As I point out every January, these are my ten favorite songs of the previous year. Other people who have written for TSL over the years may have very different favorite songs of the year. In fact, check out Necromoonyeti’s list of his 35 top albums!
Anyway, here are my ten favorite songs of the previous year. For the most part, my musical tastes tend to run the gamut from EDM to More EDM. That said, I think there’s perhaps a bit of variety to this year’s list as opposed to previous years. Or maybe not. Who knows? I’m typing this up at one in the morning so, to be honest, I’m lucky that I can even keep straight which year I’m writing about.
Oh, the goodbye hug. The tearful break-up. The understanding farewell. The moment when you watch someone walk away and it becomes clear that the two of you will probably never see each other again. We’ve all been through that type of pain and, more often than not, when we remember the moment, we remember it as being in black-and-white. Selena Gomez was the perfect choice for this song, bringing truthful sadness and emotion to the lyrics.
This video was directed by Dave Meyers. Dave Meyers has directed a lot of videos. How many Dave Meyers videos have we shared on this site? I don’t know, I’ve lost track. Whatever it is that it takes to make someone into a good music video director, Dave Meyers definitely has it. This, of course, is actually the second video for this song. The first video has a sort of sci-fi feel to it. I prefer Meyers’s more emotional approach.
Remember when Selena Gomez shows up in The Big Short and explained how some sort of stock market concept worked. And some old lady said, “I like Selena Gomez, I’ll invest in whatever she’s investing in.” That was a weird scene and I have to admit that I still have no idea how the stock market works.
I usually don’t follow or comment on celebrity gossip because I find it to be tacky but I was happy when Chris Martin divorced Gwyneth Paltrow. I was concerned that she was using all of his Coldplay money to invest in making candles. I will admit that I kind of pictured the “Dinner Party” episode of The Office whenever I imagined what it was like to visit Chris and Gwyneth. “Hey, babe? How about we take the beer sign down until our guests leave and then we can discuss it.”
Anyway, enjoy!
We had that kind of love I thought that it would never end Oh, my lover, oh, my other, oh, my friend We talked around in circles and We talked around and then I loved you to the moon and back again
You gave everything this golden glow Now turn off all the stars ’cause this I know That it hurts like so To let somebody go
All the storms we weathered Everything that we went through Now, without you, what on earth am I to do? When I called the mathematicians and I ask them to explain They said love is only equal to the pain
And when everything was going wrong You could turn my sorrow into song Oh, it hurts like so To let somebody go To let somebody go Oh-oh (oh-oh) Oh-oh (Let somebody, let somebody go) yeah
Oh, oh-oh (oh), when you love somebody (oh) When you love somebody (oh) Got to let somebody know Oh, oh-oh (oh), when you love somebody (oh) When you love somebody (oh) Got to let somebody know So, when you love somebody When you love somebody
Then it hurts like so To let somebody go It hurts like so To let somebody go
But you’re still with me, now I know (Let somebody, let somebody go) Oh-oh (let somebody, let somebody go) But you’re still with me, now I know
I have to admit that my initial reaction to the trailer for Hotel Transylvania 4 was to say, “They’ve done four of these!?”
And it’s true. For an animated franchise that has never exactly been a critical favorite and which isn’t backed by PIXAR, there’s been quite a installments in the HotelTransylvania saga. Regardless of what the critics may think, the films do well enough at the box office. I’d be lying I said I could remember much about the previous few installments but I do recall that they were cute if not particularly ground-breaking.
The fourth film explores what happens when all the monsters get transformed into human beings. It’s a good look for Frankenstein but less so for Dracula. Adam Sandler, who voiced Dracula in the previous three films, does not return in this installment and he has been replaced by YouTuber Brian Hull. As well, Kevin James will not be returning as Frankenstein and has been replaced by Brad Abrell. Selana Gomez, however, does return to voice Mavis and the great Steve Buscemi will be back as Wayne the Werewolf.
Hotel Transylvania4 will be replaced on October 1st.
