It’s that time of year again — a moment in which I can sit down and reflect on both the days passed by and the songs that helped me through them. Fortunately for me, 2024 has been the greatest year of my life.
I got married in September, and I’ve been told by many around me that I’m blatantly happier. I know my smiles are now genuine. Another sign is my Spotify Wrapped showed my music listening minutes were down substantially for the year — I barely crossed 50,000, while last year I nearly hit 65,000 and in years past I was always over 80,000. I listen to music most weekdays while I’m working, so that tells me I’m actually living when I’m away from my desk. But that doesn’t mean music means any less to me these days and that these songs on my list don’t affect me nearly as much.
It just means I’ve found a happy balance between needing to feel and the methods with which I do that. My wife has taught me to explore what’s around me, and we travel quite consistently, which has opened me to a new world. I still love music and know it’ll always be there for me when I need it, but I also now know I’m not wholly dependent on it for catharsis.
Anyway, here is the music that stayed with me through this life-changing year. My top 10 songs from 10 different artists:
10. “Perfect Soul” by Spiritbox
This is the third consecutive year that Spiritbox has appeared on my year-end list, and as long as they continue to consistently release music (their next LP comes out in 2025, lucky me), I don’t foresee that changing any time soon. Boxies — fans of the band, that is — love to argue about what avenues the prog-metal quartet should take when it comes to their sound, and I think “Perfect Soul” encapsulates them at their best: a seamless blend of heaviness and ethereal melodies. (My favorite Spiritbox song is, probably controversially, “Constance,” so this argument would hopefully make sense to any other Boxies out there). Frontwoman Courtney LaPlante goes into the idea of self-perception and obsessing over someone who has made it clear doesn’t care about you. She works her way through recovering from it with sickly sweet melodic flows against blistering guitar riffs from husband/lead guitarist Mike Stringer. It’s a great song to start with if you’re looking to dive into the djent/post-hardcore world, especially if you consider its sister single, “Soft Spine,” is the band’s heaviest song to date.
9. “Silver Sable” by Cigarettes After Sex
On the opposite side of the sonic spectrum is “Silver Sable,” an exquisitely atmospheric track from the creator of my ninth favorite song of all time. One of the things you learn quite early on in the Cigarettes After Sex world is every song is comparable in terms of sound (airy, delicate, levitating-bound) and content (intimate, full of feeling). And that’s fine with me, because the dream pop trio clearly found the formula on how to make a magical song and knew they had to stick with it. Frontman Greg Gonzalez knows this relationship is only temporary, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t feel anything for the woman he’s holding. They’re clearly not nervous with each other, either — “And when we kiss, we don’t need to close our eyes in the dark at all” — and just want to drown in the intimacy of the moment together. A winding guitar loops atop Gonzalez’s soft pleas, and it’s a world you can easily melt into if you let yourself.
8. “to be seen” by Searows
Phoebe Bridgers, is that you? Though Alec Duckart, the man behind Searows, has subdued vocals that mirror that of the indie folk phenom, his artistry is distinct. He started gaining traction on TikTok at the peak of COVID-19 — most people have heard “House Song” as a sound on the app — and he continues to get better. Enter his latest EP, flush, and what I think is the hidden gem: “to be seen.” Duckart sits reflective as he bounces from one piano key to the next, trying to do whatever he can to be understood — even if that means completely ridding himself of his true identity. It’s certainly not meant to have a happy ending, with no indication of a solution or even what happens next, but you have to believe he gives in to the need to fit in. It’s stark, breathtaking and incredibly real.
7. “Drunk” by Maggie Rogers
I didn’t enter 2024 as a Maggie Rogers “stan,” but I’m definitely leaving as one. I have always casually liked her — tracks like “Love You For A Long Time” and “Light On” are alt-pop classics! — but it wasn’t until I saw her live at her hometown show in June that I fully understood how incredible she is. She sounds light years better live, and her concert is one of the most energetic shows I’ve ever had the pleasure of witnessing. Her second song of the night, “Drunk,” embodied that charisma. As she navigates utter independence for the first time, she compares the feeling to being drunk, finding yourself lost in the moment with total jubilation and realizing this is the beginning of a thrilling adventure. I’d advise any on-the-fence fans to get tickets to the next Maggie show and see what a live experience can do for your perception.
6. “KID AGAIN” by Jon Bellion
Finally, the king is back. I’ve been waiting for Jon Bellion to drop his own music for what seems like forever now; “Glory Sound Prep,” though brilliant, certainly wasn’t enough to hold me over for the last six years. His absence is excused, though — he’s been fighting over his masters for several years, and now that his contract has been reversed, he’s free to make the music he truly wants. Over a crunchy beat pad, Bellion makes a call to his younger self, letting him know the time finally does come when he can express himself authentically again. He employs AI to ask “What happened to your light?” as he weaves through his journey of battling with his record company and finally obtaining ownership of his songs. It’s not Bellion’s greatest song to date, but he’s also never made a bad track — and if it’s even half of the full-length album fans are anticipating soon, then I will be more than satisfied.
