Ray's Top 20 songs of 2018

IT'S THAT TIME OF YEAR AGAIN, and so I emerge from another period of radio silence to list of my top 20 favourite songs of the year. Thanks to uni i havent listened to as much new music as I would have liked to in the last third of 2018 (Although several songs from it are still represented), so dont go into this thinking its some kind of objective overview of the year in music. Also, my criteria for a song to get on here is that it has to have either been released this year on been on an album released this year (even if it came out at the end of 2017). Lets go:

Honourable Mention: 6ix9ine - BILLY




Bear with me, bear with me, I KNOW 6ix9ine is a terrible human being, but to be fair thats pretty much the appeal of his music to begin with. Listen to  'BILLY' once and it's clear it's a terrible, awful, borderline unlistenable song, but I love it to death. The sheer absurdity of a rainbow-coloured young man with '69' tattooed on his forehead screeching primary-school bully tier lyrics with a voice of burnt gravel is the epitome of so-bad-it's-good. So for what may be the most unintentionally hilarious song of the year, 6ix9ine makes the list.

20. SOPHIE - Faceshopping




On the actually good side of things is 'Faceshopping' by Sophie, a song which, to me at least, feels like its been thrown into 2018 from the future. Complete with it's rather terrifying music video, Sophie tackles consumerism... maybe? And identity... maybe. No matter what the song is about, it sounds like a firework display going off inside a metal bin, which is good enough for me.

19. St Vincent - Fast Slow Disco




One of my favourite albums of last year was 'MASSEDUCTION' by St. Vincent. One of my least favourite songs on the album was 'Slow Disco'. For some reason - possibly just for the sake of having a slightly funny in-joke song title - the originally solemn track was twisted into a synth-pop banger. And now I like it more than nearly every other song on 'MASSEDUCTION'. Huh.

18. The Voidz - QYURRYUS




'QYURRYUS' sounds unlike I've anything I've ever heard. The guitar work sounds more like sirens and malfunctioning machines than 'music', and at least of half of Julian Casablancas' lyrics are incomprehensibly murmured or shouted in a guttaral, almost Asian-inspired way, until the song evolves into a weird Ariel Pink-esque chant, with auto-tuned ad-libs. The complete antithesis to anyone complaining about the Strokes constantly looking backwards into history for inspiration.

17. They Might Be Giants - I Left My Body




On their latest LP They Might Be Giants proclaimed that they 'Like Fun'. 'I Left My Body' follows a character who drifts out of his body and cant get back in, waiting endlessly in an unbearable purgatory. I'm not sure if They Might Be Giants like fun.

16. Jeff Rosenstock -Yr Throat



I had some trouble picking the stand-out track from 'POST-', but ultimately 'Yr Throat' is the song which holds up best almost a year after the January 1st release date of the album. It probably helps that it does sound like a Christmas song in many ways, albeit a Christmas song about crushing dread. Jeff always manages to come up with vocal melodies that stick in your brain after a single listen and refuse to leave, and 'Yr Throat' stands amongst 'Festival Song' and 'Nausea' as his best work.

15. U.S. Girls - M.A.H



Thankfully obnoxious anti-trump music was on the fade this year on the whole, but we still got one political middle-finger worth keeping thanks to U.S. Girls disco-infused, Kylie Minogue-esque jam 'Mad As Hell (M.A.H.)'. Sounding like a lost gem from the seventies yet grounded firmly in 2018, this is a great example on how to make political music that is as listenable as it is thought-provoking.

14.Mitski - Two Slow Dancers

 

One of two songs on this list about slow dancing, the finale of Mitski's latest LP is the rare ballad that manages to enthrall me. The music is beautiful, as is Mitski's gentle singing, but what really pulls this song together are the lyrics, which manage to escape the tediously over-wraught, melodramatic lyrics that make similar ballads fail. The arresting first line - 'Does it smell like a school gymnasium in here' is maybe my favourite lyric of the year, instantly bringing up nostalgia, sex and longing that ride out on every metaphor and pondering thought Mitski pours into the rest of the wonderfully brief runtime.

13.Beach House - Pay No Mind



The central melody of 'Pay No Mind' sounds remarkably familiar, to the point where I had to look up the chord sequence to see if I could find some earlier version, but I couldnt. Either way, 'Pay No Mind' is the most relaxing, blissful and transcendental dream-pop song of the year. The song sounds like sitting in a tiny wooden hut by a fire, watching the stars in the night sky, or something equally romantic.

