Iz様 🌟

Aww I really like Punk Rocker, I get why it divides opinions but I think it progresses really well with the drums, she sings it well and I'm always up for a bit of nostalgia in music, even as rose-tinted as this one is.

I mean, of course they would, the news has been doom and gloom about it for weeks and the median voter is now primed against it, plus there's a few things in there which hit everyone and people always hate budgets which make their taxes rise, it's kinda natural even though taxes do need to rise sometimes. I think the best reaction to this is... 'eh'. The negative aspects like salary sacrifice (which to be clear, are a mistake) are going to financially hit an individual not that much in real terms, the tax rises are not that much in real terms. The S&S move would be far better with a carrot rather than a stick but is actually going to be a good thing financially for people who move what was going to be deposited into their cash ISA into a S&S ETF as long as they treat it sensibly and do the bare minimum of investing education. The more vulnerable do get a decent amount out of the budget but not much is being done for the average person to ease their finances nor improve their earning potential so the feeling of malaise will continue to dog Labour.

Some good things in the budget (mansion tax, encouraging savers into S&S, train fare freeze, two child benefit cap gone) but very 'eh' on the whole and emblematic of the tinkering around the edges that has come to define Starmer's Labour. The salary sacrifice into pensions is by some distance the worst one, in that it affects normal workers but is quite clearly messing with their plans to save for retirement (for which the argument for encouraging private pensions in the first place was to save money on the state pension), by literally taking from them in order to fund the struggling state pension itself. Very short-term and I can't imagine anyone's going to be happy with it for very long because it will mess directly with in-place business pension schemes, I'd also predict it's the big loser policy from this budget that will get complained about most long term, like the "jobs tax" was last year. In a very similar area too. Does feel like a reaction to not do anything that would scare off any markets or businesses while keeping the tax rises going as are required. I'm on board with some of the philosophy and it was a difficult budget to construct with so many competing opinions but it does very little to address the underlying problems with why the government bill keeps rising, nor does it help out normal people's finances to stimulate the economy very much.

Always hate FIFA meddling, I really hope one of those top 4 don't win their group so it scuppers their dollar sign dreams of them as semi-finals even before the knockout stage starts.

Real indictment of X Factor as having no creative value whatsoever that they reuse an already pretty trite 'made-to-be-a-winner's-single' as a winner's single cover. Only three seasons in! Ending up making American Idol look good by comparison. Wasn't sure where that'd end up but indeed, no loss.

For a while back in the day 'Unfaithful' was my favourite Rihanna song so that would have been one I was again on the wrong side of. Bizarre #1 of course, no reason to listen to the McFly version of this Queen song, it does very little the original doesn't do, just worse, and the other song is far from their best.

Two-child benefit cap reporting to be scrapped in the Budget! Excellent. Also rail fares frozen for the first time in 30 years.

Interested to see how this shakes out, there's some real timeless classics on this list, and a few completely forgettable ones like 'The Rose'. Unlike with 2005, where I really started becoming aware partway through the year, I remember the majority of the #1s from the time as being pretty inescapable, and I'm not sure how this goes beyond the bottom lot, nor how I'd rank them yet. I'll never saying no to seeing a Westlife song at the bottom of the ranking anyway, and this is one of their most painfully boring efforts. The Saints Are Coming would have been a far better #1 for at least being a little bit of an oddity I suppose, even if both bands (and particularly Green Day) have far better.

What a fantastic end to the countdown, I thought there was a possibility you might have put Arctics #1 but I'm very happy it's ended up as my initial prediction and it's gone to DARE. 'I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor' and 'Hung Up' are obviously giants of 2005 and very memorable from that era, the former revolutionising online music and giving us one of the most innovative and clever bands of the 21st century, the latter a genius concoction to top off the Queen of Pop's career, very much both deserve to be up there. DARE though, I do have specific memories of hearing it at the time (it was #1 in my first month of secondary school) and that is great, because it sounded so out there in a brilliant way compared to most hits, attention grabbing, you have a good beat for it but it's not annoying in the slightest, it is just fantastic - and that basically ended up to be the gateway for Gorillaz to eventually become one of my favourite bands of all time. I'd have slammed it in #1 just like you have, and while I dearly wish that Feel Good Inc was in this list as well, DARE being here and being the sole #1 for one of the best creations of British music of modern times, I've always loved that it managed to sneak a week ever since following the charts and I'm probably not exaggerating when I say that it is my favourite UK #1 of all time. So good and catchy. Video's also genius too, I've gotten so into the Gorillaz videos and their lore over the years but their peak was the Demon Days storylines, Feel Good Inc showing a dark tower with light shining in with the windmill, this coming from Noodle messing around at night at their 'base', and then El Manana of course, but the whole thing is a great showcase of a nostalgic fictionalised world where the band members are a team putting out music and fighting darkness (or something). The vibes are just perfect for someone who was growing up in the 00s, emo but in a nice, accessible way. Thanks for this thread Chez, really interesting commentary to read through over the last few weeks and I've learned a lot of things I didn't know about these songs beforehand. I won't do a complete rank, mostly because I'm confident that mine would be very very similar to how you've laid it out here.

