Top Songs of 2019: 61-80

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80. “Déjà Vu” 

SOAK
Grim Town

79. “Higher Love (single)” 

Kygo & Whitney Houston

We generally know the music world pretty well but Steve Winwood and Jackson Browne are two names we've always heard without being able to name a single song. This year covers of each singer appear on the list.  

78. “You” 

MARINA 

LOVE + FEAR

77. “Good Side (single)” 

Liz Phair

...

76. “Limitless” 

Sudan Archives

Athena

75. “Hand Mouth Dancer” 

Pond
Tasmania

Weird video of the year nominee number 1. 

74. “Mess” 

Noah Kahan

Busyhead

Technically, 89 will only get you as far as Concord, which would also work syllabically.

73. “Juice” 

Lizzo
Cuz I Love You

72. “Black Cadillac (single)” 

Mondo Cozmo

Very Velvets

71. “The Elephant” 

B.O.B.
Southmatic

Misogynistic as fuck, but that "Bob Bob Bob Bob Bob Bob Bob Bob Bob" is a heck of an earworm.  

70. “Life Must Go On (single)” 

Quinn XCII

We non-ironically like the guys music, but everything about Quin XCII seems a bit on-the-nose. Listen to his music and it is no surprise that sharing your student ID gets you a merch discount on his website. 

69. “True Blue (feat. Angel Olsen)” 

Mark Ronson
Late Night Feelings 

68. “My Way” 

Alana D.
Isn't It Romantic (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) 

67. “Wisconsin Wedding” 

Bombadil
Beautiful Country

66. “Western Stars” 

Bruce Springsteen
Western Stars 

65. “Destiny” 

Burna Boy

African Giant 

Though Damini Ogulu falls lower on the song list this year than 2018, African Giant (one of two LPs he released this year) would be a top 20 album for the year.  

64. “To Noise Making (Sing)” 

Hozier
Wasteland, Baby! 

It is unclear if Hozier still gives student ID discounts. 

63. “Riding Solo (single)” 

Hinds

Hinds has been singing in English for several years now but their pronunciation is still endearingly (intentionally?) weird.

62. “Can I Go On” 

Sleater-Kinney

The Center Won't Hold

61. “Started Out (single)” 

Georgia

Official album release on Jan 10 may offer the first additions to the 2020 list.  

Top Songs of 2019: 81-100

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Apple Music Link

100. "Woman Oh Woman"

Harry Nilsson 

Losst and Founnd

In what has become the nostalgia/reissue spot, Nilsson's estate caps a renaissance year (thanks to several hundred plays of "Gotta Get Up" in Russian Doll) with an album of lost tracks.  

99. “Best for You” 

Blood Cultures
Oh Uncertainty! A Universe Despairs

98. “Might be Right” 

White Reaper
You Deserve Love 

97. “MONOPOLY (single)” 

Ariana Grande  & Victoria Monet

It may be the residual goodwill from all those "Santa Tell Me" plays over the holidays but this is Ms. Grande's first appearance on the list.   

96. “All My Friends Are Pretty” 

Sarah Jaffe 

SMUT 

We were introduced to Sarah Jaffe via the extremely offbeat (in a good way) 2018 movie Never Goin' Back. 

95. “Verona” 

Kligande
The Album

Yes, it is super derivative of "Jubel", but that may have been a top 30 song of the decade for us (underappreciated in its time at #9 in 2014). 

94. “Diane Mozart” 

Saint Motel

The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack - Vol. 1

93. “Telepathy” 

Jai Wolf
The Cure to Loneliness

92. “Bullet From a Gun” 

Skepta
Ignorance Is Bliss

91. “Betty Who”

Betty Who
Betty

The 80's start to kick in at the 1:06 mark and fully arrive at 1:26.    

90. “Apologize (single)” 

Grandson  

"I lose a bit of myself with every selfie / lose sleep over wealth, it's not healthy / finding a new religion on Yelp to come help me / praying to the label itself, 'Do not shelf me' "

89. “Rocket” 
Steve Mason
About the Light

88. “Burned By The Love (single)” 
Juke Ross

"Still the choir plays on / they ain't playing our song"

87. “Waterphone (single)” 

Seabear


The outfit behind on our top albums of the last decade (The Ghost That Carried us Away was #42 of the 2000s) returns after a 9-year absence with a new single. 

86. “Slip (single)” 

AMA 

85. “1972” 

Broken Social Scene

Let's Try the After (Vol. 1) - EP

 

84. “You'll Need a New Backseat Driver” 

The New Pornographers
In the Morse Code of the Brake Lights


Overall, ItMCotBL was a disappointing album from one of our favorites, but the album title (and song lyric here) is one of the best on 2019. 

83. “Down” 

Hemlock Ernst & Kenny Segal
Back at the House

82. “Thunderclouds” 

LSD

LABRINTH, SIA & DIPLO PRESENT... LSD

81. “Meet Me at the End of the World Again” 

Jesse Malin
Sunset Kids

Top Songs of 2018: 1 - 20

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Spotify link

20. “I Won't Run From It” 

Big Red Machine

Big Red Machine

"it's a very hard thing to have grief"

Hopefully the debut from Justin Vernon (Bon Iver) and Aaron Dessner (The National) is not a one off, but something the pair return to when taking a break from their day jobs (similar to James Mercer w/ Broken Bells).  

