What was your favorite #1 hit in 2013?

[Foucaulf]

Some context: from March onwards Billboard changed its ranking methodology to include Youtube streaming numbers; this is how Harlem Shake took the #1 spot after it became a meme. What was an attempt to better reflect consumer taste has, in my opinion, become a ways to flood the charts with music approved by teenagers and white people. In the end the biggest songs were "edgy," "controversial" or "misogynist," its dissemination kosher because a white guy's singing it.

Locked Out of Heaven because it's at least imitating something that has worked.

[Foucaulf]

No one but teenagers with undersized brains listens to "singles" type music, and whites have the numbers and the money, so singles charts are supposed to reflect that.

Not necessarily! Having read music bloggers from the anglosphere (in case the same does not apply to Germany), the relative cheapness of singles along with a music press willing to hype has yielded great things. It was through singles that punk, hip-hop and rave first breached mainstream consciousness, such that I can remember. More mundane is the idea of music "saving lives," which sure does happen.

I want to subscribe to this mentality that popular music is a force for social change. In good times it makes digestible worthy causes and perspectives; in bad times it reinforces ignorance. Then I would say 2013 was particularly bad because there was so little rhythmic innovation on the charts, so filled with white pop stars shouting over angry drums. Blurred Lines is also awful in that respect, though whether it deserves a particular status is questionable (apologies, of course, for my clinical language here).