ILM's Top 77 Tracks of 2014

Crying while driving a car at night, crying with $50 bills around the table, crying at the beach, crying at the top of Sears Tower, crying while smoking a cigarette with a tie loosened

I see you enjoyed "Pyramids"

crying at the anomie that success brings as it removes me from my peers and into a world where everyone seems fake and the modern world is confusing but i dont know how to admit to it, im not sure if im sad if im autotuned its not really me its this other sad me that lives inside, there are two me's the successful one and the one that only shows emotion in my car at 4am and its raining you'll end up running someone over soon if you drive like that

And without further ado, another episode of my unsolicited hot takes on today’s tracks:

Mark Ronson - Uptown Funk ft. Bruno Mars
Another track I’ve heard, but don’t know where. Well-produced pop populism carried by the bassy vocal sample hook. Fresh sounding synths and vocals, and nice touches with the slap bass and horns. Sounds a bit out of left field though. Without context. I guess that’s the case with a lot of music today. Almost sounds like a remix or something. Nice, climatic, James Brown sounding outro. Okay, 6/10

Jennifer Lopez - I Luh Ya Papi (Explicit) ft. French Montana
Infectious chorus; nice, sparse, verse hooks. Groovin ideas going on throughout the track. Like the vibe JLO is going for, and nice production flourishes too. Think I’ve heard better from French Montana though. And I’m not convinced the whole thing hangs together in the end. 6/10

Against Me! – Transgender Dysphoria Blues
Already like this more than the one ranked above. Nice guitar tone and good feels. Song doesn’t really go anywhere though. 5.5/10

Nicki Minah – Boss Ass Bitch ft. PTAF
Great flow. Falls somewhere in between Anaconda and Lookin’ Ass for me. I dunno. 5.5/10

HAIM – If I Could Change Your Mind
Nice, musical, pop. Sounds just right. Again, not sure how I feel about music so referential and simultaneously decontextualized. An era unlived, renewed here 6/10.

Migos ft. Young Thug – YRN
Neither my favourite Migos or Young Thug track from the year. Elevated given its cross-over appeal. Lots of fun here. Definitely more Young Thug than Migos? 8/10

ALVVAYS – Archie, Marry Me
I feel like I am stuck in someone’s garage and want to go home. Relies on echoes from a past that it cannot possess. It ended nicely. 4/10

Spoon – Inside Out
This is the one track I’ve heard off the album. These guys are still together? The thrust of my comments above apply to this too, a bit, though the modern compression and production update it. I like the sparseness of it all. I’ll never listen to this again. 7/10

D’Angelo – Sugah Daddy
Play it again, D’an 9/10

FKA Twigs – Pendulum
Right. Like what’s it doing, but hard to get into for me overall. Too disjointed. Though not so disjointed that I appreciate it in the abstract. It has some really nice moments. 7/10

Hey QT – QT
It’s as if the pitch of the track (drums included) was increased to veil its mediocrity. A quick YouTube of a slowed down version confirmed my suspicions. This track is awful. 3/10

Katy Perry – Dark Horse
Bizarre and problematic video, but clearly a memorable track from the year. The first half of the Juicy J rapping over the chorus hook takes it home. 6.5/10

Jessie Ware – Champagne Kisses
Beautiful song 7.5/10

ILOVEMAKONNEN - Club Going Up On A Tuesday
Got the Club going up! / on a Tuesday! 7.5/10

Rita Ora – I Will Never Let You Down
Production a bit over the top on this, but the verse riff is infection. It works! 6.5/10

Aphex Twin - Minipops 67 [120.2] (source field mix)
It does it all 9.5/10

Todd Terje – Delorean Dynamite
This track really takes halfway through until it opens up and rains all its brilliance down 8.5/10

Katy B – Crying For No Reason
This flows really nicely from the Terje track. Liked the energy a lot 7.5/10

Shamir – On The Regular
I like the mid-section with the pads and pingy toms. But the bass doesn’t really do it for me. And the breakdown is nice. I wish the flow wasn’t so predictably on the beat though. 6/10

Javiera Mena - Otra Era
Nice, something I was looking for — a gem I hadn’t heard yet. 7/10

Not quite as many new songs I enjoyed this time around like yesterday. Looks like my favorites were songs I’d already heard prior, unfortunately. Maybe I need to let some of these newer finds sink in. Still like listening to this spectrum of new music though. Looking forward to what gifts tomorrow brings.

