The Fresh Heir’s Top 40 Hip-Hop Songs of 2011

For Part Two of The Fresh Heir’s “Year in Review” posts, I proudly present the Top 40 Hip-Hop Songs of 2011. I couldn’t settle on a number – I started with 25, but then it slowly crept up to 30, then 35, and at last I decided that 40 sounded nice. Why not go radio style? Top 40. It has a ring to it. I started out with over a hundred songs that were under consideration, but after several painstaking hours (that involved largely listening to music, eating, and watching Chappelle’s Show), I managed to whittle the list down to 40.

So, without further ado, the following are The Fresh Heir’s Top 40 Hip-Hop Songs of 2011.

Actually, there’s going to be a little further ado. Let me just say that I easily could have included ten Kendrick Lamar songs in this list. I probably could’ve thrown in a couple more K.R.I.T. tracks as well. I wanted to try to make the Top 40 as diverse as possible. As a result, there are several tracks that are truly some of my personal favorites that aren’t included in the list, but for the most part, the following are the 40 hip-hop tracks that stand out to me as some of the best of 2011. Everyone has different tastes, so I would never go as far as to say that these are the BEST hip-hop songs of 2011 – just my favorites. Also, don’t take the order of the list to mean too much. After the top ten or fifteen, I basically started just listing the rest of the tracks I wanted in the Top 40 – it was too difficult to distinguish between #34 and #35, for example.

Check out the list, and please comment with your opinions at the bottom of the page. Did you love the choices? Are there some glaring omissions? What would you have included in your Top 40? Top 10? Top 5? Read and enjoy. Hopefully you discover a few tracks you’ve never heard that you love, because at the end of the day that’s what this is all about. Spreading good music, spreading love.

40. Time For Some – Action Bronson & Statik Selektah

39. Thinking About You – Frank Ocean

38. She Don’t Want A Man – Curren$y

37. CDC – Dom Kennedy ft. Casey Veggies & cARTer

36. Make My – The Roots ft. Big K.R.I.T. & Dice Raw

35. Dolla and a Dream III – J. Cole

34. B.A.N.ned – Freddie Gibbs

33. Call of Duty – Jay Electronica ft. Mobb Deep

32. Memories Part 2 – Big Sean ft. John Legend

31. Graduate – Dom Kennedy

30. The Vent – Big K.R.I.T.

29. Hard Times – Asher Roth ft. Kids These Days & Casey Veggies

28. Menace II Society – Freddie Gibbs ft. Dom Kennedy

27. Pound – Stalley

26. I Hate Myself – Lil B

25. Trouble On My Mind – Pusha T & Tyler the Creator

24. All Black Everything – Lupe Fiasco

23. Round of Applause (Remix) – Waka Flocka ft. Drake

22. Murder to Excellence – Jay-Z and Kanye West

21. Stripes (Run DMC) – Young Jeezy ft. Freddie Gibbs

20. Buried Alive (Interlude) – Kendrick Lamar

19. Look What You’ve Done – Drake

18. HiiiPower – Kendrick Lamar

17. American Rapstar – Big K.R.I.T.

16. Scottie Pippen – Curren$y ft. Freddie Gibbs

15. Peso – A$AP Rocky

14. Make That Money – Macklemore & Ryan Lewis

13. Posted – Pac Div

12. She – Tyler the Creator ft. Frank Ocean

11. The Morning – The Weeknd

10. Poe Man’s Dreams – Kendrick Lamar

9. Lost Ones – J. Cole

8. Blue Sky – Common AND 30 – Danny Brown (apparently I had two #8s on my list and didn’t realize it til now. Changing the list at this point would require time that I do not currently have. The result is a tie between Common and Danny Brown!)