Year-End Review: Albums in 2024
Interested in what I heard during and what I think about music in 2024? Neither am I. This weeks edition: Albums.
The Notes app in my phone is home to a masterlist I’ve been keeping since 2018. What began as the “Albums in” year long note has grown to include an “EPs in” section as well, and for the first time in my listkeeping, I have added an “Other Years in” section to cover music I heard in 2024 coming from, you guessed it, other years.
Full list of albums I listened to at the bottom, here’s some records I recommend and a sample of each.
This is: Albums in 2024
Merce Lemon - Watch Me Drive Them Dogs Wild
A realization I had about myself sometime this year is that I really like pedal steel. This has manifested itself as a recent, rapidly growing affinity for alt-country-lite-indie-twang and folk music, most evidently apparent in my adoration for this record. It’s got it all, country melancholia, acoustic arrangements, formidable lap steel bends, and good songwriting. I can pretty easily see this record and the right touring schedule going into 2025 propelling Merce Lemon to indie superstardom and further acclaim, because this is a seriously stellar record. Buy your stocks now.
Itasca - Imitation of War
Continuing on with folk music here, it was during a bi-annual late night scroll through the Pitchfork reviews that this album cover caught my eye because it literally looks like clipart. Nevertheless, I was compelled to listen to this album in spite of or rather exactly because of that, and as it turns out it’s a really solid semi-psychedelic-western-dreamrock record that has some blissful guitar licks that instantly remind me of Popol Vuh’s Hosianna Mantra. A real vibey folk record and hidden gem this year.
Maya De Vitry - The Only Moment
Maya De Vitry is an artist I found a year or two ago after randomly searching through new music on Bandcamp, an app I almost never use for that purpose. The album preceding The Only Moment, 2022’s Violet Light was a breezy, frankly beautiful listen, featuring what’s now one of my favorite songs in Real Time, Real Tears. This new offering is a good if not more intimate followup with all sorts of fingerpicked acoustic guitar and emotion that’s seriously worth your time if you’re even remotely interested in folk. Another gem.
The Chisel - What A Fucking Nightmare
A pretty big year for me personally in terms of listening to more punk and hardcore, and this is a record firmly cemented towards the top of my AOTY list as it just Goes So Hard. Sixteen working class UK punk bangers that most often clock in at under two and a half minutes, for a thirty six minute run-time. A seriously passionate, angry, and sincere standout on the list, a record and a band with something to say, and I will never forgive myself for not seeing them on tour with Edmonton, Alberta Canada’s Home Front this year. Oi!!
Bob Vylan - Humble As The Sun
When I saw Amyl and The Sniffers (listening to them since 2018 btw longer than you nbd) in September 2022, I hadn’t heard of Bob Vylan. That night a conservative dad chaperone whined to the Bobs on stage to keep politics out of it and was jumped by the crowd before being pulled over the barricade by security the very next song. Humble As The Sun is just as in your face and political, more working class UK tracks from the punk rap perspective. Can’t imagine how happy these guys (rightfully) were when the Queen died.
Bladee - Cold Visions
Bladee is someone I’ve been acutely aware of since I was in middle school but I never got into him or Ecco2k, sadly. But when I listened to this earlier this year I could not BELIEVE what I was hearing. Good music is supposed to make you feel like your brain is on fire, and I was struck by that feeling on consecutive tracks on this. While it may not be the, “Rap Album of the Year,” it is undeniably one of the top rap releases of this year, maybe even this decade. I seriously feel like I cannot die when I listen to this album.
Contention - Artillery From Heaven
Continuing with that theme of being unkillable via music, Contention, a Tampa hardcore band dropped one of my favorite heavy records this year in Artillery From Heaven, coming out swinging with I.C.B.M., following up with the brand-new-all-timer Inflict My Will, and closing strong with In the Land of Nod towards the end of the record. “…on a world that wants to crush me, I inflict my will” followed by a hard breakdown and a divebomb. One of several crazy tracks on a hard hitting, scathing twenty minute record.
Sidestep - Sidestep
Continuing on, Sidestep is a hardcore band from Gothenberg, Sweden that I found over the summer whilst perusing Twitter, and this record is fast paced, energetic, and forceful. Clocking in at just over twenty minutes and aside from three interludes, this thing doesn’t slow down and doesn’t relent. As if this record didn’t go hard enough, these Swedish guys close the album with the Migos flow, rapping in triplets over some powerful riffs on Muscle Memory. God bless these Swedes.
Candy - It’s Inside You
Going into this, I didn’t know if Candy still had it in them after putting out the fantastic Good To Feel and following it up with Heaven Is Here, which I can’t remember listening to, but It’s Inside You is one of the best heavy releases of the year. The grip that this record had on me when it released was incredible. Thirty minutes flat of pure hatred (and hypercore at the end.) Then they followed up with one of the best EPs of the year in Flipping. 2024 might be Candy’s MVP year!
Adorável Clichê - Sonhos que nunca morrem
It’s (almost) time to finally start talking about shoegaze. Sonhos que nunca morrem is a record that leans more towards indie and dreampop rather than the outright shoegaze stylings of fellow Balaclava Records label-mates terraplana (see: você,) but it’s a line that’s straddled well in a modern world with too much Mid-To-Forgettable Gaze. Dreamy, fuzzy at times, well executed, what’s not to love here?
(Fun fact, the song above has the exact same main riff as Our Girl by Our Girl.)
Cold Gawd - I’ll Drown On This Earth
I’ll Drown On This Earth is the followup to Cold Gawd’s 2022 release, God Get Me The Fuck Out Of Here. But, calling this a followup implies the idea of, “more of the same,” for these guys when that couldn’t be further from the truth for this new record. The sum total of this bands efforts on this LP, from heavy riffs, to soaring guitar leads, to the ethereal autotuned croons, come together to make this not just a step-up, but a serious, marked improvement sonically, creatively, and artistically. Better in every sense of the word.
