Best Songs of 2007

In January 2008, for my still-growing mix CD club, I compiled a special 40-track, 2-CD mix of my favorite songs of 2007. Ten years later, I’ve reshuffled that original mix, added 60 new tracks, and put it, not on CD(s), but on a streaming service for all to hear.

The contrast between delivery methods is a great reminder that—in human terms, at least—ten years is actually a long time, despite the fact that I can remember quite well the life I lived a decade ago. Ten years is enough for music to move back from permanent to ephemeral as it also moves from physical to digital.

This is one of the first lists of mine where a handful of these songs weren’t just discovered via digital means, but never even appeared on physical media. I wonder if ten years from the time I write this, in 2017, whether that could be said of most music. I would be sad if that were true, but I certainly would not be surprised.

For these year-end lists, I like to undertake the seemingly impossibly task of creating an hours-long mix. The order you see below represents that effort, which you can listen to via Spotify. Sadly all 100 tracks aren't available, but you get the general idea. Track notes to come eventually or maybe never.

Show Grid

Ice Cream

Muscles

Guns Babes Lemonade

Modular

Notes
Int’l Player’s Anthem (I Choose You)

UGK featuring Outkast

UGK (Underground Kingz)

Jive

Notes
Umbrella

Rihanna featuring Jay Z

Good Girl Gone Bad

Def Jam

Notes
Give It to Me

Timbaland featuring Justin Timberlake & Nelly Furtado

Shock Value

Blackground

Notes
Do U

Gabriel Teodros

Lovework

MassLine

Notes
Rehab

Amy Winehouse

Back to Black

Universal

Notes
Be Easy

Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings

100 Days, 100 Nights

Daptone

Notes
Welfare Bread

King Khan & The Shrines

What Is ?!

Vice

Notes
You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb

Spoon

Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga

Merge

Notes
What We Had

Handsome Furs

Plague Park

Sub Pop

Notes
Prickly Thorn, But Sweetly Worn

The White Stripes

Icky Thump

Third Man

Notes
No Bad News

Patty Griffin

Children Running Through

ATO

Notes
Four Winds

Bright Eyes

Cassadaga

Saddle Creek

Notes
Dancing on Our Graves

The Cave Singers

Invitation Songs

Matador

Notes
Flood

The Acorn

Glory Hope Mountain

Paper Bag

Notes
Nothin’ No

David Vandervelde

The Moonstation House Band

Secretly Canadian

Notes
Wild Mountain Nation

Blitzen Trapper

Wild Mountain Nation

Sub Pop

Notes
The Hand That Held Me Down

Two Gallants

Two Gallants

Saddle Creek

Notes
Hate It Here

Wilco

Sky Blue Sky

Nonesuch

Notes
Unless It’s Kicks

Okkervil River

The Stage Names

Jagjaguwar

Notes
Down in the Valley

The Broken West

I Can’t Go On I’ll Go On

Merge

Notes
Nine Ships

The Voom Blooms

Nine Ships

Fabtone

Notes
To Be Surprised

Sondre Lerche

Dan in Real Life

Virgin

Notes
Pregnant Pause

Cass McCombs

Dropping the Writ

Domino

Notes
The Trouble With River Cities

Pela

Anytown Graffiti

Great Society

Notes
Take Me to the Ballroom

Moonbabies

Moonbabies at the Ballroom

Hidden Agenda

Notes
Carrying a Stone

Loney, Dear

Loney, Noir

Sub Pop

Notes
Elephant Gun

Beirut

Lon Gisland

Ba Da Bing!

Notes
Open Your Heart

Lavender Diamond

Imagine Our Love

Matador

Notes
You! Me! Dancing!

Los Campesinos!

Sticking Fingers Into Sockets

Arts and Crafts

Notes
Princess

Datarock

Datarock Datarock

Nettwerk

2005 Norway release
Waiting 4 U

Chromeo

Fancy Footwork

Vice

Notes
Out of Control (State of Emotion)

Kenna

Make Sure They See My Face

Interscope

Notes
D.A.N.C.E.

Justice

†

Ed Banger

Notes
I’m a Flirt (Shoreline)

The Hood Internet

The Mixtape Volume One

self-released

Digital-only release
I Feel It All

Feist

The Reminder

Interscope

Notes
Sun Is Out

The Apples in Stereo

New Magnetic Wonder

Yep Roc

Notes
Amy

Mark Ronson featuring Kenna

Version

RCA

Notes
Archangel

Burial

Untrue

Hyperdub

Notes
Soon the New Day

Talib Kweli featuring Norah Jones

Eardrum

Blacksmith Music

Notes
The People

Common

Finding Forever

G.O.O.D.

