Under that moniker DJ Shadow, Joshua Paul Davis in 1996 gave sample-based music one of its first hit albums with Endtroducing. He transcended the established norms of ‘90s hip-hop by incorporating elements of ambient music, electronica and “sampledelia.” Davis found more common ground with U.K. trip-hop than West Coast G-funk—which might…

Photo: Che Holts Usually this column is the top five songs of each year. Sometimes, in an especially good year, I bend that and make it the top 10. This week has nine. The reasons for this are threefold: First, the longlist has 23 songs on it and that’s…