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The 100 Best Songs of 2011, Part 5

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Posted by Andrew Unterberger on 12/21/2011 at 1:10 PM Exclusive, News

The Popdust Files: 100 best songs of 2011, year in review

10. BRITNEY SPEARS, “TIL THE WORLD ENDS”

The apocalypse was on everyone’s minds in 2011, and Britney Spears and Dr. Luke were smart enough to know that the one place that doesn’t care about the prospect of the world ending—in fact, the one place where they sort of welcome it as an acceptable consequence—is the dance floor. “Till the World Ends” offered listeners a club jam so enthralling that it seems only right that doomsday should be at its end, with its slithery synth intro, anticipation-building pre-chorus, filter-house breakdown section and hugely satisfying release of a wordless chorus. (You might be able to get through the “woah-ah-oh-oh-oh” chanting without throwing your hands in the air, but we guarantee you’ll throw something up there.) Most such jams would content themselves with partying until the morning, but that’s not good enough for this song: “See the sunlight / We ain’t stopping / Keep on dancing till the world ends.” See you in December 2012, Britney. —A.U.

9. LADY GAGA, “EDGE OF GLORY”

“Marry the Night” might be the heart of Born This Way, but “The Edge of Glory” is its soul, grafting Springsteen rock onto sound-system synths, the slickest, shiniest, glammest subset of metal and the New York and youth mythology of RENT (the sound, sentiment and video are all essentially “Out Tonight.”) It’s the last track on the album, and Lady Gaga’s delivery, which throughout the album goes from the plaintive chant and pushed-to-a-breakdown roars of “Marry the Night” to be screwed, stuttered, pitch-slicked and whiskey-slurred, but here she’s absolutely confident, even triumphant. She’s reached the precipice, see, and she’s ready to jump and soar; every shout of “the edge” gets larger and more glorious. “The Edge of Glory,” of course, will forever be remembered for another thing: it’s E Street Band saxophonist Clarence Clemons’ final recording, and in retrospect, it’s hard to imagine a more generous gift than how the music parts like curtains around his cameo. And even if it’s ambiguous what precisely is past said edge of glory, or even what the hell it means (in interviews, Gaga’s said it’s death), that’s not the point. The destination doesn’t matter so much as feeling the rush. —K.S.A.

8. FRANK OCEAN, “NOVACANE”

“Novacane” sounds like what it’s about, a gorgeously produced blur of directionless synths, dull buzzes and fuzzy percussion that eventually drives itself to collapse into a druggy haze that’s kind of too pretty and too dimly comfortable to want to leave. Frank’s delivery is the same; those perfect ad-libs (“yikes,” “perfect”) are the only times he breaks through his relentless, affectless, almost singsong delivery; eventually, all his harmonies losing steam, muffling themselves in pitch-shifting, and his words run into each other until first punctuation, then sentences, then individual words and syllables drop away, leaving nothing but a lone, inert synth by the end. “Novacane” is an Odd Future offshoot, so of course it’s full of exaggeratedly sordid situations, not-exactly-praised women and provocateur-ready catchphrases (“cocaine for breakfast,” or perhaps “f— me long, f— me numb / love me now, when I’m gone, love me none.”) But with “Novacane,” you don’t get the sense that Frank’s either bragging, humblebragging or trolling; you’re seriously drawn in, as if it really is the last lucid dispatch from someone too gone to report back again. It’s not a pleasant place to get lost in, but it’s also remarkably easy. —K.S.A.

7. LMFAO FEAT. LAUREN BENNETT & GOONROCK, “PARTY ROCK ANTHEM”

If you were to do a list of established pop acts most likely to have the country’s official Summer Jam in 2012, the goofy pop moppets of LMFAO might have ranked in the low 100s, right behind Danity Kane and David Archuleta. But the duo had the belief, and more importantly, they had the song: “Party Rock Anthem,” a tune scientifically engineered to be the biggest party hit of the year, and one good enough to end up as anything but. It’s got all the elements of a 2011 smash hit—the syncopated main hook, the screechy synth breakdown, the pro-partying, caution-to-the-wind chorus, even the implied presence of ubiquitous rapper Rick Ross via the “Everyday I’m shufflin’” section. But it was still so LMFAO in essence that it never came off as cynical or overly calculated, with insanely quotable lyrics flying out of every verse (“Gonna rise to the top, no Led in our Zeppelin,” “We gettin’ money, don’t be mad / Now stop / Hatin’ is bad”) and the duo’s irrepressible gonzo energy lifting the thing into the pop stratosphere. It’s going to be a long, long time before you can go to a wedding, Bar Mitzvah, holiday party or karaoke outing without hearing “Party Rock Anthem” at least once, and we wouldn’t have it any other way. —A.U.

6. BEYONCE, “COUNTDOWN”

A cacophony of frenetic sounds—rattling percussion, blaring trumpet, reggae-flavored synths, twinkling steel drums—work to convey the complexities of Beyonce’s relationship. “Dedicated to the one [she] loves,” the chorus operates on a gimmicky ten to one countdown, but the titular metaphor is hardly the track’s most notable moment. Bey flexes all of her her vocal chords, opting for softness on the breathy hook (“Oh, killing me softly / And I’m still falling”) all while maintaining her B-is-from-Texas swagger. In an album filled with emotional catharsis via huge, sweeping ballads, “Countdown” finds the middle ground between calling upon your female army to eviscerate the male gender entirely, and begging your man to come to bed. It’s undoubtedly a love song; a sassy take on treating a man well that undercuts any subservient imagery by the assertion that B—and all of us ladies—come first. He should be so lucky to have her grind up on him. Go ahead and try not to bounce to “me and my boof and in my boof boof riding.” And those steel drums. Always more steel drums, please. —E.E

