of time when Nas & Jay-Z were beefing. I'm not about to include "Ether" which I think doesn't age super well with its homophobic slurs. Instead I lean towards this track which is far less cutting and more of an introspection on the years gone by. This is notable in the feud because Nas did release his debut a couple years before Jay did and a lot happened in that time. Many contemporaries, famous or not, did not make it out of the decade which is where the title comes from. It's all just a much more smart & mature way of saying 'Just remember I'm above you' and production-wise, it's very palatable.

 

59. Karnivool -

(2009)

 

The lead single to Karnivool's 2nd album safely met my expectations. It's certainly among the loudest songs I can remember getting regular radio play at the time. The drumming in this song is completely unhinged, the guitar goes in all sorts of wild directions before the monstrous chugging of the chorus, and the singing goes over it to great effect.

 

58. The Killers -

(2004)

 

The funny thing to me about "Mr. Brightside" being so omnipresent nowadays is that it really didn't feel like that at the time. It was a moderate hit and I knew it was popular, but I really have no recollection of ever hearing it until years down the track. I was absolutely aware of The Killers though because I knew and loved this song. I was so familiar with it that I remember years later seeing a music video on TV and recognising a lot of similar visual effects, to which I concluded that they must have filmed it after The Killers filmed this video. I even noticed that the drum kit said 'The Killers' on it. If you know the origin story of The Killers then you know where this is going because I'm obviously talking about New Order's "Crystal" where the song is played by a fictional band called The Killers and that's where the non-fictional Killers got their name from. As for the song itself, Brandon Flowers absolutely knows how to command attention and write a hook that is so fun to sing along to. I got a lot of mileage out of this being in a SingStar game.

 

57. The xx -

(2009)

 

I've been making weekly personal charts for over 10 years now and I am yet to have two songs with the same title both reach #1. It very nearly happened because the lovely Owl Eyes did get to #1 in 2012 with a song called "Crystalised", but this one had some poor timing and ended up unlucky to peak at #2. It feels like a massive indie hit that never got a chance to have it quantified, particularly as it didn't start getting radio airplay here until the year after it came out, so it never got into the Hottest 100. I wasn't instantly on board with The xx at the time, as the main single "Islands" had a stilted melody that didn't totally sit well with me. This however flowed a lot better and I instantly connected with it. Romy & Oliver still had an awkward chemistry but I found the endless stream of hooks & melodies irresistible.

 

56. Tom Ugly -

(2008)

 

The longer you spend paying attention to music, the more apparent it is that revisionism rules the course. I'm not saying that people aren't allowed to start liking songs in droves where there is no evidence to suggest they ever did at the time, a lot of stuff like that is propelled by younger audiences who weren't around at the time to have a say on it. On the other hand, I find it quite peculiar when larger media entities pick and choose a more presentable version of events. As someone who's been listening to over 12 years, I find that triple j does this all the time. One of the most blatant examples is their annual Unearthed High competition, which has been running since 2008 and helps to lift artists into much more attention while they're still in high school. They've done it quite well, with former winners like Snakadaktal, Stonefield, Japanese Wallpaper & Gretta Ray gaining respectable followings and attention. This year's winner KIAN is currently in the ARIA top 50 right now, and I'm seeing 2012's winner Asta live later this week. Artists like these, they love to mention in retrospectives or things like, 'what are they up to now', but in truth, not every winner goes on to greater things. Even though they ended up with quite a few singles on the radio at the time, I practically never hear any mention of Tom Ugly, the band who won in the very first year of the competition. I was really on board with them being the next big thing too, their first single "Cult Romance" I thought had a really fresh sound, and the hook of the song reminded me ever so favourably of Matt Bellamy's falsetto. It all just never really caught on though. What sold me the most however is that the follow up single managed to capture a similar vibe but even more effectively. "Roll Again" was my favourite song around for months, and one of only about 4 songs to ever take the title of being my most played song on iTunes which it held for years. Even with all the elements in the song, it was the very simple rollick of the guitar in the chorus that had me hooked. Although this did come shortly after Harlequin League's "Again and Again" (the song it dethroned at the top of my iTunes stats) so I just had a thing for the word 'again' in late 2008 I guess.

 

55. My Chemical Romance -

(2006)

 

A big formative song for me here. I had no idea it would go on to be a huge chart hit and enduring favourite, because when I first heard it, it was just one of a bunch of songs I'd never heard of, by artists I'd never heard of whose music videos I saw for the first time and changed my life forever. "Welcome To The Black Parade" stood out in particular because how could it not? The song just oozed of ambition and was loaded with different sections that all worked well together. Since for a while I only got to hear it once a week, it took a while to remember it, I can remember sitting around some days trying to piece together the song I loved but could only really remember that it goes 'CARRY ON!'. It was a mammoth of a song that seemed to never end and I was perfectly content with that. Also while I'm here, the last 3 MCR albums really should never be considered emo because if you look past some of the lyrics, it's all way too upbeat and fun to branch in with the style. I think media outlets around 2006 got confused with the influx of pop-punk bands that didn't really sound like the early 2000s brand of it and all those bands, especially MCR were branded with another genre that was making significant underground waves at the time and it's stuck. This song is just way too uplifting and fun to sit alongside stuff like American Football.

 

54. Battles -

(2007)

 

This is a distinctive song. It's certainly unlike anything else and yet it didn't take long for me to warm to it. It did however take a while before I realised I really loved it. Nonetheless it's another song that possibly goes for too long but yet still manages to utilise all of its different elements & hooks with enough variation that there's also something to look forward to. I'm a big fan of the massive drum fills, but there's also a bit near the end where the main instrumental drops out for a moment onto to come charging back in to great effect.

 

53. Arcade Fire -

(2004)

 

The second song in this list after "Moan" to have some relation to the first dog in space. Something I like in the Neighborhood songs is the sort of nostalgic childhood imagery that can even connect to me when my childhood was not really similar at all. They do it especially well on "The Suburbs", but of course since this is "Funeral" it's all a bit more clearly dark in its imagery. They only vaguely disguise this with the cathartic chorus.

 

52. Arcade Fire -

(2007)

 

You can say a lot about how influential Arcade Fire have been in the indie scene, to the point that I wonder how they might hold up to future generations in the same way a lot of pioneering works of media often feel quaint because their most clever moments of writing have all been rehashed into the ground. I find "No Cars Go" a keen example of this because the song's chorus has quite a forceful 'HEY!' in it, which I suspect doesn't have the same impact in a post-Lumineers & post-Of Monsters and Men world. Honestly "Little Talks" is really similar to this song. It perhaps is a favour to this song that it never got truly overplayed because otherwise it would feel less special. I still get really swept up in the rush of excitement when this song plays.