5. “Staying” by Lizzy McAlpine
Lizzy McAlpine may or may not be mentioned later as a track feature, so this can stand. Fresh off her breakout album, five seconds flat, and the uber-hit “ceilings,” a song I considered one of my all-time favorites before it took the world by storm, the alt-pop singer-songwriter decided to strip down her music even further. Though her latest album, Older, didn’t get as much attention, I’m absolutely here for it. She homes in on a sound I’ve loved — wispy, acoustic, dreamy all the way through — since I discovered the way music can make me feel, and “Staying” checks all the boxes and more (it is my top song on my Spotify Wrapped this year, after all). It starts out with just a quiet piano and reflection on a toxic relationship before a Weyes Blood-esque lap steel whisks her held-out vocals into a soundscape chock full of dreamy harmonies and reassurance that leaving is the best thing to do. It is absolutely a song best enjoyed by listening yourself rather than reading about it; my words can’t hold a candle to its beauty.
4. “Death by a Thousand Cuts – Feat. Lucas Woodland” by Imminence
I am approximately half of the 1.2 million streams this song has on Spotify. Holding Absence (another staple of my list) didn’t release any music this year, but put frontman Lucas Woodland on any song and it’s bound to become gold. That’s exactly what happened with Swedish metalcore group Imminence on “Death by a Thousand Cuts,” a poignant look at life through the lens of someone who can’t seem to escape pain. In years prior, this track may be even higher — I used to feel like this a lot more — but the vocal delivery alone shot this song to number four. Woodland perfectly bounces off Eddie Berg’s pleas that he’s dying ever so slowly, asking “Do you bleed for something / Or will you die for nothing?” Sharp guitar licks accent Berg’s pain as he shows, not tells, how the shots are killing him — “one by one by one.” Lyrics like “What’s the point of living life on the edge of a knife?” are enough to make me stop in my tracks, but this five-and-a-half-minute track absolutely flies by, not even allowing me enough time to digest the astounding story within it.
3. “Ribcage” by Kevin Atwater
If you had asked me my predictions for my 2024 list at the end of last year, this never would’ve crossed my mind. In fact, I didn’t even know Kevin Atwater was a person until around March, and now, I can’t get enough. I found him mindlessly one night while scrolling through TikTok, and I’ve been bewitched ever since by his sad-yet-sonically-fun story of a one-sided relationship on “Ribcage.” While Kevin cares almost too much about his partner, his counterpart turns to poking fun at him for his deep emotional investment any time his overzealousness gets the best of him. Knowing it’s the only thing that really gets them interacting with him, Kevin allows it: “Come on, baby / Tell it again / I love the part where I look stupid.” It cuts deep for anyone who’s been in a toxic or half-hearted affair, or who accidentally caught feelings in the midst of a casual relationship. Even though Kevin sings this mostly dejected, the pain is incredibly palpable.
2. “Paranoid” by Hippo Campus
Hippo Campus is one of the first bands I ever truly loved, and while I haven’t been the biggest fan of the alt quintet’s last couple projects, “Paranoid” is a song I feel like I’ve been waiting my life for. You can’t start a track with “Do I love you, or am I just too afraid to leave?” and not catch someone’s attention. The song seems to detail the fear and utter paralysis that can come with anxiety and not knowing what’s exactly out there in the world, but I continue to stay with the first verse — knowing when the time is right to leave a bad relationship (I wish I had this song a few years back). Couple the moving lyrics with Jake Luppen’s slippery delivery when it comes to listing brutal adjectives to describe just how terrified he is of the world, and you have a buzzing track that will stay in your mind for days on end. In a musical landscape that continues to churn out sad songs with increasingly fun sonic elements, this stands out among the top.
1. “For Sale Sign (feat. Lizzy McAlpine)” by Tiny Habits
I told you McAlpine would be back — and for good reason. This song by Tiny Habits, a trio of singer-songwriters from Berklee College of Music, where McAlpine also attended for a while, made me sit down and stop what I was doing. On its surface, the track details someone who doesn’t know what to do upon hearing the news that their neighbor died, knowing (1) they don’t know what awaits them and (2) their routine of watching them in the garden and hearing their car engine start every morning has gone to dust. It’s a weird thing to live on without someone, suddenly finding yourself missing their quirks that you never really noticed before, but it’s even weirder when it forces you to think about what’s next for yourself as well. McAlpine says it best with her feathery vocals: “I hope to God you got let off easy / And that there’s someone out there just waiting for you to arrive / I look at the sky sometimes and think about endings.” A shiver goes through me even just reading those words. The world moves on for this group, though, as a for sale sign goes up, another family will move in and new routines will begin. But the impact someone has, even if it was minimal, is everlasting, and this song tells that in such a mindblowingly poignant way. I won’t stop listening to this for a while. Give it a whirl and you’ll see why.
Bre Callahan 