The 100 best songs of the first decade of the 2000s (40-31)

(Click here for the whole list.)


40. Daniel Merriweather — "For Your Money"

Sean Lennon plays some nice guitar leads on this.




39. Faded Paper Figures — "North by North"

I love the male/female vocal harmonies in this song.




38. Polydream — "Hollywood"

(Full disclosure: I'm friends with them.)




37. Bat for Lashes — "Daniel"




36. Mika — "Grace Kelly"

And here's a solo unplugged live performance.




35. Grizzly Bear — "Two Weeks"




34. Sara Bareilles— "Love Song"

Here a few of the main questions I've asked myself in selecting the songs:

1) Is it capable of giving me chills? (Or: does it emotionally affect me?)

2) Is it capable of getting stuck in my head?

3) Do I enjoy listening to the singer's voice?

4) Does the music have some sort of dramatic arc or development? (A bridge or other deviation from "verse/chorus/verse/chorus" is especially helpful.)

5) Is there a sense of "inevitability" — that is, does each note seem to lead naturally to the next?

A song where I'd answer "Yes" to all those questions is probably a good contender for the list. A song where I'd answer "No" to most of those questions probably won't be on the list.

This song — which has a casually effervescent quality that reminds me of Paul McCartney — gets a "Yes" answer to all 5 questions.




33. Dntel — "(This Is) the Dream of Evan and Chan"

This song was created by the same lineup as The Postal Service.

Another blog, The Factual Opinion, ranked this the best song of the decade, saying:

The 2001 people imagined decades ago must have sounded like this--the electronic squall, the nearly overwhelming surge of drums, the drifting grasp on reality. ... 8 years on, “(This Is) The Dream of Evan and Chan” sounds like a future that we still haven't caught up with.

The Factual Opinion quotes the line, "He then played every song from 1993," and says, "I always imagine that he’s talking about hearing every song from 1993, from 'Whoomp (There It Is)' to 'Mr. Jones.'" Although that's what the line would seem to literally mean, I always imagine that he's talking about Kurt Cobain in the last full year of his life, and "every song from 1993" means every one of his songs from 1993 — in other words, In Utero, Nirvana's last studio album. That's why (I imagine) Ben Gibbard wittily accentuates the next line, which I hear as a reference to Cobain's famously conflicted feelings about his own success: "The crowd applauded as he curtsied bashfully."




32. The New Pornographers — "The Laws Have Changed"

It's always fun to hear both A.C. Newman and Neko Case singing lead in the same song.




31. Camera Obscura — "Lloyd, I'm Ready to Be Heartbroken"

When I listen to Camera Obscura, I imagine a band from the early '60s traveling through time to the '00s and trying to fit in.

Let me tell you about the awesome musicians I know, part 3: Polydream (with free mp3 downloads!)

Continuing with the shameless plugs for music being made by friends of mine, it's ... Polydream.

That's them in the photo, which I took one afternoon by the lake in our hometown of Madison, Wisconsin.

Their drummer, Brit Rice (top left in the photo), is someone I've played in a few different bands with over the years, not to mention countless random jam sessions and State Street outings.

As far as their music, think: U2, Coldplay, Tom Petty, Death Cab for Cutie.

You know -- clean, crisp, optimistic rock music. The anti-grunge!

Other influences they cite: "the sky, the world, life, ladies, love, mountains, being on mountains, newspapers, domestic and international issues, you."

You can download 2 Polydream songs for free:

1. The anthemic "Catch Me If You Can." (If you're using a PC, you can download the song by right-clicking the link and selecting "Save Target As." If you're using a Mac, "control"-click the link and select "Download Linked File.")

It's the kind of song that you hear and think: "Wait a minute, I can't believe that song hasn't always been around." That's a very good thing.

And it features a children's choir! So I give them points for incongruity.

2. "Hollywood." (If you're using a PC, you can download the song by right-clicking the link and selecting "Save Target As." If you're using a Mac, "control"-click the link and select "Download Linked File.")

This song is so packed with imagery, expression, and a sense of motion -- I always picture an animated cartoon accompanying the lyrics when I listen to it.

Like a few of their other songs, "Hollywood" almost sounds like country, which would be amusing if you knew these guys.

I've been repeatedly listening to their new album, Send Me to the Sun, which you can buy on iTunes (or buy a physical CD here). I'm obviously biased, but I mean this: if you listen to the two sample songs linked above and you enjoy them, you cannot go wrong getting the whole album. While there are no weird curveballs -- those two songs convey the overall feel of the album -- there also aren't any two songs that sound alike. There are no "duds," and I don't think there's even a single moment where they don't stay committed to their characteristic sincerity and uplift.

If you're interested in background info, interviews, or reviews, see their Wikipedia entry. And here's their MySpace profile, which has free streaming songs, etc.

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I'm in a never-ending, years-long argument with Polydream's singer, Jon Knudson (the fellow in the red shoes up there), about his embrace of Naderism -- or, the refusal to support the party most capable of implementing your own policy preferences instead of an unattainable ideal.

I shouldn't really single Jon out. I had this debate with probably 20 or 30 friends in 2000, when most residents of the far-left town of Madison were considering if not outright supporting Ralph Nader. (You saw more Nader yard signs than Gore and Bush yard signs put together.)

You have their counterparts in Florida to thank for all the Bush administration's actions and inaction, and the missed opportunity to have an intelligent, environmentalist president who believes a woman has a right to choose what to do with her own body, believes that "gay men and women ought to have the same rights as heterosexual men and women," and would have appointed two of the nine Supreme Court justices if he'd served a full two terms. Yes, let's remember the actual contributions that have been made by the far left in America: you have them to thank for the United States' environmental policies of the past 8 years, tax cuts overwhelming slanted toward the rich, and the deaths of who-knows-how-many innocent people in the Iraq war.

To my friends who supported Nader in 2000: have you discerned the subtle differences between Bush and Gore yet?

Admittedly, this is a transparent ploy to get Jon to show up in the comments section.

Oh, and sorry, Polydream guys, to turn this post about your music into a political tirade.

But hey ... at least I plugged your band.

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