Chez VampireBat

I would be pretty confident in this one, but not sure I can be when there's so many other pickings for the alt crowd to go to! I left four songs out that should really be points-worthy sooo....I may feel a little bad if they end up DNQing by a small margin D: (Although one would be an absolute shock if it were out even in this semi #cryptic)

Malamente so close 😢 Blaming you, @Bror xx

Aww, three quite gutting eliminations there. All three new wave groups were never going to last and Ultravox was always going first I think, but a shame, I liked this one too and their mentor picked some really good choices (I'm sure it was someone from the Sunday Synctube sessions as most of them were played there and went down well x), shame we never saw Dancing With Tears in My Eyes, I expect for the Golden Gamu anything other than a certain song will mean nothing to them.... Roosevelt is quite a sad loss as it's an artist I've always enjoyed what I've heard, but maybe a bit too lesser known to get much further, I did like the choices although a shame a lot of my main favourites I already knew like Automatic, Elliott, No Ordinary Love and the particularly underrated Forgive weren't sent. Jessie Ware was very up and down for me and unfortunately, I wasn't into this choice but I did love the album track choice last round and glad 110% got a chance to shine. I guess she has a few bangers that could stand a pretty good chance of getting her back. Glad Robyn is safe though, no way did this deserve to get her (temporarily) out!

01; Gary Numan - My Name is Ruin 02; Damien Rice – Cannonball 03; Sam Fender - Get You Down 04; Roosevelt – Montreal 05; Darin - Fantasi 06; Calvin Harris & Sam Smith – Desire 07; Sam Smith - I'm Not the Only One 08; HRVY – hesitate 09; Tom Grennan - Boys Don't Cry Ooft, that's a fantastic new one from Gary that I never knew about, he's had fantastic representation so far, I actually have been preferring Damien's other picks to Cannonball which has never been a big favourite, but it's still enough for second and hopefully he can give us one more of them! The Sam S song is better than Stay With Me, but that ballad phase of theirs was always such a slog.

01; Kate Bush – Cloudbusting 02; MARINA - I Am Not a Robot 03; Robyn - Keep This Fire Burning 04; Adele - Chasing Pavements 05; Agnes - 24 Hours 06; Sophie Ellis-Bextor - Bittersweet 07; Zara Larsson - Can't Tame Her 08; Jessie Ware - Hot N Heavy 09; Leona Lewis feat. Avicii - Collide I'm a 6Music listener so have to stan Cloudbusting x (I don't think I'd actually seen the video or looking into the song before though, it's lovely <3) TIL Keep This Fire Burning was a Robyn original! Wow, Beverley Knight really just did a carbon copy of it didn't she? It's a good song though and doesn't deserve to send her out (or temporarily out). I love the original Penguin from Avicii, but Collide was not great.

01; Fontaines D.C. – Marianne 02; Texas - Black Eyed Boy 03; Depeche Mode – Precious 04; Ultravox - All Stood Still 05; iamamiwhoami - t 06; New Order – Crystal 07; Years & Years – Sanctify 08; Sade - By Your Side 09; Bananarama - Love in the First Degree First one I've really liked (and a classic) from Texas and good to hear some more modern stuff from Depeche Mode and New Order as I wasn't that familiar with them. I did like Sanctify at the time, but it's not aged that well hearing it now, oops x I do quite like the Bananarama song too, but this was another very strong round and I think they did this sound better elsewhere (Venus namely x)

I feel for Hannah as I think she'd have been best as a faithful where she can put her deduction skills to good use, but she's not an actor so being thrown into a situation where you have to adapt doesn't come as naturally. I'm glad she stayed though as she's giving it her best, though she surely can't last much longer, especially with Miranda hot on her tail, although these types of tasks always throw out new suspicions so you never know x

Votes in, the four songs I left out could genuinely be in my top 5 another month, jeez </3

