ILM's Top 77 Tracks of 2019

Agreed.

yeah, as aforementioned I went for the album but this was the clear apex to me. I'll be almost let down if either of the remaining noms tops it.

https://i.imgur.com/ezRcOnM.jpg
49: Clairo - “Bags” - 206 points - 8 votes - 1 number 1 vote
video
Clairo - Immunity

Pitchfork BNM:
https://pitchfork.com/reviews/tracks/clairo-bags/

““Bags,” Clairo’s strongest song to date, ups the ante significantly. She delivers oblique, stream-of-consciousness lyricism about a deteriorating relationship, singing in a characteristic deadpan that seems to contradict the emotional weight of lines like, “Pardon my emotions, I should probably keep it all to myself,” and, “Can you see me using everything to hold back?” But the instrumentals tell a different story; unlike the gauzy, synth-heavy wash that usually cocoons her vocals, “Bags” is sonic splatter paint. Clairo and Rostam’s production is a mishmash of choppy helicopter synth, chugging electric guitar, Danielle Haim’s drums, and keys that sound as if they’re being banged by a kindergartener. Though it sounds busy on paper, it’s executed beautifully, each twinkling element bringing new vibrancy to the mix. With the dewy turbulence of a monsoon rain, “Bags” marks a new kind of Clairo energy.” - Vrinda Jagota

Nice!

SAULT and more Purple Mountains! Not the ones I voted for though.

Good song imo.

*drums fingers*

― opden gnash (imago), Monday, 27 January 2020 17:32 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

This is nice! The little sad guitar line in the chorus is good. Must have missed this on the playlist. Misheard the lyrics as 'walking out the door with your parents', which gave a preferred mystery to the situation tbh.

https://i.imgur.com/ABVPYbr.jpg
48: Lana Del Rey - “Hope Is A Dangerous Thing For A Woman Like Me To Have - But I Have It” - 210 points - 6 votes
video
Lana Del Rey - Norman Fucking Rockwell (2019)

NPR:
https://www.npr.org/2019/12/11/778226694/the-5-best-songs-from-lana-del-reys-norman-f-rockwell

“In a world still overrun with male violence, a woman's survival sometimes depends upon her learning how to fashion weapons from materials other than brute force. Love can work, as can art, or ridicule (at some point on NFR!, Lana Del Rey tries any and all of these three) but the all-powerful quantity she conjures on NFR!'s closing track is hope. "I have it, yeah I have it," she warns in the waning moments of this unforgettable song, which by its end has become nothing short of an incantation: In just under six minutes, she has transformed optimism into something as sharp as a switchblade.” - Lindsay Zoladz

"nights that wont happen" is a quietly devastating one. i went for another PM track though (which hasnt appeared yet)

Woot! My #2!

Looking forward to lj's impromptu commentary.

This is the worst songtitle in the history of ILM EOY polls, and I don't like the song much better either

Such a great song. My favorite from the album.

beautiful, devastating song (went for the album tho)

i still don't really "get" ldr after all these years

Why did I click on the YT comments.

the way she says ''fucking'' is insane , it makes this word so beautiful

Every time I listen to LDR it goads the dormant authenticity stan in me (with apologies to Alfred).

good morning!

For an arrangement this spare I would want the melody at least to be doing something more unusual, but I don't hate it.

yep, still never made it through an entire LDR song

It would have been fine without the perpetual smugness that underpins her delivery.

xp

'suge' is good

'up all night' sounds like a levi's commercial

ldr's aesthetic is corny and on the nose

https://i.imgur.com/ZU8YiVF.jpg
47: Angel Olsen - “All Mirrors” - 210 points - 7 votes
video
Angel Olsen

The Singles Jukebox

“When Pazz & Jop’s top albums of 2014 list was announced, I decided to listen to the five highest-ranking albums by female soloists. I had already enjoyed Taylor Swift’s 1989 (#7), but I discovered artists that I came to love: St. Vincent (#4), FKA Twigs (#5), and Miranda Lambert (#12). The only album I wasn’t immediately taken with was Angel Olsen’s Burn Your Fire for No Wilderness (#8); I struggled to enjoy the barebones alternative stylings, especially when juxtaposed with the sonically rich production of the other four albums. When Olsen released “Intern,” where her tender vocals waded through layered synths, I felt a little ashamed of how much I preferred it to her previous album. (That guilt only intensified when My Woman largely didn’t sound anything like “Intern.”) Why did I prefer Olsen when she was submerged in goopy noise? Was I just incapable of appreciating artistry when it was presented without intricate crowding? “All Mirrors” features Olsen at her goopiest yet, save for maybe her Mark Ronson collaboration, and once again I’m conflicted about how much I utterly love the combination of Olsen and these overbearing backdrops. I can tell where people will find this bloated: That middle section, where the synths acquire an orchestral intensity reminiscent of Susanne Sundfør, doesn’t particularly mesh with the rest, as if Olsen ended her first verse, shrugged, and told producer John Congleton to just go ham. But I don’t care, because the song evokes something in me, regardless of how unearned all that swelling is, regardless of that awkward transition back to Olsen’s vocals, and even regardless of how the lyrics still don’t make sense to me. Maybe someday I’ll be able to properly take stock of these weaknesses, but for now I’ve fallen victim to Olsen’s goop.” - Joshua Lu

