50 Songs Of The Decade (2000 – 2009)

(photo by dcdead)

I released my 50 albums of the decade list two years ago with all intentions to follow it up with a matching songs list. Days turned into weeks and weeks into months. No such list ever materialized and I kindof gave up on the idea. That is until earlier this summer when I took a weekend trip to visit some friends in Chicago and decided to soundtrack the drive with a playlist of my favorite songs from 2000-2009. I thought the mix turned out pretty good so I chiseled it down to my absolute favorite 50 songs, gave them a mostly-arbitrary ranking and now I’m sharing it with you. Of course, belating this list for two years has given me the necessary perspective to narrow this list down to only the essentials. These are the tracks that I play over and over and never get tired of, the songs that always make me turn the volume up when they shuffle on my iPod, basically the songs that are “really, really ridiculously good looking” and not just “so hot right now”.

A few words of about this list, I’m not claiming to have made an end-all be-all “greatest songs of the naughts” list, just my personal favorites. A few folks took offense to the lack of  some genres (ahem, hip hop) on the albums list but hopefully this one will counterbalance that woeful underrepresentation somewhat. Furthermore, I didn’t do full reviews of each track, because seriously, who has that kind of time, but I’ve created a Spotify Playlist where you can listen to all of the tracks (there’s also vimeo/youtube videos linked to each one). In keeping with my yearly songs lists I’ve limited myself to one track per artist.  If you scroll all the way down you’ll see some songs that “just missed” and some per-year stats (‘05 reins supreme again in my book). So here it is, the long overdue top 50 songs of the decade according to me. Feel free to dispute or agree with my choices in the comments. Enjoy!

music for kids who can’t read good presents: 50 Songs Of The Decade (2000 – 2009)

Most easily found on: The Earth Is Not A Cold Dead Place

Most easily found on: The Execution Of All Things

Most easily found on: Bows + Arrows

Most easily found on: Veckatimest

Most easily found on: Sticking Fingers Into Sockets

Most easily found on: Black Sheep Boy

Most easily found on: White Blood Cells

Most easily found on: Let It Die

Most easily found on: Shut Up I Am Dreaming

Most easily found on: Give Up

Follow the jump to see the rest!

Mates of State's Crushes (+ more covers)

I’ve long been a huge Mates of State fan, so I was very excited to hear they were coming out with some new material, albeit not being an official album, but an all-covers mixtape entitled Crushes. It’s super nice of them in their busy touring / baby-raising schedule to throw something the fans way. Plus, I’ve always felt the indie pop duo has done a wonderful job with the covers, whether it’s of classic rock icons like David Bowie or Nico or modern classics like Gnarles’ Barkley’s “Crazy”. Their covers mixtape has some stuff I’m really interested in hearing, most especially Belle & Sebastian’s fantastic “Sleep The Clock Around”.  Here’s a couple tracks from the covers mixtape (the Tom Waits cover was previously released on this year’s “Sweethearts” compilation from Starbucks) as well as all of the additional covers from the band that I could find.

MP3 Laura (Girls cover)
MP3 Long Way Home (Tom Waits cover)

More Mates of State covers!

MP3 These Days (Nico cover)
MP3 California (Phantom Planet cover)
MP3 Starman (David Bowie cover)
MP3 Like U Crazy / Crazy (Gnarls Barkley live cover)

Check out the full tracklist at Stereogum. Hey, this is my second covers post this week. Yay for variety!

Best Music Videos of 2008

The holiday season is upon us, which for any self-respecting music writer means making end-of-the-year lists.  I, like many a blogger, live for this kind of year-end reflection, so this will be the first of many lists.  Here before you are the absolute 25 best music videos of the year 2008.   All the videos are embedded below for easy viewing, but I highly recommend you watch the higher quality version, which you can view (if available) by clicking on the song title. Except for the five at the end (the best of the best) the order is completely random.

The qualifications for this list are the video must be visually interesting, uniquely executed, with a song that’s pretty good as well.  Superb editing and gorgeous cinematography doesn’t hurt either. Basically I didn’t put a video on this list if it’s not was worth your time (it’s not like you have anything better to do over the holidays than sit for an hour and a half watching music videos though, amirite?).  As always, If you have any favorites videos from the year that you think I missed, make sure to leave it in the comments. The first three are embedded below, but you’ll have to click through to see the whole list.