12. Daughters - The Reason They Hate Me



And on the opposite end of the musical spectrum is Daughters with 'The Reason They Hate Me'. Pretty much any song from 'You Won't Get You Want'  could have been here, but this late track on the album starts with a bang and just keeps getting more and more intense until the first chorus - perhaps climax is a more apprpropriate term - where the broken-machinery guitar-riff turns into a demonic printer edging out soul-stabbing shrieks. Exciting, explosive and terrifying this is the musical equivalent of a really great horror movie.

11. Janelle Monae - Make Me Feel



'Make Me Feel' is exactly the type of song that 80s Prince would have made in 2018, and that kind of 80s  worship carries over to the impressive music video, one of many Monae released this year. Don't get caught thinking this is mere throwback music - Greta Van Fleet this aint - Monae updates the 'Kiss' esque elements of 'make Me Feel' with 2000s girl-group harmonies and a slight off-kilter-ness that makes everything sound somehow even more colourful and rich than even Prince could manage.

10. The 1975 - Love it if We Made It



I don't particularly consider myself to be a fan of the 1975 but they manage to consistently release a few incredible singles every album cycle. Last time it was 'Love Me' and 'The Sound' , but I think they've out-done themselves this time with 'Love it if We Made It', which is surely their best song yet. Matt Healy shouts the lyrics so passionately you cant help but pay attention to what he's saying - and what he's saying is pretty amazing, the lyrics taking the form of a 'We didn't Start the Fire' or 'It's The End Of The World As We Know It' stream of consciousness of relevant news topics. This makes the song sound absolutely massive, as if the entire world as it is is encapsulated in a chaotic four minute pop song. Best of all is the ultimately hopeful sentiment that we've been lacking in so much pop music for the past few years, as Healy sings 'Modernity has failed us - but I'd love it if we made it.'

9.Kanye West - Ghost town



Whatever KanyeWest does, says or changes his name to, I don't really care as long as he keeps dropping songs as musically varied, unique and ultimately powerful as 'Ghost Town'. Every one of the many guests that pop up here in just a few short minutes add immensley to the song, from Kid Cudi's heartfelt chorus to 070 SHAKE's euphoric outro of the song whcih builds up, collapses and builds again bigger over and over until only that unforgettable melody is lodged in your head.

8.Death Grips - Black Paint



This is the song that grew on me the most over 2018. On my first few listens I could barely get a grip on any kind of melody or instrument within the super-dense mix of 'Black Paint', but upon further listens (Especially when turned up loud), this is one of the most forceful and exciting as well as by far one of the heaviest songs Death Grips have ever produced. The chorus of 'BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM' is as fun to scream along to as anything you could want from MC Ride and the bass is so thicc it practically sounds like the sonic equivalent of... well, black paint.

7.Kero Kero Bonito - Only Acting



Surely my biggest musical surprise of 2018 was 'Only Acting'. It starts off with a hollow, industrial beat and immediately it's clear something is... off. 'Bonito generation' was a joyful, cute and child-like album, and on 'Only Acting' KKB grew up big time, taking influences from contemporaries like Jeff Rosenstock and of all people, Death Grips to make a catchy but wonderfully dark meditation on social media and identity, complete with a key change that (On the album) is sharply interrupted by distorted interference.

6.MGMT - When You Die



It's almost a year to the day of me writing this that this completely whacked out psychadelic jam was sprung on to the world by musical pranksters MGMT. Complete with proabably my favourite music video of the year, the individual elements of 'When You Die' are so bizarre that when they come together its impossible to know whether you should laugh or be terrified. With only a single extended chorus, the main hook of the song funtions as 'GO FUCK YOURSELF', which pretty much exemplifies this idea. If your gonna do LSD at least do yourself the favour of listening to this while you trip out.

5.Anna Von HaussWolf - The Mysterious Vanishing Of Electra



It's rare for a song to genuinely unnerve me, but 'the Mysterious Vanishing Of Electra', with it's crushing repeating riff and razor-edge vocals manages to be unsettling and thrilling on every repeated listen. After three minutes of tense build-up the real climax of the song bursts unexpectedly just when you think the coast is clear. Inspired by recent Swans albums it may be, but Anna Von Hausswolff manages to channel Michael Gira's cackle into a more theatrical and dramatic as well as arguably more accessible piece of sound.

