Adele
“When We Were Young”, #22
“Water Under The Bridge”, #70
“Send My Love (To Your New Lover)”, #79
“Remedy”, #87
Adele’s billions of fans (those that didn’t buy the album straight away, at least), pick their favorites from 25, and if this is the best of the lot, I hate to think what the rest of the album must sound like. The two ballads, “When We Were Young” and “Remedy”, are the worst of the bunch, bad songs badly sung (however Adele learned to slur her words together instead of enunciating consonants, she needs to unlearn it fast). Of the two more uptempo songs, “Water Under the Bridge”, with its rote arrangement and cliché lyric, is almost worse than the ballads. Which leaves “Send My Love (To Your New Lover)” as the only decent record in the bunch. More than decent, in fact: it successfully gets at everything the other songs only suggest, delineating sorrow without wallowing in it, musically simple yet emotionally complicated. It’s also, with its African-influenced guitar line and hooky chorus, the catchiest track Adele has cut so far. It’s easily my favorite of all her records, but I’m beginning to think she’s only good for one great track per album.
Luke Bryan Featuring Karen Fairchild
“Home Alone Tonight”
#97
What separates Bryan from his bro peers is the depth of his bitterness and vindictiveness. If the guys in Florida Georgia Line ever lost a girl, they’d shrug it off, jump in their truck, and go find another one. Not Bryan: when he gets dumped he gets glum, and vengeful, and mean. He finds himself another girl, too, but it isn’t fun and games. It’s revenge sex, and it isn’t pretty or sexy. If it wasn’t for Karen Fairchild, who is here largely to demonstrate that women can feel the same way (and is forced to sing in a key much too low for her), this would be nothing but an ugly, misogynist rant. As it is, it’s just ugly.
Young Thug
“Best Friend”
#98
I’m unsure what to make of Young Thug. His flow is impressive, constantly shifting gears and direction, and the wordplay that goes with it is almost as inventive—he throws out the occasional cliché just to bring himself back to earth. But those clichés fit because what he has to say isn’t much different from any other rapper: he wants money and drugs and sex, and lots of each. His music, as great as much of it is, doesn’t break any new ground, either, it just burrows deeper into what already exists. That’s an achievement of a kind, but I’m not sure it leads anywhere.
Future
“Rich $ex”
#100
You can leave your bling on.