Albums of the Year 2024
The albums that defined 2024 across every genre and sound
As list season bore on and the days past and this list began to really materialize I felt a bit like what’s the point? Will readers be listed out by the time this hits their inbox?
So what makes this list different?
This list comes late because every year I sift through every other list I can get my hands on before finishing. This list is a result of that deep digging, that I love to do so others don’t have to. It’s also a result of some selective culling, there’s no need to reiterate albums on every other year end list (sorry Charli, Clairo, and Co).
There isn’t an album on this list that will be a waste of your time if you have at least a passing interest in the genre. This list largely skips electronic releases because those were already spotlighted on another post this past week. Thanks to all who shared and commented and engaged with that list, it was amazing to see such reception.
In the last few years I stopped numbering and instead bucket albums into 3 categories. This list will follow that format also with Essential, Really Great, and Notable.
The complete list with embedded players and blurbs for each album is live on the website but I’m only featuring picks here that I didn’t cover on Substack throughout the year.
I’ve always made it a point to include some reference genres for each release on the site as that kind of orienting information isn’t alway as accessible. Genres in 2024 are blurry things but I added some semblance of them here for some guidance.
I’ve selected a standout track from each album for a playlist on Spotify for easy discovery. This format inherently hurts most of these albums because they’re pieces of art meant to be consumed in full. However, these playlists are a sample platter that exhibit standouts from each album for those not interested in reading.
There is also a Buy Music Club page featuring everything available on Bandcamp.
This email will be cut in your inbox so click here to visit the Natural Music site for the full list which includes writing on all of these albums and embeddable players to listen along.
Tier 1 - Essential Albums
If you haven’t checked these albums and have an interest in the genres listed I can’t recommend these projects enough. The albums that will stick with me from 2024.
Jessica Pratt - Here in the Pitch [contemporary folk, bossa nova, brill building, lounge]
Jessica Pratt transforms her intimate folk into something grander on Here in the Pitch, where her ghostly voice floats through baroque arrangements and noir-tinged shadows. It's a bewitching reinvention that feels both timeless and fresh - like discovering a lost classic from an alternate past.
Chanel Beads - Your Day Will Come [dream pop, hypnagogic pop]
A hypnotic debut that defies easy categorization as a striking document of New York's underground. It’s an album of pure earworms that masterfully flutters between whispered confessions and cathartic screams and I just couldn’t get enough of it this year. I don’t think the band has had an NYC show that hasn’t sold out and Shane Lavers is an absolutely electric live performer.
Cindy Lee - Diamond Jubilee [brill building, psychedelic pop, indie rock]
Diamond Jubilee is a haunting, genre-bending must listen masterpiece that blends vintage aesthetics with modern production. The album's dreamy ballads, funk jams, and ghostly melodies evoke a sense of longing and nostalgia for the the faded dreams of a bygone era, while its lo-fi style creates a fragmented, hypnagogic version of Americana.
Astrid Sonne - Great Doubt [art pop, trip hop, ambient r&b]
Classical viola and detuned pianos collide with compressed percussion and dry 808s as Sonne's hushed vocals float through the mix. It’s avant-garde R&B and bizarre pop reimagined as a fever dream, where every element is twisted just enough to become thrillingly strange. Living in the greater orbit that is Denmark’s underground pop scene alongside innovators like Clarissa Connelly (featured below), ML Buch, Molina, Fine, and Erika de Casier.
Hannah Frances – Keeper Of The Shepherd [progressive folk, singer-songwriter]
In a remarkable year for folk music, Keeper of the Shepherd emerges as a stunning achievement. Frances’ commanding voice soars over sparse arrangements that blend traditional folk with experimental flourishes, recalling Sandy Denny while carving out entirely new territory. Through abstract, deeply affecting lyrics about loss and renewal, Frances creates an album that feels both timeless and urgently contemporary.
Lip Critic - Hex Dealer [synth punk, digital hardcore, post-industrial]
Lip Critic's debut album sounds like the fucked up amalgamation of Death Grips, The Garden, Machine Girl, Model/Actriz, and Daughter. Noisy, twisted electronic garage punk madness that hits like a freight train with massive sub warping basslines but also surprisingly wicked hooks that claw through the barreling assault of noise.
MIKE & Tony Selzer - Pinball [trap, east coast hip hop]
MIKE takes an exhilarating detour on "Pinball," trading his signature introspection for unabashed swagger over Tony Seltzer's psychedelic trap beats. The 20-minute collaboration finds the typically contemplative rapper flexing with newfound energy, while still weaving in his trademark existential bars.
