TOP TRACKS 2024
29 great tracks to discover or rediscover.
Top Tracks Until the End of Time and Forever and Ever, or 2025, Whichever Comes First.
29 Tracks, not 28, not 30, in no particular order because there’s too much variety under the sun to compare apples and oranges with grapes.
Enjoy all of the Year In Review.
TOP TRACKS
Dead Gowns “How Can I”
Dead Gowns released an EP called How. Then leads off their forthcoming LP It's Summer, I Love You, and I'm Surrounded by Snow with a song called “How Can I.” Iridescent indie rock from a band that loves the interrogative adverb “how.”
Jessica Pratt “Better Hate”
Shades of Atomic Age Joni Mitchell, Nancy Sinatra, and Astrud Gilberto. A sneaky spare tune that keeps multiplying inside your mind the more you listen to it. Jessica Pratt packs in mood for miles.
Marika Hackman “Big Sigh”
The title track off full-length LP Big Sigh is a cool, understated thriller. Powerful melancholy from Marika Hackman.
Naked Roommate “Bus”
The West Coast electropop outfit Naked Roommate serves up fun in all flavors. It’s “Bus,” though, that I keep coming back to. Bus solidarity. “We take the bus.” You’re goddamn right.
Circus Trees “Save Yourself”
I heard Circus Trees perform this track “Save Yourself” live at The 4th Wall, and it blew me away.
Big Brave “canon : in canon”
Fragile beauty: devastation. Big Brave is a poetry of opposites and grammatical quirks. The fourth song off their album A Chaos of Flowers, “canon: in canon,” is a dizzy spell of spoken word set to a late Sonic Youth landscape of calculating, guitar-based acrimony.
Edhochuli “Questionably Paleo, Incontravertably Neanderthal”
Oh, fuck yes, Edhochuli is 1000% psych-drenched, post hardcore perfection. Gently place “Questionably Paleo, Incontravertably Neanderthal” in your year-end Tracks bouquet and breathe in the aroma. Off their full-length Higherlander, a tweaking rabbit warren of rock.
Other Brother Darryl “Sometimes”
Shout out to Other Brother Darryl winning Best Country Artist at the 2024 Boston Music Awards. The Boston-based band has a lot of sounds, wears a lot of hats. Rock. Folk. And Country is definitely in the mix, like on “Sometimes,” a stargazing backwoods sparkler.
Main Era “I Met God in the Denny's Parking Lot”
Twee thrashlords of “Clandestine Sadness” no more. Main Era scream now, quite often. And their live sets are tighter than an over torqued lug nut. Slow burner “I Met God in the Denny’s Parking Lot” flashes new squad goals. Off Archie.
TIFFY “Mirror”
Hawt licks-led indie rock banger about navigating narcissism in the age of… Oh well, maybe TIFFY just wrote a song called “Mirror” about narcissism in every age? Off EP 2.
Battlemode “Playlist”
The lovelorn hit of a chiptune summer. Or is this track “Playlist” even “chiptune” anymore? Might just be a mainstream club banger from Battlemode.
Ribbon “Cut Flowers”
The Pantone color of 2025 is Mocha Mousse. Which lacks some flair, but I think the idea is that a quiet, slow elegance goes far in a loud, fast, hyper saturated world. So it is with Ribbon, whose “Cut Flowers” dials down the chaos. Off I Watched the Ribbon.
Jean Paul Jean Paul “Fix Bayonets”
Jean Paul Jean Paul penned a bunch of bangers on their latest album It Comes Back. ‘Fix Bayonets” is one of them. A stomp-your-foot, fist-in-the-air, sing-along chorus, dive bar special.
Hell Beach “Poison Mind”
A glorious, triumphant surf punk growler from Hell Beach, off their LP Beachworld. Is the New Hampshire band living that Salt Life or what? Shout out to the transcendent key fill around 2:30 on “Poison Mind.”
Sour Widows “Staring Into Heaven/Shining”
You gotta like those albums where the band, which had been trotting out three-, four-, five-minute numbers the whole time, unloads with a big closer. All the fireworks. I mean, we’re not talking “The End” by the Doors, but “Staring Into Heaven/Shining” breaks out all the tools in Sour Widows’ toolbox for the big finish.
