After a year’s hiatus, here’s what I liked for music in 2024 in a hastily written list.
01. Infant Island - Obsidian Wreath (Screamo, Secret Voice Records)
This came out the second week of January and I knew this was an album-of-the-year contender. Screamo and post-rock is nothing new, but Infant Island balance chaos and melody in a way that seems fresh. Even has a splash of death metal. Fittingly I caught this band directly after attending a funeral earlier this year.
02. Thou - Umbilical (Doom Metal, Sacred Bones Records)
A long-time, personal favorite band. They’ve topped many a’ year-end lists in the past. Known for long, slow doom dirges, Thou has decided to go for the throat and put out their most “punk” album. Nasty, angry and present.
03. Civerous - Maze Envy (Death Doom, 20 Buck Spin)
You can’t throw a rock without hitting a great death metal band these days. Civerous are a dizzy, doomy take on the genre, laying down thick slabs of atmosphere before ripping into bursting bouts of DM. Death Doom bands in particular can settle into limited pace, but Civerous keep you guessing where the song might take you next—kinda like the big purple maze on the album’s cover.
04. Wildflower - Green World (Indie Folk, Dog’s Breath Records)
Maybe the exact opposite of Civerous. The band describes its sound as “soft rock,” and just like a recent trip to the band’s home city of Portland, Maine, their music is warm, breezy and pleasant. I’ve been obsessed with this little-known band and will push them onto anyone who will listen.
05. Blood Incantation - Absolute Everywhere (Progressive Death Metal, Nuclear Blast Records)
This one is showing up on a lot of lists—even mainstream outlets are latching onto this. While it’s rare for any album featuring death growls to pop up on, say Time Magazine’s year-end list, turns out the combination with proggy, ever-evolving, Tangerine Dream influences (and cameos), it can psych up the squares.
06. The Cure - Songs of a Lost World (Rock, Universal)
I don’t think any one was expecting this to be great, but any idea of shelving The Cure as a washed legacy band got thrown out the window with Songs of a Lost World. Personally it’s exactly what I want from a Cure record: moody, dreamy songs that sound huge. They took their time making this (16 years!), but it doesn’t feel overthought or overstuffed. I almost never listen to anything past Wish (1992), but I’ll be coming back to this for years to come.
07. Contaminated - Celebratory Beheading (Deathgrind, Blood Harvest Records)
Just idiotically heavy and unhinged death-grind from Melbourne, Australia. This was my default, not-sure-what-to-listen-to-right-now-so-I’ll-listen-this-psychotic-masterpiece-with-songs-titles-like-Apex-C.H.U.D. album of the year.
08. Laceration - I Erode (Death Metal, 20 Buck Spin)
Laceration isn’t busting down doors of ingenuity, but I Erode masters a technically adroit, Death style, OSDM. Heavy, melodic and endlessly fun to listen to.
09. Knoll - As Spoken (Grindcore, self-released)
The first Knoll album I’ve really listened to honestly, but seeing them perform songs from this live, supporting Thantifaxath at Saint Vitus (rip) in February made me a fan. You could compare this young band to Full of Hell, but on this album they’ve adopted a nauseating Portal-esque Shepard tone to their guitar parts and feature occult, Victorian/early 20th century obsolete expressionist lyrics and aesthetics. And occasionally toot on a trumpet.
10.Mount Eerie - Night Palace (Indie, P.W. Elverum & Sun)
Any new Phil Elverum is always worth listening to, but I was relieved that we’ve moved away from exclusively dedicating full albums to singing about the death of his late wife Genevieve Castree. A Crow Looked at Me and Now Only are beautifully rendered tributes, but really hard to listen to without crying. Not great for the subway commute. Night Palace does not shy away from the personal, but what I love about Mount Eerie most is the combination of abstract lyrics over sweet, homespun melodies with interjections of cacophony and little nods to black metal, which is delivered here for a bold 81 minutes.
