The Ziggy's: my top ten albums of 2024
Part one: Records that came out in 2024
Introduction
Some people do lists. Steve (Ziggy) Maycock and Steve (Stitch) Hitchcock do a top 100 songs of the year. Every year. I haven’t got the stamina to undertake a task like that, but I have come across some great albums in 2024 that I’d like to share with you.
So here are the Ziggy’s! My top ten albums. However, because I’ve listened to and loved a vast amount of new music this year, I’ve set three simple rules for myself – otherwise the whole thing could run away with me!!
The list shall be a top ten only – counting down from 10 to 1 - with 1 being my album of the year. Note: I could have done more (and there is an honorary mentions list too) but, like I said, things run away…
The albums on it must have been acquired by me as a physical or digital entity, rather than just streamed. Note: If I’ve bought it, there is a reason for that, so I think of this as a kind of awards shortlist… If I haven’t bought it, then there’s also a reason…
For this list, Part 1, the albums must have been released in the year in question - in this case, 2024. Note: I’ve discovered a lot of music from before 2024 this year, so am trying to keep it clean… see below for my get-out clause…
A bunch of 2024 records didn’t make the Final Cut. I’ve put some of them in an Honorary Mentions section at the end. I’m also preparing a second top ten of other albums discovered this year. That list - Part 2 - will be music discovered in 2024, but released in earlier years…
Is that all geeky enough for you?
The Final Cut
10. Khruangbin – A La Sala
I’ve had my eyes and ears on Texan band, Khruangbin, for a while, but somehow never really got round to listening to much more than a few songs here and there. Yet, they’re a band that people have been raving about; a band that should be right up my street. A three piece, driven by the deep and intuitive bass work of Laura Lee Ochoa, along with her two bandmates, guitarist Mark Speer and drummer DJ Johnson. With their myriad of influences, the word ‘fusion’ was probably coined for this band! As their profile says on Secretly Store:
Khruangbin has always been multilingual, weaving far-flung musical languages like East Asian surf-rock, Persian funk, and Jamaican dub into mellifluous harmony.
Their previous album, Mordechai, was funky and gorgeous, the lead single - Time (You and I) from that album is well worth a listen. Their 2024 album is very different – a quieter thing altogether. Gentler, more reflective and jazzy, A La Sala is a record to sink into. The symbiotic interaction between the trio is still there though – born out of years playing live all around the world. Basically this record crept up on me to get into my top ten albums of the year. This surprised me a little! However, I do know I will listen to it time and time again and it deserves to be there…
The video for A Love International is one of my favourites of the year too – funny, joyous, warm and romantic…
Favourite track: A Love International
9. Bronski Beat - The Age of Consent
I make the rules. I stick to them. And my own rules don’t say nothing about reissues. Hence, The Age of Consent, which I first owned on a battered cassette tape since back when it was released in 1984. The cassette got lost somewhere along the way, or played to death. One of the two. Anyway, when I heard the Bronski’s were releasing the record on its 40th anniversary, it was straight on my wanted list.
I’ll write more about Jimmy Somerville at some stage as I’ve loved his music and voice all the way through from the release of Smalltown Boy, his work with The Communards and beyond. I can’t hear that song or watch the video without a flood of nostalgia - and a flood of gratitude that, in some parts of the world anyway, it is easier to be queer. However, we also need to remember (and there’s a reminder on the reissue sleeve notes) that in over 50 countries worldwide, homosexuality is still criminalised. A short documentary to coincide with the release tells us Why?…1
In short, the record is still, after four decades, a great unashamedly gay pop record and a necesssary call to arms.
A sad thing is that Steve Bronski didn’t get to see its re-release: he died, aged 62, in 2021. A strange thing is that in 2017, a new version of the album, entitled The Age of Reason was released with updated version of the songs, a couple of new ones and a new vocalist. It was never clear why, and it wasn’t highly rated, so the definitive version is still the 1984 record or, in this case, the 40th anniversary package which includes the original album and the remix EP Hundreds and Thousands.
