#250-#246

#250. Steve Lacy - Bad Habit (#4, 2022)

16th of 2022

In 2018, Kali Uchis released the song "Just a Stranger" which features Steve Lacy. It's a song I loved instantly and I think could one day find a bigger audience, the way many songs by both artists have in the years since it was released. It's the first time I really took notice of Steve Lacy as a solo artist and not just the guy who plays guitar for The Internet, though I'm not sure how much he contributed to the production of the song outside of a catchy hook. Both artists have certainly gotten more popular since then. Kali Uchis has a song that's closing in on 3 billion Spotify streams, and Steve Lacy has gotten a Billboard #1 hit, wait a minute, this is that Billboard #1 hit!

It's often hard to discern where you can draw or blur the line between a hit that seems accidental and one that seems planned. When a completely random band from years ago does it and then makes no notable headway from it (like Surf Curse or Richy Mitch & The Coal Miners), it's probably an accident. When it's a big artist on a major label, probably not. A somewhat big artist on a major label? That's where it gets blurry.

Steve Lacy prefaced this with his song "Dark Red". It's a very Dominic Fike type situation, in that it was chucked out years ago as part of a disorganised collection of demos that he recorded, with an average length of about 2 minutes. "Dark Red" is the kind of hit that just needs to be uncovered though. Just an incredibly sticky song that's dripping in catchy hooks and chill tones. If you're ever compelled to consider Steve Lacy a one hit wonder, it's worth considering that though "Dark Red" didn't chart quite as obviously well, it's managed to stave off "Bad Habit" and remains his most streamed song on Spotify, with a lead that is presently growing as I write this.

If it turned out that "Bad Habit" was written to try and capitalise on this success, I'd be willing to believe it. I don't think of it as a commercial sellout or anything like this, but the absolute density of hooks is not something you just accidentally stumble upon. One of those moments where a hip and cool artist writes an undeniable smash and nearly everyone's rooting for it to climb the charts. I wasn't obsessively in love with it, but it was clearly my favourite thing going on in the charts at the time. It feels appropriate to mention that I've dusted off the entire top 10 for 2022 on this list now. Somewhat ironic given that it was nearly the last one to open the pack (#688).

"Bad Habit" getting to #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 feels like a fairy tale ending. I will break this illusion, because while it was absolutely a monster hit in its own right, it had a little helping hand. Its ascent was pushed up with the release of an official sped up version of the song. There's no magic to it; they literally just sped it up by about 21.47%. I know because I just mocked it up in Audacity and it sounds exactly the same as the official version. It's incredibly easy to re-create it. At present, this version has roughly 7.5% as many Spotify streams as the original version, which doesn't sound like much, but on its first and third weeks at the top, it was doing so with a razor-thin margin. The second week was probably fine either way, but it's a reminder that even those seemingly hip and cool artists (or rather their labels) are often times employing all the dodgy techniques that don't get associated with them.

The TikTok machine also revealed another wrinkle in the situation. Steve Lacy would go out on tour, and the obvious direction this would take is that it reveals a huge portion of the crowd that were only there to hear his big hit song. It's a familiar story, especially with one notable British band for a while. In Steve Lacy's case it was even worse. You can find a video of him performing the song in early October 2022, at the peak of the song's popularity to a crowd that immediately clams up after he gets past the 'I wish I knew' part of the song. They occasionally come back because the song has a few viral parts, 'I bite my tongue, it's a bad habit' and 'you can't surprise a Gemini', but it's an oddly fractured experience. He's performing to people who seemingly have only heard parts of the song. I'm not sure the crowd has clocked that he actually flips the title lyric on the second chorus into a question ('Can I bite your tongue like my bad habit?'). I remember the same thing happening not long later with Lizzy McAlpine, who'd perform "ceilings" to a roaring crowd that's screaming every word in 2022, but then a year later (after some viral success) has a whole bunch of people who try to sing the final chorus where the first one's supposed to go. You can tell in both cases that they're extremely irritated by this, and it's one of those things that can take some shine off the illusion of a beloved hit song.

Fortunately, it's not on me to judge a song on the merits of how it gets popular, and for those who are willing to engage fully with the conversation, it can be a means to put great music in the spotlight whether it truly is fulfilling the impression. "Bad Habit" remains a song that I have no beef with. It still sounds great, and we can always do with more songs about being socially awkward. I mean, who knows where I could be if I ever felt comfortable shooting my shot? How can anyone have the confidence to not feel like everyone's too good for them? Steve's speaking to my soul here.

#249. Duke Dumont - Ocean Drive (#13, 2015)

32nd of 2015

For a while, "Ocean Drive" was Australia's little secret. A hit song by an international artist that got incredibly popular, bigger than any song he'd put out before or since, while going mostly under the radar elsewhere. At this point Duke Dumont had two #1 hits in the UK in the past 2 years, but this one couldn't even crack the top 40. The system just worked here and the song caught on like wildfire, becoming one of the absolute biggest radio hits ever. The rest of the world has eventually caught up. It's firmly his biggest hit nowadays, very successfully carving itself a niche as a bouncy dance pop single that's fresh and original, no distracting elements at all.

There's a side of the story that's a little less fun, but I'm having trouble finding sources for it. My only assumption is that the hatchet has been long buried. I just have this strange recollection of the vocalist on this song (Boy Matthews) getting particularly peeved about the way Duke Dumont was acting once the song started to blow up. Taking the full auteur route of paying no credit to someone who was a big part of both performing and writing the record. There's nothing I can find from the immediate time, but from Boy Matthews' Twitter feed, he occasionally gets a bit (understandably) bothered about the way songwriters are often treated in the equation.

The reason I say the hatchet has been buried is because Boy Matthews has retweeted Duke Dumont many years later, suggesting better terms, while in his 2018 Under The Influence interview on triple j talking about the making of "Ocean Drive", Duke Dumont does take the time to absolutely spotlight Boy Matthews' contribution. He also mentions that the song was shopped around to potentially be sung by The Weeknd or a certain other R&B singer, as well as being very proud of the record, and very candid about Industry Rule #4080.

That's a happy ending I think. Except then in 2021, Duke Dumont got into an argument on Instagram with Kelli-Leigh over minimising her contribution for the song "Melt", which in a sign of either terrible misunderstanding or bad faith, had him instead citing her just singing a Whitney Houston top line on their previous collaboration "I Got U" (#441). This controversy was new to me but it looks exactly how I imagined it did for "Ocean Drive", so I guess some people never truly change. "Melt" actually comes from the same EP as "Ocean Drive" so it's one of three songs on there with uncredited vocals (the other one is "Won't Look Back").

Often times it feels like women get the worst shake of it, which is why I'm not sure I feel much better if Boy Matthews is just an exception in hindsight. At one point he quote tweets Bebe Rexha talking about unbalanced producer royalties. Bebe Rexha was a very public victim of these situations. When she sung the hook to David Guetta's song "Hey Mama", she was initially left off the credits under the belief that there were too many names on the song which becomes bad for business (it was credited as David Guetta featuring Afrojack & Nicki Minaj). A few months later she did get her name on it, but I often fear that not enough credit is given. Bebe Rexha unfairly became a massive punching bag for pop music fans as a permanent C-lister (even if she did eventually score an enormous hit for herself) that it's easy to dismiss her concerns, or worse, discredit her as a songwriter because of the way the industry treats her. I can certainly think of another artist who will eventually appear on this list with something to say about it all.

As for the song itself, yeah, it's delightful. One of those neat little packages that feels like opening a present every time. Nothing too flashy either, just a really solid groove, good vocals, and an insanely catchy hook. Duke Dumont says it himself that the phrase 'dance with the devil' works so well because the alliteration sticks it in your head, though he doesn't think he was smart enough at the time to make the same leap with his stage name. For me, that phrase always makes me think of the 1970 box office smash "Love Story". Can't imagine why. Poor Andy Williams, lived long enough to hear "Gangnam Style", but not quite long enough to also experience the joy of "Ocean Drive", and like, all those December royalties that really ramped up in the past decade.

