First off the bat, this isn't a thread about your favourite single of this decade it's about influential singles that will (or already are) be looked back on as key or landmark releases that moved music in a different direction (hopefully forward!) or accelerated it down the road it was travelling.

Here are some of my thoughts.

2000


Aaliyah - "Try Again"



A monster of sleek efficient hooks and addictive squelching bass rumbling. The calling card for the producer who would go on to define the shiny sound of modern R&B and send it hard back to the top of the charts.

Destiny's Child - "Independent Women Pt 1"



Certainly the high watermark for R&B-pop this decade so far in terms of sound and success. Sure other songs may have sounded more polished (including Beyonce's "Crazy In Love") but this big song from Charlie's Angels, only this line-up's second single, is one that showed just how dominating this style of music could and would be this decade.


Eminem ft. Dido - "Stan"



The biggest star on the planet in the first half of the decade with a song that; i) Showed the majority he produce a song more notably for it's melody and haunting lyrical content instead of profanity and controversy. ii) Launched the career of Dido who in turn would provide the template for successive Norah Jones's onwards to Amy Winehouse's and everywhere between. iii) Continued the blossoming trend for the ft. credit, despite being a sample and not a duet, which now can be seen in 14 of this week's Billboard's top 40 songs and iv) showed that the biggest rap star in the world could be the biggest star in the world.

Coldplay - "Trouble"



It would be easy to plump for something fro their more rounded, and larger selling worldwide, second album for this or plump for "Yellow". It's revisionism to consider the earlier single, despite it's higher chart position, the song that broke them as it's "Trouble" that was much easier to the ears of commercial radio listeners in the UK and continued the path blazed by Travis the previous year. As with the group of bands that claim to be influenced by Radiohead's OK Computer when it's actually "Karma Police" and "No Surprises" they are channelling not "Airbag", "Paranoid Android" or "Climbing Up The Walls", it's actually the sonically unremarkable moments on Coldplay's debut that have had the main influence on approaching a decade of mortgage rock listened to not by the younger NME readers (like myself) who first took note of Coldplay at the end of the last century but the New Labour voting Mondeo Men and Women of middle England. Somewhere, Keane, Athlete, Snow Patrol, The Fray et al were furiously taking notes.

Spiller ft Sophie Ellis-Bextor - "Groovejet (If This Ain't Love)"



A song that showed that people in the UK were, temporarily at least, over guitar music in the charts after Britpop (Ellis-Bextor was once in theaudience), fed up of The Spice Girls but still in love with making the big song of the summer from Ibiza number one on returning in early autumn. It launched a semi-successful solo career for Ellis-Bextor as well as providing (along with that year's "Pure Shores" and "Overload" by All Saints and Sugababes) a template that all European girl groups would have to follow for the rest of the decade, Moving away from the boys output (more on this later) and the Euro-pop/dance nature of groups like Steps and Aqua to a sleeker pop sound which would reach near perfection a couple of years later (again, more on this later) as well as seeing a songwriting credit for ex-Mud's Rob Davis.


Sorry if the last two of been a bit too UK centric, it won't be the case all the way through. These are four from this year that I felt I could write about easily enough and have acted as templates for further dozen artists down the line. I'll keep this format up with the other years.

Others from this year that I feel are important but not worth blurbing

At The Drive-In - "One Armed Scissor"
Limp Bizkit - "Rollin'"
Avalanches - "Since I Left You"
OutKast - "B.O.B (Bombs Over Baghdad)

'Thong Song' is better than all of those. I'm serious. Especially if you play the instrumental at 33rpm.

What was the defining R&B single of the decade, which managed to mix American polish with garage beats to great success, gets slowed down to proto-dubstep levels and becomes beautifully melancholic.

"Since U Been Gone" - Kelly Clarkson

I have a friend who majored in classical composition - or some such thing; my point is, he's a really talented musician who has a pretty incredible ear and real knack for composition. When I asked what music he listens to, what he really digs lately - after playing him a Sufjan Stevens track, thinking he'd admire the shit out of it - he responded that "Thong Song" is probably the most impressive piece of music he's ever heard. I don't really get it, but you got some traction there, TSLVR.

The fact "Hey Ya!" is not mentioned here so far is a bit silly. Reasons it is important:

1. It's the most popular single this decade.

2. Though not their strongest song, it allowed lots of people to dive into the back catalog of Outkast.

3. It became a mass commercial hit despite of (or possibly because of) the phrase "just want to make you cum-a".

4. Though overplayed, still a song I could listen to today and enjoy.

So, are we sticking with 2000 right now?
It's late-2000, and made more of an impact of 2001, but:


The start of Gwen Stefani's solo career/the beginning of the end for No Doubt


Also:

"Hey Ya!" Outkast
"Last Nite" The Strokes
"Get Ur Freak On" Missy Elliott

Thong Song was certainly another I considered but ultimately I am a bit useless writing about R&B. I will get to talking about 1999/00 garage and onward to dubsteb when talking about a song from 2001.




