Paramore — “Ignorance”

Released: 7.7.09 Peak: #67 What could “rock” possibly mean to your ordinary everyday mainstream kid in 2009? Former Timbaland session guitarist Kevin Rudolf’s “Let It Rock,” which subtracted everything but the synths from Bon Jovi’s “Runaway” and had about as much in common with its titular genre as US3′s “Cantaloop” had with jazz? The All-American [...]

La Roux — “Bulletproof”

Released: 7.21.09 Peak: #8 “You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)” made a strange comeback in 2009. For starters, you had Dr. Luke negligently violating the DNR order and defibrillating the Dead or Alive hook for Flo Rida’s benefit on “Right Round,” as translated by Ke$ha’s most arresting vocal to date. (I don’t necessarily mean [...]

Drake — “Best I Ever Had”

Released: 6.16.09 Peak: #2 Drake was something of a historic inevitability. The passive-aggressive sing-rap of Kanye’s 808s & Heartbreak, the smoked out self-absorption of Kid Cudi’s “Day ‘N’ Nite,” the shameless infatuation of Soulja Boy’s “Kiss Me Through the Phone” — in hindsight, the path couldn’t have been more clearly paved for Drizzy’s sullen girl-friendly [...]

Mariah Carey — “Obsessed”

Released:6.16.09 Peak:#7 You can’t just blame the drugs, of course. You can never just blame the drugs. No use blaming Proof’s murderers or Kim or Debbie either for Eminem’s by-far worst album. Relapse was the work of a man well aware that he was pissing away his talent. Pushing forty, Marshall Mathers’ heart just wasn’t [...]

Black Eyed Peas — “I Gotta Feeling”

Released: 6.16.09 Peak: #1 I’ve never seen the percentage in hating the Black Eyed Peas. They’re never bullying or misogynist, and their closest stray toward the sententious, “Where Is the Love?,” was bold enough to remind us that the C.I.A. is a terrorist org. Far be it from me to guess what roils foes who’ve [...]

a quick question

Hey there, neglected blog readers.  Hoping to squeeze out the past few entries soon (or not-so-soon), but I have a quick request: Could you let me know which of these posts have been your favorites? Trying to round up and revise a handful of the best.

DJ Quik & Kurupt — “9X’s Outta Ten”

Released: 6.9.11 Peak: Did not chart My opinions on ’90s L.A. hip-hop are highly suspect. Even my taste in Cali gangsta runs toward the agile semiotics of Jersey transplant Ice T rather than the blocky bludgeoning of Compton homebody Ice Cube. Chalk it up to east-coast nurturing if you like; my personal theory is that [...]

Best Albums 2009 (11-15)

15. Shakira – She Wolf Clocking in at barely more than a half hour (Spanish-lyric versions, label add-ons and all), Gabriel Garcia-Marquez’s favorite pop star scales back her pretensions so drastically I worry that she’s come to accept that polyglot dance-pop won’t change the world after all. Whether insisting that lycanthropy is no laughing matter [...]

Das Racist — “Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell”

Released: 6.9.11 Peak: Did not chart Here we have what seems like exactly the sort of internet novelty blip that annoys all the right people. (By whom I mean, of course, “not me.” The internet novelty blips that I–and, I’m sure, you, wise reader—hate are wholly deserving of opprobrium.) The lyrics aren’t solely limited solely [...]

Michael Franti — “Say Hey (I Love You)”

Released: 6.7.09 Peak: #18 I wasn’t startled to hear a song by the creator of “Television, the Drug of a Nation” in a TV beer commercial — I was just glad Michael Franti and his label sponsors at Anti- were getting paid. Even back when he thought his Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy were doing for [...]