**********Just the trax, ma'am: THE ILX 2007 POLL RESULTS, part 1**********

^this song sucks

'u + ur hand' came out like 3 months before and is infinitely better

Isn't Avril the punk chick supposed to hate girls like the video's protagonist? She's just a bully in the song and especially in the video, and the whole video is incredibly mean-spirited. I'm not familiar enough with Avril's work to cite specific examples from her earlier albums, but it certainly feels as if "Girlfriend Avril" is the girl the old Avril used to hate.

I swear I had just been thinking (after the Timberlake song), "Oh, good, maybe that Avril Lavigne song isn't going to make it after all."

one more for today:

23. Gui Boratto - Beautiful Life (90 points, 10 votes) (link)

http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/6764/727793xx7.jpg

If you ignore almost everything about it, "Girlfriend" is a fun song the first few times.

50. M.I.A. - Jimmy (58 points, 5 votes)
49. Aly & AJ - Potential Breakup Song (58 points, 5 votes, 1 number one vote)
48. Jens Lekman - The Opposite Of Hallelujah (61 points, 5 votes, 1 number one vote)
47. Los Campesinos! - You! Me! Dancing! (61 points, 7 votes)
46. Malcolm Middleton - We're All Going To Die (62 points, 5 votes
45. Björk - Earth Intruders (62 points, 6 votes)
44. Low - Murderer (64 points, 5 votes
43. Kanye West - Stronger (67 points, 5 votes)
42. Von Südenfed - The Rhinohead (68 points, 6 votes, 2 number ones, + 1 vote for Pilooski Remix)
41. Rich Boy - Throw Some D's (69 points, 5 votes)
40. Chromatics - Running Up That Hill (69 points, 6 votes)
39. M.I.A. - Boyz (69 points, 7 votes)
38. National - Fake Empire (69 points, 8 votes)
37. Feist - My Moon My Man (72 points, 5 votes + 2 for Boys Noize Remix)
36. Spoon - The Underdog (72 points, 6 votes, 1 number one vote)
35. Groove Armada - Song 4 Mutya (73 points, 7 votes)
34. Radiohead - Reckoner (74 points, 6 votes)
33. Lil' Mama - Lip Gloss (75 points, 6 votes)
32. White Stripes - Icky Thump (79 points, 8 votes)
31. Roisin Murphy - Overpowered (79 points, 10 votes)
30. LCD Soundsystem - Get Innocuous (82 points, 8 votes)
29. Britney Spears - Piece Of Me (83 points, 7 votes, 1 number votes)
28. Gwen Stefani Ft Akon - The Sweet Escape (84 points, 6 votes, 1 number one vote)
27. Radiohead - 15 Step (84 points, 8 votes)
26. Studio - Out There (87 points, 9 votes, 1 number votes
25. Justin Timberlake - What Goes Around... Comes Around (88 points, 8 votes)
24. Avril Lavigne - Girlfriend (90 points, 7 votes, 1 number votes)
23. Gui Boratto - Beautiful Life (90 points, 10 votes)

Eclectic.

I know nothing about Studio, but that cover is great, makes me want to listen to it.

It sounds as awesome as the cover looks.

5 votes for Aly & AJ and they come in just by a hair. I had it top 5 or 6, and I imagine the other 4 voters did too.

I'm glad this list isn't pretending that it was a good year for indie rock.

Average for Aly & AJ is 9 or 10.

A whole bunch of other songs that only got 5 votes placed higher.

2007 was the worst year in the history of popular music.

^might be otm

Oh fucking Jesus. Why do people unfailingly manage to think themselves clever by decrying the current or previous year as the worst year for music ever, especially when, by fact of reality, it's only possible to hear a tiny fraction of what's available or even tiny fraction of what is great?

the fuck?

a. i don't think billstevejim said that to be clever
b. he said popular music, which is by definition music that most people should have heard most if not all of
c. it's a good and fairly common argument to have

a, b, fine. C, NO IT IS NOT A GOOD ARGUMENT IT IS THE MOST BORRRRINGG ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ ARGUMENT THAT CAN BE HAD SOME HINDSIGHT WTF

It's a fairly common argument to have among people whose opinions I feel completely at ease to disregard, goddammit.

A side note, I'm interested in the wallpaper or whatever that JT's got on the cover of "What Goes Around"... the song I could take or leave, it's brilliantly headsticky but in a way that's SO insistent that, once you've had it stuck in your head once, you really truly want to never hear the song again for fear it will trigger that infinite loop of "goes around goes around goes around comes all the way back arouuunnd." It's also sort of retroactively destructive because I can't hear "Cry Me A River" without subconsciously expecting/wanting it to morph into WGACA. That's not a knock on either song, but it's the way it is.

xp: I mean, if you think having a "who's the most jaded" pissing contest is entertaining, umma do me, you do you.

why you so mad rev

damn dude

i don't think it's jaded to say that pop music this year wasn't as good as it's been in previous years

I think that's fine, but there's a difference between "not as good as it's been in previous years", and "worst year in the history of recorded music". Jaded people get in my craw, that's all.

ethan otm?

reverend is cool with me hes just kinda crotchety

-- and what, Wednesday, August 1, 2007 12:42 PM (6 months ago) Bookmark Link

It's for a good cause?

(haha for a second I thought the "ethan otm" was part of the quote, and was like "wth, you can't otm yrself!")

