(Ed. note: I am well aware that it is January 16, 2012. I am also aware that most best-of 2011 lists came out at the end of December, 2011. I wanted this list to come out at that time but it took me so fucking long to write this. I wasn't anticipating this post to be this long, but it is...so...yeah. Deal with it.)
Well, another year and all that shit. It's been an OK year for music, in my opinion. I always seem to say this at the end of every year. "Yeah it was decent. Not great, but not terrible". In reality, the true measure of a year's worth of music cannot be calculated until long after December 31. Opinions change. What was good in 2011 may not appear as good in five years. The fact of the matter is that we cannot yet begin to determine what songs sound "dated", or trapped in their time. Some songs will inevitably be associated with one point in the history of popular music, other songs will transcend. That's my criteria for judging the best. Do they retread and regurgitate old tricks? Or do they create a new way of writing and creating that other artists desperately attempt to catch up to?