That top 2 is amazing - I discovered Pyramids quite a few years after it came out, though didn't fully appreciate it until I heard Channel Orange on my first album bucket list. The epic first part with gradiose synths matching the historical context gradually seguing into the more subdued but subtle parallels the change in perspective brings is really striking and as you say, a really layered and complex song, I think it will be remembered as one of the all time greatest songs from around the time in the future. The whole album was fantastic and I really need to get into Blonde at some point as that's on my second one. If he indeed never makes music again, he's certainly left a good legacy x I love Luna as well, that would be similarly high up for me too, I have a lot of final year of uni memories associated with it and the merging of his vocals with Rae Morris' works wonderfully and adds a lot of emotional weight to the song as you say. There are few other songs I quite like from them, but that remains by a mile my favourite. Some good BJSC picks - I gave Drab Majesty ten points and it has stuck with me a bit, I had to remind myself of the Vitalic song, it was a commiseration for me at the time but definitely points-worthy listening to it now, maybe it was a strong contest x I do have quite clear memories of around that period in BJSC and my taste was very influenced by it. I do find Lana Del Rey a bit too samey sometimes (though I have been meaning to look into her other albums as they have had a lot of acclaim), but I loved her first era and it also holds a lot of uni memories. Ride wasn't quite as good as Video Games and Born to Die (or West Coast from the next era for that matter) for me but do appreciate the extremely cinematic atmosphere and strong chorus. When We All Fall Asleep... was a hell of a first era for Billie Eilish, and quite influential in bringing that kind of quirky/alt-pop style back to the mainstream at the time, I do think her albums have gotten better each time and her sound has really evolved, like you, but a lot of the singles from there still sound great. My favourite would be Everything I Wanted, but When the Party's Over is similarly beautiful and shows how good she was at doing that haunting ballad sound. A good one from Ariana too, I think I'd have Breathing or Into You as my favourite from the decade (We Can't Be Friends from the next decade though is rapidly approaching that), but it was a special moment after that awful tragedy and showed real artistic diversity and personal growth. I've been documenting my favourite songs of the year since 2011 on this forum so I actually have a reference point for my own personal list which I compiled in 2019 (granted it's still not particularly final as I'm rediscovering and checking out things I missed from this decade all the time) 1. Two Steps from Hell - Miracles 2. CHVRCHES – The Mother We Share 3. Alan Walker - Faded 4. Arcade Fire – Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains) 5. Lights & Motion - Fireflies 6. Wintergatan – Sommarfagel 7. Thomas Bergersen – One Million Voices 8. Bombay Bicycle Club – Luna 9. Swedish House Mafia feat. John Martin – Don’t You Worry Child 10. M83 – Un Nouveau Soleil 11. Of Monsters & Men – Dirty Paws 12. Films - clone 13. Chase & Status feat. Liam Bailey – Blind Faith 14. Coldplay - Hypnotised 15. Fractal Dreamers – Clarum Somnium 16. Fractal Dreamers – Fortuna Redux 17. Marcus Warner – If Elephants Could Fly 18. Steven Wilson feat. Ninet Tayab - Pariah 19. David Guetta feat. Sia – Titanium 20. Lindsey Stirling – Crystallize A fairly similar mix of some chart songs, BJSC/song contest stuff and very under-the-radar stuff, mainly of the epic classical/art-post rock kind of genres. I was certainly in my own bubble for a lot of the latter part of this decade, but it did really formulate my taste into what it is today.

Pagasa is not DNQing!! (although it's quite hard to see what is from that semi, oops :x)

Congrats Scene, quite ironic that an era so infamous for her flopping has sparked such a clear winner, wasn't for me really, but didn't mind it x As said, I can't say the top half of that scoreboard enthuses me much, I was hoping that it wouldn't be entirely dominated by the well known names, but I guess that's not exactly surprising! 8-10 are all excellent though and nice that we got some alt representation there and a few more of my votes just below, Definitely way too low for Sweet Milk tho x I'll take 18th gladly given this was a very pop leaning set of results, I think that makes up nicely for Orpheus & Eurydice all those years ago x Thank you all for voting, and if you liked this, I'd recommend the Myths and Legends album for a lot of very cool new age vibes x Thanks for hosting Rollo!

