If it seems like a lot of the description I've written below and for previous sections of this list lean too heavily on memories from my past, well then you are probably right. This is how I listen to music. I listen, and I feel, and I remember. The contexts in which I listen to the songs originally are almost as important to me as the songs themselves. So yes, a lot of these songs are on here because they mean something to me. If that makes a shitty list, then so be it. I fucking love these songs, and I trudged through writing about one hundred of them because I want you to love them too. That's all. Please enjoy.
Click on these links if you wanna see previous entries on this list: #100-#76, #75-51, #50-#26. Otherwise, read on to see what my favorite songs of last decade are. And if you don't feel like listening to any of these songs now, come have a beer at my house, you'll most likely here them then on my shitty knockoff iPod speakers, whether you ask to or not.
Click on these links if you wanna see previous entries on this list: #100-#76, #75-51, #50-#26. Otherwise, read on to see what my favorite songs of last decade are. And if you don't feel like listening to any of these songs now, come have a beer at my house, you'll most likely here them then on my shitty knockoff iPod speakers, whether you ask to or not.
25. "Point/Counterpoint" by Streetlight Manifesto
Don't ask me how I ended up with a ska album in my possession in 2006. Don't ask me how my friends started listening to it to. Don't ask me how it became our pump-up jam as we drove down Cottman Ave. in my parents' car, yelling curse words out the window. Don't ask me about this song, because I don't remember. It's just always been, and always will be.
24. "I'm a Pretender" by the Exploding Hearts
The kids you are listening to are dead. Like A Christmas Carol, this is where the story of the Exploding Hearts starts. It's a story of unfulfilled potential. While touring, promoting their excellent breakout debut record Guitar Romantic, the Exploding Hearts' tour van flipped, and three of the four members were killed. They averaged 21 years old. The whole album is worth many dozens of spins, but something about "I'm a Pretender" particularly puts a hitch in my throat every time I hear it. There's a magical moment in this song, and it happens on the third chorus. It's one of those musical moments in time when you just hear a band fucking click into a higher gear. I hear this chorus and its subsequent guitar solo and all the hand claps and all the damn fun these kids are having, and I weep.
23. "Letter from an Occupant" by the New Pornographers
When I first heard this song in former PoYB correspondent Mandy B**.'s dorm room, my first thought was that we were listening to the munchkins on the yellow brick road. My judgment, to say the least, was flawed. Neko Case is shrill in this song, there's just no other way to say it. BUT she takes that shrillness and brings a power to it that's only matched by A.C. Newman's soaring "Ooo-ooo" chorus. I wonder how different my musical tastes would be had I bent the butterfly's wings and taken "Letter from an Occupant" seriously when I first heard it.
22. "Light a Roman Candle with Me" by fun.
You are free to interpret songs however you'd like. When Pam questioned the suitability of "Light a Roman Candle with Me" as our wedding song, she had a point. Ostensibly, Nate Ruess is singing about a one-night stand that may or may not be working. At face value, these might not be the best lyrics to be sung over a first dance as husband and wife. However, I've always felt differently about this song and how it applies to our situation (anyone's situation, really). To me, Ruess is expressing doubts, sure, but in the end, he's making the case that none of us know what can happen when we first get together. He's singing that the future is wide open. Boy and Girl meet. They might fade away, but there's a possibility that they might fall in love! Why piss away that chance?! Pam and I did not piss it away, and here we were getting married, and so we figured there was no better song to dance to on our wedding day. Plus... the song is fun as fuck.
21. "A-Punk" by Vampire Weekend
I guess it was Pitchfork that said that Modern Vampires of the City, Vampire Weekend's third album, was the grad school dissertation to the band's freshman year philosophy 101 paper of a debut album. I guess that's technically true, but then again, who ever gets the inclination to read a dissertation? Sometimes you just wanna kick back and relax with some easy bullshit. "A-Punk" is easy bullshit to me, and I love it dearly. I have strong flashbacks of partying in my dorm room, drinking Cherry Wave (yup), and dancing around to this song. Dissertations were the farthest thing from my mind.