 

51. System Of A Down -

(2001)

 

It's hard to talk about System Of A Down without mentioning this song. As I was exposed to the band to a far greater degree than most at my young age, I can barely remember not knowing this song. It's something that stuck with me for so long that years later it ended up being the first song I ever illegally downloaded. Beyond just me though, it's a song that has really endured, and is one of the most streamed songs of the 2000s on Spotify, just recently passing a third of a billion plays (and with a further 700 million on YouTube). Like everyone else, I just loved how the song swapped between the loud & fast bits, and the calm chorus. I might have at one point thought they were two different songs because no one song can have all those hooks. It also has one of the most weirdly brilliant coincidences in that if you're familiar with the music video, there's a 2 second shot for seemingly no reason of Serj eating chop suey, and because that's right near the middle of the video, it has become the song's thumbnail on YouTube. What was once a very easy to miss moment is now the single image most associated with the song. I cannot imagine people older than me at the time ever expected this song to endure the way that it has.

50. Powderfinger -

(2000)

 

Powderfinger's biggest run of success came in the late '90s and early '00s. This is also the time when they released a near endless streak of ballads as singles many of which remain among the band's most enduring hits. "The Metre" fits in this timeline but it is by no means one of their most remembered, which is a shame. As far as soft rock ballads go, there aren't many I find as compelling as this one. It's done largely through simplicity with the pre-chorus 7 note melody, but really all the elements compliment each other well.

 

49. Little Birdy -

(2003)

 

Putting these two songs next to each other makes me realise that they have a decent amount in common with their slow burning emotion. Just like their prior entry, it's almost entirely sold on vocal conviction. Most people prefer "Relapse" but I've really leant towards this song in recent years.

 

48. Zero 7 (feat Sia) -

(2001)

 

Early in Sia's career she started to make a name for herself with some electronic music collaborations. She had a top 50 hit in Australia back in 1999 long before becoming a household name. More well known despite less success are her chill collaborations with Zero 7. If you know any of them, it's probably "Destiny". All the vocal affectations you expect are there, and it's coupled with really lovely melodies.

 

47. OutKast -

(2000)

 

I remember reading Pitchfork's End of Decade list in 2010, where this song was #1. I had never heard of it before then so it was weird to hear that it was the best song of the decade. It's a fair choice though. I'm still yet to get around to much of OutKast's '90s material to see how it compares, but this song on its own is quite a moment. It's also considerably more unconventional than you might think. The production borders on drum & bass, and it also has a curious structure where there are just 2 verses and both are wrapped up before the halfway mark of the 5 minute song. All parts of it are pure adrenaline though.

 

46. Radiohead -

(2003)

 

Though Radiohead veered a little away from conventional rock in the 2000s, it didn't stop them from putting out what has to be one of their all time best riffs via "There There". The song meanders for a while before picking up the pace in the second half, and I'm consistently stunned by how good the song's climax is. What's peculiar is that the main chorus line and this riff are introduced separately, but then when they're brought together near the end, it's a delightful combination that feels like they were made with in mind.

 

45. The Roots (feat Cody ChesnuTT) -

(2002)

 

I feel like this song went a long way towards easing rock fans into hip hop. The lines are blurred so much at this point that you're more likely to hear a lot of rap hits on alternative radio rather than pop radio now, but back then it was a much harder sell. This may as well be straight up blues rock that just has some rapped verses. It also has a great sample utilised which is where the curious title comes from, with Cody ChesnuTT's delightfully sung hook about infidelity & getting a girl pregnant. He makes it sound beautiful though.

 

44. Silversun Pickups -

(2009)

 

A vintage meme on the radio with this song is people always texting in to say that it sounds like he's saying 'it's nice to know you wear cologne'. It's rare that I hear this song get played even now and it doesn't mention, and it's admittedly something I thought of myself before the joke got established. As for the song itself, I was not yet really converted to fandom at this point but this song went a long way to changing that. This is a grand song with sweeping instrumentation and massive string swells. Brings out some of the best in their shoegazey style with just how easy it is to get lost in the bed of sound.

 

43. System of a Down - Kill Rock 'n' Roll (2005)

 

For a surprise, here's my actual favourite System of a Down song. I don't recall having a proper specific run of nostalgia for it, just that I was very familiar with this album but I never took special note of this song. That changed when I heard this song on the radio one day and it all came flooding back. It's just such a quick rush that manages to accomplish all I need in under two and a half minutes.

 

42. deadmau5 & Kaskade -

(2008)

 

For a long time I only knew this song for the radio edit which I rather liked, the vocals (which are by Haley Gibby and not Kaskade as I might have thought) were really compelling. It was also when I was just starting to hear a fair amount of stuff from deadmau5 which I took note of due to his memorable gimmick. It's the full 9+ minute version that really hits the spot for me now though. It's proof of the evocative power that electronic music can still hold in its own way. The way all the instrumental elements in the song flow with each other and overlap themselves just feels so smooth and natural.

 

41. Muse -

(2006)

 

One of the happiest moments of my life came about from a radio music poll. That sounds ridiculous but it really was a bizarrely potent chain of events culminating that that point. Because going into 2008, I was pretty lonely in my life. Some of my closest friends moved away and I was still really struggling to fit in at school (it wasn't until my senior year in 2009 that I finally settled in). Music was so important for me to keep everything in check and give me something to be invested in. The monolith of that was the triple j Hottest 100, and for 2007 (which airs at the start of 2008), it was the first time I'd spent the entire year invested in the music. There could never be a poll more attuned to my interests. It did come however with a feeling of dread because it seemed all signs pointed to an underwhelming result. Even though no one I knew seemed to like it, it looked like Silverchair's big comeback hit "Straight Lines" was poised for the top spot, and I was really not happy about that (the song has since grown on me a bit). The other thing is that this was the first time I'd ever voted in it. One of the songs I voted for, was "Knights Of Cydonia", a song I nearly missed and only kept because I was at my final cull with Muse's other single "Invincible" on my list. I realised that I far preferred "Knights Of Cydonia" and swapped it back out. It has to be noted that this poll has gotten far more popular in the last decade, such that it's hard to get to the top without being exceedingly well known, and in addition to that, it's very difficult for the poll to offer up a surprise, especially as social media votes serve as a fairly accurate sample to estimate from. 10 years ago this wasn't the case, so it was possible for a dark horse to storm the poll, which is exactly what happened. For the first time in my life I was thrilled to hear "Straight Lines" as the first notes played and I realised it had landed at #2. In a historic finish, there was the smallest ever gap between the top two. With nearly a million votes cast, "Knights Of Cydonia" won by just 13 votes, one of which was mine. It's pretty much been since that moment that I've been a huge Muse fan, I wasn't really familiar with any of their songs prior to "Black Holes and Revelations" before then, but "Knights Of Cydonia" was yet another in the series of brilliantly compelling singles.

