ILM's Top 77 Tracks of 2014

2000.

2000:

I Confess : What sucks most about your musical tastes and attitudes ?

Ahh, so the poll would cover 2000-2014 then.

that was not actually started in 2000 - that was due to a glitch that changed the date of posts

also lol @ me

oh guys i should mention trick daddy has a new butt eating club he's been promoting
hope that helps

xp that's a shame, i liked believing "too many white people" was the inaugural ilm post

ILM was started in August 2000.

i mean i wish i could claim FIRST RESPONSE HALL OF FAME but i didn't start posting till 2002 xp

also i hate myself

I remember being linked to an ilm post in October 2000 i think. It was a friend who was just back to uni which makes me think october. All I remember it was by that fellow from allmusic (Ned)

who made the ilm thread not who linked me here

realising that by now I'm old ILX is weird

First ILM threads iirc:
Indie Rock: What's Going On?
Songs About Quitting Your Job?

More stats geekery. Previous placements:

FKA Twigs (1): Water Me (#49, 2013)

Taylor Swift (7): You Belong With Me (#1, 2009); Love Story (#21, 2009); I Knew You Were Trouble (#19, 2012); We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together (#29, 2012); Back to December (#47, 2010); Mine (#60, 2010); Mean (#73, 2010)

Future (2): Turn on the Lights (#10, 2012); Same Damn Time (#69, 2012)

Caribou (3): Melody Day (#18, 2007); Sun (#36, 2010), Odessa (#44, 2010)

Charli XCX (1): Superlove (#44, 2013)

T.I. (4): Rubberband Man (#37, 2004) What You Know (#2, 2006); Live Your Life (#22, 2008); No Matter What (#41, 2008)

Jessie Ware (4): 110% (#24, 2012); Wildest Moments (#55, 2012); Running (#56, 2012); Imagine It Was Us (#6, 2013)

Röyksopp & Robyn (1): The Girl and the Robot (#50, 2009)

Guru (1): Lapaz Toyota (#64, 2012)

Javiera Mena (3): Hasta la Verdad (#63, 2010); Luz de Piedra de Luna (#73, 2012); Espada (#55, 2013)

Katy B (4): Katy on a Mission (#38, 2010); Broken Record (#26, 2011); Easy Please Me (#47, 2011); Aaliyah (#4, 2012)

Todd Terje (3): Snooze 4 Love (#5, 2011); Inspector Norse (#1 2012); Strandbar (#14, 2013)

Katy Perry (2): Hot N Cold (#45, 2008); Teenage Dream (#16, 2010)

Spoon (3): I Turn My Camera On (#34, 2005); You Got Yr Cherry Bomb (#22, 2007); The Underdog (#36, 2007)

Migos (1): Versace (#39, 2012)

Haim (5): Don't Save Me (#47, 2012); Forever (#59, 2012); Falling (#10, 2013); The Wire (#26, 2013); Days Are Gone (#75, 2013)

Nicki Minaj (5): Roman's Revenge (#57, 2010); Super Bass (#3, 2011); Stupid Hoe (#42, 2012); Starships (#67, 2012); Beez in the Trap (#67, 2012)

Duke Dumont (1): Need U (100%) (#7, 2013)

St. Vincent (1): Surgeon (#61, 2011)

Shakira (1): She Wolf (#8, 2009)

Usher (2): Yeah! (#4, 2004); Climax (#5, 2012)

King (1): In the Meantime (#35, 2013)

Tune-Yards (1): Bizness (#74, 2011)

nice!

I can't believe California Gurls didn't make the cut!

an indie rock record i really loved from last year was lose by cymbals eat guitars

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.

OTM here too. Afaict, "Blank Space" and "Rather Be" were the only songs in the top 10 that went top 40 in Canada. I hear pop radio all the time and work with kids part-time and have never heard of most of these things.

yes, they are good!

xp re: Cymbals Eat Guitars

it's just that the 'indie' music that tends to place in these things is usually pretty boring, safe stuff that seems to be placing for no reason other than the fact that lots of other magazines have put it on their eoy lists -- it's hard to even locate where the enthusiasm for it on ilm is even coming from. like that war on drugs song had virtually no one explaining why they actually liked it when it showed up.