4.joji - Slow Dancing in the Dark



The other huge musical surprise for me this year was just how much I adored this song by Joji. Every other song the man's made has been mediocre at best, but Jesus Christ this song just hits me. The nocturnal, underwater soundscape constructed in the production manages to sound cutting edge - this is totally what pop music will sound like in several years time -  and Joji finally flexes his lyrical and vocal muscles. The climactic shout of the songs title in the chorus is maybe the most cathartic I've heard all year and the hopeless-romantic lyrics manage to sum up Joji's entire appeal in the most mature and original way yet. Hopefully Joji will sound more like this in the future and less like 'Test Drive'.

3.Haru Nemuri - sekaiwotorikaeshiteokure



Sometimes you hear a song from a scene you've never explored that makes you wonder what you've been missing out on all this time. This song (I'm not gonna try to write that name any more times than I have to) by Haru Nemei is a perfect example of this. Sounding just enough like Western rock music to draw me in, the vocoded backing vocals, explosive choruses, key changes and over-lapping melodies combine to make a song that I may not understand but I completely adore - especially when it breaks into a hugely impressive rap verse of all things in it's bridge. It sounds like the world ending, in Japanese.

2.Car Seat Headrest - Nervous Young Inhumans



Yes, there are proabably better songs on 'Twin Fantasy'. 'Beach Life-In-Death', 'Famous Prophets (Stars)' and 'Bodies' and 'Sober To Death' etc, etc. But for some reason this is the song I've been coming back to all year. Maybe it's the Killers-esque synth line, maybe it's just how the now-audible lyrics are some of the best on the album, maybe it's the way Will Toledo sings 'You'll get what you want and you will get what you deserve', or maybe its just that since its basically the shortest proper song on the album it's the one I feel like I can never hear enough times.

1.Kids See ghosts - Reborn




For the third year in a row I've had trouble naming my 'song of the year' - once again there hasn't been one specific song that felt so much better than everything else that I could immediately place it at the top. But there has to be a winner, and 'Reborn' is deserving as you can get. Innovative, unique, relaxing and ultimately transcendental, this track (along with 'Cudi Montage') feels destined to save thousands of lives purely through the catharsis and hope contained within it. That's not even to mention just how beautifully cathartic it is to see two of the music industries most publicly troubled individuals - Kanye West and Kid Cudi - come together to spread a message of hope, and one that sounds damn good at that. Keep movin' forward.

February Album reviews

Justin Timberlake - Man Of The Woods

This album is getting totally roasted by critics, and for the most part it deserves it, although I will also say that I don't think this is an outright awful project overall. Some parts are undeniably bad: the pretentious interludes, 'Supplies' (Along with it's music video) and the uncomfortable 'Sauce' - but most of the stuff here is just uninteresting. It's hard to imagine anyone particularly hating or liking 'The Hard Stuff' or 'Flannel' or the just-as-boring-as-the-title-suggests 'Livin' Off The Land' and 'Breeze Off The Pond'. There are even a few songs I enjoy here, the title track is a mid-tier Timberlake song and 'Filthy' is an incredibly brave if unfitting and awkward choice for the opening track. Even the more pop-country leaning 'Young Man' and 'Say Something' are pleasant enough. Hell, one of my biggest problems with JT in general is mostly absent here, as the songs don't climb into tedious 7-minute plus runtimes. So maybe not as bad as people are making it out to be, but no classic. 4.4/10

Dream Wife - Dream Wife

It seems Dream Wife have released a fairly average power pop album which has been favourably compared to the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, but I don't hear it. Nobody could argue anything on here is as good as 'Maps', but discounting this unfair comparison (Which is almost entirely because both bands are fronted by women and in the same genre), 'Dream Wife' is an album which would be better if it didn't sound like so many British 'Saviours of rock' from the 2010s as the music press tries to sell second-rate indie music to a fanbase which has moved on. Absolutely nothing is wrong with this album, it's just not what indie rock needs, and sounds like it could have come out about 10 years ago. 5.2/10

Rich Brian - Amen

Formerly known as Rich Chigga, Rich Brian is a trap-rapper that makes music which could only have come out in 2018, with lyrics heavily focused on internet culture and production which exemplifies the mish-mash of genres that my generation has been exposed to thanks to streaming. The production is the most appealing aspect of 'Amen', with songs like 'Cold' having a soundscape juicier than the majority of trap. Unfortunately despite having some great singles this album is ultimately held back by the lyrics, which aside from several lines every song, are the typical trap topics of sex ('Kitty'), flexing ('Occupied') and haters ('Enemies'). 6.3/10

Hookworms - Microshift

This is one of the most ambitious and surreal rock albums I've found so far this year. With strong influences from The Flaming Lips and Animal Collective (Specifically 'Merriweather Post Pavilion', with 'The Soft Season' sounding like an outtake from that very album), this is largely still a very original album. Filled with synth interludes and lengthy compositions, this would usually not be a particularly accessible album, but the melodies are so captivating. 7.9/10




