Music & Films for
Common People
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25
BAD GIRLS
M.I.A. (2012)
A spiky Middle-Eastern inspired synth opens the track and commands immediate attention, and then Maya Arulpragasam joins in singing as a mantra "Live fast, die young. Bad girls do it well". The effect of pairing this lines about the idea of "bad girls" with undulating synths that take us immediately to a culture where women's oppression is prevalent make for a hard contrast and establishes a narrative of intersectional feminist liberation.
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Bad Girls is both an anthem for female empowerment and music decolonization, it shatters the idea of a James Dean-esque white male living on the edge, and brings at the center the heroism in women of color risking their lives for basic human rights. Ironically, shortly after the single release, she got slammed and sued for showing the middle finger on TV.
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Also listen: Ibibio Sound Machine - Give Me a Reason /// Gaye Su Akyol - İstikrarlı Hayal Hakikattir
24
WE FOUND LOVE
Rihanna feat. Calvin Harris (2011)
This decade was transformative in many deep ways in every aspect of our life. Take love, for example, the 10's saw a first boom of couples that emerged from flirting apps like Tinder or Grindr, and many of them were ready to adopt the idea of finding love on a hopeless place (plagued with stories of one night stands, ghosting and stalking) as their hymn.
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The collaboration between Rihanna and Harris (that later was tried to be replicated to a lesser success) is explosive, a masterclass in the hold and release of tension to create a perfect musical climax. The effect that this track has in any club or party is immediate and it sends the dance floor to a collective frenzy. On a decade that was incredibly turbulent, the world needed a pop hit that just celebrated the idea of love in spite of the hate and discrimination.
Also listen: Calvin Harris feat. Florence Welch - Sweet Nothing /// Drake - Passionfruit
23
SPRAWL II (MOUNTAINS BEYOND MOUNTAINS)
Arcade Fire (2010)
Pop as an artistic movement started as a celebration of the mass culture and the ability of serial production to democratize art. It is interesting that one of Arcade Fire's purest moments of pop sound is a comment of how that industrialization is alienating the individual. Shiny synths and a repetitive beat go hand in hand with the initial ideas of mechanical reproductions and flashy marketing economies, but the overall feeling is that of dissatisfaction with routine.
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The heroine of our track has reached a moment of realization that grown-up life is not how she imagined and none of her childhood goals and ideals became real, and that she is just repeating a survival cycle. Did anyone called for existential anxiety disguised as a pop tune?
Also listen: Arcade Fire - Everything Now /// The Maccabees - Pelican
22
CELLOPHANE
FKA Twigs (2019)
It's striking how simple Cellophane sounds, a piano as the base and then a few other instruments and effects making brief (but precise) appearances. But above all, this song is entirely Twigs doing vocal contortions and pouring all her soul and vulnerability in these verses about all the insecurities she had in a relationship that was constantly on the public eye, how dating a top star actor felt like sharing her love and been judged all the time.
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For an artist who is at the foreground in the pop avant-garde explorations, a track like Cellophane means baring your art from all artifice and show that you are very well able to craft something organic that is deep and meaningful; in that aspect, Cellophane is to her what Wish You Were Here was for Pink Floyd.
Also listen: FKA Twigs - Sad Day /// ياسمين Øمدان (Yasmine Hamdan) - ØÙ„ (Hal)
21
NEW YORK
St. Vincent (2017)
New York contrast sharply with the rest of Annie Clark's catalogue, she has never sounded this intimate before. We might not be treated for her amazing guitar skills, but the accompanying piano and the crescendo synths give it a beautiful elegance that magnifies a track that is incredibly simple, but never loses the lyricist wit.
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It is the isolation paradox of being in the most agitated city on the world but feeling empty and alone. Like in a Woody Allen movie located in this same city, the song is not only about a lover, it might be an important part of it, but it is about oneself and the relationships that we carry with all the people that, from the 8.5 millions of people that inhabit New York, form our selected circle and are the ones who shape our experience of what one city means to us.