― dyl, Friday, January 23, 2015 10:44 AM (57 seconds ago)

Anyone could easily say it's just that the 'pop' music that tends to place in these things is usually pretty boring, safe stuff that seems to be placing for no reason other than the fact that lots of other magazines have put it on their covers' and what not. It would be wrong, obviously. Just as it is wrong for The War on Drugs. It's fine to dislike music, but making assumptions why some users like this and that, for any genre, it's NAGL.

― Van Horn Street, Friday, January 23, 2015 11:19 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

while i should def retract the quoted part i said earlier since it's oversimplified and arrogant to assume that is the main determinant of ppl's enjoyment of that music, i don't think your comparison is completely valid either. for the most part the biggest, most media-saturating mainstream pop music DOESN'T place or even come close to it here -- we have minor successes by relative no-names like becky g doing far better than "all about that bass" and "happy". occasionally it all lines up and we have the whole forum stanning for "call me maybe" but more often we end up snubbing the biggest hits like e.g. "rolling in the deep" and "thrift shop". meanwhile the most hyped mainstream indie songs (#1 placers on p4k, p&j etc.) are nearly without exception guaranteed a placement here even when it remains an utter mystery who here is actually voting for it.

(somewhat rambly/not-totally-related tangent: i know some ppl would be tempted to surmise that the reason for the difference is that the pop charts are all about the hype-cycle whereas the tastemakers mags/sites aren't, but i don't buy that at all, especially in recent years. lead singles from anticipated albums (usually coming out of labels w/ a strong reputation) are almost guaranteed to be named best new music on p4k immediately upon premiering [the hottest take possible], and well over 90% of songs named best new music end up on their year-end list -- evidently their increasingly non-trivial role in constructing the year-end 'canon' is far from independent of the same sorts of machinations that drive the pop charts, the only difference arguably being that the hype is egged on by different, smaller but usually still famous record labels. this is why i like seeing that e.g. "monument" from the royksopp/robyn project did far better here than the immediately-lauded but kinda boring "do it again" [which was ofc the consensus pick come year-end at p4k and p&j, whereas "monument" was barely acknowledged]. but it'd be even nicer if the biggest winners in p4k/rockcritland didn't automatically have a place reserved for them in our poll, the same way we don't reserve places for the biggest mainstream pop music just b/c we're comparatively enthusiastic about mainstream pop.)

Dyl so otm. The biggest pop hits of this year were mostly resoundingly rejected. Pop can have struggle artists and weird esoterica too yknow.

Also the point about whoever voted for the shit indie not defending it. Almost every song had detractors, often within the same scare-quotes voting bloc. If you don't rep for what you love then yes it'll look like everyone's dragging it.

who made the ilm thread not who linked me here

this is a good thread idea

well i guess i articulated some of this in the actual war on drugs thread but there's a certain sonic footprint and feeling they tap into for me, which is very much dependent on maybe being the age i am and reared on mtv and midwest classic rock radio, but the dire straits thing that gets brought up, tunnel of love era bruce springsteen, boys of summer by don henley, and it doesn't necessarily sound like that stuff but certain sounds and textures they use evoke that for me, and bring up a lot of feelings of when i was experiencing music for the first time....also i think he in his own kind low-key way writes deceptively good hooks, i like his lead guitar playing, and the whole thing has an almost automated pull rhythmically, like it sounds like a live drummer trying to play like a drum machines, which gives it a slight motorik krautrock edge to the 1985 MOR radio feel that i mentioned above

which all is to say that it's definitely music for people who have pretty much absorbed and internalized the last 40 years of classic rock and canonical spin/rolling stone rock touchstones, but he seems to place it in a sonic context that feels distinctive to me

i also understand people that find it dull, it's definitely music that's skirting that edge at all times but i personally tend to find it hypnotic

there's also points on the record where they will extend it and sort of drift off into a diffuse jammy terroritory that is at odds w/the pro 80s FM rock singles vibe they have

I like boring stuff

like this thread?

is there a non-obvious way to view comments on the imgur gallery? nothing is showing up

yeah! xp

lol

have i got a band 4 u

See that's the kind of thing I appreciate reading m@tt and certainly gives me an insight to the song beyond tv amateur dramatics.

