It never ceases to amaze me that I am still doing this every year, if only the fact that, at my age, I still find new music so enthralling. But anyway, here we are for my 62nd consecutive annual trawl through the year’s new albums in my Album of the Year 2024 – and a very eclectic bunch they have been.
2024 has been a really busy old year, hence no time for other blogs during the last twelve months, a trend I will be reversing next year having ‘retired’ from a number of other commitments in recognition of the fact that life is like a toilet roll – the more you use up, the less there is left! So apologies that this blog is a little later than usual but, like last year, it is along the lines of earlier ones and covers all aspects of my musical year.
So let’s start with the live gigs, of which there were a few more than recently – a trend we intend to continue moving forward. Our first in 2024 was Fever Ray, AoTY runner-up last year, at the Colston Hall in March – and yes, I do know it is now called the Be-a-con, but old habits die hard when they go all the way back to the mid-1960s. Great gig, and the band were every bit as good as the album. However, it was not the easiest to take pictures at because of the excessive backlighting, and being nagged by an usher to stop – really??!! It was our first time at the venue since their refurb, which is OK, but couldn’t really see where all those millions went. What they did spend on the new PA, however, was worth every penny!
Our next outing was in April to the Lyric Theatre in Shaftesbury Avenue for Hadestown – not so much a gig, as a revisiting of a concept album. The wonderful thing about music is you never know where a chance encounter may eventually lead. In 2010, I heard a track on the radio by an American folk singer named Anais Mitchell. I did a bit of research and eventually found it was from an album of hers, based on the Orpheus legend and titled Hadestown, but could not find a copy anywhere. Then a couple of years later, whilst staying with our daughter in San Francisco, I was browsing the racks of one of the many independent record stores on Market Street, and there it was – just one copy on an obscure label. So home it came across the pond, and by the end of the year I had made it my ‘One That Got Away’ in my 2012 annual roundup; I still play it regularly.
Fast forward to Boxing Day last year, and I was scrolling through the Ticketmaster site, looking for ways to spend the giftcards I had generously received from my kids the previous day, and up pops this musical called Hadestown. I didn’t know at that point, but it turns out that the album had been made into a stage production that took Broadway by storm, won all manner of awards, and here it was coming to the West End this year. So it had to be done! Now, those of you who know me well will know it is my other half who is the fan of musicals, not me. But I have to say this is probably the best musical I have ever seen (OK, out of a limited number that I had previously been reluctantly dragged-to) not just because the album is great anyway, but also because the performances and set are just superb. So, if you’re looking for something a bit different, give the album a listen – and if you like the album, then a trip to London may have to follow.
July was really busy with three gigs in just over two weeks. First to Cardiff Castle for Rick Astley – another from last year’s top ten. This is a really good outdoor venue, as long as the weather’s right which it was, and the gig was also excellent. On to the Halls in Wolverhampton, another super small venue since it was refurbished, for Garbage’s first tour in fifteen years. Shirley and the band were on top form, as you can see in the video below:
Then at the end of July it was the big one – The Boss at Wembley. This was the first time we have ever seen him live and it is one heck of a show, not in any small part due to the E Street Band who are simply formidible. We were warned to get there early because he never has support so, sure enough, spot on 7.15pm the gig started with Lonesome Day from his 2002 album The Rising. And so it continued for well over three hours, apparently breaking curfew at the end.
I say ‘apparently’ because there are times when you can have too much of a good thing, so we had decided to bale around 10pm, which meant that we just walked up Wembley Way to the underground station, straight onto a train and were back in our hotel in Shepherds Bush before most of the other 90,000 crowd were shouting ‘more!!’ 
In September we were back to the Be-a-con for Beverley Knight, touring another of last year’s top ten albums. I have said it before, but with a voice and a stage presence like that it is almost unbelievable that she is not an international superstar; but then if she was, we wouldn’t get to sit eight rows back from the stage in a 3000-seater to see her!
