The 37 Awesomest Songs of 2009

i completely agree with Woods, by Bon Iver. it warms the cockles of my heart with all the recognition he is getting

Honestly, Paste?

You're supposed to be the torch-barer for literate, intelligent, INDEPENDENT music.
Yet with this list it seems like your only aspiration is to morph into current-era Rolling Stone.

Drake, Gucci Mane, Chris Brown, Keri Hilson, Taylor Swift ANND MILEY CYRUS?

Excuse me a moment while I vomit due to how sickened I am that you've sunk so low.

Also, you missed two of the years best songs from one of the years best album right off the bat.

The Antlers - Kettering
The Antlers - Two

It's a sad day in the world of music publications.

Congratulations.

Seriously... please take this down.

This list is god awful. @Steven--I agree with the Rolling Stone comparison.

Fer real? I honestly haven't heard many of these. Most of the music I hear in a year comes from the Paste samplers (and I thank Paste for that). But I think if some of these were on the samplers, I would avoid all music forever for the rest of my life. I have never heard the Miley Cyrus song, clicked on the link up there and holy crap. I wouldn't even consider that song (or lame video) to be the best of the worst... let alone the awesomest of 2009. If Miley Cyrus is the torchbearer for awesome music we are doomed.. and so is Paste magazine. Very disappointed.

oh and... I don't read Rolling Stone but would THEY even pick Miley Cyrus as the awesomest of the year? Do I not know what the word awesome means?

You can only name eight albums from the last year that you love?? Then why is Paste allowing you to write for them???

Seriously, Paste, do better next time. There were MANY full-length albums that I LOVED this year. Apparently I still have the ability to sit still long enough to listen to more than a 3 minute radio single (is the skill becoming that rare?!). I'll write this article next year for you!

Boy, pathetic list. Even the Bon Iver song is one of his worst.

I spent an hour arguing with my friends over the weekend that Paste is as good, if not better, than AV Club. THEN YOU PUBLISH THIS??? Please, remove this list and the knife from by back. At least the Yo La Tengo and Major Lazer songs are worthy.

Good pick Steven S on the Antlers songs.

Paste, you are held to a higher standard and this is a poor list. These, for the most part, are all good songs, others are okay, but very few deserve to be on a Paste "Best...." list. It's understandable for them to be in lists by magazines such as Rolling Stone, as mentioned before. Of all the great hip-hop that came out this year (Blueprint III - Jay-Z, Man on the Moon: The End of Day - Kid Cudi, The Ecstatic - Mos Def, the emergence of Pac Div, P*O*S, etc.), Gucci Mane makes the list? Despicable. The list isn't as bad as people are saying, the list is bad because very few of these songs deserve recognition from Paste.

How did you become a writer for Paste?
I think I need to go through the channels you did - and do this list next year so I can breathe easier knowing my favorite publication wouldn't print a list this bad next year.
Okay, so that's not the sole reason - but I would love to be a Paste featured writer.
Any tips?

Also, thanks to everyone for their agreements, I don't think I've ever had that many comments directed my way before...

Oh, enough with the righteous indignation. "Knock You Down" is a kick-ass song, and, fuck it, "Party in the USA" is the catchy as all hell.

I only take issue with Taylor Swift, and that's because I want her to go away for awhile.

ok... emmh something did go wrong, didn't it?
where is grizzly bear? where are dirty projectors? ok, there really are too many artists that contributed to 2009 musical goodness missing on this list. I am happy to see jj - they somehow got overlooked and would have deserved much more attention! But seriously... Miley Cyrus? Kid Sister? Gucci Mane? hmm
I have a list up here, come check it out...
http://donkeysinflight.wordpress.com/2009/12/20/best-of-2009/

How many more times can we mention Kanye in a list?

Way to enable jackass-ness!!

Hey elitists - A good song is a good whether it's recorded by Miley, Deer Tick, the Dirty Projectors, Taylor Swift, the Gaslight Anthem, Kid Cudi, Lady Gaga or the Avett Brothers. Come down off your high horse. I'd hate to go through life wearing your tinted glasses.

I agree with everyone who's commented so far! What Paste needs to do is champion more bearded white guys playing acoustic guitars and shamelessly bland indie-rock bands filled with (shock!) bearded white guys. Come on, people! It's one editor's list. He likes what he likes and you all like the same old shit. Get over yourselves.

I would love to hear how many of you have actually listened to a single song from this list, much less a handful or most of them, before you left your scathingly ignorant comments. I bet the results would be entirely unsurprising.

Well, 'Party in the USA' is pretty catchy, and the fan-made YouTube video is pretty great. When I think of 2009 songs of the indie-rock persuasion, I think...

