I have seen a few best 2010s songs lists recently, and one problem unites them all — NOT. ENOUGH. SONGS. They go with 100 or 200 and expect that to tell a full story of this vast decade of music. An immediate problem arises: for example, do you just go with 1 song per artist so that Drake doesn’t pop up 17 times? When these lists have less space, they tend to pick what songs represent an artist or certain album, so that they can cover as much space as possible. For example, take the treatment of Kendrick Lamar on Pitchfork‘s 200 songs list — total of 3 (not enough) and it’s 1 selection each from GKMC, To Pimp a Butterfly and DAMN. How convenient — “King Kunta” and “HUMBLE.” would like to have a talk. I’ve always hated caps on songs per artist for this reason; the way you have to manipulate a list to make it tell a narrative distracts from the overall purpose of presenting the best songs. This flawed list-making is so easily-avoidable, and it’s especially frustrating coming from Pitchfork who made a 500 songs list for the 2000s. They have since gone back and deleted the 201-500 portion of that list for some reason when they improved the graphics, but you can still easily find it.
You won’t see that here because I went with 500 songs and no song limits per artist or album. I tried to be as honest as possible when picking the 500 songs that captivated me the most over these last 10 years, and that meant doing things like picking 4 songs off the same album or going with deep cuts I’ve seen no critical love for. You’ll also see a couple instances of 2009 songs that were released as 2010 singles being included; that’s absolutely not cheating, but I needed a loophole to get John Mayer on this list.
I did not write blurbs for this list because it just takes too much time to do that on my own.
Graphic design by Sadie Burrows!
Thank you for reading! Comment below if that’s your thing. And check out the 250 Albums list with great contributions from some people who are not me!
Here’s a Spotify playlist of all the songs available in reverse order, so you can listen along as you read! [It will be embedded at the top of each page.]
500. Quality Control & City Girls – “Fu*k Dat Ni**a” (2017)
499. Leon Vynehall – “Blush” (2016)
498. Porches – “Be Apart” (2016)
497. Alabama Shakes – “Don’t Wanna Fight” (2015)
496. Yeah Yeah Yeahs – “Sacrilege” (2013)
495. The Radio Dept. – “Heaven’s on Fire” (2010)
494. Mac Miller – “Self Care” (2018)
493. Neon Indian – “Slumlord” (2015)
492. Here We Go Magic – “Collector” (2010)
491. John Mayer – “Half of My Heart” (2010)
490. Empress Of – “When I’m With Him” (2018)
489. Megan Thee Stallion (ft. Ty Dolla $ign & Nicki Minaj) – “Hot Girl Summer” (2019)
488. Downtown Boys – “Monstro” (2015)
487. Cold Cave – “The Great Pan Is Dead” (2011)
486. Sturgill Simpson – “Welcome to Earth (Pollywog)” (2016)
485. The Men – “Bataille” (2011)
484. Lower Dens – “Brains” (2012)
483. The Hotelier – “An Introduction to the Album” (2014)
482. Phoebe Bridgers – “Motion Sickness” (2017)
481. Kehlani – “Undercover” (2017)
480. Nicolas Jaar – “Space Is Only Noise If You Can See” (2011)
479. Makthaverskan – “Asleep” (2014)
478. Kevin Morby – “I Have Been to the Mountain” (2016)
477. Charlotte Gainsbourg – “Deadly Valentine” (2017)
476. Yuck – “Get Away” (2011)
475. Soccer Mommy – “Your Dog” (2018)
474. Eleanor Friedberger – “My Mistakes” (2011)
473. DaVido – “Fall” (2017)
472. Japanese Breakfast – “Everybody Wants to Love You” (2016)
471. Frankie Cosmos – “Young” (2015)
470. Thee Oh Sees – “The Dream” (2011)
469. DaBaby – “Suge” (2019)
468. The Voidz – “Leave It in My Dreams” (2018)
467. dvsn – “Hallucinations” (2016)
466. KING – “The Greatest” (2016)
465. Classixx (ft. Nancy Whang) – “All You’re Waiting For” (2013)
464. Tobias Jesso Jr. – “True Love” (2014)
463. Azari & III – “Reckless (With Your Love) – Tensnake Remix” (2010)
462. Cage the Elephant – “Cigarette Daydreams” (2013)
461. Liars – “No. 1 Against the Rush” (2012)
460. Jlin – “Nyakinyua Rise” (2017)
459. Jessica Pratt – “Back, Baby” (2014)
458. Julia Holter – “I Shall Love 2” (2018)
457. CHAI – “I’m Me” (2019)
456. Kelly Lee Owens (ft. Jenny Hval) – “Anxi.” (2017)
455. Kavinsky – “Nightcall” (2010)
454. Tierra Whack – “Hungry Hippo” (2018)
453. Panda Bear – “Tropic of Cancer” (2015)
452. Sleater-Kinney – “A New Wave” (2015)
451. Waxahatchee – “Swan Dive” (2013)
Bitter Melodies 