Thing is I'm pretty sure, like, t-swift got as many "ugh" comments as war or pugs or whomever, but there were ppl actively talking about their love for her songs too

goole try this http://imgur.com/gallery/PlPeG?desktop=1

still just 2 comments but it was at like 900 views last I looked (not showing me view count on my phone)

i can think of a poster who would hate a war on pugs
xp

thx gr8

lmao imgur culture is basically a subunit of reddit atp right?

iampsych101 4 points : 5 days ago reply
Its hard to take advice from a female perspective, when males are being slammed in the same articles (I'm a psych graduate)

btw

think we ought to introduce an annual WOD'n'Spoon award for the worst indie rock garbage in the poll- noted indie hater nickb making an uncharacteristic pun

no actually i was being deadly serious there! smash this whole thing indie rock thing, burn it down to the ground and stomp the ashes into the dirt

this was my number one btw: Esben & the Witch - No Dog

yeah if anything it's a more homogenized reddit i guess

vic mensa was a P4K BNM which probably goes a little to explaining its presence here.

updates from the field--yoga instructor's playlist today included the spoon song

Vic Mensa also had a half decent TSJ score (7.42).

A huge thank you to gr8080 for the rollout and the effort that went into the graphics. And also to everyone else that was involved in the poll. Looking through the results justifies the reason I enter this poll. It's surely the only place where Becky G, DeJ Loaf, Hodgson and and Kira Isabella can come within 7 places of each other.

As rob mentioned up thread, it is disappointing not to see any dancehall again this year, although, as we discussed on the thread, it was always extremely unlikely given the lack of contributors and consensus. The more disappointing was the lack of R&B which seems to have a bigger constituency and had a strong year in terms of quality. Although Miguel releasing his E.P. earlier would of surely increased the numbers.

P.S. I was the first place voter for Tinashe.

P.P.S. to Matt D.C.
Any prize would be greatly appreciated.

i didn't realize Vic Mensa's song charted all over Europe...never even really heard of it until the list. i just remember when he released a mixtape and what little i heard of it was not interesting at all so i kinda tuned him out.

for the most part the biggest, most media-saturating mainstream pop music DOESN'T place or even come close to it here -- we have minor successes by relative no-names like becky g doing far better than "all about that bass" and "happy". occasionally it all lines up and we have the whole forum stanning for "call me maybe" but more often we end up snubbing the biggest hits like e.g. "rolling in the deep" and "thrift shop". meanwhile the most hyped mainstream indie songs (#1 placers on p4k, p&j etc.) are nearly without exception guaranteed a placement here even when it remains an utter mystery who here is actually voting for it.

― dyl, Friday, January 23, 2015 1:47 PM (2 hours ago)

This is self-flattering to some degree. Pitchfork's #1 this year was "Seasons", which came it at #6 here, no big difference. "Tuesday" was their #2 and "Two Weeks" their #3. Along with those, the upper half of their list includes tracks from ILM favorites Tinashe, Young Thug, Nicki Minaj, Todd Terje, QT, Shamir, Future, Vic Mensa, Bobby Shmurda, Charli XCX, Aphex Twin and Taylor Swift. These may or may not be the biggest pop hits in the land, but they're all among the moment's consensus classics, tracks and artists that dedicated followers of pop culture & criticism have been steered toward throughout the year by a series of tubes. Caribou & War on Drugs tracks did come in much higher on the Pitchfork list than ours, but that hardly suggests that they're questionably sourced interlopers carrying an alien indie taint (yum). Overall, I see much more commonality between the ILM and Pitchfork lists than radical divergence, and that's hardly limited to card-carrying indie.

The Pitchfork list leans more indie, overall, no argument there. It includes fewer left-field choices, though it's not entirely devoid of interest. For instance, I'd have liked to see Swans and Grouper show up here, though I can't really complain as I didn't vote...

I never got why ilx didn't like rolling in the deep, great single

we did we just like 77 songs more

OTM here too. Afaict, "Blank Space" and "Rather Be" were the only songs in the top 10 that went top 40 in Canada. I hear pop radio all the time and work with kids part-time and have never heard of most of these things.

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Friday, January 23, 2015 1:40 PM Bookmark

"2 On", "No Flex Zone", and "Lifestyle" all reached the top 40 in the US.

My friend came round and we drank beer and danced around to all the hip hop tracks in this thread. I totally get No Flex Zone now.

to beer

it knows better

forks just sent me some more breaking news about Bobby Shmurda

http://nahadaily.com/celebrity-news/shmoney-dancing-with-nypd/