Lorde was 2013’s biggest new pop sensation, sending her single “Royals” to #1 in August and releasing her album Pure Heroine in September. Both were NPI favorites. We were particularly taken with her voice and her lyrics so, as we are wont to do here, we decided to rank our favorite lyrics from her songs. Here are our 18 favorite lyrics of hers:
18) “All work and no play / Keeps me on the new shit, yeah”—Still Sane
(Tim’s rank: 17/John’s rank: 18/Josh’s rank: 18)
17) “Let me in the ring, I’ll show you what that big word means”—Glory and Gore
(Tim: 16/John: 15/Josh: 17)
16) “But this is summer, playing dumber than fall”—Still Sane
(11/19/16)
15) “In all chaos there is calculation” —Glory and Gore
(10/16/15)
14) “I won’t be smiling but the notes from my admirers fill the dashboard just the same”—White Teeth Teens
(15/7/14)
T12) “And you can watch from your window”—Tennis Court
(18/14/2)
T12) “I’m sitting pretty on the throne / There’s nothing more I want, except to be alone”—The Love Club
(14/5/13)
T10) “I don’t ever think about death / It’s alright if you do, that’s fine”—Glory and Gore
(13/11/8)
T10) “The way they are, the way they seem is something else”—White Teeth Teens
Before I start, I want to address how silly a ranking like this is bound to be. It’s not that lists are inherently dumb—we at NPI (and the Internet writ large) LOVE presenting things in list form. But listing the best movies of 2013 IN 2013 (or, technically, immediately after 2013) feels misguided. It takes a while for feelings about a movie to settle. I saw five of these movies in the last two weeks; who knows how I’ll feel about them in a month? It’s not always clear which movies will be remembered well, or suffer on a rewatching. Looking back at my list from last year, I see about a dozen changes I would make. So consider this list somewhat provisional.
With that said, I saw a lot of movies this year, and lists can be a helpful way of organizing your thoughts on those movies. I’ve borrowed some of my category ideas from Josh’s ranking, but unlike Josh I find the distinction between “independent” movies and studio films to be arbitrary to the point of distraction. Plus, it’s a little pretentious. If a movie is good, it’s good; if it’s bad, it’s bad. Who cares who made it or what the budget was?
Anyway, here are the movies I saw in 2013, in order from worst to best…
The Esquire Theater in Denver, Colorado. Where I watched many of the films on this list, including Blue Jasmine.
I watched and will now rank 27 independent films that came out this year. I don’t expect to match this number until retirement absent a radical career change.
What’s an “independent film”? Defining the term is difficult. Wikipedia defines it as “a professional film production resulting in a feature film that is produced mostly or completely outside of the major film studio system [or] [by the indie] subsidiaries of major film studios [e.g. Fox Searchlight].”* That definition is good enough for me and I adopt it here.
*But why does it matter that a film is “independent”? There seem to be two prime reasons: (1) independence from major film studios — and, consequently, independence from the desires of the median viewer in the demographic the studio wants to attract — permits production of a broader range of content and (2) independent films generally have significantly lower budgets and accordingly have to make tough choices that major studio filmmakers don’t face. And a third reason for ranking purposes: outside of Los Angeles and New York City, most independent films play in different venues — independent theaters and arthouses — than major studio films and only a subset of filmgoers frequent these venues with any regularity. There surely is a bigger debateto be had on whether these reasons hold water and whether there’s a better way to define an independent film —- perhaps solely according to budget —- but I’ll save that for another day.
I missed a few of this year’s highly-acclaimed indie films (e.g. Blackfish, Wadjda, All is Lost) and I left off this list any film I saw that satisfied the above definition but received a lot of play in standard theaters (e.g. Twelve Years a Slave).
Although I already tried to identify the year’s “trend” in movies, I didn’t do a Top 10 list, and obviously no summation of the year is complete without a Top 10 list. Normally, I don’t do such a list for movies, because I rarely see more than 10 films in a given year. In 2012, though, for a variety of reasons—like embracing Josh’s philosophy—I saw more movies than in any other year of my life, so I finally feel qualified to make a list.*
*Of course, I didn’t see EVERY movie this year. So to clarify whether any given film missed the Top 10 because of quality or omission, here is the full list of movies I saw this year:
Here are the best episodes of 2012. Obviously this contains spoilers:
10) “Argentina” — Dexter
One of the nicest surprises on television this year was Dexter’s renaissance in quality. After some misguided years and a true nadir of a season in 2011, Dexter finally embraced a real progression in the story—having Debra find out about her brother’s “hobby”—and was all the better for it. The tension between Deb and Dexter led to some of the show’s best scenes ever. And since Dexter didn’t spend the entire season chasing his usual Big Bad Guy, Season Seven actually had decent subplots, including great guest performances from Ray Stevenson and Yvonne Strahovski. In “Argentina,” the show was even able to address the weirdest element of last season—Deb’s crush on her brother—in an impressive and compelling way.