#248. Kendrick Lamar - N95 (#41, 2022)

15th of 2022

It's been a few years so in case you've forgotten, this is the 'you out of pocket' song. You might have also forgotten that N95 refers to a specific kind of mask that was ideal for preventing spreading germs. It's also certainly a double-entendre in this sense given that he spends most of the song telling people to take off all kinds of metaphorical masks. I suspect Kendrick had some opinions about the geopolitical state of the world at the time, but surprisingly, it's a story for another entry. We're about to get introspective here.

"N95" is the sole representation here for "Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers". It's probably his most challenging album, because if you think it might be that other one, I think you should stack the two up together. I think you'll find this is the one that's considerably lacking in potential crossover singles. It says a lot that all you've got on the album is "Die Hard" (which just missed this list) and this song. Maybe it can be enjoyed as a mindless banger, but it feels far too confronting for that to actually stick.

When I think about "Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers", those aren't really the songs that come to mind. I'm thinking of those confronting moments. There's the lamenting of parental issues on "Father Time" (even if Sampha is steering it with a nice hook). There's the absolutely confronting experience of "We Cry Together", a scarily accurate depiction of a domestic dispute where everyone is in the wrong but too focused on getting the moral high ground to acknowledge it. Sure, you might have messed up, but that's nothing compared to what they did! You've got "Auntie Diaries", a song where I witnessed the global arrival in real time, where seemingly in the name of performative politics, the album's reputation took a total nosedive because Kendrick wrote a song about a family member transitioning but didn't follow the internet's guideline to saying the right thing because he's not online enough. The nuance did get through eventually, but it was an eye-opening experience. Towards the end of the album, you've got the album's crowning moment, the beautiful, evocative "Mother I Sober". Kendrick waxes on systemic sexual abuse and slavery with a hopeful turn to breaking the cycle, while Portishead's Beth Gibbons proves she's still got it with a harrowing performance. If you studied all the supplementary material in 2024, you might also recall it as the song that Drake mis-interpreted on one of his diss tracks. His final power play to land on his arse and embarrass himself, the way you could only wish could be the standard for genuinely awful takes that float around. I don't want to tap dance around the issue, but it is in fact the album with all the tap dancing.

On the whole though, it's a very introspective album, and I love it for that. I think a lot of people want Kendrick to use his platform to speak about all the injustices of the world again and again, and if you listen to "Mirror" at the end of the album, Kendrick probably feels some of that on himself. I don't know where he stands on it 5 years later, if the feeling of shame is still there, but I think there's something to be said about how many problems in the world could be alleviated if we took more time to better ourselves. Put on our masks before we help those around us. Just take off the superficial one before you do that as well.

In that regard, maybe "N95" resonated because it is the closest to something that does address the world at large. It's one that certainly feels more purpose built to be latched onto. Get a stopwatch out as you listen out for hooks and I guarantee you'll be hitting reset on the regular. And of course, if you're just listening out to hear Kendrick rap his head off with constantly shifting flows, well there's a lot to like here. I don't know what the general reception is on his high pitched voice he often does, but for me it always reminds me of Emperor Pilaf from Dragonball so I just get immensely amused by it. You can't rule the world with one Hottest 100 entry though, but I'd be lying if I said I thought it was supposed to rule the world. Kendrick just seems to have developed a holding pattern where he'll pivot between reaching for the stars and doing something completely different. I'm glad we get the best of both worlds. It makes me feel like there isn't a stone being left unturned.

#247. Bring Me The Horizon with YUNGBLUD - Obey (#71, 2020)

17th of 2020

The enjoyment of music isn't really a science you can pin down. Maybe on a grand scale there are sweeping gestures that can be made. Back in the early 2000s, a company named Polyphonic HMI developed a program named Hit Song Science. It would analyse music to spot similarities to hit songs of years gone by, and claimed to predict the hit potential of new releases, on the basis of familiarity. I don't know how much credit they get for it, but the claim that tends to get thrown around a lot is that it anticipated the monster success of Norah Jones' "Come Away With Me" album. There's another more interesting one where a certain song was scoring exceptionally high in all the important metrics, which gave the record label confidence to push it on the radio. Radio listeners hated it and would change the station very readily. That song was "Hey Ya!" by OutKast. You can claim they had the last laugh, but given their claims of familiar rhythms and patterns making a song more instantly stick immediately, it doesn't feel like it should count.

Even so, we're only looking at broad strokes. The notion that a lot of people will like something, whether or not you, the person reading this, or I, the one writing it are part of that circle. You can excavate a big pile of sand but some will inevitably fall out the side in the process. Sometimes we're just subject to whims that may or may not be quantified. Did we all think that "Keith" by Playlunch was certainly one of the best songs of 2025? Maybe, maybe not, but it was operating on a different playing field. One where the intangible fun of yelling 'don't f**k with my trailer, c**t', or otherwise imagining an exaggerated version of ex-Western Bulldogs star Barry Hall doing it instead can outweigh the hard science behind it all.

Why am I saying all of this? Well let's be honest, tangents are the only way I'm getting any meat out of my 12th entry on Bring Me The Horizon. But it is relevant in this case. However it is that you receive "Obey", it's probably different to me. Personally, it's one of my favourite Bring Me The Horizon songs on a purely stupid level. At the time I tweeted out something along the lines of 'Oh, bae, I hope you have a lovely day :)' and I've never been able to hear the song any other way since. This is a deeply political song that's taking aim at authoritarian regimes that pacify their constituents. I choose to ignore all of this and instead sing along a little goddamn louder to a happy song (#309).

This is absolutely the right song for this kind of juxtaposition. It feels like part of the metatext when it's one of their loudest and most chaotic songs in recent memory, but it's just waiting to give you a big hook to sing along with. YUNGBLUD doesn't really detract from the experience. I like to imagine someone who doesn't know his music is hearing the start of his verse and imagining that he's a trap rapper who demands a trap beat under his performance. When he mimics Oli on the pre-chorus, he's pretty impressive though. But yeah, wake up sheeple and all that.

#246. Hayden James (feat GRAACE) - NUMB (#32, 2017)

27th of 2017

I'm not sure how well known or remembered this is, but GRAACE was actually a contestant on Season 4 of The Voice Australia. She didn't get especially far, but as this list may continue to prove, that isn't always a hindrance to future successes. She chose an interesting time to emerge mononymously though. A couple of years prior to this, Australia housed two distinctly different singer-songwriters who went by Grace. Not a big deal, but one of those Graces happened their way onto a #1 hit, and suddenly the other Grace was getting a lot of mistaken messages. The less famous Grace is now R.W. Grace, but then later on, the more famous Grace also changed her name to SAYGRACE. Now we're left with GRAACE as the closest proxy who has steadfastly kept the name for nearly a decade now.

I suppose as a follow up to the Duke Dumont situation, I'm finding it hard to draw the right conclusion with Hayden James. Nothing but the nicest exchanges between him and Boy Matthews, not just about the song he sings on and receives a feature credit for (#401), but also one that he just co-wrote (#624). It's just that if you look at DSPs, you won't find those writing credits there. I don't think it's under dispute or anything, so I don't know why it ended up like this. GRAACE on the other hand has her writing credit locked in, which if anything makes it stand out as more unusual. Good for her. I wouldn't think she ever imagined she'd ever pen a 3xPlatinum hit, so it's important to lock down those royalties.

For me, "NUMB" feels like the natural culmination of Hayden James' sound. It achieves a certain mysterious darkness to it through what sound like conventional tricks initially. Like that rising tension before the chorus, it's just bringing up the background synth to waft a little closer to the surface, while adding and then promptly removing some handclaps. You've likely heard this exact same trick in Flume's remix of "HyperParadise". When the chorus does hit, it feels like the sinister energy has just been displaced onto GRAACE, with her vocals being pitched down. She also starts singing faster and it reminds me a bit of what Kygo tended to do around this time where he'd chop up vocal snippets and create new hooks from them to pretty good effect. GRAACE is pretty clearly speaking full sentences, trying to bargain with the man causing her pain. Just a really strong single that paved the way to his greatest success.

