2009

Things tend to get a little strange as decades draw to close — think back to freaky 1969 or techno-paranoid 1999 — and the final year of the Zeroes matched that trend by filling the charts with a paradoxical kind of pop: it was glossy and carefree on the one hand, sideways and cynical on the other . . . which was generally a very good thing. So, we had Lily Allen looking like butter wouldn't melt while skewering vacuous lifestyles on "The Fear"; a couple of grimey raggamuffins buffing up to take dancefloors by storm (Dizzee Rascal & Tinchy Stryder); and Lady Gaga out-grooving them all with a kinky smile and a knowing wink. Can you read her poker face? Madge celebrates, and Take That consolidates, in Next Steps.

Ever get that déja vu feeling about 2009? Well, it was a little strange to hear David Guetta, in the company of former Destiny's Child member Kelly Rowland, deliver his blast of throwback Balearic euphoria "When Love Takes Over" — but, let's be honest, it felt really good. The same goes for the big, warm, vocal duvet wrapped around us by Gary Barlow and his evergreen Take That chums, who prepared the ground for the return of Robbie Williams with mouthwatering chart confections like "Said It All". Even Madonna got us thinking back to her breakthrough 1983 track "Holiday" with the gloriously upbeat "Celebration", never mind its creamy house veneer. Nothing is what it seems when you take a look at our 2009 Deep Cuts.

"We are not what you think we are" proclaimed Mika on "We Are Golden", hinting at the year's intriguing habit of presenting us with multiple pop layers that needed to be peeled away. In that sense, 2009 might be considered the year of the onion, as Ironik made us look beneath the surface of Elton John's "Tiny Dancer", Shakira stripped back her excess good-girl fluff to reveal a hard-bodied blood-lustin' "She Wolf", and Florence Welch (and the Machine) gave us a glimpse of underlying anxiety beneath her glowing indie exterior on "Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up)" by posing the questions "Who is the lamb/And who is the knife?"

Faced with the combined global double-whammy of swine flu and financial meltdown, it would have come as no surprise if mankind had decided to cancel 2009, and sit it out on a hillside in somewhere remote. But you know what? That never happened. Instead, we fought back by clubbing like it was 1999 — and Lady Gaga summed it up best with her two-word rallying cry, "Just Dance". Another phrase that caught our imagination, and made us think anything was possible, was "Jai Ho!" which translated to Academy Award supremacy and a hook-up with Pussycat Dolls. Veterans U2 and the Prodigy showed us they still had something to say, while young gun Jamie T. blew us all away with his rich 'n' riotous street poetry, and Kanye West, Jay Z. and Rihanna formed a superstar alliance that confirmed their status as 2009 royalty.