Notes
The White Flash

Modeselektor featuring Thom Yorke

Happy Birthday

Bpitch Control

German-only physical release
Herculean

The Good, The Bad and The Queen

The Good, The Bad and The Queen

Virgin

Notes
2080

Yeasayer

All Hour Cymbals

We Are Free

Notes
Neck Escaper

No Age

Weirdo Rippers

Fatcat

Notes
Timebomb

Beck

Timebomb

Interscope

Notes
Florida

Modest Mouse

We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank

Epic

Notes
Patty Lee

Les Savy Fav

Let’s Stay Friends

Frenchkiss

Notes
The Sons of Cain

Ted Leo and The Pharmacists

Living With the Living

Touch & Go

Notes
Middle Management

Bishop Allen

The Broken String

Dead Oceans

Notes
The Plot

White Rabbits

Fort Nightly

Say Hey

Notes
Moving to New York

The Wombats

A Guide to Love, Loss and Desperation

14th Floor

Notes
Lake Michigan

Rogue Wave

Asleep at Heaven’s Gate

Brushfire

Notes
Is There a Ghost

Band of Horses

Cease to Begin

Sub Pop

Notes
McFearless

Kings of Leon

Because of the Times

RCA

Notes
It Makes No Difference

My Morning Jacket

Endless Highway: The Music of The Band

429 Records

Notes
Lover

Devendra Banhart

Smokey Rolls Down Thunder Canyon

XL Recordings

Notes
Put It on Me

Ben Harper & The Innocent Criminals

Lifeline

Virgin

Notes
Boy With a Coin

Iron & Wine

The Shepherd’s Dog

Sub Pop

Notes
The Ghost of Old Bull Lee

Arthur & Yu

In Camera

Hardly Art

Notes
Marine Life

Oakley Hall

I’ll Follow You

Merge

Notes
London Bridges

Josh Rouse

Country Mouse, City House

Bedroom Classics

Notes
You’re a Wolf

Sea Wolf

Leaves in the River

Dangerbird

Notes
Shaker

Tulsa

I Was Submerged

Park the Van

Notes
Timeflies

Peter and The Wolf

Fireflies

self-released

Notes
I Won’t Look Back

Port O’Brien

The Wind and the Swell

American Dust

Notes
While You Were Sleeping

Elvis Perkins

Ash Wednesday

XL Recordings

Notes
Here Come the Water Now

Tom Brosseau

Grand Forks

Loveless

Notes
From This Moment On

Mark Mulcahy

Guilt By Association

Engine Room

Notes
Whatever (Folk Song in C)

Elliott Smith

New Moon

Kill Rock Stars

Notes
Teardrop

José González

In Our Nature

Mute

Notes
Rise & Shine

Guster

Satellite EP

Reprise

Notes
Hungry

Ben Lee

Ripe

New West

Notes
You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere

The Swell Season

I’m Not There

Sony

Notes
Peg and Awl

Freedy Johnston

Song of America

31 Tigers

Notes
Hard Sun

Eddie Vedder

Into the Wild

J Records

Notes
We’re Not Alone

Dinosaur Jr.

Beyond

Fat Possum

Notes
Precious One

Joseph Arthur & The Lonely Astronauts

Let’s Just Be

Lonely Astronaut

Notes
Straight Up

Luna

Guilt by Assocation

Engine Room

Notes
Good to Sea

Pinback

Autumn of the Seraphs

Touch & Go

Notes
Someone Great

LCD Soundsystem

Sound of Silver

DFA

Notes
The Daydream

Tycho

The Daydream

self-released

Notes
Now, Now

St. Vincent

Marry Me

Beggars Banquet

Notes
Start a War

The National

Boxer

Beggars Banquet

Notes
On

Bloc Party

A Weekend in the City

Vice

Notes
Reckoner

Radiohead

In Rainbows

self-released/XL Recordings

Notes
No Cars Go

Arcade Fire

Neon Bible

Merge

Notes
Wet and Rusing

Menomena

Friend and Foe

Barsuk

Notes
Plasticities

Andrew Bird

Armchair Apocrypha

Fat Possum

Notes
Challengers

The New Pornographers

Challengers

Matador

Notes
Phantom Limb

The Shins

Wincing the Night Away

Sub Pop

Notes
Young Folks

Peter Bjorn and John

Writer’s Block

Almost Gold

Notes
Back in Your Head

Tegan and Sara

The Con

Sire

Notes
West Coast

Coconut Records

Nighttiming

Young Baby

Notes
Lazy Girls

Jill Cunniff

City Beach

Militia Group

Notes
The Wheel

Bill Callahan

Woke on a Whaleheart

Drag City

Notes
White Winter Hymnal

Fleet Foxes

Mountaineers

self-released

Digital- and Demo-only release
The Weight of Lies

The Avett Brothers

Emotionalism

Ramseur

Notes
I Taught Myself How to Grow Old

Ryan Adams

Easy Tiger

Lost Highway

Notes
Rise Above

Dirty Projectors

Rise Above

Dead Oceans

Notes