Can we add to the detritus that are the overabundant and excessive year-end music lists?

Yes we can!

Speaking of... Although it didn't make our year-end list, this was an important song and not just because all of the editors here voted for "That One." I know much of it was irritating and maybe a tad cultish, but still, it was important. (By the way, will.i.am released a follow-up song following the election. If you can believe it, this one was cheesier, more self-congratulatory, and even more irritating).

With that, it's now time for The First Annual Pun Spot Year End Compilation. The list below are the editors' favorite songs of the past year. Eligibility is limited to songs that were released as singles in 2008. So although there were a few songs that were prominent in 2008 (many of them featured on this blog), we chose not to include them. (I'm looking at you Marvin Gaye.)

1. Estelle - American Boy (feat. Kanye West)
2. Jay-Z - Brooklyn (Go Hard) (feat. Santogold)
3. Lil Wayne - A Milli
4. M.I.A. - Paper Planes
5. Leona Lewis - Bleeding Love
6. Kanye West - Love Lockdown
7. Usher - Love in This Club (feat. Young Jeezy)
8. Lil Wayne - Lollipop
9. Jay-Z - Jockin' Jay-Z
10. Coldplay - Viva La Vida
11. T.I. - Swagger Like Us (feat. Kanye West, Jay-Z & Lil Wayne)
12. Beyonce - Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)
13. Santogold - L.E.S. Artistes
14. N.E.R.D - Everyone Nose (remix feat. Kanye West, Lupe Fiasco & Pusha T)
15. Katy Perry - I Kissed A Girl
16. Young Jeezy - Put On (feat. Kanye West)
17. Gnarls Barkley - Going On
18. Kanye West - Heartless
19. Chris Brown - Forever
20. Lloyd - Girls Around The World (feat. Lil Wayne)
21. The Roots - Rising Up (feat. Chrisette Michelle & Wale)

A few notes:

• Why 21 songs? Initially we were going with 20, but numbers 19, 20, and 21 were tied, so there you go.
  
• Kanye West and Lil Wayne dominate this chart with a total of 10 appearances between the two (I count "Swagger Like Us" two times).
  
• Jay-Z didn't do too bad either with three appearances on the list.
  
• Much disagreement between the editors (and perhaps some flaws with our scoring system) led some songs to rank much lower than expected (e.g., "Paper Planes" was ranked as 1 or 2 by three of the editors while it didn't even make the list of the fourth editor's top 20).
  
• Notable artists missing from the list: Vampire Weekend, Rhianna, and Ne-Yo. All of these artists had a tremendous year by any standard, yet they don't meet the exacting standards of our committee. Harsh.
  

Thanks everyone for a really good first year for the blog. Thanks to the editors and all the writers for putting in the time to contribute. And thanks to the readers (all 5 of you).