11. Ulcerate - Cutting the Throat of God (Dissonant Death Metal, Debemur Morti Productions) bandcamp
12. Full of Hell / Full of Hell & Andrew Nolen - Coagulated Bliss / Scraping the Divine (Grindcore, Closed Casket Activities) bandcamp bandcamp
13. Kali Malone - All Life Long (Experimental / Drone, Ideologic Organ) bandcamp
14. Locrian - End Terrain (Experimental Metal, Profound Lore Records) bandcamp
15. Dreamless Veil - Every Limb of the Flood (Black Metal, Relapse Records) bandcamp
16. Oranssi Pazuzu - Muuntautuja (Psychedelic Black Metal, Nuclear Blast Records) bandcamp
17. Toadliquor - Back in the Hole (Sludge, Southern Lord) bandcamp
18. Krallice - Inorganic Rites (Black Metal, electronic, P2) bandcamp
19. Slift - ILION (Progressive Psychedelic Stoner Metal, Sub Pop) bandcamp
20. Black Curse - Burning in Celestial Poison (Feral Black Metal, Sepulchral Voice Records) bandcamp
21. Amen Dunes - Death Jokes (Indie, Sub Pop) bandcamp
22. Planes Mistaken For Stars -Do You Still Love Me? (Punk, Deathwish Inc.) bandcamp
23. Charlie Crocket - $10 Cowboy (Country, Thirty Tigers) YouTube
24. Crypt Sermon - The Stygian Rose (Heavy Metal, Dark Descent Records) bandcamp
25. Leaving - Liminal (Doomgaze, Protagonist Music) bandcamp
26. Chuck Johnson - Sun Glories (Experimental / Ambient, Western Vinyl) bandcamp
27. Mortal Wound - The Anus of the World (Death Metal, Dark Descent Records) bandcamp
28. Midwife - No Depression In Heaven (Dream Pop, The Flenser) bandcamp
29. Osees - SORCS 80 (New Wave / Psychedelic Punk, Castle Face) bandcamp
30. The Body / The Body & Dis Fig - The Crying Out of Things / Orchards of Futile Heaven (Experimental Doom, Thrill Jockey) bandcamp bandcamp
31. Apparition - Disgraced Emanations From a Tranquil State (Death Doom, Profound Lore Records) bandcamp
32. The Reds, Pinks & Purples - Unwishing Well (Bedroom Pop, self-released) bandcamp
33. Tzompantli - Beating the Drums of Ancestral Force (Death Doom, 20 Buck Spin) bandcamp
34. Departure Chandelier - Satan Soldier of Fortune (Black Metal, Nuclear War Now) bandcamp
35. Gaoled - Bestial Hardcore (Hardcore, Iron Lung Records) bandcamp
36. Hulder - Verses in Oath (Black Metal, 20 Buck Spin) bandcamp
37. Hope Conspiracy - Tools of Oppression / Rule By Deception (Hardcore, Deathwish Inc.) bandcamp
38. Witch Vomit - Funeral Sanctum (Death Metal, 20 Buck Spin) bandcamp
39. The Chisel - What a Fucking Nightmare (Punk, Pure Noise Records) bandcamp
40. Andrew Bird - Cunningham Bird / Sunday Morning Put-On (Indie / Jazz, Wegawam Music Co.) bandcamp bandcamp
41. Spectral Voice - Sparagmos (Death Doom, Dark Descent Records) bandcamp
42. Belong - Realistic IX (Shoegaze / Electronic, Kranky) bandcamp
43. De Mannen Broeders - Sober Maal (Drone / Flemish Folk, Relapse) bandcamp
44. Necrot - Lifeless Birth (Death Metal, Tankcrimes) bandcamp
45. Gatecreeper - Dark Superstition (Death Metal, Nuclear Blast Records) bandcamp
46. High on Fire - Cometh the Storm (Heavy Metal, MNRK Records) bandcamp
47. Pallbearer - Mind Burns Alive (Doom, Nuclear Blast Records) bandcamp
48. Hyperdontia - Harvest of Malevolence (Death Metal, Dark Descent Records) bandcamp
49. The Dopamines - 80/20 (Pop Punk, Rad Girlfriend Records) bandcamp
50. Skeletal Remains - Fragments of the Ageless (Death Metal, Century Media) bandcamp
Others that I think are great:
Pyrolatrous - Inveterate (Black Metal, Gilead Media) bandcamp
Mean Jeans - Blasted (Pop Punk, Fat Wreck) bandcamp
Molder - Catastrophic Reconfiguration (Death Metal, Prosthetic Records) bandcamp
Gutless - High Impact Violence (Death Metal, Dark Descent Records) bandcamp
Pinhead Gunpowder - Unt (Pop Punk, self-released) bandcamp
Mayhemic - Toba (Thrash, Sepulchral Voice Records) bandcamp
Inter Arma - New Heaven (Death, Doom, Relapse Records) bandcamp
Mother of Graves - The Periapt of Absence (Gothic Doom, Profound Lore Records) bandcamp
Fulci - Duck Face Killings (Death Metal, 20 Buck Spin) bandcamp
Bedsore - Dreaming the Strife For Love (Progressive Death Metal, 20 Buck Spin) bandcamp
Undeath - More Insane (Death Metal, Prosthetic Records) bandcamp
Castle Rat - Into the Realm (Doom, King Volume) bandcamp
Ceremony of Silence - Halios (Doom, post-metal)
Mitochondrion - Vitriseptome (Dissonant Death Metal)
