ILM's Top 77 Tracks of 2014

xxxp naw RT would've mumbled some nonsense about corporation$ by now

oh man, this Ana Tijoux track is amazing! I need more stuff like this.

Really excited to see Tkay show up (and someone put her at #1 meaning they like her more than me!) - having seen her live recently I can confirm that she has many more bangers in the vault. She's more or less an underground star here now and it's only a matter of time before she gets some international recognition. Her 30min Switch Tape mix is def worth a listen.

Tkay, D'Angelo, Kira, Shift K3y for me today which makes 10/25 so far - and I adore "Shower" and am embarrassed I forgot to vote for it. Glad to see a few things I don't know show up today. Perplexed by "Monument" placing which is imo deathly dull and interminable.

Boom Clap I like I guess but it is definitely Charli phoning things in to an extent, there are much more interesting things on the album

i thought this was the charli xcx single that even charli xcx stans didn't like but i guess paying lip service to ~hits is a thing. it's sort of leaden to me. i don't get stanning for someone who is all potential and no actual uncomplicated easy greatness, her album isn't ever bad but the tryhardness shouldn't show as much as it does

i saw her on SNL and it was a little embarrassing :/

i thought this was the charli xcx single that even charli xcx stans didn't like

for me it was a tremendous grower, especially when it was suddenly everywhere

i've only listened to the charli album 1x but found it p thrilling

It's among my favorites on the album, even though it was around quite a while before it. Like it more even now than I originally did, but didn't vote for it.

"danny glover" - i don't even like the nicki remix of this, is how much i dislike the song. i remembered it as being an autotune warble but people are right, it's not, his voice just sounds like that, which might make it even worse...his singing voice is so nails-down-blackboard quavery

― lex pretend, Wednesday, January 21, 2015 4:59 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark

DRIPPING DOWN HIS DICK THIS PUSSY'S TOO VICIOUS

Well that was perversely enjoyable if surprisingly draining, tomorrow is the last one?

u'd think a board full of charlie xcx fans would place her a little higher

Top 20, yeah.

time to start talking about qt again

time to start talking about qt again

― emo canon in twee major (BradNelson), Wednesday, January 21, 2015 4:07 PM (6 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Brad are you a sadist

haha no way is saer raccoon tanuki

contenderizer, why does modern country's sound repel you? How is it more repellent than, say, Billy Sherill's George Jones productions or Loretta Lynn's early seventies stuff? And if you listen to eighties country productions it's often no different sonically than Atlantic Starr. Because the revulsion keeps coming up -- offboard too -- I'm wondering why gloss is a burden with country like it isn't with pop.

(Not attacking. I'm genuinely curious!)

wish i'd heard this javiera mena track in the summer.

Don't think it was around then. LP came out in October.

― Johnny Fever,

It leaked in the summer. Jukebox got it.

haha no way is saer raccoon tanuki

― The Reverend, Wednesday, January 21, 2015 5:10 PM (57 seconds ago) Bookmark

Nah saer is like deep tech house tech no bobbins

haha no way is saer raccoon tanuki

― The Reverend, Wednesday, January 21, 2015 4:10 PM (58 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

nah i just meant cos charli xcx came up! the xps came so fast...

Top 20 predix

2 On
No Flex Zone
Lifestyle
Seasons
Two Weeks
No Type
Can't Do Without You
La Joya
Style
Blank Space
Really Love
Move That Dope
Queen
Turn Down For What
Emotions
Hot N*gga
Down On My Luck
Love Me Harder
something from bobbins
something by run the jewels / vince staples (?) i dunno. stuck for this last one.

much better song than the apalling break the rules

How is it more repellent than, say, Billy Sherill's George Jones productions or Loretta Lynn's early seventies stuff?

I'll take this: Modern country/bro country/post-Shania/Mutt country sounds like the residue of late 80s-thru-mid 90s rock and pop radio. It should. It's mostly the same musicians and a lot of the same songwriters, all of which moved to Nashville when the labels started waving cash in the air. If you liked all that stuff then, it's no surprise you still like it now.

"Otra Era" the song was only around for a few weeks before album release but "La Joya" came out in like May or something iirc

for me it was a tremendous grower, especially when it was suddenly everywhere

― emo canon in twee major (BradNelson), Wednesday, January 21, 2015 10:02 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This. Somehow the whole movie tie-in thing made me like it more, like Madonna's "Crazy For You" or something.

I predict a "Mr. Noah" showing

how many people voted in tracks? I think it was said 147 overall?

The weirdest part is that stuff which actually SOUNDS LIKE country music, at least in part (but some cases in whole), has been ghettoized into a sort of dissmissive "alt country" label.

but 'Quarterback' doesn't sound like "Bottoms Up" or "Drunk on a Plane." This implies that there's one Nashville Sound.

131 tracks ballots. 147 ballots cast in total. Some both, some only tracks, some only albums.

The weirdest part is that stuff which actually SOUNDS LIKE country music, at least in part (but some cases in whole), has been ghettoized into a sort of dissmissive "alt country" label.

which acts? A lot of this alt country stuff was boring as hell in the early nineties too. For me country like pop needs a little schlock: that tightrope walk where the performance and song could collapse into kitsch at any moment.

tbh i will laugh really hard if nothing by ariana grande places

"boom clap" is what passes for catchy nowadays, pretty sad

- dad

but 'Quarterback' doesn't sound like "Bottoms Up" or "Drunk on a Plane." This implies that there's one Nashville Sound.

That's another thing. The girls all sound one way and the guys all sound another. It's gross.

anyway today was really great! looking forward to the rest plus all yr hot takes

I really love Boom Clap but there's at least five songs on the album I love more including my number one. Don't see it placing at this point.

very taken aback by the comments suggesting "quarterback" is sonically indivisible from the rest of pop country bc imo it sounds really, really individual, but i guess that's bc i listen to a lot of it

For me country like pop needs a little schlock: that tightrope walk where the performance and song could collapse into kitsch at any moment.

otm

Miranda Lambert and Kira Isabella's rockier moments on her album are in the Eric Church/Brad Paisley, er, wheelhouse.

Country still gets these IS IT REAL MAAAAN dismissals, as if music -- any music -- wasn't about funny hats and role playing and growling and riffs.

alfred it's okay for people to hate shit music

modern country production is so unobjectionable to me, it's just not the point and in the country i love it does a great job of not being the point. cannot even tell what's meant to be offensive about something that's hardly front and centre

btw "Quarterback" made my P&J list, although initially I had problems with Isabella's vocal inadequacies. Then I let them help the song: it made what she described more poignant because it could happen to any girl of modest talents.

monotony: What is "Emotions"? Also I expect a couple songs I voted for not on your list.

communicating harrowing and resonant things through gloss= subtlety and artistry imo

xp it's the katy b song everyone was stanning for when her album came out. maybe i'm overestimating its popularity but ppl seemed to be way more into it than "crying for no reason" which placed

I'd add Rather Be to the last of predictions Monotony. Think it's going to be very high.

communicating harrowing and resonant things through gloss= subtlety and artistry imo

― emo canon in twee major (BradNelson)

the Scritti Politti Dictum

Move That Dope

listening to this in 2015 kinda revealing that it is actually the longest song ever made

it's always surprising to me when people still think saying one song in particular out of a genre they pay no attention to sounds just like the rest of the genre they pay no attention to is a worthwhile opinion to state out loud (re: reactions to quarterback.)

great run today