ILM’s Top 77 Tracks of 2018

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The 2018 ILX Metal n' Heavy Rock Poll VOTING + CAMPAIGNING thread! Ballots due Saturday, Feb. 2nd!

\m/

hoping for 1 or 2 metal-adjacent things in this poll. let's seeeee

"in my dreams" is quite delicately framed

"the moments we are happiest are the moments that we don't exist"

which way are ppl taking this?

Good start to the countdown. I voted for a different Kali Uchis song, but In My Dreams is a lovely song. Certainly the best thing Damon was involved with this year.

i voted for 2 kpop tracks this year up from my usual 0 so you folks finally got me

http://i.imgur.com/viLzKw7.jpg

74 (Tie): Laura Jean – “Girls on the TV” – 164 points – 6 votes
video

http://www.thesinglesjukebox.com/?p=25856

A tale of dashed female friendship akin to Who Will Run the Frog Hospital or Cat’s Eye; what it loses in prose it gains in a kaleidoscopic, wistful arrangement. It fills its six minutes well; like memory itself, it alternates between immediate and almost photorealistic (that one deep synth around 0:30), then languid and ungraspable. – Katherine St Asaph

I’m unaccustomed to hearing such brusque, direct, and yet tender third-person storytelling in modern synth-pop. Jean’s memories of sitting in front of rage on a Saturday morning when young serve as an access point into an important story that deserved to be recounted. – William John

This checks off all the boxes of something I'd be predisposed to liking, but I never got much out of it. Huh.

lovely song

just a great opening run so far

wow way too low, i was hoping the TSJ high score might push this into like the top 20 as sometimes happens? my #2, just a perfect groove with an affecting narrative

i really recommend the album version which lets things groove out for another few minutes: https://youtu.be/G1egX_w_msM

Way close to my #1.

Another one that lost out in my final cull, such a beautiful track.

I've never heard of this. Do the TSJ-only quotes mean no one on ilm ever posted about it?

basically, or that commentary was limited to "i like this" more or less.
now's the opportunity to discuss!

(if i'm wrong, please post links!)

I liked the video a lot but the song just never stuck with me.

"the moments we are happiest are the moments that we don't exist"

which way are ppl taking this?

― ogmor, Monday, 28 January 2019 14:12 (eighteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

from user hazeviii on genius.com:

This could have two meanings:

When they are the happiest, they have reached a sort of euphoria that leads them to feel as though they don’t exist. More simply, when Kali/Damon are no longer conscious and obsessive over their lives and selves, they are the happiest.

The happiest moments are when Kali/Damon aren’t in them. Because they live such tragic lives and are exposed to such horrible events, they live in dreams where their physical selves don’t exist and could never exist in.

I can see how it could read as a wish for oblivion / death / end of relationship too.

is this entire list going to be governed by a shady external institution known as 'the singles jukebox' ;)

I'd not voted before, and had little clue about the odds of selections placing. But that makes 2/3 so far.

xxp or you cld take it as arguing that happiness has an essential unreal/fantastic quality

http://i.imgur.com/J2iSdQq.jpg

74 (Tie): Andrew W.K. – “Music Is Worth Living For” - 164 points – 6 votes
video

Andrew WK: C/D?

lol

adios, singles jukebox

i didn't vote for this but i approve

YESS

I've heard precisely 0% of this list so far.

lol very ilm

this is as close to metal as we're getting, I think. also the first of my votes to appear

the heroic intersection of bro-ish party metal and self-help

As someone who really adored the I Get Wet album and gave almost no fucks about anything he's made since then, this is no different. I Get Wet sounded easy. This sounds labored.

I voted for the more radical "I don't know anything"

that rapid bit of falsetto in the chorus made me cackle so i got more than i expected to out of an andrew wk single from 2018 at least

the painful intersection of hearing music and seeking help

xxxp close calls with brick walls, dude!!

all the stuff he's done since i get wet has dealt more or less openly with struggles against depression - that's where the laboredness comes in perhaps. i think it adds another layer myself

omg saer

I voted for a different Andrew WK song, but I'm glad to see this make it on here.

this one didn't do it for me like the old ones

Simon, we have a song that I would consider more "metal" than WK charting later this very day even!

!!

btw, saer's single nominations deserve their own thread and should be sought out on the youtube nomination playlist ASAP (hint: look for the white labels)
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLcqiswAZfVPo7ukF0c4p8B55JCRt0jEA3

imago otm, the dark subtext of this is what makes the relentless positivity feel genuine.

(my first one to place too!)

Wow, Andrew WK still exists?

I am 99% sure I know what the other metal placement is

Youtube nomination playlist was a complete joy - doubt anything from it will place, so maybe a nice adjunct to the main poll.

nothing made the 77 with less than five votes
BUT
two songs missed the 77 with eight votes. guesses welcome.

i threw new australian national anthem 'smoko' by the chats low on my ballot and i suppose a few others did. would love it to place but that is my guess for missing out with 8

I am 99% sure I know what the other metal placement is

Poppy - X?

forks, have you not started adding to the Spotify playlist yet or is it just not refreshed on my end?

it's updated and currently includes our #73.

http://i.imgur.com/APYlVPT.jpg

73: Helena Hauff – “Hyper-Intelligent Genetically Enriched Cyborg” – 167 points – 7 votes
video

