(there's a vid + it's a good one but it cuts out the ending which is very crucial for the general effect)
Yeah idk just the whole of it, the low-keyness, the auto-tune, the TyD$ harmonizing, the Beatlesque organ melody going on near the end right when you think the song's about to wind down, the general concept of the deceased parent giving a child a message from heaven, the total breaking/ inconsistency of that narrative all throughout the song, how hard it is to take it seriously + but also so funny to listen to given that at the end of the day all of the words are STLL coming out of said child's mouth, but how it doesn't matter because of the genuine blinded sincerity of the delivery. I don't still want to get a tattoo of it, but 13 months later it still does mean as much and sound as good to me as it did that first time on blackout drunken New Years.
On the topic of The Build... this one is a very different kind than you would find in say a Beach House song, but in its wake pretty much everyone else working in the actual same lane might as well just not even try. It's structured very beautifully all around that one, goosebumps-inducing moment, getting to the point where an EXPLOSION is the only thing that could reasonably happen, but inconspicuously enough that on the first listen it might still come as a surprise. But any time after that .. just .. boiiii. Everything has changed.
This top 10 here is overall very much a happy one: genuinely joyful moments (#s 1, 5, 6), or at least songs speaking on more complicated emotions but that still give you the same feeling (#s 3, 7). But it was a blast of pure anger – directed outwards, inwards, at whoever would listen really but then maybe also more so at those who wouldn't – that held my attention the very most over the majority of the year. One of the biggest breakouts of the decade hasn't helped things; Kendrick has had enough – of the system sure, but very much inclusive of those who do all kinds of things to continue perpetuating it – and at the time he hit his boiling point no one was spared from his wrath, least of all himself. There's enough power in every word (not even speaking of the backing arrangements) to charge up an entire album's worth of protest music, but it comes from a different place than that kind of stuff would: again it's straight from inside, and for all he cares he doesn't even need an audience to hear him out. "Chanting"? nah, that didn't really do anything for me this album cycle around, but it's all good still because I was already in position to get up fight someone -- fight FOR someone -- off the strength of the second single.
1. Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experiment - Sunday Candy
This song ****ING destroys me. Listening to it now it took about 3 seconds from the opening note for the first tear to start preparing itself, but even under the happiest circumstances -- especially under the happiest circumstances?? -- they would certainly be on the way by the ending, I swear on my life. To the point where I very much would not be able to listen to this song on a bus.
And it is not even my grandma they're singing about! Can you imagine how truly, wholly, LOVED you would feel if you went in to check your email, or whatever, and there was a link in there with someone informing you that a family member had gotten a whole group together and created this song from scratch just to celebrate you? I'm just thinking of the transformation from Cocoa Butter Kisses, c. 2013, with Chance carrying around a guilty conscience after his grandmother won't hug him anymore that he smells like cigarettes ... to now. Take the Teenage Symphony to God and swap out God with your mother's mother and you get the effect.
I may bag on the idea of the uncompromising ball of positivity, but just look at the area around my eyes rn for all the proof you need that it gets results.
I never really cared for Mr. Chance the Rapper. I do like "Sunday Candy" a bit though. And "The Blacker the Berry", "Run Away With Me" and "Clearest Blue" are definitely deserving of their acclaim, they're some of the greatest songs of the year! Overall, great list.
Rih, Drake, Lil Mix, Demi, Selena, Janet, Adele, MISSY (!!), GOOD CHOICES
I'm the biggest J-nae fan around but I just couldn't force myself to like Yoga idk
Sea Calls me Home, yes.
That future song is stuck I'm my head every once in a while ill admit
How much a dollar cost rlly is haunting, ill have to listen to the radiohead song someday. And nice Alright drag, v. overrated
FFS is the ultimate grower.
Sparks... I don't think Beach House has that many 'great' songs, but when they do woo
Slumlord is somethin else.
Borders, HI, i could listen to those all day.
Nice Joanna pick, that song most reminded me of **** **** with the storytelling
The Weeknd killed it last year obviously. Those 2... Best singles run hands down
Trap Queen is a song thats impossible not to like
I KNOW is probably the single of the year.
3 for 5 on that top 5. Carly, duh. Autotune Kanye never vibes with me idk. CHVRCHES song is .. eh? The opposites of 1 and 2, both are perfect tho Sunday Candy is just pure joy, TBTB is intense af. GREAT list overall!