top 20 singles

[15] Allison Crutchfield, ‘Dean’s Room’

allison-crutchfield-2016

A big couple of years for the Crutchfield twins, because of course Waxahatchee made this countdown last year. Check their Wikipedia entries. No, don’t check their Wikipedia entries. Allison’s made the right decision to stretch her legs outside Swearin’. Her debut solo album Tourist In This Town (which I’ve just seen is not out until February, so, sorry about the spoilers) takes her band’s scratchy lo-fi brashness but then digs out all the pop possibilities, bringing out the toplines and generally sounding like it’s not afraid to be out front.

And ‘Dean’s Room’ is the best New Order song since all those very decent efforts on last year’s Music Complete. Kind of undermined the compliment there, but you get the idea. It’s particularly good when it slaps the splashy beats on the chorus. J3 mimes them, J1 shouts “I like this!” with some surprise, J2 is making wry comments about her mum’s friend Allison: “Well, I never knew she could do this…”

For all its raucous earworm abandon, there’s something creepy underneath ‘Dean’s Room’ (“You just want to catch me alone… Think of you like a roach at my feet”) but it all slips under the pounding drums.

[16] Radiohead, ‘Burn The Witch’

radiohead-2016

It was like Now That’s What I Call Music, wasn’t it? A Moon Shaped Pool was stuffed, once more, with wall-to-wall hits purpose-built for warbling in the shower, soundtracking summer BBQs and filling your favourite banger playlists. And ‘Burn The Witch’ was the catchiest of the lot with its convulsive judder, portent-heavy chorus and bouncing bassline. We got our Radiohead back.

You know, a bit.

“Apart from the singing,” observes Junior, “the music’s actually quite good! I can’t imagine playing it on my flute though – it’d be forte all the way through.”

“Apart from the singing.” Soz, Thom.

[17] Little Scream, ‘Love As A Weapon’

little-scream-2016

I’m listening to The 1975’s I Like It When You Sleep… (that’ll do) for the whateverth time this year. Still don’t quite get the decision to end with two acoustic ballads. Every time I play it, I expect it to make some kind of sense to see out one of the most fidgety pop albums of the last 30 years in such a one-note way, but I’m not there yet. I’ll try to make this sound relevant in a minute.

“Is this Prince?” asks J2. She’s got a point. Clipped funk, falsetto and a knack for addictive pop make ‘Love As A Weapon’ very Purple, even if it feels more eager to please than he ever was. “Is it a man or a lady?” she adds. Clearly, Laurel Sprengelmeyer begs the same questions as Prince too. If Bowie managed to write his own epitaph this year, at least Prince got to hang around in spirit, and not just here. He’s embedded in that sprawling 1975 double as well, nestled alongside Duran Duran of every period from 1981 to 2004.

Perhaps we should recoil from referencing heritage artists whenever we listen to new stuff, but if the current breed can’t help doing it themselves, what can you do? It doesn’t bother me.

J1 shrugs. “Meh.”

[18] The Avalanches, ‘Because I’m Me’

avalanches-2016

There are people who’d have gone from reception to graduation in the time it took The Avalanches to get off their sample-clearing backsides and release a second album. I kept a faith that was looking increasingly stupid, wishful and, frankly, futile all those years, but was improbably repaid. Wildflower – I’m not going to review it now; I did that quite comprehensively here – was almost everything I wanted, and certainly good enough to top my 2016 list, even if half that impetus was powered by nostalgia.

Nostalgia – that’s what The Avalanches are built on. ‘Because I’m Me’, Wildflower’s riotous, sunshine intro, pulls from The Honey Cone and 1950s street sounds to recreate The Jackson 5 (with some J Walter Negro-style block party rap) and makes you hug yourself to have them back.

“Ohhh Frankie Sinatra,” sings J2 because she knows what’s coming next, but not here. J1 likes the anonymous kid’s voice. That’s the feedback. The rest is dancing.

[19] Justin Timberlake, ‘Can’t Stop The Feeling!’

justin-timberlake-2016

J2 gasps.
J1: “Awesome. The best.”
J3: “It’s gonna win.”

Well, that’s clearly, mathematically untrue. They’re all singing and dancing now, proving this isn’t just dad disco, it’s kid disco too. Monumentally cheesy, but somehow irresistible, which probably isn’t where JT should be at this stage of his career. More and more pop stars are accelerating towards Vegas, aren’t they? Sam Smith started about half a mile outside.

There are two things that really get me with this song: The hurtling chorus bonus line “All those things I shouldn’t do” that keeps it flying; the phrase “It goes electric wavy”. That’s charming, a bit ‘timey-wimey’. I’d dance to this in a really dad way if I still knew people who’d invite me to a wedding.

[20] Karl Blau, ‘Fallin’ Rain’

karl-blau-2016

Before we start, a word on Brexit and Trump.

Not really. More pertinent questions: what’s a single? What is this? Who are we?

A single is a single, and we’re going to make the best of it. It’s also an ‘impact’ track these days, and pretty much any song that’s even marginally promoted outside the confines of its album. Look, these are confusing times.

