A Subjective Top Ten — The Best Love Songs
Love songs. Let’s face it, approximately 90 per cent of all songs are love songs. And of those, at least 80 per cent are cheesy, pseudo-dramatic, and boring.
But then there are the 20 per cent that are actually good. The rare kind of love song that feels and sounds somewhat new. The rare kind of love song that makes you want to fall in love rightaway with the next best stranger you meet.
This is a highly subjective list of ten love songs that are particularly brilliant. They are all either about falling in love with someone or about being in love with someone. Songs about heartbreak will get their own top ten list eventually.
It’s time to put on your rose-coloured glasses and fall in love with these romantic masterpieces.
10. “Let’s Get Lost” — Carly Rae Jepsen
“Keeping my fingers crossed that maybe you’ll take the long way home.”
Like so many other popstars, Carly Rae Jepsen just loves love songs. And while she did write and release some quite bad ones, there is one particular track that’s fantastic enough to make it into this top ten. What makes “Let’s Get Lost” so good is the way it captures the feelings of a shy character who has unexpectedly found love. The lyrics are sweet and relatable, without being too cheesy, and the uptempo melodies add just the right dose of excitement.
9. “Us 2 Little Gods” — Dido
“Just this life, I need no other. Just this day, I need no more.”
Released on Dido’s underrated Safe Trip Home album, “Us 2 Little Gods” tells the (love-)story of a young family. It’s one of the more complex songs of the singer’s career, featuring allusions to poverty and happiness in the face of suboptimal circumstances (“I’m just thankful for what we’ve got, she said.”).
The music video for the track, which follows people working on a waste dump, underlines this. The life-affirming chorus, then, creates a moment of pure bliss and makes “Us 2 Little Gods” a particularly empowering love song.
8. “I See You” — Mika
“You could be cruel to me. Why go risking the way that I see you?”
There’s no song that better captures the fear of starting a conversation with somebody you’ve got a crush on than “I See You” does. Once you’ve created the perfect image of a stranger in your mind, why give that stranger the chance to ruin it? It’s not a logical train of thought, but it’s a common one. Mika summarises the worries of a person in love perfectly, making “I See You” one of the most relatable and at the same time one of the saddest love songs of all time.
7. “Pandemonium” — Pet Shop Boys
“That song you sing means everything to me, I’m living in ecstasy.”
This uptempo power-pop gem about a tumultuous and passionate relationship was inspired by Kate Moss and Pete Doherty. “Is this a riot, or are you just pleased to see me?” singer Neil Tennant asks at the beginning of the track, paraphrasing a certain well-known saying. In the chorus he admits, “My world’s gone mad, what did you do? I’m telling perfect strangers that I love you.”
“Pandemonium” stands out among the myriads of love songs that exist in this world because it addresses an intriguing kind of relationship. Besides, it’s simply an incredibly catchy pop masterpiece.
6. “Enchanted” — Taylor Swift
“This night is flawless, don’t you let it go. I’m wonderstuck, dancing ‘round all alone.”
How could one possibly compile a list of love songs without adding at least one Taylor Swift creation? Like no other, the former country and now pop star manages to write about love from the perspective of a starry-eyed girl without actually coming across as cheesy. Well, at least most of the time.
“Enchanted”, taken from Swift’s best album Speak Now, is the pinnacle of her love-song-writing. Allegedly written about Owl City’s Adam Young, who actually recorded his own version of the song for Taylor, the mid-tempo country-pop song deals with the first meeting of two potential lovers at a party. Combining believable situations with wishful thinking, “Enchanted” radiates positivity and makes you wish you were wearing rose-coloured glasses.
5. “Might Tell You Tonight” — Scissor Sisters
“And I just might say it tonight. And I just might tell you tonight that I love you.”
The Scissor Sisters are a severly underrated and misunderstood band. Mainly known for their uptempo dance hits like “I Don’t Feel Like Dancin’” and “Filthy/Gorgeous”, they have, in fact, released their fair share of amazing ballads. “Might Tell You Tonight” is one of them.
The heartfelt mid-tempo track features several mental leaps reminiscent of stream of consciousness writing in the verses, while the chorus is a simple, straightforward, and yet quite understated declaration of love fitting to a wedding. Indeed, the song is pointedly followed by “Everybody Wants The Same Thing” — a track about marriage equality — on its parent album Ta-Dah.
4. “Black Coffee” — All Saints
“I wouldn’t wanna be anywhere else but here. I wouldn’t wanna change anything at all.”
All Saints and William Orbit’s masterpiece “Black Coffee” almost makes the top three. The electropop ballad is a timeless ode to the small gestures and the magic moments that make a relationship special. “Each moment is new,” the band sing in the pre-chorus, before the elegant and dreamy chorus kicks in to send the listener into a blissful trance. This effortless gem is certainly one of the greatest popsongs — not just love songs — of all time.
3. “Begin Again” — Sportsman
“All love ever does is break and burn and end. But on a wednesday, in a café, I watched it begin again.”
In fact, this was written by Taylor Swift, so she deserves half the credit for its place in the top three. However, while her version is good, a few subtle differences make Sportsman’s cover truly brilliant.
For instance, his version is slightly slower and more dreamy than the original. Moreover, the fact that he didn’t change any of the pronouns makes his cover an empowering queer anthem — in addition to generally being a great, believable love song. Lines like “he didn’t like it when I wore high-heels, but I do,” suddenly have a lot more meaning when a man sings them.
2. “Late To The Party” — Kacey Musgraves
“I just want them all to see me coming late to the party with you.”
Kacey Musgraves is a genius songwriter and one of the few who address a variety of topics on their records. Needless to say, she’s also recorded a few love songs. Among them, “Late To The Party” is the clear standout track.
The laid-back down-tempo country song features a certain setting: a couple getting ready for a party. In this setting, the special relationship and the feelings of the two characters for each other are beautifully and effortlessly described. “The world can wait, ’cause I’m never late to the party when I’m late to the party with you,” Musgraves sings.
“Late To The Party” is a sweet declaration of love uttered in an everyday situation. It’s a brilliant love song, but not brilliant enough to end up being number one.
1. “Who’d Have Known” — Lily Allen
“And today you accidentally called me ‘baby’.”
Here it is, quite possibly the best love song of all time. It was written by British starlet Lily Allen and released on her acclaimed album It’s Not Me, It’s You. The song’s fantastic chorus melody was actually stolen from Take That’s “Shine” — which Allen openly admitted — but let’s not concern ourselves with legal details, shall we?
Because, all in all, “Who’d Have Known” is a master piece. There is no love song out there that is sweeter, more believable, catchier, and — believe it or not — not at all cheesy. Love song writing is always a balancing act, and Lily Allen did everything just right. From the “it’s five o’clock in the morning, conversation got boring,” opening line to the “are you mine? ’cause I stay here all the time, watching telly, drinking wine” chorus: there is nothing — not a single word, not a single beat — to criticise here.
If you don’t want to fall in love immediately after listening to this song, you’re the tin man from Wizard of OZ. Period.
Do you agree with this list? Adele probably doesn’t.