Every January, I list my favorite songs of the previous year and, every January, I include the same disclaimer. My favorite songs are not necessarily the favorite songs of any of the other writers here at the Shattered Lens. We are a large and diverse group of people and, as such, we all have our own individual tastes.
If you ever visited the TSL Bunker, you would be shocked by the different music coming out of each office. You would hear everything from opera to death metal to the best of Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin. And then, of course, you would reach my office and you would discover that my taste in music pretty much runs the gamut from EDM to More EDM.
Now, usually, I do try to listen to a variety of music. You can go to my Song of the Day site — Lisa Marie’s Song of the Day — and see that I do occasionally listen to other types of music. But, I have to be honest. 2020 was not a year that inspired me to really leave me comfort zone. If anything, music provided me with some much needed consistency in an otherwise chaotic year. 2020 was a year that made me want to dance until it was all over and, for the most part, my favorite songs of the year reflect that fact.
Before I list my songs, I should make something else very clear. These are my favorite songs of 2020. I’m not saying that they’re necessarily the best songs of 2020. I’ll leave that debate for others. Instead, there are the songs that I found myself listening to over and over again. These are the songs made me dance. These are the songs that made me sing. A few of these songs relaxed me when I needed to be relaxed. These are songs that I liked.
You might like them.
Or you might not.
That’s the beautiful thing about art. Everyone experiences it in their own individual way. For instance, if you want to see an example of the different tastes of music that you’ll find here at TSL, be sure to check out Necromoonyeti’s top albums of 2020. And also go to Days Without Incident and check out some of the songs that Leonard has posted. To quote my friend Shirley Loh, “we all like different things.”
Here are my favorite songs of 2020:
20) No Sleep by Jessie Frye
19) Ghost In These Streets by Kate Vogel
18) Matches by Britney Spears and Backstreet Boys
17) You Do you by Dillon Francis and BabyJake
16) Into the Abyss by Zeds Dead x REZZ
15) Teacher by Chromatics
14) Stardew by Purity Ring
13) Everybody Here Hates You by Courtney Barnett
12) Swimming in the Stars by Britney Spears
11) Don’t Wanna by Haim
10) Preach by Saint Motel
9) Famous Monsters by Chromatics
8) Break my Heart by Dua Lipa
7) Feel Something by Armin van Buuren feat. Duncan Laurence
6) Dance Again by Selena Gomez
5) Phobos by Space 92
4) Pomegranate by deadmau5 & The Neptunes
3) Castles In The Sky by i_o
2) The Steps by Haim
1) A Good Song Never Dies by Saint Motel
Finally, allow me to offer up two honorable mentions to my favorite cinematic musical moments of the year. From Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga:
Dolittle tells the story of Dr. Dolittle (Robert Downey, Jr.), the eccentric doctor who can talk to the animals and who hasn’t had much use for humans ever since the tragic death of his wife, Lily (Kasia Smutniak). Dolittle would be happy to just spend his entire life locked away in his estate, talking to Poly the Parrot (voice of Emma Thompson) and Chee-Chee the Gorilla (voice of Rami Malek) and all of the other animals but Dolitle has to eventually leave his home because otherwise, there wouldn’t be a movie.
When Queen Victoria (Jessie Buckley) is mysteriously taken ill, only Dolittle can save her. Dolittle quickly realizes that the Queen has been poisoned and that the only cure for the poison is to be found on a tree that’s located on an island that no one has ever seen before. Soon, Dolittle and the animals are sailing in search of the island. Accompanying them is Tommy Stubbins (Harry Collett), a sensitive teen who hates to hunt and who hopes to become Dolittle’s apprentice. Pursuing Dolittle is the evil Dr. Blair Mudfly (Michael Sheen), who went to college with Dolittle and who is in cahoots with the conspirators who are trying to do away with Queen Victoria.
Got all of that? I hope so because we haven’t even gotten to the dragon with a set of bagpipes crammed up her ass. Yes, you read that correctly.