10. “Octopus” — Bloc Party: Four was a disappointing album, but, happily, the wiry “Octopus” was an exception.
9. “Argonauts” — Hospitality: Hospitality’s self-titled album was my favorite of 2012, and “Argonauts” is the album’s most layered, sophisticated track.
But, of course, NPI wouldn’t be NPI without rankings. And so to commemorate our 1,000th post, we’re ranking our rankings. To keep it manageable, we limited the list to the collaborative rankings. We also threw Josh’s ranking of the Bill of Rights in there (John S and Tim’s ongoing rankings, respectively of Bob Dylan songs and everything in history, being incomplete and therefore ineligible). What was our result?
On this all-important American holiday, Tim and Josh decided to dive into one of their tastiest debates: candy. So give them a break while they chew it over with Twix, avoid laying a finger on each other’s Butterfinger, and taste the rainbow. You may find that first they’re sour, then they’re sweet.
TIM: Well, it’s Halloween, Josh, and that can only mean one thing. Well, it means one thing at our age, and a different, more innocent thing when we were younger: candy. You have to hand it to whoever decided this was how Halloween would be celebrated, with little kids prancing around the neighborhood in costumes collecting mass quantities of candy. But of course, we’re greedy as kids, and there’s a definitive candy hierarchy, with certain candies frowned upon (Mary Janes, anyone?) and others received enthusiastically. So Josh, what candy were you most excited to get on Halloween as a kid, and has that changed at all since?
JOSH: Well, first, let me say that the main appeal of Halloween for me is still candy. When else can I go to CVS and have an option of purchasing more than ten bags of candy that each combine at least three different individual candies? Second, if there’s one video to link to on Halloween and candy, it’s this one. To answer your question, as a kid, I was most excited for sour candies, namely Sour Patch Kids. If you went to three houses, you’d almost be guaranteed one of those mini-Twix or Snickers bars, so chocolate bars were in high supply. But, you don’t see those mini-packs of Sour Patch Kids frequently, so, when I did stumble upon them, I tended to freak out a little. I still think sour candy is in undersupply on Halloween and Sour Patch Kids are the pinnacle of sour candy, so I’d venture to say I feel the same today as I did as a kid. Except now, I could just buy a jumbo pack of Sour Patch Kids at the store; eating them unsupervised, though, does present an issue. What about your favorite? And, do kids in New Jersey really prance around the streets?
It’s time for my third annual installment of this laboriously titled NPI feature! And, man, was compiling this year’s list difficult. Not only is this fall season following an unusually impressive summer in TV, with Breaking Bad, Louie, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Pretty Little Liars, and Rivals all airing solid to great seasons, but the shows premiering over the next few weeks do not look especially promising. After all, does Whitney Cummings really need two new shows? As usual, some old favorites are off the list, either due to a decline in quality (Dexter) or senescence (Friday Night Lights). In their place, though, are shows I am not at all confident in labeling “exciting.” Anyway, with all that hedging out of the way, on with the list:
10) Hope Solo on Dancing With The StarsPremiered September 19 on ABC
The best thing about the Oklahoma City Thunder’s advancement in this year’s NBA Playoffs — and yes, it’s even better than watching Kevin Durant on a big stage (that dude couldn’t even get to the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament) — is getting to say “Thunder” a lot more. I’ve said this before (possibly in this forum) that I love seeing the Thunder as a road team on ESPN’s BottomLine, because I automatically connect “Thunder” to whatever other team they’re playing.
But what makes the best combination? What teams would do best by “thundering up”?*
*This whole project, of course, was simply the best and most rational way to deal with the death of Osama bin Laden.
On this all-important American holiday, Tim and Josh decided to dive into one of their tastiest debates: candy. So give them a break while they chew it over with Twix, avoid laying a finger on each other’s Butterfinger, and taste the rainbow. You may find that first they’re sour, then they’re sweet.
No Pun Intended 