Jawnino - 40 [uk hip hop, experimental hip hop, grime]
A rising star in the UK underground rap scene, known for his laidback flow and unique blend of grime, jungle, cloud rap, and dream-pop. His debut combines bass-driven beats with coolly delivered freestyles over warping breakbeats and airy synths. Nathan Evans of
wrote a stellar profile on the anonymous artist for Crack thats worth reading if you vibe with the sound.Spresso - Pretty Penny Slur [noise rock, stoner rock, garage rock]
Alpha Maid and Mica Levi's 'Pretty Penny Slur' is a masterclass in controlled chaos – sixteen tracks of twisted punk squeezed into twenty breathless minutes. Like archaeologists with sledgehammers, they excavate '90s grunge and DIY punk, reconstructing the pieces into something thrillingly askew. Alpha Maid's serrated guitar work tangles with Levi's fractured rhythms, while hidden production tricks create deliberate glitches that feel like your record player is haunted. It's both a love letter to basement show energy and a subversive dismantling of it.
Rich Ruth - Water Still Flows [jazz fusion, nu jazz]
An unlikely fusion of meditative ambient and crushing metal that shouldn't work but emerges as something transcendent. The Nashville artist weaves together harps, roaring saxophones, and droning guitars with the precision of a jazz composer and the spiritual weight of a shaman. A delta where heavy metal meets minimalism, krautrock flows into jazz fusion, all unified by Ruth's adventurous vision.
Geordie Greep - The New Sound [jazz/art/prog-rock, samba]
Geordie Greep's solo debut pirouettes like a deranged carnival through brass-soaked Brazilian tropicália, prog jazz-funk and unfashionable Broadway excess. The Black Midi frontman's theatrical speak-sing delivery leads a 30-piece ensemble with cartoonish flair that's equal parts vulgar comedy and profound tragedy.
YATTA - PALM WINE [art pop, neo-psychedelia, experimental] *
A kaleidoscopic homecoming, where ancient West African storytelling collides with avant-pop experimentation. The album weaves together sacred hymns and irreverent covers, traditional palm wine melodies and digital dreamscapes. It's a fascinating family legacy twisted into new shapes – YATTA's granduncle pioneered the palm wine genre, and now their descendant reconstructs it through a prismatic modern lens.
Tier 2 - Really Great Albums
I really loved these projects and I’m sure I’ll come back to them. I struggled with honing the essentials list so the albums at the top here are almost as essential.* denotes not mentioned on Substack before
JPEGMAFIA – I Lay Down My Life For You [experimental hip hop, rap rock]
Adrianne Lenker - Bright Future [singer-songwriter, contemporary folk]
Martha Skye Murphy - Um [ambient art pop, avant-folk]
Martha Skye Murphy's debut album "Um" is a stunningly original and diverse work of art pop that showcases her ethereal vocals set against meticulously crafted soundscapes. Think Slauson Malone meets Kate Bush.
Anastasia Coope – Darning Woman [freak folk, avant folk]
An album of heady, forward thinking pop music that might be described as freak folk by some. It’s sparse and quant at times but full of pleasantly unusual earworms with melodies that float around a room.
Moin - You Never End [experimental rock, post rock, spoken word]
Cappo - S.T.A.R.V.E. [UK hip hop] *
Every year I seem to come across a banging heady UK hip hop record that feels absolutely essential. Last year was Brother May’s Pattern With Force and this year it’s this album. S.T.A.R.V.E. brims with fearless post grime boom bap production and head spinning production alongside Cappo’s smooth accented bravado.
Blue Bendy - So Medieval [art rock, indie rock, post-punk revival] *
A glorious contradiction – baroque pop flourishes and post punkish math-rock precision colliding with raw emotional voltage. It's the rare debut that feels both experimental and warmly inviting, where every sonic detour leads somewhere unexpectedly beautiful. Hailing from South London the band often gets swept into a pool with Dry Cleaning, Squid, or Black Country, New Road and if you’re into that sound this isn’t an album to miss.
samlrc - A Lonely Sinner [post-rock, ambient, shoegaze]
Julie: The release oscillates between shimmering shoegaze and crushing post-metal with lo-fi acoustic/ambient stitches between. It’s a collection of dramatic but soft sounds that turn life into cinema.
tldr: like GY!BE for zoomers.