Grizzly Bear - 'Two Weeks'
Phoenix - 'Listomania' and '1901'
Passion Pit - 'Sleepyhead'
Yeah Yeah Yeahs - 'Zero'
Metric - 'Help I'm Alive'
Silversun Pickups - 'Panic Switch'

I thought that's what everyone was listening too. I guess I missed the boat this year.

My less-talked-about pick would be Dirty Projectors' 'Stillness is the Move'

I just need to know one thing - is this Nick Marino's personal list or a Paste (collective) list? If the former, then good for him - it takes some moxie to list some of the mainstream artists on an year-end list (unless of course it was just meant to be hipster ironic, which is just annoying); if the latter, then Paste editorial staff has some 'splain to do.

I'm not seeing the same problem that everybody else is. Music snobbery is what I see, and there really isn't anything inherently wrong with pop music or liking it. The 90's were bad at points, I'll admit, but don't you remember times when mainstream music was alright to like? It wasn't always a sin to enjoy.

Anyway, you like what music you like. You don't have that much control over it, it almost never fits neatly into the category of "always acceptable, authentic, and sophisticated to like," and to berate someone for deeming Party in the USA "awesome" seems like waste of time and energy. Music doesn't need to be taken so seriously.

You're right, Hack. Haven't heard much from this list, but when I clicked on the link and heard the Miley song, I didn't see why it deserved to be on this list. It wasn't that special. I don't listen to much "bearded white dude" music either, but then again I don't keep score. I just expect more from Paste. Paste didn't used to be a "bearded white dude" magazine either. That is why I liked it. Again, I don't hear much that Paste doesn't feature, but I think Neko Case, BLK JKS, Samantha Crain, Ryan Bingham, Regina Spektor, Tina Dico, Heartless Bastards, Sea Wolf... deserved a mention. And I think a couple of those were from ONE Paste sampler.

I'm not being a snob.. I just expect more from Paste. They do hear a lot of stuff that most of the planet doesn't, I guess. Belive me, I'm the most un-hipsterish person you could ever meet. :D I guess I'm reminded of when I was a kid in the 90s and all my buddies were listening to the dispicable pop crap and I was just looking around for something I actually liked and not what the rest of the kid population liked.

The lack of phoenix on this list is kind of sad but I do think that forever is a good choice, even though its not indie when you have three of the best rap artists ever to have lived recording a single together its gotta be a favorite

Who-oo are the Brain Police?

FZ

Via Alan

Paste writes about songs that its writers enjoy regardless of whether they're independent. That's what I like about it. If you don't think songs should be judged by how they sound, but rather by whether they have street cred based on whether an independent label publishes them, then there might be another magazine out there for you, but I don't know what it is.

P.S. It's "torch bearer" not "torch barer," although that was a funny image.

I think it's silly when people get so up in arms about someone actually liking a widely popular song. The precise point of this list was that these songs were ones chosen by the author as being singularly good, not part of a whole album. That's usually the point of the chart toppers...these artists tend not to have whole albums worth purchasing. Yes Paste supports Independent musicians, but that doesn't mean that Paste editors have to be hypocritical about their love of music in general. Denying a song merely because it's popular is just as shameful as blindly following the top 40. Good list. Thanks for sharing!

It's just a person's opinion man

I was going to renew my Paste subscription until I saw MILEY CYRUS on your list!!! What the hell?!?!?
I'm sorry, but no one who TOOK (past tense...notice that?)your magazine seriously for a love of HONEST music will ever be caught 'moving their hips like yeah (omfg insipid and prissy much?!?!VOMIT.)
Paste has obviously gone to the dark side (and not in the cool way a la Darth). When a little poser who can't sing makes your list because someone else wrote a song for her and her daddy happened to be famous then you're done in my book. What, did you just want a piece of the cash cow run by ignorant tweens? And Taylor Swift?! Yes, just like the aforementioned I'm sure she works very hard, but maybe someone could teach her to carry a tune without the aid auto tune (did you see the Grammys????) and maybe a few new chord progressions! WHAT ARE YOU THINKING??!?!

YOU OBVIOUSLY DO NOT KNOW YOUR FAN BASE. WHEN YOU HAVE TO CLOSE YOUR DOORS FOR GOOD THINK OF THIS MOMENT!

Paste, it's been nice, but we're done.

The Miley Cyrus and Taylor Swift songs are definitely catchy enough to be on this list. All the elitist haters commenting are just closeminded assholes. It probably should have been rounded up to 40, though, because without Little Secrets by Passion Pit, Two weeks by Grizzly Bear and warm heart of africa, you may as well just not have the damn list