2024: another unforgettable year dominated by dystopian headlines.
Quick recap: Having dodged two assassinations, Trump is charging back to the White House with his sidekick Musk in the political buddy comedy no one asked for, especially Ukraine. The unthinkable kept happening in Gaza as the destruction of Palestine raged on, met with a mix of muted outrage and the media tying itself in knots. We won a shedload of medals at the Paris Olympics and Paralympics, but most eyes were on protests in the streets and sewage in the Seine. And COP29 in Dubai? Another glossy PowerPoint show that made collective, global climate action feel further out of reach. Back home, Labour finally ended the Tory clown car ride, but five months into power, their own wheels are already wobbling. Meanwhile, the unflushable Farage is back, wielding Musk’s megaphone and an online petition demanding another general election.
Sigh.
Oh, and Asteroid 1999 AN10 narrowly* missed Earth in August, in case you missed it.
* it was approximately 932,000 miles away —roughly four times the distance between the Earth and the Moon, or my ideal amount of personal space.
What about music? Despite being one of the best ever years for albums and breakthrough artists, the giant music industry house of cards looks like it’s about to tumble. While streaming platform execs cashed out their chips, grassroots venues keeled over, and an AI-generated immigrant “joke” song hit Germany’s Top 50 (massively offending and terrifying in equal measure). Oasis came back and made a lot of people briefly happy, then angry for weeks. Online ticket sellers are still smiling though, for now.
Yet amidst the chaos, Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, Kylie’s show-stopping BRITs performance, The Cure’s triumphant return, and Chappell Roan’s rebellious breakout offered something increasingly rare: pure, unfiltered joy.
The tracks I’ve picked below don’t just capture the mood of 2024 for me —they are the mood. These songs burrowed into my head, refused to leave, and kept me sane (or close enough). Here’s to a year when we kept shouting ‘WTF!?’ at a screen but, somehow, we kept going.
There’s a longer playlist at the end, if you’re stuck in Spotify’s web.
(And, remember if you like anything below – support the artist, buy the album, share it, tell them how much it means to you.)
Mousey – Home Alone
Mousey’s ‘Home Alone’ is the kind of song that stops you mid-breath. Taken from her third album, The Dreams of Our Mothers’ Mothers! the Ōtautahi /Christchurch-based singer-songwriter Sarena Close continues to prove why she’s one of New Zealand’s most compelling indie voices out there. I love how Mousey gradually transforms the song’s almost unbearable weight into something that, by its end, feels like a quiet embrace.
Julia-Sophie – Telephone
Julia-Sophie’s ‘Telephone,’ taken from one of the year’s finest albums, Forgive Too Slow, hums with a beautiful, quiet power. Rooted in her Oxford home with nods to late nights on the Cowley Road, ‘Telephone’ is a love letter wrapped in heartache. Bruising and impossible to forget—proof that the softest whispers can echo the loudest.
The Green Child – A Long Beautiful Flowing Cape
Whether it was my flu meds or just the spellbinding title, A Long Beautiful Flowing Cape instantly hooked me. Taken from The Green Child‘s latest album Look Familiar, Raven Mahon’s nonchalant, dreamlike vocals drift effortlessly over Mikey Young’s shimmering synth backdrops, creating a glow that’s as unsettling as it is captivating. Paired with Wu Li Leung’s haunting VHS style visuals, below, it feels like a memory slipping through your fingers.
Fantasy of a Broken Heart – UR Heart Stops
I met Al Nardo and Bailey Wollowitz with Water From Your Eyes at the London ICA, (they play live with the band on tour). Intrigued, I dug into the debut album of their other band Fantasy of a Broken Heart, Feats of Engineering, and was completely blown away—especially by ‘Ur Heart Stops.’
Fantasy feels like a project without limits, two artists making music purely for themselves, free of trends or expectations. Their mix of prog-rock, dream pop, and DIY is thrillingly cohesive thanks to the careful production. Rachel Brown’s kaleidoscopic video only adds to the track’s surreal brilliance, complete with Nate Amos (WFYE) as a walking shag pile carpet. It’s bold, unpredictable, and for me one of this year’s most exciting discoveries.
