Bright Future, though, is not only her most impressive solo album to date, but it’s also a genuine competitor for the best album she’s ever been involved with.

It’s a respectable collection of bluesy rockers that showcase the brothers’ strengths.

Musgraves’ most sonically cohesive album to date, every song pulling from the same muted, pastel palette. And yet, there is still enough variation to keep things interesting from song to song.

In a discography saturated with ambient anthems and frenetic energy, CAPRISONGS brilliantly brandishes the talent of an artist constantly looking for her next high.

It is precisely this linkage between systematized death and riches that makes the album such a mortifying listen and perhaps the most essential of 2024.

Because of this seeming resistance against leaving their comfort zone, Bleachers becomes so opaque it practically evaporates by the time you finish it.

The album succeeds wholly on its immediacy, and both its soundscapes and directionless lyrics slap you in the face with its message. It’s impossible to listen to The Collective without knowing exactly what Kim Gordon is talking about.

Mannequin Pussy’s map of utopia may span uneven terrain, but the band dominates every inch of it, forging cohesive paths between harsh and heavenly melodies. The feat renews one of punk’s lasting tenets for a new era of activism: to protect what’s precious—freedom, community or otherwise—you usually have to raise a little hell.

That tension between fun and miserable is perfect for love songs, and the ones on Playing Favorites revel in it.

She’s embracing herself, her heartbreak, her sarcasm and taking time to dance, slowly, with her feelings.

There’s such a charming muscle being flexed here that you might not even immediately realize that, beneath massive hooks, Yard Act are performing an exorcism on the ever-so universal fixation creatives have on shit-talk outmaneuvering praise.

On their debut, Friko have cemented themselves as one of the most distinguished up-and-coming voices in all of indie-rock.

If anything, the group has gotten better at keeping the subtlety of their music, and their lyrical sentiments, from straying over the line into dull.

The record signifies the formidable maturation of Hughes’ career and pop prowess. Allie X can masquerade as the Girl With No Face all she wants—but there’s no hiding this album’s serious legs.

It’s Nance’s best work yet; who knew all he had to do was ham up his own sublime talents to get there.

While Loss of Life still gives no compelling answer to the question “Who is MGMT?,” it also doesn’t need to. The album makes it obvious that the duo are most at home behind the boards, uniting their musical memories from Oasis to Roxy Music.

Whether it’s Timony’s perplexing lyrical delivery, unconventional rhythms or some instrumental surprises, every song on Untame the Tiger induces some head-scratching, more often to its benefit than not.

Hurray for the Riff Raff not only expands the umbrella of “Americana”; it challenges the very structures on which we hang it, and the legacies of pain that accompany them.

CRAWLER, especially, reads like a love album—a demonstration of the hard work and self-reflection required to be the most loving version of yourself. Talbot’s integrity could be felt on every beat. But TANGK boils love down so much it’s not clear if there’s anything there at all.

GRIP is a vulnerable collection of songs made for heat-of-the-moment intimacy—and everything that comes before, during and after. It’s also serpent’s most instantly replayable album to date.

Souvenir never feels nostalgic. It’s too fast-paced, with only one song extending past three-and-a-half seconds. It’s too brisk, mechanical and brittle to deal in memories. The album shines when it delivers those high-octane moments of rock. These are no souvenirs; they’re gifts for the present.

Think of the best moments throughout the Grandaddy discography and you will rarely praise them for their consistency. Blu Wav is nothing of the sort, and frustratingly so. By Lytle’s own accounting, seven of the 13 songs on the album are waltzes, which, it turns out, might be far too many waltzes. The lonesome, ambling tone works on a few occasions.

Each performance is lucid and brutal, rattling audiences with its unstoppable fervor. Sometimes it’s hard to envision this adolescent version of Sonic Youth while knowing what’s to come for them, but it makes for an all the more enthralling listen as we imagine how it must have felt to be on the precipice of greatness.

Weird Faith is a level up in every regard for Madi Diaz, and it’s hard to see a world where it doesn’t accomplish the goal of raising her profile.

There’s a confidence and vulnerability Brittany Howard fearlessly reveals on this album, which is more adventurous and riskier than Jaime.

She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She finds Chelsea Wolfe at her most creative while reviving her particular, audacious and revered brand of dark storytelling. Every piece of the record finds a way to tie into the themes at its core while still pushing Wolfe’s own sound forward in earnest.

It’s exciting to see an artist lean into their intuition and embrace their own creative influences—and that shines through on What Happened To The Beach? in a compelling way—but the album as a whole seems to be figuring itself out alongside its listeners.

These songs sink their hooks into you immediately and, by the time you realize your foot is tired from tapping, the tracklist is three, four notches ahead of where you once were. And that is because Ducks Ltd. have such an acute knack for lulling worn-in, familiar pop tropes into exciting, bright and trebly guitar-forward arrangements. Harm’s Way is frenetic and warm, seamless yet meticulous.