#220-#216

 #220. SAFIA - Listen To Soul, Listen To Blues (#76, 2013)

39th of 2013

There's a definite risk if you're a new artist and you include the name of a genre in your song. You're gonna potentially alienate people from ever listening to it in the first place because it might be selling them something they don't think they want. This gets even worse if it's arguably not even the genre you're getting involved in. That way, all the people who thought they were getting one thing get let down when they instead get another thing. Just best to stay away from the whole concept until you're big enough to get away with it.

I don't know what anyone else's first reaction to SAFIA was, if this was the first song, but I remember being a bit confused by it. It's possible that I was ignorant enough to convince myself that this was something that could be described as soul and/or blues. It wasn't a very immediate song for me and I think that initial bait and switch might have slowed me down on it for a bit. Certainly, there's a soulfulness to Ben's singing, but outside of a shade of sorrow, I don't hear the blues in this.

It's the kind of thing that I think the radio can be very beneficial for. Sometimes the ease at which we can pick and choose what we listen to can make it that we miss out on anything that isn't immediately making its best case. The very fact that something is on the radio means that someone has decided it's worth our time even if we haven't realised it yet, and it'll likely make you hear it enough times to figure out if that's true.

The part of this I've been leaving out until now is that "Listen To Soul, Listen To Blues" takes a big pivot just after the halfway mark. The previously smooth backing just goes completely haywire. With this being SAFIA's first single, it's not clear which part of the song is more representative of their work, but with the gift of hindsight, I think this section is the SAFIA we'd come to know. It would grow to be my favourite part of the song, not for all the wacky sounds, but for the return of the song's chorus. There's this distorted effect they put on Ben's voice that adds some gravitas to what was already a pretty powerful hook. It's clearly the sound of a band in their infancy, but they're willing to try some interesting things, and the only way was up.

#219. Flume (feat Toro y Moi) - The Difference (#3, 2020)

14th of 2020

In what might be the most pointless thing to try to gain hipster cred for, I think I knew about COVID-19 before most people. I wasn't on the scene obviously, but someone I followed on social media was. Throughout December I was getting pretty regular updates on this serious issue that was spreading over China and the seemingly drastic response to something that in hindsight, the world just wasn't ready for. When you look at search trends for it online, it's practically non-existent until 2020, though that might say more about just how incredibly sharp the graph jolts up in March. It seems weird to think that more people weren't looking into it before, but it's easy to not think about something until it's absolutely uprooted your day to day life.

I touched on this a bit with "Sending Me Ur Loving" (#731). That was one of the songs that made it out into the world early on in 2020, one of the last songs to get the full extent of possible attention until the world got concerned with bigger news. You have to feel for the artists and labels who might have had a full rollout planned and then had to restructure everything because suddenly nothing was quite where it used to be. With Flume we've got a prime example. "The Difference" was released on the very same day that COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic by the WHO. 'Hey guys, check out my new song...oh, fair enough'.

If you look at charts and numbers (and obviously I do), you won't notice a significant change in terms of how the big hits tended to perform at the time. Maybe a slight dip in streaming numbers as it turned out the lack of commuting more than cancelled out the extra time at home in terms of reasons to put music on. I think the main issue was that it completely changed the dynamics of music discovery in a way that made people not really return to the old. I used to get annoyed at my brother if we'd be playing a game, someone would get called off to do something for a minute, and then we'd come back and he wouldn't want to play anymore. Just breaking that enchantment could have permanently kneecapped past promotional avenues like the radio. I'm not about to call "The Difference" a total failure and pin all of it on this, but when you compare it to his other high placing Hottest 100 hits, it didn't really have much to show for it on the charts. Only with hindsight has it held up as one of his biggest hits. More global streams than "Rushing Back" (#619) for instance.

Then again this could be a classic symptom of a hit that plays off better in hindsight. Something like an "On Melancholy Hill" or an "Instant Crush" (#293). Not really playing to the feel of the big hits that came before it, but hitting a sweet sentimental spot that resonates better out of context. The people who are just sampling random music they haven't heard before might get something out of this that the people pining for new Flume could potentially never see.

That's what I like the most about "The Difference". It's a Flume song that doesn't remotely feel like it's just doing his standard affair. He almost removes himself from the song completely without much of a hallmark, outside of the first 5 seconds. This is a drum & bass song that begs for you to run outside to on a hot day. I'd try it myself but it's too hot today. I'll admit I was a little surprised to see it poll so well. Maybe I'm stupid for ever doubting Flume in that regard, but it was a welcome thing to see.

#218. Silk Sonic, Bruno Mars & Anderson .Paak - Leave The Door Open (#47, 2021)

10th of 2021

It's always fun when an artist who knows nothing but success collaborates with an artist for whom those heights are a foreign concept. It's an unstoppable object meeting an immovable object. One of your guys has to break your rule! Usually what happens is something that breaks both rules by meeting in the middle to an extent. It can at times be a harsh reminder that as much as you may certainly think your favourite artists just lack the promotional game to get to the top, when they finally get that chance, they're just not famous enough to command the attention of that large majority of an audience that have been keeping them down in the first place. You'd more readily bring Bruno Mars down to Anderson .Paak's level than the other way around, it's just not what he does.

In 2021 we got a terrific demonstration of this all when Bruno Mars & Anderson .Paak decided to work together. It added a certain layer of intrigue that opened things up outside of the usual realm of Bruno Mars discussion. I say that thinking that I don't really see much discussion around Bruno Mars albums, despite the fact that he's sold so many of them and even won a GRAMMY for Album Of The Year for one of them. I'm much more likely to see people talk about a new Anderson .Paak album even if he categorically sells less of them and wins less awards. Now those people get to hitch their wagon to a juggernaut and use those numbers to validate the notion that it's a big deal when they do talk about it! In the end, it wasn't quite as successful as the average Bruno Mars album. I like to imagine it's a case of suffering from side project side effects, where there's just generally less imperative to check it out as not part of the mainline series. Maybe it just didn't quite have the hits, to which you might say 'Yes it did', but when you look at Bruno Mars' chart history, you have to remember what you're competing with. This is a man who had not remotely missed the mark once before this.

I mainly say all of this because I think the Silk Sonic project is really good! It's the kind of meeting of minds that works well for both by getting to inject that meeting ground on what both of them tend to do. Maybe you can be cynical and say that it's the kind of project that looks engineered to win GRAMMY awards and then feel alienated by the whole thing, but I hear it as a reward that keeps on giving. It pains me a little that it only comes up just the once on this list because "Smokin Out The Window" was a bonafide hit that's just right there. Evidently the mathematics of audience get even more complicated when you introduce it to the triple j circle, where neither of these artists are particularly notable stars (though Anderson .Paak will certainly appear more times here).

The Billboard charts have a funny tendency to just keep greasing the wheel for a certain handful of stars. From the outside looking in, it just feels like they're ordained the top spot while getting a reality check overseas. Just recently, Bruno Mars has had no issues scoring another #1 hit with "I Just Might". He's thoroughly backed by the machine and has the trust of radio airplay to plug up the shaky streaming figures. Outside of North America though, it feels like a hit that's only riding along because it's one of the few new and notable songs going around at the moment. In any case, I'm also describing a similar situation that happened with "Leave The Door Open", which also had its early week at #1 followed by the secondary week to coincide with better airplay. That one was a little less comfortable though, and resulted in a highly delayed Hot 100 since there had to be fraudulent downloads of Dua Lipa's "Levitating" removed from the count. None of that is on Bruno Mars or Silk Sonic, except to say that this collaboration was putting a strain on that guaranteed feeling of taking the top spot.

I'm also not going to knock it because I think "Leave The Door Open" is great. It's one of the best produced hit songs I've ever heard. Sounding smooth like a new born, or in a way that I feel like I'm going to be asked to leave quietly without making a fuss. Bruno Mars is still the star of the show, and I think does a lot to add to his own stocks when he shows off his vocal chops here. Usually he's the kind of performer that doesn't warrant a lot of comment, but his performance on this song is stellar. As for Anderson .Paak, he slips into the whole thing so naturally as if to make a case that he should be more of a star. I mean, I'd thought that for a long time already, but that's a topic for later entries. This is the kind of nostalgic throwback that is so well crafted that I can't help but fall for it. It's not good in a boring technical way, but in an 'I didn't realise how badly I wanted this' kind of way. Just absolutely puts me in a good mood.

