Triple J's Hottest 100 - 2014
Right. The 2014 Hottest 100. I'll level with you: I nearly didn't vote. These days, I rarely listen to Triple J, for tedious reasons like I'm old and boring, I no longer work at One Rabbit (where we listened to the station during the day), and I now listen to the more "adult" focussed Double J instead. (Considering how much I enjoy the music they play, I seemingly fit right in Double J's target demographic. Presumably they're trying to capture the "aging music nerd" market). I figured that because I hadn't been listening to Triple J, I wouldn't have any idea on what was good and worth voting for... so why bother?
But then along came Buzzfeed with their amusing campaign to get Taylor Swift's Shake It Off into the countdown. The reaction to it from a segment of dedicated Triple J listeners was dramatic, and to be honest, it kind of grated on me. People fiercely argued that the song was mainstream pop rubbish and had no right to be played on Triple J, and the whole vibe I got from the arguments was that people who listen to Triple J have much better tastes than "commercial" radio listeners. Quite frankly, that snobbery annoyed me! These days, I think dismissing something, whether it is "mainstream" or "uncommercial" (or whatever particular genre) is pretty pointless: either you like the song or you don't. Why put limitations on what you will listen to and like because of the various labels you can affix to the music? (Unfortunately, despite holding this opinion, it doesn't mean that I'm not snobbish myself).
And besides, I also happen to really like Shake It Off.
For those not in the know, I am (bizarrely?) a bit of a fan of Taylor Swift. I think she's a fearsomely talented songwriter, and her album Red was one of my favourite albums of 2012 (In a demonstration of my confusing tastes, Red is tied with Swans' The Seer, though I have certainly listened to Red a lot more). Now, admittedly the first few times I heard Shake It Off, I thought it was so dumb that I wanted to jam a sharpened pencil into my ear drum, but damn if it isn't insanely catchy: I'll forgive a lot if you give me an awesome hook. These days, I think it's a great song, and I now consider the ridiculous "This! Sick! Beat!" part and cheerleader chant that follows more "silly" than "stupid".
So, why not vote in the Hottest 100? Any excuse to force my musical tastes (and Taylor Swift!) onto people, right?
In the end, it turns out that I'd listened to enough music to put together a respectable list. The songs I voted for were:
First of all, I've been following Art of Sleeping for awhile now (voted for them in 2012!), and Crazy was an easy choice, as it's a great song! I heard The Decemberists and sleepmakeswaves songs on Double J, with the station introducing me to the latter band: their album Love of Cartography turned out to be an excellent instrumental rock album! Both the Interpol and Foster the People songs were unexpected: All the Rage Back Home may well be the first Interpol song that I legitimately like, and though I've never been particularly interested in Foster the People, I was surprised at how much I enjoyed the pop-rock Coming of Age. As for Lana Del Rey, her Ultraviolence album has proven to be remarkably solid, and although I really liked the single West Coast, I found myself enjoying the album's title-track more (although compared to West Coast it placed nearly one hundred places lower in the results!). The War on Drugs' Red Eyes appealed to me from the first time I heard it, with its quickly strummed acoustic guitar and uplifting lead guitar, so that was another easy pick. Finally... Foo Fighters. They just rock, and even if the song's opening does remind me of their older single The Pretender, I still love the slow but steady build of Something From Nothing and its monstrous finale.
The last song to vote for was a tough decision: it came down to Leonard Cohen's Almost Like the Blues, Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars' Uptown Funk and Zola Jesus' Dangerous Days. After much deliberation, Zola was narrowly beaten and I settled on Leonard Cohen's song. (I've said it before, but there's no shame in losing out to Leonard Cohen!). Next, in the questionnaire after the poll, I selected Taylor Swift's Shake It Off as "Song of the Year". Of course I did.
I actually streamed most of the countdown in Vancouver, starting from the low nineties onwards, and due to time differences, it finished at 1am Pacific Standard Time, which made it a fairly late night. To be honest, the music that featured in the countdown wasn't as bad as I feared it would be, though I was oblivious to a large amount of it. (Then again, a friend did describe the countdown as "worst hottest 100 bunch of songs ever").
The countdown's top ten was:
Glancing at the countdown as a whole, there were a remarkable number of Australian bands with multiple entries. I did read an interesting comment on the makeup of the list, with the writer sarcastically asking if only ten albums were released in 2014. After crunching the numbers, it seems 23 songs in the first 100 came from eight different albums, so the fellow had a point. Plus, listening to the countdown (and half of the 101 - 200 countdown as well), also cemented my opinion that The Amity Affliction are really, really godawful, and yet... really, really popular. They got seven songs in the Top 200! *shudders*. (The considerably more listenable Sticky Fingers also got seven songs in the 200 as well!)
