25 November 2010 You Irish people of 2010 must have really loved the British Army, since this is the second charity fundraiser for injured British military personnel that you sent all the way to the top of the charts in Ireland—my country—in two years. I had emigrated then, as all true sons and daughters of … Continue reading The X Factor Finalists 2010 – ‘Heroes’ →

4 November 2010 I remember the spectacular skyscraping chorus of 'Only Girl (In The World)' but not much else of it. That's me having listened to it just now, by the way, not casting my mind back to 2010. Scrunching up my face and listening another time really, really hard, the verses here could be … Continue reading Rihanna – ‘Only Girl (In The World)’ →

28 October 2010 It might seem unfair to suggest that the only explanatory factor for 'Promise This' topping the Irish and UK charts was the celebrity status of its singer, as seen on prime-time TV every Saturday night and in the gossip-hungry tabloid press all the other days of the week. For one thing, the … Continue reading Cheryl – ‘Promise This’ →

7 October 2010 Remember when Bruno Mars was a fresh, exciting new act? Hah! Trick question. Yes, unlike the latter-day Martian retro soul schtick, its faddish-for-2010 mix of beats and piano make 'Just The Way You Are' sound like it was made by people who acknowledge the existence of pop music made after 1975. Otherwise, … Continue reading Bruno Mars – ‘Just The Way You Are’ →

30 September 2010 My long-standing modus operandi here vis-à-vis 'inspirational' tracks is that I don't knock or begrudge anyone for getting inspiration from something. Here in October 2023 as I write this, the world is being even more relentlessly dreadful than usual: take any inspiration or solace you can get, is what I say. What … Continue reading Tinie Tempah ft. Eric Turner – ‘Written In The Stars’ →

9 September 2010 Mark Sheehan, guitarist with The Script, died in April 2023, only six months ago as I write this. The Script's brand of U2-influenced earnest, melodramatic, stadium-sized soft rock has been hugely successful, and 'For The First Time'—whose video stars Eve Hewson—is on-brand in that regard. It's not a genre of music that … Continue reading The Script – ‘For The First Time’ →

2 September 2010 Party-anthem EDM-pop beds in for 2010 and beyond. Following in the designer loafers of designer loafers Flo Rida, David Guetta and Taio Cruz, here again is Katy Perry, America's sweetheart of the spring-break mechanical-bull rodeo. 'Teenage Dream' aims less for saucy-postcard and more schoolgirl-diary, or at least a grown-up's contrivance of same: … Continue reading Katy Perry – ‘Teenage Dream’ →

26 August 2010 Oh, so they were making generic US whoop-holler EDM for the Tesco piped music in 2010, were they? (Genuine question: at that time I was still living in France, where all my local supermarkets played uncensored versions of the sweariest US and UK chart hits.) To call 'Dynamite' EDM-by-numbers implies it goes … Continue reading Taio Cruz – ‘Dynamite’ →

5 August 2010 Flo Rida, like an anti-intellectual faction of The Black Eyed Peas, and David Guetta, court jester to the crass blingerati partying while the world economy burned: between them, the ambient noise of our 2009-10 charts. Now, in that era's depressingly familiar synergy of inanity, they've joined forces for a 'collab'. And when … Continue reading Flo Rida ft. David Guetta – ‘Club Can’t Handle Me’ →

29 July 2010 If in 2010 you were only consuming the latest pop sounds by whatever you overheard on TV stings or a passing radio—and it happens to us all—chances are you still knew the bleepy Charleston of 'We No Speak Americano'. Electro-this-that-and-the-other was having a moment at the end of the '00s and into … Continue reading Yolanda Be Cool & DCUP – ‘We No Speak Americano’ →