Some great picks for Muse - Knights of Cydonia is possibly the most rousing epic piece they've done and it's wonderful when live, though Hysteria I would probably say is my favourite Muse song but it's close, absolutely love it, some of their best guitar work. I rlly need to see them live again at some point, they were so amazing :wub:

 

No Cars Go is a great song too, I was sad that and Keep the Car Running were never big hits over here as they were some of my favourite songs from them.

 

Lots of love for I Remember as well :wub: I also thought Kaskade was the vocalist for a long time haha

Some great picks for Muse - Knights of Cydonia is possibly the most rousing epic piece they've done and it's wonderful when live, though Hysteria I would probably say is my favourite Muse song but it's close, absolutely love it, some of their best guitar work. I rlly need to see them live again at some point, they were so amazing :wub:

 

No Cars Go is a great song too, I was sad that and Keep the Car Running were never big hits over here as they were some of my favourite songs from them.

 

Lots of love for I Remember as well :wub: I also thought Kaskade was the vocalist for a long time haha

One of my biggest regrets is that I only recently started going to see live shows, and so earlier this decade I missed seeing Muse's Australian tour supported by Birds of Tokyo which were like my two favourite bands together at the time.

 

It actually amazes me that Arcade Fire chart as often as they do in the UK, they just do not sound like a hit making band at all to me! Their only ever charting single in Australia was "Reflektor" which just barely got in at like #95 the week it came out.

 

40. The Knife -

(2002)

 

I like Jose Gonzalez and he even does some cover versions I like but I just don't have any interest in his cover of this song. Much of the strength in this song rests on its divine instrumental which is pretty much peak synth pop in my ears. That it sounds a little dated adds to its charm, it kind of sounds like it belongs in a '90s video game. For that matter, Karin is just so wonderfully expressive with so many vocal lines sounding like hooks in their own right.

 

39. The Presets -

(2007)

 

One of the most influential songs of the 21st century without even being a hit outside of Australia. For better or worse, will.i.am was very much influenced by this song's hard hitting electropop sound when he was on a trip in Australia, and that proved very influential with his approach to the next Black Eyed Peas album, which in itself was central to the electropop domination of the earl 2010s. In the more modest dwellings of Australia, it was the lead single to their hugely successful second album, only the 2nd ever Australian electronic album to debut at #1 on the album chart, and the first ever to win the ARIA Award for Album Of The Year. "Apocalypso" was one of my favourite albums growing up, just a relentless good time. "My People" is the clear highlight still though. It's not even a mindless party banger either, as the song is written in solidarity with the unfortunately still relevant issue of asylum seekers being locked up.

 

38. Muse -

(2003)

 

This is one of the heaviest songs that Muse have ever released and it was the lead single to "Absolution" which amazes me. Perhaps it was to make for a less jarring transition for old fans, except then the next lead single was "Supermassive Black Hole" so who can say for sure. Even with the unrelenting nature of the song, there's quite a surprising amount of variety in what happens in the song, the softer chorus being a notable highlight.

 

37. Something For Kate - Monsters (2001)

 

Something For Kate's 3rd album "Echolalia" stands as their most beloved album in their long career. A lot of this relates particularly to the song "Monsters". While the band always had (and to an extent still does) a sort of off kilter approach to songwriting that stopped them from being fully radio friendly, this does enough to bypass that. Although in saying that, it's hard to properly define something constituting as a chorus here. Where the song particularly excels is in the lyrics. There's something so profoundly executed about its tale of existential terror which is far more relatable to me than I should be comfortable admitting.

 

36. At The Drive-In -

(2000)

 

I've known this song for a really long time but considering that it wasn't a hit song at all, I'm not sure why. I think that it could be a hit song though because the hook is very catchy and memorable, but maybe then it's a bit too loud & screamy to really catch on. For a long time it was the only song I knew from At The Drive-In though I slowly worked on that and now I really like the album this comes from.

 

35. Gyroscope -

(2007)

 

This song was a big moment for me at the time. Gyroscope are a Western Australian band, just like I am, but I'd never heard of them before this song. I just remember that when I first heard this song, I loved it, which is something that just never happened to me at the time, I always took a few listens to get into something. I wasn't alone in the praise and the song was one of the most beloved of the year, despite a late release. It also has a very curious chart run where it only spent 1 week in the ARIA top 50, debuting there as Gyroscope singles tended to do, but it was far more popular in the ensuing months due to being used in AFL promos. It just so happens that the lengthy parabola of that promotion only got it back to about #51 so it's easily forgotten. It's harder to think of a less simple melody than the piano tune that starts this song (it's literally, A, A, B, B, C, C for the first 6 notes) but it manages to sound so striking, and a good contrast for when the song gets a bit louder.

 

34. Franz Ferdinand -

(2004)

 

You might have heard of this one. I was a big fan of the few songs I knew from Franz Ferdinand when I was younger, and this was obviously the big one. Even when I wasn't much into music, I just found this such an interesting song with the way that it fakes out the intro before turning into a completely different song right in the middle of Drake's first verse...wait.

 

33. The Postal Service -

(2003)

 

The whole Owl City thing is really not for me. Vocal inflection aside, I really didn't have a chance because I heard this first and the two are way too similar. I was first introduced to it via Ben Folds doing a cover of it, which had a rather memorable finish with a cacophany of bizarre instrumental choices and then ending with him just playing the chorus to "Macarena" from his phone, it was memorable to say the least. The Postal Service are of course fronted by Ben Gibbard of Death Cab fame, and just like that band, it's a song full of curiously specific phrasing that sticks out. The instrumental also pans between each audio channel and I love it.

 

32. Arctic Monkeys -

(2007)

 

This was a pretty weird lead single for the 2nd Arctic Monkeys song. It feels like a massive failure for them that it couldn't get to #1 in the UK given their reputation at the time, but this really was too short, fast & loud compared to what they'd released prior. The song is largely built around the main guitar riff which is pretty wonderful so that makes sense.

 

31. MGMT -

(2008)

 

I have a certain suspicion that if I were a bit older I might not like this song anywhere near as much as I do because I'd probably be too cynical. Then again this is a weird song to quantify because there are at the very least, 3 different versions of the song that get around with a bit of traction and sound rather different despite being the same core song. I remember when it had a very belated run as a top 40 hit here that I was just not vibing with the version they played on commercial radio, and for a while I accidentally downloaded the original EP version not realising it was different and I had to get used to that. What I'm saying is that the album version is the best version, it gets the best mileage out of the synth riff by making it really poke out through the mix. Holy hell I love that riff though, this song has been a long time favourite for that.

really like 'My People', was a big fave back in the day when I was in Australia and it was getting a lot of music video TV play.

 

'Take Me Out', 'Brianstorm' and 'Kids' are great picks too.

I didn't forget about this list, nor did I intentionally draw it out, just been a bit busy lately! Will wrap up soon.