Conrad Flynn wrote a blurb for The Underdog which I carelessly forgot to append to the track post when it appeared, so here it is in all its glory:

36. Spoon - The Underdog (72 points, 6 votes, 1 number one vote) (link)

http://img521.imageshack.us/img521/9519/gagagagagafv7.jpg

The Underdog is the type of uplifting and delightful song Belle and Sebastian used to release all the time (and stick primarily on their EPs and b-sides) but stupidly stopped making around 2002 or so. It's like a camp-fire sing-a-long that almost becomes power-pop but at the last minute decided that that would be too aggressive and so exchanges loud guitars for acoustic strumming, maracas, and horns. Producer Jon Brion might have helped Spoon make that adjustment and a lot of bands would improve overnight if they did what Spoon has done here: stop with the non-stop indie posturing and focus more on just making a song that is pleasant to listen to above all else.
-Conrad Flynn

I'm happy Gui Boratto placed relatively highly. Such an obvious sound but it just WORKS.

22. Spoon - You Got Yr Cherry Bomb (91 points, 10 votes) (link)

http://img521.imageshack.us/img521/9519/gagagagagafv7.jpg

"You Got Yr Cherry Bomb" is compact, lean, economical -- that's what Spoon do. But there's a lot going on in this track. For starters,
there's one of Britt Daniel's most engaging melodies, marrying angular
verses with a more linear chorus (built, as it happens, on the tail
end of the verse). Compared to the minimalism elsewhere on _Ga Ga Ga
Ga Ga_, the arrangement is downright lavish: the rhythm section --
snare drum, piano and rhythm guitar -- is brightened by a tambourine
jangle and augmented by vibraphone and horn parts. It sounds like
Motown, in fact, which is fitting for this bittersweet song about
breaking up ("It was the longest day that I ever known / I watched you
start that drive alone") and moving on ("Life can be so fair / Let it
go on and on").
-Paul in Santa Cruz

-'what goes around' is awesome

-jon brion produced the new spoon??

Just The Underdog, I think.

21. Of Montreal - The Past Is A Grotesque Animal (93 points, 10
votes) (link)

http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/2341/o480487fp4za9.jpg

I can honestly say I don't get the love for that song. I think I read some end-of-year track list (Pitchfork, maybe?) that chose it, and I can't figure out why. There are some great songs on that album, but the 11 minute albatross in the middle puts me off listening to the whole thing.

i was actually just thinking i should have voted 'grotesque animal' way higher. i put it at like 19 or 20.

20. Timbaland feat. Keri Hilson - The Way I Are (93 points, 12 votes) (link)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7c/The%2Bway%2Bi%2Bare.jpg

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2183/2282654959_e7f6571a89_o.jpg

you ain't got 8 AmEx cards? wtf does that even mean? god I hate the nonsensical math on some of those rap graphs.

let's not go somewhere exotic SEVEN TIMES

sorry, six

my proposed webbie graph> all other graphs

19. Brave Kylie - 2 Hearts (& Studio Version) (96 points, 8 votes) (link and Studio Version)

http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/694/kylie2heartsaw2ly0.jpg

The publicity surrounding Kylie's illness and subsequent recovery
seemed to elevate her into some untouchable Everywoman of pop.
Claiming you don't like Kylie nowadays gets about the same reaction as
saying you like having sex with little baby kittens. Whilst listening
to The Wombats.

It seems to have given her an incredible confidence as a performer,
which is evident here. Her vocals swagger and though it starts slight
it builds into a stomping, cock-sure GETOUTOFMYWAY!! The obvious
glam-rock related comparisons are Goldfrapp and Rachel Stevens, and
Kylie offers a personality and warmth here that trumps either of those
interlopers.

That said, I may have voted for this erroneously - I thought it was
the single version. But, though that wasn't technically in the poll,
it damn well should have been. So it’s still okay. Yes. Really. A
shame people preferred wibbling X-factor finalists singing Celine
Dion-esque nonsense and she didn't get the number one she deserved.
-Hobart Paving

(Studio Version) If Balearic does prove to be the sound of 2008, the
stream of consistently great remixes the Scandinavian duo have been
putting out will go a long way towards cementing that position. This
is the finest of the lot though, Kylie's vocals freed from the
constraints of the lumpen original and allowed to float through a haze
of lovely intertwining acoustic guitar lines and lush electronic
flourishes. Plus points to Studio for having the audacity to use those
two most overused of pop remix devices, the ticking clock and beating
heart, at the same time.
-Matt DC

<3 studio but i wasn't that impressed by '2 hearts' remix. i thought it sounded like a mountain of one, and not in the greatest way.

I'm not sure what the distribution of votes was regarding the single edit versus the remix, especially since "studio version" is a particularly misleading name for a remix, so let's count it's place at #19 as a win for both.

18. Caribou - Melody Day (99 points, 9 votes) (link)

http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/5122/893861nl3.jpg

'The Past Is A Grotesque Animal' is amazing. Still. Every listen. I don't get the Spoon love though.

17. Panda Bear - Bro's (104 points, 12 votes) (link)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/cb/214_442.jpg

16. Pantha Du Prince - Saturn Strobe (110 points, 9 votes, 2 number one votes) (link)

http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/4297/o768903lh3qo1.jpg

15. LCD Soundsystem - North American Scum (114 points, 10 votes) (link)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/01/Northamericanscum.jpg

Re: Saturn Strobe - that was my number one, which I really didn't expect when I started putting my list together. I don't know *why* it works so well, possibly because the all the minimal house elements have been quietly slipped under the strings rather than one element grafted on top of the other, or because they seem to move together so well.

Also, that bit around 5:19 when that hissing noise pans right across = like seeing the bright white lights bathing the dancefloor at 5am for a few seconds to allow everyone to put their hands in the air. It's beautiful.