Oztix | News | The Votes Are In: Here's What We Think Are The Top Songs Of 2018

Each year, The Music team and contributors take a deep dive into the year that was, scratch our heads and try to jog our memories for what were our top picks of the year. The votes have been cast, the results have been tallied and 2018's best and brightest can finally be revealed. We kicked off with Album Of The Year yesterday (read it here) and today comes Song Of The Year.

The 2018 Writers’ Poll Song Of The Year is super noteworthy because of the high representation of people of colour in the top five – that’s four out of five artists.

This Is America, of course, topped the list by a wide margin and is one of the most politically charged anthems of the last decade. Childish Gambino addresses both gun violence and racial discrimination in the United States in an incredibly confronting way both in the song and in its incredibly impactful video clip. It’s undoubtedly the video clip of the year, as Gambino draws upon viral dance crazes and historical cultural stereotypes including the Jim Crow caricature to confront police violence against Black Americans and the horrors of racially motivated mass shootings. The whole thing is aching to be unpacked and makes a statement about what it is we are willing to look past in order to live without guilt, to avoid our history.

It’s followed by an equally powerful Indigenous Australian anthem in Mojo Juju’s Native Tongue: a song the artist describes as about self-empowerment and reclaiming culture. It also so happens to be groovy as hell. It forces you to consider the relationship between this country and its First Peoples and the ongoing discrimination experienced by them, enacted in paternalistic policy, or say, ignoring the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

Song Of The Year is also a really interesting category because it’s made up of six women – not including Sweater Curse, a band which also has a woman in it. That ratio is a super exciting one, featuring Janelle Monae’s smooth Make Me Feel, and includes a stack of Aussies, Mojo Juju, G Flip, Courtney Barnett and Laura Jean. That’s just over a half-half local to international split in the top ten (well, technically 11 as there was a tie for tenth), not taking into account the presence of Troye Sivan on 1999. Didirri was the other Aussie in the mix at the pointy end.

Talking viral videos, Drake’s In My Feelings has to get a mention – it turned into an internet meme challenge thanks to comedian Shiggy’s pink tracksuited dance, with the new Queer Eye guys and Will Smith giving it a crack. Drake then took some of his favourite examples and dropped them into the clip. Interestingly, Drake’s vote was split with God’s Plan also garnering a few votes and even Nice For What. Barnett too had multiple votes for different songs, with Charity and Hopefulessness also getting some nods.

The Music Writers’ Poll is not complete without a walloping of punk, thanks to British rockers IDLES, and a pure dose of pop, which Charli XCX & Troye Sivan’s nostalgia feast, 1999, delivers. Its video clip is also a contender for top video clip of the year. The song is fun, pure and simple, and if you don’t like fun, that’s your problem.