My Top 5 Songs of 2013

This post, which runs down my five favorite songs of 2012, might come as an anticlimax, given that I've spent the past month and a half intermittently, painstakingly descending from #13 to #6. (I've been busy lately.) But today is February 10, the Grammys are about to begin, and it's time to move on.

So.

#5: Killer Mike, "Reagan"

Too often, it seems to me, the rage in hip-hop is directed at rival MCs rather than, say, the War on Drugs. Or mass incarceration. Or American imperialism. Or the legacy of Reaganomics.

There's plenty of important stuff to be angry about.

Thank goodness, then, for Killer Mike, whose bracing blend of straight talk, unhinged paranoia, social analysis, and righteous anger you will not be seeing on stage at the Staples Center tonight.



"They declared a war on drugs, like a war on terror, / But what it really did was let the police terrorize whoever."

#4: Chairlift, "I Belong in Your Arms"

Sweetness and sunlight, open hearts and banana splits. The aesthetic antithesis of Killer Mike's "Reagan." The aural equivalent of the film Amelie. Lyrics consisting of dadaist joy-bursts. Octave jumps! Synthesizers! The 80s! Just the slightest undercurrent of sadness!

All the girls wear polka-dot dresses, and all the boys are uninhibited by masculine norms!

I want to live in this song, even at the risk of turning into a twee lunatic.



"Because the world goes on without us, / Doesn't matter what we do-o-o. / All silhouettes with no regrets, / When I'm melting into you."

#3: Dum Dum Girls, "Lord Knows"

When music critics have no idea what's going on, they use the word "charisma." Why did the Beatles send young concert-goers into hysterics? They played with charisma. What made Michael Jackson different from every other pop star? He danced and sang more charismatically.

And why does "Lord Knows," essentially a pastiche of The Pretenders and "Crimson & Clover," seem unique? Why is it so moving? So much better than anything else by the otherwise unremarkable Dum Dum Girls?

There's something about the vocal. It's really, really....

(Charismatic.)



"I want to live a pure life, / I'd say that it's about time."

#2: Frank Ocean, "Thinkin Bout You"

Yeah, Mumford & Sons (ruthlessly inauthentic as they are) will likely win the Grammy for Best Album tonight. But Frank Ocean's channel ORANGE remains the best loved, or at least the most intensely loved, record of 2012, combining mass and critical appeal in a way that only Kanye West's finest albums have recently matched.

Lead single "Thinkin Bout You" highlights Ocean's most underrated strength: his facility with melody. Listen, for instance, to how he contrasts the circular, low-register verse with the vertical, falsetto chorus. The effect is one of a private, obsessive anxiety releasing into a straightforward ache.

And then you arrive at the bridge. 2:12. Whoa.

(The nonsensical music video I've embedded below features an alternate version of the song. It's the best I could find in the free, legal regions of the Internet.)



"We'll go down this road / Till it turns from color to black and white."

#1: Japandroids, "The House That Heaven Built"

Hey bro, you play air drums. I'll play air guitar. We'll have the BEST F#@$ING TIME EVER.



"And if they try to slow you down, / Tell 'em all to go to hell."