#255-#251

#255. Tame Impala - 'Cause I'm a Man (#61, 2015)

33rd for 2015

Maybe to you, it's been half a week, but for me, I just wrote about one footy mad singer, and here's another one. I wonder if they've ever hung out and lamented differing fortunes, the way two fans of one of the most successful and least successful teams respectively might do so. They've had some great duels of late (jury's out on last weekend but it was suspenseful at least), and now I badly need to know if Kevin Parker has ever hung out with Mason Cox. Niche fact here, but Tame Impala released the song "Loser" in 2025 just a few days before Fremantle became the first team to ever lose a final to Gold Coast. You'd hope he wields his powers more responsibly this year. I'm sorry I talk about this all the time, it's just one of my hyperfixations, 'cause I'm a man, and all that comes with it.

I remember the initial response to this song being a little patchy. "Currents" has gone on to become a very beloved album for many, but when you haven't reached that point (or all the big selling points haven't yet arrived), you're gonna see something a little more mixed. See also the initial response to "Von dutch" by Charli xcx (and heck, even the album cover). Once you're locked down as iconic, even the most awkward of building blocks can be redeemed. I begin to wonder if 'It might make more sense in the context of the album' is more about whether or not that sweeping quality grade can flatten it out, rather than being improved because of good sequencing or a throughline. It's the same thing I said last time about "Currents" actually (#886); I'm just looking at it from the opposite angle.

Of course, attached to all of this is that strange feeling of pop appeal and how that will actually affect the parameters. "'Cause I'm A Man" was the second single released from "Currents". The first one will appear later on this list of course. That song has very much earnt its stripes in the last decade but it is worth noting that this one that came after did manage to chart a little bit better at first. It could perhaps be noted that the first single was also initially released as a free download, but I've often had trouble determining how much that can affect sales. I'd be surprised if it offset the potential as much as the sheer nature of being a second single affected "'Cause I'm A Man", and so we have to be reminded of the curious workings of popularity. There absolutely will exist songs that are not made for the pop charts because they're too long, cerebral, what have you, but they'll find their audience in the long run. Often times when it comes to tracking the new releases, you just find more success putting out a "'Cause I'm A Man" than well, that other song.

I don't know if I would call this a full on pop pivot, especially now in the 2020s when we actually have an idea of what that could sound like in a Tame Impala context. It's definitely more bite-sized though, with an easy layer of instant gratification. I'm once again putting my hand up to say that I was one of those people who bought into this song pretty easily but don't go back to it as much anymore. Judging how far this fell behind the other singles in the Hottest 100, it looks like it was a quick discard for many of us. Is it bad though? I don't think so. Maybe a bit straightforward with a cheesy hook, but it sits itself in a nice slow groove that's among the best sounds on "Currents". Just be glad that we got through it all just before culture wars took a grip on anything tangentially related to gender politics that'd make this song no doubt the subject of the worst conversations imaginable. I'd jokingly say they only do this 'cause they're men but I think we all have the agency to do better.

#254. Cub Sport - Come On Mess Me Up (#24, 2016)

28th of 2016

I have mentioned previously that Cub Sport are a very outwardly queer band and I never really expanded on that because I was waiting for the main event. There's no way to sugar-coat it. Tim and Sam from Cub Sport are partners, and this song to me feels like a cathartic anthem of release for it. Tim didn't actually come out publicly until 2017 though, so in early interviews about this song, he has to play dumb and pretend that it's all just about his experiences with the music industry. You listen to it now and it's like 'duh, what else could this song really be about'.

It was a long time coming though. I'm taking most of it from an interview he did in 2018 with Linda Marigliano. Basically, he'd been very close with Sam since they finished high school together but in a way that caused confusion mostly because it was a new experience to feel that way about anyone, regardless of gender. I'm not entirely sure when "Come On Mess Me Up" was written, but he seems to imply it was quite a while before it was released. He was inspired by the open, detailed songwriting of Leonard Cohen, and found that it unlocked something in his own writing that helped him discover who he was, both as a songwriter and a person. He even says that even though they'd been making music together for about 6 years at that point, this song was the proper arrival of Cub Sport.

It's still very surprising to see it knocking about like this. I say this as someone who was mildly following the band at this time and there was just nothing to suggest that they were priming for the big time. "Come On Mess Me Up" was actually the 3rd single released from the album, and it wasn't even initially planned for that. I suppose it must have been well received on tour and got a good run with word of mouth. They performed it for their Like A Version segment which probably got the biggest signal boost. If we're to believe in proximity rules for promotion, then getting in around the same time DMA'S put out the most popular Like A Version ever (#987) has to be a boon. They covered a fairly recent song that will eventually appear in this list. If you look at the YouTube comments for their performance, you can actually find someone who clocked the real meaning of the song but dismisses it because of what Tim says in the interview.

So I guess what you can say about this song is that if you were ever under the impression that the important meaning of the song is what made it big, then know that the real timeline is that everyone just clicked onto a very likeable song without any particular meaning behind it. I don't know how often that actually happens nowadays. I definitely feel stronger about it now. I don't always clock songs in this way, but I hear this one and I appreciate that it's here. These kinds of wholesome messages are most effective in the form of a popular, catchy song.

#253. The Smith Street Band - Birthdays (#21, 2017)

28th of 2017

A vital connection here as eagle-eared listeners will note that "Come On Mess Me Up" mentions walking on Smith Street. Cub Sport are from Brisbane but they also partially recorded that album in Melbourne, which is me admitting once again I have no idea which Smith Street could possibly matter. Maybe it is the Melbourne one because as far as I can tell, there isn't one in Brisbane, as impossible as that seems. But then you tell me what you'd prefer, the hustle and bustle of the big city in the commercial zone of Smith Street, Melbourne, or the quiet residential zone of nearby Smith Street in the Redlands? I guess I'm always a small town boy at heart. The love that you need can be found at home.

The Smith Street Band manage to win this battle, not by just 1 position, but $200, because they mention Elizabeth Street on this song. I'm going to confidently assume they're talking about the one in Melbourne and not Sydney, in which case, that's a $260 property in the 1996 Australian edition of Monopoly, and in a bizarre coincidence, sits directly across from the $60 Smith Street, which as I'll remind you, is actually the one in Alice Springs. If I can say one more thing about this extremely niche piece of pop culture, it's that they unintentionally allow the Melbourne/Sydney war to settle. They give Sydney the higher property values which seems good, except they're on those garbage green properties that nobody wants and nobody ever lands on, who's the real winner here? I'll tell you it's Adelaide, because the orange properties conveniently spaced 6-9 spaces away from jail are the most important real estate in that game.

Okay I'll talk about the actual Smith Street Band song. "Birthdays" is one of their biggest hits too, and is their equal highest placer here. I think it stands out a bit from the rest for being a little quieter. I'd say it's more contemplative but then that's been their whole deal no matter how loud they get. From what I can see, the origin of the song is Wil hearing someone lament being nothing but a future housewife, and him not agreeing with the grim outlook. It doesn't necessarily match up with it generally being a love song, or having a music video where a little girl grows up with a robot companion. I suspect though, the future housewives lyric is the one that's gonna stick with you the most.

"Birthdays" is also an early appearance for Jess Locke who provides some backing vocals. She'd become a touring member with the band shortly after, and since 2021, she's been a full member of the band. I mainly know her for her solo career that has run alongside it. I think she's great! Very moody and occasionally drudging rock, but with some of the most pleasant tones and rewarding melodies. She first starts getting writing credits on a couple of songs from their 2022 album (including "I Don't Wanna Do Nothing Forever" (#256)).

This is a song that I probably wasn't completely on board with on immediate release, but absolutely bought into the hype after the fact. I think it strikes a great sonic balance when it shifts between completely gentle and completely raucous like a light switch. A great bunch of lyrics also in the first verse, drawing up the contradictory feelings of mental health where you 'Wanna be alone, wanna be surrounded', but having all that confusion go away when in the presence of that special someone. They do all this and flip the script with the last line of the song and I don't know what to say about it anyway but I hope you enjoyed reading about it.