20. "A Wolf at the Door. (It Girl. Rag Doll.)" by Radiohead
Is it just me, or does Radiohead seem, I dunno, BORED sometimes? Maybe aloof or removed? That's what I thought before I heard this song, anyway. I guess I still feel that way, but can't blame "A Wolf at the Door" for SERIOUSLY challenging my perceptions of this band. Thom Yorke has never sounded so desperate.
20. "A Wolf at the Door. (It Girl. Rag Doll.)" by Radiohead
Is it just me, or does Radiohead seem, I dunno, BORED sometimes? Maybe aloof or removed? That's what I thought before I heard this song, anyway. I guess I still feel that way, but can't blame "A Wolf at the Door" for SERIOUSLY challenging my perceptions of this band. Thom Yorke has never sounded so desperate.
19. "Missed the Boat" by Modest Mouse
The ping pong ball goes behind the back, hits an empty Lionshead bottle, bounces off the plastic fold-up table, and lands directly in the cup, a shot worth around $100, with one of Modest Mouse's perpetually-nautical-themed anthems punctuating the scene—"GO-GOD-DAMN!"
18. "Fake Empire" by the National
There's a lot I love about "Fake Empire" that I can talk about without having to yet again become all mopey and nostalgic. There's the way it eschews the verse/chorus structure of a traditional pop song for a linear progression (just piano to piano and drums to a cutting brass section). There's the very neat trick of using the drums to move us from 4/4 to 6/8 time before you even know what's happening. There's the lyrics, morose in the way all the best National songs are, lyrics that speak to you both on a micro (I feel out place) and macro (I feel like this country is going to shit) level. But nah, fuck, I was wrong. I have to be nostalgic. I have to see the cold dew forming on the St. Basil's dorm front lawn when I hear this song. My heart just doesn't work any other way.
17. "The Mariner's Revenge Song" by the Decemberists
There's no other band quite like the Decemberists, and not a single other band on earth could write a nine-minute sea shanty and have it land at #17 on a decade-spanning list of best songs. The band and their frontman Colin Meloy have always been literary geeks, with plenty of Merriam-Webster-busting songs about ancient civilizations and secret foreign spies and lovable crane people. But "The Mariner's Revenge Song," an epic tale about being swallowed by a whale with your mortal enemy, is PEAK Decemberists.
16. "The Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth" by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
We, the Clap Your Hands Say Yeah stans, almost feel like a secret society. This strange and beautiful band had its moment in the sun in 2005 thanks to the bombastic words from niche music blogs. The stans know better than to believe that this band is dead. We stand in shadows, for over a decade at this point, quietly beating the drums and keeping the legend of CYHSY alive. When I was in a random fucking dive bar in Nashville last spring, and "The Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth" came on the stereo, the bartender and I exchanged knowing glances. This is the band. This is it.
15. "Jesus of Suburbia" by Green Day
Time, I'd argue, has been kind to Green Day. Sure, American Idiot may be 6x platinum here in the U.S., but at the time of its release in 2004, I feel like it didn't really get the critical acclaim it deserved. (But I've already written all about that.) I guess what I'm arguing, in a very hacky way, is that, like Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus of Suburbia was unjustly slain, but has since risen anew. I am this song's Peter. I believed, and I continue to believe. Fuck, what's not to love about this goofy-ass song? It's bombastic (five sections, indicated by roman numerals in the subtitles), wildly teenager-ish lyrics (rhymes "Ritalin" with "my sins"), some great drum fills, tempo changes, hahaha oh man, no wonder this shit went to Broadway.
14. "She Moves in Her Own Way" by the Kooks
This jangly little piece of Brit-pop has ruled my personal airwaves ever since that wonderful carefree summer when I discovered it (doesn't hurt that it's been on Comcast Music On-Demand pretty much forever). Maybe it's the bridge that makes this the quintessential summer song: "I wish we never made it / through all the summers." I certainly do wish that now, sitting at my work desk, in July, summer nowhere to be found.
