Best Music Videos of 2010: 1-10 | 11-20 | 20-30
11. Chilly Gonzales – I Am Europe (Director: Adam Traynor)
‘I Am Europe’, the music video is a montage of clips from Chilly’s ambitious movie of the same name (also the title of his album) and casts Chilly as a failed chessmaster about to meet his nemesis played by Tiga. Daft.
12. Lady Gaga – Telephone (Director: Jonas Åkerlund)
For making the music video an event again, ‘Telephone’ deserves to be here.
13. Massive Attack – Splitting the Atom (Director: Edouard Salier)
A gigantic demon rabbit stalks a black chrome city. Slow-motion chaos ensues. The ‘Atlas Air’ video serves as a prelude.
14. Shit Robot – Take Em Up (Director: Eoghan Kidney)
Nancy Wang in New York. Cool as fuck clip by one Irishman for another. There’s a short Q&A with director Eoghan Kidney here.
15. Cathy Davey – Little Red (Director: Lorcan Finnegan)
A puppet and cut-out paper retelling of Little Red Riding Hood through music video form.
16. Die Antwoord – Enter the Ninja (Directors: by NINJA and Rob Malpage)
South Africa’s rap-rave comedy crossover really hit home with ‘Enter The Ninja’ where they made a catchy-as-fuck tune and made a freaky star out of Yo-landa Vi$$er. Then, they signed to a major, played Coachella, US TV shows and played with Aphex Twin. All together now… “Ayayeya, I am your butterfly , I need your protection, need your protection”.
17. Baths – Lovely Bloodflow (Directors: Alex Takacs and Joe Nankin)
Sumptuous.
18. Cee Lo Green – Fuck You (Director: )
After the typography-only version received over a million views in four days, the video proper debuted and now has over 30 million views. One of the songs of the year too. Obviously.
19. Glasser – Mirrorage (Director: Carlos Charlie Perez )
20. Fight Like Apes – Knucklehead (Director: 0ldScratch)
A fan-made video featuring Lego couldn’t have been more appropriate.

Niall Byrne is the founder of the most-influential Irish music site Nialler9, where he has been writing about music since 2005 . He is the co-host of the Nialler9 Podcast and has written for the Irish Times, Irish Independent, Cara Magazine, Sunday Times, Totally Dublin, Red Bull and more. Niall is a DJ, founder of Lumo Club, club promoter, event curator and producer of gigs, listening parties & events in Dublin.
Great list although I thought Giving Up The Gun kinda ruined the song. Some songs are best left without any visuals.