Let’s take a few moments today to talk about some songs I enjoyed from 2018.
‘Love Is Bigger Than Anything In Its Way’ by U2
After considering a few candidates, I think I’ve settled on this song as my favorite from the band’s newest album, 2018’s Songs of Experience. I don’t have a ton to add about this song – it’s a good song from a good album but both seem likely to disappear into obscurity thanks to the band’s massive overall output. The song plays well live, a fact I learned firsthand in June. Of the many versions out there I think this one is the best.
The tour led me to return to some of the band’s older work and I emerged from the year with new appreciation for some of their classics. The performance of ‘Staring At The Sun’ from the Boston show was my favorite song from my first U2 concert – I think it did justice to this excellent 2001 version. I loved this piano-aided version of ‘Whose Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses’ from 2006 and enjoyed this 2010 performance of ‘Ultraviolet’. While I’m on the topic, I should note that I also liked The Killers’ cover of the latter – as I’ve noted in the past, the Las Vegas band has a gift for covering a song.
‘Graffiti’ by Chvrches
No ‘list of the year’ would be complete without a pure pop hit and this Chvrches single fits the bill. ‘Graffiti’ played well in concert but I think the most memorable version of it I heard in 2018 was this acoustic performance. The trio rose to prominence on the strength of their synth-driven performances but I suspect this won’t be the last time I’m pleasantly surprised when Chvrches decides to unplug for a song or two.
I mentioned in my concert review that I thought ‘Science/Visions’ and ‘Clearest Blue’ were their two strongest concert performances – linked are the best live versions I could find. I’ve also harped on how much I value a band’s ability to produce a good cover – this version of ‘Do I Wanna Know’ by the Arctic Monkeys proved Chvrches fit the bill while this rendition of ‘Somebody Else’ by The 1975 was probably my favorite cover of the year.
‘The Handler’ by Muse
Muse returned to the top of my music list in 2018 and I think ‘The Handler’ deserves some credit for their resurgence. It’s not just that the song is very good – it also made me interested in working backward through their work and led me to some older songs I hadn’t paid much attention to the in the past.
‘The Handler’ comes from 2016’s Drones. It has the self-contained energy of any great Muse song and in that sense is more of a great ‘Muse song’ than it is a great song by Muse. If I had to make a preposterous ‘music critic’ style analysis of the track, I would describe it as the before, during, and after of a spring downpour.
‘Cornerstone’ by Arctic Monkeys
The quality I noticed right away in this band was how easily the band captured a sense of nostalgia in their work – I think ‘Fluorescent Adolescent’ and ‘Mardy Bum’ are the two best examples of this idea. ‘Cornerstone’ takes it a step further because the song isn’t just about nostalgia, it’s about the futile effort to actively recapture it, and in some moments I wondered if the song was written only to induce suffering.
The band has been around long enough to try some different things with their work. The aforementioned ‘Mardy Bum’ is a good example – I enjoyed this alternate version as much as I did the original.
A stroll down memory lane…
There were some longtime favorites that remained a consistent part of my music world in 2018. Here are a few links to the best live performances I could find:
‘American Pie’ cover by John Mayer
‘King and Lionheart’ by Of Monsters and Men
‘Sounds Like Hallelujah’ by The Head and The Heart
‘My Speed’ by Lake Street Dive
‘The Pieces’ by Slow Club
‘Landslide’ piano cover by vkgoeswild
And last but not least…
‘Dirty Old Town’ cover by Celtic Social Club
There are songs that you like and then there are songs that compel you to sing – for me, the latter category is microscopically small and therefore any song that enters such rarefied air requires mention in this space. This song has a rich history that includes many different cover performances – the list includes among others The Dubliners, Rod Stewart, and of course, U2. The version I like best is this performance by Celtic Social Club – it might not do justice to my earnest mangling of the opening verse, but it’ll do for now.
Thanks for reading – and listening.
