50. Teenage Halloween - Clarity
It isn't easy to pull off an earnest punk song that doesn't go short on feelings. "All-day jobs are capitalist," "gentrifying is so careless, nobody cares that they're complacent," "sick of all of my friends dying" all ring out as pretty basic truths of The Frustrated. The raw edges in Luke Hendricks's voice fit the mood perfectly, and the soaring surges in the brief choruses of "Clarity! Clarity! Clarity!" seem to fall between pleas and shouts of triumph. Hits pretty hard for a song barely over 2 minutes.
49. Dua Lipa - Cool
One of the best parts about a lot of the tracks on Future Nostalgia, for me, is how full and spacey the rhythm sections can be. There's a patient, gently plodding bass line above a slowly staccato keyboard foundation that just makes the vocals sound like they're floating. And of course, being an A-list pop star means the production values are almost stiflingly high. A lot of care goes into putting songs like this together, making sure each hook and effect lingers in your ears even after the song ends. Without getting melodramatic, "Cool" has all the exuberance you want out of a song that feels like a summer night down the shore: Enough self-assurance to be relaxed, but enough lust for life to still feel like going out to get it.
48. Everything Everything - Arch Enemy
I think you'd have had a hard time persuading 22-year-old me to think he'd eventually get so into highbrow political art rock, but the thing about Everything Everything is that they just make it so easy. There's urgency in each song, and a lot of foreboding feelings surrounding all of RE-ANIMATOR. "Arch Enemy" bubbles along like industrial flubber, the assembly-line drums getting a bit more...animated as the bass and guitar flutter about in the choruses as Jon Higgs bleats "You put the poison into me, now I'm lonely without you" in his trademark falsetto.
47. Loose Buttons - Something Better
I'm hesitant to call songs that tip a hat to the mid-2000s as "throwbacks" because, dear god the aging, but there's a pretty distinct 2005-06 feel to the megaphoned vocals and ever-so-slightly frazzled guitar pedaling. I like it! It sounds a lot like my college radio DJing days, so you'll always get a place on my lists when you do this good a job bringing me back there.
46. Frances Quinlan - Your Reply
Speaking of distinct, it's hard to mistake the Hop Along lead's voice when it goes hunting for those higher notes. Here, on a solo effort, Quinlan hits a highlight with this more deliberate, almost pazz-and-jop kind of single. Its piano verses sound like something that should soundtrack a traveling montage in a movie or TV show. It feels bright and airy, even if the lyrics smack of something a bit more heartbroken or forlorn. It's catchy and smart. Boxes: Checked.
45. Beach Bunny - Dream Boy
A hooky powerpop jangle that bops around the stage earnestly, "Dream Boy" is one of a couple of examples on Honeymoon that beseeches some great unknown to requite lead singer Lili Trefilio's love. It's a song about knowing and being true to yourself, and sticking up for that even if it means that love has to go unrequited for a little longer. Better than matching for matching's sake.
44. La Roux - 21st Century
Created and produced in the (titular) 21st century, this song often feels like it's from anytime but. All I see when I close my eyes and hear the easy chord progressions stepping up and down are big hairdos, lots of eyeshadow, and rollerskates. It's got an obvious groove but stays away from being "danceable," hardly to its detriment.
43. Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever - She's There
Even for a RBCF song, this song starts fast out of the gate, every instrument chiming in at once at a 4-minute mile runner's pace. And running feels appropriate, since the band describe the track as “that feeling in a dream where you need to be somewhere, and you don’t really know why, but you are determined to overcome every obstacle to get there," and the music video tries to recreate that exact scenario. It is, exactly like you might think for basically any RBCF song, very catchy and instantly toe-tappable.
42. Bartees Strange - Boomer
From a guy who reinterpreted National songs to cobble together a covers EP, this is pretty definitively Not The National. It's more like alt-country TV On the Radio, which is kind of a wild thought in and of itself to me. Whatever you liken it to, it rocks, and barely stops to take a breath. It's captivating, and sounds like it would absolutely bring a house down on tour. I only miss concerts a tiny bit.
41. Perfume Genius - Without You
I'm incredibly hard-pressed to come up with an artist who can put together songs that are altogether operatic, wounded, angelic, and...grooveable like Mike Hadreas. Every song isn't like this one, and if it were then each Perfume Genius album would be emotionally exhausting instead of just some kind of fascination. This is a capturing of a particular moment when you start to fall for someone, or even just the realization that you fell for them long ago. Timing isn't really relevant; it's a celebration of that moment, whenever it comes and however hard it hits, and it resonates for just as long.
