Published Issue 132, December 2024
Despite 2024 ending on a fairly ominous note, more thrilling and inspiring music was on hand and these selections are a mere vibrant slice of that sonic rainbow.
A Place to Bury Strangers – Synthesizer
Harrowing emotional clarity through radical spontaneous musical combustion.
Bloodhype – Trendoids
Vaporwave electroclash subversion of corporate training video sounds.
The Body & Dis Fig – Orchards of a Futile Heaven
A scorched and vulnerable portrait of personal and civilizational transcendence.
Charli XCX – Brat
Self-aware swagger synth pop supreme.
Chat Pile – Cool World
The poignant noise rock evocation of America’s cultural and societal failings and nightmares in the current century.
The Children… – A Sudden Craving
Dark, art folk post-punk theatrical poetics.
Cindy Lee – Diamond Jubilee
Sprawling triple album pastoral hypnogogic psych pop masterpiece and swan song.
The Drin – Elude the Torch
Weirdo psych folk kosmische akin to Ghost from Japan.
Einstürzende Neubauten – Rampen (apm: alien pop music)
Born of liminal improv, an entire record of heavenly creative industrial solvents of the international fash.
Fontaines D.C. – Romance
A moody and manga-and-beat-inspired cinematic post-punk odyssey.
The Jesus Lizard – Rack
Front to back splintery lunacy against dullard foolishness.
J.R.C.G. – Grim Iconic…(Sadistic Mantra)
Engrossing polyrhythmic psychedelic prog dub punk.
Julia Holter – Something in the Room She Moves
Guided by organic, intuitive flow, rhythm and structure, a fascinating work of ambient futuristic dream pop.
Kamasi Washington – Fearless Movement
Densely dynamic, cinematic, transporting, cosmic post-bop orchestral jazz embodiment of collective liberation.
Karen Haglof – One Hand Up
Masterful New Wave art rock Americana with massive chops.
Kontravoid – Detachment
The sound of dancing off the dissociating instinct of surviving in dystopian times.
Lesser Care – HEEL TURN
Gloriously melancholic and vulnerable shoegaze-infused post-punk.
Letting Up Despite Great Faults – Reveries
Most memorable melodic hooks on an album, dream pop or otherwise, of 2024.
Luna Honey – Bound
Brooding, visceral catharsis swimming in darkly mystical goth psychedelia.
Mamaleek – Vida Blue
Downtempo and mournful-free jazz black metal meditation on loss.
Mannequin Pussy – I Got Heaven
Scathing and uplifting punk bangers about yearning and scorching of religious indoctrination.
Meatbodies – Flora Ocean Tiger Bloom
Kaleidoscopic fuzz-drenched heavy psych excursions into the surreal.
Melt-Banana – 3+5
Hyperkinetic bursts of joyful industrialized noise rock like a soundtrack to an intense sidescroller.
Molchat Doma – Belaya Polosa
The most representative of the band’s rich and engulfing live sound and expansive gloomy moods to date.
Morgan Garrett – Purity
Brilliantly deconstructed and fractured No Wave nü metal industrial noise folk.
Mount Kimbie – The Sunset Violent
A measured yet entrancing vacation from overstimulation through tender minimalism.
Pharmakon – Maggot Mass
A tribal power electronics equivalent of the most disorienting passages of an Alex Garland film.
Pissed Jeans – Half Divorced
A caustic and urgent dismantling of the multifold manifestations of American hubris.
The Prids – I Only Care About You and Me
Elegiac dream pop snapshots of regret and romantic fervor.
Sex Swing – Golden Triangle
Like a Krautrock Butthole Surfers UK in its psychedelic intensity and lunatic calm.
Shellac – To All Trains
Insightful, wryly and starkly humorous sketches of American angst cast in wiry minimalism.
Street Fever – Absolution
Hard darkrave anthems of recovery and perseverance in exorcising religious trauma and cycles of abuse.
Studded Left – Casual Flexer
The hypnotic mutant creative offspring of mid-70s Eno, Magazine, industrial psych, New Wave romanticism and Pink Reason-esque revolution rock with chill vibes.
SUUNS – The Breaks
Slackadaisical IDM psychedelia leaning into passages of orchestral indie art rave.
Tactical Pagan – Self-titled
Industrial world funk noise and dungeon downtempo.
Tassel – A Sacrifice: Unto Idols
Industrial death goth declarations of self-affirmation and liberation.
Thou – Umbilical
A seething and brutal testimonial to the power of ideas and articles of faith to compel and scar our psyches.
Torres – What an enormous room
Creatively ambitious, experimental indie glam art rock.
Uboa – Impossible Light
An epic and vulnerable hellscape of revelation and transformative anguish.
Urban Heat – The Tower
Soulful and commanding fusion of darkwave, emo and R&B.
VR Sex – Hard Copy
Caustic, psychedelic post-punk infused with industrial flavor and irreverent humor.
Wand – Vertigo
Lush, enigmatic, melancholic, expansive and rapturous psychedelia.
Washed Out – Notes From a Quiet Life
Mind cleansing melodies that drift through reflections on melancholia and loss to feelings of gratitude, acceptance and inner peace.
For more see queencitysoundsandart.wordpress.com
Tom Murphy is a Denver-based music writer and science fiction/fantasy/horror creator. He is also a musician, historian and itinerant filmmaker.
Check out Tom’s November Queen City Sounds in case you missed it, or head to our Explore section to see more of his past reviews.