Last year, Dolittle was one of the few major studio productions to actually get a wide release before COVID-19 closed down all the theaters. It was released in January, which is traditionally the time when studios release the films that they hope everyone will have forgotten about by the time April rolls around. January is traditionally the month when studios release the films that they know aren’t any good. And, indeed, the reviews of Dolittle were overwhelmingly negative. Not only did the critics hate Dolittle but audiences were also rather unenthusiastic and the film bombed at the box office. Indeed, under normal circumstances, the reaction to Dolittle and its subsequent box office failure would be considered one of the year’s biggest disasters. However, 2020 was a year of disasters. Compared to everything else that ended up happening over the past 12 months, Dolittle’s lukewarm reception seems almost quaint now.
Earlier today, I finally watched Dolittle on HBOMax. I was expecting the film to be terrible but it’s actually not quite as bad as I had been led to believe. I mean, don’t get me wrong. Dolittle has a ton of problems. The tone is all over the place as the film tries to mix cartoonish humor with thrilling adventure in a style that owes more to the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise than it does to Dr. Dolittle. Despite a few self-consciously manic moments, Robert Downey, Jr. seems remarkably bored in the lead role. Many of the jokes fall flat and the awkward attempts to shoehorn the usual message of “be true to yourself” into the film just felt awkward. That said, the CGI animals were cute enough to hold my interest and that’s really the most important thing when it comes to a film like Dolittle. Cute animals — even computer generated ones — help to make up for a lot of flaws.
Dolittle’s final scene hints at a sequel or even a franchise. Considering the reaction to the first film, I doubt we’ll get a second. I do think Dr. Dolittle could make for an enjoyable PIXAR film but it might be time to give the live action adaptations a rest.
For the record, even under lockdown, I’m still dancing.
Of course, now, I have to either go do it in the backyard or clear some space in the living room. But that’s okay. It’s not important where you dance. Instead, it’s just important that you do it.
Seriously, I’ve lost track of how many zombie films I’ve seen over the past ten years. This last decade was the decade when zombies went mainstream and I have to admit that I have mixed feelings about it. Zombies have become so overexposed that they’re no longer as scary as they once were. I mean, there’s even PG-rated zombie movies now! How the Hell did that happen? Everyone’s getting in on the act.
There were a brief flurry of excitement when Jim Jarmusch announced that his next film would be a zombie film. Myself, I was a bit skeptical and the release of a terrible trailer didn’t really help matters. The fact that the film was full of recognizable names also made me uneasy. Would this be an actual zombie film or would it just be a bunch of actors slumming in the genre? The film opened the Cannes Film Festival and received mixed reviews. By the time it opened in the United States, it seemed as if everyone had forgotten about The Dead Don’t Die. It was widely chalked up as being one of Jim Jarmusch’s rare misfires, like The Limits of Control.
Last month, I finally watched The Dead Don’t Die and you know what? It’s a flawed film and yes, there are times when it even becomes an annoying film. That said, I still kind of liked it.
In The Dead Don’t Die, the Earth’s rotation has been altered, the result of polar fracking. No one seems to be particularly concerned about it. Instead, they’re just kind of annoyed by the fact that the sun is now staying up in the sky a bit longer than usual. Cell phones and watches stop working. House pets abandon and occasionally attack their owners. In the rural town of Centerville, the dead rise from their graves and start to eat people. Whether or not that’s connected to the Earth’s rotation is anyone’s guess. (I like to think that the whole thing about the Earth’s rotation being altered was Jarmusch’s homage to Night of the Living Dead‘s suggestion that the zombies were the result of space radiation.)
We meet the inhabitant of Centerville. Zelda (Tilda Swinton) is the enigmatic mortician. Bobby (Caleb Landry Jones) is the horror movie expert. Farmer Miller (Steve Buscemi) is the red-hatted farmer who hates everyone. Zoe (Selena Gomez) is the traveler who is staying at the run-down motel with two friends. Cliff Robertson (Bill Murray) is the police chief who wants to save everyone but Farmer Miller. Ronnie (Adam Driver) and Mindy (Chloe Sevigny) are police officers. They’re all in the middle of a zombie apocalypse but very few of them seem to really be that surprised by any of it.
