ILM's Top 77 Tracks of 2014

also i heard "seasons" playing in the restaurant i went to tonight O_o

Tracks that got a single #1 vote and nothing else:

Affie Yusuf - Rinse & Dry
CAZZETTE - Sleepless
Girl Talk & Freeway ft. Jadakiss - I Can Hear Sweat
Hannah Diamond - Attachment
Isaiah Rashad - Heavenly Father
Jessica Pratt - Back, Baby
Lee Ann Womack - Send It On Down
Mariah Carey - Meteorite
Róisín Murphy - Ancora Ancora Ancora (Severino & Nico De Ceglia Remix)
Samantha Jade - Sweet Talk
TV On The Radio - Careful You
The Nels Cline Singers - Companion Piece
Yhdentekevää - Pyhä Lehmä Anthem

― seandalai, Thursday, January 22, 2015 1:33 PM (10 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i love these two

forks please add the correct that's not me to the spotify.

Just noticed that Serebro got 5 votes and Dasha Charusha got 3!

<3 <3 <3 <3

To answer my own question, no one voted for all hands on deck. Actually thought that was the next best song on the tinashe album but what do i know

Also can I just say that 'get money like an invoice' has got to be one of the dreariest similes I've heard, it's like being at work or something. Did one of the payments clerks write that line?

fantastic tracks, rollout (aside from time zones) and beef ITT - many thanks to sean and gr80

Missed the top ten yeasterday, just caught up.

thx gr8080 and seandalai for the tabulations, graphics, and rollout.

*yesterday*

Thanks Sean and gr80 - as always loved the countdown. Faves were most of the Rap singles. Not as much as R&B (well almost nothing) but the no1 made up that. Elsewhere I like Herndon, Tchelete, Jessie Ware unexpectedly clicked, Somos Sur and a few others.

Never that keen on the rock & avant-garde ish stuff that places here - but it has never been the place for the latter and I hope we can keep the novelty away next year.

Sorry not much R&B placed..

Oh and re: grime. Whoever said London ilx was dead better think again :-)

It strikes me that 'indie music' (however we're meant to define it) is pretty much not a thing any more as far as the ILM hivemind is concerned. Sure we had Future Islands and in the lower regions things like Alvvays, but these are outliers now, much in the same way as metal and avant-garde crossover acts like Deafheaven, Scott Walker and Richard Dawson have made token appearances in polls. Is this indicative of ILM's current tastes and values, or is it a reflection of music as a whole? It strikes me that the only traditional rock band I've heard and been excited about in the last twelve months were Ought.

Echoing thanks to poll runners and to gr80 for the beautiful images (and animated at the end!! kudos)

Some comments on the tracks to follow, probably on Sunday when the rest of you have all moved on :/

xp ^ i know, i know, Tracks poll and everything, but maybe my memory is filling in blanks in that I can't help feeling previous polls were ever so slightly more diverse. I made a 2 and a half hour playlist of things that had passed me by on the tracks poll last night and there was a noticeable and significant amount of slow-tempo 808 rap jams and female-fronted pop-dance songs on there.

Now I like these two styles a lot, there's a wealth of great stuff out there and I always enjoy discovering new hip-hop and dance-pop through the tracks poll (since I don't really follow these styles enough the rest of the year). These are really enduring styles of music that ILM loves, and I appreciate that, but I wonder if I'm validated in feeling things are starting to ossify a little in terms of diversity? Has a consensus now been reached that these are the dominant genres and that everything else is deemed as ephemera or an exception?

One of the reasons I have continued to post on and follow ILM these last... what was it 15 years(?!) - is because there are no specialisms and that all styles are embraced and accepted (the odd genre war notwithstanding).

Could my gripes all be down to a lot of non-pop posters not voting in the tracks poll, or is this the future for ILM?

All this said, I loved the poll and very much appreciate the countdown, the UK friendly starts and especially the top-n

..otch graphics

Nope, you're wrong, only 808 rap jams and female fronted synthpop acceptable from here on.

dang

i realise my posts read as if i'm pining for more indie music in the poll - just want to say that's not true, but i was hoping for just a little more diversity.

It strikes me that 'indie music' (however we're meant to define it) is pretty much not a thing any more as far as the ILM hivemind is concerned

have a hunch that the album poll will put paid to this belief to some extent. would expect to see war on drugs, st. vincent, sun kil moon, swans, angel olsen, owen pallett and maybe future islands all place, plus whatever else i have repressed

against me!, sleaford mods, warpaint?

yeah, no doubt. the albums poll is always a bit more alt-friendly.

I don't know, I think 6 of mine made it and that's pretty good for me & ilx, so I'm feeling relatively good about the whole endeavour. Weird that there was no actual rock music in the whole poll, though (if people are going to claim Haim as indie (which they obviously aren't, but whatever) then they can't count as rock, so ner).

The main thing I'm taking away is that I should spend more time on the Afropop/Afrobeats style threads, as that's where my favourite "never heard of this before" discoveries came from.

tune yards & ariel pink too, you get the picture xps

Oh wait, Against Me! totally count as proper rock music, how did they fall out of my brain?