Obviously I'll get to it.



Nothing to do with this thread's concept. Can we avoid "I really like it as justification" I don't really think I'd be using your other points for discussion to be honest; Popularity, a window to an artist's back catalogue and one mildly naughty sounding line aren't the kind of criteria that we should be looking for. It's more about originality or trend setting and influence. Even if it's not just on a sonic level.



I am but no-one else needs to.

Moby was best left in 1999 and Gwen gets a mention later on as well as Daft Punk. I can't say that the end of No Doubt is something that will be looking back on with more than a shrug to be honest.

Lily Allen's "LDN" has to be in the team photo, having exploited MySpace to gain a following that caused her label to get its ass in gear and gave her more creative control. Thereby allowing her to create a great album because of the success of a single that helped drive another nail into the coffin of albums.

My kit is spread around the city but, when I get it together, I will put the slowed-down instrumental on a MiniDisc and send it to you. Everything about it is so right: the way the violins sound slowed down, the way the 2step beat sticks in the mire like it was a lost Boxcutter rhythm... the key change especially is amazing. I love the regular version massively, but the when played too slow it just becomes majestic.

Best thing about normal speed version with vocals is the fact that he can get as passionate as anyone in popular music - just about underwear. One of the greatest ad libs of the decade is near the end when, after banging on about thongs for four minutes, he cries 'I don't think ya heeeard me!'

The White Stripes - "Fell In Love With A Girl"

America re-discovers the joys of the 2-minute frenetic rock-n-roll song. A tide of wannabes is rushed into production.





Jet- "Are You Gonna Be My Girl?"

Apple exploits the marketability of the 2-minute frenetic rock-n-roll song. A tidal wave of backlash soon ensues.

importance usually isn't something i hold to too highly when looking for new music, so i'm probably not the most qualified for this. but here a few that came to mind.

The White Stripes - Fell in Love with a Girl
Marked a short garage revival w/in the US (Hives/Vines/etc) but also marked a starting point for chart success for The Strokes and other guitar based 'indie' bands on both sides of the Atlantic.

The Shins - New Slang
'changed yr life' etc. but it also was an important turning point for american indie and more specifically indie pop. this song (along w/ the postal service) brought an entirely new generation of college kids (girls?) into 'non-mainstream' music.

Modest Mouse - Float On
while nowhere similar in scale, this single was the coming out party for indie music in the same way as 'smells like teen spirit' was for alternative/grunge/etc. well, this and 'take me out'

edit: xpost

Haven't heard this song in a while, but it was one of the few R&B songs that I liked back before I liked R&B.

That slow instrumental version sounds awesome though.

I'm seeing your point with regard to Thong Song TS. Musically the song is pretty original for a R&B/pop song (or any type of song, you might argue) but the guy is singing about a thong for chirst sake. I mean, really? Maybe it's better without lyrics, I don't know.

Anyway, when do we get to Kelly Clarkson's Since You've Been Gone?. I'll fight anyone to the death for that song.

easily one of the most important singles at least in terms of changing perception is...

Kylie Minogue "Can't Get You Out of My Head"

'Who's that boy Lethal B'?[/Jeopardy]


Never hurt Kyuss

How is "Rollin'" an important single from this decade? Nu-metal's decline since 2001 has been swift, to the point now where it's completely irrelevant.

I think you just sort of described why. "Rollin'" was like the epitome of the excess in that genre.

so "Rollin'" is important in that it effectively killed nu-metal?

I can see that, but I think I see that as the end of a 1990s phenomenon, not something that impacted heavy music in this decade.

On a similar negative side, Nickelback's "How You Remind Me" is a very important 2000s single, in that it perpetuated the post-grunge plague another ten years.

I'll nominate "Seven Nation Army" and second "Hey Ya!" and "Float On".

I'll even put "Jesus Walks" or "Through The Wire" out there.