Throughout the film, we hear Sturgill Simpson singing a wonderful song called The Dead Don’t Die. Cliff demands to know why the song is always one the radio. Ronnie replies that it’s the “theme song.” Ronnie, we discover, has an answer for almost everything. He explains that he knows what’s going to happen because he’s the only one that “Jim” allowed to read the entire script. Cliff isn’t happy about that.
That’s the type of film that The Dead Don’t Die is. It’s an elaborate in-joke, a zombie movie about people who know that they’re in a zombie movie but who are too detached to actually use that information to their advantage. The script has been written so they have no choice but to do what the script says regardless of whether it makes them happy or not. It’s a clever conceit, though a bit of a thin one to build a 103-minute movie around.
As I said, the film can occasionally be an endurance test. Everyone is so deadpan that you actually find yourself getting angry at them. But, whenever you’re on the verge of giving up, there will be a clever line that will draw you back in or the theme song will start playing again. Bill Murray and Adam Driver are fun to watch and Driver reminds us that he’s actually a good comedic actor. (In the year of Marriage Story and Rise of Skywalker, that can be easy to forget.)
It’s a flawed film and definitely not one of Jim Jarmusch’s best. At the same time, though, The Dead Don’t Die is not as bad as you may have heard.
I know that I should probably be more excited about The Dead Don’t Die, the upcoming zombie comedy film from Jim Jarmusch.
I mean, after all, Jim Jarmusch has made some brilliant films and I enjoyed his take on vampires, Only Lovers Left Alive. Add to that, the film is full of wonderful actors, people like Adam Driver, Bill Murray, Selena Gomez, Steve Buscemi, and Tilda Swinton. And yet, for whatever reason, I can’t summon up much enthusiasm for The Dead Don’t Die. Everything that I’ve seen about it so far just seems to add up to one big “meh.”
Maybe it’s just the fact that there’s seems to be a new zombie movie every week. Seriously, zombies were a lot more interesting before they went mainstream.
Anyway, The Dead Don’t Die opened the Cannes Film Festival yesterday and the response so far has been rather lukewarm, if respectful of the fact that the film was directed by a very important filmmaker. Reading the reviews, you get the feeling that it’s a film that the reviewers wanted to like more than they actually did.
To coincide with the Cannes premiere, here’s a new redband trailer! You can watch it below. Maybe it’ll leave you with a bit more enthusiasm than it does me.
The Dead Don’t Die comes to theaters on June 14th.
(Originally, I was going to list my picks for the best in SyFy today. However, I need one more day to work on that so look for that tomorrow! For now, here are my favorite songs of 2017!)
Every January, I list my favorite songs of the previous year and, every January, I include the same disclaimer. My favorite songs are not necessarily the favorite songs of any of the other writers here at the Shattered Lens. We are a large and diverse group of people and, as such, we all have our own individual tastes.
If you ever visited the TSL Bunker, you would be shocked by the different music coming out of each office. You would hear everything from opera to death metal to the best of Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin. And then, of course, you would reach my office and you would discover that my taste in music pretty much runs the gamut from EDM to More EDM.
Now, usually, I do try to listen to a variety of music. You can go to my Song of the Day site — Lisa Marie’s Song of the Day — and see that I do occasionally listen to other types of music. But, I have to be honest. 2017 was not a year that inspired me to really leave me comfort zone. If anything, music provided me with some much needed consistency in an otherwise chaotic year. 2017 was a year that made me want to dance until it was all over and, for the most part, my favorite songs of the year reflect that fact.
Before I list my songs, I should make something else very clear. These are my favorite songs of 2017. I’m not saying that they’re necessarily the best songs of 2017. I’ll leave that debate for others. Instead, there are the songs that I found myself listening to over and over again. These are the songs made me dance. These are the songs that made me sing. A few of these songs relaxed me when I needed to be relaxed. These are songs that I liked.
You might like them.
Or you might not.
That’s the beautiful thing about art. Everyone experiences it in their own individual way.