<was there a more dour huge hit in 2014 than Dark Horse?

― skip

Prayer in C?

nothing i voted for yet!

songs i have discovered from the results & loved:
$$ champagne kisses - right up my strasse pet
$$ sombra da lua - intense khole experience

songs i like and almost voted for:
$ good kisser - amazing drums but this didn't quite click for me
$ tchelete - i voted for a few african pop things that i'm hoping will place, happy with this one though!
$ luh ya papi - listenined to remix more but orig. is great too
$ YRN - my migos pick was 'fight night' cos it felt like the bigger song, this one is probably cooler tho
$ sugah daddy - yeah should have voted for
$ crying for no reason - got into this through DJ Q sets, where it's pretty hard to hear this as the languid pop it's being accused of being

wack shit:
0 hey qt - avoided hearing any pc music until now but this is terrible, stupid vocals
0 tuesday - great subject matter, awful vocal performance
0 on the regular - this sound is so dated and lame come on now

Here are my takes on the tunes I had the time to listen to yesterday:

60 MARK RONSON "Uptown Funk" Ft Bruno Mars
Like people have said, this is clearly trying to imitate Kool & The Gang, with a bit of Morris Day vocal theatrics thrown in. I love how the beat breakdowns are all EDM music though, so it doesn't even try to pretend to be a classy pastiche like "Rehab" or something. The groove is nice and the horn riff is even nicer, but it seems to completely lack a proper chorus, so it still doesn't as good as the stuff it's imitating.

59 JENNIFER LOPEZ "I Luh Ya Papi" Ft French Montana [252 points, 9 votes]
Love the synth riff, the vocals are a bit slight and disposable, but in a likable summer jam kind of way. The video's idea of "let's objectify the boys for change" would be cool if it didn't also have so many shots zooming on J-Lo's ass in microshorts. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

58 AGAINST ME! "Transgender Dysphoria Blues"
See my comment on the other Against Me song.

57 NICKI MINAJ "Boss Ass Bitch" ft. PTAF
Love the lyrics and the delivery on this one, but again the beat has this AD/HD quality I don't really like in club raps of this era, because I'm an grumpy ol' man and it just tires my ears. Much better than Anaconda, still.

56 HAIM - "If I Could Change Your Mind"
Based on the ILM discussion I thought Haim was some kind of a rock band, but this is pure 80s new wave dance pop, no? It's pretty good, but sounds a bit too faithful to its inspirations, no sense of adventure.

55 MIGOS - "YRN" Ft. Young Thug
The sample choice is awesome, but I could understand only about the half of the stuff these guys are saying, what's the tune about? Anyway, it has a nice relaxed vibe compared to the other rap tunes that have placed so far, I dig it.

54 ALVVAYS - "Archie, Marry Me"
I thought this would be about Archie the comic book character, so I was disappointed that it wasn't. Can't see the point of adding so much echo to everything, and the singer has this stereotypical alt rock warbly delivery that grates my ears. Not my thing.

53 SPOON - "Inside Out"
The beats and the synths are nice in harmless way, but the singer has the most bland vocal style imaginable, like Bruce Springsteen with no cocaine.

52 D'ANGELO AND THE VANGUARD "Sugah Daddy"
Now this is how you do pastiche! No sugar-coating for modern listeners, just pure funk groove. Really nice.

51 FKA TWIGS "Pendulum"
The vocal gymnastics in this one are really, really good, but what's up with the "beats" that sound like street drills? Felt like this was bit unnecessarily artsy, would've liked the song with a more traditionally poppy backing track.

50 QT - "Hey QT"
There's good a Eurodance track buried somewhere in there, but I don't just get why they've done the things they've done to it. Kids these days.

Noone gives a fuck but let's do this!