Also listen: Beach House - Myth /// She & Him - In the Sun
20
SHUT UP KISS ME
Angel Olsen (2016)
Before 2016, Olsen was a rising singer-songwriter with two solid albums that were haunting and dark, there was a prevalent aura of mystery in her music that although it filled her songs with elegance and maturity, it also kept the artist somewhat hidden in the dark. With Shut Up Kiss Me, she pulls the curtain and steps in the limelight to show her most histrionic side.
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A track that almost borders the realm of glam rock without losing the harsher edges in the sound. We're taken in an emotional rollercoaster with a vocal performance that is intense and full of personality. If the chorus find her at her most commanding, the verses and bridges show tenderness, exasperation, and even despair. It was the very moment that Olsen claimed her place as one of the central voices of the contemporary alternative music.
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Also listen: Angel Olsen - Intern /// Angel Olsen - All Mirrors
19
EVERYTHING IS EMBARRASSING
Sky Ferreira (2012)
Music has explored the idea of a heartbreak as many things, from a lesson to be learnt to a blessing in disguise, but mostly it has been the dramatic loss of a part of our soul. Ferreira's notion of heartbreak as a source of embarrassment shows a new approach to it, but what better word to use for fighting all the things that we wanted and that never will be.
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Written and produced by Dev Haynes, one of the best pop producers of the decade, Everything's Embarrassing exudes detachment, jumping on a retro drum machine and Haynes' funky piano, Ferreira's cold performance tackles the idea of giving up on someone who, deep down, we always knew never felt as we did. Yep, we all have that one particular story that is a defeat and a constant reminder of our self-humiliation.
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Also listen: Sky Ferreira - I Blame Myself /// Chvrches - Recover
18
THE WILHELM SCREAM
James Blake (2011)
The Wilhelm Scream repeats the same two phrases over and over. Blake ruminates his self-doubt for over four minutes until it has lost all its meaning. We might be tempted to say that he is as lost as any 22 year old might be, that no one at that age really knows anything about love or dreams, but the way that Blake construct his song, this is more a Rimbaud's descent to hell, rather than a teen angst complain.
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Blake has a gifted voice, but here it is more an instrument rather than the focal point. It is the synths the ones who carry all the weight and the ones that transform those two sentences with every evolution of the track. Blake is a sound architect, he knows how to create marvelous edifications that are as beautiful as haunting; this track is his cathedral to despair.
Also listen: Jai Paul - BTSTU /// John Talabot - Destiny (feat. Pional)
17
ODESSA
Caribou (2010)
Listening to Odessa for the first time will take you out of balance, somehow you are sure that you've listened to this before, but at the same time is unlike anything else that you can think of, specially nothing in Dan Snaith's previous catalogue. There's an immediate uncanny resemblance to the indie synthpop of The Whitest Boy Alive, and a clear nod towards to 70's disco music, but there's an almost spectral quality that eludes comparitions.
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Snaith restrains his performance, almost putting his voice in the background, and gets the effects at the center: the bridge piano is overwhelming, and the distorted "ah-ah" almost bring a chorus of psychedelic hallucinations (Fantasia-style) to any room where this is played. It is not an easy pill to intellectually digest, but once you get swept by its rhythm, you're hooked.
Also listen: Caribou - Can't Do Without You /// Essaie Pas - Retox
16
LATCH
Disclosure feat. Sam Smith (2012)
The end of the 00's and the beginning of a new decade saw Electronic Dance Music veering towards frenetic music full of drops, and festivals like Tomorrowland celebrated and magnified the figure of the "push play" celebrity DJ. Latch was the beginning of the end for that era, A much more mellow house beat with a few effects in the right places, this track's bubbly trepidation towards a killer chorus that is the warmest side of computer music.
It slowly took over, and two years after its release, the Disclosure sound was dominating the electronic festivals, and the lead guest singer, Sam Smith, became a superstar famous for his impressive vocals that are in full display here. There's a level of intimacy that is rare in electronic music, and Latch is a beautiful romantic moment shared in a dancefloor.