#252. Mark Ronson (feat Bruno Mars) - Uptown Funk (#6, 2014)

31st of 2014

I feel like a staple of old music biopics is the gruelling story of the album, or the song. Just the idea of a band or musician who is so fully locked in because they know they're in the process of creating history. From what I saw of the Beatles' "Get Back" documentary, that's the realistic picture of it. Frustration over small parts not working, arguing about whose idea should get the go ahead, and stress over the unreasonable hours spent toiling away with little to show for it. I don't know how often this still happens. Possibly a big switch to digital has mitigated some parts of it, while you also just don't really get hits of the same stature by actual bands very often. Not all is lost, it's just a little different for the most part, with the occasional exception.

"Uptown Funk" is one of those exceptions. When I hear this song, I hear an immaculately crafted pop hit. A song that's been carefully considered to within an inch of its life to sound effortless and ready to be enjoyed by everyone. I also picture Mark Ronson in the studio, losing both his mind and sleep to make this happen. This is one of those songs with a story. It starts with Mark Ronson, Jeff Bhasker & Bruno Mars working in the studio after hitting it off well during the recording of Bruno's 2nd album and wanting to go around again. Some of the initial ideas were promising, which made them strive to see it through, a process that took many months. The song took on many forms because Mark Ronson was so determined to put it together in the right way. I think deep down he knew he had a hit, and it was a matter of removing any possible reservations that might keep it off the radio. All that effort paid off though, because we're looking at one of the biggest hit songs of all time.

There are a few ways this is made clear. The song is 22xPlatinum in Australia for instance. If not for people being sad about a car movie, it would've pushed its way to being the longest running #1 hit of all time in America, with such a drawn out chart run that Billboard seemingly added tighter restrictions on chart endurance just to end its stay. I think my favourite stat piece is that it became the first song ever in Australia to make 3 consecutive End Of Year lists, just sneaking in for 2016 after being the runaway #1 of 2015. The most jarring thing about this is seeing a song released in the middle of November making it to be the 29th biggest hit of 2014. By comparison, future Hottest 100 entrant Gracie Abrams released "That's So True" a few weeks earlier in the UK, it quickly vaulted to #1 and initially spent 5 weeks there in November/December. It did not even crack the top 100 over there that year.

I need to also point out the funny situation that came up when the song was released. It just so happened to coincide with the week ARIA added streaming to the charts, which for the most part didn't cause a drastic shift because the numbers weren't big enough yet, but they tended to shuffle some things around a little. One such example is that the hot new download hit "Uptown Funk" hadn't fully found its streaming footing quite as fast, so it actually missed out on debuting in the top 10 as a result. It jumped up to #2 the next week so it's not so bad, it just adds to the surprisingly common pattern of Bruno Mars songs climbing in their second week. Just in the past few months, Bruno Mars has once again debuted at #11 and climbed into the top 10 the week after. No matter how established and famous he is, he just keeps doing it. Of the 19 top 10 hits he has now, only two of them started in the top 10, and they were his very recent collaborations with Lady Gaga & Rosé.

I might have been implying that "Uptown Funk" is a completely sanitised record, and maybe it is, but an odd quirk of this is that the song was largely built around an interpolation of "All Gold Everything" by Trinidad James. If you don't know that song, it's where 'don't believe me, just watch' comes from. Bruno Mars leaves out the copious number of times Trinidad James says the n-word after that hook. I always like to think of it as Mark Ronson being a good friend. Thanks to this decision, Trinidad James gets a free writing credit on a song that is making millions upon millions of dollars. Must be a nice royalty check to get to cash in every now and then. There's a Trinidad James remix of "Uptown Funk" where he's all on his own for the first minute of the song, and gets to finish his contribution by saying his lyric in its original form.

When a song gets this astronomically popular, you can lose a little connection to it. I've always felt like "Uptown Funk" does a good job at avoiding all of this because it's just such a well-oiled machine. You look at past instances of 'what an unfathomably popular song', at the time the most recent example was Pharrell's "Happy", and they might feel more than a little sanded down. "Uptown Funk" just feels so dense by comparison. It's like it's managed to avoid those trappings by giving you so many things to focus on instead. What a cool little bass riff, horns that sound massive, Bruno Mars, what a star, etc, etc. It's a song that's so outwardly confident that when Bruno Mars tells me that 'Uptown funk gon' give it to ya', I can't help but read it as a proper noun. This song is a meta-text about how awesome the song is, and I find myself ready to buy into it.

#251. Disclosure (feat AlunaGeorge) - White Noise (#69, 2013)

42nd of 2013

I personally verified this list multiple times while it was being created. Important to make sure it has exactly 1,000 songs, with no erroneous inclusions, no double ups, no omissions. You'd think it'd sort itself out, but projects of this scale have a habit of making something pop up. Then once you're done, you fast forward a couple of years and start to cast doubt on the whole thing. How thorough could I have possibly been? Is there a chance I still let something slip? I've been experiencing this list in a gradual fashion as I'm doing it. I write this entry with the next two and a half weeks of entries in front of me as well, which helps in case I need to do extra preparation for something. Until two and a half weeks ago, something was getting increasingly strange. Where are Disclosure? I know they have a bunch of entries here, but we're getting really deep into it and I still don't see them. Could I have just scrolled ahead and found them? Absolutely, but that's less fun. I wanted to have the same experience of shock as they continue to suppress all comers. They came within an inch of having their entire set within the top 250. Incredible innings for a band I never saw myself as a massive fan of, and for whom my favourite songs aren't even on this list. I guess everyone who thought they were ahead of their time was right, and I'm only just catching up.

Disclosure were first put on my radar with their song "Control" in mid-2012. It didn't make a big impression on me but I remembered the name because they were getting a lot of buzz. Around this time, I was habitually recording weekly Spotify charts in Australia, something that was particularly to my taste at the time because it was so heavily dictated by triple j's playlist. A bunch of bands I can't mention yet were running rampant. I remember being a little surprised to see Disclosure's next single make a pretty solid impression, implying they might be rising up faster than I expected. It sounds a little silly in hindsight when I point out that the song in question was "Latch". It was a respectable hit in the UK, but when it came to going global, it was one of the biggest sleeper hits of the decade, not peaking in America until the middle of 2014. It was probably helped by the significantly increased profile of the guest vocalist, whom I can't name yet, another sign that Disclosure were ahead of the curve.

"Latch" peaked at #11 in the UK, but they'd cash their cheque on the next single, "White Noise". This very quickly became their highest ever charter when it climbed to #2 in its second week on the chart, kept off the top by the UK's late arrival to Macklemore's "Thrift Shop" moment, a song that had hit #1 in Australia two months prior. An incredible showing though for a duo who'd just popped onto most people's radar a few months ago. They'd notch up more hits as they released their debut album, but the version of that story I'll tell through the Hottest 100 looks a little different to the charts.

Realising just how much I actually like Disclosure has been a big discovery while making this list, and apparently again while making these entries. "White Noise" is probably the most evident because I never had strong feelings about it at the time. One of those tidy songs that felt like it did nothing wrong but still didn't rise above the pack for it. It was merely a source of amusement for me making light of Aluna's British-ism pronunciation, pronouncing 'automatic' as if there's only one 't' in it. A true 'bottle of water' moment. The whole thing is sublime though. You've got the bouncy synth that feels like Disclosure's trademark at this point, but it's going over an atmospheric instrumental that feels like floating in space. Maybe the best decision is to really hold off the last chorus, providing a complete fake out with the pre-chorus and going on a wonderful journey instead. There are good bridges on their own, but there are also good bridges that fit perfectly into the context of the song and enhance the whole experience. Apparently sometimes you don't even need words to do it.

