20. Campus – Vampire Weekend

From the self titled album Vampire Weekend, released in 2008.

19. No one does it like you – Department of Eagles

From the 2008 album In Ear Park.

18. Home – Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros

From the 2009 album Up From Below.

17. Long Way Home – Tom Waits

Off the 2006 triple album Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards.

16. Electric Feel – MGMT

Off the 2008 album Oracular Spectacular .

15. Sing – Travis

From the 2001 album The Invisible Band.

14. Do You Realize – The Flaming Lips

Off the 2002 album Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots.

13. Love of my life… – Erykah Badu & Common

Erykah Badu & Common collaborated on this soulful tune for the soundtrack of Brown Sugar in 2002. The film barely made an impression, while this stand out track will likely last for many decades to come.

12. All These things that I’ve Done – The Killers

From the 2004 album Hot Fuss.

11. Crazy – Gnarls Barkley

From the 2006 album St. Elsewhere.

Kid Cudi is such a cutie! And he’s like Ferris Bueller: Everyone loves him, they think he’s a righteous dude. With all of the neato collaborations Cudi has been doing, it’s tough not to notice. And now, he’s got heart throbs directing his videos! Check out the video for Kid Cudi’s Pursuit of Happiness, feat. MGMT & produced by Ratatat

(via Pigeons & Planes)

I’m on the pursuit of happiness
and I know
everything that shine
ain’t always gonna be gold
I’ll be fine
once I get it,
I’ll be good.

For your listening enjoyment, here is a selection of remixes of the tune.

Kid Cudi – Pursuit Of Happiness (Steve Aoki Dance Remix)

Kid Cudi – Pursuit Of Happiness (Benny Benassi Remix)

Kid Cudi – Pursuit Of Happiness (Team EZY Remix)

And here is the cream of 2008… in my very humble opinion.

5. Dance, Dance, Dance – Lykke Li

The young and beautiful Lykke Li released her debut album Youth Novels early in 2008, which was met with great fanfare through the blogosphere, which had been primed with the early release of Dance, Dance, Dance. In the song Lykke Li claims that her dancing hips lie and she is actually terribly shy. I love how wonderfully unique, catchy and adorable this tune is.

4. Sleepy Head – Passion Pit

I wrote about this track as one of those fabulous crooked trees, those fabulous tracks that are both strange and wonderful. Passion Pit independently released Sleepy Head early in the year, which resulted in multiple labels vying for the artist to sign with them. In the end, Frenchkiss Records won out, and the album Chunk of Change was released in mid September.

3. Walking on a Dream – Empire of the Sun

The Empire of the Sun are a diversely talented pair from Australia. I posted about their haunting track Country earlier this year, but neglected to tell you about their ridiculously catchy, soon to be pop classic Walking on a Dream (I wouldn’t doubt that you heard about it anyways!). It took a couple of listens for this track to sink into my psyche, but it didn’t take long before I was searching through the tracks on my mp3 player so that I could hear this gem again.

2. Electric Feel – MGMT

The young pair from Brooklyn dropped an amazing album on the scene with help from The Flaming Lips producer, Dave Fridmann. Oracular Spectacular contains several stand out tracks that made MGMT one of the top bands of 2008. While I adore the majority of the album, Electric Feel is the stand out track that I listen to over and over. Sadly, I didn’t get around to posting about MGMT this year, but I’m excited to post about their future offerings.

1. Day ‘N’ Nite (Crookers Remix) – Kid Cudi

This song isn’t even officially out yet, it’s set to hit the shelves January 13th, 2009. But, I have the satisfaction in knowing that I posted about it 8 months ago. This killer track earns my top spot in this year’s best of list with the fresh, thick sound that The Crookers bring to the up and coming rapper Kid Cudi, aka. The Man on the Moon.