#217. Tame Impala - Patience (#52, 2019)

16th of 2019

Still mining the well here. Something I always find interesting is the way the Hottest 100 preserves a state of time. The way we look at a lot of music can change over time. We can gain new insight that increases or decreases their worth to us. I heard an interesting quote recently about how we instinctively look for things that have been said before and try to find a way to level ourselves above us, in the abstract sense of either superiority or progress. Sometimes it'll be completely contradictory to reality. 'Why wasn't this song a bigger hit?' I say to myself while ignoring the fact that I was one of the people being a barrier to its success by not buying into it right away.

Going back to the original point though, Tame Impala's performance in the 2019 Hottest 100 remains locked in place. It's not changing, unless that one guy who keeps editing the 2013 & 2014 Wikipedia pages increases his scope. It leaves us with "Patience", the first new Tame Impala song since "Currents", nearly 4 years ago at that point. So many big accolades to come with it. It was nominated for multiple ARIA Awards, it was the first Tame Impala song to crack the UK top 100, named on multiple year end lists (including my own). This is a crazy amount of attention for a song that ended up tucked away on  "The Slow Rush B-Sides & Remixes". We did not know when "Patience" came out that it would never end up on the album proper, unless you count the Japanese bonus track, or one physical box set. Maybe the Hottest 100 performance really is an early reflection of it. Imagine a Tame Impala lead single not even cracking the top 50. You've got to scrub that immediately, the classic 'promo single' pivot that implicitly implies fans have to really do the work if they want the songs they like to get the proper treatment (except not so forcefully as to make it happen). Now it just feels like a random Tame Impala song that got in because it was one of three Tame Impala songs that were around in 2019 (well, four, but "Posthumous Forgiveness" was in December).

It's hard for me to not want to self-correct in the wake of this. I look at the way I responded to it initially and start to wonder if I'd ever give it the same time if it were just an album track. We're looking at the last gasp before Tame Impala fatigue started to set in and I look positively generous looking back. But then I want to cite "No Choice" (#307) and just contend with the idea that maybe this still is one of the best Tame Impala songs from this period. Maybe it's not really re-inventing the wheel, but the reverberated piano filling out the mix is positively striking. Then it's just the usual hallmarks. You've got drums that seem to splash, and all those mini odysseys where Kevin changes his inflection. It's definitely a little brother to that other Tame Impala song, but still worthwhile in a pinch.

#216. Boy & Bear - Southern Sun (#41, 2013)

38th of 2013

The locked in history can work both ways. For every hit that doesn't stand the test of time, there's one that probably should've been a hit but just wasn't really. You look at the performance of "Southern Sun" circa 2013 and it's just a modest comedown after their mighty success a couple of years ago. Still a hit to some degree, but one that comes off as a sophomore slump. Anyway, I don't know if you've kept track of things but it's absolutely Boy & Bear's most popular song now. All that says to me is that they just weren't allowed to keep the gravy train rolling into the future. Seemingly there isn't a song they could've put out that would've kept them at the top. It's why I do like to prioritise long time success. That's where the platinum certifications are hiding at least. "Southern Sun" is up to 3xPlatinum so far, which ties it with their cover of "Fall At Your Feet". I'm sure they'd probably prefer it if their own song is the one that goes the distance, given they implied as much when "Feeding Line" got their highest Hottest 100 position in 2011.

When I saw Boy & Bear live a couple of years back, it was a tour for the anniversary of their second album. They played every song on it, some for the first time in many years. I quickly also cottoned onto the fact that they were playing the whole thing in track list order. It's a cute, sensible idea in theory, but probably in practice isn't the most satisfying. The three most popular songs on the album are tracks 1-3. Maybe you've got some favourites on the back end but it's a long time to go without big highlights. This is how I also quickly realised that they were cheating on this system, and deliberately saved "Southern Sun" for last, so they could go out on a high, before coming back for several more highs when they brought out all the expected favourites that aren't on that album. It was quite peculiar though to see the reaction. Such a loud reaction for such an unassuming song. Maybe it's just a numbers game but funny how it works out like that.

There's an odd set up to this song though. A brisk walk the whole way, but with unusual moments to lift. You can't tell if the chorus is supposed to be the hook, or it's the nifty little guitar getting its moment afterwards instead. Generally stays at one pace almost the whole way until you get one of the great bridges. Maybe I'm doing it backwards as it's probably cooled off on me a little over the years, but hard to say it doesn't succeed in its mission.

#225-#221

#225. San Cisco - Too Much Time Together (#49, 2015)

30th of 2015

I can't imagine what it'd be like to be an adult in 2001, witnessing the meteoric rise of a certain New York band, the kind that's signalling a new era for rock music despite endless certain declaration that the scene is dead. Sure, the singer might have a nasally voice that's hard to decipher at times, but he's tapping into something raw. Maybe that's okay though, maybe I'm just describing Geese in the year 2025. If there are any doubts to their credentials, the problem is that it may well cause ripples that we are a long way away from seeing the conclusions to. Or all that stuff that came up after I wrote this.

I don't need to hide it though, obviously I'm talking about The Strokes. It's one of those reminders that a musical revolution does not necessarily make a big, obvious splash. It's very rare that you can take things in a new direction and win over enough of the stalwart gatekeepers who aren't willing to change the status quo. The Strokes don't really have top 40 hits. Surprisingly also, while they have all the hallmarks of a band that'd quickly fizzle out, they've remained surprisingly relevant as a group for over two decades now. Some of their most popular songs come from an album that was released in 2020.

If there's a point I want to make here, it's that beyond all the hype, I wasn't able to fully articulate just how much The Strokes mattered until I started hearing bands who were clearly influenced by them. Listen to "Eleven" by Last Dinosaurs and try to think of anything else. All the hallmarks are there: the fast guitars, the vocal distortion & falsetto, verse/chorus transitions that feel like they're lifted straight from "Is This It". If nothing else, it's proof of concept for me that there's still something to mine from this sound after so many years. I'm still finding songs to this day that scratch the same itch.

"Too Much Time Together" is another one in that chain. What is the main guitar riff in this song if it isn't just "Reptilia" or "Take It or Leave It" with less steps? What is the chorus of this song if it isn't just "Hard To Explain" or "Barely Legal" with less steps? It's just a very good way of doling out that instant gratisfaction even if you're hearing it for the first time. I will be completely fair to San Cisco and note that the vocal back & forth on this song adds a different flair to it. Jordi is not remotely trying to change things up and start sounding like Julian.

Actually the vocals are an interesting component of this because I've had trouble telling what's really going on in the mix. I tended to assume that Scarlett was doing all of the backing vocals but now I'm not so sure. The brief snippet in the second verse sounds like her, but when I was looking up live performances of the song, it's actually Josh adding those 'ooooh, na na na na na' parts, so it feels like a big group effort. Still, it's all the kinds of instant hooks that make me not surprised that this is one of the band's biggest hits overall, and the last one to make the ARIA Chart. This is the band's last song to appear here and I don't know how to round it out, so here's a wholesome picture of Scarlett, age 11, with Julian Casablancas & Fabrizio Moretti, no doubt plotting to eventually surpass them both in highest Hottest 100 entry, and total number of entries.

#224. Ruby Fields - Dinosaurs (#9, 2018)

25th of 2018

I love movies, you know that. Jurassic Park, now that's a good movie there. I say this with no strong level of nostalgia as I think I was very skeptical of it when I was younger and took a long time to watch the whole thing. Maybe that's what's stopping me from fully worshipping it, but nonetheless I have a lot of respect to hand out. I always think about how there was a contest to name the new Toronto basketball team in 1994, and due to the recent release of the film, 'Raptors' was the overwhelming favourite, and the name has stuck to this day. I did not think I'd bring them up twice in this blog (#500).

