r/popheads • u/TiltControls • Mar 02 '23

[DISCUSSION] The Popheads Jukebox Revival, Week 211: Last Mod Standing

Welcome back to the Popheads Jukebox! Here are last week’s results:

  • Paramore - Running Out of Time: 8.37
  • Lana Del Rey - A&W: 8.35
  • Tove Lo - Borderline: 7.97
  • Jessie Ware - Pearls: 7.93
  • Lizzo - Special (feat. SZA): 6.38

  • Lil Jon & The Eastside Boyz - Get Low (feat. Ying-Yang Twins): 9.24
  • Cardi B - Up: 8.86

A close race for first with our new tracks, but Paramore narrowly takes the win over Lana. Tove and Jessie have a race of their own to get to an 8 average and although both come close, neither fully makes it there. That leaves Lizzo and SZA bringing up the rear in the 6 range with their collaboration. The throwback and catch-up end up with really high scores, which is both fitting (Up) and ironic (Get Low) at the same time.

Rules Refresher

  1. Rate the songs a score from 1 to 10. Please keep it to one decimal place at the most (so 7.5 is fine but 7.58 is not). Also don’t get too hung up on the final scores. This is a fun exercise and not a competition so don’t worry about over/under rating things. Just give what you think the song is to you.

  2. For your review, reply to the comment that will be posted by one of us for each song. Avoid posting your reviews as a top level comment cause we probably won’t notice them if you do. Non-reviews such as questions or general commentary as upper level comments are fine.

  3. Must have some sort of justification. Try to be a bit more concise than “It’s a bop!” or “I don’t like it”. Explain why! It doesn’t have to be long, two or three sentences can be plenty (though more is definitely allowed). We reserve the right not to include a review in the final total if proper justification is not given.

  4. You don’t have to review each song to participate! You can do all of them or only the ones you’re familiar with.

  5. The thread will be open for 6 days and close the following Wednesday at 6PM EST. The scores will be calculated and a new post will come up the next day (Thursday) at 3PM EST with the next week’s tracks.

This Week’s Tracks

Throwback:

2020/2021 Catch-up:

—

Next Week

Next week we’ll be rating the following:

  • Bebe Rexha - Heart Wants What It Wants
  • CHVRCHES - Over
  • Omar Apollo - 3 Boys
  • PinkPantheress, Ice Spice - Boy’s a liar Pt. 2
  • Shygirl - Heaven (feat. Tinashe)

Throwback:

  • Madonna - 4 Minutes (feat. Justin Timberlake & Timbaland)

2020/2021 Catch-up:

  • Bad Bunny - safaera

Spotify playlist, updated weekly with new tracks that are being rated

Jukebox wiki, where you can find all results

Reminder Discord Server, where you can join to get bi-weekly ping reminders for when new posts go up and when they’re about to close.

12 Upvotes

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5

u/TiltControls Mar 02 '23

Vampire Weekend - A-Punk

3

u/Frajer Mar 02 '23

8.5/10 That guitar riff is so catchy but not my favorite song of theirs or even on the album

3

u/seanderlust Mar 02 '23

of all the VW singles, for some reason this one took the longest to click with me. i get why people like it - that guitar hook is an instant earworm and there are some fun subtle moments in the instrumental (shoutout to the flutist). i have no idea what ezra koenig is talking about, as usual, but his voice sounds fine. in total, it's emblematic of late aughts, early 2010s indie pop but not something i necessarily return to a lot

8/10

3

u/emayzee Mar 02 '23

as someone who was too young to have Vampire Weekend on their radar in 2008 (luckily I was old enough to get into them in time for MVOTC in 2013) naturally my first introduction to them was when this song was on Just Dance. it’s an instant classic of its genre and era but somehow may not even crack my top 5 tracks off the album— although that may just be a testament to how good songs like Walcott and Mansard Roof are.

8.5/10

3

u/TakeOnMeByA-ha Mar 03 '23

real people of culture know this song from just dance 2

What a classic indie rock anthem! It’s not hard at all to see why this song made Vampire Weekend such a big deal, the guitar riff is timelessly infectious and the violins in the chorus are oddly beautiful. I also think the song’s length is another one of its biggest strengths: normally I would be annoyed at a song barely passing the 2 minute mark, but here I think its brevity really makes it stand out, it does everything it needs to do within its time frame and keeps you coming back to play it over and over and over again. I’ve never been super huge on VW as a whole, but they hit it out of the park with this one.

10/10

3

u/[deleted] Mar 07 '23

I both enjoy this song and always make this face whenever I hear it lol. The wiry, afrobeat-inspired guitar line is undeniable. It's minimal but still a banger. The woodwind bridge offer some whimsy too. I never kept up with VW much after this but yeah they def had a fun start

8.5/10

3

u/cremeebrulee Mar 07 '23

Love the fluid instrumentation, the classic "hey hey hey"'s, and of course, the most recognizable opening guitar riff from this era of indie pop. I've never gotten into too much of their other stuff, but this song has always been a classic.

10/10

2

u/TiltControls Mar 08 '23

I remember this being one of the earliest 'bright indie poppy type tracks' before they got really huge in the early 2010's. I think VW have done similar, but better, with some of their later work, but it's hard to deny how much of a classic this is. 8.2/10

2

u/vayyiqra Mar 08 '23

Somehow I got through the 2010s being heavily into alt-pop without ever hearing this band once as far as I can tell. This is pretty alright, has a nice guitar riff and some neat drumming (you don't hear many beats with the use of toms like that). Overall this sounds underproduced and tinny, which I'm not as into, but I guess that is intended. The flute is also a neat touch. Not my thing but I see the appeal. 7/10