ILM’s Top 77 Tracks of 2018

i can appreciate "julia" somewhat but it's not really my thing i think

kali uchs - it's ok
red velvet - funny how every in the last couple years every k-pop song has trap drums. this songs rly good
laura jean - meh
andrew wk - really sucks
helena hauff - i probably overrated this album slightly at the time, but it's fun to listen to someone make bangin rudimentary techno on some old pos hardware
nice for what - great sample. btw i was just thinking today, was scorpion drake's new jersey? i feel like there's arguments to be made for any of his last 3
koze - i kinda hated his album from this year but this one's good. i mean so simple right, how can u go wrong
mgmt - ok this poll kind of sucks lol... yall...
rolling blackouts coaster - pretty nice. this album bored me really badly, maybe i'll check out the eps... kinda lazy tho
parquet courts - great opener to the best rock album of the year, by my fav band. i've started becoming so cranky and bored by music for a lot of the last couple years and it felt improbable that i'd crush so hard on a band as i did after this album prompted me to get back into them (had checked out after the first couple albums out of laziness, despite liking them). the basslines are sooo good
twin sister - my other fav band. see them live if you can imo. she's totally transfixing as frontperson, and the rest of the band are v cute, you wish you were friends with them irl. i really regret not nominating 'tops and bottoms' from the album, which was my fav off the album. i love the sade worship stuff but i also love when they branch out into their dubbier dark techno side like 'out of the dark' off the last album. thought they should've explored that side a bit more
sticky - really great. that vocal's wild. love how the drums come in and cut against the guitar. poll's picking up steam... fingers crossed
your dog - soccer mommy >>>>>>> snail mail. sheryl crowe-core
shimmer - it's alright
tony braxton - d0pe.. controversial opinion (not rly): the mainstream r&b on these polls is better than the shimmery 80s influenced slowmo vaguely dancey indie pop that always takes up 1/3 of it
mewithoutyou - there's usually one or two brad albums per year i listen to once and it doesn't really click at first and then i go back to it a year later and realize i was wrong and it rips... not sure if this will be the case with this one. it's cool tho, kinda emo deathrock
wizkid - this guy's been killing it for like 4 years now? still not getting his due imo. afrobeats production is so much cooler and more hi-def than american pop production has been the last decade

i don't get the "soccer mommy >>> snail mail" opinions, i don't really like either but snail mail has one really nice song in "heat wave" at least which i'd guess is probably yet to show

I played these this morning bloody hell this is thin gruel

75: Laura Jean – “Girls on the TV”
71: DJ Koze – “Pick Up
70: MGMT – “When You Die”
69: Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever – “Talking Straight”
65: Soccer Mommy – “Your Dog”
64: Fabiana Palladino – “Shimmer”
67: Mr Twin Sister – “Echo Arms”
77: Kali Uchis – “In My Dreams”

these all sound a photocopy of a photograph of a memory of watching a tv show in a doctors waiting room. tough to even think of anything to say about this pallid schlock

73: Helena Hauff – “Hyper-Intelligent Genetically Enriched Cyborg

sounds exactly like its title. Cyborgs are joyless unfriendly dicks and the sooner people admit it the better

72: Drake – “Nice for What”

i like this fellows memes where he's wearing a coat

68: Parquet Courts – “Total Football”

great title, unlistenable garbage

66: Ravyn Lenae – “Sticky”

if it was instrumental it would be bearable

Sorry about being so negative, i will say this there weren't that many that were actively painful!

Yes but did you like the Wizkid?

Aw <3

xp

Yes but did you like the Wizkid?

― Matt DC, Tuesday,

I would quite like this as an instrumental! but the vocals are no good for me, why is he so morose. Sounds like he's wasting a sunny Saturday afternoon sat at a desk in front of a mountain of paperwork or dealing with some car insurance problems. I get it, bureaucracy is a pain, I had to transfer out Kane from my fantasy football team when he got injured but sometimes you just have to deal with these things head on

Sounds like he's wasting a sunny Saturday afternoon sat at a desk in front of a mountain of paperwork or dealing with some car insurance problems.
― saer, Tuesday, January 29, 2019 11:57 AM (fifty-six minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

That should have been the blurb for Soco.

Wizkid's vocals are the best part! It's all about how relaxed he sounds, imo.

*is (- grrrrrrrr)

The only thing that could have made Soco even better than it is would be if the other vocalists on it sounded as relaxed and carefree as Wizkid does.