One of my greatest sources of entertainment with the film is a dumb anecdote of mine. I don't remember when exactly I first saw part of the movie, but it would have been at a time when I didn't watch many live action films or shows, and I had difficulty understanding how it all worked. My parents would watch Seinfeld and I wouldn't really understand what was going on, but I picked up faces. You watch Jurassic Park and very quickly think 'that's Newman!', and because of that, I'd 'solved' it and assumed the two things to be very closely linked. That's to say that for a very, very long time, I didn't know who Jeff Goldblum was and thought he was Kramer. I don't think anyone else ever made the same mistake I did, but something does resonate with me in an episode of Nirvanna The Band The Show when they're watching Jurassic Park enthusiastically. They're concerned over how Samuel L. Jackson's character is reacting, given what 'Newman' has just done to the security system. Just a subtle, realistic nod to the way we take note of famous character actors. I've seen Wayne Knight in so many things, but he really is immortalised as Seinfeld's nemesis.

I do find myself fascinated at the fluctuating popularity of dinosaurs with children. A lot of it does just come down to the media that exists at the time. Often it's just very hard to quantify though because anyone can relay their individual experience and misconstrue it as the general feeling. The first animated dinosaur film was in the 1910s, but I can't say for sure what impact it had. I do think that given the glut of associated films, there must have been a big peak in the late '80s and early '90s, one that still ripples from here on. Ruby Fields was born in the late '90s, but it's not a significant stretch for me to believe that she's still in on that wave. Dinosaurs are just too conceptually cool to not catch on like that with children.

If it wasn't in the title of the song I'm not sure I'd pay as close attention to that part of it. There aren't that many lyrics to be fair, but you could just as easily see me doing some sort of mathematical calculation to prove that it's not actually that strange to have attended more funerals than weddings as a teenager (the short answer is that your friends probably aren't getting married yet, and at the end of the day, there are probably more funerals to be had, logistically).

I also want to note just how much of a big, out of the gate success this song was. Just to put it into context, Ruby Fields was another one of those big 'check them out' Unearthed discoveries right from her debut single, a bit like G Flip. The only difference is that while G Flip's was an instant success, Ruby Fields instead landed at #137 and #152 in the Hottest 100. That easily could've been as good as it gets. "I Want" is a great track and I was surprised it didn't do better. I guess this song just speaks to more people through the specifics of its platitudes. That big build up and explosive finish, that's the stuff that top 10 finishers are made of right there. This is being filed in the same cabinet as "Don't Fight It" by The Panics. In general though I think there is something to be commended with making such a grand statement within relatively simple terms. Coming to terms with growing up and what it entails for you despite the fact that deep down you still are that innocent child you once were. Much like how a family movie can make statements about man's folly, and helpless desire to play god without being prepared for the responsibility, under the guise of 'hey, cool CGI dinosaurs!'. If I wasn't on a time constraint, I'd also consider putting on the film again.

#223. Alex Lahey - Every Day's the Weekend (#45, 2017)

26th of 2017

There is a certain kinship that comes with this very concept for me. In theory as someone on disability, every day is the weekend. In reality, I get so caught up in weekly commitments that it doesn't necessarily come across that way. My hours might not be rigid, but sometimes I keep myself so busy that the result is basically the same as working. I absolutely look forward to Saturday because it's the one day of the week that I don't actually have to do anything. It's one of those ways I can still tell the difference between weekdays and weekends, even when football season ends (#256).

This song isn't really about that concept, but instead it's about being deeply connected with someone (guess I'm out) and disrupting all prior commitments to spend time with them. On some level that is an experience I do relate to though, and I've had to force myself to occasionally saying no, simply because I haven't earnt the break, and future me will be lamenting past me and my laziness. Where I tend to fall on the whole situation is that it is important to have some sort of balance between productivity and recreation, but that might just be me speaking from my experience of always wanting to jump from one thing to another.

In any case, this song was an instant favourite for me in a way that's so self-evident that I have little to say on the subject. Upbeat, vibrant pop rock and it's just my bread and butter. It's employing that same sense of balance though with a steady chorus that runs on a metronome, but gets broken up with some 'wa-oh, wa-oh, wa-oh'. This is the end of the Alex Lahey saga on this blog which is saving me a bit of trouble when I didn't have much of a unique spin on things (don't look up how many more Skegss songs there are). I think part of that comes down to the song selection though, which all hits on a similar tone. My favourite song of her's is probably "I Want U" which feels like a completely different spin on things. It's slowed down a little and her guitar has more of a '50s/'60s reverberation to it. Then if we want to be technical, she also co-wrote and played guitar on "Heather" by Sarah Saint James. That's more in her typical wheelhouse, but an extremely catchy nugget if you haven't heard it, extremely likely given that view count.

#222. Genesis Owusu - Get Inspired (#17, 2022)

12th of 2022

I am occasionally ostracised for my refusal to install an adblocker. On some level I think it might be a generational gap at times, where growing up with a number amount of ads (especially watching kids TV) has me finding the current standard for advertising to be relatively mild. If watching YouTube is at best, 10% ads (or less if your hands are free to skip it), that's a pretty good ratio for me. I suppose the other thing is that I don't even necessarily find ads to be a worthless endeavour. It's inevitably a way to find out about things, and often through reinforcement, get accustomed to things that might not be in my periphery, but are important to others and comes in handy to know.

I won't deny that there are negative side effects to this. Depending on where you're sourcing things from, you are inevitably going to see the same ads over and over again, and that can get tiresome quickly. The basic HBO Max plan is great because it has some of the greatest TV shows ever in its library, but if you use it a lot, you have to get used to a very small rotation of the same ads constantly, that only seem to update every few weeks. Knowing every beat of the promotional ad to "A Minecraft Movie" hasn't really paid off for me yet. Meanwhile Flight Centre has made sure I never want to hear "Life In A Northern Town" or "Sunchyme" ever again. Why would they do this to me?

There are two possibilities here. You saw what song I posted above here and had an immediate reaction, amplified by the above two paragraphs, or you blissfully have been ignorant of the whole charade. It's something I've been hinting towards multiple times in previous entries, but "Get Inspired" is probably the song whose relationship with me has changed the most since I made this ranked list. I don't know if it's fair to say that I should change its placement, or that it's wrong to put it here, but it's been quite egregious for a song that I've comfortably heard far too much of in the past year.

"Get Inspired" is on a KFC ad. It's part of a long tradition where they tend to pluck out some song that landed in the top 20 of the Hottest 100 a while ago and trot it around far too much. First they came for Drapht's "Rapunzel" (fun story, since I wrote this, I actually met Drapht), then San Cisco's "Awkward", and then Icona Pop's "I Love It". Actually I'll pay the last one as it's become an inseparable part of the song now. They really chose the worst 3 words of the chorus to associate with their brand and it's so ridiculous that it worked. Usually they were doing it with a song that was about a decade old, and so a fun throwback, but the attack on "Get Inspired" happened when the song was barely 2 years old. It's one of the newest songs in this list because it came out so late in 2022, and so it's had the least amount of time to gain some notoriety, and now it's just that song I don't want to hear right now.

I will put forward a proper case for it though which is that I'm describing the worst, most unfair part of the scenario. It's not so much the song itself but rather a soundbite. You're only really hearing about 10 seconds of the song each time, the same 10 seconds, but that's all it is. That can provide an uncanny feeling, like rewinding the same section of a podcast multiple times, or just hearing your own voice playing back to you because someone hasn't sorted out their voice chat settings properly. Not great, but if you actually go back to the full song, you get much more variety than you're used to, and maybe on some level, it's actually improved for it. Like I'd totally forgotten the song has a bridge. It's just felt egregious for the past year knowing that I have to write something about this song, and that it's the highest entry for Genesis Owusu in the end. The rank just locked in a time when there was nothing to note about this song other than it being the closest approximation we're getting in this list to the wild energy of "The Other Black Dog". At least I can safely listen to his new music, but we never know when the KFC demon is going to strike again.

#221. Disclosure (feat Sam Smith) - Omen (#62, 2015)

29th of 2015

Every now and then you'll have a big commercial breakout that comes from an artist that really isn't suited for that limelight. Whether they crafted an effective crossover within their style, or they created something so fascinating as to supplant the usual process, they're an anomaly. Everyone knows this, and they know this too. The next question is what they're going to do next. They can either completely disregard it and do whatever they want, or lean further into it, to try and make lightning strike again. I think deep down we probably want something in the middle, as if it's too obvious in one of those two directions, it gets discouraging.

