If you have ever read a newspaper or magazine (I’m presuming you are literate), you have most likely seen some random writer’s top music picks for (insert season or event name here). These articles share one thing only –– they promote hipster music that the writer found on Napster. I could give two shits about “Best Summer Relaxin’ Jams” by Jennie Birch from the South Kitsap School for the Blind Times or “Fresh Tracks You Gotta Hear” by Dirk Sims from the Clackamas County Mirror. Grow up, people! Even the AARP had the “Greatest Songs to Have Played At Your Funeral.” Therefore, as an honest hypocrite, I have resolved to make my own list of the best songs from select genres. Here goes nothing…

Jazz: This genre is dead and so are the people who actually enjoy listening to it. However, I will suggest “Take Five” by Dave Brubeck. This song swept through West Coast colleges in the ‘60s, entrancing thousands of white 20-year-olds with thick black-framed glasses who enjoyed the sounds of soulless appropriated music. Sounds like Whitman.

Country: Do I look like I know anything about country with my Birkenstocks, pleated shorts and pink sweater tied around my neck? You should ask the guys in cowboy hats riding in the dirty flatbed F-150 who called you a “Yeti-Looking Fuck.”

Pop: This a toss-up between two of my favorites. I love all of Taylor Swift’s brokenhearted ballads because they remind me that relationships suck. They assure me that it is better to use a vacuum to put hickies on my neck so that it looks like I kiss girls instead of being in a relationship that will eventually end in tears. My other favorite, if you can get past the fact that Pitbull is a sweaty bald man with zero talent, is “Timber.” It’s that perfect song for the TKE basement when you’re in cutoff jean shorts and flannel dancing with a Natty Light in your hand or the three hours later when you are puking up Prentiss pizza in the TKE keg urinal.

Metal: I do not understand this. This is not a genre that you sing along to in the car or hum to your child as you rock them to sleep. The only people who appreciate it are U.S. military torturers who blast it 24/7 to psychologically break down foreign prisoners. If I make it into heaven and the angels’ golden harps only play metal, I am getting on the highway to hell.

Electronic Music: I, too, can create music from my computer. In fact, just the other day I discovered a program called Ableton. If I wanted to feel a Dubstep drop, I would eat five pounds of pasta primavera, drink a gallon of milk and hop on Disney’s Tower of Terror. That would be way more enjoyable.

Trap Music: Are you drunk? Nope. So why would I listen to this.

Reggae: Are you stoned? Nope. So why would you listen to this.

Classical: This genre gets enough crap as it is.

Rap: Let’s be real. When people say they like a certain rap song, they really only like it because of the samples that the artist stole from other songs or because of the beats their producer created. If you take all the beats and samples away, you end up with a bunch of scraggly-looking dudes doing spoken word and rhyming every other word with “fuck.” The only reason it appears that there are good rappers is because there are so many terrible ones. Love you, Riff Raff. And for those rappers who decide they want to actually try to sing, there is a wonderful program called Auto-Tune that can even make a goat sound like it’s singing. It’s what Stevie Nicks uses. If I must recommend an artist, I choose Kanye West because he was the theme of 2-West last year and I miss that puke-stained poster of Kanye we used to have.

Christmas Music: You shouldn’t just be listening to this music. You should be composing it or recording it, too. If you write one good Christmas song, it will be played for eternity. I cannot tell you how many times I have heard Nat King Cole’s Christmas song about the chestnuts and fire or Bruce Springsteen’s rendition of “Santa Claus is Coming to Town,” in which he sounds like he rubbed his vocal chords with sandpaper. But really, though, Christmas music is the only music to listen to because if you listen to music like grunge, classic rock or elevator music, you are going to hell. At least that’s what my preschool teacher told me.

Thanks for reading. If you enjoyed this list, look for my next week’s list of the best roads in the U.S. to drive on naked.

Joseph Wood is a pseudonym.