The Top Ten Songs Of 2022

Every year, it feels like this is the hardest thing I have to do. Picking individual songs to represent my feelings on an entire year is difficult, not just because of the huge number of them I hear over the course of twelve months, but because it's far easier to think in big-picture terms. An album has more meat on the bones, and when you invest the time in forty-five minutes of music again and again, there's a mechanism of reinforcement you don't get when there is one great song on an album you otherwise don't like. Talking about a three minute song isn't always easy, but it's always worthwhile to point out which songs are the ones I felt closest to over the year.

10. The Spider Accomplice - Fire The Sorrow

A lovely surprise on "The Venomous Montage" was this number, a synth-drenched 80s rocker that elevated a sound I'm not of the right vintage to swoon to. Sounding like a "Blinding Lights" for a more rock-oriented audience, VK and Arno adopted the neon coloring of old "Miami Vice" episodes, and used it to put a fluorescent underline on their first full-length album. This song is a slice of 'neon noir', like a pair of lustrous blue irises wrapped around the deep black of dilated pupils. My eyes can't always handle things that are too bright, but this one is hard to look away from.

9. Ghost - Spillways

I will not call myself a fan of "Impera" as an album, but a gem is a gem. Ghost is great when they don't get sucked into their gimmickry and concepts, and a simple song like this proves it. The best part of "Prequelle" was, to me, the heightened pop aspects. That's what this song delivers again, as the core melody to the song could certainly make for a pop hit. You know, if Ghost wasn't Ghost. As frustrating as they can be, it's worth the aggravation to get songs that are this much fun.

8. Cold Years - Say Goodbye

For twenty years, Green Day's "Warning" is one of the few records that has ever felt like a true melding of modern alt/punk and old power-pop. I absolutely love that, so hearing Cold Years being able to revitalize that sound was (ugh, sorry for this pun) music to my ears. I love the slight swing of the guitars at the start, how the song stops before letting out the hook, and how it feels like an old AM radio hit. And the line "I drove all night with the street lights casting shadows in my mind" is just lovely. This one feels like an old friend to me.

7. Taylor Swift - Snow On The Beach

I have never been to the beach, but I have plenty of experience with snow. I am not as in awe of it as Taylor is here, but the feeling of something out-of-place being weirdly beautiful is one I can understand. Sometimes, we feel like that as people, about ourselves. The coldness of the production on "Midnights" works to perfection here, as the stark instrumentation and Taylor's flat vocal carry the aura of a cold night as flurries begin to fall, and your lips are too frozen to belt out more than a sigh. That feeling is wonderfully replicated here.

6. Halestorm - The Steeple

Here's an interesting song. When I first heard it, I was annoyed by the nursery-rhyme aspects of the lyrics. It felt hokey to me, and I thought it was going to be an annoyance when I kept listening to the full album. In an odd twist, it's this song that has stood out to me the most from "Back From The Dead", in part because of just how damn catchy that aspect makes it. Look, I'm still not a big fan of some of the lyrics, but a call-to-arms doesn't have to be poetic. This one isn't, but I do find myself getting caught up in it.

5. The Wonder Years - You're The Reason I Don't Want The World To End

Now this is how you end an album. This song might not be what you think of with the word 'epic', but the emotional swell of the song is that strong. It's powerful, stirring, and everything from the screaming bridge straight through the quick drop and the final chorus, is flawless. It epitomizes the idea of the emotional catharsis, and that it comes from the simple idea of finding a pair of gloves in your coat pocket just makes it that much more incredible. I may not be able to relate to it with the same intention it was written with, but the feeling it evokes is universal, and deep enough to cut.

4. Allen/Olzon - Never Too Late

Speaking of album closers, here is another one that feels like a true final statement. Russell and Anette work so well together, and when the melody spices things up with a bit more drama, there is no denying the power they embody. There is an air of defiance to the song, as their voices rise up together to stop us from giving up. Maybe that's a bit ironic at the end of an album, but damn if it doesn't work. This is the type of song I think of when I imagine a festival crowd shouting at the top of their lungs. It doesn't get much better.

3. Valleyheart - Back & Forth

The soft/loud dynamic has been in use forever, but that's because it works. As this song goes through its softer opening half, it's a nice little number. The melody is pleasant, and the somber mood hits some good marks. But that changes when the band kicks into gear, as the heavier final push escalates things, revealing an engine that had been idling, waiting for the pedal to be pushed to the floor. When that happens, as The Frugal Gourmet used to say, "Ooo, it's so good."

2. Avril Lavigne - All I Wanted

I found myself listening to "Enema Of The State" a lot this year, and with Mark Hoppus appearing on this song, it struck me as the best Blink-182 song in decades. Avril's voice plays as well off Hoppus' as the classic Blink formula, but it's the weariness of the message (and Hoppus' voice, to be honest) that I love so much, for how it undercuts what could be a bubblegum bit of pop-punk. This song sounds more wistful, more nostalgic, and like they know they're trying to recapture something that was lightning in a bottle.

1. Slash - The River Is Rising

My favorite song of the year is one that annoys me, which I think only underscores how much I love it. I absolutely hate the production, but I almost think the brittle sound is necessary, because otherwise the impending flood wouldn't sound like anything to worry about. Myles Kennedy always comes up with one or two of these songs on each album, and this time there is something about the soar and the swagger that got to me like it hadn't before. Rock and roll doesn't need to be complicated. Give us a cool riff and a catchy melody, and everything else will take care of itself. I don't think any other song this year embodied that quite as well.