“Heartbeat” – Annie
(Words/music:  Anne Lilia Berge-Strand, Svein Berge, and Torbjørn Brundtland, available on Anniemal, 679 Recordings 2004)

Right now, Pitchfork is in the process of rolling out a top 500 songs of the decade contributors’ poll (a fact many will selectively ignore when letting the complaints fly tomorrow) with the top 20 set to be revealed early Friday morning.  In addition to reliving the last decade of music and reading some excellent write-ups on the songs, it’s made many a music geek think back to their own lists.  I will not be making a “top X of the decade” for a number of reasons, but I’ve been thinking about a lot of the singles I’ve discovered and enjoyed over the last decade.  “Heartbeat” stands out not as my favorite song of the aughts (again, I have no clue what that would be nor do I think I could figure that out) but remains an important song in my musical evolution.  If I had to paint the decade in one broad stroke, I’d say that this was the decade that changed my personal stance toward pop music.  I was still in high school at the turn of the decade and part of my personality involved distancing myself from pop radio.  I desperately wanted to think that listening to things that my peers didn’t know made me cool (ed note – nope.) so I grew to write off most things on mainstream radio.  It took a lot of those weird-yet-wonderfully catchy singles from the first half of the decade (think “Get Ur Freak On” or “Can’t Get You Out of My Head”) that made me rethink my stance.  Part of it, in my opinion, was an upturn in the quality of pop music (“Thong Song” was a hit around the turn of the decade, right?), but part of it was retraining myself not to worry about things like radio airplay getting in the way of a good song.

Annie’s album helped redefine my concept of pop music.  In particular, “Heartbeat” felt like it could be on the radio yet felt like it came from another world.  At its core, “Heartbeat” is another song about going out and having fun on the dancefloor.  However, it felt a little more real to me; Annie’s performance felt giddy and excited where a pop diva might just belt her way through the song.  It gave the song a more realistic personality, and maybe that’s why I let it sneak into my playlists so frequently.  It also sounds like it has a shimmery exterior, making it seem a little less real and a little more otherworldly.  Most importantly, it’s a fun and easy song to enjoy.   It’s safe to say that I enjoy this song a lot more in August 2009 than I would have in August 1999, although perhaps it would have convinced me otherwise!  Regardless, it’s one of the finest pop songs of the last decade.

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