13. "With Arms Outstretched" by Rilo Kiley
Please play this at my funeral service. "Now some days, they last longer than others..."
12. "Constructive Summer" by the Hold Steady
Okay, these top twelve songs are the all-time greats. They are unbeatable. We start with "Constructive Summer," a song in which Craig Finn somehow captures the very essence of what it meant to grow up in Northeast Philly. I've loved this song so long that it was a big part of my very first blog post EVER (lost to the winds, recapped here). Finn and the boys will probably never know how much this song means to me (or maybe they will! Look for Joe's review of the Hold Steady's "Constructive Summer" Tour this Wednesday, right here on PoYB!).
11. "Doing It Right" by the Go! Team
I was at a fantasy football draft one time (hanging out with friends, not participating), and tried playing this song, claiming that it was the closest thing I had on my iPod to Jock Jams. I got laughed out of the room, but I hold true to my conviction. The Go! Team bottles up the manic energy of an exciting sporting event and packages it in a giddy lo-fi pop-rock tune. There are marching bands, cheerleaders, you name it. Try playing this at your next sporting event during halftime, even if your friends are a bunch of jackals.
10. "Wolf like Me" by TV on the Radio
Jaleel Bunton plays the drumming backbeat to end all backbeats here. It gets me fucking PUMPED. The guitars are fuzzy and frantic. Tunde Adebimpe really does sound like he's transforming into a werewolf, the way he sings these impressive lyrics. My college girlfriend's roommate told me that this song sounded like a song you should kill yourself to. She knows nothing about music. This song is all love, baby.
9. "Four Winds" by Bright Eyes
If you look at the lyric sheet, you can see that this is very much a song that would appeal to a senior in high school, into pop philosophical conversations while getting toasted on cheap beer. Rather than dismiss the song based on the fact that I may have outgrown its values, I embrace it. I hold tight because even though the angsty teenage ideals are on full display in "Four Winds," it only seems broad and hackneyed because it's based in some pretty universal truths. ("The Bible's blind, the Torah's deaf, the Qu'ran is mute / if you burned them all together you'd get close to the truth" whew lad that spits fucking TRUTH alright.) Lyrics aside, the song spoke to me on a musical level too. With its howling fiddle and rustic female backing vocals, "Four Winds" opened up musical worlds I knew existed but hadn't cared to try prior. And, at the end of it all, you can't really go wrong with a passionate Conor Oberst singing his fucking heart out, can ya?
8. "7/4 (Shoreline)" by Broken Social Scene
Broken Social Scene write songs in the clouds. "It's a shoreline / And it's high speed / It's a cruel world / And it's time." These lyrics literally mean nothing. But it doesn't matter. Those pounding drums make up for it and more. "7/4 (Shoreline)" is relentless. It's the best song ever that's in a 7/4 time signature, wrestling Pink Floyd's "Money" away from the throne for good.
7. "Wake Up" by Arcade Fire
I wish the whole "put your lighters in the air" thing wasn't a cliché at this point, because if it wasn't, this is the song I'd be putting my goddamn lighter in the air for. As loathe as I am to provide the bait, I'll say it anyway: This is the millennial anthem to end all millennial anthems. We need to wake up, you guys! Let's goooooooo.
6. "Float On" by Modest Mouse
I liked this song when it came out, but then, so too did every single man, woman, and child in America. Nothing special about it. It was only when I was having a rough weekend in freshman year of college, and this song came on, and told me to keep my chin up, keep going, it was then that I knew this song was special. Raise your Natty Lights, boys, in celebration. Modest Mouse, a small-time garage band if I ever saw one, somehow made a monster, world-conquering hit. Raise a toast to them. Raise a toast to Isaac Brock, songwriter and frontman, too, who wrote "Float On" because he "just want[ed] to feel good for a day." I feel good every day this song exists, sir.