 

30. Radiohead -

(2000)

 

Radiohead's "Kid A" is a long time favourite of mine. In a manner that was rather quick for my standards at the time I ended up listening to it just a few months after I got into "OK Computer", given its reputation and I really enjoyed it. The song I value the most I think is "Idioteque". The album has plenty of loud rock & ballad moments which are pretty standard for Radiohead's discography, but nothing they've done sounds quite like this. Even after so many years and advancements in synthetic instrumentation, "Idioteque" feels ageless. There's an intensity to it that reminds me quite a bit of Underworld's "Born Slippy .NUXX" which is a very big compliment.

 

29. The Matches -

(2006)

 

This song could not sound more like 2006 if it tried. It probably wouldn't hold up near as well if I didn't have such a soft spot for the era as a sort of secondary formative era for me. I was never really a big fan of most songs I heard by The Matches but this song ticks a lot of boxes for me. For what could be a relatively standard alt rock track, quite a bit goes into giving it a bit of intrigue here and there. For one, the chorus gets bigger and bigger. It's quite amusing how explosive it gets halfway into the song, only to descent into laughter and a return to the verse as if nothing happened. I think the frenetic video also helped with selling the energy to me.

 

28. Manchester Orchestra -

(2009)

 

I remember this getting a lot of radio airplay early in 2009, and having never heard of Manchester Orchestra before that, I didn't pay it much mind. I can't remember exactly why but one day that year it just clicked with me in a huge way and became one of my favourite songs of the year, and one that I only continue to love more and more over time. In fact from the strength of this song, Manchester Orchestra are a band I'm always excited to hear new music from, and they pretty much always knock their lead singles out of the park. As for this song, I think part of it is Andy Hull's singing which toes the line on screaming for the most part, but with a bit of character through his accent that always shines. Musically it's also rather engaging with a huge wall of sound that I can only really compare to Silversun Pickups or something. The completely wordless outro is a stellar moment for reasons I can't really explain either.

 

27. Karnivool -

(2005)

 

One of the most monumental moments of Australian television came about in Season 4 of Australian Idol in 2006. For the Final 11 it was a free choice week, and Western Australian contestant Reigan Derry perhaps leant a bit too much into her local favourites as she sung the progressive metal hit "Themata" from Karnivool which was obviously a big favourite among the Idol audience and she was eliminated that week. Several years later she went on to have hits with the duo Scarlett Belle and also appeared again on X Factor several years after that so it's not like it killed her career but it's a very 'I can't believe that was a thing that happened' thing. I didn't watch Idol much then and I hadn't even heard of Karnivool at the time so I didn't learn about it until I'd fallen in love with this song tangentially. It's a song that kind of belongs in the "Paranoid Android", "Welcome To The Black Parade", "SICKO MODE" canon of songs that just have so many different parts to it. For me it always reminds me of my senior year in high school. Because of schedules, I always had to arrive at school at around 8pm, 45 minutes before I was required to arrive, and usually 10-20 minutes before anyone else did. It was one of the rare cases where I spent a lot of time alone involuntarily. I walked home at the end of school so I always brought my iPod with me even though we weren't supposed to be using them. Since no one was around, I sometimes got it out early in those mornings, with this song being a big favourite to listen to, lip syncing every monstrous scream.

 

26. Bloc Party -

(2004)

 

I was too late to the party for the "Silent Alarm" hype so I've never been able to truly appreciate how it was received at the time, but nonetheless Bloc Party became a band I really liked through only hearing the material on their 2nd album. I would eventually start hearing more cuts from the first album over the years in different places, though I didn't quite have the same affinity for them as I did their more diverse later catalogue. Plenty of them have grown on me, not least of which "Banquet" which if not for a certain song that will be appearing later in this list, I would say is perhaps the peak of the whole post-punk revivalist movement of the mid-2000s. This is a song where every component feels carefully considered with no excess included. Every jagged dueling guitar riff, every audio channel flip, every drum fill, it's all expertly done to make a thoroughly satisfying listen.

 

25. Jimmy Eat World -

(2005)

 

If you only know Jimmy Eat World through one particular song this might be a bit of a shock to the system. Heck, even having listened to quite a lot of their catalogue over the years, this still sticks out quite a bit. This is not a high energy pop punk tune but rather a slow burning 8 minute monster. It's just remarkably ambitious, but not without just being enjoyable as a result of it. There are essentially two persistent lines delivered in two different channels of vocals and the way they come together near the end is a remarkable moment.

 

24. Arcade Fire -

(2004)

 

"Funeral" is obviously beloved for all those big, obvious cuts that everyone knows about. The deep cuts are very essential to that because aside from maybe 2 tracks, the album is pretty much nonstop classics. "Crown Of Love" is one of those which I have a lot of love for. Arcade Fire take their baroque rock style to a natural peak with this song being largely driven by the building violins. It's one of Win's most compelling vocal performances.

 

23. Augie March -

(2006)

 

This song secured its reputation as an Australian classic when it won the 2006 Hottest 100 poll ahead of several much bigger commercial hits. Though this song spent most of the year in the middling portion of the ARIA Chart, I can confidently say that I had never heard of it when the win was announced. In fact I just heard the name Augie March announced and assumed that it was referring to the song "The Cold Acre" which appeared earlier in the list, the only song of theirs I knew. I didn't even get to hear the song at the time because of frantic circumstances at the time. Obviously I did eventually and what a song it is. There's so much beauty in the admittedly simple chord progressions, while as far as big hits go, it's rare to have one that is so cluttered with both literary references and a literary approach to the craft of lyrics. The rhyme scheme at time is almost as elaborate as Eminem at times. You don't need to understand any of that to enjoy the song though, as it's quite a lovely waltz-driven rock tune.

 

22. Arcade Fire -

(2004)

 

On the topic of Arcade Fire deep cuts, this is as deep as you can go on "Funeral" because it's the final track. It's also one of those rare cases where Regine takes the role of lead vocals. Really it couldn't be any other way because only her voice could fit this gentle tune. Well that and the very direct lyrical content which the album is all about. The use of the backseat as an allegory for childhood innocence is so poignant, or I mean I imagine it is to most, because I still don't know how to drive. Nonetheless it's another important reminder to cherish every moment of peace and tranquility you can, until you're the one who has to take action and allow the next person to do what you once did.

 

21. Jimmy Eat World -

(2001)

 

But if you are just familiar with the one Jimmy Eat World song, this is probably an easier transition to make. In fact you might just happen to know this song as I'm pretty sure it was pretty popular in its time as well, and I knew it really well myself. If I haven't made it clear that I have a certain affinity for loud, engaging rock music, well then you might need a bit more salt, sweat and/or sugar on the asphault. This doesn't have the nerdy proficiency of "Banquet" but it does the job nonetheless. For starters, what a glorious guitar riff, the solo on the bridge is there to put emphasis on that, and also what a hook. Never get tired of singing along to this one.