CHUCK – Nothing Matters To Me Now
After quitting music a few years ago, CHUCK (aka filmmaker Charles Griffin Gibson) reappeared in 2024 with this DIY indie pop gem on Audio Anti Hero. “Nothing Matters To Me Now” is weird, funny, raw, biting, and way too relatable. Written after the 2016 election, its acrid lyrics take sly swipes at the Trumps of the world, capturing the helpless rage we all carry but never quite know what to do with. Like a cathartic scream in a soundproof booth, something we’ll all probably need next year. Welcome back, CHUCK. Stick around this time, won’t ya?
Kassie Krut – Reckless
Kassie Krut didn’t just emerge from the remains of Philadelphia math-rockers Palm—they warped into something entirely new with their debut single, Reckless. The trio—Kasra Kurt, Eve Alpert, and producer Matt Anderegg—has the same infectious post-everything energy and cool as fellow Fire Talk labellers Mandy Indiana. One of my tips for 2025, who wouldn’t want to follow where Reckless leads?
Dead Pioneers – Bad Indian
Ok, so this song was technically released in 2023, but it got a mega boost from UK Label Hassle Records (punk sister label of Full Time Hobby) in August with the physical release of debut album, Dead Pioneers. Frontman Gregg Deal, a Pyramid Lake Paiute artist and activist, slices through stereotypes with wit and fury. There are so many quotable, wry one-liners packed into its three minutes. But for me, it’s not just Deal’s message—it’s the guts to lay it all bare and demand to be heard. That’s punk. It’s confrontational and real. It makes you check yourself and what you really think. Let’s face it, supporting important, original voices like Dead Pioneers? That’s half the joy of this malarkey.
Haunted Plasma – Machines Like Us
Haunted Plasma is the sound of machines learning to scream – Finnish black metal meets experimental electronica in a fierce and intense singularity. This cyber-super group has members of Oranssi Pazuzu, K-X-P, Grave Pleasures and Aavikko and also feature guest vocals from Mat McNerney (Hexvessel), Pauliina Lindell (Vuono, Dust Mountain) and Ringa Manner (Ruusut, The Hearing). Machines Like Us epitomises the feel and format of Haunted Plasma, which builds menacingly on each song before plunging you into a molten matrix of digital and organic sounds.
Cindy Lee – If You Hear Me Crying
Taken from my album of the year, Diamond Jubilee, Cindy Lee’s If You Hear Me Crying passes by like a ghost, leaving the air heavier in its wake. Patrick Flegel, formerly of the sorely missed band Women, channels something pure and unfiltered in alias Cindy Lee. Smiling through tears, the tracks lo-fi Motown production amplifies every aching crack as Lee sings “If you hear me crying /I only wanted to be heard, to belong.” Flegel’s exploration of identity and alienation hits hard – the queerness, the grief, the sense of being on the outside looking in—it’s all there. Poignantly classic, and utterly mesmerizing.
Babehoven – Birdseye
This track soars, as the title implies. Babehoven have featured before on my end year lists. They have something special I just can’t pinpoint. Maybe it’s Maya Bon’s voice —delicate yet deeply assured, carrying the weight of every lyric as if it’s been lived twice over? Anyway, the whole of their last album Water’s Here In You kept me gripped, showing new sides to their songwriting at every turn and this opening track is a brilliant introduction for those who have been sleeping on this duo.
Waxahatchee – Right Back to It (ft MJ Lenderman)
Sometimes love isn’t about grand gestures—it’s about showing up, weathering the storms together, and finding beauty in the cracks that time leaves behind.
Shaina Hayes – A Thousand Perfect Words
Canadian Shaina Hayes was a stranger to me at the start of the year, but her album Kindergarten Heart is now etched into my all-time favourites. Her voice carries a quiet vulnerability, the kind that makes you pause and really listen in. ‘A Thousand Perfect Words’ resonates in so many ways. It’s about the clumsiness of trying to say what we mean, of wanting to connect but not always knowing how. And isn’t that the story of 2024? Here’s to music that helps us figure it out, one perfect word at a time.