MOP - Secrets
Portland based MOP start up and don’t really ever stop here. If not actively looking at the tracklist you might not realize you’ve been listening to a full album rather than one or two long songs up until the mellowed out Blue Clay late in the album. This can be pretty shocking as it’s only twenty minutes, but it’s a bristling and noisy indie rock record that transitions seamlessly and effortlessly weaves between quick its multitude of buzzing riffs. Tight, well written and sequenced, and super replayable. A real joy to listen to.
kennedy mann - Maybe Tomorrow
Kennedy Mann is a member of the Philly based dreampop and indie rock band Highnoon, who has gone on to release her first solo project as kennedy mann in October, titled Maybe Tomorrow and it’s really good! The sounds here range from slow solo bedroom indie, to more energetic full band arrangements on tracks featuring Highnoon, culminating in the tracks Phone and Tomorrow, two full on, flatout alt rock and gaze-lite killers with buzzy solos both clocking in at six minutes a piece, the latter of the two qualifying for my, “Closer Track of the Year,” award as it goes that hard. Big up kenneday mann, big up jwar. Goodbye 2024.
You made it to the end. Here’s every record I listened to and liked well enough in 2024:
Infant Island - Obsidian Wreath
Boldy James - Penalty of Leadership
Fawning - All Around Me
topographies - Interior Spring
Brad Stank - In The Midst of You
Benny The Butcher - Everybody Can’t Go
Nürnberg - Adkaz
The Chisel - What A Fucking Nightmare
Velvet - Romance
Whitelands - Night-bound Eyes Are Blind To The Day
Friko - Where we’ve been, Where we go from here
Itasca - Imitation of War
MIKE - Pinball
Bob Vylan - Humble As The Sun
Fabiana Palladino - Fabiana Palladino
The KVB - Tremors
Soft Kill - Escape Forever
Gangrene - Heads I Win, Tails You Lose
Bladee - Cold Visions
Joyer - Night Songs
Contention - Artillery From Heaven
ellis - no place that feels like
Jessica Pratt - Here In the Pitch
Kamasi Washington - Fearless Movement
Mdou Moctar - Funeral for Justice
Knocked Loose - YWGBYST
Chief Keef - Almighty So 2
Bummer Hill - Far Removed
Blushing - Sugarcoat
Ekko Astral - pink balloons
Roc Marciano - Marciology
Gatecreeper - Dark Superstition
Extinguish - One Less Enemy
Mach-Hommy - #RICHAXXHAITIAN
Conway the Machine - Slant Face Killah
Adrienne Lenker - Bright Future
Waxahatchee - Tigers Blood
Rose Hotel - A Pawn Surrender
Missing Link - Watch Me Bleed
Peggy Gou - I Hear You
Charli xcx - BRAT
Candy - It’s Inside You
Robb Bank$ - i think i might be happy, pt. 2
L’Imperatrice - Pulsar
Blue Hawaii - Diamond Shovel
Amery - Continue As Amery
Juanpalitoschinos - Natsukashii
Thou - Umbilical
Blind Girls - An Exit Exists
You Wish - Lathe
Arooj Aftab - Night Reign
Armand Hammer - We Buy Diabetic Test Strips
This Is Lorelei - Box for Buddy, Box for Star
Sour Widows - Revival Of A Friend
Molly Nilsson - Un-American Activities
Denzel Curry - KOTMSV2
a Lesser Version - She Was Wounded, I Was Terrified!
Maya De Vitry - The Only Moment
Male Tears - Paradísco
Webbed Wing - Vol. III
IX of Swords - I can’t imagine how it felt to live
Yndling - Mood Booster
Bleached Cross, True Faith - Columns of Impenetrable Light
MAVI - Shadowbox
Sidestep - Sidestep
Adorável Clichê - sonhos que nunca morrem
Coatie Pop - Unknown God
Rest Assured - Delirium
True Body - Love Spell
Cold Gawd - I’ll Drown On This Earth
Foxing - Foxing
MoritaSaki in the pool - Love is Over!
The Alchemist - The Genuine Articulate
Future - MIXTAPE PLUTO
Niko B - dog eat dog food world
Geneva Jacuzzi - Triple Fire
Full of Hell - Coagulated Bliss
Merce Lemon - Watch Me Drive Them Dogs
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Wild God
MOP - Secrets
Chain Cult - Harm Reduction
Blood Incantation - Absolute Elsewhere
Okay Kaya - Oh My God - That’s So Me
Uboa - Impossible Light
Wild Pink - Dulling The Horns
Chat Pile - Cool World
Nails - Every Bridge Burning
High Vis - Guided Tour
Midwife - No Depression In Heaven
Amyl and The Sniffers - Cartoon Darkness
Trauma Ray - Chameleon
kennedy mann - Maybe Tomorrow
Dora Morelenbaum - Pique
Melt-Banana - 3+5
Clinic Stars - Only Hinting
The Cure - Songs Of A Lost World
SahBabii - Saaheem
World Brain - Open Source
Beth Gibbons - Lives Outgrown
Laura Marling - Patterns In Repeat
VA - LSIK: A Celebration of Margo Guryan
Kendrick Lamar - GNX
Father John Misty - Mahashmashana
Haywire 617 - Conditioned for Demolition
Nerves - Glórach
sunshy - I don’t care what comes next
shower curtain - words from a wishing well
Palomino Blond - You Feel It Too
Mo Dotti - Opaque
Flowers For The Dead - Magnolia
KNEECAP - Fine Art
Miss anything? Let me know. Thanks.