We are all guilty of it. Of liking something just because nobody else knows what it is, of not really enjoying a song but saying we do because it sounds cool to do so, of parroting whatever Pitchfork said about something that sounds kind of profound but might not actually mean anything.
2010 was a stellar year for providing us with things to be ironic about, and I would congratulate them, but I’m too busy composing a diatribe on why I hate American Apparel while simultaneously trying to grow a handlebar mustache. I’m a girl.
Here is a list to celebrate the inner hipster in all of us, and the outer hipster in others (really, Ezra Koenig, stop, you don’t count).
10. Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti – Round and Round
Apathetic, faded singing voice? Retro intro? Nostalgic references to creepy childhood theme park rides? Yes, all of these would immediately qualify Ariel Pink’s “Round and Round” as painfully hipster, but what really puts this song on the list is that it is #1 on the Pitchfork, the-most-painfully-indie-music-website-on-the-internet, 2010 roundup.
9. The Tallest Man On Earth – King of Spain
If being a normal-sized Swedish banjo-player with a voice that draws critics’ comparisons to Bob Dylan and an ironic moniker doesn’t qualify as painfully hipster, then you can slap the prescription-less wayfarers from Beacon’s Closet right off my face. This song features hipster staples like a vague appreciation for foreign cultures, conversation-style singing, and sporadic howling.
8. Titus Andronicus – A More Perfect Union
The War in Iraq is out. The Civil War is in. Update your Twitter accordingly. Just kidding, hipsters would never tweet. Don’t joke about that. I’m serious.
7. Gil Scott-Heron – Anything (really… anything by him)
Hipsters like politics. Hipsters like being apolitical. Hipsters like learning through beat poetry when the revolution will be televised. Hipsters like learning through beat poetry when the revolution will not be televised. Hipsters like liking things that are outside their usual age, race, and choice of drug demographics. Hipsters like hating words like “demographics.” Therefore, hipsters like Gil Scott-Heron.
6. Stromae – Alors On Danse
Your unfriendly neighborhood hipster probably doesn’t dance, probably doesn’t sing, and only knows enough French to pass as vaguely sophisticated at parties. But he probably loves this song and hates the Kanye remix.
5. Arcade Fire – We Used to Wait
This interactive, nostalgic music video made even the Hipster Grinch’s skinny jeans grow three sizes that day
4. Lil B – Bitches Im Bill Clinton
This freestyle rap about Bill Clinton by the “Unknow [sic] UK Master Chef” will be dropped from this list once the view count teeters over 15,000. Which is why it is included.
3. Kanye West – Runaway
He’s just so underground.
2. Nature – Heavy Rain
An effervescent flow, rapid refrain, and a chorus that comes rushing in to the very depths of your soul makes “Heavy Rain” the second best track of the year. Nature is certainly an unpredictable artist, and one to watch out for. We can’t wait to see what he/she/it does next. The YouTube commenter put it best, with “my faverorite [sic] part was win [sic] the rain hit the ground over and over and over and over.”
1. Justin Bieber – Baby
Because even insufferable hipsters can’t help but love him. (Note from the Author: They were playing this song when I was at an erotic museum in Barcelona. Creepy.)
– MG’12