Looking at the final results, I managed to get two songs into Hottest 100 (three if you count Shake It Off), and an additional three songs in the 101 - 200 range. Not too bad, I suppose, for someone who hasn't listened to Triple J in nearly a year. However, the songs that did get in the 100 didn't feature particularly highly, with my highest pick being The War on Drugs' Red Eyes at #63, followed by the Foo Fighters' Something From Nothing at #84. (Beforehand, I accurately predicted that those would be the only two songs from my list that would make it into the Top 100). Still, I'm glad that a few more songs turned up in the 101 - 200 section, and proving that I'm not totally and hopelessly out of touch. On the other hand, as I had to add the Leonard Cohen song in "manually", there was no way he was going to end up in the countdown. Oh well.
Now, let's discuss the most interesting thing about the countdown: Shake It Off. For starters, it was obvious that Triple J were never going play the song, and were keeping quiet in order to fuel more attention to the poll. As if good old Triple J was going to be the butt of a joke! Had they played it, there would have been a massive dummy-spit from that certain diehard group of listeners. (Hell, that group already threw a colossal tantrum at the mere possibility of Shake It Off even appearing in the countdown!). I did kinda hope that they would actually play the song, should it get enough votes: in the end, it apparently made it to #12, but for a number of reasons, the song was disqualified.
What we learned from this whole debacle is that there is nothing more humourless than a Triple J listener arguing about "the rules" and what songs are "acceptable". I mean, seriously? Sia's Chandelier and Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars' Uptown Funk are in the Top 10! Those songs, which were massive hits and all over commercial radio, are acceptable, but Shake It Off isn't?! (Hell, I was quite surprised when I heard Uptown Funk on Triple J to begin with: I figured that they'd never play something with Bruno Mars in such a prominent role on the station). For the most part, I can understand some of the reasons behind Triple J not playing the song (the trolling aspect, not setting a precendent, etc), but when you tout yourself as being the "world's largest musical democracy", and then proceed to remove the results you don't like, it seems awfully hypocritical. I guess one upside to Shake It Off's disqualification meant that Australian singer/rapper Tkay Maidza was bumped up from 101 to 100, which was at least a nice outcome for the young musician. Sure, the one song of hers I do know (Brontosaurus), I can't stand, but eh...
Ahh, shake it off, Brad.
Finally, I'd like to end with the following hastag: #Tay4TripleJ2015
But then along came Buzzfeed with their amusing campaign to get Taylor Swift's Shake It Off into the countdown. The reaction to it from a segment of dedicated Triple J listeners was dramatic, and to be honest, it kind of grated on me. People fiercely argued that the song was mainstream pop rubbish and had no right to be played on Triple J, and the whole vibe I got from the arguments was that people who listen to Triple J have much better tastes than "commercial" radio listeners. Quite frankly, that snobbery annoyed me! These days, I think dismissing something, whether it is "mainstream" or "uncommercial" (or whatever particular genre) is pretty pointless: either you like the song or you don't. Why put limitations on what you will listen to and like because of the various labels you can affix to the music? (Unfortunately, despite holding this opinion, it doesn't mean that I'm not snobbish myself).
And besides, I also happen to really like Shake It Off.
For those not in the know, I am (bizarrely?) a bit of a fan of Taylor Swift. I think she's a fearsomely talented songwriter, and her album Red was one of my favourite albums of 2012 (In a demonstration of my confusing tastes, Red is tied with Swans' The Seer, though I have certainly listened to Red a lot more). Now, admittedly the first few times I heard Shake It Off, I thought it was so dumb that I wanted to jam a sharpened pencil into my ear drum, but damn if it isn't insanely catchy: I'll forgive a lot if you give me an awesome hook. These days, I think it's a great song, and I now consider the ridiculous "This! Sick! Beat!" part and cheerleader chant that follows more "silly" than "stupid".
So, why not vote in the Hottest 100? Any excuse to force my musical tastes (and Taylor Swift!) onto people, right?
In the end, it turns out that I'd listened to enough music to put together a respectable list. The songs I voted for were:
- Art Of Sleeping - Crazy
- Leonard Cohen - Almost Like the Blues
- Decemberists, The - Make You Better
- Lana Del Rey - Ultraviolence - #129
- Interpol - All The Rage Back Home - #132
- Foo Fighters - Something From Nothing - #84
- Foster The People - Coming of Age - #110
- sleepmakeswaves - Great Northern
- Taylor Swift - Shake It Off - #12 (DQ)
- War On Drugs, The - Red Eyes - #63
First of all, I've been following Art of Sleeping for awhile now (voted for them in 2012!), and Crazy was an easy choice, as it's a great song! I heard The Decemberists and sleepmakeswaves songs on Double J, with the station introducing me to the latter band: their album Love of Cartography turned out to be an excellent instrumental rock album! Both the Interpol and Foster the People songs were unexpected: All the Rage Back Home may well be the first Interpol song that I legitimately like, and though I've never been particularly interested in Foster the People, I was surprised at how much I enjoyed the pop-rock Coming of Age. As for Lana Del Rey, her Ultraviolence album has proven to be remarkably solid, and although I really liked the single West Coast, I found myself enjoying the album's title-track more (although compared to West Coast it placed nearly one hundred places lower in the results!). The War on Drugs' Red Eyes appealed to me from the first time I heard it, with its quickly strummed acoustic guitar and uplifting lead guitar, so that was another easy pick. Finally... Foo Fighters. They just rock, and even if the song's opening does remind me of their older single The Pretender, I still love the slow but steady build of Something From Nothing and its monstrous finale.