https://www.ebu.ch/news/2025/11/ebu-announces-changes-to-eurovision-song-contest-voting-rules-to-strengthen-trust-and-transparency The EBU announced today a bunch of changes to the rules of the contest Not a huge fan. The clearer rules on promotion is clearly an acknowledgement that Israel 2025 cheated or at least went against the spirit of the rule, the most we've gotten so far. Yet despite the EBU obviously knowing which country they are talking about, and that they disagree with this, there are no sanctions for doing this and there's not even an outright ban on the practice. Fewer maximum votes is a step towards the solution, but misses a cap on voting for the same song at the expense of giving some superfans a hard limit. Juries returning to the semi-final, actively bad. You might get some claiming that this allows for jury bait to qualify again and dilute it in the final but there were actively bad jury songs qualifying at the end of that and this encourages delegations to go back to sending jury bait. Jury expansion, good. I have been asking for this for years. 5 to 7 is possibly a bit too little, though the profession expansion and young jurors is welcomed, again I distrust that the safeguards that are allegedly put in place. Does feel like they stopped short of putting in hard rules for this stuff which just weakens what they're trying to achieve.

I'd say that given Shabana Mahmood's tour of cruelty and harsh anti-refugee rhetoric over the last week, the Home Office part of the government is already in the hands of a far-right nutjob. Labour capitulation to Reform narratives is absolutely going to be their biggest weakness going forward. Even if Mahmood gets to look confident on the circuit in the short-term. Clive Lewis' announcement looks inconsequential tbh, obviously Burnham would never take him up on it, and based on how the BBC initially reported it it seemed nothing more than some offhand comment Lewis made. His public statements do have him defending the idea though and I agree with the thrust of the argument, electoral logistics aside, the government probably would be in a better place and stand a better chance of combattng the right if Burnham were leader and making a stronger case for popular left politics.

Umamusume nominated! hope it wins it's been uniting me with all my western weeb friends as far as strategy games go, lol at Civ VII getting nominated that's incredibly dumb, for the mainstream ones, as ever I haven't played most of them but from what I know of them, hope Expedition 33/Silent Hill f/Silksong end up taking most of the big awards.

Absolutely love 'Like Toy Soldiers' and 'Ghetto Gospel' in particular, two huge pillars of my faves in 00s rap, I love conscious hip-hop and particularly Ghetto Gospel works really well with those touches to bring it to a more mainstream audience, I don't think I'd have heard of Shakur anywhere near as early on as I did had this not been on the airwaves spreading out his legacy, admittedly not as hard-hitting as the material he recorded while he was alive. The Eminem song, I think again he lifts the song well with his lyrics and it (and Mockingbird) is about the only thing that works on an otherwise disastrous album era for him. 'Idle' and 'Dakota' are excellent starts to the top 5, both are some of the best of cinematic arena rock that was coming out about this time, the former has Oasis just really going for it with a rhythmic beauty that isn't them yowling into the mic for once, 'Dakota' is a really amazing song, like you I've never really got into Stereophonics normally for their stature as a rock band and wouldn't have thought from their other songs they could make something like this but this foray into synth really works and that explosion into the chorus really is unparalleled. nothing but love for everything in this top 7 tbh

Nice easy win for the gov and even bigger for fans, excellent job. (sure, some of its implementations may have a few issues but this is great progress!)

I have a few potentially hype-worthy options actually for the first time in what feels like ages, which one though?

Congratulations Rich, so very well deserved after an incredible entry run over the last few years and many times where I really thought you should have won it, brilliant song to do it with too! I love voting for the winner! thank you those who got me to the final - I really want to get a good result sooner or later. Thank you Jade for being an amazing host and everyone else for making this such a fun contest.

diabolical teasing Jade!

Was thinking about who they'd vote for and concluded they could potentially be voting for both of those songs, eek.

oh yeah! I mean I'm happy to be here but I could feasibly be pushed into last too (if unlikely with so few voters left?). sad

ORKID feels like a below par amalgamation of many of the recent winners that I have been tepidly on board with at best. We need other sounds winning!

Rontvia hold on please!

an essential goal is not having bby finish near the bottom so good work aelandor

thank you Addy and Pav!

let this be the POPHub RISE

thank you Dan & Chris, this is progressing very well to be in the top 20 at any point(!) very happy to see that lead opening up for Sadu