The 2010s had some amazing music of all genres come out and it was hard to keep up with all. Unfortunately, there were plenty of awful songs on the radio/pop charts to try to avoid while looking for the good stuff. There are plenty of artists you might expect these duds from, but the more surprising part was the number of good artists who released some pretty terrible songs. So today I will make fun of and list the songs that I was unfortunate enough to hear the last decade and still am haunted by. Thankfully it's easy to avoid a lot of these as they've been forgotten with time, but going back to make this list wasn't too easy. So here are the 15 worst songs I heard in the 2010s... and yeah there are plenty of bad ones I didn't listen to that won't be on here.
3/13/2023
3/07/2023
Top 10 hit songs of the 2010s
One last looks back at the past, the not-so-distant past this time. After finishing the top songs of the 80s, 90s, and 00's now it's time to look back at the most recent dead decade and the biggest hits and artists that came from the decade that ended just a few years ago. I wasn't expecting this decade to be so hard, but it actually ended up being the hardest to go through. Deciding 10 songs out of the hundred+ great songs released in the decade was tough, especially since this was the decade where streaming really took off giving us access to so many different songs at any time we want. During the last decade, I really grew to like a lot of music I didn't really give a chance back in my teens, especially getting more into pop music.
Since the list was so long I want to give some special mentions to a few songs that almost made the list, but ultimately had to be left out of the top 10. I'm going to keep it to 5 extra songs, otherwise it would be a very long list. So lots of big names will be left off the list, but what can you do. Also, one specific artist who probably would have made the top 10 was left off because he's a terrible person now who deserves no attention (you probably know who I mean, and if not even better). So here are the 5 honorable mentions:
Honorable #5: "Rolling in the Deep" by Adele (2011)
Every time an Adele album is released it feels like a huge event. It's crazy to think there were only two Adele albums released in the entire 2010s decade. That's probably why you gotta appreciate them while they come, it's not something that happens often. "21" was her second full-length album and the album that pushed Adele from a relatively popular artist to a household name. There are a couple of songs from "21" you could put here as classics, but I stuck with "Rolling in the Deep". Adele can break your heart with one of her amazing ballads, but here she shows her more fiery side with an angrier breakup song. The lyrics are fantastic and when you add Adele's vocals it's completely undeniable. This song pushed her to the top of the charts and she's cemented her place there with hit after hit in the last 15 years.
Honorable #4: "Pumped Up Kicks" by Foster the People (2011)
Honorable #3: "Sign of the Times" by Harry Styles (2017)
Honorable #2: "Ride" by Twenty One Pilots (2015)
It's not often an indie band I loved from early on ends up becoming one of the bigger rock bands of the decade. The mid-2010s were very kind to Twenty One Pilots as they found multiple hits from their album "Blurryface" and even got a big single from the "Suicide Squad" movie. "Ride" shows off how good this band can be with their mix of alt-rock/hip-hop/reggae to make a really fun song. It's a style that no one's really been able to replicate not for lack of trying.
Honorable #1: "Shallows" by Lady Gaga/Bradley Cooper
10: "thank u, next" by Ariana Grande (2019)
9. "Shut Up and Dance" by WALK THE MOON (2014)
8. "Run Away With Me" by Carly Rae Jepsen (2015)
7. "Out of the Woods" by Taylor Swift (2014)
6. "I Love It" by Icona Pop, Feat. Charli XCX (2012)
5. "Can't Feel My Face" by The Weeknd (2015)
4. "Redbone" by Childish Gambino (2016)
3. "Alright" by Kendrick Lamar (2015)
2. "Royals" by Lorde (2013)
1. "Rather Be" by Clean Bandit, feat. Jess Glynne (2014)
3/05/2023
Creed III
The Rocky franchise has been around since the mid-1970s with the first movie winning the Best Picture Oscar in 1977. Since then the franchise has followed the story of Rocky Balboa as he takes on bigger and better challenges that push him to new limits. 2015 introduced Rocky's new protege Adonis Creed, who is the son of his best friend and world-famous boxer Apollo Creed. The franchise changed from focusing on Rocky to focusing on the new young up-and-comer boxer Adonis Creed. Creed 3 will be the 9th movie in the Rocky franchise and the first to be completely absent of its creator and iconic character Sylvester Stallone (Rocky). How does Creed 3 hold up without the presence of Rocky? That's the main question I found myself asking going into this movie.
Creed 3 stars Michael B. Jordan as Adonis Creed. The story picks up where the second movie left off in Adonis' career. After having accomplished everything he set out to as a boxer, Adonis decides to hang up his gloves and focus more on his family and his health. Years after retiring, we see that Adonis has become a successful boxing promoter and even has his own protege named Felix Chavez who is the current champion. Everything seems to be going great until an old friend of Adonis named Damian (Jonathan Majors) appears back into his life after getting out of prison. His old friend brings back feelings of guilt and trauma that Adonis had been suppressing for years. Now Adonis must battle with these feelings as all he has built over the last few years starts to fall apart.
As a movie in the Rocky franchise, this movie does a lot of things that follow the formula of past movies. Much like the rest of the movies, this one is all building toward that big fight at the end where the hero fights his new rival. While the formula is overused, this movie somehow finds a way to keep it all very interesting despite the repetition. What this movie gets right is how it gets you invested in the character's stories and feelings. Thanks to all the amazing performances you truly care about every character and what happens to them. A big part of what makes this story work is Jonathan Majors' portrayal of Damian. He not only looks like a threat just by his intimidating build but his character is written pretty much perfectly. The best villains are the ones who you can sympathize with to an extent and that's Damian all the way through. Even though there's sympathy, you still root against him because of how his actions affect the character you actually root for in Adonis.
Another thing this movie does really well is keeping the boxing scenes visually interesting as well as getting you emotionally invested in who wins or loses. The last fight scene in particular was so uniquely crafted it was unlike anything a boxing movie has ever done. I think it was necessary to try something new to keep the boxing scenes fresh in a franchise with nine movies and they did really good here. I find it hard to find anything to complain about here because the movie handles everything so well with the story, characters and fight scenes. The only complaint I might have is the big fight scene at the end goes against the big message of the movie in some ways, but I can't get into that without spoilers.
I was surprised by how emotional this movie was, the crowd I was watching it in the theater with seemed very invested in the movie and I could hear some groans and gasps at moments the movie was getting pretty heavy. Nine movies in and the story still felt emotional and the boxing still felt epic and exciting. Creed 3 finds ways to keep a repetitive formula fresh and shows that this decades-old franchise still has a lot left to say and show. There's even a nice tease showing where this franchise can ultimately end up in the future and it's pretty exciting.
Overall Grade: A