Ooh, wonderful entry there from Bre, feel it's been a while since I've given you a song contest top pointer (and thanks for the points x)

I suppose that top 5 was expected, but it's a bit unexciting, hope one of 6-10 has a chance of getting up there. Hooray for more points x

Oh I lucked out on that semi! That alt/pop split feels particularly strong here. Prayers to the pop/alt songs caught in the wrong semi x I've been drawn in Semi 1 8/10 times this year and I was really hoping I'd make it a full year, I suppose it could still make it part of one x The only one I know is in the other semi - Elliot Minor!! What a throwback to the Kerrang days, and one from when I was avidly following the charts so remember it charting twice, I haven't heard it in a long time but I loved it back in the day. Hope you all like my Underworld throwback, I wanted to enter Real Tree Lee by them earlier in the year but never got round to it, so fortunate that this is even better! Apologies to @dandy* who also confirmed this, been a while since my entry's been wanted by more than one person!

I first entered Cusco to BJSC in the 100th edition (almost ten years to the date!), it sadly DNQed amongst a huge pool of entrants so I perhaps misjudged sending it at that time, they were an artist that pretty much fit the theme exactly and with me since visiting Peru, what better time to bring them back! I debated between this and Oracle of Delphi, that was a bit more accessible and shorter, but couldn't resist the topical reference in the title. I suppose we'll see if I can improve on my placing last time (thanks Jade for the solitary point so far x) My mantra is always that if my artist can't get justice the first time, then we must take every chance we can get to remedy this!

Oh no at M83, I mean it wasn't their best epic instrumental granted but still rather stunning </3 I suppose in a category that stacked with alt-faves, there's always going to be some casualties, I guess they'll now be waiting in a car until the Golden Gamu x Dido is less surprising but a shame as well as I liked that song. I'm very pleased Damien Rice, Roosevelt and Gary are safe though as I got a bit worried with some of those votes. Lewis has never been for me, but Forget Me, I didn't dislike his entries here.

I loved the original Tsunami at the time, I discovered it through BJSC, I would've loved to see that at number 1 but Tinie shouting nonsense all over it made it a hell of a lot worse, I'm glad these 'rent-a-rapper over popular European instrumentals' trend that lasted a while has stopped now as it was infuriating as the originals can easily stand on their own x Easy to forget Cheryl holds the record for number 1s by a female artist after how quiet she went after this, I guess she didn't adapt well to the streaming age. I quite liked a few of her earlier solo hits, but these two were both pretty awful and throwaway. Crazy Stupid Love with it's 'rollercoaster, but I'm only going up' lyric and saxophones that still sound a bit out of tune is particularly bad! I've softened to All About that Bass a bit over the years, it's a well-intentioned song and the doo-wop sound was quite unique at the time. The rest of her discography has been awful though.

Starvation - Starvation* / Tam-Tam Pour L'Ethiope* Tears For Fears - Everybody Wants To Rule The World The Damned - Grimly Fiendish REO Speedwagon - Can't Fight This Feeling Dream Academy - Life In A Northern Town Have to give credit for Starvation, the first side was rubbish but it's great to see some actual African voices in a charity single. The Damned also a great discovery, Pie Jesu just missed out.

