Month: February 2019

Some year-end lists

It’s February. It’s a good time for them. (Caveat Last.fm)

Top 20 most played artists in 2018

Number in parentheses is place in last year’s list.
  1. Taylor Swift (12)
  2. The 1975 (—)
  3. Avril Lavigne  (—)
  4. Brand New (1)
  5. Julien Baker  (—)
  6. Kacey Musgraves  (—)
  7. Camp Cope (—)
  8. Cardi B (—)
  9. Amy Shark (—)
  10. Kanye West  (18)
  11. Kylie Minogue (—)
  12. Madonna (—)
  13. Joyce Manor (—)
  14. Snoop Dogg (—)
  15. Foo Fighters (—)
  16. New Order (—)
  17. U2 (—)
  18. Drake  (5)
  19. Justin Timberlake (—)
  20. Hole (—) / Pale Waves (—)

Top 20 most played tracks in 2018

Edited to one song per artist.
  1. Camp Cope, “The Opener”
  2. The 1975, “Love It If We Made It”
  3. Laura Jean, “Girls on the TV”
  4. Kacey Musgraves, “High Horse”
  5. Kylie Minogue, “Dancing”
  6. Soccer Mommy, “Your Dog”
  7. Joyce Manor, “Think I’m Still in Love With You”
  8. J Balvin, “Ahora”
  9. Lana Del Rey, “Venice Bitch”
  10. YoungBoy NBA, “Outside Today”
  11. Pusha T, “If You Know You Know”
  12. Amy Shark, “I Said Hi”
  13. Drake, “Nice for What”
  14. Ella Mai, “Boo’d Up”
  15. Sheck Wes, “Mo Bamba”
  16. Ariana Grande, “No Tears Left to Cry” / “Thank U, Next”
  17. Chvrches, “Get Out”
  18. Kassi Ashton, “California, Missouri”
  19. Meek Mill, “Stay Woke”
  20. Pale Waves, “Eighteen” / Panic! At the Disco, “High Hopes” / serpentwithfeet, “Cherubim”

Top ten songs I listened to in 2018 not from 2018

  1. Julien Baker, “Even” (2017)
  2. Steve Earle, “The Galway Girl” (2000)
  3. Taylor Swift, “This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things” (2017)
  4. Amy Shark, “Adore” (2016)
  5. The Triffids, “The Seabirds” (1986)
  6. Brand New, “Lit Me Up” (2017)
  7. Halsey, “Tokyo Narita (Freestyle)” (2016)
  8. The War on Drugs, “Strangest Thing” (2017)
  9. Cardi B, “Bodak Yellow” (2017)
  10. Jadakiss, “We Gonna Make It” (2001)
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Bagels!

They’re not sacred, says Jody Rosen. They’re tacky:

In fact, Jews didn’t just transmit bagel love to the goyim. They transmitted bagel lore and bagel wisdom, bagel theory and bagel practice. The purist halakha governing bagels—how they should be made, what they should look like, how they should taste, what should and shouldn’t be cooked in or piled on them—has permeated American life so profoundly that bagel purists can found be just about everywhere. On a road trip not long ago, I made a pit stop in a Dunkin Donuts on the outskirts of a tiny central New Hampshire town, about as far outside the cultural orbit of New York City Jewry as it is possible to travel in the northeastern United States. The woman standing in line in front of me was as self-evidently a New Englander of Protestant stock as my great-great-great grandmother was a Krakow Jew, yet when her bagel order arrived—a flimsy slab of bread-like matter, a kind of coffee table coaster with a hole in the middle—she curled her lip and unleashed a soliloquy on the theme “You call this a bagel?” to rival the rantings of the prophet in Isaiah chapter 10.

And if you, like ill-fated New York mayoral candidate Cynthia Nixon (remember her?), should like a cinnamon-bagel-with-everything, be comforted that your sacrilicious predilections have pedigree.

In fact, the cinnamon raisin-fish combination has precedents in Jewish tradition. Many North African Jewish fish recipes incorporate cinnamon and generous garnishes of raisins. Pesce All’Ebraica, a sweet and sour fish with raisins and pine nuts, is a traditional Italian Jewish dish eaten on festive occasions, including the Yom Kippur break-fast.

Bagels are Canadian, too. In Montréal, they’re the basis of a cross-town rivalry between dispensaries Fairmount Bagel and St-Viateur Bagel:

Despite the apparent complexity of this feud, the Montreal-style bagel itself is pretty simple. In general, the bagels are made with relatively basic ingredients: flour, malt, and eggs. The dough is shaped into rings before being poached in honey-infused boiling water and baked in a wood-fired oven. This recipe and cooking process was brought to Montreal by Jewish immigrants from Kraków, Poland. In comparison with the New York-style bagel, the Montreal-style bagel is less dense, thinner, and sweeter.

I tried both when I made a brief Carly Rae Jepsen–related visit to Montréal a few years back. Désolé to any Québécois looking for me to take a side: I thought each distinct and each excellent.

I was also introduced to another regionalism: le dépanneur. In regular French, it would be a repair shop; in Québéc it has become a word for a corner store. Compare, maybe, to the distinctly Detroit party store.

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