ILM's Top 77 Tracks of 2014

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.

*jam

Most of the people throwing around the "you don't really like pop" accusations don't really like actual pop music either, they like their carefully-constructed version of what they believe pop music to be and nothing else.

I still lack the cynicism to enjoy this with a straight face.

Not sure why you want to enjoy something with a straight face, tbh. I find enjoying things while smiling and laughing is much more pleasurable.

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

― Tuomas,

if there's anything we've learned in a decade, it's that there are people who don't listen to the radio for some reason.

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")

― 龜, Wednesday, January 21, 2015 12:02 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

reader, I voted for them

I dont even have a radio

i'm glad that hot fruit made a good jam

a happy ending all round imo

reader, I voted for them

― telling like hot takes (imago), Wednesday, January 21, 2015 7:18 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

Got it *closes book*

Most of the people throwing around the "you don't really like pop" accusations don't really like actual pop music either, they like their carefully-constructed version of what they believe pop music to be and nothing else.

who do you even mean apart from lex

Yes, you know what this thread really needs is me listing a bunch of people who I think are pretentious assholes. That'll help us all out. Great plan, Tim.

Not sure why you want to enjoy something with a straight face, tbh. I find enjoying things while smiling and laughing is much more pleasurable.

― emil.y, Wednesday, January 21, 2015 12:16 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^^^righteous

as to the first part of emil.y's post, I could be coaxed into joining the rumble ;)

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

― Tuomas,

if there's anything we've learned in a decade, it's that there are people who don't listen to the radio for some reason.

I havent' really listened to radio since the 90s, and I still managed to hear those tunes all the time! They were pretty ubiquitous: you could hear them on the telly, or the DJ would play them at a club, or some friend would play them at a house party, or someone would link to the parody video of "Hips Don't Lie" on Youtube, etc.

Not sure we'll get a Hot Fruit this year but anyone who liked them might be interested in Ravioli Me Away, who have a similar DIY art-pop ethos but with better songs. Catcall would be a good place to start.

Yes, you know what this thread really needs is me listing a bunch of people who I think are pretentious assholes. That'll help us all out. Great plan, Tim.

― emil.y, Wednesday, January 21, 2015 12:25 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

oh so this is you being diplomatic, soz I misunderstood, carry on.

Ravioli Me Away were quite cute when we listened thru the nominations :)

How can you say that when Hey QT has placed

'Cat Call' was in my top 5 last year, the album is pretty high in my list this year (but I forget exactly where).

This year's Hot Fruitiest nomination was 15 year-old Norfolk schoolgirl duo Let's Eat Grandma - absolutely awesome & I voted for it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Ndv1XtiLrU

The Ravioli Me Away album was high in my ballot. They arramazing!

^ cosign ravioli me away - great album
hope it'll place
had similar thoughts for hookworms 2k13 and it was nowhere near

Bands and their names.

I think if you're below a certain age then it's understandable to have not knowingly heard Shakira, she's not really like a Beyonce or Rihanna who is always there in the media, neither does she have three or four hits a year, she tends to wax and wane in the popular consciousness until suddenly she has another global megahit and there hasn't really been one of those for about seven years now.

Not sure what you're taking away from Hot Fruit, lj, but that 15 year-old Norfolk schoolgirl duo don't particularly seem like avant-DIY queer feminists.

the aesthetic has clear similarities imo!

def going to check out Ravioli Me Away again, actually - pressed for time checking out every single nominated album meant too short shrift, altho they were definitely approved of

good morning everyone!!!!

MON/TUES RECAP:

GALLERY OF IMAGES 77-41

77 NICKI MINAJ "Lookin Ass"
76 OWEN PALLETT "Song for Five & Six”
75 TUNE-YARDS "Water Fountain"
74 NINOS DU BRASIL "Sombra da Lua"
73 KING "Mister Chameleon"
72 KATIE GATELY "Pivot"
71 ANA TIJOUX Ft. Shadia Mansour "Somos Sur"
70 USHER "Good Kisser"
69 NICKI MINAJ "Anaconda"
68 DAVIDO "Tchelete" Ft. Mafikizolo
67 RÖYKSOPP & ROBYN "Do It Again"
66 SHAKIRA "Empire"
65 ST. VINCENT "Prince Johnny"
64 DUKE DUMONT "I Got U" Ft. Jax Jones
63 CARIBOU "Silver"
62 AGAINST ME! "FUCKMYLIFE666"
61 HOLLY HERNDON "Chorus"

60 MARK RONSON "Uptown Funk" Ft Bruno Mars
59 JENNIFER LOPEZ "I Luh Ya Papi" Ft French Montana
58 AGAINST ME! "Transgender Dysphoria Blues"
57 NICKI MINAJ "Boss Ass Bitch" ft. PTAF
56 HAIM "If I Could Change Your Mind"
55 MIGOS "YRN" Ft. Young Thug
54 ALVVAYS "Archie, Marry Me"
53 SPOON "Inside Out"
52 D'ANGELO AND THE VANGUARD "Sugah Daddy"
51 FKA TWIGS "Pendulum"
50 QT "Hey QT"
49 KATY PERRY "Dark Horse" Ft. Juicy J
48 JESSIE WARE "Champagne Kisses"
47 ILOVEMAKONNEN "Club Going Up On A Tuesday"
46 RITA ORA "I Will Never Let You Down"
45 APHEX TWIN "Minipops 67 [120.2] (source field mix)"
44 TODD TERJE "Delorean Dynamite"
43 KATY B "Crying For No Reason"
42 SHAMIR "On The Regular"
41 JAVIERA MENA "Otra Era"

http://i.imgur.com/6CL6rrH.jpg

40 GURU "Pooley" [320 points, 8 votes, 3 first place votes]
http://youtu.be/7UPYjg6bQAU