Pop Messiah’s Summer Hymns (2013 Edition)

You may remember that last year we consulted #ThePopGods and compiled a playlist of Summer Hymns in 2012! Well the Summer Hymns compilation is back for 2013 and bigger than ever!!

Click “Read More” for 25 of Pop Heaven’s finest summer anthems!

Judgement Day (Special Edition): Pop Heaven’s Top 100 Songs of 2012 (Part 4 of 4)

The time has come! Were about to reveal Pop Heaven’s top 25 songs of 2012! As this year’s chart comes to a close, I find myself reflecting on the journey of actually compiling a year-end chart.

I started off with 188 singles that were released this year by popular music’s heavy hitters from all genres. Additionally, there were plenty of amazing non-singles this year, so I carefully selected the best of the best (hoping that they don’t become runaway hits in 2013 so I won’t regret including them this year) and added those to the pool as well.

From there began the surprisingly arduous task of trying to rank them all. I prayed day and night to the Pop Gods to guide me in my mission. Sometimes I found myself heartbroken to realize that a song I loved would be cut when it slowly slipped over the fine line between #100 and #101. Admittedly, there were many other terrific tracks this year that didn’t make the list.

As always, there were some oversights and there are a couple of flat-out mistakes that I wish I could go back and amend, but once it’s been published it’s Pop Gospel so it’s time to let go of regret and move on with our  top 25!

In case you’re just joining us, you should catch up!!:

– Read entries 100 through 76 in Part 1!
– Read entries 75 through 51 in Part 2!
– Read entries 50 through 26 in Part 3!

Now, if you’re all caught up.. check out the conclusion of our year-end charts. Watch/Listen to the YouTube playlist below, or read the Top 25 after the break…

Judgement Day (Special Edition): Pop Heaven’s Top 100 Songs of 2012 (Part 3 of 4)

We’re still counting down The Pop Gods’ Top 100 songs of 2012. It was a fantastic year for singles, with the ongoing dance-pop trend still cranking out lots of hits despite seeing a lot of changes take root in the mainstream soundscape. I wager that the past year was a turning point and that 2013 will be a year of change, but for now let’s focus on 2012!

In case you’re just joining us:

– Read entries #100 through #76 in Part 1!
– Read entries #75 through #51 in Part 2!

Without further ado, here are chart positions #50 through #26! Feel free to watch and listen with our YouTube playlist, or read the chart after the jump!

Pop Messiah’s Summer Hymns (2012 Edition)

A few weeks back I started making a playlist of all of my favorite tracks this summer. Most of them are recent releases, but a few are older tracks that never got the opportunity to truly be summer smash hits. I thought it would be fun to share them all with you. In the spirit of keeping things legal, I found a cool site called 8Track, which reports all plays to the RIAA to ensure that artists are collecting royalties, and though it’s not downloadable – you will be able to listen to the tracks whenever you like and there are purchase links embedded in case you decide you love any of our picks so much you just HAVE to have it for yourself!!

Judgement Day (Special Edition): Pop Heaven’s Top 100 Songs of 2011 (Part 1 of 4)

After a few touch-and-go years in popular music, it’s important to start off by saying that 2011 was an AMAZING YEAR and anyone who thinks otherwise can take a one way ticket to the tonedeaf but finely autotuned fires of Pop Hell.

I am going to state for the record that after compiling this chart, I realized that a lot of my favorite songs from 2011, across multiple genres of popular music share a common thread: a major late 80’s or early 90’s inspiration. While people have been trying to recreate the 80’s/90’s sounds in recent years, it is my personal opinion that 2011 is the year when they finally got it right.

• Return of emotional lyrics: With the major success of UK crooner, Adele, airwaves in 2011 shifted ever-so-slightly away from over-processed vocalists and headed back towards real voices singing about real feelings. We also saw a lot of fantastic artists known for their emotional material release much anticipated new albums/singles this year (i.e. Kelly Clarkson, Darren Hayes, Jennifer Hudson, JoJo, Adam Lambert, etc.)

• The Summer of Sax!: Though two hit pop singles and an album track do not make a revolution, there was a small resurgence of the classic late 80’s, early 90’s saxophone solo via a couple of Pop Heaven regulars: Katy Perry & Lady Gaga!

• Classic R&B Re-Emergence: Artists like Beyonce, Jessie J & the originators; Boyz II Men brought us back to the days when r&b music still had soul and made you feel a certain glow as the influence of R&B’s last golden days in the 1990’s creeped back in. We pray to The Pop Gods that this trend continues!

• IMPRESSIVE Emerging Artists: Not only were pop veterans out in full swing, there were a LOT of promising new emerging artists producing FANTASTIC singles this year. Including: The Rescues, Sabi, Neon Hitch, Simon Curtis & Jared Lee.

Without further ado, I present Pop Heaven’s Top 100 Songs of 2011. (Ok that’s a lie, but you do get entries 100 through 75!)