Forgetting You Is Like Breathing Water - s/t [post rock, jazz, ambient]
Kneecap - Fine Art [political hip hop, hardcore hip hop] **
A fearless second album that weaves Irish and English rap with biting social commentary and dark humor. A concept album of sorts alongside their breakout film of the same name, we follow the lads on a meandering night out, replete with skits and interludes, on a no-holds-barred journey that builds on their signature style with ambitious production ranging from dubstep bangers to reflective collaborations with Fontaines D.C.
English Teacher - This Could Be Texas [indie rock, art rock, post-punk, art punk] *
English Teacher's Mercury Prize-winning "This Could Be Texas" reinvents British guitar music with fearless imagination. The Leeds quartet combines razor-sharp wit and working-class narratives with an expansive sonic palette, proving art-rock can be both adventurous and accessible without compromising either.
Sacre - Orchestration of My Joy [idm, glitch, ambient]
This is slightly haunted headphone listening music for fans of Actress, Space Afrika, and the likes. It’s a thrilling swirl of lush breaks, beautiful piano bits, and heady textures which at moments (like on ‘substitutes’) is complemented by subterranean drum and bass.
BABii - DareDeviil2000 [uk bass, alternative r&b]
BABii flexes her Björk-level aptitude and penchant for deep world building as she enters something akin to Dante’s Inferno. It’s the pure unadulterated fun we all need sometimes and a comforting salve to those who felt pain listening through SOPHIE’s posthumous release.
Malibu - Essential Mixtape [ambient, electronic, field recordings] *
The Essential Mixtape is a cleansing, water-like album that washes over the mind. Malibu and Merely’s music is swelling and stormy, navigating space to achieve resolution time and time again. Like all well-balanced ambient tracks, the celestial elements and vocals are articulated with rumbles, pulses, and waves of bass, delivering a heaviness and texture necessary to feel the release of music in its entirety. It’s invigorating and soothing, consuming without suffocating, providing air. - Julie Kim
Ekko Astral – pink balloons [queercore, post-hardcore, noise rock] *
pink balloons "is about disruption. But it’s also about Washington, DC, queerness, partying, money, violence, difference, irony, and religion. And also: fuck you. The debut LP from DC-based Ekko Astral is a complex mesh of bubblegum noise punk and no-wave art rock that holds an elastic space for the knotty, tangled horrors of living in the imperial core.
Julie - my anti-aircraft friend [slacker rock, shoegaze, noise pop]*
julie's debut "my anti-aircraft friend" reinvigorates '90s alt-rock with a potent blend of shoegaze, grunge, and slacker rock. Raw emotions burst through seas of atmospheric distortion and muscular noisy guitar work.
This email will be cut in your inbox so click here to visit the Natural Music site for the full list which includes writing on all of these albums and embeddable players to listen along.
Tapir! - The Pilgrim, Their God and The King Of My Decrepit Mountain [indie folk, chamber folk, post rock]
RIYL: Fleet Foxes, Grizzly Bear, Black Country New Road, and GYBE
Laura Marling - Patterns in Repeat [chamber folk, singer-songwriter] *
Laura Marling's "Patterns in Repeat" captures the quiet revelations of new motherhood through intimate folk arrangements wrapped in warm analog hiss. Her eighth album finds profound beauty in domestic life, where flutes, rustic strings, and her devastating voice turn everyday moments into tender poetry
Mount Eerie - Night Palace [singer songwriter, post-rock, avant-folk, drone] *
Phil Elverum taps into the little universe he's created as Mount Eerie over the last 25 years for a double album that's among his best. Leaving behind the minimally instrumented profoundly worded death songs of his last two releases he captures something larger drawing from rock, metal, drone and folk textures.
Godspeed You! Black Emperor - “No Title As of 13 February 2024 28,340 Dead” [post rock]
2K88 - SHAME [instrumental hip hop, uk bass, jungle]
2K88's debut album “SHAME” is a sonic tapestry that fuses classic Polish rap samples with innovative soundscapes, blending ambient textures, dub basslines, and frenetic jungle beats. The album reflects on Poland's post-communist cultural evolution while pushing the boundaries of the country's vibrant hybrid club scene.
Able Noise - high tide [experimental rock, post-rock, sound collage, free improv] *
Able Noise's "High Tide" warps post-rock foundations into something thrillingly new through meticulous tape manipulation and fractured rhythms. The Dutch-Greek duo builds vast sonic landscapes where violins, saxophones, and clarinets weave through the chaos with surprising grace. Even at its most experimental, the album maintains a magnetic pull - finding meaning in the spaces between noise and melody.