Having gone through the playlist from yesterday the only song I actively dislike is the Andrew WK one, it just has a sort of sports stadium sound/quality to it that I find really off-putting.

I have to admit, I'm not in LOVE with Soco. Wizkid's an absolute afrobeats darling but the only song I really like with him on it is Ma Lo, but that's mostly cos of Tiwa Savage.

I'm fucking gutted I missed the voting thread. Maybe not enough BIG CAPITALS in the thread title this year? It's not like I've strayed far from ILM. Anyway, I only know the Wizkid and Parquet Courts songs so far. Weird choice for PQs - a good opener and Black Flag homage but nowhere near the best track on that album.

But it was a single, and had a fun video, and fuck Tom Brady

The biggest shock for me was that mewithoutYou song, a new don't fear the reaper sounds great to me, excellent track. Do they do heavier shit? Or is this basically the way they always sound?

― Will (kruezer2), Monday, January 28, 2019 10:20 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

check out the most recent album imo, but the answer is: 1. yes (and lighter shit too) 2. not really, “julia” is one of their few songs that is both gentle and aggressive, but if you like it you’ll probably like their other stuff

you didn't ask for it but i'm giving it to you anyway

77: Kali Uchis – “In My Dreams”: this is cute enough, kind of a slightly more boisterous big sister to that dreamy version of 'rock your baby' that emerson kitamura put out this year
76: Red Velvet – “Bad Boy”: i like this quite a bit tbh
75: Laura Jean – “Girls on the TV”: for the sake of your own health, eat less beige food people
74: Andrew W.K. – “Music Is Worth Living For”: sounds like something from quiet riot: the musical
73: Helena Hauff – “Hyper-Intelligent Genetically Enriched Cyborg”: really nice electro that's a lot more warm and tactile than i expected - some satisfyingly moist and splashy synth sounds in there; probably should've listened to the album tbh
72: Drake – “Nice for What”: hey i didn't hate this! well not that much anyhow
71: DJ Koze – “Pick Up": i loved this when i first heard it but it only gets more boring with each subsequent play. gorgeous loop but he takes forever to go absolutely nowhere with it
70: MGMT – “When You Die”: have never heard anything else by these chuckleheads apart from that one fucking song, so i was pleasantly surprised by this. i like the music a lot more than i like the singing though
69: Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever – “Talking Straight”: not terrible but the chorus is really annoying. it makes me sad that blank realm got so roundly ignored while they were around, cos i think they made a better fist of this sort of fidgetty clean-ish hypno-jangle
68: Parquet Courts – “Total Football”: yeah, i'd like to see if these lads could still do it against 'theme from sparta fc' on a wet tuesday night in stoke
67: Mr Twin Sister – “Echo Arms”: i feel like a freelance food writer who's just been assigned a review of ten different off-brand porridges
66: Ravyn Lenae – “Sticky”: solid enough but could do without the comedy vocal effects
65: Soccer Mommy – “Your Dog”: don't mind the singer but this is all a bit mimsy and forgettable. needs more loud
64: Fabiana Palladino – “Shimmer”: eh, this is lame like haim. her voice just makes me wish Laura Groves would hurry up and make another album
63: Toni Braxton – “Long As I Live: haha, this sounds fucking amazing in the context of the rest of this list
62: mewithoutyou – “Julia (or, Holy to the LORD’ on the Bells of Horses)”: getting a cormac mccarthy vibe from that title, song sounds a bit like katatonia? hated the video, like the director was trying to shoot a netflix pilot for some terrible post-stranger things throwback bullshit (but maybe that's all music videos these days i dunno?)
61: Wizkid – “Soco”: don't hate it but wish i could say i liked it more, i'm sorry

i'd also recommend anyone curious about mewithout you check out the ep that accompanied the album they put out last year (both are named untitled), totally different side of them

yeah parquet courts were definitely going for a Fall thing, sans bite

Voted for: Kali Uchis, Red Velvet, Toni Braxton
Voted for the B-side instead: DJ Koze (and NIckB OTM about the A-side)
Best discovery: Mr Twin Sister (was put off by their name until now; listened to half the album last night and that was rather good too)

Love how for most of the year everyone's being nice about music they like in cosy self-contained threads, then in January we all come together to tell everyone else the music they like is boring and shit.

:D

I'm restraining myself so far tbf - but as soon as y'all lay into something I REALLY like then no holds will be barred. Only Acting will probably be a sparkpoint

sans bite

Things I still find amusing although I'm no longer 14: 'bite' (pronounced like 'beet') means 'penis' in French.

