One reason that I still use ITunes over Spotify to listen to the songs that I already own is that Spotify doesn't seem to have the play count feature that ITunes has. And every year, I like to see what songs I ended up listening to the most.

To get a few more bands on this year's list, I'm going to start off by counting Sleeper Agent's "Celebrasion" as my album of the year since the songs from that album would take up six of the top 10 spots. If you haven't checked them out, Sleeper Agent is a nice pop rock band. The #1 song of the year was Shuga Cane, although I will confess to listening to it a number of times to figure out where the chorus came from (it's pretty similar to a part in The Rolling Stones's "Rocks Off".)

The #2 song is "Stay Too Long" from Plan B's rap/soul opera. The whole album covers a pop star's rise to fame, night in which he hooks up with a girl who says he raped her, and his dealing with being sent to prison for the false charge. It's an interesting album with a few great songs, including the #9 song on the list, "She Said". I prefer "Stay Too Long" but in the UK, She Said was the big hit (and has 16 million YouTube plays to "Stay Too Long"'s 3 million.

#3 and #8 came from Kyla La Grange. She doesn't have an album out yet but she's consistently dropping quality songs onto her website or on YouTube.

#4 is a late mover. I saw the Cold War Kids and while they were solid in concert, they didn't have much stage presence which made it a rather lackluster concert. Still, I hadn't heard much of their newest album which made up most of the evening's set list. One songs that jumped out at me and that I played over and over afterwards was "Bulldozer".

#5 and #6 come from my favorite live band Foxy Shazam. "Bye Bye Symphony" is a great song about getting over your troubles and putting the sad songs behind you. It also has one of my favorite choruses, "Life is a bitch, but she's totally doable." #6, on the other hand, is from their upcoming album and is about black women's asses. (And yes, the video for it (if it is even the official video) is not safe for work.)

#7 comes from college crowd faves Walk the Moon. I'm not sure they'll ever break out of the university crowd but I'm a big fan of their big song "Anna Sun", although I prefer this acoustic version to the actual single.

#10 was the new group Various Cruelties and their "Neon Truth". A very catchy song although I think that their shot at breaking in the US might be their new single, "The Great Unknown." The single came out on January 1st but I can't seem to buy it on ITunes or Amazon in the ol' US of A. Hopefully, that will change soon and these guys will put out their full length LP.

As for the rest of the top 25, it rounds out like this:
11. Laws of Gravity by Rubik
12. Drunk by Stray Dog
13. Civilian by Wye Oak
14. Greyhounds in the Slips by The Joy Formidable
15. Animal by Neon Trees
16. Been Better by Kyla La Grange
17. Silent Flight, Sleeping Dawn by Mono*
18. Pure As Snow by Mono*
*Both of these songs are off their live album Holy Ground: Live with The Wordless Music Orchestra. If there's one band I wish would come to the US, I think it would be this Japanese post-rock trio along with the Wordless Music Orchestra. This is my go-to band for music to write to.
19. Almost Home by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (from The Social Network Soundtrack)
20. Royal Blue by Cold War Kids
21. First Breath After Coma by Explosions in the Sky
22. Cradle by The Joy Formidable
23. No Kind Words by The Maccabees
24. Last Known Surroundings by Explosions in the Sky
25. River of Deceit by Mad Season

I'm kind of surprised that it's mostly new stuff but I guess those are the songs I listen to over and over for a while whereas my older stuff I'll give a handful to a dozen listens to over the year.