I technically already wrote about Disclosure's big follow up single (#251) when "Latch" turned into a huge hit for them. It doesn't feel like the complete story though. Given just how long it took for "Latch" to take off in America, it was a whole different ball game by that point. Disclosure's first album cycle and been and gone, and it was just about time to move onto the second one. Additionally, that guest vocalist they had hired had gotten just a little more well known.

This is the first and only appearance here for Sam Smith. Admittedly it's underselling their massive impact from 2013 to 2022, but it was mostly outside the periphery of triple j. In the same way that Adele was prior, and Olivia Dean is currently, Sam Smith was just the ticket. That mix of sensible, polite music that was modern enough that the kids were into it as well. Just a huge boon for labels knowing they can comfortably ship truckloads of albums and largely rely on big streaming numbers in perpetuity. The belated success of "Latch" overseas felt more like a deliberate vehicle to keep the Sam Smith train rolling, the same way Sam Fender is currently benefitting from an Olivia Dean feature credit. When an artist is on a hot streak like that, it doesn't matter whose songs they're on, people just can't get enough of it. They'll probably chew it up and spit them out in the aftermath, but that doesn't have to be a hard and fast rule either.

There are other loopholes of course. We're looking at the most obvious one right here. How many people groaned when they saw the big lead single from Disclosure's second album also featured Sam Smith? I probably did to a degree. They were probably right to do it, and well within their rights given they basically put them on the map, but it was hard not to see it as a cynical ploy for a hit. The worst thing about it was that you knew deep down that it could still work, even if it would remain confined to the shadow of its twin. You'd be hard pressed to find many people who prefer "Omen" over "Latch".

This would be a great moment to make the most controversial statement I've made here but I don't think I can do it. "Latch" is just timeless. The only thing I'll say on the matter is that years later, looking at it on its own merits and with the added context of what Disclosure had been doing on this album, I've found myself to be far more charitable to this song. It comes close to suffering from feeling overcooked, just desperately in search of a hook that sticks. It'll never be quite as sticky as it wants to be. When the chorus does arrive though, it's absolutely one of Sam's best hooks. The kind of song that's best served by sneaking up on you, maybe playing in the background. Let it perform without the pressure of having to be something it's not trying to be.

#230-#226

 #230. The Smith Street Band - Death to the Lads (#21, 2016)

26th of 2016

You might astutely have noticed that I placed the majority of the entries from The Smith Street Band within a very small amount of space (and the other two weren't far off). It's something that I tend to be self-conscious of. I don't want to fall into that trap of voting for the band, or otherwise assigning a rough cap to what they might be capable of. To me it just represents the incidental chance of this happening with a randomly selected set of songs. A faux linguist is breathing a sigh of relief that I finally didn't end a sentence with a preposition. I had no intention of doing this but it just ended up this way. In a sense, great, it's a solid set of entries. In another sense, just terrible here because I've never been able to recharge myself to find something new to put into this.

If I were to add a new tangent to all of this, I barely scratched the surface on the fact that most of The Smith Street Band's entries here were produced by Jeff Rosenstock, this included. I don't have an encyclopaedic knowledge of his music but I do like "WORRY." quite a bit as well as that Bomb the Music Industry! album that tends to get the most love. I wouldn't say the Smith Street collaborations are a carbon copy, but the best parts of his music just remind me of the best parts of PUP's music. It's an appropriate team up though, because who else would pair up extreme wordiness with anthemic singalongs?

"Death to the Lads" has one goal in mind which is to become exactly that kind of anthem. The moment I first heard of it, all I could think was that it was a deliberate attempt to engineer it. The great thing about it is that 'the lads' doesn't even need to be a specific sub-group. There are probably groups of people who are considered 'the lads' to one group, who have their own 'the lads' to push below themselves on the ladder. I don't even think this song is taking aim at any particular group. Rather it's about recognising our own shortcomings, so really, we're all the lads. I'm here thinking over this list for a solid year and I still end up putting the 'get out of my f**king face, mate' song ahead of all the more intricately introspective songs instead. If you've mastered the art of ranking things why would you spend half your time choking with blatantly uncouth decisions?

#229. Travis Scott - SICKO MODE (#3, 2018)

26th of 2018

This was a long time coming for Travis Scott. He'd been on the cusp of a big breakthrough for years but without a crossover hit to show for it. It was so willed into existence that a significant portion of his album swarmed the charts on the week it came out, despite his only top 50 hit prior to this being a feature credit on a moderately sized Major Lazer hit. It gives us one of those ascents you can map out as a projection of the general populace. "SICKO MODE" debuted in the top 10 at #7, but that was just the eager Travis Scott fans, and maybe some Drake fans as well. The song spent the next two months slowly sliding as those early listeners weren't maintaining the same enthusiasm, the way I imagine most people who obsess over an album probably will reach their critical mass for how frequently they listen to it very quickly. The song levels out, but then picks up a second wave of momentum, as everyone who was detached from the album cycle hype is now just tuning into what has turned out to be one of the biggest hits of the year. It's even easy to imagine someone half-heartedly trying it out, dismissing it as messy album filler, and only later finding that connection that makes the brain click with the idea of it being a hit song. The song got back to #7 another 2 months later, and when they seemed like it might be the end of it, the result of triple j's Hottest 100 a further 2 months later finally got it that shiny new peak. It got to #6. A tremendous result for a song as weird as this.

*TRANSITION*

They seem to get an unpopular reaction but I love the extra fluff that comes along with the Hottest 100 countdown. Maybe not necessarily calling up drunk parties (though I understand why they do that), but I'm talking about the extra sauce that puts more life into the countdown appearances. Little intros, interviews and that sort of thing. If you're in any way voting in the countdown because you want your favourite songs to get more exposure and commendations, then you should absolutely, more than anything else, hope that they get an introductory segment. I've found through watching the response to it on download & streaming charts that getting the extra bit of focus goes a huge way towards making people pay attention to them. We just like things when we know more about them and it makes them feel more important.

It's not often something that gets commented on very much, but there's one big exception to this. Before the #3 song was played for 2018, triple j played one of these info sections to build up to it. It starts with a clip of Anthony Fantano saying 'This generation's "Bohemian Rhapsody". It's taken from one of his 'Let's Argue' videos where he's reading a quote from a random Twitter user. If you listen to the whole thing in context, you'll find there's a degree of reluctance to it, where even though he likes the song a lot, the flaw(s) really makes it hard to fully support the idea. triple j's segment keeps running with it, but it's clear to me they're just having a bit of fun.

The people were not happy about it. For weeks upon weeks, any and all triple j threads about anything were at risk of being derailed once someone brought up the quote. This may have all been amplified by the fact that the "Bohemian Rhapsody" biopic was very recently released, so Queen idolisation was at a generational high. It eventually cooled off but as recently as a week ago I saw someone bring it up again and specifically attribute the quote to Ben & Liam, who were hosting breakfast and that segment of the countdown at the time. There is some slight truth to this in that they did say this (I apologise but I've never been able to distinguish which one is which so I can't correctly attribute this. I saw one person say it was Liam but I'm not about to take that as gospel). Once "SICKO MODE" ended, you hear Ben or Liam say 'They're calling it this generation's "Bohemian Rhapsody", except their microphone wasn't turned on at first, so the first three words came in very quietly. It's possible this one very slight radio gaffe amplified the situation, but it's impossible to say. It's certainly one of the all-time over-reactions though. It's so blatantly superficial and silly in an era where everything surrounding Drake was turning into a meme. It's not even the most famous "SICKO MODE" meme because it was around the same time as a screenshot from "The Polar Express" was being exploited to make people debate their preference between it and Sheck Wes's "Mo Bamba". A battle where the hits were not remotely on the same scale to make it fair, but it has that certain 'yob or wanker' feel to it in the world of memey but very popular hip-hop songs of late 2018.