TDE - Black Panther Soundtrack

Surprisingly cohesive, and I do quite like 'All The Stars' (Basically by SZA) and 'I Am' (Basically by Jorja Smith), but Kendrick is largely disappointing and FUTURE's god-awful falsetto on 'King's Dead' is one of the worst things i've heard all year. (Also the film was fairly average). 5.8/10







MGMT - Little Dark Age 

I was really hoping that 'Little dark age'  would live up to the 80s-drenched single of the same name, and it definitely has. Nothing on here even really sounds much like the song 'Little Dark Age' other than gothic synthpop anthem 'One Thing Left To Try', but all of the songs are linked by a fun-filled homage to the electronic side of the 80s, from the glorious silliness of 'She Works Out Too Much' and 'Me and Michael' to the morbidly twisted 'When You Die', with it's bendy, quirky riffs and expletive lyrics. It's not perfect, and while no track is below average the LP is certainly front loaded with it's four best songs being the first four tracks, but it's hard to complain when the closer 'Hand It Over' rolls in. 8.5/10

The Wombats - Beautiful People Will Ruin Your Life

I have a love-hate relationship with The Wombats, and much of their material teeters on an awkward line between great and awful. I can't stand the twee cheesiness of 'Let's Dance To Joy Division', yet I've been playing 'Be Your Shadow' since it was released in 2015. This new album sadly falls mainly onto the twee cheesy side of things and I can't get behind it. The synthpop of their last album has been swapped out for an awkward combination of post-punk and pop that works alright on 'Lemon to a Knife Fight' but usually falls flat. The lyrics try desperately to be smart, especially shown on 'Turn', and it ends up becoming cringe-worthy. 4.5/10


U.S Girls - In a Poem Unlimited
This is a really weird album, and it mixes funk, pop, electronica and rock together in a way I haven't really heard before, and it works fantastically well. Opener 'Velvet 4 Sale' has jazzy wah-guitars, crackling synthesisers, horns and layers of vocals, all underpinned by a disco beat, and while some tracks follow this formula ('Rage Of Plastics'), others go in the complete other direction, like the electric storm of 'Incidental Boogie'. The production is also great, with the different elements being brought together with cohesion while maintaining breathing space in the mix. Difficult to classify in genre but easy to categorise in quality. 8.4/10

6ix9ine - DAY69

I have absolutely no idea what to think about DAY69, or 6ix9ine in general. His brand of trap is fairly unique, shouting abrasive curses over moody beats, but gets tiring quickly since most of the songs sound identical (Including having one song twice on the tracklist), even if they are entertaining. The mixtape is weighed down with two posse cuts, 'RONDO' and 'KEKE' which are fine, but sound completely separate from the rest of the material. Also, 6ix9ine could have at least removed the 'SCUUUMM GAAANG' intro from most of these tracks so nobody has to hear it 8 times in a row. 4.0/10

Car Seat Headrest - Twin Fantasy - ALBUM OF THE MONTH

I was heavily biased towards loving this album before it came out, the original 'Twin Fantasy', released in late 2011 is probably within my top 5 albums of all time. It's amazing then that I actually like this cleaner, updated version more than the original. This 2018 version takes everything great about the original - the songwriting, the lyrics and how uniquely and brilliantly interconnected the whole album is - and improves the major issue I had with the album, the ultra lo-fi production. Along the way there are a few moments I love in the original which have been lost, such as the intro to 'Cute Thing', the outro to 'Nervous Young Inhumans' (Which is otherwise soooooo much better on the 2018 version) and the 'Thank God for the little things, then f*ck God that they're little things' line in 'Beach Life-in-Death', but I can sacrifice these moments for the new moments that we get. 'High To Death' is  improved so much it sounds like a brand new song, the new outro to 'Twin Fantasy (Those Boys)' is shockingly romantic (Like most of the album), and with a massively improved mix 'Bodys' can finally live-up to its potential as maybe the best indie-rock anthem of the decade. Best of all are the improvements made to the 13 and 16 minute-long 'Beach Life-In-Death' and 'Famous Prophets (Stars)', the former benefiting from an increased variety of guitar sounds that stop the song getting as jading as the previous version could occasionally get, and the latter being transformed from a middling cut to one of the best songs on the album by a newly added outro which reaches a climactic high. This will almost undoubtedly be my album of the year and also has a real chance of being my favourite album of the decade. 10/10