So finally to Joe Jackson in October. He is one of those artists I have been waiting to see for decades, so when tickets for a gig at the Forum in Bath popped up earlier this year, they were enthusiastically grabbed. I didn’t realise that it was part of the tour for his new album, his 21st, succinctly titled Mr. Joe Jackson presents: Max Champion in ‘What A Racket!’ What turned out to be an unmissable gig was in two parts, the first an unplugged solo set featuring a retrospect of his long career, including two of his three iconic singles from the late 70s/early 80s, Different for Girls and Steppin’ Out.
The second part was the new album, based on the story of Max Champion, a little-known Edwardian Music Hall performer, examples of whose sheet music, with surprisingly modern themes, had emerged in the last ten to fifteen years from dusty attics in Whitechapel to junk shops in the backstreets of Malta, to be collected together by Joe in this tribute album. The songs were performed in a totally-entertaining theatrical manner with a nine-piece music hall-style band, all dressed, like Joe, in Edwardian costumes, culminating in an encore featuring a music hall version of the third iconic hit Is She Really Going Out With Him. Of course, there is speculation that Max Champion never really existed, but that is of little consequence – because he does now!
Next to The One That Got Away – an album that would have made the top ten had I purchased it in the appropriate year, and which came belatedly to my radar in 2024. This year those albums covered more than fifty years, from soul band Black Ivory’s Don’t Turn Around from 1972 to several albums that came out last year. In the end, the accolade went to one of the latter – Windrush Baby by Aleighcia Scott.
Aleighcia is a reggae singer from Cardiff, who also has her own show on BBC Radio Wales. We saw her live when she impressed supporting Gentlemens Dub Club in Bristol early in 2023. This album was released that September, but it took me a while to get hold of a CD. But it was well worth the wait, and is a very accomplished production, with the tracks Hey World and Good Vibe well worth a listen – and can be found on my OTGA playlist here on Spotify.
For those of you new to this blog, the self-imposed criteria for my selections are that I must have a physical copy in my collection that has been purchased during the year, normally from my favourite independent record store, Sound Knowledge in Marlborough, the album’s UK release date has to be in the year being reviewed, and the list can contain no compilations or live albums. I compile a long list as the year progresses of albums that stand out from the crowd, then produce a short list for the final process.
Having said that compilations aren’t part of this process, that doesn’t mean I don’t buy them. Which means that, occasionally, some pop up that are worth a mention. So before we move on, here are two worth a visit:
The first is a tribute compilation of legendary singer-songwriter Nick Drake’s work. There was a previous attempt at this over twenty years ago, called Poor Boy but, although the result was very capable, the artists themselves were a bit obscure and so it did not gain the traction that, perhaps, it deserved. This latest album, The Endless Coloured Ways is performed and recorded by over thirty well-known artists from Fontaines DC to Bombay Bicycle Club, Ben Howard to Emile Sande. The brief was simple: re-interpret the material in your own individual way, re-imagine if you like, whilst maintaining Nick’s original melody and words. That this album brings them all to life so eloquently, despite each artist offering their own unique take on a timeless classic, is a huge testament to everybody involved.
The other is a Northern Soul compilation from Kent Records, celebrating forty years since their first album For Dancers Only hit the record shops with resounding success. This new CD For Dancers Forty revisits the catalogue of both the US Modern and Kent labels and features stompers, rhythm & blues rockers and group harmonies, including a previously unheard 1966 recording from Aaron Collins and The Teen Queens, and other underplayed tracks including my personal favourite on here, You’d Be Good For Me by Jeanette Jones – from a lost 1969 recording session.
As usual, I have acquired considerably more albums than are needed for a top ten, so the shortlisting process was quite difficult, particularly as some of these were from artists who have featured prominently in previous years. Early casualties included Foster the People’s Paradise State of Mind which starts really strongly, but peters out around halfway, and Alabama Shakes lead singer Brittany Howard’s second solo album What Now, where the lack of a question mark was not just in the title. This is also the point where English Teacher’s debut album, and surprise winner of the Mercury Prize, This Could Be Texas, fell out of the running. In reality it had stopped featuring on the player well before the ceremony, but made a brief reappearance afterwards simply to ascertain if I had missed something; I hadn’t.