Favourite track: Smalltown Boy
8. Micky Greaney – And Now All This
Another re-issue, or rather an issue that never got issued in the first place. The songs that make up this release were recorded over two sessions in 1995 and ‘96, with a couple of bonuses from a BBC session in 1996. Greaney had released a debut album two years earlier, but this second one never saw the light of day - until now. 2
It’s a strangely timeless record, and sounds quite unlike much of the mid-nineties indie that was dominating at the time. As my friend, Phil commented “Look at me now and Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow make me think George Harrison/Travelling Wilburys kind of vibe. (and that’s a good thing IMO)”. I know what he means, though I think Look At Me Now has a bit of The Verve about it. In truth, all the songs have a classic, almost epic feel to them and the songwriting is really strong. It feels like someone at the top of his game and, like all great albums, it has a trajectory. From the strings-led Overture to the beautiful Stop Breaking My Heart, this was always going to be an excellent set. Add the three BBC recorded tracks and you have a classic.
This was one of my finds of the year, and I can thank the great curator of all things folk and funk, Paul Hillery, who put out a post on Instagram, simply stating “YOU NEED THIS ! Go to Bandcamp and buy this album”. I’ll echo that sentiment. You can find it here:
Favourite track: Look At Me Now
7. Tim Reaper and Kloke – In Full Effect
This one crept in almost at the last minute. I saw this on a list of five star albums you might have missed in the excellent Guardian music pages. I’ve since picked up a couple of these to check out, but as a fan of 90s Drum and Bass, In Full Effect really jumped out, and I ordered the vinyl double album straight away.
Everything we love about Jungle and D & B from back in the day is in this record. The tunes are awesome and, from the first chiming echoes that reminded me of the Logical Progression and Promised Land series from back in the day, I was hooked. However, it’s not just a hark back to the good old days (though there’s plenty of that going on!) the album is brilliantly and thoughtfully put together and has a very 21st century feel to it – even as you hear deeply familiar samples, piano riffs and breakbeats circling in and out of the mix.
South East London's Tim Reaper and Kloke from Victoria, Australia are the producers on this album, and I’m anxious to follow up more of their collaborations. Most of the Drum and Bass I’ve listened to over the past couple of years has been from the excellent Hospital Records, so its good to branch out and get something a bit different, from Hyperdub, a label previously known for its experimental dance and electronic (and for being the home of Burial). This is apparently the label’s first Jungle release. Let’s hope there’s lots more to come!
Favourite track (so far): Continuities
6. Underworld - Strawberry Hotel
From the new-old to the old-new. Underworld have been a fixture of British dance culture since Born Slippy and beyond, through the 2012 Olympics soundtrack and national treasure status, and on to their brilliant, generous Drift project in which they released weekly tracks and remixes. As they put it: “DRIFT is an ongoing experiment that will regularly publish new Underworld material.” It’s very worthwhile checking Drift out, and signing up for their other regular ‘drops’ and ‘freebies. I’m not sure that many people know about that side of their output… Suffice to say that their YouTube channel is a treasure trove of videos and work in progress.
Anyway, Strawberry Hotel is a great album. Brilliantly put together, and meant to be listened to as a full piece, it’s full of familiar sounding bangers like denver luna and surprising beauties like Black Poppies. Beyond these early single releases however, there’s loads more goodies spread over four sides of vinyl. Lovely stuff! Dance music!!
Big fish, little fish, cardboard box!!!
Favourite track (today, it changes with each listen): Techno Shinkansen
5. Fold – We Do Not Forget
Fold is a Leeds based collective, headed up by Seth Mowshowitz, that I’ve been following for sometime. Their excellent debut, Fold, came out in 2015 and was a unique mixture of spoken word samples and hip-hop, jazz-funk influenced, down-tempo production, with the occasional rap provided by Leeds poet, Mr Gee. The full band comprises Sam Hutchison, James Child, Seth Mowshowitz and Phil Hepworth. Their online biography says this about their raison d’être:
By incorporating a wide range of voices including MCs, poets, historical speakers and singers into our music, we aim to amplify humanitarian perspectives and critical reflections on today’s world. Through doing so we also hope to help keep spaces open for speaking freely and truthfully.