Also listen: Lescop - La Forêt /// Katy B - Katy on a Mission
15
PYRAMIDS
Frank Ocean (2012)
Pyramids is the most ambitious track in Frank Ocean career, the one that showed us the full scope of his project and left very clear that we were in for a ride. Expanding for almost 10 minutes and with two very clear structure breaks, Pyramids starts in the old Egyptian empire and finishes in a strip-club in Las Vegas, making a subtle point of gender and race, and how colonization has put black women in the lowest position of the chain of oppression.
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From the opening diffused bells to the disruptive flashing synths, there's a commanding force takes you in a navigation of the urban Nile, touching the ports of rap, R&B, electronica, pop and psychedelic rock. There are so many sequenced elements that in theory shouldn't work together, but Ocean is resourceful in getting a total cohesion of his expansive creativity.
Also listen: Frank Ocean - Bad Religion /// Frank Ocean - Nikes
14
I FOLLOW RIVERS
Lykke Li (2011)
Lykke Li break through the indie scene as a cutesy pop minimalist, but it was her transformation on a darker, more mysterious and intense version of herself, what finally put her in the canon of the alternative pop. Although I Follow Rivers might be a song about full devotion, there's a deep feeling of confidence, this is not a mere rapturous desire, there's a full conviction of having found the one that deserves to be followed through sea and land.
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The instrumental experimentations with drums and organs add many layers of depth, and even brings some images of the exotic places and religious submission. There's a honorary mention to the wonderful remix made by The Magician, arguably one of the best ones of the decade, that very deservedly pushed the track to the mainstream.
Also listen: Mark Ronson - True Blue (feat. Angel Olsen) /// GusGus - Obnoxiously Sexual
13
SEVENTEEN
Sharon Van Etten (2019)
The climax of the film has passed, the main character has learned that what she wanted all along wasn't really what she needed, but now she's smiling because she has found her place in the world. That's the exact moment when the first chords of Seventeen start, right before cutting to the final credits of the film of your own youth.
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Packed with hope and nostalgia, a song that is able to transform us into a more mature version of ourselves while reminding us of all the fun and all the tears that happened on the path that led to this exact moment. Sharon Van Etten delivered an incredibly powerful rock song that feels extremely liberating while singing it at the top of your lungs; with it, you can exactly remember the euphoria of being seventeen.
Also listen: Sharon Van Etten - Every Time the Sun Comes Up /// Deerhunter - Desire Lines
12
QUEEN
Perfume Genius (2014)
It might be difficult to find a better piece of lyric written during the last decade than "No family is safe when I sashay". Mike Hadreass, after two albums of sad songs about the pains of queer life, changed the entire scope of his project and Queen finds him as a confrontative figure ready to defy the social discrimination that homosexual men are still suffering.
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Queen is a statement of strength and integrity, a queer hymn to challenge prejudice. Queen is not a reassuring moment for homophobes, Hadreass is not here to calm them by adhering to patriarcal norms, he takes pride in the discomfort generated on bigots and conservatives. And if to that unquestionable lyrical sensitivity you add a elegant avant-garde sonic experimentations, you have a trascendental track, a milestone for queer music achievement.
Also listen: Perfume Genius - Grid /// Alex Anwandter - ¿Cómo Puedes Vivir Contigo Mismo?
11
MIDNIGHT CITY
M83 (2011)
Midnight City is the soundtrack for a science fiction film that hasn't been written. It's a dreamlike trip to childhood intergalactic fantasies, where the synths evoke extraterrestrial creatures that welcome you to a new fantastic world full of magical possibilities. Although Midnight City is not explicitly a child's song (yet, feel free to put this to them to enhance their imagination and creativity), the approach that Anthony Gonzalez takes is that of play, of using his instrumental elements to tell a story that is out of touch with adult realities.
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The structure is relatively simple, but the execution of singing at mid-voice, almost as a whisper, contrasting with the melody resounding loud, is able to create cinematic images that are powerful and emotional, bringing our inner-child to a space of surrealist free creativity.
Also listen: Flavien Berger - La Fête Noire /// Beach House - Sparks