*TRANSITION*

I do want to emphasize just how weird this song is. Everything about it (except the feature) screams of an accidental hit, the kind that is just not going to be pushed along by the machine unless it's forced to keep up. A song running for over 5 minutes, shifting between beats that have nothing in common. That's all while it's operating in Travis Scott's typically hazed out modus operandi that's never really proven itself to be pop viable. Even in those bounds, we're not done, because (especially during Travis's verse) you're caught off guard by every strange idea that has entered the man's head. I'm adverse to ever denoting this song as 'Travis Scott featuring Drake' because it's ignoring all the other contributions. Swae Lee says all of 3 words on the song but makes an amazing impression with it. Biggie even has 3 words of his own two decades after his death. Just the words 'gimme the loot' alone add 14 songwriters to this behemoth. At long last, Ali Shaheed Muhammad, Phife Dawg, DJ Premier & Guru have co-written a Billboard #1 hit, I'm happy for them. Feel like I've left out a name or two there, I'm sure they'll get their moment.

Drake does naturally get most of the attention here. This makes sense because it's 2018 and this song is just a victory lap for him, though you can have fun with the fact that he's not normally credited on the song. I was strongly considering writing this whole entry without mentioning him once but it was too awkward to write around him. He's just a beacon for things to talk about, or maybe he's like a light, like a light, like a light, Lisa needs braces, pick up Bart, a part of us all. His best part of the song is the intro, where he lands on the sorrow, remorseful Drake mood which I find always connects with me. Perhaps put a pin in that for a future entry.

If there's something to be let down about in the whole experience it's that there's not nearly enough chemistry in here. The very fact that they tease it at the end probably makes it worse. I want to pretend they're in the same room trading bars, rather than emailing them back and forth. Still, the era of "SICKO MODE" is always one I'm happy to re-live. A tremendous high point for the people who made it, and the people who made it a hit.

#228. Arctic Monkeys - Body Paint (#79, 2022)

13th of 2022

Welcome back to the Arctic Monkeys lounge experience, enjoy your stay, we have jet skis on the moat. It feels miraculous to say that this is the second entry here from "The Car", given the album before this one only managed one, and at a lower position. They shouldn't have been able to get away with this again. At the time I had a brief inclination to say that I might prefer "The Car" to the couple of albums that came before it, but I'm not sure that holds anymore. Admittedly I've not gone back to those ones as I'm saving them up for later dates.

I can only guess that it was an accidental master stroke in timing. This album was released in mid-October. Normally I'd say aim for a month or two before that, but it's not quite as important if you're an artist of Arctic Monkeys' stature. They're guaranteed to get the necessary attention early on, and it's just a matter of holding onto it for long enough. A lot of albums like this run the risk of falling out of focus for the next big thing and then the enthusiasm dries up quickly. This is exactly that kind of album but they made it work for them. We are looking at Arctic Monkeys a solid 17 years into their career though. I wonder if younger listeners would see them the same way that I might have felt when Pearl Jam were finding their way into the list as late as 2006. Even Pearl Jam's big second commercial burst they had when "Last Kiss" became a #1 hit was more recent then, than Arctic Monkeys' "AM" success was in 2022. Unctic Monkeys, or something like that. It's not like the actual music would dissuade anyone from thinking that.

My personally biased point perspective here is that part of the success came from them holding onto the album's secret weapon as a second single. If there was an obvious beacon for votes like there was last time, they'd probably be doomed to repeating the performance, but here you had the pretty likeable lead single (#417), and then this one later down the line that's just a little more straight forward to get into. I can't exactly claim Arctic Monkeys aren't able to get away with lengthy song titles given what the early part of their career was like, but they had a certain whimsy you don't get from the ode to demanding a mirrorball. "Body Paint"? Much more straight to the point. It didn't quite take the lead as their most popular song here, but landed awfully close given how much less attention it got from the outset.

I like to count it as a win for "Body Paint" anyway, because it otherwise had no business getting through here. If I were to vote for an Arctic Monkeys song that year, it'd be this one. It takes their extremely mild chill out zone to new places, ones that feel a little less indulgent. I contain contradictions though so my favourite part of this song is the ultra-indulgent guitar solo at the end. So predictable, I know. It's just a very nice feather in the cap that they'd been building to the whole time. So while I might not go back to "The Car" very often, this is a very worthwhile cut to take away from it, was stoked to see it here.

#227. Violent Soho - Vacation Forever (#69, 2019)

18th of 2019

The funny number. The original funny number if you will. It is a number that does not discriminate in the Hottest 100, and is willing to be home to the deeply serious (gestures to Crash Test Dummies' "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm", and the deeply unserious (gestures towards "(Let's Go) Smoke Some Pot", "Waving My Dick In The Wind"). It's so thoroughly random what we get here that in all our time of Hottest 100 countdowns, just one artist has managed to slot in there twice. It wouldn't be right if #69 didn't have a partner, and fortunately, 3 years after their first stint, Violent Soho found their way in there again. I really thought they had a chance to do it again another 3 years later but it wasn't to be.

I sometimes forget that "Vacation Forever" wasn't just a loose single. The album came out in 2020 and went to #1 on the charts, forcing Dua Lipa to wait a little bit longer to hit #1. There were no further Hottest 100 entries though, a considerable drop off when they had 6 on the previous album. The reality of it is that they had two near misses, "Pick It Up Again" at #113 and "Lying On The Floor" at #117. I very much enjoy the latter which feels like the closest approximation of all the hits on "WACO". Good build up, good hook to lock it into place. Maybe a lot of time felt like it passed in 2020 and everyone just forgot about it. In general though, I don't think the album showcases their best for the most part. It's short and sweet, but drags on a bit, nonetheless.

"Vacation Forever" is a solid single though. It's the gift that keeps giving. You get a big hook, and then the chorus just keeps on going, and going. Only then do you finally remember that this is that one song with the 'baby boomer' lyric and it's the cement that holds it all together. Such great worldbuilding, what on earth is the context?

#226. Mallrat - Charlie (#3, 2019)

17th of 2019

"Charlie" was released on August 7th, 2019. At the same time it was released, there was a new #1 single in Australia. With the exception of a week when Mariah Carey's "All I Want For Christmas Is You" took over, that same song remained at #1 all the way up until the end of the voting period for the 2019 Hottest 100. In that same time, "Charlie" could not quite managed to crack the ARIA top 100 (though it would reach #50 in 2020, Mallrat's only ever top 50 hit). That song landed just behind "Charlie" in the Hottest 100. I'm not making any comment on that song here (although you may have realised it still hasn't appeared), just that it is one of the most monumentally extreme examples of how the charts don't always dictate the poll in the way it might feel they do. It's a David vs. Goliath situation where admittedly, Goliath has been getting his fair share of victories lately, and arguably he still did in 2019 (another song is being omitted from discussion), but you never really know how the dice are going to land, and that's very interesting. Just this idea that a song can be well beloved, but in an 'off the grid' kind of way.

Maybe for Mallrat, it wasn't so surprising given that all the momentum was on her side. She was climbing higher and higher on the list each year with this being the logical zenith. Maybe "Groceries" (#313) really was the bigger hit, but it also fully put her on the map as an undeniable hitmaker. Maybe on those metrics she didn't do quite as well here, but she succeeded in a different way by pulling at the heart strings.

Do you know the story about Hachikō? He was an Akita dog born over 100 years ago who would wait for his owner after work every day. One day, his owner suddenly died at work, but Hachikō would continue to come back to Shibuya Station in Tokyo almost every day waiting for his owner to come back. He continued doing this for a decade until he also passed away. There's now a statue of him at Shibuya station. You might also know this story via that one episode of Futurama. I am informed by people who have very deep affection for dogs in general that this is a heartbreakingly sad episode. Don't let my dog agnostic feelings get in the way of that if you feel this way.

Mallrat doesn't go into that sad aspect of it, but it is a song about the joy that comes with returning to her dog when she gets home. Nothing about this is particularly explicit in the text unless you know her dog is named Charlie, and even then, it won't turn up until you're nearly at the end of the song. I am undecided on whether the whole song is about Charlie, and it's just a misdirection before that or not, because you can read a lot of these lyrics as being about a prospective partner as well. I promise there's nothing suspect in that. In any case, the Hottest 100 has a long history with songs about how dogs are great, and Mallrat has just set a massive benchmark for the next comer to try and top.