“Space opera outro music, in the best possible way. Warped vocal samples shoot around the track, breathing hard, sounding like ghosts warding you away from your basement, living underneath groaning violins and an unyielding bass line. Everything is pushing against something, but all the smoke in Angel’s voice keeps running into glass. Drily, she repeats, “at least at times it knew me.””  -Ashley Bardhan

Now that's more like it.

Just what I was going to say

This is awesome. I mean she's kind of borrowing from The Teardrop Explodes and Spiritualized but that isn't a bad thing

No it is not.

I suppose I'll understand her someday.

I voted for the album instead of any track btw

I considered voting for the album but the second half loses me all too often, albeit never completely.

find it impossible to listen to this ldr track without rolling my eyes

"I've been tearing around in my fucking nightgown / 24/7 sylvia plath" is a terrible lyric in a way that is really differently terrible from how her lyrics used to be

I figure either "hi Dad" gets you or nothing in it does

you're right

anyway looking forward to doing this routine one to three more times btwn the two polls

Is copy/paste allowed?

I can't resist the plaintiveness of its chorus melody, but, yes, she misreads "Sylvia Plath" as persona and Sylvia Plath the poet. I guess Plath deserved it for "Daddy" though.

https://i.imgur.com/uuHN9JD.jpg
46: Charlotte Adigéry - “Paténipat” - 210 points - 8 votes
video
Charlotte Adigéry (Adigery)

The Singles Jukebox

“Context is not everything, yet here it provides something: “Paténipat” refers to “zandoli pa té ni pat,” a Creole saying which translates to “the gecko didn’t have any legs,” which in Adigéry’s voice becomes a true mantra in sheer repetition. And the mantra is cryptic when taken literally, but in the music it becomes clear: by reverencing her tradition, Adigéry presents the possible and tangible future bond of house and a long lost dream of global pop.” -Danilo Bortoli

““Hypnotic” has been overused and abused in electronic music criticism, but Charlotte Adigéry’s chants truly sound like she’s trying to lull you into a trance. The harsh, spare beat gives her plenty of room to throw her voice(s) around the track, and her tongue-twisting incantations warp and sizzle like oil in a hot pan. The electric churn constantly threatens to overtake her, and near the end it looks like she’s finally been subsumed. But when the waves clear, she stands tall; taking her down won’t be that easy.” - Julian Axelrod

“Had an archivist claimed “Paténipat” was a marooned track from a 1982 mutant disco track, I wouldn’t have blinked. Armed with a kick drum and a stick-like-glue chant, Charlotte Adigéry creates a track that works as auto hypnosis.” -Alfred Soto

I can't resist the plaintiveness of its chorus melody, but, yes, she misreads "Sylvia Plath" as persona and Sylvia Plath the poet. I guess Plath deserved it for "Daddy" though.

― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, January 28, 2020 7:57 AM (twenty-four seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

also i genuinely hate when people add "fucking" into a line just so the meter works, and there's nothing going on in the song to distract me from that

TUNE

Also I quite like the LDR album but she is really bad at swearing convincingly.

Haha, I love that lyric because she's so willing to be that ridiculous and overwrought. There's a lot of humor in even her saddest songs.

As I said yesterday, the only track I don't love on an otherwise stellar EP. Has a nice rhythmic hook but forgets to have a TUNE imo. As I say, I'm otherwise completely in favour

Ch. Adigéry bis: aight, I need to hear the rest now.

i'm a huge hypocrite bc if all three nominated adigéry tracks place i'll be pretty happy

also god "all mirrors" is the best song ever

i would like to be directed to the levi's commercials that sound like "up all night"

oh this is the Charlotte Adigery song I know. Put this in a thousand DJ sets this year as it mixes with loads of stuff.

This was also my least favorite track on the EP but listening to it again yesterday I warmed up to it considerably. It’s still my least favorite but what a great EP.