#260-#256

#260. Angie McMahon - Slow Mover (#33, 2017)

29th of 2017

I have a certain fascination with the way many artists seem to reach their greatest career peaks at the very start, even when it doesn't feel like it lines up accurately with the arc of their career and infamy. I've mentioned before with artists like Nickelback, how it can potentially be a product of being 'figured out' by the audience, in terms of where they stand and what they represent. More potential in buying into something speculative. Other times it just feels strangely out of place. You can blame different chart eras but it's odd to think that Troye Sivan's only ever top 10 single in Australia was achieved within a month of his first ever chart appearance. Chris Brown debuted at #1 in Australia and outside of his collaboration on "No Air", he's never been back at #1 since then. It might feel like Angie McMahon's only gotten more famous over the years, but she still got her biggest Hottest 100 hit straight away.

This still feels strange to me but it does line up with another happening at the same time. In 2017, Wolf Alice had a decent showing in the top 200 with two of their songs. One of those 'what could have been' moments that could've been rectified if the voting was more unified behind one song. I think if anything they just needed more time, because they won the Mercury Prize later on in 2018, which has made "Don't Delete The Kisses" into a bigger deal. It's something that'd be rectified in the future...right? Well, two albums later and they're now charting better in terms of music charts, but they are a complete absence from being even close to the Hottest 100. When people lament their lack of success, or likewise for Angie McMahon who was last seen at the #101 & #103 positions, it just seems like both artists had a bunch of people who eagerly voted for them then, but then mysteriously disappeared. Just whistling inconspicuously while witnessing the outrage. I voted for Wolf Alice multiple times so don't get your pitchforks out at me, but I suppose then I am a passive supporter of Angie McMahon who's never given her the dues.

Perhaps it all comes down to that intangible feeling of a hit song that connects, and we have to wonder what "Slow Mover" does to put itself there. It's a big, sweeping gesture song that's thinking about the future in the way that I don't always expect to resonate with the youth audience. It's like a Family Guy joke I saw recently poking fun at How I Met Your Mother, how Ted at his age seems strangely fixated on the idea of marriage rather than just dating. Maybe this generation (then) are just willing to support someone who's contemplating bigger things, awarding the confidence in it all. I think it's a conviction that Angie can definitely sell in this song, even though she's making a declaration of the opposite, and maybe once you put all your chips in for a song like this, it's just incredibly difficult to ever meet the same heights, no matter what you do. Everything's just a permutation on our first impression of what the artist is, and what they should be. Maybe you'll buy her album, maybe you'll buy the next one, you're just waiting it out to see if it's all as good as this song promises it to be.

#259. Cold War Kids - First (#89, 2014)

32nd of 2014

I wonder if in 2007, you just had to be there. I was, so you can trust me on it, but I imagine otherwise if you look at the pointy end of the Hottest 100, there are a handful of songs that don't really have the popular credentials to justify themselves. The one that probably sticks out the most is "Hang Me Up to Dry" by Cold War Kids, a song that had been doing the rounds since the start of the year but wasn't a hit by any measure. Cold War Kids weren't an essential 'everyone's talking about them' kind of band either. They're not even Australian. Yet here they are inserting themselves into the pointy end of the countdown.

To me, it makes perfect sense, but then the whole "Robbers & Cowards" album is a core memory for me. I was mostly into the singles near the front of it, but they fill a niche that cannot be replaced with anything else. A combination of stress, anguish, and inserting odd instruments into the mix. I can't decide if it sounded genuinely modern at the time because I don't really have a point of comparison. It's just that when the riffs to "We Used to Vacation" or "Hang Me Up to Dry" start, I'm instantly teleported back to 2007, and everything is good.

This early success was probably enough on its own to justify keeping the band around for a while yet. I'm proof positive as someone who kept digging into random new singles of theirs as late as 2017. They notched up a couple more Hottest 100 entries after 2007, but it felt like a last hurrah when they couldn't quite make it in 2013. I feel like after that we get a completely different story that's unrelated to everything going before it.

Or maybe not initially. Cold War Kids snuck into the Hottest 100 again with "First" in 2014. A quirky rebound that was probably mostly on the back of their previous momentum but they had a more well liked single this time around. In the time since this has happened, "First" has gone from that fluke of a last gasp to absolutely the band's signature song. A song that's become so big that the band might retroactively be considered one hit wonders for it. There's talk of a lot of alternative rock songs sounding like car commercial music, and this might be the guilty party in that stereotype because it literally was used in one.

At some point you have to stop and wonder 'Why this song?'. It would be fair to wonder why this of all things has become one of the biggest hits of all time on alternative radio. It's a completely isolated incident too. It didn't remotely stop the band from dipping into obscurity. My only best guess here is that it's a song that finds the sweet spot of sounding a little different and interesting, but not too weird and off-putting. Sometimes it can be hard to tell how much of it comes down to the song as opposed to just being in the right place at the right time, because what I just said could describe a lot of Cold War Kids songs. I guess people just really like that one drum fill and the bit about flying like a cannonball. If we've learnt anything recently it's that the people crave Oasis.

#258. FISHER - Losing It (#2, 2018)

28th of 2018

It's insane to think that we're still on a generational FISHER run right now. The 2025 Hottest 100 has wrapped up and there he is again, two entries at #32 & #89. I'm just a touch early to seeing how his new song is faring but he's got plenty of time to sort something out and keep the streak going. For now, he's made the list 8 years in a row and it all started with this bolter in 2018. You'd think maintaining this would require a career with steadily paced out peaks but aside from a couple of recent songs that vaguely could be called crossover hits, he's mostly been coasting off a strong start. Then again, The Living End also introduced themselves to the world with their defining hit song, and they're the benchmark with 10 consecutive appearances. As far as I'm concerned, I'm gonna get through this entry and my burden of writing about so many FISHER songs will finally be over.

I don't know if there is a general consensus on the strengths of Hottest 100 years. The funny thing is that I of course saw someone say that the Hottest 100 died in 2025, only to get chimed in with a bunch of people who were seemingly united in saying that the answer was a different time period prior to that. You might agree that it's passed it with someone, but if they're saying it happened 10 years before, surely that's gotta be fighting words as they're disparaging a decade of key memories for you.

2018 looks tailor made to push people to Double J though. I'm not done dissecting the whole top end so I won't jump ahead on it, but I see a whole lot of songs that are poised to infuriate for some combination of being an absolute irritant, a boring pop crossover, or an Ocean Alley song that manages to do both at the same time (#521). When you get to a song like "Losing It", I've gotta be out of my mind if I think a bunch of people introduced to it in that very moment are gonna say 'Oh yeah, the kids are alright!' and not 'Is this what they call music nowadays?'. For the rockist perspective, "Losing It" does so little to placate the reservations. It only has 24 words in it, or if you don't count repeats, it only has 3 words in it. The closest comparison point I can make to it is probably The Bloody Beetroots' "Warp 1.9". I think though even fans of that song might find the minimalism of "Losing It" to provide nowhere near the same payoff. It's the kind of thing that's gonna make you paradoxically question if the new generation has any spice in their interests, before lamenting a week later that they seem shockingly desensitized given the filth that passes as entertainment now. God, I wish any of the people who voted "Wings" as the first ever Best Picture winner in the 1920s could be brought back just to watch "Anora" or "Everything, Everywhere, All At Once".

I think the gut reaction is important because it lays the groundwork for how willing you're going to be to concede to the new canon of music history being written without your input. Over time, it's how I've tried to make sense of it, and it's a more fun way to experience things, I can tell you that. "Losing It" might just be the pinnacle of tension and release. From the very first second you're introduced to a buzzing alarm, and the whole song builds up to drops that don't even really give you a chance to calm down after. I have to imagine it's pretty incredible in a live setting. All the constant build up and the catharsis afterwards. It almost feels cruel, the way the first two drops come in after about 15 seconds of percussion hits, but then the next one doubles it to around 30 seconds. Just the ultimate drum roll. Maybe in my ideal world, "Losing It" would have a bit more meat in the drops, but I think the simplicity is where it finds its niche. Don't make us think too hard about it.

