10
“Nembutal”
Nick Cave, Warren Ellis
One of my hot takes this year (I think) is that I really liked Andrew Dominik’s Blonde. Marilyn Monroe was born to die, a tragic heroine, and the way Dominik portrays her suicide at the end of his artistic look at her life is crushing. And half of that reason is because Nick Cave and Warren Ellis wrote this track, a crushing and optimistic lament with shades of Angelo Badalamenti that took away my heart.
9
“Texas Sun”
Khruangbin, Leon Bridges
There’s so much character in this song and it only uses two chords. Good music doesn’t have to be complicated.
8
“Baby”
Charli XCX
Night mooooves done as pitch perfect as it can be from one of the top songwriters of this generation of music.
7
“American Teenager”
Ethel Cain
A queen of the oozing, brooding oeuvre, Ethel Cain rips her debut LP, Preacher’s Daughter, wide open with an indelible pop track, an immaculate piece of songwriting showing her in full control of sound, fury, and sadness.
I need a second sentence on this one for some of the ingenious, layered lyricism:
Grew up under yellow light on the street
Putting too much faith in the make believe
Another high-school football team
The neighbor’s brother came home in a box
But he wanted to go so maybe it was his fault
Another red heart taken by the American dream
6
“One Right Now”
Post Malone feat. The Weeknd
There’s a reason these two have the second and third most billion-streamed tracks on earth.
5
“Take My Breath”
The Weeknd
Suave as Knight Rider, hits like “Eye of the Tiger”.
4
“I’m in Love with You”
The 1975
Caption: (light upbeat music)
3
“Sleep Explosion”
Norma Jean
Furious, manic, heaviest ending to a song all year.
2
“Oh Caroline”
The 1975
Look, it’s always going to be really hard to compete with Andre 3000 and Neil Diamond for songs about Caroline.
1
“Outta Time”
Orville Peck
Orville Peck is a modern-day Van Morrison by-way-of Elvis who managed to follow up one of the other best tracks of the decade with an album full of them. This track is the best of the rest, but it’s also truly the best of the best: I spent the most collective minutes listening to tracks off from Bronco, and this is the stand out. God save Orville Peck.
Playlist
Honorable Mention
Just before spring, Euphoria was wrapping up its second season on HBO. At its core, the show is about addiction, and — no hyperbole — Zendaya gave the performance of the year in Episode 5, “Stand Still Like the Hummingbird.” The season hinges (metaphorically) on the episode (and physically, falling almost exactly at the mid-point in running time). It’s a rare moment where film captures real life as close to accurately as Sam Levinson does in those 20 minutes, watching someone burn it down and salt the earth behind them in the trench warfare of an intervention.
The episode before, though, is where the gun gets loaded. Episode 4 ends with a hopeful promise, not written in dialogue; instead, it’s a scene underscored by Labrinth as Rue (Zendaya’s character) enters a cathedral while hallucinating on drugs, listening to the orchestra Labrinth is conducting. She makes her way to the man and hugs him as he sings when, at that moment, he turns into her father — the reason she’s an addict, filling the father-sized hole.
Going from this surreal sequence — characterized in song and saying this way more than dialogue could ever speak — into the prodigious performances at the top of the next entry — word-after-word-after-word, no music, battering the audience, a war of attrition between a family hoping for peace and a daughter who can’t live life without fighting for the only thing she knows — makes “I’m Tired” one of the most poignant moments I had watching something in 2022.