The samples they use are often from radical American voices – mostly black activists and poets. Their 2021 album, Aphelion, for example was a tribute to Lorraine Hansberry, the African-American playwright. This latest album, We do not forget, was released as a CD with a 28 page hand-illustrated zine that includes a long essay by Seth, with illustrations by his daughter and partner. It is his most personal and intimate work yet, and in his essay he reflects upon the horrors of war, the iniquities of our world and the rabbit holes of neurodiversity. On the album, meanwhile, there are words and samples by writers and activists such as Alice Walker, bel hooks, Noam Chomsky, Richard Bach, Gwendolyn Brooks, Michael Ruppert, Frederick Douglas and the aforementioned Mr Gee.
Seth weaves family, politics, activism, literature and a deep visceral care for the world into his work with Fold. The music comes over as deeply committed, but never preachy (to my ears anyway), and even if it was a bit polemical, someone needs to be saying these things in the “Shit So Crazy” days we live in.
Favourite track: Dark Matters (with Mr Gee)
4. Audrey Powne – From the Fire
Another late find, this time I think from a Bandcamp playlist recommendation. This album was released by the impressive label BBE (Barely Breaking Even!) which also released Paul Hillery’s We Are The Children Of The Sun compilations and his upcoming third Folk Funk and Trippy Troubadours compilation, together with a host of other Jazz, Funk and Soul past, lost and future classics. BBE’s blurb on Australian musician, composer and producer, Audrey Powne’s debut album begins: “Audrey Powne’s stunning debut album, From The Fire, is set to be one of those must have LPs in any music lover’s collection.”
On my first listen I had to agree. It’s full of gorgeous songs and arrangements, with Audrey’s exquisite trumpet playing on several of the track. It is a gorgeous piece of work. Jazz, yes. Soul, yes – but loads of other influences too. As well as the album itself, there are some great remixes to go with it (one of which, Feed the Fire, I linked to in a recent Listening2… post).
Powne wrote the album while living back home in Melbourne during the Pandemic. She talked about in an interview with Mixdown Mag in April of this year:
I was obsessively watching the news in Melbourne as I think we all were, and a story came on about the beginning of regeneration and regrowth of native trees quite literally from the ashes of the devastating bushfires of 2019. I became obsessed with this idea of rebirth and rejuvenation and through the cathartic writing of this album I feel I was able to somewhat manifest my own rebirth, healing and regeneration into a new season of my life. I’ve never written anything so deeply personal.
This could have easily been my album of the year... highly recommended!
Favourite track: Indigo (I could have chosen almost any of them!)
3. MRCY - Volume One
Getting close now. The purpose compiling this list was to highlight the albums I’ve loved and been committed to this year. Any of the top three or four in this list could have been my album of the year and, as a seasoned soul-boy, I couldn’t resist MRCY’s Volume One, an eight track wonder of brilliant, bass driven funk, and I’ve played this album as much as anything since I received it from the marvellous Secretly Store (the home of some of the best music I’ve heard over the last couple of years - you can get a digital version on Bandcamp too)
MRCY is a collaboration between producer (and bassist) Barney Lister and vocalist Kojo Degraft-Johnson, who met ‘online’ during lockdown. Their music has a feel of the new British soul fusion being forged by Sault and other artists, and their video of their live session, Live From The Mildmay Club is definitely my music film of the year. I’ve posted it before, on a Listening2… post, but you can find it again in the bonuses below!3
Favourite track: any of them, but here’s California
2. Beth Gibbons - Lives Outgrown
In June the year, when I completed my second Oddfinds profile piece on Beth Gibbons, I’d more or less chosen this record as my album of the year. Here was the enigmatic Portishead lead singer and intrepid interpreter of Henryk Gorecki’s Symphony No 3, Symphony of Sorrowful Songs on one of the best ever classical crossover albums (IMHO), producing new music for the first time in many years.
In the past two decades she’d had two other excellent releases – with Rustin Man in 2002 and the third Portishead release in 2008 and then nothing more until, that is, the stunning Lives Outgrown came out in May this year. Over the summer, the record was seldom off my turntable, and I loved watching and listening the filmed and recorded sessions that have appeared on YouTube and the BBC. Putting this list together has necessitated another listen to the record, of course. Listening to it again fresh, it actually reminds me of the 1990s Portishead albums, in its tone and experimental feel. It’s a piece in which the instrumental ensemble – mainly acoustic - does a similar kind of job that the electronics did on those classic trip-hop albums. And right there in the mix is Beth Gibbons voice, as deep, wonderful and mysterious as it ever was.