Beak> - >>>> [krautrock, post-rock, neo-psychedelia]
The Body & Dis Fig - Orchards of a Futile Heaven [death industrial, post-industrial]
Milan W. - Leave Another Day [neo-psychedelia, dream pop, ambient pop]
Brittany Howard - What Now [psychedelic soul, funk rock]
Clarissa Connelly - World of Work [progressive folk, art pop] *
Clarissa Connelly weaves medieval mysticism and modern philosophy into ethereal folk explorations of labor and desire. Her haunting voice guides us through gothic ballads where church bells meet electronics, transforming personal longing into universal poetry.
Jabu - A Soft and Gatherable Star [dream pop, dub, downtempo]
Jabu explore abstract textures and echoing dub with deep bass lines and minimal, sparkly guitar lines for a modern take on bristolian post punk / trip hop.
Still House Plants - If I don't make it, I love u [experimental rock, post-rock]
Guests - I Wish I Was Special [ambient pop, spoken word, field recordings]*
Hypnotic DIY pop with Jessica Higgins' deadpan poetry drifting over dreamlike soundscapes. The Glasgow duo builds intimate collages where café ambience, primitive synths, and spoken word blur into something quietly mesmerizing. RIYL: Headache
Goat - Goat [psych rock, funk, heavy]
Goat are back with their rollicking, blown out take on bluesy psychedelic biker rock. Featuring hedonistic funk, merciless fuzz, and hypnotic grooves that ignite alongside unexpected detours into free jazz, hip hop, and breakbeats showcasing a band effortlessly straddling past, present, and future.
meaningful stone - angel interview [dream pop, shoegaze] *
A standout shoegaze album that thrums with delicate radiance and brightness.
Marika Hackman - Big Sigh [indie folk]
Marika Hackman's latest melds 90s grunge grit with classical piano flourishes, exploring darker introspection and cathartic moments of tension and release.
Mount Kimbie - The Sunset Violent [indie rock, post-punk, dream pop] *
An album that leaves behind the band's electronic roots (and last album) for hypnotic post-punk, where krautrock rhythms meet shimmering guitar work. The London duo expands their sound with a full band and taps King Krule for two tracks creating their most accessible yet emotionally resonant album to date.
Colle — Montalvo [dream pop, ambient pop, trip hop] *
While known for her work in Chanel Beads (an essential 2025 listen), Maya McGrory also stepped into stunning new territory on her solo debut as Colle this year, weaving childhood memories into crystalline electronic landscapes; "characterised by expansive glacial synths and strings, while trip-hop and shoegaze-inspired beats push her music into an experimental realm of electronic indie-rock"
ØKSE - ØKSE [avant-garde jazz, experimental hip hop]
Masaka Masaka - Barely Making Much [experimental hip hop, jungle, techno]
A sprawling, ambitious album that's as sculptural as it is explorative, reaching through genre membranes and refusing to stay still for a second. Masaka Masaka drew inspiration listening to the sounds of Dean Blunt, Slauson Malone, Arca, Jpegmafia and Vegyn and you can really hear it (in the best way).
Winged Wheel - Big Hotel [post-punk, shoegaze, krautrock] *
Winged Wheel's Big Hotel brings together an all-star cast of experimental musicians to craft hypnotic krautrock grooves and cosmic textures. The supergroup, featuring members of Sonic Youth and Matchess, channels the spirit of Can and Neu! into a singular, pulsing journey through space.
Yu Ching - The Crystal Hum [neo-psychedelia, ambient pop] *
An album that haunts the space between dream and reality, where minimal arrangements of reverb-soaked guitars and vintage Casios create spectral Lynchian love songs. Yuching Huang's debut weaves spectral vocals through nocturnal soundscapes that feel like getting lost in midnight streets of an imaginary city.
Tristwch Y Fenywod - Tristwch Y Fenywod [darkwave, avant-folk, gothic rock]
Ludwig Wandinger - Is Peace Wild?
In hotel rooms between shows and heartbreak, Ludwig Wandinger strips rhythm bare to craft beatless nocturnes that search for serenity, while guest vocals float through like midnight whispers questioning the nature of peace itself. Don't miss ‘Fire’, where Evita Manji transforms Lana's 'Young and Beautiful' into a spectral lullaby.