As the process got to the sharper end, a number of old favourites fell by the wayside including Snow Patrol’s The Forest is the Path, Black Keys’ Ohio Players and Elbow’s Audio Vertigo – all very good albums, but just not quite up to this year’s standard. Two American bands worth a listen are California three-piece Thee Sacred Souls with their second album Got a Story to Tell which has a real ‘sixties soul vibe to it, and Little Rope by Sleater Kinney, a Washington Indie band who have been around, in various line-ups, for nearly thirty years without featuring on my radar before. Two English singer songwriters who have also come belatedly to notice through their latest albums are Lucy Rose with This Ain’t the Way You Go Out and Rosie Lowe with Lover, Other.
Next in this part of the round-up are four albums by long-standing artists who suddenly popped-up with something both new and fresh – not an easy feat these days. First is an old, old favourite, former Genesis guitarist Steve Hackett, who, in between releasing around thirty solo albums, has rehashed and repurposed his way through that band’s back catalogue over a number of years, performing the tracks live long after the rest of the band vacated the arena. As might be expected, the tracks on his latest album The Circus and the Nightwhale do not sound overly different from some of the others released over the last 45 years. However, this has something of a concept feel to it – never a problem for me as you know – to the point that, due to the evolutionary nature of the tracks, it may either be a homage to other bands of his era, or somewhat autobiographical. Or both, which makes a really good listen even more interesting.
Shed Seven’s first album was released thirty years ago, and A Matter of Time is their first release in nearly eight years. Similarly, Atlanta’s Black Crowes burst on the scene in 1992 with their superb second album The Southern Harmony and Musical Companion but although the follow-up Amorica made the UK top ten two years later, they simply faded away on this side of the pond. Now, three reformations later and fourteen years after their last album, Happiness Bastards, brought their driving rock style back to my player. Good ol’ rocking tracks worth checking out are Real Love from the former, and Rats & Clowns from the latter.
Beth Gi
bbons has flitted in and out of our musical lives for some thirty years since Portishead’s iconic Dummy album featured her plaintive vocals for the first time. The other two Portishead albums, perhaps unsurprisingly, never emulated that original, neither did the 2002 album she released with Talk Talk bass player Paul Webb under the moniker of Beth Gibbons and Rustin’ Man – despite one reviewer of the time describing it as ‘Billie Holiday fronting Siouxsie & the Banshees’. Finally, some twenty years later, we finally have her first solo album Lives Outgrown, .and what a delight it is, particularly for late-night listening.
Finally in this section I have to mention a debut album that just missed-out on the final cut – Pools of Colour by Junodream. They are currently based in Brixton, although Bristol features quite strongly in their history, and describe their sound as alternative space rock, and their influnces as Pink Floyd, Air, Spritualized and Radiohead. You can certainly hear the latter in the mix, along with some Coldplay, and there’s nothing wrong with that! The album is a really good listen and only just missed out of the final cut by a whisker. Fever Dream, Death Drive and Happiness Advantage are all tracks worth a listen.
So we come to that top ten, in no particular order until the top three:
Goat
Although I had heard the odd track over the years, this eponymous album is the first from this long-established Swedish band that I have actually acquired. There is a definite prog/psychedelic influence in their sound, as might be expected from a band who have a somewhat Bohemian commune history of line-up changes over several decades, and who perform in voodoo masks (one of which features on the cover). The masks are, apparently, a reference to their remote home village of Korpilombolo which, according to local legend, had a history of voodoo worship after a witch doctor came and lived there during medieval times. Supposedly, when Christian crusaders came and destroyed the village in the sixteenth century, the surviving people fled and placed a curse on the place. I suspect this may make you think this is not necessarily be to everyone’s taste, but try the first couple of tracks, One More Death and Goatbrain, and you may find yourself changing your view.
Lady Blackbird – Slang Spirituals
Readers may recall that Lady Blackbird, aka Marley Munroe from Farmington New Mexico, was last year’s ‘One That Got Away’ with her 2021 debut album, Black Acid Soul. That album primarily had a late-night feel to it, but this follow-up has a more upbeat feel, although still well-planted in sixties/seventies soul and gospel music, particularly the tracks Like a Woman, The City and and the gorgeous opener Let Not (Your Heart be Troubled). We have just been given tickets for her gig at the Be-a-con at the end of January, so expect a review of that early next year.