It’s as good an album as I could hope to hear in any year, and for a long time I felt sure it would be my top album of 2024. It’s certainly essential, though I’ve actually gone elsewhere for my Ziggy’s Lament number one! Not that I think, Beth Gibbons will mind…
Favourite track: Oceans
1. Rona Mac – Honeymilk and Heavy Weather
My album of the year for 2024 is a beautiful record from a local artist to me, with a growing profile and, now, this gorgeous, heartbreaking set of songs. In some way, Rona Mac’s Honeymilk and Heavy Weather shares qualities with Beth Gibbons’s album. Listen to Oceans (above) from Gibbons, and then to a song like Rona’s Darling, and you might hear what I mean. There’s questions of grief and meaning in both, deeply and quietly addressed though, not shouted out from revelatory rooftops, and beautifully played and produced.
Back in the Autumn when I saw Rona play a couple of time at the Boia Festival, it was at the end of her UK tour to launch this album. Her gig in a packed Tabernacl felt like a coming home triumph (or relief!), and she was rapturously received. Soon after that she was in Belgium back playing more small room gigs and appearing on a radio session. It’s this commitment to her craft, and playing live over the past few years that has led, in my view, to her delivering an album of this quality. The songwriting is exceptional and mature; her live sets relaxed and accomplished.
The second set I saw her play at Boia, in the Grain pizza cafe in St David, she’d almost lost her voice, but the affectionate connection with her audience was clear, and she carried on playing, keeping up the humour, and impressing with the quality of her guitar playing and mastery of the sample and loop pedals that make her solo work so distinctive.
The record itself is dedicated to the memory of Rona’s friend, Emily, who died in 2020. It’s heartbreaking in places, but never loses sight of the love at the heart of it. Grief is faced head on, and Rona’s lyrics read like a grizzled wise old country singer at times, with a deep knowledge of what life and death can mean:
Oh life and death's a funny old thing We gamble like we know we're gunna win Even though the table's on the spin
There’s more to Rona and her music to explore and write about. Meanwhile, like me, she lives in a beautiful place. And beneath beauty there’s always something darker. That’s just life, and it takes a proper poet, and a brilliant musician, to capture this contradiction. Rona’s done it with this album. It is, I believe, a great record. It deserves to be massive…
You can get it from here. Please buy a CD or digital album. Artists like Rona aren’t playing the Albert Hall or Glastonbury or living off royalties and they need support – particularly when they’ve just produced an album of the year!
Favourite tracks: My favourite song of the year, Darling, comes from this album. I’ve posted it before but you’re getting it again because I love it – and another track too, her latest video, Seafront Room:
Honorary mentions:
OK, there were albums this year that didn’t make the cut (or didn’t meet all my arbitrary rules!), but that I really enjoyed and want to hear more of – and maybe even have in my collection if funds and space allow. All these were 2024 releases though, so thumbs up to rule three! In no particular order:
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Wild God: This nearly made my top ten. There were reasons why not and they’re the same as the reasons why it was nearly in there… I enjoyed all of it, so why don’t I love this record as much as I should? Confusing. A future post on the problematic and brilliant Mr Cave will be forthcoming: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_l8uUel5F20D4jrp7lHNLYgQyw1MZL0ORY
Sault - Acts of Faith: strictly speaking, this should have been in the top ten, but the physical record is currently only on pre-order. A free digital version was released this year (see my piece on Sault HERE), but until it’s in my hand, I think it’s a borderline rule breaker. It’s brilliant though… https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nHpQxcZd-eElt1exiug-7QnjXw829IFkw
Goat Girl – Below the Waste: If I had this in my collection, and I will one day, it would have been there or thereabouts. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_krNjZUT2ZfsBj_iwcPYtR0CU4JpyL170U&si=j9QCfMp2os-Udj_1
