Trying to distill the 10 "best" songs of the decade is a futile task, like trying to herd cats -- on ice. So this is not that list. Instead, in order to keep things mainstream -- i.e. not an obscure personal inventory of deep album cuts from my favorite bands -- this is a list of what were the most irresistible singles that charted in the top 20 of the Billboard Hot 100 for each year. Whether these were the "best" of the last 10 years isn't the point. What matters is that at some point in the last decade, whether you wanted them to or not, these songs wormed their way into your head. And you didn't want them to leave.

-- Sarah Rodman, Globe Staff