Helena Hauff - Hyper-Intelligent Genetically Enriched Cyborg

IDG what people who don't like this are looking for in music. - flopson

Dirtbox acid mournful synth, every track's a belter. AOTY. - kraudive

imo it's a worrying (or...exciting?) sign when something with its own ecstatic thread comes in this low

i had hoped i'd like this based on descriptions in the thread but it's not for me

it makes me happy that "It Makes You Forget (itgehane)" won this poll

I dont believe you

”You’re a liiiiiar! Play it fuckin’ loud!

https://gaslightrecords.com/assets/img/feature/dylan-1966-melbourne.jpg

he acts like he’s never drank dreck

i’ve never been in a starbucks and i’m not interested in the sort of music they may or may not play inside

― budo jeru, Friday, February 1, 2019

I dont believe you

― Your sweetie-pie-coo-coo I love ya (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday,

these lads need to get thisen in a Greggs, £1.40 brexit beans coffee, fist bumps and garage bangers all before 11am

thanks to Moka and forks and all the voters! pretty good consistency this year, with no insanely wild highs, nor hideous turds apart from The 1975

anybody NOT want me to go ahead with this? Just want to make sure i don't get yelled at in an hour.

― Fuck the NRA (ulysses), Friday, February 1, 2019 6:53 AM (two hours ago)

yes, me, I'm having trouble keeping up obv (and so was another following-along exlxor I talked to in a bar last night)

Today makes two months since I've last smoked a cigarette after smoking for 26 years, so I'm pretty over them now. That's a hot photo though.

CONGRATULATIONS JOHNNY FEVER!

NB to UK/AU ILXors: i had never heard the term "Smoko" before this song

had UK ilxors?

or you can listen to it here: https://autechre.bleepstores.com/release/98703-autechre-nts-sessions-1-4

I accepted cookies in two different browsers and this still didn't work. now Sheffield has my n00dz and I have to buy an industrial fan instead

Did you know “Hang With Me” is a cover? The original is an shy, intimate, almost folky love song, to which Robyn adds the “recklessly, headlessly” chorus

worth noting the reversioning, but Klas Ahlund re-arranging and re-recording one of his own songs (yet again) isn't exactly Robyn covering. since the Body Talk writing credits* break down when she contributed lyrics to a song, seems likely that the new chorus was him too.

*(16/19 by Klas, 14/19 by Robyn)

going back to Robyn's earlier work after Honey was disappointing, a fair few great singles but not any great albums

tbf she's only had two proper solo albums (post her teenpop era), and this is the first one released in the US

monae gives me the same ilm-bait vibes as that big boi record that won the albums poll here and then no one really talked about again
->
I had Shutterbug on and off my running playlist for a good while

I went back to a few jams from the album last month, still bangs

I rate the Janelle album very highly and it made the top three on my ballot I think but 'Make Me Feel' is the only one I ever feel the urge to skip, it's just too on-the-nose as homages go. (And it's definitely a homage first and foremost rather than a pastiche, although it might be that as well).

I realize I've been sort of conflating Kero Kero Bonito and Kyary Pamyu Pamyu. I'm probably not the first.

Please report any mistakes or oversights to me, so I can do the whole damn thing over again. Thank U, next!

I voted for Americans, but would definitely had put Screwed on there as well if I'd thought it had traction.

I thought 'Americans' was the best song on the album, and have a strict 1-song-per-artist rule, unless there's a good reason to have two songs on, such as Screwed having a shot at making it.

Ok, I get it, but based on the discussion here it seems the reason "Screwed" didn't have a shot at making it was because people who liked it thought it didn't have a shot at making it. So, a self-fulfilling prophecy.

_ Please report any mistakes or oversights to me, so I can do the whole damn thing over again. Thank U, next!_
Since your list seems to be based on country of origin and not residence, according to Resident Advisor Peach is a Canadian who lives in the UK.

i’ve never been in a starbucks and i’m not interested in the sort of music they may or may not play inside

― budo jeru, Friday, February 1, 2019

the world is a starbucks by war

saw this in tunbridge wells earlier today, good luck uk

https://i.ibb.co/jbBx1py/4-B076-D0-D-F9-E1-4-EE7-89-B8-763544455-A89.jpg

__ Please report any mistakes or oversights to me, so I can do the whole damn thing over again. Thank U, next!_
Since your list seems to be based on country of origin and not residence, according to Resident Advisor Peach is a Canadian who lives in the UK._

Thanks, Tuomas. Yes, I went with country of origin and/or self-identification, more or less. DJs seem to be more elusive than most in this regard, or require a bit more googling at least. Hope I didn’t make too much of a shambles of it...

and I have to buy an industrial fan instead

walked through a downtown commuter tunnel that's about to be filled with concrete yesterday, with industrial fans thundering breathable air from the streets above, and thought of this

i give "boo'd up" extra points for sounding distinctly like a huge R&B hit circa 2005. i thought it was telling that mariah basically repaid the homage by getting dj mustard to produce the same sort of glassy R&B song for her own album. the emancipation of mimi influence snake eating its own tail.

the starbucks on 43rd and madison by my old office was always playing R&B from like 98-06 and "boo'd up" could definitely have gotten some burn in there

I dipped into this thread briefly a couple of days ago, but just getting around to fully catching up with it now - I can't believe 'Give Yourself a Try' placed and 'It's Not Living (If It's Not With You)' didn't. Can't fault the other 1975 tracks that placed.