#257. Dune Rats - Too Tough Terry (#85, 2020)

18th of 2020

There's a band from Oxfordshire called Young Knives. I will readily assume most don't really know them very well because in the leagues of landfill indie, they don't even have that one crossover song that people still listen to. They'd long for even a taste of the success that run off singles by The Fratellis get. Anyway, I bring them up because I hated them. If you were ever going to sell me on the idea that Kaiser Chiefs and associated bands maybe weren't actually worth the time of day, then reminding me of bands like this could have been what did it. Maybe I was wrong for thinking this, but I'd hear "She's Attracted To" and get bogged down by every decision made that seems laser focused to irritate. I think it's pretty harmless nowadays, but then every throwback tends to seem better divorced from its initial context. Can't imagine the discourse if the song came out now though.

A funny thing happened years later. I heard a new song on triple j quite a few years later and I really liked it. The Strokes were about to drop their big comeback single, and I'd be pretty obsessed by it. They were beaten to the punch by another song with raucous, sticky riffs. You know I'm talking about "Love My Name" by Young Knives. It's always my nomination for one of the most unexplainably transcendent songs ever made. The closest thing I can think of for what works is that the song's chorus includes these funny 'pew, pew, pew' sounds that remind me of some similar sounds in "Mario Land 3: Wario Land", which is nostalgic as heck. In general though it's just so tightly packed without a moment wasted. Between them and Silversun Pickups, I just had an incredible track record of tricking artists into making some of my all-time favourite songs just by declaring to myself that I hate them. Maybe there's something in that. You're so invested in the storyline that you pay closer attention, just close enough for the surprise sucker punch of glory.

It's funny for two other reasons too. The first is that for whatever reason, the song and album just never made it to Australia. It's 2026 and you still won't find it on Apple or Spotify. I haven't the faintest idea why, and the fact that it was obviously sent to radio here in some capacity just adds to the confusion. Maybe there was some stumbling at the time because the band were currently rebranding (they used to be *The* Young Knives), but I wonder if there's just not enough demand and no one noticed it. The other funny thing is that over a decade later, Dune Rats found some success by making the song "Too Tough Terry", which feels like it has to be a deliberate Young Knives pastiche. They're so completely memory holed that I don't see anyone else point it out.

Of course, we're talking about Dune Rats here, so they're still going to be playing to their own devices. While the confrontational energy is all there, I just don't remember Young Knives saying 'c**t' quite as many times. Nah, I'm just joking, we all know Dune Rats are singing 'Terry is a tough, can't see straight Terry'. All up though, it's an important evolution of the form. When you're singing about the most absolutely abrasive person imaginable, you have to meet him in form. Terry wouldn't stand for his theme song being weaksauce. I'm ready to be convinced that this is the prototype for Playlunch's "Keith", setting the stage for the most niche Epic Rap Battles of History...of history. Just imagine how many parking spots Terry could hog with his 18 wheeler.

#256. The Smith Street Band - I Don't Wanna Do Nothing Forever (#90, 2022)

17th of 2022

I learnt some pretty difficult news about Wil Wagner while I was researching one of the previous entries. I can't actually find him talking about it very much because it's a very taboo topic, the kind of thing that's difficult to go out and say in public. Maybe the clues were always there given the location of Smith Street in Melbourne. I'm afraid to say that Wil Wagner is a massive Collingwood fan. The album that this song comes from is called "Life After Football", which is of course ironic as that's a foreign concept for that team. Pendlebury and Sidebottom have been playing together longer than The Smith Street Band have. Maybe this song getting into the list is compensation to make up for just how unbelievably stressed he must have been in 2022, watching his team win 9 close finishes in 12 weeks, only to finally have the tables turn as they fell short of making the Grand Final by 1 point. I think about this whole spectacle and wonder if I even hate Collingwood anymore. There's an alternate history where they don't lock in a year later and my team wins that year instead, but then subsequently doesn't for the next two years.

In all seriousness though, it'd be wrong not to at least acknowledge some of the allegations put towards Wil Wagner. Some of them involve an artist who will appear in this list later on! I don't think it's really my place to comment on it as it's one of those hard to decipher situations where there could be some culpability on both sides that isn't even necessarily catastrophic (because we're humans and sometimes we don't make the best decisions, and sometimes we feel the need for karmic retribution to make up for being wronged in a non-malicious way). I'd like to hope at least everyone's learnt from the experience.

It did feel a little strange to see The Smith Street Band still showing up here after all that time though. This looks like it will be the last time (though not for this ranking) and it's not a bad way to go out in any case. If you're after songs that are equally anthemic and existential, then I've got the song for you. Sometimes they'll wrap it up in packages that we're familiar with, but I love that the big kicker phrase is something as banal as being stuck at work on respective birthdays. A simple creed to illustrate how the things we do to maintain our life get in the way of the very life we're trying to maintain. On the other hand, we're looking at a well-worn path set by New Radicals, because the lyric that always sticks with me the most is the one about the sexy Germans. Feels like I don't wanna do nothing at all, nothing at all, nothing at all. Stupid sexy Germans.

#265-#261

#265. Hermitude (feat Mataya & Young Tapz) - The Buzz (#8, 2015)

34th of 2015

How long do you think Hermitude have been around? It's probably longer than that. They first formed in 2000, but had known each other since 1994. They got signed pretty early on to Elefant Traks, and their debut album even has a little cameo by The Herd, like a $3.40 bag of hip hop from your local fish and chip shop. I'm listening to that first album, "Alleys To Valleys" and it sounds nothing like you could possibly picture from anything you associate with Hermitude. All very relaxed, more along the lines of DJ Shadow or J Dilla, but even that's underselling just how reserved it is. I want to shout out "Moth Journey" for its cool vibe that's simultaneously noir & sci-fi. Never going to top the charts, but it got their name out there and they started growing their brand for a while.

I was trying to find a clear thread from past to present in their older material but I didn't really see it. Even in 2008, while they may have upped the scales a little, I still feel like I'm listening to this obscure group that never went anywhere. It did click with me that I was familiar with them back then though, because they had the quirky collaboration with Elana Stone & Urthboy, "Your Call" on their 3rd album. It was probably their closest thing to crossover success in that moment, reaching #148 in the Hottest 100 that year. Just a bit of an oddball for them in the same year they were covering "Jóga" by Björk for Like A Version and taking it to strange new places.

The real change came in 2010 with the release of their single "Get In My Life", the lead single to "HyperParadise" which would arrive 15 months later in 2012. It just feels like a complete shift in focus. While the core of the music is the same, there's an increase in danceable beats that sound decidedly more modern. It's still almost completely instrumental, but it feels like it wants to eat the Ratatat (#281) cake by making big hooks out of aggressive riffs. That song wasn't a particularly big hit for them, but the next single, "Speak of the Devil" was. This song feels like their big push for popular recognition that for once decides to use a big sung hook in addition to an instrumental you won't forget. A lot of credit also has to go to one of the best music videos ever which no doubt boosted the song's profile. It worked, and they were entrenched in the Hottest 100 for the first time ever, the start of a decent run of hits for them. Maybe that looked to be a one-off, but they scored some immense fortune when young upstart Flume remixed the title track to their latest album "HyperParadise" and Hermitude got to be interlocked with his big rise in 2012. You look at all his hits at that time and one of the biggest is actually a Hermitude song.

To me, this feels like a big turning point because you fast forward a few more years and Hermitude's 5th album comes out. It might sound silly but I listen to it and I hear a lot of songs that sound like the Flume remix of them, it's so different to where we started. They knew what people were after though and it got them a #1 album, and additionally the biggest hit of the career, "The Buzz". It feels like it's a song that might have gotten too big because it's completely overshadowed everything around it and since. Mainly I just think they've not been trying to replicate it so they haven't kept that same audience with them. Whenever I hear a new Hermitude song nowadays, I find it hard to place them as the same duo, as their sound continues to take more and more unusual pivots. I think "Janela" is a great track, but I wouldn't question anything if it had just been credited as a solo Kimbra track.