Hot Chip – Ready For The Floor (Dir. Nima Nourizadeh)

The Ting Tings – Shut Up and Let Me Go (Dir. Alexand Liane)

Okkervil River – Lost Coastlines (Dir. Seth and Bobby) MP3

Click the link below for the rest!

Gnarles Barkley – Live @ Lollapalooza

Cee-Lo and Danger Mouse, the duo who make up Gnarles Barkley, were the definition of style and class at the Lollapalooza.   Sharply attired in matching khaki suits (that were complete with striped bow ties) and featuring a very youthful band in equally snazzy get-up, they won the best dressed contest hands down. 

The music wasn’t half bad either though (actually quite good). Gnarles charged through songs like “Run”, “Smiley Faces” and “Going On” and laid it down real smooth for “Who’s Gonna Save Your Soul” and their mega-hit “Crazy”.  Their was even a cover of Radiohead’s “Reckoner” which showed of Cee-Lo’s vocal prowess.  Overall very fun set, I’m glad I finally got to see these guys.

MP3 Going On 

Click the link below to check out some more of my Gnarles Barkley pictures.

Top 30 Songs of 2006

This is my first attempt at an end of the year songs list. As a measure I’ve selected songs that I think I’ll still be playing and replaying after the year, but as a rule I didn’t choose more than one song per artist. It’s kindof crazy to try to rank songs at a certain point, but after some toiling I came up with a definitive 30, that I’m happy with. A selection of them are available for download and they are labeled as such. Make sure to click read more… for my top ten. Thanks for visiting!

30. Camera Obscura – Lloyd I’m Ready To Be Heartbroken
29. Snowden – Anti-Anti MP3
28. Regina Spector – Fidelity
27. Eric Bachmann – Carrboro Woman MP3
26. Destroyer – European Oils
25. Danielson – Ship the Magestic Suffix MP3
24. Ben Kweller – Penny on the Train Track
23. Devotchka – Til The End of Time
22. Islands – Swans (Life After Death)
21. Phoenix – Consolation Prizes MP3

20. Page France – Antarctica (My Beloved Home) MP3
19. CSS – Let’s Make Love and Listen to Death From Above MP3
18. Birdmonster – Spaceman
17. Mates of State – Beautiful Dreamer
16. Shearwater – Seventy-four, Seventy-five MP3
15. Headlights – Put Us Back Together MP3
14. Hot Chip – Boy From School
13. The Pipettes – Pull Shapes
12. Midlake – Roscoe MP3
11. Anathallo – Hanaskajijii (Four: A Great Wind, More Ash) MP3

The Evolution of "Crazy"

Origin: You all have heard Gnarles Barkley’s “Crazy” (it’s pretty much impossible to get away from at this point), but have you heard “Nel Cimitero Di Tucson”, which is essentially a raw instrumental form of Crazy. Unless you check alot of random world-music blogs (like me) you probably haven’t. It seems that Gnarles Barkley heavily sampled the song, which comes from the soundtrack of the film, Preparati la bara! (IMDB link here).

It’s very interesting to listen to the original version and be able to hear the progression to it’s current chart-topping form, most noticeably the trumpets from the original were replaced with strings for Gnarles Barkley’s version, but the bass line stays the same nearly the whole song though.

Gianfranco Reverberi – Nel Cimitero Di Tucson

The blogger that found this goes by the name Guuzbourg and he writes for The Spleninda Project. The original post is here. Great find, Guuz!

Covers: You can’t mention the song without talking about the covers, three of which feature an acoustic/stripped down version of the song and one (Twilight Singers) which turns it into a soulful piano jam. Time will tell, what Paris Hilton will do with the song when she covers it. Here’s all four versions:

MP3 The Kooks – Crazy
MP3 Ray Lamontagne – Crazy
MP3 Nelly Furtado – Crazy
MP3 The Twilight Singers – Crazy
MP3 Mates of State – Like U Crazy / Crazy (Gnarles Barkley Cover) update*

Live: Finally, the live performances of Crazy have all have had variations. The MTV version varies the least, other than some wind effects and added a piano melody on “who do you think you are”. The Top of the Pops version slows down the tempo and adds in marching drums, and the Conan version is completely remixed with some funky sound effects at the end. View all three:

Crazy @ MTV Movie Awards – Darth Vader
Crazy @ Top of the Pops – Airplane Pilot
Crazy @ Conan O’Brien – Bathrobe
(courtesy of YouTube)

Overall, I’ve heard this song more than any other single played this year, and I still enjoy it. Does that me crazy? possibly…