77 NICKI MINAJ "Lookin Ass"
I think she said niggers 15 times in the first 30 seconds.

76 OWEN PALLETT "Song for Five & Six”
I know Owen posts in here and I think he's adorable but I'm not a fan of his Kermit voice (sorry Owen!). The arrangements are top notch as always, though, I'm happy this placed. I wish he had a vocal collaborator because I think he's a brilliant musician, just not a fan of this sort of voice.

75 TUNE-YARDS "Water Fountain"
I love the post-punk bassline on this one.

74 NINOS DU BRASIL "Sombra da Lua"
The first of my votes to place. I'm thrilled to see this is one of the few songs on the ranking almost everyone has liked, makes me wonder how high it would place if we'd made a second poll only nominating the 77 winners from this poll.

73 KING "Mister Chameleon"
This makes me want to rub my nipples. I love how the bended synth notes that first appeared on Hey have become a part of their style.

72 KATIE GATELY "Pivot"
Can't make my mind about this sort of song with just one listen.

71 ANA TIJOUX Ft. Shadia Mansour "Somos Sur"
Not a huge fan of this sort of maximalist hip-hop, if you don't speak spanish the lyrics are anti-usa, pro-palestine btw.

70 USHER "Good Kisser"
Love the bass and sample but this feels to me like a really good 4 minute verse.

69 NICKI MINAJ "Anaconda"
Ugh

68 DAVIDO "Tchelete" Ft. Mafikizolo
If reggaeton had sounded like this +10 years ago I would have been down with it. It sounds surprisingly thin somehow... I feel like I'm listening from another room.

67 RÖYKSOPP & ROBYN "Do It Again"
Zzzzzzzz

66 SHAKIRA "Empire"
It shames me that english speakers have this extremely insipid version of Shakira and you will never experience what she was in the 90s.

65 ST. VINCENT "Prince Johnny"
I like her but this doesn't sound remarkable at first listen.

64 DUKE DUMONT "I Got U" Ft. Jax Jones
For better or for worse, I think 10 years from now this is the sort of sound that the 2010-2015 will be remembered for.

63 CARIBOU "Silver"
The result of Dan Snaith listening to a fuck-ton of chillwave a la Toro & Moi and making something valuable out of it.

62 AGAINST ME! "FUCKMYLIFE666"
The title is lovely in its self-parody but it's 2014 ffs who listens to this shit anymore?

61 HOLLY HERNDON "Chorus"
This sounds great, need to check back.

60 MARK RONSON "Uptown Funk" Ft Bruno Mars
This is Bruno Mars at his most likable for me. Makes me think him and Mark Ronson would be a great fit for the inevitable Ghostbusters theme remake.

59 JENNIFER LOPEZ "I Luh Ya Papi" Ft French Montana
lol. The backing track is cool but the lyrics are terrible 5th grade bullshit. I can imagine someone like Willow Smith singing this but JLO is 45 years old, come on.

58 AGAINST ME! "Transgender Dysphoria Blues"
see 62.

57 NICKI MINAJ "Boss Ass Bitch" ft. PTAF
Yeah, I won't even bother listening to this.

56 HAIM "If I Could Change Your Mind"
Love Haim but didn't vote for this as it feels 2013 for me.

55 MIGOS "YRN" Ft. Young Thug
Oh, this sounds fun. I can't understand the lyrics at all but the beat is awesome.

54 ALVVAYS "Archie, Marry Me"
I don't mind this sort of song at all but I'm left scratching my head at how high it ranked in here. Indie M.O.R.

53 SPOON "Inside Out"
I love this song! It's perfectly inoffensive and groovy. How come so many people in here hate it?

52 D'ANGELO AND THE VANGUARD "Sugah Daddy"
I love D'Angelo and it blows my mind how many people can get behind such a seemingly offbeat sort of RnB.

51 FKA TWIGS "Pendulum"
I think this song is a bit boring but same as D'Angelo, happy to see so many people supporting offbeat RnB.

50 QT "Hey QT"
I still lack the cynicism to enjoy this with a straight face.

49 KATY PERRY "Dark Horse" Ft. Juicy J
Had no idea Katy Perry released any singles this year. I don't mind this but I don't find it particularly interesting nor catchy.