19. “Heaven's Only Wishful”  

MorMor

"I'm just a poor boy / waiting for answers" 

18. “Me and My Husband” 

Mitski 

Be the Cowboy

"at least in this lifetime / we're sticking together"

We at ATHoM love final tracks. In an album filled with relationship uncertainty, "Me and My Husband" begins with a deep exhale and what follows is a jaunty and a mildly hopeful (still cynical) acceptance of what works in life, at the end of life. It is a perfect album coda. And it is track 7 of 14 for some reason.  

17. “Crown” 

Flatbush Zombies feat. Portugal. The Man. 

"but excuse my aggression / 'cause my tribe called for questions / if I'm made in god's image / tell me why am I blemished?"

16. “Tremolo” 

Young Fathers

Cocoa Sugar

"climbing on a ladder to redeem my fortress / poor with money but I know what love is"

15. “People Get Old” 

Lori McKenna  

The Tree

"babies grow up / and houses get sold / and that's how it goes"

Mileage may vary here based on your age and desire for subtlety. It is very on the nose, down to the explicit title. It's like if "Cats in the Cradle" was called "I'm a Bad Father" and had a matching chorus. Still ... shit... maybe the only thing harder than getting old yourself is seeing it happen to the people around you and McKenna nails it.  

14. “Stand Up Tragedy” 
The Fratellis 

In Your Own Sweet Time

"you look like salvation / but you taste like a refugee"

13. “La Marcheuse” 

Christine and the Queens
Chris

Chris is a double album with French and English versions of each song. Maybe the French versions seem better to us because it is her native language. But more likely it is because dumb/simplistic lyrics are often a liability and here the vocals are merely another instrument (one year of high school French does very little). 

12. “This is America” 

Childish Gambino

"get your money"

Donald Glover entered the year with one sure thing (Solo) and two riskier bets (Season 2 of the incredibly ambitious Atlanta and a single/video that attempts to satirically address race in 2018 America). That's why they play the games.  

11. “Orgasm of Death” 

The Growlers 
Casual Acquaintances

"vices squeeze us 'til we're blue / me and you / that's of no concern to me / that doesn't cause me misery".

10. “Takes So Much” 
Waxahatchee 
Great Thunder EP

"I say / you will hit the bottom harder each time" 

9. “High” 
Young Thug feat. Elton John
On The Run EP

The second "hiiiiiiiiiiiiigh" in each chorus (the Young Thug version) is probably our favorite use of autotune. 

8. “Everybody Wants to Be Famous” 
Superorganism
Superorganism

"everybody wants and nobody's ashamed" 

Superorganism was odd in places, but wasn't quite the carnival freakshow that the early singles suggested. We would have enjoyed a greater embrace of the weird in places, but here the (relative) restraint is a benefit. 

7. “Set to Attack” 
Albert Hammond Jr 
Francis Trouble

"I was still hoping / that you were the victory / to what felt like love" 

Even with Hammond's high ranking here and several Julian appearances over the years, Fabrizio Moretti still holds the ATHoM title for best non-Strokes effort by any member of the band (Little Joy's "Next Time Around"). 

6. “In a River” 
Rostam

"we got dreams / we keep together / we got time to spend / oh hell yeah"

We obviously like the song enough to rank it here, but can still appreciate this random person on the internet: "I wish the lyrics for his song with the mandolin didn't sound so much like lyrics from a song with a mandolin"

5. “One That Suits Me” 
Hop Along
Bark Your Head Off, Dog

"of course I am for peace / one that suits me"

Frances Quinlan has maybe our favorite singing voice in rock today. 

4. “If You Know You Know” 
Pusha T 
DAYTONA

"when we all clicking like Golden State / and you and your team are the motorcade" 

3. “One Trick Ponies” 
Kurt Vile  
Bottle It In

"'some are weird as hell / but we love 'em /  some are one trick ponies / but we embrace 'em" 

This is basically Pretty Pimpin' 2.0, but maybe the song title is a subtle nod to that. Plus, we've always had a soft spot for repetition. 

2. “Keep a Little Soul” 
Tom Petty 
An American Treasure

Mark Maron said the only thing Americans can agree on these days are burritos and Tom Petty. An unearthed song from 1982 shouldn't be here, but no "new" new song made us happier this year. 

  

1. “Ghost Town” 
Kanye West feat. John Legend, Kid Cudi and 070 Shake 
ye

"some day the drama'll be gone / and they'll play this on and on"

In an underwhelming year for music, is the placement of a non-inner-circle Kanye track at #1 (Kanye has never placed higher than #2 at ATHoM) a statement? A backlash to the backlash? Not consciously, and we certainly lost further respect for Kanye the person this year. But weren't we already in "bitch, you knew i was a snake" territory? For their part, music critics have certainly tried to pretend that ye didn't exist, instead only allowing themselves to sprinkle occasional praise to his G.O.O.D. production efforts like Pusha (at #4 above). 

Let's put the music first for a second. This is a 5-part song (with only one part repeated) in which every segment works and is worth looking forward to: 1) a killer sample from Shirley Ann Lee that morphs into 2) the best vocals from John Legend since he worked at BCG (especially the mumbled "now I'm livin' high and doing what i wanna") into 3) Scott Mescudi's slurred and repeated mantra that could be Kanye's epitaph to 4) Kanye's most self-aware verse since "Runaway" (quite a feat given how bad his lyrics have been post-MBDTF) and finally 5) 070 Shake's haunting coda. In the Ringer's exit survey for the album, someone called this track a ripoff of fun.'s "Some Nights", presumably because of the "we're still the kids we used to be" line. That's simply stupid. This isn't reactionary, this is the #1 song of the year. Kanye is a trainwreck, but he remains our favorite unstable genius. 


Full top 100 (counting up, 101 tracks due to the tie at 28):

Apple Music

Spotify