V late but floored to see Godspeed on this list *.* My favourite of theirs is "East Hastings" but their whole discography is solid. :wub:

What a co-incidence that we both add 'In The Backseat' by Arcade Fire to our charts on the same day. I've just revealed it to be my 26th favourite song of all time.

V late but floored to see Godspeed on this list *.* My favourite of theirs is "East Hastings" but their whole discography is solid. :wub:

Funny you should mention them right now...

What a co-incidence that we both add 'In The Backseat' by Arcade Fire to our charts on the same day. I've just revealed it to be my 26th favourite song of all time.

Evidently justifying my delay! Quite an esoteric song to do such a deed though! :D

 

20. Godspeed You! Black Emperor -

(2000)

 

Listening to it is extremely situational but "Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas To Heaven" is one of my all time favourite albums. One of those cases where I have an affinity for an extremely lengthy piece of media primarily because of all the occasional gut punches it throws at you. If you're familiar with the album, you'll recognise "Sleep" as the song with the rant about Coney Island at the start of it. For me this song is all about its long, drawn out pay offs. It spends the first 7 minutes relatively relaxed before really ramping up. After that there's a skittish component added that makes me think of a swarm of drone bees and it feels appropriately ominous to accommodate it. Following that you're taken for a ride with some of the most captivating musical sequences I've heard ever. It's like they really go above and beyond to tap into these aural sweet spots. The outro replaces the guitars with strings and it's absolutely beautiful.

 

19. Kanye West (feat Jay-Z) -

(2005)

 

I slightly lied with my post at the start of the thread detailing the 50 next songs. If I was being entirely truthful, "Diamonds From Sierra Leone", the single version released prior to the album would be on that list, as I consider it different enough from this version, with its own specific aspects to it that merit commendation. With Kanye's contribution shortened in this version for instance, you don't get all those classic lines like 'I forgot better things than you ever thought of' or 'Some of my plastics still say KAYNE'. But this version wouldn't be so high if it couldn't do something with that extra space and it certainly delivers there. I'm not old enough, or at least wasn't interested in music enough at the time to recall, but I like to imagine more than a few people being thrown for a loop when this familiar single came on during a first listen, only it sounded a little different. Then you reach the line about him and Jay and all of a sudden he's here as well. He then goes to deliver one of his greatest verses, which is easy to joke about for being ridiculous and off topic, but it just gets me hyped every time. Going completely unmentioned until now is the excellent Shirley Bassey sample, which combined with the menacing production (reminds me a lot of El-P's stuff), had me falling in love with this song on first listen, even back when I wasn't anywhere near as big a Kanye fan as I am now.

 

18. Queens Of The Stone Age -

(2002)

 

Taking their sweet time making their first ever entrance, I've had a lot of love for Queens Of The Stone Age ever since the first time I knowingly heard one of their songs, more on that later. "No One Knows" I quickly cottoned onto later as its reputation more than preceded itself, being voted in Australia as the #1 song of 2002 which still amazes me to this day. Maybe a lot of the popularity of "Songs For The Deaf" owes to the borderline listenbait of 'Dave Grohl does the drums!', which is not without my appreciation, there are some amazing drum fills in this song certainly. But outside of that it's got one of the most addictive guitar riffs I know, which just sounded so impossibly cool to me the first time I heard it. It's become one of my most played songs on two different iTunes accounts because I've had times I just couldn't get enough of it.

 

17. Metric -

(2009)

 

It's been a while since I last talked about it so it's worth reiterating that Metric's album "Fantasies" is one of my favourites of all time, owing largely to an extremely formative time when I didn't even hear the album, but effectively heard half of it with how many radio singles there were. "Gimme Sympathy" was one of two tracks on the album that went to #1 on my personal chart at the time, which looking back is a bit peculiar as it's not remotely a riff heavy banger as my favourite songs of the time then tended to be. I'm inclined to say that the primary lyric of this song just struck a chord with me for some reason. If the title isn't a clue, this is a song that is loaded with Rolling Stones & Beatles references, and calls to question who you'd rather be, as it is very clear the two bands have had very different trajectories since around 1970...primarily only one of them has had a trajectory at all, but some would argue it probably shouldn't have. In a recent AMA on reddit, someone asked the question to the band, and though it wasn't signed so I don't know who wrote it (probably Emily), they just replied with 'METRIC!'. As much as I have notational evidence to show that I absolutely loved this song when it came out, I find that I continue to love it even more over time. To me it's pretty much pop rock perfection, with a moderate but tasteful inclusion of synthesizers.

 

16. Queens Of The Stone Age -

(2007)

 

I have a really hard time separating these two particular Queens Of The Stone Age songs and I might change my mind on another day but when I made this list I settled it as such. "Sick, Sick, Sick" holds a special place in my heart because it was the first song I'd heard from the band, who I only continued to grow a further liking for with each successive song I heard. In that sense it's a bit unfortunate that they only have 2 songs in this list because there's so much more I'd love to fit in as well. As for "Sick, Sick, Sick", suffice to say it's not nearly as popular as "No One Knows", not helped by being on one of the band's most divisive albums. For me I've never shaken off the captivation I had when I first got to knowing this song. It wasn't a heavy metal song, but it had a certain menace to it that wasn't too dissimilar to that, with its extremely down tuned guitars. That gives it a primary appeal though with an incredibly distinct 1 note opening riff. Perhaps that isn't the main riff of the song though, which instead comes in after the chorus, giving some appreciated additional flavour to the song. Also doing that is Julian Casablancas, as I didn't realise for years but it's him very distinctly providing vocals at the end of the song. I want to mention the video too because seeing this song weekly on TV is a big component of my loving of it. By sheer coincidence, the two Queens Of The Stone Age songs I have listed here are two where in the video, the band is (arguably) killed off, only in this one it's done much more gradually and bordering on nightmare fuel. It does fit the song quite well I think, and will possibly either make you hungry or extremely not hungry.

 

15. Muse -

(2001)

 

I have thought of this as my favourite Muse song for many years. As I suspect you might know, the song kind of has this riff in it. That is to say that it feels like Matt Bellamy came up with the riff and wrote a song around it. Then again it's not even present in the chorus and that still goes down a treat. A great moment of pride for me is that on one not remotely all-encompassing website, I briefly held the high score for this song on Guitar Hero on Expert, though admittedly I was always a bit disappointed with how easy the song was to play.