#235-#231

#235. SZA - I Hate U (#78, 2021)

12th of 2021

Since around 2014, triple j have held onto a pretty consistent ruling with regard to eligibility for the list. It's something that's been so hard locked in since then that it's well understood and remembered whenever the conversation comes up. The first day of eligibility is December 1st of the previous year, all up until November 30th. All roughly 2-14 months in advance of the countdown. It's not one of those things that falls out of place when the 365 (or 366) days of the year come into play, it's always those exact cut offs. So few hits actually end up released in December so they probably could get away with making it fully wrap around the year, but it's probably fair to give some more of a chance to build up hype, considering how poorly November hits tend to do anyway.

When the voting lists come out, this doesn't usually pan out exactly to plan. Understandable when you're dealing with a very large list of songs and the resources for accurate date checking not always being immediately obvious. It tends to be nowadays when the list comes out that some ineligible songs just end up on the voting list. Usually it's brief and fixed up once it gets pointed out, and it's no harm done. Save for all the people who just wasted a vote and won't get it reimbursed. Then I guess sometimes they just never fix it and we're stuck with it.

"I Hate U" probably should not be on this list. Well, maybe it should, but it probably shouldn't be on the 2021 list. It all depends on how you define the term 'released'. SZA originally put the song up on SoundCloud in August, 2021. The buzz around it was good, and so she released it fully on December 3rd, 2021. It starts to get a little odd here though because if you look at the upload for the song on SoundCloud now, it has that December 3rd release date, yet the oldest comments on it are from November 2021. I just don't know how the site works. The original upload is still around though, via an anonymous account that SZA was using to put out the songs (it was also titled "I Hate You" at that point). That's my proof that the song did exist in its very same form in August, 2021. I just don't know if I'd say that it counts as a released song like that. triple j didn't play the song once until the official release. This might just be me in the bargaining phase where I look at this song specifically as the one that kicked MAY-A's "Time I Love To Waste" outside of the top 100, a song I'd re-iterate as probably being my #1 pick for that list if it were there. This song's 12th place for me is a reasonable consolation, but the grass really is always greener.

In any case, another hit for SZA. Another notch towards finally releasing that album, and back when I didn't know what I might have been dealing with, was definitely a quick favourite for me. It's made to be a single. The synth hook is memorable and sets the tone for a nice pocket of spite. It's all that unbridled fury though, where at first she's being reasonable and calling out a shitty thing to do, but eventually the urge to just scream 'f**k you!' takes over. The switch up on the chorus is so unexpected but works so well.

#234. Alabama Shakes - Don't Wanna Fight (#65, 2015)

31st of 2015

I find myself wondering if there's an alternative universe where we're all just a little bit sick of Alabama Shakes. They achieved success right out the gate with their first album and even got nominated for Best New Artist at the GRAMMYs. They didn't win, but they'd cash in their cheque with the next album. The chart positions got better, and they actually started winning a bunch of GRAMMYs. The only one they lost out on was for Album Of The Year, losing to Taylor Swift. I do wonder if they may have been seriously in the mix to win it, but maybe Chris Stapleton diluted their votes a little bit. It's a fast track to being seen as one of those artists that are inexplicably obsessed over by the GRAMMY committee and that can tank your reputation pretty quickly. Instead what Alabama Shakes did was they just didn't release any more music. Their 2015 album "Sound & Colour" remains their latest full release. They did finally release a new song in 2025 called "Another Life", which I'll endorse, but at the time of writing, that's all there is. I'll update to say they also released "American Dream" a few weeks ago.

The part I'm leaving out here is that between these releases, Brittany Howard has embarked on a solo career. You might recall it from its specific characteristic of sounding absolutely nothing like Alabama Shakes. A lot of the time whenever I heard songs from her, I couldn't even pick out her distinct voice because the template surrounding it was just so different. Her debut album really just does everything all at once.

Brittany has always been the calling card of Alabama Shakes though. A singer with a big voice that's able to emote in such specific ways that stand out. I am one of the people who initially got fooled by her androgynous voice, something that sounds increasingly silly once you go back to "Hold On" and realise she name-checks herself and her much less gender-neutral first name. Part of me hopes this whole entry has been a big 'WTF' moment for someone reading it. It's always nice to teach & learn new things. Another interesting thing about the band is that they're from Athens, Alabama. The state makes sense, but the city provides the opportunity to have to say 'no, not that one' twice. It feels fair to say though that no city punches so far above its own weight in the world of music than Athens, Georgia.

"Don't Wanna Fight" has always been a big standout for me for all the same reasons. It feels like it should be their big breakout hit because it perfectly nails that crossover friendly blues sound akin to The Black Keys before them. Just hit 'em with a funky riff and it'll go a long way. It helps contribute to an extremely catchy hook though, where Brittany finds an even higher note to go crazy on. Well, I guess it's not as high as she goes, because there's the infamous introduction to this song that sounds like a kettle boiling. I forget who made that observation first but it's the only thing I ever think about now.

#233. Tate McRae - she's all i wanna be (#74, 2022)

14th of 2022

Today when I was watching the footy I heard a bit of an interview that caught my ear. It was Gold Coast Suns coach Damien Hardwick looking forward to the current season with optimism. The club had what most would generally agree was a very lucrative trade & draft period. The phrasing that got my attention is how he referred to these new player acquisitions as 'toys' to play around with. Maybe on some level, that's how people see it all, but it was language that felt dehumanising to me, and it's something that's rubbed me the wrong way no matter who's doing it.

I don't know how you might feel about Tate McRae, but I'm writing this in 2026, and it's fair to say that she's one of the biggest pop stars of the decade. It's a winning formula to be prolific and while her pace of releasing albums might not be quite on par with the Rihannas and Taylor Swifts of the world, it's harder to find moments in time when she doesn't have a hit doing the rounds than when she does. I don't want to talk about that part of her career though, that's all largely in the realm of a hypothetical sequel blog. I want to look at the early part of her career, before she had even released an album, and when her bid to be a star was still up in the air, it's where the story begins for me, and eventually everyone else.

For most people, I think the first time Tate McRae enters the picture was with her song "you broke me first". I'm pretty sure it's the first one I heard though I don't have any recollection of that moment anymore. The song was a slow burner though, released early on in 2020 and taking about 4 months to take off. In that intervening period, I was getting acquainted with her music. I'd taken a liking to some of the subsequent singles, "vicious" and "don't be sad" back when I had no reason to suspect she was hitting the big time very soon. They're fun songs. An interesting blend of pop and trap that stood out quite a bit. It feels important for me to acknowledge this period because I constantly forget about it. Once an artist gets as big as she's gotten, and feels like the go-to vehicle for all the big pop producers, you can forget about those humble beginnings because the idea that she was ever approachably niche just doesn't sound right anymore.

Another part of this is the way that a lot of people tend to use persuasive language to try and drive home their point of view. The part I left out about "you broke me first" becoming a big hit was the internet's collective response to it. Words to the effect of her just being a Billie Eilish clone manufactured by the labels but with none of the talent. I think having known her music for just a little longer than most, it stood out to me as a little disingenuous, and reeked of that hesitance that always comes with new faces if they haven't been manually approved beforehand. Whenever these artists come back through again, there's that sneering, dehumanising statement that comes around. Stop me if you've ever heard something along the lines of 'I thought we agreed the Jessie Murph experiment was over'.

Tate McRae was firmly in these leagues for years. I think she's well past it now but it wouldn't surprise me if some of those more steadfast individuals still refuse to give her flowers, still treating her as a C-lister no matter how far up the ladder she's managed to climb. It certainly seemed like the remaining sentiment when "she's all i wanna be" came out. A chance to smugly stroke chins and declare that after copying the 2019 success of Billie Eilish into 2020, she was now copying the 2021 success of Olivia Rodrigo into 2022. You can sound extra clever if you wrap it up into meta-context on what the song is about. It's all so very surface level, tiresome, and feels amplified due to this uncontrollable urge the world has to subconsciously pit women against each other. I'll concede that this is a bit of a genre experiment she hasn't really stuck with, but there aren't a lot of opportunities to break through in your career by doing something that isn't a little bit trendy. What I mean to say is that if you're looking for these angles to be critical, you'll find them.

