2021 was an excellent year for music, and here I include a playlist with 40 of (in my opinion*) the years best tracks.
At the beginning of the year, we saw a newcomer in Olivia Rodrigo storm the charts with ‘Drivers License’, staying at number one for nine weeks! She followed that up with ‘Deja Vu’ and ‘Good For You’, the latter reaching number one and staying for five weeks.
At Super Bowl LV in February, The Weeknd played the half-time show to critical acclaim, helping his hits album and the single ‘Save Your Tears’ chart at number two.
2021 was also the year that we sang sea shanties… Yes, it’s true, a sea shanty – ‘Wellerman’ – went to number one. Fred Again… & The Blessed Madonna gave us a song reminding us of everything we weren’t allowed to do during the pandemic, called ‘Marea (We’ve Lost Dancing)’, which only peaked at number 36 on the UK charts. Still, I’ve included it as it gives us a window into what 2020/21 was like.
Coldplay was back with ‘Higher Power’. Chris Martin explained the meaning behind the lyrics, saying: “The song is about trying to find the astronaut in all of us, the person that can do amazing things.” They followed this up with ‘My Universe’, in collaboration with K-Pop sensation BTS, who also had a hit with ‘Butter’, peaking at number three.
While the United Kingdom managed an unenviable “Nul Points” at the Eurovision Song Contest in May, Italian rock band Måneskin won with ‘Zitti E Buoni’.
In 2017 Ed Sheeran broke the charts when his album ‘÷’ was released, having 16 of the top 20 singles, with the top ten being filled with nine of his songs. This saw a shakeup in how streaming songs were recorded for the charts. In 2021 he was at it again, with the single ‘Bad Habits’ spending a whopping eleven weeks at number one. He was eventually knocked off the top spot by… Ed Sheeran and ‘Shivers’, which spent four further weeks at number one. He also took the number one and two slots for Christmas (together with Elton John), meaning Ed was number one for over a third of 2021. *Sigh*
Speaking of Elton, before this year, his last number one single (that wasn’t a sample featuring him) came in 1997 with ‘Something About The Way You Look/Candle’ in tribute to Princess Diana. However, this year he stormed back with three number one singles, starting with ‘Cold Heart’, a duet with Dua Lippa, and then the Christmas song ‘Merry Christmas’ together with Ed Sheeran, and finally the coveted Christmas number one slot with Ed Sheeran and the record-breaking Ladbaby, ‘Sausage Rolls For Everyone’.
This year saw the long-awaited return of Adele, and she didn’t disappoint with the single ‘Easy On Me’ reaching number one.
However, my record of the year goes to the fabulous Sam Fender with ‘Seventeen Going Under’, which failed to make it to the top spot, and is amazingly his only top 40 hit to date! The song was written as a letter to his 17-year-old self. He explained; “17 is when all the challenges begin: you’re not a baby, but you’re definitely not an adult, I’m not even sure it’ll happen at all for you, but growing up is for fools and the near-dead, so stop being so serious all the time”.
That’s it! Enjoy the sounds below, and feel free to comment below. *Remember, these are my opinions, and you are entitled to your own. If you think something else deserves to be the record of the year, you are not wrong, and neither am I, we just have different thoughts, and that’s okay!
