Music of the Year 2024

Indulge me while I pontificate about my favourite music of the year

I’m a fan of end-of-year lists, and have always wanted an excuse to compile my own, so please indulge me while I pontificate about my favourite recorded music of 2024. Only three podium positions available, which has made the decision extra-difficult (what no Cure’s Songs For a Lost World??) Books and gigs to come. I’d be happy to hear your faves in the comments - I’m always keen for recommendations.

#1: Absolute Elsewhere by Blood Incantation

Blood Incantation came to wider prominence following the release of their 2022 Timewave Zero – an album-length John Carpenter-esque ambient workout that no-one expected, especially as their previous output was firmly rooted in the death metal genre, albeit peppered with psychedelic, ambient and electronic interludes. However, in stark contrast to ill-advised forays into experimental territory by other ‘extreme metal’ acts (e.g. 1349’s not-very-good Revelations of the Black Flame and Morbid Angel’s universally derided Illud Divinum Insanus), Timewave Zero was surprisingly good; as good, in fact, as anything from more established electronic-ambient-soundtrack artists. It not only confirmed Blood Incantation’s extraordinary talents but also justified their reputation for restless experimentation, and effectively gave them permission to explore wherever they pleased. For reference, their eclecticism is fully exposed in the Amoeba Records video for the ‘What's In My Bag?’ series, where the band select wax from luminaries as varied and unlikely as XTC, Tears For Fears, Klaus Schulze and Gong / Steve Hillage.

The quality control remains as high as ever with their 2024 release Absolute Elsewhere, marking a return to their death metal roots and putting to bed any lingering claims of hipsterism. Purists may remain unnerved by their catholic tastes however, as the whole album ebbs and flows between strident, echo-laden kosmisch death metal and kraut-prog-space-rock workouts sometimes reminiscent of 1970-71 era Pink Floyd, but certainly not in any way derivative. The second track, for example, is a collab with Tangerine Dream, whose peculiar brand of uptight, menacing ambience is evident. Ashra-style basslines and ambient washes, flute and acoustic guitar – perhaps recalling Opeth’s finer moments – give way to intense, syncopated outbreaks of deranged, hypnotic cosmic horror of the type familiar to acolytes of epic death-doomers Behold! The Monolith.

Track four drops a Swervedriver-y intro and a few Enslaved-style licks, before weaving a wonderfully haunting lead guitar line reminiscent of Daylight Dies through sinuous, but unequivocally death metal, topographies. Then the mood returns to prog, easing into Pink Floyd-isms to such an extent that you could swear you’re hearing Roger Waters. Or is it Dave Brock?

The music is mercurial and magpie-like, although nothing is ironically exploited or used in pastiche. Despite its sprawling inventiveness, Absolute Elsewhere feels tight and snappy, as though every minute has been pressed into the service of a focussed yet sonically varied mission. It is superbly produced: crisp and with an acoustic depth and clarity.

If you’re grown up enough to simultaneously appreciate virtuoso, kinetic death metal and psychedelic synth-chillout, and see no contradiction in ambient legend Steve Roach supporting Blood Incantation live, then Absolute Elsewhere is almost certainly your cup of mushroom tea. Record of the year.

#2: Ritual by Jon Hopkins

Any classically trained musician with a passion for electronic music and an evangelising zeal for the healing power of entheogens is probably going to create sonic experiments that are, at worst, interesting and, at best, transformative. Ritual is, I would say, firmly in the latter camp. Musically it is, perhaps, a fulcrum that balances Hopkins’s two other works: the very ambient Music For Psychedelic Therapy with the dancefloor techno of Singularity. Yet Ritual goes beyond both into genuinely mind-expanding territory.

A continuous piece divided into eight movements, it builds slowly over the forty-minute running time, introducing and layering various motifs until a crescendo is reached at track six, easing off and fading out thereafter. The arrangements remain largely dancefloor-oriented, exploiting kinetics and dynamics to build tension. But with a BPM of around 67, it is a work most definitely not designed for stentorian gabber-ists. Rather, it requires a meditative state from the listener: physically relaxed; mentally alert and attentive.

The cumulative effect is curiously wide-angled and macro-focussed, both cosmic and intimate in scale. Some motifs recall what you might call the sounds of the universe, the frequencies and oscillations of deep space. Others suggest the rhythms of the body and its manifold cycles. Meanwhile, the percussion has a distinctly driving, shamanistic quality, as though the work has passed through a threshold and entered into ceremony.

The overall effect is odd. It is simultaneously spacious and claustrophobic and, I suspect, is constructed to deliberately evoke that contradiction. It is perhaps the closest I’ve experienced to what it might be like to listen to DMT. The record is a carefully constructed trip-analog, a ritualistic journey through peaks and troughs, sometimes almost overwhelming, visceral and breath-taking, but ultimately resolving to wonder and euphoria.

#3: Amituofo by Dhyana

This single-track release edges into third position mainly because I’m an absolute sucker for huge-riffed, heavy-as-fuck, wall-of-sound, ambient drone. And this record delivers in spades. Dhyana’s previous outings are, it’s fair to say, heavily influenced by Al Cisneros’s Om, but this release descends into new and heavier realms. Enthusiasts of Earth, Sunn O))), Boris, Bong, Yob etc will be very impressed. Light up the chalice and enjoy the ride.