Mike Posner
“I Took A Pill In Ibiza”
#79
In 1970, the Denver-based band Sugarloaf had a top ten record with a song called “Green Eyed Lady”. Then, like so many others, they found themselves unable to produce a followup, disappearing from the public eye and tossed between labels that either folded before the band could get another record out or made promises they had no intention of keeping. In 1975, though, Sugarloaf made the top ten again, with a comic song about their professional limbo, “Don’t Call Us, We’ll Call You”. The song contained, among other inside jokes, the private phone number, in touch-tone form, of the Columbia Records executive who had constantly ignored their calls. It was the perfect revenge on the industry. Their next single was a flop, and they were never heard from again.
In 2010, Mike Posner had a top ten record with a song called “Cooler Than Me”. Then, like so many others, he found himself unable to produce a followup and disappeared from the public eye. Unlike Sugarloaf, however, Posner continued to be successful behind the scenes, writing songs for Justin Bieber and others, including one of the biggest pop hits of the last few years, Maroon 5’s “Sugar”. Now, in 2016, Posner has managed another big hit, a song about how sad he is despite his wealth, with plenty of whining about his privileged but lonely life in One Shot Heaven. It’s the perfect reflection of his self-absorption and inability to think seriously about anything but himself. And then he warns others not to make the same mistakes. What mistakes? Pinning your sense of self-worth on your place on the charts? Shitting on young people’s dreams? Asking others to feel sorry for you for being such a dick? Yes, sudden success followed by years of obscurity can fuck you up, but plenty have found better ways to deal with it.
Empire Of The Sun
“Walking On A Dream”
#82
A hit in Australia in 2008, “Walking On a Dream” washes up on our shores eight years later thanks to it’s placement in a TV commercial. It has a certain naive, pretentious charm, but there are a million records, and not only from 2008, that sound much like it. Some bands just get lucky.
Panic! At The Disco
“Victorious”, #89
“Death Of A Bachelor”, #92
“Victorious” is as brashly entertaining as any of Brendon Urie’s previous records, but it also works over familiar ground and adds little that’s new. “Death of a Bachelor” is something else. It works both as a parody of and homage to lounge music (in places Urie sounds a lot like Michael Buble), which matches perfectly with its vision of the end of the single life and the ambivalent feelings it brings. It’s bachelor pad music for the bachelor who’s about to marry. As usual, Urie over-emotes, there are bad moments, and this is hardly an avenue I expect him to pursue much further, but it’s a great change of pace.
DJ Snake Featuring Bipolar Sunshine
“Middle”
#95
This is ordinary EDM, with lyrics that sound like they were written by someone for whom English is a second language and a singer who might get away with his shaky timbre if he hadn’t christened himself Bipolar Sunshine. Is this the new trend in awkward hippie names? Will we soon get to meet Schizophrenic Butterfly Wing and Borderline Personality Disorder Moonchild?
Lukas Graham
“7 Years”
#96
Every generation gets their “Cat’s In the Cradle” or “Seasons In the Sun”, a song so bad it seems to blot out the sky. Oh, you lucky millennials, this is yours.
iLoveMemphis
“Lean & Dabb”
#98
This disappeared from the chart as quickly as it arrived, guaranteeing iLove Memphis’s place in One Shot Heaven, but if anything “Lean and Dabb” is better than “Hit the Quan”. Completely lacking in pretension, Memphis and whoever provides the Lil Jon imitation throw everything they’ve got into this piece of danceable nonsense, varying from blatant self-promotion (“You can Google me! You can Google me!”) to hints of darker times (“I’ll take the steak, the strip, and the salad/Cause growing up in Memphis, Tennessee I couldn’t have it”). I could do without the tired Valley Girl bit on the intro, but otherwise this is near-perfect.