Watercoat “Map”
We’ve written up this Vermont band Watercoat a few times, just love the bubbling electronic beats & vox stew. “Map” takes generous advantage of the autotune, sandwiched between about 10,000 other layers. Kind of a twee Salem vibe. Does that make sense? Off Circles On My Map.
Twen “Lucky Onze”
A bouncy pop psycher from Twen, who dropped a streak of singles in 2024, and rolled them all up into their EP Infinite Sky. “Lucky Onze” rocks trippy vibes with tight beats and rhythm for days.
Already Dead “Landlord”
A punk burner from Already Dead, telling it like it is on behalf of the tenant class. They don’t say it outright, so we’ll do it ourselves: landlords suck, rent is bullshit, and housing is a human right. That’s our takeaway from “Landlord,” the fourth track off Something Like a War.
Trophy Husband “Gonna Lighter!”
You ever see that scene in Wayne’s World where they rock out to “Bohemian Rhapsody” in the back of a 1976 AMC Pacer? You could slot in Trophy Husband’s song “Gonna Lighter!” without missing a beat (well, not too many beats – it’s Queen after all!). The power thrashers have that kind of whimsical grind to them, plus vocal shenanigans. Most excellent!
Bnny “Good Stuff”
A whisp of an indie rock dream from Chicago’s Bnny with “Good Stuff.” The chord progressions burrow softly into your skull. The abrupt ending jolts you out of the dream, but like Paul Atreides father always said: “The sleeper must awaken.” Off One Million Love Songs.
Sean Nicholas Savage “Screamo”
Not going to let a year go by without shouting out Sean Nicholas Savage, whose boundless creativity blossomed into the Trilogy album in 2024. “Screamo” is a funky, throwback crooner with 80s textures. Shout out to the “yah-yah-yah-yahhhhhhh” samples at the close, turning another beautiful corner of odd.
Reading Room “Job”
We dug Reading Room’s LP Tried Relaxing in 2024. “Job” is a chill indie rocker about mapping your soul onto the 9 to 5. But apparently the band was into a whole other kind of chill this year, releasing an additional hour+ of chill mixes on a collection called Chillbox. Not trying to shill for the chill, but go check it out.
Ty Segall “My Room”
Ty Segall can get silly, corny, weird, heavy, psych, remote, lifted, scattershot. We like him best when he writes and performs great music, like this driving post punk ambler. “My Room” showcases clipped guitar lines that do a lot with a little, squeezing a thousand personalities into simple licks. Hawt stuff, off Three Bells.
Blondshell “What’s Fair”
A tight, melodic heavy pop banger from Blondshell that knows where all the levers are located to build up tension, up, up up, up… And then “What’s Fair” unloads with the big crunchy guitar chorus to make all your singalong rock arena show dreamz come true.
Perennial “Jet Set Mono”
We previously wrote up “Action Painting,” but that was 2:02. “Jet Set Mono” is 1:40, and shorter might be better with Perennial. The art rock micropunks work best in small batches, cooking up conceits that blow up in your face just as you lean in to take a sniff. Kind of like a stick of dynamite dressed up like a flower in one of those old Warner Bros cartoons. Off Art History.
Mary Halvorson “Desiderata”
Cloudward is a chill album, full of mellow jazz ramblers, but we like it best when Mary Halvorson blows up with a song like “Desiderata.” A little avant garde atonal edge and maxi-chromaticism pulled back into the fold by vibraphone chicanery. Watch out for that guitar solo.
FACS “North American Endless”
Angular, ocular, phantasmogrokular. Is FACS the most prolific band in post punk? The regular release schedule evokes life on the assembly line. This band has the sprockets, the know how, and a can-do spirit in “North American Endless.”
Claire Rousay “head”
2024 was a big year for Claire Rousay, making a big push into pop with the full-length sentiment. The experimental artist has played in this sandbox before (shout out to the collab with More Eaze), but this time it’s for solo realsies on a Thrill Jockey release. Analog meets digital in eye-opening ways on “head.”
Black Beach “Psychic War”
Black Beach’s guitar runs riot over a hypnotic, hypnotized rhythm section, plus some gonzo vocals to boot on “Psychic War.” Picture Werner Herzog, wearing a gas mask, walking like an Egyptian in front of his bedroom mirror.