Just working with 2000, and ones not mentioned thusfar (agree with Mitch about all except Spiller, of which he may very well be right but I have no idea):

N Sync - "Bye, Bye, Bye" & "It's Gonna Be Me" (brought pop into the new millenium, set up N Sync and of course Justin solo as being pop stars beyond the 90s, briefly extended the boy band craze's expiration date by two or threee years)
Britney Spears - "Oops I Did It Again" (much the same as above, first big example of late-90s female pop darlings growing up/going dirrrty)
Nelly - "Country Grammar (Hot Shit)" (Put St. Louis, however briefly, on the musical map, set up the career of maybe the definitive pop-rapper of the 00s, helped move the national focus of hip-hop further south)
Ludacris - "What's Yo Fantasy" (Once again moves hip-hop focus south of Mason Dixon, sets up one of the decade's most unique and prolific talents)
Dynamite Hack - "Boyz n the Hood" (Laugh if you want, but how many white guys with guitars and pianos have we heard covering gangsta rap in its wake? Probably says something about the supremacy of rap at the time too and the relative meekness of rock)
StainD/Aaron Lewis f/ Fred Durst - "Outside" (The first classic nu-metal power ballad, ensuring the genre's transition from aggro rap/rock hyprid to primarily grungy whinefest)
Radiohead - "Idiotheque" (High school stoners have to contend with bleeps and bloops for the first time)
D'Angelo - "Untitled (How Does it Feel)" (Extends the hipness of nu-soul for another couple years, makes the genre sexy in a way that Jill Scott probably never could, sets up one of the decade's most disappointing disappearing acts)
Three Doors Down - "Kryptonite" (Did for 00s MOR what Bread's "Make It With You" did for the 70s, set the standard for offenseless, cross-platform rock music a year or two before Nickelback stepped up)


Should be included but can't come up with a decent justification:

OutKast - "Ms. Jackson"
Incubus - "Pardon Me"
Dr. Dre f/ Eminem - "Forgot About Dre"
Alice Deejay - "Better Off Alone"
U2 - "Beautiful Day"

I thought the same thing after Mitchell's listing of "B.O.B." Pretty much every big OutKast hit of the 2000s is important, but I can't think of anything else that has mattered since then that has sounded anything like those songs. Maybe tie it into the rise of Kanye West with hip-hop that everyone from different audiences seems to love on the same critical level?

Here's a few:



1.






2.



3.



4.



5.




6.



7.



8.



9.



10.



11.



12.



13.



14.



15.



16.



17.




18.

Putting 18 streaming videos into one post makes them all act weird and not want to play for me.

*parochial post alert*

Belle & Sebastian - I'm waking up to us. The last great single by the last Great British Singles Band. Or at least, the end of the phase in which they qualified for the title and fitted into that canonical line - KinksWhoBuzzcocksJamMadnessSmithsBlur - a Great British band that was fully aware of the inherent beauty of the singles format and which arguably put it's best efforts into it.

See also - any single by the Libertines. This band went a long way to showing that the concept was vital to the way the UK music scene sees itself, so forcefully did everyone rush to proclaim them the next link in the same chain. Unhappily, they shambled into view just at a time when the basic blueprint for British pop music (as in 'popular') finally completed it's transformation from white blokes with guitars to a fully urbanised youth tooling around with beats and at the exact time when the people who run the old media, and who are aware of and in love with this canonical concept, were being usurped by the democratising power of the chatroom and filesharing.
That they turned out to be media-savvy chancers who weren't very good didn't do anyone any favours either.

So this is why I think (pick a single by the Libertines) might be important with hindsight. Their singles represent, for me anyway, the last dismal throw of the dice for the concept of the Great British Singles Band.

*parochial post ends*

Good posts all round, Bill with some points that would come up for me in 2001 re: N*Sync etc, not that they were going to be featured.

Predictably awful post by Montana; I'm not sure on which planet MGMT, Flaming Lips, M83 and Sparklehorse have ever released an important single.

I'll get onto five shouts for 2001 later.

Not my faves by a long shot, but songs that cast a long shadow

Strokes - Last Nite
Rehab - Winehouse
Real Slim Shady - Eminem
Get Ur Freak on - Missy
Can't Stand Me Now - Libertines
Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor - Arctic Monkeys

Usher's YEAH! is a terrible song (I know I'm alone on this), but MAJOR influence on hip hop/r&b/club music.

where is crazy?

Seriously. When I saw this thread, that was one of the first handful of songs that came to mind. I'd also say The Soggy Bottom Boys "Man Of Constant Sorrow" was pretty critical in bringing attention to an entire genre of music for a couple generations of people unfamiliar with it. It could be argued that the film played a more important role in that, but that was the best and most popular song from the film.

Really though, most of the songs I think of for this thread are hip hop. Jay-Z's Izzo, Beyonce/Jay-Z's Crazy In Love, and Missy Elliot's Work It all have a place.