As a brief aside, I should note that "she's all i wanna be" is an odd inclusion in this list. triple j had been sporadically playing Tate McRae as early as 2020, but generally steering around her hits. "feel like shit" got a whole lot of time on the station. By end of 2022, "she's all i wanna be" had been played once on the station. It felt a little lucky to make it onto the voting list, and because it was a big hit in the wider world, it snuck onto this list. It was probably a reality check moment for triple j who took it as a sign to further get behind her, and she's had a very strong showing in the last 3 countdowns as a result. If not for a rare case of triple j ignoring one of her biggest hits in "Just Keep Watching", she'd already be up to 10 entries to date in the Hottest 100. She's had as many entries as Violent Soho, and more than Tool and The Offspring. She feels like a main character of the recent countdowns who is just making an early cameo at the moment, so often earlier in the list I'd wanted to reference her but had to remind myself this was on the way, just so out of place here.

That's just on a meta level that it's out of place. I think this pop rock pivot makes for a generally easier sell than the more 2000s R&B influenced pop she's putting out now. It's the kind of song that I could completely imagine hearing on triple j, especially if it were by an Australian artist. I'm somewhat cautious when things like this happen, but I was ready to welcome this instance because it's always been a song I've really enjoyed. Enough so that I've gone so far as to put it above all of Olivia Rodrigo's pop rock adjacent songs, I don't see this as a pale imitation at all. Maybe my bias as something of an early fan still influences my feelings on her music. Hard to say really. I forget about that so much that it has to be on a subconscious level you'd think. Even when she's moved so far away from making music that's marketed for me, I can often find something to take away from it. No caveats for this one though, just highly enjoyable.

#232. The Jungle Giants - Love Signs (#18, 2021)

11th of 2021

There's a long running, well recognised bit that the signature component of all ska music is the phrase 'pick it up' being repeated very quickly. You don't even need to be able to think of a song that does it, it's just the calling card. It goes way back, even beyond the '90s, though if you want an archetypical example, then you want "Sound System" by Operation Ivy. Maybe the most famous ska song to do it is "Superman" by Goldfinger, but it's also entirely possible you know an entire Tony Hawk's Pro Skater two minute run of the song and have not even noticed it's there, slightly buried in the mix. I've always joked to myself that "Love Signs" is officially a ska song, because it says the phrase considerably more times than the songs I've mentioned here. The cadence and speed aren't right at all, but you can't tell me they weren't shitposting with this one. It's that and the fact that the opening words to this song are 'Love signs, baby'. I can think of exactly one 5 letter word that begins with S that I'd expect to see in that space and it isn't signs, or space. Who knew The Jungle Giants simply had no limits to what kinds of music they'd gentrify with their new sound?

I jest of course. Given what came before and after, there's an argument to be made that "Love Signs" is probably the least challenging Jungle Giants song. It doesn't sound remotely interested in threatening your perception of their music. I think they wanted a hit, because that's what they do. To an extent, they got it. Not quite on the level as the two that came before it, but you look at this sitting pretty snugly in the top 20 on a competitive year and you have to conclude that they did alright with this one.

There's a soft spot for me in it too because it's probably the only Jungle Giants song I've really gravitated to on my first listen. They've fared pretty well on this list overall, but they're all the consequence of me giving them the time to thrive. This one was just sending & receiving love signs immediately. I think they hit on a nice chill sound for this one, something that reminds me of deep cuts on Chairlift's "Something" album. It's the kind of song that helps you forget about what Subway's former spokesperson did.

#231. Childish Gambino - 3005 (#43, 2013)

40th of 2013

I have never been overly familiar with Donald Glover's writing & acting work. I've seen the occasional clips of Community and enjoyed those small bites (the GIF of him walking into a burning building with pizza is an all-timer), but otherwise it's pretty separate from me. With that in mind, I think of him as a rapper first and foremost. I'll probably exclusively call him Childish Gambino in all of these entries because that's my entry point.

Along with Disclosure, he's been something of a surprise package for this list for me. I've never really seen myself as a big fan or anything to that degree, but when we actually look at his stat sheet, we're looking at a pretty unimpeachable set of entries. He'll appear in this list 5 more times after this one, all with an eclectic set of songs that hardly sound anything like each other, taking big swings and consistently finding intrigue. He's had one more Hottest 100 entry since the cutoff with "Lithonia", and I greatly admire that one too. Inexplicably getting away with making a Weezer sounding rock ballad in the year 2024. I think it'd still be to come in this list if I subbed it in, so it's an incredible innings all up.

We have to start somewhere, and "3005" is the likely case. Jump back into 2013 and I was not fond of the song at all. It wasn't actually my introduction to Childish Gambino because I knew "Heartbeat" and "Do Or Die" by then. Good songs, and they had me generally rooting for him. "3005" felt like a step back to me where I just didn't enjoy the hook at all and that got in the way of everything else. It just felt a little more dull compared to my expectations and I started to resent its popularity.

I held onto these feelings for a really long time. I've been waiting years to share the story but it was actually in early 2020 when I had my revelation. I was at the BROCKHAMPTON show and there was a DJ playing assorted hits as a warmup, which I was vaguely paying attention to since that's the level of music nerd I am. I don't really remember what else was part of it, just that it was a lot of hip-hop. "3005" was in that mix though and maybe it was the good vibes of the time, maybe it was being outside, maybe it was seeing a bunch of people having fun in the mosh section, but something about it just clicked right there. That same hook that always felt momentum crushing just felt euphoric in the moment. In hindsight, I think it's always had that effect, but it's amplified much more strongly on the second iteration, after which I was usually checked out. Now I think it's probably the best part of the song, the glue that holds it all together. Gambino's rapping is still pretty fun though. I think he sets the tone pretty early with the legendary line 'Girl, why is you lying? Girl, why you Mufasa?'. I think if you can manage to accept that corny bar into your life, it's very easy to get on board with the whole thing. Surely won't be the last time he pulls off something like that in this list.

#240-#236

#240. Telenova - Bones (#91, 2021)

13th of 2021

It's very peculiar to have Telenova be part of this story. They feel especially modern even though they're not on the final year of this cut off. It is however their debut single that shows up here and it's the only time they've ever made the list. I have no idea how they wrangled this kind of support just this once and never again, and it's making this once-off just feel stranger by the year.

Telenova to me land squarely in that niche of extremely tasteful indie pop. It's basically my bread and butter and almost never amounts to anything. In fact, while "Bones" was getting the attention, I was more focused on some other Telenova songs that were meeting the usual quota. "Tranquilize" might still just be the quintessential Telenova song to me still. Something about the way Angeline delivers the title lyric is just hypnotic. I understand for many that "Bones" came in first and the two don't sound especially different, but that's the refined formula. The band has only gotten to be a tighter unit in the years since. The vocals are shining once again on songs like "Why Do I Keep You?" and "Temples", but it's that added instrumental punch that sends them over the edge. They've slowly turned into more of a rock band, which might not be as algorithm friendly, but it's worth keeping them around. A very solid grasp on catchy melodies.

If I had to guess what it is that got "Bones" over the line, it probably is that minimalist flair. There's a popular British band who will eventually appear on this list who probably set the stage for what popular indie pop was to sound like, and who asserted it when they were regularly pulling incredibly good stats for listener retention. "Bones" feels like a slight translation of that away from the more electronic elements. Also a little MS MR here just with a more light, feathery outlook. That and the way the chorus is just one unending hook with these big affirming statements that all look like they want to be the centre of attention. I always zoom in on 'run, baby run', because it's follows by a line that matches the exact syllable cadence of We The Kings' "Check Yes Juliet", and I'm here to make sure you never unhear that.

#239. The Preatures - Is This How You Feel? (#9, 2013)

41st of 2013

We've had The Preatures here before. I'm going to summon a magic link that roughly takes you to the post for "Somebody's Talking" (#397). This is the big one though, their crowning pop glory that took them to Platinum sales and a top 10 finish. Not bad for a fledgling band, but evidently something they had trouble navigating alongside a bunch of other things crumbling apart.

Something that might strike you if you listen to the first two Preatures EPs is how different the setup is. It's easy to forget if you never heard their initial breakthrough single "Take A Card" that Gideon was a main vocalist in the band, who sings half of the songs on those two EPs. In an interview with TheMusic back in 2013, Isabella Manfredi takes time to note the set up and how they both weighed up importance for those contributions. In any case, "Is This How You Feel?" turned out to be a big hit, and by the time the album rolls around, Isabella has become the face of the band. It's just her on the album cover and she sings on every song now. I don't know if this relates to Gideon's future departure from the band but it might factor in somewhere.

