Yesterday we brought an end to our top 40 albums countdown, and now it’s time for our top 40 tracks of the year! As with the albums, this list is voted on exclusively by the AU contributors, and the track simply must have been released on an album (or as a single) in 2013! So get ready for the eclectic mix that is our top 40 for 2013…
40. Queens Of The Stone Age – I Sat By The Ocean
Justine McNamara: Try and listen to this without it getting stuck in your head for days. I love the chord progression, I love the way the verses build after the chorus, and the softer side of Josh Homme’s voice.
39. Parquet Courts – Stoned and Starving
Paul McBride: Like Television and The Strokes before them, Parquet Courts’ brand of lo-fi garage guitars and streetwise attitudes make their music sound so much more fresh and exciting than almost everything else.
38. Josh Pyke – Leeward Side
Tanya Ali: This song makes my heart swell, and puts a smile on my face without fail. Dripping with harmonica-induced nostalgia, Pyke has penned a winner right here. Song of the Summer.
37. Boards of Canada – Reach for the Dead
Tom Williams: …a song soaked in its own background static, swells to a beautiful peak and is held for maximum tension. It’s a humbling point on Tomorrow’s Harvest, and it’s only the album’s second track.
36. The Trotskies – Home
Gemma Bastiani: My favourite track from a flawless debut EP. Will get stuck in your head and you’ll wish you’d made this one.
35. My Bloody Valentine – In Another Way
Andrew McDonald: Shoegaze from a future we daren’t dream. An angular and violent twist on the beautiful lushness the band perfected over two decades ago. As fun as it is exciting and challenging.
34. Lorde – Bravado
Nazia Hafiz: The orchestral element to the song is so Madonna’s Like a Prayer, I love the strength and honesty of the lyric accompanied by Lorde’s rich voice. The music changes tempo and style so fluidly, it’s the unpredictably and variation from the norm that’s the best part.
33. Daft Punk – Giorgio By Moroder
Leonardo Silvestrini: While the rest of Random Access Memories didn’t excite me as much as other people, I couldn’t ignore this blockbuster, a celebration of not only one of Daft Punk’s idols, but of the history of dance music itself. Giorgio utters at one point “Once you free your mind about the concept of harmony, and of music being ‘correct’, you can do whatever you want”, and the French duo seem to have taken it as the manifesto for not only this track, but everything they do. Strings, live drums, guitars solos (in addition to that infectious synth line) all coalesce into a dance track that overloads the senses, which is exactly what they’re suppose to do.
32. Kurt Vile – Waking On A Pretty Day
Pete Dovgan: The Summer anthem of 2013!
31. James Blake – Overgrown
Tanya Ali: On the album’s title track, James presents a more organic sound – it’s a slight more away from the beats and bass style of the other songs. It’s a moving, touchingly honest song; the percussion is soft and unobtrusive and when the piano chords come in towards the middle of the song, they build to create a heartbreaking mood. The fade out of the simple block piano chords is incredibly effective to end one of Blake’s finest pieces to date.
Stay tuned for more from our top 40 countdown!