Here are my favorite songs of 2017:
14. Shutdown by Joywave
13. Love So Soft by Kelly Clarkson
12. Rainmaker by Sleigh Bells
11. I feel It Coming by The Weeknd featuring Daft Punk
(Technically, this is a 2016 song but I listened to it a lot in 2017 and this is my list so fuck it, I’m including it.)
10. Alone by Alan Walker
9. Byte by Martin Garrix & Brooks
8. You Could Be by R3HAB featuring Khrebto
7. Mirage by Lindey Stirling featuring Raja Kumari
6. Rich Boy by Galantis
5. What About Us by P!nk
4. First Time by Kygo & Ellie Goulding
3. Escape Reality Tonight by Paul van Dyk & Emanuele Braveri ft. Rebecca Louise Burch
2. Look What You Made Me Do by Taylor Swift
It Ain’t Me by Kygo, featuring Selena Gomez
For tomorrow’s look back at 2017, I will (finally) share my picks for the best of the SyFy Network!
(For the past three weeks, Lisa Marie has been in the process of reviewing 56 back to school films! She’s promised the rest of the TSL staff that this project will finally wrap up by the end of today, so that she can devote her time to helping to prepare the site for its annual October horrorthon! Will she make it or will she fail, lose her administrator privileges, and end up writing listicles for Buzzfeed? Keep reading the site to find out!)
How many times can the same thing keep happening to the same people?
That’s a question that you may be tempted to ask yourself while watching Neighbors 2. Neighbors 2 is, of course, a sequel to the original Neighbors. In the first film, Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne played Mac and Kelly Radner, a married couple who are struggling to deal with the fact that, as new parents, they are now officially adults. When a crazy and wild fraternity moves in next door to them and refuses to tone down their partying ways, Mac and Kelly are forced to take matters into their own hands. Occasionally hilarious mayhem ensues.
In Neighbors 2, Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne again play Mac and Kelly Radner, a married couple who are struggling to deal with the fact that, as parents who are awaiting the arrival of their 2nd child, they are now officially adults and may have to finally move into a more family friendly house in the suburbs. When a crazy and wild fraternity sorority moves in next door to them and refuses to tone down their partying ways, Mac and Kelly are forced to take matters into their own hands. Occasionally hilarious mayhem ensues.
Yeah, it’s all pretty familiar. Not only are many of the same jokes from the first film repeated but they’re often repeated at that exact same spot in which they originally appeared. To the film’s credit, it does occasionally acknowledge that it’s repeating itself, though it never quite reaches the self-aware heights of something like 22 Jump Street. Even Zac Efron returns and, again, he is initially the Radner’s enemy before eventually becoming their ally.
That said, the familiarity is not necessarily a bad thing. Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne both know how to get laughs, even when they’re telling the same joke that they told a year ago. Zac Efron tends to try too hard whenever he has a dramatic role (like in The Paperboy, for instance) but he’s got a real talent for comedy.
Ultimately, though, the best thing that saves Neighbors 2 from just being a forgettable comedy sequel is the sorority. As opposed to the first film’s creepy fraternity, the sorority in Neighbors 2 is partying for a cause greater than just hedonism. Shelby (Chloe Grace Moretz, finally getting to have fun in a movie) starts her independent sorority in response to being told that official sororities are not allowed to throw parties and, instead, can only attend misogynistic frat parties. When Shelby and her sorority buy the house, it’s not just to make trouble. It’s because they need a place where they can have a good time without feeling that they’re in constant danger from drunk and perverted frat boys. A subtext of empowerment through partying runs through Neighbors 2 and it elevates the entire film.
Neighbors 2 is an entertaining film, even if it never leaves as much of an impression as you may hope. (I have to admit that, whenever I try to list all the films that I’ve seen this year, Neighbors 2 is one of those that I often have to struggle to remember.) That said, it’s not a terrible way to spend 97 minutes and it’ll make you laugh. And, ultimately, that really is the most important thing when it comes to comedy.
As for the question of how often can the same thing happen to the same person…
Well, I guess we’ll have to wait for Neighbors 3 to get our answer!
Through the Shattered Lens 