I had mistakenly believed Isabella and Gideon to be a couple, but it was actually Jack, the band's guitarist. They broke up in the late 2010s around the same time the band did, and from what I've heard from Isabella, it was the result of him taking advantage of her naïveté to control the relationship and also commit adultery. They were on good enough terms to briefly reunite in 2024 but it's gotta rattle the foundation. The band also cite an outdated record contract which brought everything to a halt. Everything points to The Preatures being a short-lived burst of excitement that could've been more, but at least they'll always have this song.

"Is This How You Feel?" is the sound of everything coming together. That undeniable hit that has everyone scratching their heads wishing they'd thought of it first. I always think about the Roxette songwriting process where they seemed to operate with a perfect understanding of how the listener took things in. A hook every 6 seconds, that sort of thing. I don't know if I'd say this song quite reaches those lofty standards, but as I listen to it, I never find it falling into the doldrums. The guitar and bass keep trying new things and the chorus keeps ascending to new highs. Not a moment wasted. Even the bridge, which feels more minimalist than the rest of the song, manages to land in that zone of intrigue, where the repetitive refrain just sounds so unique that it becomes one of the finest moments.

#238. One Day - Love Me Less (#92, 2014)

29th of 2014

Australian hip-hop lesson time. One Day is a supergroup. They might just be the biggest Australian hip-hop supergroup because there isn't a lot of competition and though short-lived, their credentials are pretty solid. They've got in them all the members of Horrorshow, Jackie Onassis, Spit Syndicate, and also Joyride. We've seen Horrorshow in this list before (#644), and Joyride also had a guest appearance as he loves to turn up on a Like A Version (#566). Spit Syndicate might be the most important segment for this entry because Jimmy Nice is singing the hook and first verse. I've got some familiarity with them because they were several albums deep at this point and have a handful of songs lodged in my head permanently. "Here Today, Gone Tomorrow" is a good one (and actually features Solo from Horrorshow), as is "Beauty in the Bricks", probably the one I heard the most. Jackie Onassis enter the scene a little later, and also have a Solo feature on one of their early releases. I want to say they're the "Crystal Balling" duo, a triumphant song it has to be said. One Day was formed out of mutual respect where they all basically grew up together and it seemed like a good idea to strengthen that bond.

If you need proof of concept for the supergroup concept, then here's what happens when you take some mostly less well known artists and put them all together: You get a #2 album. Well, in fairness Horrorshow did that on their own just a year before this one but it's impressive to pull the same weight like this. When P!nk & City and Colour made an album together, it got to #2 as well, so maybe the lesson is that unifying a tightly knit fanbase can work better than trying to lodge disparate ones together. At least that's in terms of album sales, the increased attention given to artists' top tracks on streaming services is certainly adding a bonus to ending up on as many of those lists as possible. It helped also that One Day has a bonafide hit with some minor chart presence, enough to get the word out and lend some credibility.

"Love Me Less" is that hit. I feel like it might have just gotten a little lost in the shuffle by the time voting opened because I was expecting it quite a bit higher than #92. It starts to look like the beginning of the end for this era of Australian hip-hop, where only Hilltop Hoods are able to carry the mantle going forwards. They're all usually on the fringe anyway, but the crossover hits very quickly became few, far between, and then nothing.

"Love Me Less" sounds like a crossover hit to me though. If not just because Urthboy flipped a similar sample just a year later on "Long Loud Hours" (#334), with the high pitch sounding like a crying child. I'm more convinced it actually is the sound of a crying child on this one though, and it's one of those funny samples that feels like a joke but then oddly just fits into place. Well, I listen to them rap about all these infidelities and it still pokes through at times and makes me laugh again.

It's a peculiar song from the jump that's asking us to make a moral judgement. Are we going to root for the anti-hero who is gleefully boasting about how unfaithful he is on the first line? Is it even the truth of what's going on though? Jump forward to the first verse and Jimmy is contradicting himself by saying he doesn't cheat on every girl. He's right that he's got my attention from that but I am left quite riddled by it. My best guess is that he's just presenting the dichotomy of how he might be perceived, or where the relationship might go. Engaging with a new person in your life is always going to be that question of whether or not you hit it off, and then whether or not you find out that they're just diametrically opposed to you on some key issue. Sometimes you've just got to decide if you're gonna take that risk. I'm also obliged to mention that later on in the song, Solo mentions a flat battery in his phone and then mentions receiving some flattery. It's been 12 years now and I still think of this song as the 'flattery' song, only that I'm reading it as a bizarre portmanteau. Haven't really added it to my lexicon but in fairness I tend to keep my phone charged.

#237. Spacey Jane - Weightless (#81, 2020)

15th of 2020

This is going to sound like a backhanded compliment but my favourite thing about this song is the pre-chorus, where everything calms down for a moment before ripping right into it. It'll be back-handed because for me, it's just emulating another song that'll be higher on this list. Not enough to call it a rip-off by any measure but I suspect my positive reaction to it is simply my brain being reminded of something I like a lot.

It's with this that I get highly critical of the way this band tend to be perceived. It sure sounds snappy to say that Spacey Jane, Ocean Alley & Lime Cordiale are all the same band (real comment I saw). The sentiment is so inherently uninformed on the outset but with all three bands occupying that mental slot of 'boring Australian band that inexplicably gets loads of Hottest 100 entries' for many, they become an outlet for the laziest of derision just because even within echo chambers that don't really ride for the bands, the affirmation of 'It can't just be me who doesn't get it' rings so loudly. You'll cling to any incoherent message that vaguely points in the direction you're facing. Relevant Simpsons clip. It's the kind of adversarial way of experiencing music that garners no sympathy. A mere sidestep away from inventing a person to get mad at them.

Don't deprive yourself of these moments. Sometimes all it takes is one song and suddenly everything clicks into place. You put it through the lens of them being able to make this, so the rest can't be so bad. This just feels like the pinnacle of it all. A similar build up to "Good for You" (#434), but added experience to make it really ascend.

#236. Baker Boy (feat JessB) - Meditjin (#98, 2019)

19th of 2019

Remember 9 months ago when I was talking about the "Lady Marmalade" Like a Version (#628), and how there was this cool rapper from Aotearoa on it that I couldn't mention. Here's the resolution to that and it's all because JessB snuck onto the list just prior to that. It was only a matter of months in fact, "Meditjin" was released quite late in 2019, and that cover was (unsurprisingly) very early in 2020. Just before this song came out, I heard of JessB through her song "So Low". That might have just been a vehicle for Paige singing the chorus, but they both show up well on it, she's absolutely got the Lil Kim flow on lock. JessB also used to be a professional netball player, gotta grab those multi-hyphenates when you get the chance.

"Meditjin" is absolutely a song I associate with sports now. It spent quite a while being used on TV commercials as a hype anthem, and more recently it's been part of the brutally small rotation of songs played after goals at Perth Stadium for Fremantle. I'm writing this just before the 2026 season starts and I'm just hoping they change it up this year (Update: they have). I'll grant that this is a good selection anyhow, but I've been to enough games to know that no one is feeling the "Viva la Vida" chant, where it seems to be an attempt to get everyone to say 'Freooooooo' over the bridge but it just isn't happening. That one game last year where it took 1.5 quarters and 8 behinds to get a goal might have just completely ruined it. "This Girl" by Kungs & Cookin' on 3 Burners though, goes pretty well for a song that I imagine most people do not know a scrap of metadata for, and wouldn't know how to look up either.

Also, "Meditjin" is the medicine. That's what the song means too. It's basically Baker Boy's mission statement boiled down to its simplest form. Baker Boy is once again proving he's a fanboy of Kendrick Lamar by referencing a song that I've not yet written about (or maybe I have by the time you're reading this, who knows). I don't think it's intentional, but I also get a bit of Sergio Mendes' "Mas Que Nada" in the wordless chanting, always a tick in my box. It's surprisingly intense for such a feel good song, but it's a level that Baker Boy and JessB are both capable of matching up to. Guest verses often run a little short so I'm fond of ones like this that give us enough time with the up and comer.