30; Sufjan Stevens - Mystery of Love 29; Wolf Alice - Don't Delete The Kisses 28; Arcade Fire - Everything Now 27; Harry Styles - Sign of the Times 26; Lorde - Green Light 25; Dua Lipa - Be The One 24; Carly Rae Jepsen - Cut To The Feeling 23; Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds - Holy Mountain 22; Rita Ora - Anywhere 21; French Montana (feat. Swae Lee) - Unforgettable 20; MGMT - Little Dark Age 19; Kendrick Lamar - Humble. 18; Sampha - (No One Knows Me Like) The Piano 17; Paramore - Hard Times 16; Jax Jones (feat. Ina Wroldsen) - Breathe 15; Lorde - Perfect Places 14; ZAYN (feat. Sia) - Dusk Till Dawn 13; Camila Cabello (feat. Young Thug) - Havana 12; Disciples - On My Mind 11; Dua Lipa - New Rules 10; Clean Bandit (feat. Zara Larsson) - Symphony 09; Calvin Harris (feat. Frank Ocean & Migos) - Slide 08; Killers - The Man 07; Linkin Park (feat. Kiiara) - Heavy 06; Gareth Emery & STANDERWICK (feat. HALIENE) - Saving Light 05; Miley Cyrus - Malibu 04; Portugal. The Man - Feel It Still 03; Charli XCX - Boys 02; Drake - Passionfruit 01; Kygo & Selena Gomez - It Ain't Me

01; Jessie Ware - The Kill 02; Kate Bush - Reaching Out 03; MARINA - Teen Idle 04; Leona Lewis - Outta My Head 05; Dido - Mary’s in India 06; Adele - Can I Get It 07; Zara Larsson - Blue Moon 08; Agnes - Loaded 09; Robyn - Time Machine 10; Sophie Ellis-Bextor - New York City Lights Great round here, I didn't dislike anything. Fantastic stuff from Jessie, must get round to that album. I was hoping for something from the Ninth Wave section of Hounds of Love from Kate Bush, but this was lovely too x Never been the biggest fan of Leona but my parents did used to buy her albums and that track, while dated, was one of the few songs I liked off it. Poor Dido, I rather liked it x

01; Gary Numan – M.E. 02; Damien Rice – Amie 03; Roosevelt - Forget 04; Sam Smith - Lose You 05; Calvin Harris feat. Tinashe - Dollar Signs 06; Tom Grennan - If Only 07; Darin - Om du var min 08; Sam Fender - The Treadmill 09; Lewis Capaldi - Heavenly Kind of State of Mind 10; HRVY - Never Be Us I do hope Damien's not at risk, that was my favourite I've heard from him so far.

01; M83 - Lower Your Eyelids to Die With the Sun 02; iamamiwhoami – shadowshow 03; Sade - Pearls 04; Depeche Mode - Photographic 05; Ultravox - Accent on Youth 06; Years & Years - Ties 07; Fontaines D.C. – Sundowner 08; New Order - Love Vigilantes 09; Bananarama - Bad For Me 10; Texas - Like Lovers (Holding On) Wonderful to hear another one of those glorious soundscapes from M83 <3 shadowshow certainly sounds like a big blog hit with a video so surprised that wasn't a single! I liked everything here to some extent, stop all the shade to this category xx

M83's same album inspiring three different people to make topics, how impactful can one band be (I do intend to listen to this!)

Yes, wonderfully entertaining as he's been in his short time, Richard should definitely go here and I think that will work out much better for the traitors as they can recruit someone less of a liability, the other two definitely need to jump ship though or they'll immediately look suspicious. This lot seem a bit more switched on than last year's so I think they'll have a harder fight on their hands. Poor Hannah, that feels like a gift for the traitors to murder a smart one so early, unless they try to move suspicion onto her.

I do remember the real hype that was surrounding Band Aid 30 at the time, and even thought they could do something quite distinctive or put a modern twist on it like 20, but it seems after all that hype they just...didn't bother at all, because the final product just seems so half-arsed, if they were trying to recreate the DIY feel of the original, it definitely didn't work as well! I would rank it between 20 and 2 overall but all of them feel totally unnecessary after the original. I did quite like Rude at the time, it was quite distinctive and came out of nowhere, but I wouldn't put it on these days, it's not a style or sound that have really aged that well. I actually prefer Money on My Mind to the Sam Smith song still to come although still wouldn't put it that high, they lost me quite quickly when they turned into a dull balladeer after their brilliant features leading up to it.