The last song to vote for was a tough decision: it came down to Leonard Cohen's Almost Like the Blues, Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars' Uptown Funk and Zola Jesus' Dangerous Days. After much deliberation, Zola was narrowly beaten and I settled on Leonard Cohen's song. (I've said it before, but there's no shame in losing out to Leonard Cohen!). Next, in the questionnaire after the poll, I selected Taylor Swift's Shake It Off as "Song of the Year". Of course I did.
I actually streamed most of the countdown in Vancouver, starting from the low nineties onwards, and due to time differences, it finished at 1am Pacific Standard Time, which made it a fairly late night. To be honest, the music that featured in the countdown wasn't as bad as I feared it would be, though I was oblivious to a large amount of it. (Then again, a friend did describe the countdown as "worst hottest 100 bunch of songs ever").
The countdown's top ten was:
- Chet Faker - Talk is Cheap
- Peking Duk (Featuring Nicole Millar) - High
- Hilltop Hoods - Cosby Sweater
- Milky Chance - Stolen Dance
- Peking Duk (Featuring SAFIA) - Take Me Over
- Mark Ronson (Featuring Bruno Mars) - Uptown Funk
- Chet Faker - Gold
- Chet Faker - 1998
- Sia - Chandelier
- Ásgeir - King and Cross
Glancing at the countdown as a whole, there were a remarkable number of Australian bands with multiple entries. I did read an interesting comment on the makeup of the list, with the writer sarcastically asking if only ten albums were released in 2014. After crunching the numbers, it seems 23 songs in the first 100 came from eight different albums, so the fellow had a point. Plus, listening to the countdown (and half of the 101 - 200 countdown as well), also cemented my opinion that The Amity Affliction are really, really godawful, and yet... really, really popular. They got seven songs in the Top 200! *shudders*. (The considerably more listenable Sticky Fingers also got seven songs in the 200 as well!)
Looking at the final results, I managed to get two songs into Hottest 100 (three if you count Shake It Off), and an additional three songs in the 101 - 200 range. Not too bad, I suppose, for someone who hasn't listened to Triple J in nearly a year. However, the songs that did get in the 100 didn't feature particularly highly, with my highest pick being The War on Drugs' Red Eyes at #63, followed by the Foo Fighters' Something From Nothing at #84. (Beforehand, I accurately predicted that those would be the only two songs from my list that would make it into the Top 100). Still, I'm glad that a few more songs turned up in the 101 - 200 section, and proving that I'm not totally and hopelessly out of touch. On the other hand, as I had to add the Leonard Cohen song in "manually", there was no way he was going to end up in the countdown. Oh well.
Now, let's discuss the most interesting thing about the countdown: Shake It Off. For starters, it was obvious that Triple J were never going play the song, and were keeping quiet in order to fuel more attention to the poll. As if good old Triple J was going to be the butt of a joke! Had they played it, there would have been a massive dummy-spit from that certain diehard group of listeners. (Hell, that group already threw a colossal tantrum at the mere possibility of Shake It Off even appearing in the countdown!). I did kinda hope that they would actually play the song, should it get enough votes: in the end, it apparently made it to #12, but for a number of reasons, the song was disqualified.
What we learned from this whole debacle is that there is nothing more humourless than a Triple J listener arguing about "the rules" and what songs are "acceptable". I mean, seriously? Sia's Chandelier and Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars' Uptown Funk are in the Top 10! Those songs, which were massive hits and all over commercial radio, are acceptable, but Shake It Off isn't?! (Hell, I was quite surprised when I heard Uptown Funk on Triple J to begin with: I figured that they'd never play something with Bruno Mars in such a prominent role on the station). For the most part, I can understand some of the reasons behind Triple J not playing the song (the trolling aspect, not setting a precendent, etc), but when you tout yourself as being the "world's largest musical democracy", and then proceed to remove the results you don't like, it seems awfully hypocritical. I guess one upside to Shake It Off's disqualification meant that Australian singer/rapper Tkay Maidza was bumped up from 101 to 100, which was at least a nice outcome for the young musician. Sure, the one song of hers I do know (Brontosaurus), I can't stand, but eh...
Ahh, shake it off, Brad.
Finally, I'd like to end with the following hastag: #Tay4TripleJ2015