The Unthanks - In Winter: I love The Unthanks, and everything they do. This album is up there with their best, and is among the best winter albums ever. They are never less that brilliantly adventurous: https://www.the-unthanks.com
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_m0Gu0ptMhPBJw5x89Ap_x9y_d02xrEcRw&si=u6aSoLCH0xtL2RaT
The Cure - Songs of the Lost World: a definitely, maybe for me. When the first single came out I was mesmerised. When the album came out I was very impressed. When they did their three hour marathon gig at the Troxy… well… https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLiN-7mukU_RGGEJ5tii20IVQaMi0g1RqJ&si=ZmnNzem4NDSLC23Z
Gillian Welsh and David Rawlings - Woodland: another close contender and a record I am very fond of. As a fan of Welsh’s early records, it’s wonderful to hear the connection to and development from those songs. Highly recommended and ‘Americana album of the year’ if I had a category for that - which I don't: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_mOiAxF0i96QgwRMCQ9nKB52MAJ2EkSQNk&si=sI33eODZNC4JOE97
Taylor Swift – The Tortured Poets Society: In the earlier part of 2024, I spent a lot of time talking to my 12 year old granddaughter about this record. Sharing favourite tracks and commiserating with her about not getting tickets for the Eras tour. We watched the film together though. It is brilliant - as is this album: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nHp0eyey7jk72rkbes6rVYFLohYBEkFFQ&si=xrAD0Tm9Z9A5h2KW
Nia Archives – Silence is Loud: Drum & Bass is having another day in the sun. It’s never gone away of course, but every so often new artists break through into the mainstream (see also Tim Reaper & Kloke above) and remind us how brilliant a genre it is. I played this a lot earlier in the year: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_lu7xm1GSJpGlMM1DBf3kgUkrwlvQ09jRA
Mabe Fratti - Sentir que no sabes: The debut album by Guatemalan cellist, Mabe Fratti, it’s as unusual as you might expect, and a brilliant record that was high on my wanted list earlier this year: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_lN5Jo9hMEMS1txsMurbY250yHxhnwCJDQ&si=f4ZQzQt8Kei_OuDc
Nadine Shah - Filthy Underneath: an early frontrunner for record of the year for me. A brilliant, raw, honest album with awesome songs. What’s not to like? https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvsYXqtYjMYe8W4fiCBA0vNV0sawxGNS3&si=opTHW9JxNsIrl-tQ
Warrington-Runcorn New Town Development Plan – Your Community Hub: I got into a lot of DIY electronic this year; and this was one of the best of the 2024 releases. I love Gordon Chapman-Fox’s description of the WRNTDP project as: “Music for a broken concrete utopia”: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_ll0MhmW6lkCBPN_7T1KsztUhHpyU43F8k&si=uEtxpHbVA5rMSuQ6
Bodega – Our Brand Could Be Yr Life: I saw New York hardcore band, Bodega at the Boia Festival and was mightily impressed. Their album has featured on my playlists since. It’s a grower too: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLogBMFZ09d_cxMu1J6EL43NVGBhyA7TqQ&si=YDJk-Exon2yalYlP
Patrick Carpenter – Electric Envelope: these lists are all about music I enjoyed and listened to a lot. For me that included my friend and fellow Unpsychology editor, Patrick Carpenter’s brilliant electronic album which is, as he puts it: “All deeply embedded in the armchair with a nod and a wink to the dancefloor.” It’s not on YouTube so you can get it from here on Bandcamp:
Bonus 1: The re-release of The Age of Consent was marked with a short documentary from London Records: “This documentary tells a story of resilience, power, community and solidarity using Bronski Beat’s enduring anthem ‘Why?’ as its thematic spark point. The short film honours those who speak up and put themselves on the line for the sake of love - those in the frontlines often being the most at risk.” It’s age-restricted so you’ll have to go to YouTube to watch it…
Bonus 2: Micky Greaney’s first album, Little Symphonies for the Kids, was released in 1994, and isn’t available at the moment. There is, however, a two part film of the sessions that made up the album that has been restored on YouTube. I’m hoping that one day the first album will come to light and be released as well as And Now All This. The film is a bit scratchy and is in two parts, but its an archive gem:
Bonus 3: My music video of the year, if I had such a category in the shambling, randomness that is Ziggy’s Lament, is MRCY’s Live From The Mildmay Club. Soulful, funky and full of joy – and cool as f**k…