 

14. Kanye West (feat Nas & Really Doe) - We Major (2005)

 

I am extremely inclined to speak in defence of Kanye West and one of the primary reasons for that is how his music is severely misrepresented through what breaks through to the mainstream. It's something I could have said even before this year where "I Love It" has 99% as many streams on Spotify than all of "KIDS SEE GHOSTS" put together, and extremely poignant tracks on "ye" like "Violent Crimes" were quickly tossed aside because Spotify decided that everyone should favour the other booty jam. And then people have the nerve to say that he's just another talentless pop rapper, bloody hell. Suffice to say, when he's on point, he really nails it. "We Major" isn't exactly a sociopolitical statement, but it is profoundly uplifting like no other song. It is called "We Major" after all. I have spent much of my adult life struggling with anxiety but when this song is playing it feels like you can conquer the world. It's kind of a miracle that the song exists too, as it was released near the height of the Jay-Z/Nas feud and somehow Kanye managed to get both of them on the same album, on adjacent tracks. He raps quite wonderfully, don't you agree, don't you agree?

 

13. Sia -

(2008)

 

The culmination of my increasing interest in Sia's music at the end of the 2000s came about with this song. I think I caught it by chance on Rage one week and that's all it took for me to be completely captivated. I was hardly alone in this as I'm pretty sure this happened right around when it debuted for its 1 week on the ARIA Chart in 2009. All the vocal affectations you know are here and used excellently to convey the emotional sway of the song. I can't imagine the song working anywhere near as well in anyone else's...hands. For me it's the pinnacle of Sia's career.

 

12. Gotye -

(2006)

 

Speaking of Australian artists who proceeded to get tremendously more famous in the 2010s, here's one I've wanted to touch on for quite a long time. As you'd obviously know, Gotye is an eclectic multi-instrumentalist with a penchant for sampling obscure records who had quite a breakthrough in 2006 with his 2nd album "Like Drawing Blood". Nothing on the album charted, which I imagine is due to chart rules of the time and how it was promoted, but 5 years after release, the album managed to be certified Platinum in Australia. It's kind of amusing to me when people say that his popularity came out of nowhere because I have a strong suspicion that his hit single would have never gotten off the ground if it hadn't come from two artists with the reach of popularity at the time to accommodate such an out of place song. I do think that a lot of the loyalty he built up prior to that is thanks to this song, which remains so beloved that it was once voted the 4th best Australian song of the last 20 years, behind two Powderfinger songs and narrowly behind one other Gotye song. For me though, the funniest thing that came about when considerably more people started hearing the name Gotye, was that considerably more people started mis-hearing the name Gotye. There's a classic story of how Gotye sent his first demo in to triple j radio, and the first thing the music director did was call him up to clarify how to pronounce his name, which tended to get around the station and so I always heard his name pronounced correctly...but since it was only on the radio, for a long time I didn't have a clue how to spell it. To me I thought it was something like "Goutier", so for people 5 years later to first come across the spelling and butcher every attempt at pronunciation, effectively the opposite problem to me, is immensely amusing. As for this song itself, it has two very good things going for it. One is the main synth hook, that alone had me captivated instantly when I got familiar with the song. The other is the sheer aching pain in Gotye's delivery for the chorus of the song, putting a heck of a lot on the line at a stage when he was just a bedroom producer. As interesting as the concept can be, I kind of hate the term 'one hit wonder' at times because it carries a weight of dismissal to it, or at worst, a boastful dismissal to imply that the general public collectively decided an artist has nothing else of value to offer. I don't think Gotye minds really, but I do think it's a shame that one of the most humble and talented musicians this country has to offer is primarily known for only one song, and not just because I think this song is better.

 

11. The Avalanches -

(2000)

 

Speaking of Australian artists who have a strange concept of what is a normal gap between album releases. We've now come to the highest Australian song in this whole list, which is a bit unfortunate to miss the top 10 considering that the last 3 songs have all been Australian. This one might be a bit more familiar as from what I recall, it did chart in the UK. It is also surely one of the most unusual hit singles, and yet one that endures far more nowadays. "Since I Left You" is an album that to my knowledge is created solely from samples, hundreds of them, assembled on extremely primitive computer hardware. Even on the album this song sticks out like a sore thumb for its eccentricity. The main hooks you hear on this song are snippets from old TV shows and radio comedy sketches, the titular line being from a sketch about the novel concept of a psychiatrist on the wild frontier. Nonetheless it's highly amusing to me how mundane so many of the hooks in this song are in their natural context.

"Sleep" is amazing too - second only to "Storm" from that album for me. The monologue at the start gave me the impression Coney Island was an absolute shithole but it turns out it's actually quite nice even today :lol: Godspeed do a great job at making you think everything in the world is miserable lol.

Wish I knew more of these songs but My People, Take Me Out, Brainstorm and Kids are all great and take me back to my childhood :wub:

And when I said I'd wrap this up I didn't expect to end up contracting a cold that refuses to leave me entirely. Normally not a problem but I really didn't want to half-ass the commentary at the pointy end, as such I've spent a good 2 hours tonight writing hopefully enough to satisfy the pinnacle of the list, enjoy!

 

(There might be more stuff I want to post in this thread but for now I'm glad to have finished the core list)

 

10. The Strokes -

(2003)

 

I wouldn't say it's the reason I don't get involved with BJSC and related things but I do have a memory from about 10 years ago entering this song into something somewhat similar on another forum and having it be voted into last place. I'd like to believe I've been vindicated by the fact that this now stands as The Strokes' 2nd most played song on Spotify, even despite it not coming on their signature album that gets all the attention. I liken this song to Arctic Monkeys' "Brianstorm" as a follow up to an album that oozed a certain style, and they change things up with an uncharacteristically heavy sounding single. The meaty riff and bass line here make it sound considerably different to their prior output, and I'm all here for it. The pre-chorus where everything drops out except for the riff is a brilliant shift of dynamics and something I've never tired of over the years.

 

9. The Walkmen -

(2004)

 

This song is standing pretty close by to two considerably more well known songs that could fit under a sort of post-punk revival hat, but it's easy to say that it's the lesser known of them. That's probably just due to The Walkmen's profile which never really ascended higher than this song on its own, but nonetheless it's quite a tune to have under your belt. Perhaps I can't say it's the genre perfected because there's a slightly higher song, but it really does well to encapsulate the tension on all cylinders. The syncopated drum pattern, the grit-through-your-teeth screaming of the lyrics and the down-tuned riff all fit together for a package of sheer menace.

 

8. Beck -

(2002)

 

I distinctly remember the first time I heard this even though I barely heard it properly. Rather than use a proper alarm, I just set my clock to turn the radio on when I want to wake up, which works reasonably well though if I have no intention/need to get up I'll probably fall back to sleep, or at the very least listen to the radio very hazily. This has had an interesting effect over the years of making me feel accustomed to songs that I'd felt as though I'd never actually heard before, or at least couldn't think of a time when I would have, which is surprisingly effective in making something grow on you as it plants a seed of familiarity. This song was a little like that. I was consciously aware of what I was listening to, but I wasn't awake enough to really work out what it was. I actually thought it was a chill Queens Of The Stone Age song a la "Make It Wit Chu" as the closest reference point to the unfamiliar vocals I could make. It was largely because I hadn't heard "Sea Change" at this point (and the similar "Morning Phase" hadn't quite come out either) so I mainly knew Beck for his more upbeat tracks. Nonetheless I was utterly captivated by this on first listen. I love to rag on basic white dudes with guitars because so often they really represent a bare minimum in so many ways, be it instrumental flair or lyrical/vocal commitment. So often you can just tell there's no heart to it and it's just posturing to pick up girls. I don't get anything but absolute heartbreak out of this song.