The one big part of "The Buzz"'s success that always amazes me is that it made the ARIA End Of Year list for 2015. That's going well beyond being just a niche flash in the pan, or a song riding Hottest 100 hype, but a strangely genuine hit. Sorry "Hoops" (#895), sorry Jess Glynne, but we've found something that does beat a Jet2 holiday, and it's this instrumental hip hop duo coming in at #100 with a song that commercial radio barely gave a sniff to. It's not like it's stacked with star power either, the intro is a few looped words by new singer Mataya, who would amusingly have her only other star turn two years later, also landing at #8 in the Hottest 100 (#861). Kiwi rapper TAPZ GALLANTINO, or Young Tapz as he was known then gets most of the action here. He was also heard on their previous single "Through The Roof", but I've scarcely heard of him anywhere since, outside of an unexpected collaboration with a certain singer I'm known to like, and I believe his brother getting some accusations against him that I don't know the verdict on. Nothing screams hit here, so I guess you've got to feel the buzz.

Nothing about it feels like it should work, Tapz's slurred delivery, and all those stiff synth hits that seem to crawl up to the next drum break. At the very least it doesn't feel like it should be working in 2015, a time when popular dance music just didn't really sound like this at all. It wasn't even a brief fling either as the song also showed up in the Hottest 100 of the Decade at #63, higher than an annual #8 finish would suggest, especially when nudged out of the way by more famous artists with dedicated followings. I am but a small part of this song's huge popularity, but it's really always astounded me.

#264. Olivia Rodrigo - deja vu (#33, 2021)

15th of 2021

If we imagine a hypothetical version of this list that I started one year earlier, we'd have a pretty different list to be working with. Rudimental would be waiting down the line with three drum & bass bangers instead of just one. Maybe I could rehabilitate that one electronic song I never much liked, but heard on shuffle the other day and wasn't bothered, the one that isn't "Love Is All I Got", though I can't say the artist name yet. Most of all though, it would just help me out a little bit here. "deja vu" is a remarkably successful song, even by the standards of Olivia Rodrigo where basically any song she's ever released does rather well. It's also a song that holds an ominous degree of infamy: The infamy of copyright nonsense. Wait, this is strange, I can't escape the familiar feeling that we've been here before. Maybe there's a word for that.

In 2013, Katy Perry released the single "Roar" as the lead single to her third album, "Prism". She was coming off a monstrously successful album cycle that took her to the absolute top of the pop landscape if there was any doubt previously. I wouldn't say massive success was guaranteed, but if she played her cards right, she was better suited than anyone. This is obviously what happened. "Roar" was the biggest hit of the year despite being released fairly late. I wouldn't say the song was universally beloved, and many on the more cynical side noticed a strong similarity to "Brave", a single released by Sara Bareilles a few months before. Hardly a problem though, because the song wasn't very well known to the general public.

"Brave" belatedly became a hit song in early 2014. A big moment for Sara surely, ending her 5+ year stay in the Khia ward for one hit wonders. It was also one of the first successes of Jack Antonoff as a writer & producer beyond his fun. days. He'll come back into this picture a little later. One of the main things I remember observing at the time was a slight backlash. I saw numerous comments suggesting that Sara had ripped off Katy Perry. Obviously not true, but if you hear the songs in the order that most people did, it's easy to see how that connection might be made.

It's seven years later in 2021 and Olivia Rodrigo releases "deja vu", the second single from her debut album, and the one that much more quickly ended any one hit wonder allegations for her. Or if that still wasn't a big enough hit, then "good 4 u" (#341) was right around the corner too. There's nothing untoward for a while, even when the album is released a month later. Track 4 on the album, "1 step forward, 3 steps back" has a peculiar set of names in the writing credits though, Taylor Swift and Jack Antonoff. That's via an interpolation of Taylor Swift's 2017 song "New Year's Day". I don't know for certain if that's related, but a couple of months later, "deja vu" suddenly has writing credits for that pair again, along with St. Vincent. Given that it happened well after the song was released, it's possible that it's just a case of Swifties starting a wildfire, but along the way, Olivia Rodrigo herself noted a similarity to Taylor Swift's 2019 song "Cruel Summer", and so these back to back writing credits occur. At least I can only assume it had to be fans raising a stink because what are the chances that you'd include one interpolation and not the other on adjacent tracks, when they're both sourcing the same artist and mostly the same writers.

The whole thing annoyed me for the same reason the "good 4 u" situation did. I just don't hear it. It feels equally superficial. A similarity that boils down to the notion that Taylor Swift invented shouting on bridges. With the hindsight of 5 years, it feels like an early incarnation of Taylor Swift (or more likely her team) utilising her massive influence to stamp down on all upcoming stars who don't go through her. We're not talking about some unreachable recluse, but someone who could easily say 'I own the rights to that song, I won't press charges, it's all good'. I guess I'd be hard pressed to name a billionaire who got there by being courteous or generous.

I think about the Sara Bareilles situation because beyond all of this, the big twist waiting in the wings was the massive second wave of success for "Cruel Summer" that would come a couple of years later. The beloved deep cut became possibly the biggest hit of Taylor Swift's career, and for her, that's saying something. It introduced the possibility of a whole new peanut gallery who experience the pop charts in their re-arranged chronological order. Alas, I've never seen anyone say that they heard the new Taylor Swift song on the radio and thought it was ripping off Olivia Rodrigo. I will invite the realistic possibility that the parameters of popularity don't match the previous problem, and maybe music fans are just better informed than they were a decade ago. On the other hand, maybe it just makes more sense that no one would draw the comparison to two songs that just don't sound the same.

I've always very much enjoyed both of those songs, but I think I have to give the advantage to "deja vu" at this point, as a song that's never worn out for me. I think Dan Nigro needs a lot of credit for making this strange pop/psych rock hybrid that sounds pretty unique. I'll admit if there's any song I would compare this to, it's actually "400 Lux" by Lorde. This song came up on Bandle back in April last year and I desperately wanted to put Lorde down because at one point in time it was the only song I could hear on it. A problem in that game is that you can lock onto a wrong answer so assuredly that you'll probably lose two guesses waiting for something else to emerge. Yes that's right, I wrote that note down a year ago and have been waiting all this time to point it out.

We're yet to actually reach the start of the Olivia Rodrigo journey here, I've largely had the car in reverse this whole time, but "deja vu" introduces a new side to her songwriting as well. It's one that's more oriented on specific details, rather than platitudes that can apply to anyone. I'm not saying that Glee and Billy Joel are niche by any means, but they do manage to paint a picture. The specific accusation of transferring reverence of "Uptown Girl" to a new girlfriend is so funny, but a reminder that no one's born knowing music, and even the daggiest of '80s hits will feel like unearthed gems at a young age. Hughie from The Boys would probably tell you that you don't want to risk ever having the last thing you said to your girlfriend be about respecting Billy Joel though.

I do wonder if I'm even supposed to side with Olivia on this song. Teen romance is rife for scrutiny, especially if it's on the jealous side of things. I suppose the main way I differ from her perspective here is that I love the idea of someone transferring tidbits from my conversations. Maybe they hit a sour spot from association for her, but if I could get someone to transfer that experience, I might even be happy for them. One of my favourite unlikely things that ever happened to me is when I made one single meme in a subreddit for a video game. It only got upvoted about 200 times but somewhere along the way, it made it to a reasonably big YouTuber who included it in a video of theirs for about two seconds. Someone I was talking to saw it there, and then brought it up to me in conversation. Something I made managed to loop all the way around the world and end up back at me. By a wide margin one of the least likely things that I've ever experienced.

#263. Thundamentals - Everybody But You (#92, 2018)

29th of 2018

I don't even know how this is here. In 2017, Thundamentals scored their biggest hit in Hottest 100 terms (#861), one that painted over the fact that their previous album was more successful on the whole. That usually spells the end on the next album cycle. It's a path we've seen here many times (#654), (#404), (#351). It'll happen more as we go through this list. Thundamentals followed the playbook except when they put out their next album 18 months later, they still managed a pretty fair showing, with this unusual appearance solidifying that they weren't going anywhere. Now, they haven't had another entry since 2018, but nothing about it screams of a logical last gasp.

