40
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The Script - The Man Who Can't Be Moved
I'm sure I can't have been the only person who, on hearing this particular track for the first time, thought "that new Sting song sounds pretty good", and then did a double-take when the DJ back-announced that it wasn't the lute-playing Geordie minstrel, but a bunch of Irish lads called The Script. Being mistaken for dad-rock won't do their street-cred any favours, but this beautiful ballad of unrequited love is a perfect example of the instantly familiar sound that has seen them sell singles and albums by the bucket-load - as I write this in January 2009 their eponymous album has gone back to Number 1 in the album chart five months after it first hit the top spot - and which turned The Man Who Can't Be Moved into The Song That Wouldn't Go Away.
Greg B
No of votes: 7, Score:
43, Highest vote: 2nd
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39
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Rihanna - Disturbia
Artist link: 1  24 36 46
From the woman who brought us that song with an acute case of the "ella's", comes another phrase destined to haunt you as you start singing it under your breath without realising - "bum bum bee dum bum bum bee dum bum" (yes, I worked it out through repeated listens). Since the word "disturbia" doesn't officially exist, may I be the first to propose the definition to be "the recurring sensation of hearing nonsensical phrases in Rihanna songs"? It doesn't really trouble me though, as the song itself takes those quirks and gives them their musical context - a darker, more sinister effort than the likes of "Umbrella", coupled with a hypnotic bass and rhythm that wants to be a bit of a dancefloor stomper. Although this makes you think it will be Frankenstein's monster, instead you get a brooding, menacing pop masterpiece. Given her impressive commercial success, Rihanna might be emerging as the new queen of pop - with pop being given the 21st century reality tv makeover.
Jason M
No of votes: 7, Score:
46, Highest vote: 2nd
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38
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Goldfrapp - A&E
Artist link: 31  42
So, you're the undisputed robo-dominatrix queen of pulsating electro pop; no theramin is safe from your pervy advances... what next? Why, intimate, organic, down-tempo pagan ambient-folk and cavorting with giant owls, obviously. Madonna can keep her scary leotards, when it comes to reinvention, she's got absolutely nothing.... NOTHING... on Alison Goldfrapp. "A&E" represents the morning-after-the-night-before of the band's last two albums, the pumping, pulsating pop of "Black Cherry" and "Supernature". That powerful sexuality is still very much present here, albeit more subtley revealed amidst a gentle, acoustic melody and within a tender, longing vocal. The song sucks you in with a purring vocal and the alluring image of the singer in a backless dress, and then almost before you know where you are - POW! - it hits you right between the eyes that we're maybe not gently coming down from the night before after all, but we're in a hospital and perhaps waking up from a suicide attempt. It's a genuinely beautiful and haunting song that is well-complemented by an unforgettable video featuring, of course, woodland creatures and dancing leaf men. Don't ask. That woman doesn't need nipple clamps, a corset and dancers dressed as horses to be alluring.... although I note that she has hung onto her riding crop, just in case.
Swiss T
No of votes: 7, Score:
51, Highest vote: 1st
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37
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Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal
The Fleet Foxes are from modern Seattle but sound as though they have just stepped out of the Bruegel painting that graces the front of their brilliant debut album, released in June 2008. They are city boys, but their songs reference squirrels, mountains, woodland and meadow larks. Their musical references are rooted in Crosby, Stills, Nash, Young and the other singer-songwriters of the 1960s Laurel Canyon set, and yet somehow this song, their first single, is so timeless that it could almost have been written at any point in the last five hundred years. It sounds as much like a medieval rondel as it does a contemporary rock song, an image that intensifies when you look at the band in all their weirdy-beardy, hairy glory. It's a simple song, with pure, clear vocal harmonies looping around a haunting and yet oddly sinister refrain of children playing in the snow and of blood spilled. A glorious song and surely no band has sung this well together since the Beach Boys.
Swiss T
No of votes: 7, Score:
57, Highest vote: 1st
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36
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The Wombats - Moving To New York
You've got to applaud Scouse combo the Wombats' dogged persistence - having re-released not one, not two, but three singles this year. Nonetheless, if they hadn't put this one out again, I doubt the subsequent chain of events that lead to me writing about it would have taken place. This song is quite educational too - I for one, would never have learned that New York is in fact renowned being a world leader in sorting insomnia (I can only guess that being a 24 hour city and all, this has arisen out of need), where they get you to try the radical walking treatment called the 30 yard backward step. Okay, so the lyrics have me baffled, but the tune I feel on firmer ground with, coupling scuzzy bass with some deft work on the guitar, all played at breakneck speed and fizzing with energy. If you've got issues with your sleep, I'd probably suggest not putting this on, as it is likely to have a similar effect to downing a triple espresso. Maybe try counting marsupials instead.
