Original Image by Johan J.Ingles-Le Nobel
Here is my year end list of my favourite songs of 2011 and its publishing happens to coincide with the one year anniversary of NOMP. Yeahh!
While compiling such a list you realize that a year is a really long time and that songs that you once liked you’ve grown over; some music has aged well while some make wonder what were you thinking? (Note the difference between this list and my favourite songs of the first half of 2011)
With a couple of exceptions I’ve stuck to the one song per artist rule. Some of these songs may have been released in 2010 but A) either were part of albums released in 2011 or rereleased separately this year or B) have been included as this is the first such list on NOMP and it would be a gross, gross injustice to miss out on them only because they were released when NOMP wasn’t around.
The songs are broadly arranged in ascending order of the likeability; rather than going by the specific numbers it would be better to view this list in blocks of ten with the songs that i listened to the most forming the last block (Click on the individual song link to find out more about the artist/song).
You can either check out individual songs or listen to the entire set as a Grooveshark playlist at the end of Page 4 of this post. I would love to know what were your favourite songs of 2011, share them with me in the comments section. Now without further ado…..
41. Better Off Without You: Summer Camp
Perfect, blissful, summery, indie pop.
40. It Takes Time To Be A Man: The Rapture
The Rapture go the soul route and deliver splendidly on It Takes Time To Be A Man. This song has such a brilliant groove that’s sooo made for slow dancing.
39. Future Starts Slow: The Kills
In which Jamie Hince creates a hypnotic little riff and Alison Mosshart implores you to ‘Blow whats left of her right mind’. I’m only human so how am I supposed to ignore that?
38. Don’t Sweat The Small Shit: Cfit
Not too many people outside of Ireland would have heard this one (not too many in Ireland heard it either actually) but I dig it for the warm lyrics, the sublime use of the xylophone, the nostalgic video and one of my favourite lines from a song: ‘On those days when the rain incinerates all it touches, we’ll just find a way to walk between the raindrops’.
37. Putting The Dog To Sleep: The Antlers
My favourite song on Burst Apart; thoughts on reconciliation, closure and moving forward have seldom been rendered more beautifully.
For some reason I find the song’s video a little too hilarious than it actually is. Great song from an album that wasn’t that well received.
Ben Howard has been wowing audiences in the UK for a while now but this songs use in the Channel 4 documentary clip brought his music out to a wider listenership including this little blog in India.
In another life I wouldn’t mind trading places with Ben Howard. This whole surfing and playing the acoustic guitar like a bomb works quite well with the ladies I believe.
The video that started it all and set the blogging universe buzzing about Lana Del Rey. Arguments about authenticity, originality, plastic surgery flew thick and thin but whether this was the start of something special or the start of something special that quite didn’t deliver remains to be seen. What is undeniable though is the songs charm.
33. Never Quite Free: The Mountain Goats
This song from All Eternal Decks is another example of why John Darnielle is a lyrical genius and one of the best songwriters out there.
32. Sadness Is A Blessing: Lykke Li
This song and most of her Wounded Rhymes album made me want to wrap my arms around and protect Lykke Li from this big bad world.
Sadness is a blessing Sadness is a pearl Sadness is my boyfriend Oh, sadness I’m your girl
31. Anna Sun: Walk The Moon
I first heard Anna Sun and saw its video in January and it’s still stuck with me. I love the exuberance and energy of the video.
To check out the next set of songs click the link to Page 2 that’s just down below the share buttons.
