I chose my top songs of 2018 based on a combination of their emotional impact and the number of times I listened to them (measured subjectively, I don’t actually keep track.) Some of these I included because I loved them, and some my kids made me listen to a million times. I didn’t include any of my own music in the list, because while I do listen to it all the time, I don’t want to seem like a malignant narcissist. (If you do want to hear my own greatest hits of the past year, they’re on my SoundCloud and Mixcloud.)
I present the songs here in chronological order of adding them to my iTunes. Enjoy.
Dolly Parton – “Jolene” (Todd Terje remix)
My kids prefer this remix to the original. The same is true for many other canonical songs. Have I scarred them for life?
Peter Gabriel – “Solsbury Hill”
I was super moved by the later seasons of Halt and Catch Fire, especially the last episode, especially especially the last couple of scenes.
Ella Fitzgerald – “Old MacDonald”
My son did a kids program at Jazz at Lincoln Center, and they introduced us to this smoking hot arrangement. Honorary mention to Ella’s performance of “Sunshine Of Your Love.”
The millennials of the MusEDLab said I should listen to this, and they were right. I’m impressed that the backing track is a single loop repeating without any variation or interruption for the entire duration of the song.
Jeremih & Chance – “Down Wit That”
Recommended by Roman Britton of CORE Music, the opening song from the least lame Christmas album in history.
Kendrick Lamar – “Bitch, Don’t Kill My Vibe”
The CORE Music folks love Kendrick, and that made me want to go get caught up on him. Somehow I never really listened to Good Kid, MaAd City before. It’s great!
Childish Gambino – “This Is America”
The video is the big thing, of course, but I also love the song itself. Plus it helped me start learning how to scratch.
Black Thought’s epic freestyle
Words fail me. “As babies we went from Similac and Enfamil to the internet and Fentanyl.”
Fats Domino – “Blueberry Hill”
When we started reading Blueberries For Sal to my daughter, this became stuck in my head and never left.
This is my favorite acapella for remixing. For some reason, both of my kids got super into one of my remixes, and then into the original, to the point where they could sing along. It makes an unexpectedly effective lullaby, too. Don’t miss the version in Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story.
John Williams – “The Jedi Steps and Finale”
This past summer was the Summer of Star Wars, when my son watched all thirty-eight movies plus the Clone Wars TV show. He wanted to listen to the Force Theme a bunch afterwards, and it was most easily accessed in the context of this lovely montage of themes from Episode VII. We’ve been remixing a bunch of these themes as a fun father-son bonding activity.
Aretha Franklin – “What a Friend We Have In Jesus”
Laurie Anderson – “O Superman”
I was doing a shift in the Park Slope Food Coop, and the squad leader was playing an unusually hip and experimental playlist, which included this track. It’s is sublimely weird in any context, but it’s especially weird as an accompaniment to people buying deeply discounted organic produce. Unfortunately, I didn’t get hip to Laurie Anderson until after I had already done a conference presentation on the vocoder. I absolutely love how the “ha ha ha” sample isn’t on the song’s root, it’s on 6^. Late in the song, the harmony switches to the relative minor, and then the “ha ha ha” finally becomes the tonic. It’s something that would not have occurred to me to do in a million years. Well played, Laurie Anderson.
Earth, Wind & Fire – “September”
My kids adore this song, and rightly so. It conceals surprising harmonic depth.
Young Thug – “High” (feat. Elton John)
My life revolves around scholarly research into the racial politics of music, and there is no more crystallizing cultural artifact than Chris Thile’s cover of this song.
Pink Floyd – “Shine On You Crazy Diamond”
I listened to lots of Pink Floyd in junior high school, and got severely burned out on them. But just when I thought I never needed to hear them again as long as I lived, Joey Da Prince made them fresh for me all over again.
Paul Simon – “René and Georgette Magritte with Their Dog After the War”
From Simon’s recent album of remakes, which might possibly be the most beautiful music the man has ever made in his long career. Another excellent lullaby.
Michael Jackson – “Man In the Mirror”
My kids are mildly obsessed with this. Thanks to iTunes shuffle, they heard Rhymefest’s remix first, and sometimes they still ask for it (“Play the one with the man talking!”) For me, the ending of this song really makes it special. It was a bold choice to sit on the IV chord until it turned into a whole Lydian mode odyssey unto itself.
Patrice Rushen – “Forget Me Nots”
I had never heard of Patrice Rushen until I heard her speak at Ableton Loop. When I told my friend Tamani that, she asked, incredulously, “Who has never heard of Patrice Rushen?” White people, Tamani, that’s who.
Hector and Coco – “Remember Me”
If you enjoy sobbing, may I recommend Coco? It’s Pixar’s second saddest movie, in between Toy Story 3 and Up. The song was written by the same evil geniuses who wrote “Let It Go” from Frozen. How about those chords! Not too many Disney songs will use an Ab/D chord. In the scene, that’s Gael Garcia Bernal’s actual daughter voice acting with him.
So, there you have it. A rough year for America and the world, but a good year for music at my house.
Wait. You hadn’t heard Lupe’s Kick Push, either?
No, I’m slow