Jason M
No of votes: 8, Score:
34, Highest vote: 5th
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35
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Pendulum - Propane Nightmares
Perth born producers Pendulum converted into a proper band this year to record their new album. The second single off their second album, Propane Nightmares is probably one of the few songs (along with most of their new album) to effectively combine rock with dance music. They are likely to have upset fans of some of their earlier more drum 'n' bass focussed work but have clearly gained more fans than they have lost as this is their highest charting single to date reaching number 9 in the UK. Combine the guitar riffs, acoustic drums and vocal style of rock music with the synthesized sounds and up tempo rhythms of electronic music, throw in some trumpets and a church like organ sound and you have one epic song from start to finish.
Henry I-S
No of votes: 8, Score:
37, Highest vote: 1st
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34
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M.I.A. - Paper Planes
Quite possibly the only song in my top ten which I've filed under US-style Tamil West-London Urban, Paper Planes has introduced a lot of newcomers (like myself) to the world of M.I.A., through its use in film trailers and regular rotation on MTV (arguably the video version, with its toned down gun shots, is an easier listen). Drawing on all of her mixed up roots, and allegedly a satire about racial stereotyping, Paper Planes is also on the Slumdog Millionaire soundtrack, so expect to hear it a lot in 2009 too! Apparently M.I.A is also a gifted graphic artist, fashion designer and documentary maker (always a good idea to have other employment options in our credit crunched world) you have to hope she'll still find time for a follow up single. Useful fact of the day - M.I.A's real name is Mathangi Arulpragasm. Sometimes it makes sense to pick a stage name.
Isaac H
No of votes: 8, Score:
42, Highest vote: 2nd
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33
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Jordin Sparks - No Air
As Leona Lewis crosses the Atlantic to break the US, Jordin Sparks is heading in the opposite direction in an attempt to get a foothold in the UK. Like Leona, Jordin is the creation (I don't think discovery is the right word) of Simon Cowell's talent show empire, in this case American Idol 2007. Getting her to duet with Chris Brown may look like a cynical marketing ploy to win over the urban music cognoscenti, but there is definitely a chemistry between the two of them, and the end result is a polished power ballad, with all the groaning and wailing that you've come to expect from this kind of thing.
Greg B
No of votes: 9, Score:
31, Highest vote: 4th
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32
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Noah And The Whale - 5 Years Time
Take some of the catchiest whistling since Roger Whittaker, add a blend of childlike rhymes, mix with some tinkling xylophones, jangling guitars and a chirping violin, season with backing vocals from the lovely Laura Marling and you have a grin inducing, folk-pop (polk? fop?) summer classic. Despite the fact that this summer contained very little actual "sun, sun, sun" or indeed "fun, fun, fun" listening to this makes you think that it did.
John C
No of votes: 9, Score:
34, Highest vote: 2nd
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31
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Santogold - L.E.S. Artistes
Very clever, this. Potential for double meaning in the title, it being both French sounding and also referencing New Yoik's Lower East Side (which is what it's all about in truth). This one for me gets the big We Are The Champions thumbs-up for the fact that it is sounds unlike absolutely anything else this year (even considering the other singles by Ms Santi White). Her vocal style actually makes me think this would be the sound of Amy Winehouse if she went for a radical change of musical direction and went alternative. Diversions aside, this is more than the sum of it's impressive parts - the verse with its distinctive plunking guitar riff building into a chorus that has got so much going on it that it sounds like a glittering wall of noise, with one of the most inventive melodies you'll hear all year to top it all off.
Jason M
No of votes: 9, Score:
47, Highest vote: 1st
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Thanks go to the following people for assisting with getting together our comprehensive aide-memoire: Greg B, Kat B, Dan Mc
A MASSIVE THANKS also to all those who slaved over a hot keyboard to produce the write ups: Danny G, Paul H, Paul M, Kat B, Andrew S, Isaac H, Milly H, P Shoo, Dan Mc, Greg B, Elliot H, John M, Jane B, Henry I-S, John C, Swiss T, Catherine Mc