48 JESSIE WARE "Champagne Kisses"
Does she just sing on top of whatever the producer throws at her? I think she is a great vocalist but every song I've heard from her seems to rely too much on the backing tracks. Quadron strikes me as a similar artist but with an opposite composition style. The singer Coco O composes a bare version of the vocal melody first and the producer creates a track around it.

47 ILOVEMAKONNEN "Club Going Up On A Tuesday"
I liked this at first but it outwears its welcome by the third listen.

46 RITA ORA "I Will Never Let You Down"
This didn't catch me at first listen but I don't hate it. Sounds like me what Lady Gaga would sound like if she relocated to California but this comparison might be completely off. Need to listen to it with fresh ears. I'm getting annoyed at this point.

45 APHEX TWIN "Minipops 67 [120.2] (source field mix)"
Happy he's back but he's not a single track sort of artist. This doesn't make sense without the context of the full album.

44 TODD TERJE "Delorean Dynamite"
Not as good as his previous singles but a good piece of space disco either way.

43 KATY B "Crying For No Reason"
this is the same singer as Katy on a Mission, right? The lyrics are awful... I think I'll forget about this as soon as it finishes.

42 SHAMIR "On The Regular"

41 JAVIERA MENA "Otra Era"
With all the artists following this sort of disco-house trend in the past decade it seems like she is one of the few ones with an innate ability to channel youth nostalgia without resorting to gimmicks.

I should love Alvvays from all descriptions of them but they're just too personality deficient to interest me at all. Not even bad per se, just default indie pop.

Yeah, Alvvays has been the only major disagreement with my gf so far - it all comes together for her but I can't see it

As I said, ALVVAYS sound like middle of the road, indie pop for me. They'll hardly annoy anyone, but they'll hardly make you excited about them too.

I don't hear what's so special about this song that the voters picked it over the other 50 similar sounding songs this year.

I think in Alvvays' defence, while the melodies are very basic, the execution has some power

I also think there's a discussion to be had concerning the almost 100% crossover rate of those boosting (and those violently repulsed by) Hey QT and Shamir. Are both songs indie disguised as pop? Are they both far too inflected with a kiddish sense of avant-garde to succeed in some minds as Serious Pop? Can fucking around be serious - does seriousness matter? Why are so many people personally affronted by music that fucks around? So many questions!

I will add that everyone who likes both songs almost certainly does so because they find them catchy as fuck (see Sund4r thread! Welcome, friend!) and not because they're going out of their way to be wacky - but what sort of catchy is it?

Shout-out to dayo as well - I posted on the AM! thread when the album first came out! It feels at once like a big statement and a comforting blanket.

Sund4r upthread, even

I listen to one Javiera Mena track every January and I'm always happy at having done so, was loving this one in a kind of Santa Etiena way until the switch up right near the end and man that was a joyous moment.

Crying while driving a car at night, crying with $50 bills around the table, crying at the beach, crying at the top of Sears Tower, crying while smoking a cigarette with a tie loosened

crying at the anomie that success brings as it removes me from my peers and into a world where everyone seems fake and the modern world is confusing but i dont know how to admit to it, im not sure if im sad if im autotuned its not really me its this other sad me that lives inside, there are two me's the successful one and the one that only shows emotion in my car at 4am and its raining you'll end up running someone over soon if you drive like that

― saer, Wednesday, January 21, 2015 7:21 AM (2 hours ago)

Booming posts.

The Shamir track and Hey QT aren't remotely the same thing, the Shamir track is sincere party music in a way that's annoying if you don't like that sort of thing, Hey QT is all dead-eyed cynicism and faux-conceptual distance. Katy Perry is all dead-eyed cynicism as well but but of a different kind.

Crying while driving a car at night, crying with $50 bills around the table, crying at the beach, crying at the top of Sears Tower, crying while smoking a cigarette with a tie loosened

crying at the anomie that success brings as it removes me from my peers and into a world where everyone seems fake and the modern world is confusing but i dont know how to admit to it, im not sure if im sad if im autotuned its not really me its this other sad me that lives inside, there are two me's the successful one and the one that only shows emotion in my car at 4am and its raining you'll end up running someone over soon if you drive like that

― saer, Wednesday, January 21, 2015 7:21 AM (2 hours ago)

Booming posts.