5. CHRIS BROWN FEAT. BUSTA RHYMES & LIL WAYNE, “LOOK AT ME NOW”

“Deuces” paved the groundwork for Chris Brown’s comeback, but “Look At Me Now” made it undeniable. The year’s first great pop jam, “Look At Me Now” was exactly what Chris Brown needed for a total career re-invention, re-casting the once-squeaky-clean teen singer as a rapping skater brat, making him seem legitimately cool for the first time in his career in the process. Of course, plenty of singers have tried rapping without cool being the first word that came to mind, but CB was given a hell of a handicap by a loopy, bubbling, whistling Diplo beat that sounded like the obvious evolution of The Neptunes’ “Drop It Like It’s Hot” track (in other words, awesome), as well as stellar supporting appearances by rap vets Busta Rhymes and Lil Wayne. Make no mistake, though—the song is still unmistakably Breezy’s, whether he’s crooning “Ladies love me / I’m on my Cool J,” inviting haters to “say hi” to his dick (wouldn’t be the last time in 2011) or bragging on the song’s brilliant stop-start chorus, “I’m gettting payyy-puhhhhrrrr!” Love him or hate him, “Look At Me Now” proved that while many may have been ready to write Chris Brown’s career off in 2008, in reality, we’re only done with the first act. —A.U.

4. FOSTER THE PEOPLE, “PUMPED UP KICKS”

Every so often (once a year if we’re lucky), a song comes out that’s so good and so confusing that the general public has no clue what to do with it—so they send it to the top of the charts. “Pumped Up Kicks” doesn’t make any more sense now as one of the year’s biggest pop hits than it did at any point in 2011—no matter how you slice it, this wonky tale of teenage violence with the shuffling rhythm section and sung-through-a-telephone vocals makes absolutely no sense on Top 40 radio next to Rihanna and Katy Perry. But the song was just that good. “Kicks” was the ultimate more-than-the-sum-of-its-parts jam, with the song’s many disparate-seeming elements (the vocals, the drum intro, the oft-repeated honking sound, slippery bass line, the whistling section, the singalong chorus) congealing into a skull-burrowing song that both made you say “Did I really just hear that?” and forced you to hit the “repeat” button to find out for sure. It was a reaction that enough people had that the song slowly grew from alt-radio favorite to concert festival anthem to dark horse Summer Jam contender, thankfully without anyone stopping to ask the obvious question: “What the hell is this song doing on the Top 40?”

Since the beginning of time, critics have used the phrase “indie pop” to refer to groups like Belle and Sebastian and The New Pornographers—groups that are really just “slightly more melodic indie rock.” With “Pumped Up Kicks”—along with pave-the-way almost-hits from groups like MGMT, Passion Pit and The Naked and Famous—we finally know what true indie pop should sound like. And it’s a wonderful, wonderful thing. —A.U.

3. JAY-Z & KANYE WEST, “NIGGAS IN PARIS”

Cocky opulence meets self-introspection over the Hit Boy-produced beats on Watch The Throne’s statement piece. Reminiscing about what his life could have been (“I’m shocked too / I’m supposed to be locked up too”) Jay-Z uses his past to justify his current “ballin” lifestyle (“If you escaped what I’ve escaped / You’d be in Paris getting fucked up too”) while Kanye is less apologetic for his behavior, using his verses as opportunity to act out with comic relief like the little brother we know and love (“Prince William’s ain’t do it right if you ask me / Cause if I was him I would have married Kate & Ashley”). The duo somehow manages to make good use of the seemingly out of place Blades of Glory dialogue to explain the song’s tittle (“No one knows what it means, but it’s provocative!”) suggesting it’s one big joke to them, too. Name-dropping the likes of Gucci, Louis and Margiela gives way to an overpowering bass that shakes you to the core, with a sense of self-importance emanating from the speakers as a haunting chorus rises, signaling what you already know (“You are now watching the throne”). There’s a reason why Jay and Ye look like they’re having so much fun when they perform this track. —E.E

2. ADELE, “ROLLING IN THE DEEP”

You don’t really know this song. That is to say, it’s almost impossible that you don’t sorta know this song, that if someone were to mumble-hum “the scars of your love…” you’d mumble-hum back “…remind me of us” and then, because you’ve just gotta, sneak away to some empty room where nobody can overhear you belt out “we could have had it all!” Patti Smith knows what I’m talking about, as does Limp Bizkit, John Legend, the Air Force and approximately 5 percent of YouTube’s karaokists. “Rolling in the Deep,” like a boulder that kicked off an avalanche, had that much of an effect on popular culture. But it didn’t start that way. The song, in the beginning, is propelled only by twitchy guitar, the kick drum, bass and piano come in later, poised and understated. In fact, the whole song’s that way. Bear with me — Adele doesn’t sing about her pain so much as matter-of-factly inform you that it’s there. Yes, even in the chorus; you’d expect it to completely, clichedly soar, overblown out, but it doesn’t; it’s got a backing chorus, but they’re relatively quiet, the piano lines don’t stomp so much as walk single-file into the verse, and even Adele’s belting is lower in the mix and more controlled than you probably remember. It’s meticulous craft, and it’s a deliberate artistic decision. “Rolling in the Deep” isn’t really about catharsis. It’s about control — the sense that no matter what’s been done to you, how sloppily anyone’s played your heart to how clumsy a beat, you’re still the one with the final, eminently reasonable words. No wonder half the world has covered this; what better way to take control than to sing along? —K.S.A.