You assume I didn't know that ;)

Boringly the only thing from yesterday I actively hate is the Drake track, which I haven't listened to. Soccer Mommy was dull, not awful, just dull. Everything else was very good and you should all congratulate yourselves for voting for it.

My comment wasn't necessarily meant for the author of those lines. ;)

xp

(tbf, I knew it meant SOMETHING but I figured I'd leave the translingual pun to the gods - and how they delivered!)

sounds like something from quiet riot: the musical

lol, it's true. nickb also otm re: long as I live as well, my fav of what I hadn't heard

pick up is like a 10 second snippet from some avalanches mix left to loop maddeningly, simmering in its own yearning. it's both too long and wldn't be as good if it was shorter

the breakdown in nice for what is proper hectic and plays against drake's simpering softness

imo soccer mommy has a command of melody and economy that most other songwriters in her field do not have, i'm not sure "your dog" is wholly representative of that though. i was surprised johnny fever likes "skin" the most bc i have referred to it as her taylor swift song

'Dick' is a more appropriate translation tbf but I enjoying scanning it as 'sans penis'.

2xp

I like almost everything that's placed so far, imagine hating so much music damn

Wait, this isn't Rolling Worst Music of 2018?

i was surprised johnny fever likes "skin" the most bc i have referred to it as her taylor swift song

― jolene club remix (BradNelson), Tuesday, January 29, 2019 7:28 AM (eight minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

actually i'd like to walk this back a little on revisit. something about her voice and the way she lingers on detail reminds me of swift regardless

check out the most recent album imo, but the answer is: 1. yes (and lighter shit too) 2. not really, “julia” is one of their few songs that is both gentle and aggressive, but if you like it you’ll probably like their other stuff

Liked (and voted for) Julia but couldn't get into the album bar one or two other tracks. Not a fan when the screaming is much higher up in the mix.

http://i.imgur.com/YtBE5Tr.jpg

60: Cardi B featuring Bad Bunny and J Balvin – “I Like It” - 181 points - 8 votes
video

Bodak Yellow is:

http://www.thesinglesjukebox.com/?p=25750

Cardi B flips this most standard of boogaloo standards into Latin trap and has two of the biggest and so most demographically advantageous performers of urban Caribbean music jump on it with her. In a year when the fever-swamps of poisonous discourse and xenophobic hatred are way past critical levels, this celebration of a few of three Latinx stars’ favorite things stands out all the more for its full-throated self-regarding glee. – Jonathan Bogart

“I Like It” somehow manages the seemingly impossible task of salvaging a song that heretofore existed in the current popular American consciousness almost exclusively thanks to a fucking Burger King commercial. And it’s only like maybe the fifth or sixth best song on Invasion of Privacy! – Josh Love

there was a thread about this track vs boo'd up vs sth else

I don't

Massive airplay for this track in South Florida, thanks to its Latin roots. I find "I Like It Like That" rather obnoxious myself.

does make me wanna get a freakin' Whopper

oh wow that's surprisingly low

it's fine but only being exposed to "i like it like that" through its constant presence in commercials etc. doesn't make it easy to like

this song is like a YouTube advert and if you're lucky you get to click away after 5 seconds rather than the full 30. actually I think that's where I've heard it before

Voted for the album, this is probably my fifth favourite track off it.

that's about right

lol I have officially no clue what's likely for the top 10, not that I voted for this not-bad song

I'll take this one as a really bad joke if you guys haven't also voted for something off Vibras, like Mi Gente.

And "Reggaeton" obviously.

http://i.imgur.com/tin0ksz.jpg

59: Prince Kaybee featuring Busiswa and TNS - “Banomoya” – 184 points – 5 votes
video

rolling afropop / afrobeats 2018

http://www.thesinglesjukebox.com/?p=26599

Store light bass leaps up and starts riding the pinpoint, juggling drums as washing froth synths drift in and over Busiswah’s authoritatively, aggressive voice, which sharply roots the song, allowing it to expand into the ozone layer as she pulls the tendrils into the soil. TNS comes in and clumsily tumbles around while Busiswah keeps putting back down roots he has already knocked out. As the block percussion sinks in, Prince Kaybee pumps more and more air as Busiswah places the last root. – Nortey Dowuona

They had me from the opening bass line. The spareness underscores the impact of those splashes of keyboard color. The sonic approach I’ve wanted from Blood Orange. – Alfred Soto

oh i didn't expect this to place at all, a total banger that i voted for