― Matt DC, Wednesday, January 21, 2015 9:52 AM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yes

(Basically I'm down with people actually liking Hey QT but unless people are also stanning for Aqua/The Vengaboys/some super hyperactive K-pop then I'm going to assume it's the arched eyebrow that's actually the main appeal and that the "hey it works as pop!" is secondary)

Can fucking around be serious - does seriousness matter?

Yes but it depends what seriousness really means.

I'm in favour of playfulness in records, but what does that mean? Well I guess it means whatever I want it to mean, which isnt necessarily helpful - deftness of touch? light-footed? something like that

But a big element of playfulness is surprise, either when a track does something playful or silly when its not expected - or in a mix, a transition from a deep record into something light-footed which you would never have thought to try yourself, but makes perfect sense

Its like going for a walk in a deciduous forest, and enjoying a genial atmosphere with a bucolic vibe and then turning a corner and well will you look at that funny little cabin, how on earth did that get there! its not serious at all, far from it, but it has added to the experience and hats off to whoever put it there, great job!

(im not talking about any of the records on this thread. they are more like receiving bad news in the post)

i do like that rita ora song, though it's probably about as corny as it is catchy. it does feel a bit machine-produced in a daytime-tv pixie lottish way, but also it's like someone has snuck back in after-hours to add lots of extra little features to the generic build: that momentary catch in the chorus that i think cad commented on, the guitar player that sounds like they were supposed to be at the steve malkmus session next door instead, murakami's wind-up bird putting in an appearance on the verses, even the objectively terrible 'whoops!' all over the place... i like all these things i think

^lol xp

DC, you're wrong, and you join a significant majority of those posting in this thread who are also wrong. Shamir and Hey QT are both fucking around in the service of fun. You are not required to join in.

I could argue that there's far more cynicism in writing a safe, radio-friendly hit guaranteed to boost label revenues and score millions of Youtube hits, but this thread would just turn ugly, so I won't.

NickB got Hey QT right upthread - it's a catchy, slyly-composed displacement of the pop sound into an expressly artificial realm - kettles serenading staplers or whatever - but also an intensification of certain aspects of that sound. If this comes off as overly academic, or cynical, or dead-eyed, then you're just not engaging, and good luck to you.

Barbie Girl is a classic, obv. Going To Ibiza is moronic horseshit with no kitsch value at all. Loads of k-pop is great. Marina & The Diamonds won't make this poll because her music is too ambiguous. Everyone who likes Hey QT likes pop, myself included. There is little accounting for taste, unless we all analyse our formative (y)ears. Leave PC Music alone!

of course the surprise can only be part of it, it can only surprise us the first time, but we remember the surprise, and then later on well you know that cabin is still there, but when you go on the walk it doesnt matter, you turn the corner and look, theres that cabin again! and this particular walk, how did it ever not have a cabin there, its so obvious now that there needs to be a cabin, and the surprise is now an old friend not an irritating show off, because it was judge just right, so another element of playfulness has to be restraint. dont build a funfair, just build a funny little cabin and tuck it away somewhere

How is "Hey QT" catchy, sly-composed or a displacement of the pop sound into an expressly artificial realm or indeed an intensification of certain aspects of any sound in a world where happy hardcore exists?

I mean, go ahead and like it, but why make grand claims for it which are patently hollow?

I like the use of the word 'composed' here, I feel reassured that this music is indeed in the lineage of Beethoven, Brahms and Xenakis.

My main gripe with 'Hey QT' is that I just don't think it's a very good pop song - it's got one hook, and it's an incredibly annoying one. The conceptual element to PC Music doesn't really bother me but it isn't particularly interesting either.

None of mine have placed yet although I did vote for different Terje & Katy B tracks. Not expecting any of my non-hive mind tracks to make it. Was hoping Vesuvio Solo or Roisin Murphy might have sneaked in.

Also voted for Style for what it's worth.