Dea Matrona – For Your Sins
This debut album from Belfast duo Orláith Forsythe and Mollie McGinn has a real country rock feel to it. Originally thrown together, reluctantly, in a school talent contest in 2017, they quickly recognised a mutual interest and started busking together. Having recruited Mollie’s younger sister to play drums, they began performing as a trio, but after academic demands restricted the younger sibling’s availability, they reverted to a duo using session musicians for live performances. They write all their own material so as they are still only in their mid-twenties, they have a big future ahead if this self-released debut is any indication.
Idles – Tangk
In my 2017 blog, I referred to Brutalism, the debut album from Bristol-based Idles, as ‘Hacked-off Punk’ because it had that angry edge to it that seemed to be somewhat lacking in most of the new music of the time. Subsequent albums did not feature here because the band did not seem to develop much, and began to sound a bit like a one-trick pony. However, their fifth album Tangk showcases them as anything but. Yes there is obvious continuity in tracks like the superb Gift Horse, but even that is just that little bit more polished than previously. But is the softer sound of tracks like Grace and A Gospel that, along with some string arrangements, show the influence of Radiohead’s producer Nigel Godrich in making this a real surprise package.
Nadine Shah – Filthy Underneath
Originally from Tyneside, but firmly based in London for a couple of decades, I first encountered Nadine Shah’s vocals on X Marks the Spot, the standout track on Ghostpoet’s album Shedding Skin which featured in my 2015 Top Ten. However, there was nothing on her two solo albums to that point that piqued my interest any further. This latest album, her fifth, is an altogether different proposition however. Rooted in a particularly difficult part of her life through, and since, the pandemic this is a tour de force on how to respond to such adversity, and a real illustration of how music acts as an aid to dealing even with the worst situations. Musically, the standout track is Greatest Dancer, but there are so many more tracks, such as Keeping Score and Sad Lads Anonymous where the lyrics speak more strongly.
Gossip – Real Power
I have been a fan of this band since their album Standing in the Way of Control featured in my top ten in 2006. In the intervening near-twenty years there have been splits and disappontments, as well as solo highlights like lead-singer Beth Ditto’s dance EP in 2011. The band reformed in 2019 for a tour, but split again when it ended with no new music emerging. Then in 2023 Beth invited the others to help her with a solo project that was not coming together as she had hoped. That collaboration grew into this album, their first for twelve years. Produced by Rick Rubin, it is a real return to form, meaning it is very difficult to nominate any particular stand out tracks, but Turn the Card Slowly, Edge of the Sun or the title track would all be a good starting point.
Supalung – I’m Alive
Supalung are a collaboration of two Bristol singer-songwriters, Sam Brookes and Pete Josef – although the latter has been working more recently in Carinthia, Southern Austria. Josef is also a producer, and it was while Brookes was helping him build a new studio in his Bristol house that this album began to be conceived. It is one of those albums with a unique sound that defies definition having emerged from such an accidental start. All of the tracks are good, but one, Mocking Bird, really stands out and is probably my favourite track of the year.
And so we reach the top three:
Pointy Features – Hill End
Pointy Features is the nom de guerre for Durham guitarist and producer Dan Leak. I have to confess that I didn’t know that when I heard what turned out to be the opening track from this album, Open Seas, for the first time on the radio. In fact I thought it must be either a new project, or a long lost track, from Paul Rodgers – the legendary lead singer of Free and Bad Company. Because not only does the album have the vibe of that era of rock music, but Dan Leak sounds uncannily similar. Maybe it’s to do with the area they both grew up in – Paul Rodgers is from Middlesborough. Hill End is quite short, the seven tracks totalling around half an hour overall. In fact, by modern standards this would probably be classed as an EP but, as I have often said, although they featured numerically more individual tracks, those albums from the ‘sixties that I chose as my early Albums of the Year were barely half an hour long in total themselves. Point being that all the tracks were quality, as is the case here – so pick any one you like as a sample.