The only thing I've got here is that Thundamentals took things down a slightly different path with this album. Not a radical transformation, but maybe tweaking the parameters just a little to maybe find favour with a different audience. I'm looking at myself here. I happened upon their song "All I See Is Music" and it instantly became a big favourite of mine. It's much more chilled out than you'd expect with an instrumental that nearly overpowers Jeswon & Tuka. Great hook too, music does make the pain go away. I guess making Aussie hip-hop music that doesn't really sound like it has often been a strength of theirs.

I wasn't familiar with "Everybody But You" at all when it made the poll. Another case of me running my own side-quest and missing the supposedly popular option. It was a strange adjustment at first. If Tuka's hook sounds a little annoying, I get it. For me it quickly emerged as a dark horse, that surprise song from the pack of dozens of downloads on the day that I look forward to hearing the most. It does exhibit some of those properties of "All I See Is Music" too, with a really warm bass line to coast you through it. It feels strange to say but I could imagine this translating into an acoustic guitar jam pretty seamlessly. It's hard to imagine many people getting behind second tier, late career Thundamentals singles, but this is a real overlooked gem from this set of songs.

#262. Kanye West - Bound 2 (#59, 2013)

43rd of 2013

There's a peculiar streak that Kanye West maintained for a very long time, which is that he had a top 50 single in Australia from every single one of his albums. Up to 2026, that's 12 albums, and you can also include 3 collaborative albums though you'll have to call it quits once you get to "Vultures 2". Though a single top 50 entry is a pretty low bar for most stars, I'm not sure there actually is anyone else that can match him. Most big stars just don't have that big a catalogue, or more likely they've got a period of time that's letting them down. Taylor Swift would have something to say about it if not for her debut album. It's mainly just weird that it's Kanye West of all artists, who so consistently sabotages his own album rollouts with unusual strategies that are not conducive to this. It's a streak that sits on a razor's edge of just barely getting over the line most of the time.

The most egregious example of this has to be "Yeezus", his 2013 album. "Yeezus" was put out with no advance singles and actually became his first #1 album in Australia...though memorably it needed a recount after some erroneous sales were attributed to his nearest competition. A rare case of the charts admitting they made a mistake and amending. This didn't help him on the Singles chart though which was currently residing with some of the toughest competition it's ever had. You couldn't just waltz into the chart because the bar for entry was so high. It was true of Kanye West in fact. The biggest hit on the album (and a future entry on this list) stalled out at #58, and then the more short-lived hype of "Bound 2" got to #56. Kanye's run of skirting the line finally coming to an end.

In 2022, "Bound 2" became the subject of a TikTok meme. I had never seen it before, but the crux of it appears to be that you get two people on camera, one lip syncs along with Kanye for a portion of the song while the other person is doing an exaggerated lip sync with the sample. Naturally the song has been sped up to the point of sounding like chipmunks, and I'll give it partial credit for being an example that actually feels justified, I don't think it'd work with the original track. Thanks to this brief viral trend, "Bound 2" re-entered the charts and got all the way to #50, preserving the streak, and linking the chain up with all the albums he'd put out since. A very satisfying turn of events.

This is all ignoring the elephant in the room by pretending that "Bound 2" is just a regular Kanye West song with nothing to report. This is clearly not the case. Sitting at the end of "Yeezus", it feels like a novelty bonus track. Just a silly joke that doesn't fit in with anything that came before it. If "Yeezus" wasn't so short, maybe it even could have been a hidden track, but then evidently there were bigger plans for it. A large part of why the song is so famous is because it received a music video where Kanye makes out with Kim Kardashian while riding a motorcycle. Popular consensus seemed to be to make fun of it for being bad, and it entered the canon of music videos on YouTube that have considerably more dislikes than likes, the area usually reserved for Justin Bieber. No longer the case, though that's probably either because dislikes aren't displayed to encourage it, or because it's only viewed now by people who already know they like it.

Otherwise, it's mainly the samples that make this a weird song. The title spills the secret as it's built from Ponderosa Twins Plus One's "Bound". Not the only popular rap song to do this, as Tyler, The Creator would use a different part of it on "A BOY IS A GUN", though that one doesn't feel nearly as strange. It's just a very slow and breezy sample next to some of the most intense songs Kanye has ever put out. The other sample comes from an early Brenda Lee hit, "Sweet Nothin's", giving us the immortal phrase 'uh huh, honey'. For Brenda Lee, it introduces the song and her, for Kanye it's a weird disarming punchline that takes you out of the whole thing multiple times.

Oh and there's a third sample, "Aeroplane (Reprise)" by Wee, which has the melody interpolated by Charlie Wilson on the bridge. The boldness of his performance was one of the first things that sold me on the song. It came into play again a year later because the drum & bass duo Sigma made a bootleg version of "Bound 2" that eventually turned into a hit song for them called "Nobody To Love". Their track re-recorded those vocals and took it from a twice-off bridge to pretty much the whole song. They also kept Brenda Lee in it, in case there was any chance it could be a coincidence. Sigma's version turned into a massive hit, going to #1 in the UK, and also hitting #11 in Australia, considerably better than "Bound 2" had managed. It felt like a strange injustice at the time but I mainly look at it now as an example of the different audience reaches some artists have. If you're getting your hit songs from the radio or anything that feeds itself from top 40, it's entirely possible that "Bound 2" just never enters your world, and everything about the Sigma track is new and novel. Even if you aren't, maybe coating over the Kanye West parts of it would make it more palatable anyway. The scenario has flipped now anyway, with "Nobody To Love" being relatively forgotten and "Bound 2" absolutely sticking around. The big names always win I guess.

Otherwise the fascinating thing about "Bound 2" is the lyrics. There's an odd sense of romanticism to it that manages to get told in the most absolutely crass way possible. There's something more real about that, anyway. Being too busy being in love to even try to find the word to describe your girl without being disrespectful. Otherwise it's hilarious. The kind where you're so compelled by the performance that the absolutely laboured 'Brad reputation' punchline still manages to hit. I just can't believe the lyric about the sink isn't even the most ridiculous part of its own rhyme. It was never really my favourite from the album but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't glad to have it when it showed up. It felt a little random at the time but I think the song itself aged surprisingly well.

#261. Thelma Plum - Backseat of My Mind (#21, 2022)

18th of 2022

I sometimes think of the middle of the list as the Xavier Rudd zone of the countdown. It was effectively the limit to how far he could go as he was playing to one specific niche of voters and it was just a matter of getting their approval or not. The funny twist with all this is that his last entry "Follow The Sun" was probably being severely underrated at the time as it's shown itself to clearly go beyond that initial audience into a massive, enduring hit. We can also say something similar about The Amity Affliction who practically live in the bottom half of the countdown and only very occasionally jumped out of it when they were having some crossover popularity. Again, it makes sense, all things considered.

Did you ever notice that Thelma Plum has only made the top half of the Hottest 100 twice? If you've been paying close attention to these posts, it's been nothing but also-rans that snuck into the lower part, because across 10 or 11 entries to date, that's just as far as most of her songs go. The first exception is obvious, and saved for a later date. The other one is this, the incredibly unassuming go-getter that acts as if it's playing similar cards to the first one. I don't think it is, and I could easily imagine numerous other songs of hers to be in this same place instead. Career momentum or just a good song? Maybe it's a bit of both.

Like "The Brown Snake" (#579), "Backseat of My Mind" comes from her "Meanjin" EP, which was written during lockdown, in case there wasn't enough COVID influence in the last two years. Meanjin is the indigenous name for Brisbane which is where she was stuck writing it. It's amusing to look at press statements at the time which seem to hint towards this being a lead single for a new album, except that when the album did eventually arrive in 2024, this wasn't on it. Maybe if it had the streaming numbers.

Not that the backseat is the right place for it, but there's a good driving pace to this. There's a clear difference from her older music where she's found a comfort in writing unabashed pop songs. I have a fondness for some of those weirder edges, but the sanded down version is mighty pleasant too. There's a familiarity here but I wouldn't call it a rip off of any of her previous singles. Just one of those hit streaks to embrace in the moment.