The Top 45 Singles Of 2012

The whole "boo hoo someone said they didn't like my jumper once" 'narrative' for female pop artists has really been run into the ground  and one can't help but feel that in many cases it's faintly sexist: women  may only veer from the supposed 'norm' if they release songs about internal strength, while Ed Sheeran walks free. But we'll let 'Wings' off due to its great clappy bits.

This song is fucking great. Insane, satirical, pro­voc­at­ive, danceable and com­pletely at home to Mr Wobbly Ravenoise. And how about this for a lyric: "I can't believe anyone could ever call me super­fi­cial." "Yeah, I mean it's not your fault you're this beautiful." "I know, right?" Absurd.

The best "oooh-oooh-oooh" bit in any 2012 pop song is to be found in 'Taking Over Me'. The fact that it is coupled with the jaw-drop­pingly immense "LOVE, LOVE, LOVE" bit hints at song­writ­ing so amazing that we suspect a gov­ern­ment con­spir­acy is probably to blame. Well done Lawson anyway.

We love songs that are about one thing while also being about another thing, and this song — chosen to launch the greatest hits album marking Kelly's ten years in pop — works as both the wistful remin­is­cence of anyone who's just turned 30, and a quite sur­pris­ingly touching look back over ten years of the highs, the lows and the bits in between that make being a popstar such a unique exper­i­ence. We wanted to give Clarko a big hug after hearing this.

It's a dubstep song without any actual dubstep in it. Hurrah. In a repeat of the Sky Ferreira Spotify problem 'I Knew You Were Trouble' isn't on Spotify so we've used a cover version on our Singles Of 2012 playlist. It's not very good, we're afraid, but what can you do.

A Katy Perry single that was at once oddly generic and com­pletely (if com­pletely coin­cid­ent­ally) in keeping with the divorce­dramz happening 'behind the scenes'.

An extraordin­ary, beautiful song. We love this per­form­ance from an Danish X Factor duo.

Justin, what do you think you're playing at? Yes we know you're a phe­nom­en­ally suc­cess­ful teen superstar and everything but you just can't go around throwing words like 'fondue' into pop songs, even if they're exciting Timberlike 'jams' such as this. Next time you're thinking of doing this please come and see us first.

A decadent, astute pop triumph that according to Wikipedia got to Number 193 in the singles chart. Jesus Christ readers, what is wrong with some people? Sometimes it feels like society is simply falling in on itself.