Daudi Matsiko - The King of Misery [singer-songwriter, indie folk]
Casey MQ - Later That Day, the Day Before, or the Day Before That [ambient, art pop]
Dawn Richard & Spencer Zahn - Quiet in a World Full of Noise [ambient, art pop, new age, chamber music, minimalism] **
Dawn Richard trades in her maximalist sound for an avant-garde take on R&B and ECM style jazz atmospherics on her second collaboration with Spencer Zahn. Through whispery vocals, orchestral textures, and minimalist piano compositions, she crafts a dreamlike meditation on trauma and healing.
Naemi - Dust Devil [ambient pop, dub]
Chuck Johnson - Sun Glories [ambient, post-rock, drone, ambient americana]
RIP SWIRL - Perfectly Blue [dream pop]
GB - Gusse Music [art pop, chamber music]
A collaged symphony of experimental music with a pop sensibilities where tracks bleed into each other, like videos in a feed, momentarily grabbing the listener's attention only to be forgotten again shortly after. A 33-minute textural plunge into the melancholy of the infinite with lofi vocal delivery reminiscent of Dean Blunt and instrumental flourishes sure to please fans of Tirzah or Vegyn.
Tier 3 - Notable Albums
I didn’t get enough time with a lot of these records because I came across many of them late in the year during list season. I think there are some real gems here that I didn’t have time to fully digest that might otherwise be in Tier 1 or 2.
Lifted - Trellis [nu jazz, experimental rock]
Belong - Realistic IX [shoegaze, post punk]
Holy Tongue meets Shackleton - The Tumbling Psychic Joy of Now [neo psych, ambient dub]
Dummy - Free Energy [neo-psychedelia, noise pop, post-punk revival]
Dummy's "Free Energy" transforms drone-punk into a joyfully kinetic fusion of IDM electronics and motorik precision.
Father John Misty - Mahashmashana [singer-songwriter, baroque pop, chamber pop]
Iceboy Violet & Nueen - You Said You'd Hold My Hand Through The Fire [UK hip hop, weightless]
More Eaze - lacuna and parlor [ambient americana, electroacoustic, minimalism]
Ambient country pocked with the subtlest, most provocative matrix glitches, sentimental and hyperreal.
22º Halo - Lily of the valley [slacker rock, bedroom pop]
LICE - Third Time at the Beach [post punk, experimental rock]
Julia Sabra - Natural History Museum [singer songwriter, indie folk]
Lyndsie Alguire - time is but the drawing of a sword [new age, ambient pop]
Jlin - Akoma [footwork, idm]
Bill Callahan - Resuscitate [progressive folk, live]
Mo Dotti - opaque [shoegaze, dream pop, noise pop]
Gerald Cleaver - The Process [techno, abstract hip hop]
Black Decelerant, Contour & Omari Jazz - Reflections Vol. 2: Black Decelerant [ambient, progressive electronic, ecm style jazz]
Nala Sinephro - Endlessness [jazz fusion, space ambient]
Rogê - Curyman II [mpb, samba-rock]
Ka - The Thief Next to Jesus [drumless, east coast hip hop, abstract hip hop]
Kendrick Lamar - GNX [hip hop, pop rap]
Deadletter - hysterical strength [post-punk, art punk]
Mu tate - wanting less [ambient, dub, downtempo]
Dean Blunt - Hackney Commercial Waste (2022-2023) [neo-psych, art pop, indie rock]
Vampire Weekend - Only God Was Above Us [indie rock, chamber pop]
Claire Rousay - Sentiment [slowcore, bedroom pop, emo]
Dekalb Works - For Barney, Who Was A Bad Dog, But A Good Boy, And Very Much Loved [experimental, ambient, trip hop]
Maya Beiser - Terry Riley’s in C [minimilism]
Florian T M Zeisig - Planet Inc [ambient, dub techno]
Kevin - Laundry [ambient pop, slowcore]
Cowboy Sadness - Selected Jambient Works, Vol 1 [ambient americana, drone, post rock]
Michael A. Muller - Mirror Music [neo classical, new age, ambient]
Danny Paul Grody Duo - Arc Of Night [ambient folk, american primitivism]
light decline - grey area [hypnagogic pop, glitch pop]
Ulla & Ultrafog - it means a lot
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Wild God
Mk.gee - Two Star & The Dream Police
If you made it this far, thank you. I hope you discovered some new music you love.