 

7. TV On The Radio -

(2006)

 

This song endures as far more popular than I'd have expected. The first time I heard this song, it was included on a Hottest 100 CD, as a relatively unobliged inclusion as it had only landed at #63 in the countdown for a compilation of roughly 40 tracks. Because it had been a 'hit' before I'd started listening I wasn't familiar with it before the compilation and when I heard it I only thought of it as a cacophony in endless search of a hook. Unfortunately because of that I rarely listened to it to change that opinion, which didn't happen for at least a few years. Nonetheless it eventually clicked for me and now all the rambunctuous nonsense of the song became the most endearing part of it. That and playing the song on Guitar Hero really made it clear just how thrilling the song really is, namely because it was one of the few songs that despite not being overly complicated, required two fingers to man the strumming because it's just way too fast to do with just your thumb. It became one of my favourite songs to play because even though the transitions between notes were always messy (kind of like that Voltorb minigame in the first Pokemon Stadium), it was just such a rush of energy that I never tired of.

 

6. LCD Soundsystem -

(2007)

 

I talked about "Losing My Edge" before which I often describe as 'midlife crisis' the song, but it's hard to say that definitively when LCD Soundsystem also have this song making a similar (though different) statement. This song can be taken in more easily without reading into the message however, which I did for many years. I just really liked the chaotic piano riff and the exciting build up. I love the opening lines of the song though, which ring so poignantly. Only problem is that so rarely I see someone slide into aging by drawing conclusion from the charts. Most people just go straight to the Principal Skinner route of assuming that it's the children who are wrong. So basically like "Losing My Edge" except they're absolutely not trying to take the piss. But that line I find sets the stage for the acceptance of aging that the song presents. Much of the song is just accepting that you'll never truly be able to re-live those glory days and acknowledging the trivial progression to and fro that make up life. But it's not with a sign of submission, the song is too joyful for that. In the end, it's the profound connections of friendship that make this whole existence worthwhile.

 

5. Goldfrapp -

(2000)

 

For a long time I thought of Goldfrapp as just a synth pop band. Certainly I knew of songs like "A&E", but I never heard them quite as often as I'd heard "Ooh La La", "Strict Machine" or all their 2010 singles. Not to say I disliked them, far from it, but I never got the impression they had much more to offer. Things changed in late 2013 when I happened across a single from their latest album which was very unlike what I was used to. It was stark and orchestral (and it was "Drew" if you're playing along), and as it turned out, rather representative of that whole album. Via this I would go on to learn that Goldfrapp really do have two sides, and their first album "Felt Mountain" was considerably drenched in moody electronics. I loved it. Mostly for the overall track by track vibe I should say, kind of like Beach House, but then not without the occasional highlight. When I first came to this track, the opening melody shot straight into me and had me hooked. Then the synthesizer riff took over on the chorus and I quickly declared it to be one of my favourite songs of all time. I'm not sure if that was borne of prior familiarity or not but nonetheless the statement has held up very well since then. Part of my love of that synth riff naturally stems from a long standing love I have of weird circus-like music with kazoos and the like, it's why I love "Laura" by the Scissor Sisters so much as well. But nonetheless this song prevents itself from sounding comical as the stiff programmed drums keep it grounded. Alongside all of this, Alison Goldfrapp is now one of my all time favourite vocalists and she really knocks it out of the park, both in her seductive lead vocals, and all the beautiful harmonies in the background. Though Alison & Gregory were well acquainted in the music scene by this stage, it's still so remarkably accomplished for something from a debut album.

 

4. Metric -

(2009)

 

The first Metric song I heard was "Help, I'm Alive". That's the case for most people and it's still their most popular song and a live staple. I like it a lot now but I didn't take to it remarkably so at the time. Though oddly enough I was making a personal chart at the time which was just a top 20, but there are two songs I recall thinking to myself as #21-#25 peakers at the time, that and Florence + The Machine's "Dog Days Are Over", both of which would probably have served as fine songs to be historically recorded over some other things I was liking at the time. Metric had their dues quickly after though, because the next single was "Sick Muse" and I adored it. Partly because I was a big fan of Muse at the time and the novelty of there being a song that had 'Muse' in the title was rewarding to me, and also partly because the whole song was quite a jolt of energy compared to "Help, I'm Alive" which was trapped by its slower tempo. Something else to the song's favour is that it's one of those songs where every component was insanely catchy. The riff was and still is a big favourite, and the song just kept intensifying all the way up to the chorus. I've often heard people talk of how daggy it is when songs have false endings, but I've always loved it in this song, which settles on a time frame so proficiently as to feel like it's been long enough that the song could be over at that point, but at the same time not feeling too long once it does go on for an extra minute. Plus you really just wanna hear that riff yet again.

 

3. Radiohead -

(2001)

 

I think a lot of people can relate to the feeling of idolising someone to the point that you'll let them be a point of entry into other ventures. I hardly think it's a controversial statement to say that a lot of landfill indie bands got their foothold thanks to conversations surrounding Arctic Monkeys and so many people wanting to big up similar artists, I remember those messageboard days. This song did not come to me via the UK indie scene at all, but rather from the aforementioned many, many entries back love I had of Sarah Blasko's music. triple j were doing an all time countdown of songs and as they often do, they enlisted a lot of musicians to chime in with the songs they would vote for, and I recall Sarah picking this Radiohead song, which was not one of the few I recognised at this point. I don't know if I listened to this song at the time, but the memory of the song's reputation stuck with me and perhaps influenced my eventual diving into it. What a song it turned out to be in the end. Much talk about this song goes into its unusual time signature, which despite all my years of music theory is something that often slips past my ears in terms of identifying it. Nonetheless I can recognise that the piano comes through here in seemingly irregular intervals. It's all just so beautifully melancholy and I've never worn out on it. Also shout out to Jonny Greenwood and his ondes martenots, which he started using more prominently in the 2000s and I can never think of a more haunting inclusion than when it's used in the back half of this song.

