Sunday, January 12, 2020

Top 30 Songs of the 2010s, Part 2

Picking up where we left off:


20. The Decemberists - "Till the Water Is All Gone"

This is a nice, slow one. I'm not quite sure what it's about -- something about guarding a water supply, people who come down from the mountains, a long dead daughter, etc. You know. All the usual stuff you hear in Top radio.


19. Alvvays - "Plimsoll Punks"

So I blew it in 2018 when I named this my Top Song of the year, considering it was actually released in 2017. Oops! But I know that this time, I got the decade right. Anyway, this is a high-energy winner with by this Toronto indie pop band.


18. I Am the Avalanche - "Anna Lee"

This was the best track on this Long Island punk band's 2014 LP Wolverines. It features the charismatic, but gravel voiced, Vinnie Caruana singing a tribute to a fallen friend.


17. Coldplay - "A Sky Full of Stars"

Wikipedia refers to this as Coldplay's first dance track. I don't know about that. But it is a very upbeat, smile-inducing love song. Whenever I hear people say they hate Coldplay, I refer them to this song.


16. Deerheart - "Wolfman Moon"

You just can't beat a good song that goes "Ah-ooo!" Just ask Warren Zevon. This was a winning track from Long Islander Deerheart's excellent 2012 rock opera The Cordon Bleu Years.


15. Boheme - "Even the Mistakes"

Boheme was a musical project by former Antigone Rising lead singer Cassidy Catanzaro (aka Cassidy). This is a very upbeat and danceable track, which encourages you get out there and live your life, because "Even the mistakes are gonna be great!" Hmph! Tell that to the dead hooker in my trunk. (Disclaimer: What I said there was just a tasteless joke. Hookers are human beings who in no way, shape or form deserve to be murdered and stuffed into people's trunks. Politicians, on the other hand ... well, the less said the better.)


14. Twenty One Pilots - "Heathens"

This was the best song from the Suicide Squad soundtrack. It's one of those songs that starts out quietly and then just explodes into a wall of sound. (Spoiler: Then it gets quiet again.) The video is pretty good, too, and features plenty of Harley Quinn. I thought you'd want to know that.


13. Daft Punk - "Get Lucky"

This was pretty much the song of the summer for 2013. It features the French electronica robots of Daft Punk and American singer Pharrell Williams staying up all night in hopes of getting into some hot girl's pants. (This was before the #MeToo movement, kiddies.) It's totally one of those tracks that you've just got to move along with.


12. Sia - "My Love"

This song was actually my first exposure to Australian songstress Sia. It's a slow, dramatic track from the 2010 soundtrack for the Twilight series film Eclipse. It's a tribute from the protagonist/singer to her dead lover who seems to have been some kind of heroic rebel leader who taught her how to fight and be strong. I'm a sucker for that kind of stuff.


11. Bayside - "Sick, Sick, Sick"

This is one of Anthony Raneri's best bad relationship songs. He wrote it after divorcing his first wife, and it starts out with him cursing the magistrate who married them in the first place, so you know it's going to be good. Wikipedia used to say that his wife was a porn film actress, which fits in with the lyrics about her "sexcapades" delivering checks, but they've since scrubbed his page of that juicy bit of gossip. Regardless, this is one of those frenetic, angry Bayside tracks that was always destined to be a winner.


OK, we're the through the middle portion of out Top Songs of the 2010's list. And as great as these have been, the next list is the one you've been waiting for - my Top 10 Songs of the previous decade. Any guesses? (Hint: There's no Justin Bieber to be found. There is a rap song, though. Sort of. I'll let you mull that one over.) I'll be back in a day or so to remove the shroud of mystery, as it were. (Unless I get hauled to the hoosegow for that whole "hooker in the trunk" thing.)