Franz's Take Me Out is probably the Hey Ya of rock tracks for me in this decade though. I can still listen to that song and dig it, even though I've heard it 742 times.

Guys, I'm taking this one year at a time. Instead of going "Oh my God what about x because Y. Can't believe it's not mentioned" just "what about x because Y" would be fine.

I still love "Crazy", but has it had any residual effect? Seems like a kind of glorious anomaly. Maybe it's significant because it's probably the most-covered song of the decade. (It seems.)

it got their "Gone Daddy Gone" cover in previews for The Heartbreak Kid, likely

I want to say that "Crazy" is important, as it's almost the poster chlid for what myspace and iTunes have done for music, opening up the charts to all manner of stuff radio would never have given a chance.

I want to say that, but my gut feeling is "Crazy" is just another one of those exceptions that will utimatey prove the rule - crap is king.

Unless we're just doing 2000, in which case wait ten pages and then read this.

Everyone is saying Luda, Nelly, etc for southern rap, but I would think Big Pimpin by Jay-Z/UGK was more important in getting that noticed by the mainstream in the new millennium than anything else. Song and video were both huge, and Jay-Z made listening to a group like UGK safe for people that don't usually take to that kind of thing. UGK never really got as big as they could have, but there was a pretty distinct difference in which rappers starting getting noticed after that came out.

Also, this song makes me want to die, but "It Wasn't Me" by Shaggy. Seemed to open the door pretty hard for the barrage of Sean Paul singles we got hit over the head by for the last 5-6 years.

There's gotta be one Neptunes' single that deserves some recognition in this thread. They pretty much owned the airwaves for a couple of years there. Rock Star maybe? U Don't Have 2 Call?

Sorry, I did read that, then forgot about it when I read the thread title again. For 2001, Get Ur Freak On brought Missy an even more massive audience.

Rockin' The Suburbs wasn't the best song on Ben Folds solo album, but it proved he didn't need Sledge and Jessee.

Whenever, Wherever opened my eyes to the hottness of South American women.

Clint Eastwood seems to belong here, I just can't justify it's "importance" other than successfully combining rock and hip hop elements.

Can You Keep A Secret? helped solidify Hikaru Utada as an international phenomenon.

Hash Pipe signaled the triumphant return of Weezer.

All The Things She Said showed the power of a great hook and barely legal lesbian public makeout sessions.

N.E.R.D.'s Lapdance.

Crazy is important not because of the music but because it was one of the first huge internet successes. Wasn't it the first song to reach #1 in the UK based only on downloads?

A big deal in any case.

bump to get past this youtube-waterlogged page

None of these remotely qualify. Well, maybe Hash Pipe, but you would have to really build the argument up a bit more.


Yeah, this is the only justification for Crazy that really makes much sense.

I like where you're going with Big Pimpin' but I don't get the sense that the average listener knew much about UGK or really perceived them as important in their own right.

Trying to think what predated It Wasn't Me in the same vein. Too lazy to research. GDB or Deej will know.

It would be Grindin', right?

I don't think its been mentioned yet, so I have to submit Jimmy Eat World's "The Middle." Crystalized the crossroads between actual '90s indie/posthardcore/emo bands, once-snotty-but-now-maturing punk bands (Blink 182, Green Day) and straight pop-rock (Weezer), and consolidated a new audience that has been a dominant chart force since.

Most of the chart emo/pop-punk stuff today owes something of a debt to it.

I'm interested to see which J-Z single Mitch chooses for 2001.

Oh man, absolutely excellent shout. Jimmy Eat World basically wrote the book on how to make the perfect pop-punk single. All the singles off that album were great, as well. Rateyourmusic says it's 2001 though, so lets not try and ruin the flow of the thread.

Pretty sure that while Mitchell will be working the chronological approach, he's more interested in people arguing for their picks than he's interested in anal-retentive housekeeping.

Dandy Warhols - Bohemian Like You - Not my favorite song, but definitely fits the definition, in particular with the focus it brought the Oregon music scene.

Ah, righto.

Agreed - break it out into year-by-year threads or just let everyone go after whatever they want to discuss, which is what half the preceeding posters did anyway.


Really? Can you give some examples? I had no idea the Oregon music scene took off in the Oughties. And I had no idea the Dandy Warhols were from Oregon.

I pretty much get what you are looking for in this thread, but just wanna say this: I don't think singles are always responsible for moving music in new, interesting and different directions. Singles are primarily designed to maximize commercial success. By just looking at unique singles, I think you are limited to finding changes within the mainstream music world.

I believe change in music often happens at the fringes - by the the sigur ros' and the animal collective's of the musical world.