Beyoncé – Cowboy Carter
So, when I first read that Beyoncé was about to release a country album, I must admit meeting the announcement with a high degree of incredulity. I mean, that would never work would it – because R&B singers have entirely different voices to country singers, don’t they? And that’s before you even consider the differences in their individual market demographics, and the potential for not only alienating your targeted new market, but also your grass roots support. And yet, here it is, not just in my top ten, but right up there – in fact, in any other year it may well have been right at the top of this list, such is the quality and range of all 23 tracks that have kept it on my player regularly since it arrived in March.
Of course, I doubt that Beyoncé will be overly-concerned about what happens in this little backwater of the music business, the eleven Grammy nominations being of far more significance. We will, of course, have to wait until February to find out how many of those she wins, but just one will eclipse the number of awards she won at the CMAs earlier this year, having not even received a single nomination. Many have written about the reasons for that, but I prefer to see it as a real accolade – so good is this album it really scared the pants off that particular establishment, having for so many years avoided innovation virtually to the point of luddism.
So if you haven’t yet listened to this album, take an hour or so off and give yourselves a treat. If you don’t have that amount of time, then good sample tracks are 16 Carriages and Bodyguard, both self-penned, and two covers – The Beatles’ Blackbird and Dolly Parton’s Jolene featuring Willie Jones. Either way, you will want to hear more.
Last Dinner Party – Prelude to Ecstasy
And here’s the reason why Beyoncé is not top of this particular tree this year – the album that has virtually dominated the player since being one of my first purchases all the way back in February (not an easy task as regular readers will attest) plus one of the best debut albums for a long, long time.
Last Dinner Party only formed in 2020. The initial three members, Abigail Morris (vocals), Lizzie Mayland (guitar) and Georgia Davies (bass) met at Kings College London, but their intial development was hampered by the pandemic, only starting to perform publically together late in 2021. The other two members Emily Roberts (lead guitar) and Aurora Nishevci (keyboards) attended the Guildhall School of Music, and joined the band during 2022. Initial performances were very raw, but as they performed more regularly they began to gel, and they were chosen to open for the Rolling Stones at their Hyde Park gig that summer.
They were signed to Island Records, and released a total of six singles through 2023 and early 2024, all of which feature on this album. Strangely only one, Nothing Matters, charted as a single, but that didn’t stop them building a formidible fan following, resulting in their winning the BBC’s Sound of 2024 Poll, and the Rising Star Award at the Brits. When this album was released, it went straight to number one in the album charts with the biggest opening week sales of any band in nearly a decade, and was the fastest-selling vinyl debut of any group this century. Having been nominated for the Mercury Prize, I expected that to be a shoe-in; that it didn’t win still amazes me.
No point in recommending specific tracks, because every track on this album is a good listen, and they fit perfectly together as a consistent listen. Which meets my criteria for a classic album, although only continued playing over an elapsed time of many years can procure that status, hence I very rarely refer in this annual roundup to even the potential for it – I think the last time was Coldplay’s Rush of Blood to the Head in 2002. Prelude to Ecstasy has every potential to fulfil such status in the years to come, in the same way that Last Dinner Party themselves, should they survive the pressures of the industry, and life in general, have every potential to be a huge band.
Too much? OK, but before making a judgement listen to the album a few times then, if you still really disagree, feel free to write your own blog. Otherwise, I hope you find something in this year’s round-up to enjoy!
I have compiled a playlist containing seventy-five of the best tracks from albums purchased during 2024, including the ones that didn’t make the shortlist. To stream the playlist on Spotify, click the logo below.
If you want to download or stream any of the individual albums mentioned, links are provided in the following table:
| Artist | Album | Stream | |
 | Last Dinner Party | Prelude to Ecstasy |  |
 | Beyoncé | Cowboy Carter | |
 | Pointy Features | Hill End | |
 | Supalung | I'm Alive | |
 | Gossip | Real Power | |
 | Various Artists | The Endless Coloured Ways | |
 | Aleighcia Scott | Windrush Baby | |