What your favourite album of 2024 says about you
Not a judgement on the albums themselves, but on the people who love them
It’s December. You’ve looked at your Spotify wrapped, you’ve considered what it says about your tastes, and you’ve set about a corrective mission for your own personally curated end-of-year lists.
There’s every chance your most-played album of 2024 isn’t your favourite from the last 12 months. There’s also every chance it isn’t even one from 2024. One of my top-five most played was ‘Supercut’ by Lorde, and I won’t be making apologies for this.
Back in 2017, I wrote my first albums of the year piece for ShortList. I won’t share it here, because their backend changes mean articles from that era are full of dead images, but you can read the 2023 version on my Medium here. That’s got links for the earlier ones, like a Russian doll that gets progressively worse and more dated.
Anyway, back to the present. Below are one-line (and, on at least one occasion, two-line) reviews of some of this year’s albums. They’re not about the albums themselves, but rather about you, the person reading this after enjoying one of the albums.
A brief Q&A before we get started:
Q: Why isn’t my favourite album on here?
A: I couldn’t think of anything funny to say about it, or maybe I just forgot
Q: Did you write all of these yourself?
A: No, as usual, I got some help when I was struggling with one or two of them. Try to guess which
Q: What was your favourite album
A: Take a guess
Q: I’m hungry, where’s good for lunch?
A: Cafe Mondo opened down the road from me recently, probably go there and get the muffuletta. Actually, not entirely sure they open on Mondays but you should go this week
Anyway, let’s get back to the music. Apologies in advance.
Aaron West and the Roaring Twenties - In Lieu of Flowers
You refer to all wrestlers as ‘my dad’ and all baseball players as ‘my son’
Adrianne Lenker - Bright Future
You volunteer at your local Park Run because there’s a great banh mi spot round the corner
Beyoncé - COWBOY CARTER
Well done, you’re in the clear with this one
Billie Eilish - HIT ME HARD AND SOFT
You claim you’re ‘not a millennial, not a gen-Zer, but a secret third thing’. This makes you a millennial
Bleachers - Bleachers
You regret only getting into Broad City when you were 33 and in a long term relationship
Caribou - Honey
You submitted a scale model of Berghain to Lego Ideas
Cassandra Jenkins - My Light, My Destroyer
You think Following is Christopher Nolan’s best film
Charli XCX - BRAT
You have paid for a private dining experience with Gizzi Erskine
Charly Bliss - Forever
Within five minutes of meeting any new person for the first time, you’ve told them the guitarist from Charly Bliss was the voice of Dash from The Incredibles
Christian Lee Hutson - Paradise Pop. 10
You watch Mubi releases at the Peckhamplex
Cindy Lee - Diamond Jubilee
You refuse to record your own music unless you’re preemptively promised an appearance on Song Exploder
Confidence Man - 3AM (La La La)
You have Songkick alerts set up for Oxide & Neutrino
Empress Of - For Your Consideration
You hope someone will one day ask you to direct an advert for Estrella Damm
Father John Misty - Mahashmashana
You wish you were friends with Adrien Brody
Fightmilk - No Souvenirs
You wish you were friends with Adrian Chiles
Floating Points - Cascade
You’ve started buying MDMA from your uncle
Fontaines D.C. - Romance
You can’t remember if your attempts to rehabilitate Morrissey in 2020 were ironic or not
Four Tet - Three
You’ve started selling MDMA to your nephew
Foxing - Foxing
Within five minutes of meeting any new person for the first time, you’ve told them the guitarist from Foxing did that ‘sitting around naming old sports players’ tweet
Ghetts - On Purpose, With Purpose
You boycotted the McRib launch but told family members it was because of Kashrut
Gracie Abrams - The Secret of Us
Your favourite gig this year was technically a fundraiser for the Democratic Party but no one needs to know that
Haley Heynderickx - Seed of a Seed
You read hardback books while walking around outside
IDLES - TANGK
You learned who George Galloway was in 2023
Japandroids - Fate & Alcohol
You make pains to tell people Joni Mitchell is Canadian but also claim Drake is American
Justice - Hyperdrama
You have googled ‘Is Ketamine vegan?’
Kendrick Lamar - GNX
You have tried to block yourself on social media
KNEECAP - Fine Art
You complained when you found out your polling station was at Millwall’s stadium
Khruangbin - A LA SALA
You have tried making your own boba tea
Los Campesinos! - All Hell
You have a group chat where people post their Immaculate Grid scores and nothing else
MJ Lenderman - Manning Fireworks
You have told people the guy from The War on Drugs is called Warren Drugs
Maggie Rogers - Don’t Forget Me
You hide David Chang books inside Samin Nosrat book sleeves
Paris Paloma - Cacophany
You share stats about the gendered division of household chores even though your much older boyfriend does all the washing up and pays the bills
Sabrina Carpenter - Short N’ Sweet
You have written fanfic about Disney’s Robin Hood
Taylor Swift - The Tortured Poets Department
You think Matty Healy should be in prison
Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross - Challengers
You think Matty Healy should be in prison, but for his music
Tyler, The Creator - CHROMAKOPIA
You spent your entire Christmas bonus on a bot that deleted all your tweets before 2017
Vampire Weekend - Only God Was Above Us
You won’t shut up about the restaurant that does a ‘Combo Meal’ of sherry and oysters
Vince Staples - Dark Times
You dual-screened US election coverage and a pirated copy of Anora
Waxahatchee - Tigers Blood
You had breakfast at Patrick’s Roadhouse five years before you watched Point Break
Wild Pink - Dulling the Horns
One of your childhood friends is a pro skater but another is a right-wing columnist