5. "Mr. Brightside" by the Killers
I dunno. Look. There's a reason this song is, today, right now, currently, STILL ON THE U.K. BILLBOARD TOP 100 SINGLES. Thirteen years later!! Only a sincerely good song could pull off such a bizarre and astounding feat. "Mr. Brightside" is a truly good song. Also, I guess it's no surprise that yet another song on this list is a "staying positive" type of song, though the Killers a little sarcastic about it here, I think. They're like: "My girl cheated on me, but fuck it, I guess I gotta stay positive right?!" Either way, this song fucking rocks, in all its corny glory.
4. "The Bleeding Heart Show" by the New Pornographers
The second half of this song is so damn primitive and simple, it's a wonder that other artists haven't copied it yet. It's basically a chant (over a jaunty drum part and racing guitars), repeating first: "Hey-la! Hey-la!" and second: "The bleeding heart show!" It doesn't really amount to much, except maybe the best outro in musical history. This is dancing-in-the-rain, best-night-of-your-life music.
3. "Stuck Between Stations" by the Hold Steady
Every generation has a voice that repeats back to us how it really is. Craig Finn, to me and my friends, is that voice. With the help of his pirate-mustached friend Franz Nicolay, Finn paints portrait after portrait of how it feels to be a teen. I often wondered when I was a teen myself: How? How did someone like Craig Finn, a schlubby bald bar-band-lifer dude, how did he know what I was doing? How did he know my life? As I get older and become just some fucking schlubby adult myself, I guess I'm starting to realize that what Finn was singing about wasn't just about me, it was about all of us. The ideas and stories are universal. Which is better, really, the more I think about it. We all went through this fucking shit TOGETHER. Finn quotes Sal Paradise in this song: "Boys and girls in America / have such a sad time together," and he spends the rest of the song laying that theory to rest. It's more than that, he's saying. It's complicated. We're sad, we're confused, we're drunk, we're happy. I'm almost 30 now, and of course it isn't the same, but "Stuck Between Stations" will always be my own little time capsule that I can open up whenever I want and rediscover what it truly felt like, all those years ago.
2. "I'll Believe in Anything" by Wolf Parade
It continues to baffle me how effecting this song is to me, because if you break it down into pieces, it's a really strange song. [To be read as a Jason Kelce-style speech:] Spencer Krug's voice is irritating. The tempo slogs. The guitars are basic. The ghostly keyboard hits are overdone. The 4/4 outro is trite. The percussion could practically be a drum machine. The lyrics are flippant at best. But, just like the 2017-18 Eagles, you put all these scrub pieces together, and something fucking incredible happens. They all complement themselves in the best ways. They all create one epic fucking song. (Read more here.)
1. "The Underdog" by Spoon
If you've been around me in the past few years when this song comes on, then I already ruined the surprise for you. When I listen to "The Underdog," I tell everyone around me that this is the best song of all time. No conditions. Full stop. What's so charming about this song is the wide variety on contexts in which I've heard this song and expressed my undying love for it. Large keg parties. Small cafes for brunch. Disgusting dive bars. A fucking Brandon Flowers concert. "The Underdog" was even so prevalent in my freshman dorm room that my roommate Pat took to calling this "our song." It's everywhere. This is the Swiss army knife of songs. It fits anywhere, it does anything. In many ways, the video for the song reflects this (click above, or below). The camera moves around the studio to all these tiny little rooms, where all types of musicians are playing their instruments. No one together. And yet, they are all playing the same song, at the same time. So many different contexts add up to one amazing musical experience. Fuck, you guys, I love this song so much. There's no song on earth I'd rather hear, and I feel that way all the time. Will I ever get sick of "The Underdog"? I dunno, maybe. It's been over a decade, and I'm not quite there yet.
Thanks for taking part in this month-long masturbatory list with me. It was fun! Be sure to check back in almost exactly seventeen months, when we do the same thing, except for the '10s! Hopefully you'll have to hear less "when I was a teenager" stories next time around!!
Thanks for taking part in this month-long masturbatory list with me. It was fun! Be sure to check back in almost exactly seventeen months, when we do the same thing, except for the '10s! Hopefully you'll have to hear less "when I was a teenager" stories next time around!!
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