 

2. Arcade Fire -

(2004)

 

Fans of certain media have a bad reputation for trying way too hard to make people like things. This particularly manifests itself when there are multiple ways to experience something and people are insistent on making sure you get the best approach, whether that be the exact same as them, or an idealised version that you wish you had. Watching people play "UNDERTALE" on twitch is a hellish experience when the chat box is filled with people absolutely furious and screaming to make sure the person playing makes all the 'correct' decisions so they get to see all the funniest dialogue, or most heartwarming scenes. In any case it's always a doubled edged sword because any attempt to railroad someone will inevitably make the pay off less gratifying because they've not stumbled upon it organically by their own accord. The reason I say all this is because I have similarly conflicting feelings about how I came across Arcade Fire. As with many popular 2000s bands, by virtue of my time of entry, it was inevitably whatever was the first album they put out from 2006 onwards, in their case "Neon Bible". This was not particularly good for me because it meant that I constantly heard radio presenters and people on the internet speaking in hyperbole about Arcade Fire and all they had to show for it from my perspective were these okay songs about cars that I felt I was severely missing a context for. Arcade Fire were treated as some sort of monolith and I didn't remotely see what made them stand out even if I grew to like some of their songs out of familiarity. Incidentally I would end up getting swept up in the hype myself not long after as I got really excited when "The Suburbs" came out, the title track in particular being a big favourite of mine. Admittedly I might have overrated it myself through being indoctrinated to Arcade Fire's greatest but nonetheless I was more than happy to shout praises. The game changing moment for me however was the 2011 Grammy Awards. For those who don't recall, Arcade Fire pulled off a shock victory for Album Of The Year, beating out considerably more popular competition from Eminem, Lady Gaga, Katy Perry & Lady Antebellum. It even caused an amazing meme that feels so quaint in the era of stan Twitter. But this win was what prompted me to finally dig into Arcade Fire's discography, namely their first album and that was when it all came together. I ADORED "Funeral" and pretty much every song on it, which as it turned out, included several songs I was familiar with without realising, notably the first 3 "Neighborhood" songs. Though my last.fm scrobbling doesn't indicate any immediate favouritism, after the dust settled, this track has asserted itself as their masterpiece. What an auspicious way to do it too, track 1 on album 1, it's almost poetic. It's also the perfect place for this song considering the way it builds up. Everything about this song is absolute triumph. I soon after was very ready to put this song on the absolute echelon of favourites, and perhaps it could have been #1 on this list if I'd compiled it a year sooner, it wasn't an easy choice. But for one of my favourite bands of all time, it doesn't get any better than this.

 

1. Silversun Pickups -

(2009)

 

The ultimate redemption story if there ever was one. As I believe I mentioned way back in the thread, my introduction to Silversun Pickups was an unpleasant one. Namely I had an irrational dislike of "Lazy Eye" which prompted me to not give the band a chance at all, even if their other singles were more to my liking. We all have a breaking point however, and for me, that was "Panic Switch". I only wish I could accurately recall my initial exposure to the song. I can only hazard a guess to say that I recognised the band with the familiar guitar tuning, and so immediately was dismissive. I can establish a vague timeline because the song was released on March 17th, 2009, entered my chart on April 5th, 2009, and hit #1 on April 26th, 2009, a rather fast turn of events given my reluctance. Nonetheless, with this song in play, my hatred for the band just completely simmered out. I didn't love them to the point of seeking out deep cuts, but I was no longer bothered to hear them on the radio, and given a proper chance, started to enjoy the songs I'd previously dismissed. The song was such a big deal for me that at the time I named it my 2nd favourite song of the year, admittedly quaint nowadays but still rather impressive given how much of that old list I'd like to shuffle around considerably more. But what is it about this song in particular? I just think that it so perfectly encapsulates the band's shoegaze-influenced alternative rock sound. That's a sub-genre of music that this song is probably instrumental in me getting interested in, as a sort of connecting the dots of 'this thing that I really like in a lot of songs has a name!' What you get from this is a wall of sound that to my ears has pretty much nothing I would want to add or remove. When I was deciding between my top two on this list, I eventually decided on this song for the reason that it will hit the spot perfectly on every listen without fail. This only got better when I learnt that it was being edited for the radio. The song packs close to 6 minutes in its full iteration and that is absolutely the version that needs to be heard. The bridge is to me the exact length necessary to build up the tension with the guitar & drums before crashing back into the chorus. That's without mentioning the extremely slick bass line and Brian's fantastic empassioned vocals on the bridge. I cannot confidently say where it would stack up if I threw different decades into the mix, but it's without a doubt one of my all time favourite songs.

Wow, there's a bevy of great songs in here! Most notably, what excellent Muse picks throughout, exactly the sort of stuff from them that stands the test of time and similar story with Arcade Fire in that Funeral is just kind of flawless, great more popular choices among the likes of Clint Eastwood and Chop Suey, some excellent mid-00s rock, Sic Transit Gloria stands out as a more niche favourite from that lot.

 

Metric are a band I know with a few songs like Gimme Sympathy and Sick Muse but they are normally ones I really enjoy, I should listen to them more. And Postal Service I can agree with you on, I heard Owl City first which is probably why I enjoy him loads (and he has far more volume now, since I turned out to love that sort of sound) but what little there is of the Postal Service is great - Death Cab are good but less consistent.

 

am trying to think of which Silversun Pickups song I know now, I don't think it's your #1, but I do know one of them from somewhere. Overall though, great read and I think I'd share quite a few if I did a similar countdown.

YES AT PANIC SWITCH BEING YOUR NUMBER ONE OF THE DECADE!!! :cheer:

 

From earlier on...

Silversun Pickups are a very interesting inclusion in here - I also didn’t really see what all the excitement was about until I heard ‘Panic Switch’, which I still think is a fantastic song!

Edited December 16, 20186 yr by coi

Metric are a band I know with a few songs like Gimme Sympathy and Sick Muse but they are normally ones I really enjoy, I should listen to them more. And Postal Service I can agree with you on, I heard Owl City first which is probably why I enjoy him loads (and he has far more volume now, since I turned out to love that sort of sound) but what little there is of the Postal Service is great - Death Cab are good but less consistent.

I can at least be glad that for fans of Owl City there is no shortage of material for them to indulge, Postal Service not so much haha. Death Cab makes for a noteworthy band who are entirely absent from the list, I think my favourite song of theirs is "Black Sun" which came out in 2015, but also I think their peak of relevancy is just slightly before my time so I don't have quite the affinity for them to push that love the necessary tier higher. Timing like that I think is extremely important and probably why I love Metric so much, since their defining album came out in my senior year.

 

YES AT PANIC SWITCH BEING YOUR NUMBER ONE OF THE DECADE!!! :cheer:

 

From earlier on...

This was SO HARD to avoid acknowledging when you mentioned it, especially the relatively similar approach :lol:

Glad to see Metric so high in your chart.

Count me in with the Panic Switch love, and especially with the initial dislike of Silversun Pickups prior to that song! :o Not sure what it was about Lazy Eye except that it sounded so much like Smashing Pumpkins who I'm not a fan of either. Yeah even at 5+ minutes and nearly 10 years later Panic Switch never gets old and feels like it could go on a few minutes longer haha. Genuinely one of my all-time faves as well, so it's great to see some mutual love for it here! Very well-written paragraph on it too!