The main thing I'm taking away is that I should spend more time on the Afropop/Afrobeats style threads, as that's where my favourite "never heard of this before" discoveries came from.

― emil.y, Friday, January 23, 2015 12:16 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

likewise

now you lot have me worrying the albums poll will be some sort of Pitchfork redux. i'm very difficult to please

Dog latin I hope that is the future of ilm.
As for metal, they have their own poll so it should not be in this poll anyway.
Maybe there should be an avant or indie eoy poll

Great idea. And let's have a separate rap poll, too. Maybe it should be invite-only?

lol

i still wanna do a music video poll one year, even if we kept is simple, 10 vote ballot, top 20 rollout.

my video noms: theo parrish 'footwork', any of the gazelle twin ones

808 rap jams and female fronted synthpop had rolling threads devoted to them which established consensus picks before the poll. Other genres are well represented in the lower placings, but suffered from vote splitting.

So. Album rollout starts on Monday?

it never occurred to me that gazelle twin has videos. i must watch these.

808 rap jams and female fronted synthpop had rolling threads devoted to them which established consensus picks before the poll. Other genres are well represented in the lower placings, but suffered from vote splitting.

― excreting zeitgeist (Sanpaku), Friday, January 23, 2015 12:45 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

rolling threads are such a necessary evil. i can't stand them, personally.

maybe one day i'll get used to listening to music primarily through spotify/youtube and that will all change though.

it never occurred to me that gazelle twin has videos. i must watch these.

oh man, they are the best - great no budget art horror vibe

it took FIVE votes to get into the 77 in the most open year in memory, let us not pretend this is a case of poor little ~avant genres getting squashed by pop monoliths. it's sad when your personal faves don't make it but if they couldn't muster up 4-5 other voters you can't complain.

it's been noted for a while that this has been an unusually great year for rap singles (and, actually, an unusually poor one for rap albums, so i doubt the album list will be as rap-heavy)

gazelle twin's videos are pretty crucial to her latest album imo

shit man. i really need to find a way to watch youtubes on my phone so they continue playing if i close the window. don't love watching youtube vids generally because a: adverts b: get a bit bored just staring at my computer screen? c: never worked out how to enqueue multiple songs or create playlists.

Ninos Du Brasil, Ana Tijoux and Vic Mensa all excellent new finds from this poll, thank you all very much.

You don't look at the screen when there is a youtube, you look out the window across the meadow

one thing i appreciated about these results contra last year's is the number of odd one-offs that weren't from consensus albums. lots of voting for tracks as tracks-in-isolation rather than just album highlights, and actually very few "are all the deep cuts off this album seriously going to place" moments

multiple artist showings

taylor swift x 4 - she's a special case and you will deal, and three of those were big singles anyway
nicki minaj x 3 - two of those were not on the album (which i doubt will place)
young thug, rae sremmurd, röyksopp & robyn x 2 - none of these acts released an album in 2014

which leaves fka twigs, owen pallett, d'angelo, against me!, jessie ware and caribou (all x 2) - i'd guess all their albums will place but it's a pretty good ratio

nickis album wasn't even nominated

a: adverts b: get a bit bored just staring at my computer screen? c: never worked out how to enqueue multiple songs or create playlists.

a: adblock
b: wtf why are you looking at the screen unless it's an actual video clip
c: even i know how to make youtube playlists, it's easy

As I say, I don't feel like it was a particularly poor year for weird stuff getting in. My comment about rock was more meant as a "demographics of ilx" musing, not really a complaint. But this place has always been poppy, it's not that unexpected.

Also I feel weird saying 'poppy' when actually it is mostly hip-hop/r&b/dance, and a lot of the placers weren't nec. in the charts over here.

one thing i appreciated about these results contra last year's is the number of odd one-offs that weren't from consensus albums. lots of voting for tracks as tracks-in-isolation rather than just album highlights, and actually very few "are all the deep cuts off this album seriously going to place" moments

multiple artist showings

taylor swift x 4 - she's a special case and you will deal, and three of those were big singles anyway
nicki minaj x 3 - two of those were not on the album (which i doubt will place)
young thug, rae sremmurd, röyksopp & robyn x 2 - none of these acts released an album in 2014

which leaves fka twigs, owen pallett, d'angelo, against me!, jessie ware and caribou (all x 2) - i'd guess all their albums will place but it's a pretty good ratio

― lex pretend, Friday, January 23, 2015 8:00 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah this was nice. 7 albums placing multiple tracks (when most of them weren't chart hits and were generally heard by people in context of the albums) is still way too many though.

b: wtf why are you looking at the screen unless it's an actual video clip

Heh, no what I mean is I feel a bit strange just passively watching video after video while sat in my office chair in my room. My listening habits tend to involve me doing stuff at the same time, like reading or writing or exercising or walking somewhere. Might be a different story if I could access YouTube through my TV but I'm one of those annoying 'I don't even watch TV' types too, so it rarely occurs to me to watch videos. Guess it's a habit I need to try.

royksopp & robyn EP got nominated and will probably place