When we at mxdwn.com decided to do a top 5 list, we didn’t pretend it would be easy. But considering that so much good music has come out this year, and we are always ready to proclaim our favorites, we thought it would be a good chance for you – the reader – to look inside our combined heads.

We started by having each staff member submit his or her two picks for the best songs (so far) of 2003. The submissions varied from pop to metal, emo to ethereal. Then we compiled that list, and out of those songs each staff member chose their top 5 personal favorites. The votes were then distilled into what we have here, the Mxdwn.com Top 5 Best Songs of 2003 (thus far). While the results were surprising to us, they may not be to you, the reader. After all, some are singles, and most are radio-friendly. Still, we hope there may be one or two that you’ve never heard before.#5 Audioslave – “Like A Stone,” from Audioslave.

Front man Chris Cornell says “It’s a song about concentrating on the afterlife you would hope for, rather than the normal monotheistic approach: You work really hard all your life to be a good person and a moral person and fair and generous…and then you go to hell anyway.” (Rolling Stone) Tom Morello adds “We took influences from Doves and Portishead, but we tried to play them in our style.” (Spin Magazine)


This song is sonic simplicity with a steroid effect…chords are struck against a solid beat as Chris Cornell wails in the foreground. The song has received a lot of radio play, speaking to the more somber crowd as a sad pseudo-love song, though what Cornell speaks of being in love with is shadowed.


#4 Radiohead – “There There,” from Hail To The Thief.

This eerie song was chosen as the first single for Radiohead’s recent release. Also called “The Boney King Of Nowhere,” “There There” seems to take its cue from fairy tales and myths. As MTV.com states, “[Thom] Yorke said that several songs on Hail to the Thief make reference to children’s stories.” This can be seen in the video for the single, which is adapted from “the spooky fairy tales Yorke has read to his kid.”


One mxdwn staff member stated “I dunno, for some reason, the drums in this song make me want to go-go dance in my apartment with the lights real low.” Adding a classic grinding Radiohead guitar lick and Yorke’s listless voice to these semi-tribal drums, “There There” becomes a creepy ballad until it’s picked up by more guitar notes that push it forward into rock territory.


Click here for Page 2 and numbers 3, 2 and 1