I think yesterday's results were good on the whole though - I voted for Javiera Mena and the False Indie stuff in the 50s. The D'Angelo and Aphex tracks are good too but they definitely feel like part of their respective albums rather than great standalone songs.

Best discoveries of the countdown so far: Ninos du Brasil and Holly Herndon.

"On the Regular" = clearly made for maximum tumblr impact. Shamir's a talented kid with much better songs imo - voted for "If it wasn't true" myself, and I loved "I know it's a good thing" even before I knew the 30-something female vocalist I was hearing was in fact a gay teenager from Vegas. He has a lovely countertenor and is best as a male diva house vocalist than he is as a second rate Azealia. Don't really know what he has to do with Hey QT though, totally different approaches to pop.

Anyway, really not feeling this list much at all - most of these I had heard before but didn't vote for. Of the ones I hadn't, my favourites so far are Ninos Du Brasil and Shakira. The Rita Ora track is surprisingly not bad but wouldn't know it was her if no one told me - she has pretty much no personality at all as a performer. No idea what an Alvvays is, but couldn't get past the first minute of it. Vaguely wondering whether Twigs' video for "Pendulum" was a secret FU to all the twilight fans who wanted RPattz to play the lead in 50 shades.

To flip it around: why did, say, the poptimist crew fall so hard for Scooter's "The Logical Song"?

And I suspect part of it is that it achieves many of the things that imago claims for "Hey QT" without explicitly making those claims for itself, so the realisation - this this is a really fucking strange, intense, transportive record - strikes you as if from out of leftfield, an unlooked for gift, what Frank Kogan would call a "free lunch".

Whereas "Hey QT" feels like the opposite, the embodiment of enthusiasm gap: I find myself looking for that objet petit a which imago et al seem to discern and just getting frustrated that it doesn't emerge, like it's a picture that looks like a magic eye picture and presents itself as a magic eye picture but turns out not to be one.

Minipops was ranking fairly high in DJ charts throughout the last few months of the year, I'm kind of curious as to the extent to which it appeared on actual dancefloors (and how it went down).

Hey QT isn't gonna get anyone into PC Music who wasn't already tbh. It got votes bcs it would e felt weird to not have PCM represented this year and it was arguably the most visible song to emerge from their stables.

Wish people would have voted for a good example then: at least I can see what is both interesting and fun about, say, "Bipp".

Well, I voted for 2 GFOTY tunes higher in my ballot *shrug emoji*

Hey QT just got me looking up platnum and old bassline pop hits.

Saer in this thread you remind me of one of those celebs who goes into I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here or Big Brother or whatever and everyone's like "oh no not them!" But then over the course of the series their character comes out and they end up winning the whole thing.

^lol otm

Trying just to lurk and enjoy this thread, but christ, enough with the "Other people like this because _______, therefore it's bad" - hugely reductive, very patronising. You don't like it, say why, that's enough, fucks sake.

Apparently I had no idea what Shakira sounded like although surely I must have heard bits of her World Cup song multiple times, still I opened 'Empire' in another tab while reading this thread and figured the first 15 seconds was some kind of advert for a new Alanis Morissette album or something until it went on for too long and I clicked back over. Really liked it.

As much I loved Katy's early UK funky singles and her first album I found it impossible to care about anything she did this year.

― The Reverend, Tuesday, January 20, 2015 8:56 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Same here.

Starting to wonder if Los Awesome or Collard Greens is going to place.

― xelab, Tuesday, January 20, 2015 9:54 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Gave some unweighted points to Los Awesome.

Cabin in the woods image may be saer's best work yet

I can't imagine how anyone could've avoided Shakira altogether? You've never heard "Hips Don't Lie"? Or "Whenever, Wherever"?

xpost

LJ what do you think of hot fruit? http://youtu.be/9HAEqvP_Cgw can we talk about this video (Hot Fruit's "Falling off the Grid")

Waaaaaaaaaah sooooo great

Shit, I forgot about Hot Fruit. Wonder what they're up to these days?

Didn't they place that year?

63

Still going, the last thing I saw was a spacey Italo disco type live jsm, pretty fun.