This is a blog that’s been running since November 2005. Admittedly, it’s running rather sporadically now, but if I’m going to go through my favourite songs of the year, it’s still the best place.

We are me and my three daughters. Junior (J1) who’s 11 and has been doing this since she was flapping her babygro arms to Kanye West all those years ago; Junior 2 (J2) who’s eight and massively into Top Of The Pops 1982, smuggling Dexys and Haircut 100 CDs up to her room; and Junior 3 (J3) who’s six and opinionated.

Finally, Karl Blau is a honey-toned C&W geezer from the Pacific Northwest who, after years on the circuit, released the wry Introducing Karl Blau this year, a collection of covers that’s the best of 2016, pipping good old Dexys’ mind-bogglingly loose selection of ‘Irish and Country Soul’. They both did the Bee Gees’ ‘To Love Somebody’ but Blau wins there too by the length of a Hammond organ. This wildly extended version of Link Wray’s ‘Fallin’ Rain’ uses gently tinkling piano to evoke the raindrops and Blau’s own gentle commitment to convey the woes of the world. He’s a Nashville Isaac Hayes.

Over to our panel: J2 is measuring angles on her mum’s macbook, J1 is watching her. J3 is bouncing a cuddly tiger on my head.

J1: “It’s all right.”
J3: “It’s bad.” She pops on her headphones and goes to play the little Yamaha keyboard on the rug.

[1] Chris Brown featuring Benny Benassi, ‘Beautiful People’

Chris Brown

It’s not my fault, it just happened. The little worm has probably used that line too.

Anyway, I searched my conscience and found that this is a Benny Benassi record, so all good. And all good it is – I’ve not heard a record that so perfectly captures early 90s club euphoria since… since…

Read not too closely between the lines and this is deeply narcissistic, of course. Could Chris be singing about himself, kids? Isn’t he a little bit beautiful inside as well? Maybe he has rather smashing internal organs. Still, taken purely as an audio experience ‘Beautiful People’ is dashing, thrilling, direct, hangs on a superb hook and is about the only rave-synthed tune of the last five years that sidesteps a cheesy doom. Come on, it does.

All these songs are purely audio experiences for Junior. That’ll change, but right now she and her sisters can just enjoy chanting “Everywhere, everywhere…” and puzzle over how Brown can be singing both the title and the woah-ohs. We’ll discuss studio techniques another time.

Anyway, we agree on this one – “I like it the most of all the others. Bom-bom-bom [‘Super Bass’] and live your life [er, this] are *thumbs up*, the others are *middling thumbs* and *thumbs down*.” So there.

Next up, 1980 or 2002.

[2] Bon Iver, ‘Calgary’

there’s a fire going out,
but there’s really nothing to the south
swollen orange and light let through
your one piece swimmer stuck to you

I think this is ‘Astral Weeks’, and the whole album is a son of Astral Weeks the album. It has a poetry wrapped up in the fug of memory, of magic, heartbreak and lost places. ‘Calgary’ is a rising storm with hooks too beautiful to remain composed in the face of, and anyway, Justin Vernon could make the TV Burp theme sound like a distraught elegy for Old Yeller.

Junior picks this up. “Oh, I know this one. Is it about someone dying?” Well, who the hell knows? It’s the impact that matters. As for her opinion – “The same thought that you think” – she’s learning Iverese.

So it should be No.1. It’s my favourite song of the year, but top spot goes to clearly the best single of the year. And it’s a disgrace.

[3] Junior Boys, ‘Banana Ripple’

Junior Boys

Now I love a nine-minute record that doesn’t waste a second as much as the next man, so no doubt we’re all delighted to see this has placed so high. My wife says it’s very me, by which I’m sure she means it’s funky, addictive and a joy to have around the house rather than over-polite, unsexy and called Jeremy.

Jeremy Greenspan isn’t a very rock’n’roll name, is it? Further evidence from Junior: “I don’t like the singing. It’s not rock’n’roll like ‘Firework’.” Well, nothing’s as rawk as Katy Perry. Not even P!nk. Junior’s in the mood to examine this record, dismissing a banana ripple for more foodstuff-based suggestions: “What about one potato, two potato? You rip the skin off them too.” There’s, um, food for thought for Junior Boys’ fifth album.

In the end I catch her doing a strutting hip dance – moving like Jagger once more – in secret. That’s Junior Boys really, dance music to be enjoyed in private.

[4] Hercules And Love Affair, ‘My House’

Hercules And Love Affair

To deliver this skintight streak of acid soul, Hercules use three singers: one to, well, sing the song, one to say “Get up, get up”, the third to say “Ca-con-con”. Staggering. The last days of disco indeed.

It’s all very Fingers Inc and diva-defiant but goes to show just how fresh this kind of thing still sounds. There’s no way you can’t at least jerk your head around to ‘My House’. In a way though, it was a false start for an album that never quite catches fire like their wonderful debut; maybe that’s the absence of Antony, but I think these three singers do a fine job even with their ill-balanced burden.

Or do they? Over to Junior: “It’s a bit good. Not the singing, the instruments – they suit the singing.” I wouldn’t like to work out those royalties.