
On Repeat: Your Most Loved Songs of 2018
Last year’s favorites spanned genres with love songs topping the list
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Written by David Ngo
Can you believe SoundHound has been around for an entire decade? We’ve evolved so much over the years — from revamping our entire app’s visuals multiple times, to hundreds of curated playlists, to creating a fresh new page just for lyrics, and even adding the ability to share songs to Instagram and Snapchat. All these enhancements and updates have been a team effort and our dedicated team wants to thank all our fans for the love and support. We most definitely wouldn’t be here without you.
To walk us down memory lane, we’d like to share some fun highlights:
With this anniversary, we couldn’t help but feel a little nostalgic. We decided to curate a playlist by looking through our entire history of identified music and find the #1 SoundHounded songs for each of the past ten years. Maybe you’ll remember these songs in an instant. Maybe they’ll make you reminisce about some happy events from the past. Maybe you haven’t yet heard some of these songs and we’re helping you find an old gem you’ll fall in love with. Whatever the case, let’s go through this playlist song by song. It might just be just a list, but it holds a legacy of not just SoundHound but the overall evolution of our millions of users’ taste in music.
Remember the Black Eyed Peas? It’s been quite some time since they’ve released anything new together, but that doesn’t change the fact that this futuristic song was playing in every club and at every dance party before the first decade of the 2000s. The most iconic lyric from this song? Fergie’s rap verse: “I’m so three thousand and eight, you so two thousand and late!”
Her debut single and the song to establish the next 10 years of pop music, Ke$ha truly dominated the charts with this song. This was the “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” of the early 2010s, and nothing ever came close to it (except maybe for Katy Perry’s single, “TGIF”).
With the last two years dominated by party anthems, people started winding down that energy in favor of something a little more ballad-centric. In comes Adele with her powerful vocals — singing about love, break-ups, and the unfaithful. Seems like the narrative was changed from partying with your crushes to realizing they weren’t that great to begin with.
Gotye’s heartbreak single burned through the charts when it debuted. We’re following up last year with the theme of relationships again, and this one’s a little more disco-infused than Adele’s particular style. It’s one of those songs you can see yourself dancing to while trying not to cry — if that makes any sense.
If you only had $20 on you in 2013 at any given moment, you were probably influenced by this funky-beat song. Macklemore really made an ode to thrift stores, and let’s be honest, there really are some good deals to be found versus spending $30 on a plain T-shirt at your local retailer.
Move over heartbreak and lovers’ pain, John Legend blazed into 2014 with a soulful passionate song about giving all of yourself to the person you love. Surprisingly, you didn’t hear about a lot of innocent, soulful love songs topping the charts at the time. You can thank 2014 for starting this trend.
Remember Ed Sheeran before he was playing on every single radio station across the country? It’s hard to recall. Either way, this little doozy of a ballad, accompanied by a very sweet music video of a romantic dance, was something everyone simply loved. How many couples do you think danced to this song at their wedding?
Remember when Macklemore said “screw expensive brands?” Sia followed up by saying money isn’t even needed to have a good time. And she’s absolutely right. 2016 marks the big mood of “financially savvy but also super loving” in music. The positivity seems endless here.
When’s the last time a sexy song was #1 on everyone’s lips? In fact, when’s the last time a Latinx artist was #1 in America? Luis Fonsi’s Despacito was a breath of fresh air. At least until it became a meme.
This song was on Portugal. The Man’s eighth studio album, but their first chart-topper. Can you believe it? And if you didn’t know, this song isn’t about having fun or any sort of romantic relationship. It’s about the lead singer, Zachary Cartother’s, love for his daughter. Could a song be any more wholesome?
Finally, we come to an artist whose entire discography sends a simple message: “Love yourself.” “Truth Hurts” is no exception — an anthem to dedicating your time and love to no one but your own self. Lizzo raps and sings about not being tied down to any sort of romantic interest because she has her career to think about. Fun fact: This song was released in 2017, but didn’t become #1 until 2019! Despite people often joking about how much of a mess these past two years have been, it seems like we’re all keeping a positive outlook.
It’s fascinating to see how far we’ve come in what we want in a song — from break-ups and partying to recognizing the importance of self-care, self-confidence, and self-love. After all, what better way to celebrate 10 years of SoundHound than striving for exactly that? More than anything, we just want to say a huge thank you to our fans for all the love, and here’s to another 10 years of music memories.
David Ngo is a Silicon Valley-based writer who covers tech and culture. An avid story seeker, he has a strong disposition for heartfelt speeches and sarcasm.
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