2024 Q1 Review and Analysis

Off to a solid start!

Getting this post out on the last day of April makes me realize just how behind I got in March. It was September 2023 all over again — too many albums and a good portion of them staggered toward the end of the month. Technically, Caravan Palace’s Gangbuster Melody Club released at the beginning of March, but I didn’t spot it until I was doing my research for the April Release Radar. Thankfully, there were fewer serious must-listens in April, so I’ve been using the month to catch up — as much as possible, anyhow.

So let’s take a moment to see how the year is looking thus far.

Albums Reviewed

We’ve covered 28 albums so far this year. And the main point of these review posts, for my audience,¹ is the convenient links to help you spot albums or reviews you might have missed. So, of course, I’m going to link all of the reviews — by bucket — here for your convenience.

For a refresher on how my bucket system works, click here. Generally, though, the main buckets align like so:

With that said, here are the 28 albums I’ve reviewed so far this year:

Purple

• Caligula’s Horse - Charcoal Grace

• Beyonce - Cowboy Carter

Lavender

• The Last Dinner Party - Prelude to Ecstasy

Blue

• Judas Priest - Invincible Shield

• Kacey Musgraves - Deeper Well

• Caravan Palace - Gangbusters Melody Club

Teal

• Everything Everything - Mountainhead

• Ministry - Hopiumforthemasses

• Ariana Grande - Eternal Sunshine

• Dragonforce - Warp Speed Warriors

• Waxahatchee - Tigers Blood

Green

• Neck Deep - Neck Deep

• The Smile - Wall of Eyes

• Chelsea Wolfe - She Reaches Out to She Reaches Out to She

• Amaranthe - The Catalyst

• MGMT - Loss of Life

• Ghetts - On Purpose, With Purpose

• New Years Day - Half Black Heart

• Norah Jones - Visions

• Johanna Wacker - Garden Over Embers

• Dasha - What Happens Now?

• Empress Of - For Your Consideration

• Fletcher - In Search of the Antidote

Yellow

• Glass Beach - Plastic Death

• Jennifer Lopez - This is Me…Now

Orange

• Kid Cudi - Insano

• Sonata Arctica - Clear Cold Beyond

Red

• Faye Webster - Underdressed at the Symphony

Statistics

These first 28 albums have, overall, given us a good spread. We already have two AOTY contenders plus four more potential Top 40 contenders. And as hard as I try to keep my Teal/Lavender buckets empty (it’s more work at the end of the year), I have had five albums that I couldn’t just write off in the Green bucket already.

And only five, TOTAL, albums at Yellow or lower? Not bad!

I’m sure that these percentages will balance out further as the year progresses — especially with 20% currently held up in the temporary buckets — but I do believe this year has produced more standout albums early than last year, for sure. At this point last year, with 33 reviews complete, ten of them (30%) wound up on a final rating of Blue; the highest-ranked at the end of the year was Haken’s Fauna in 7th.

2024 will see two Q1 releases ranking, probably, in the top 5.

For further comparison, here are the year-end percentages for the last three years.

Coming into March, I thought it odd how the only major category without a representative was Blue. We’re still a little short there, but we do have three now!

Summary and Q2 Preview

We are, of course, already actually a month into Q2. April, as stated, was rather light. But it did include the obvious snake in the room, and I hope to have that review out by early next week, at the latest. I cannot make guarantees because have you seen the size of this fucking album OMFG…..

Anyhow, I’m feeling much more optimistic about 2024, overall. For those who have been around a while, you might remember I was a bit dour at this time last year. We didn’t get a Purple until like the end of May (Sleep Token), and then it remained damn near the only standout near-perfect score all year, with the second Purple (Hozier) coming in August and then, finally, a third (Earthside) in like…November?²

While I have yet to do my May Release Radar research (that post will be out Thursday), I can say that May and June are already looking like they’ve got some bangers headed our way. There’s a new Kamasi Washington out this Friday (May 3, 2024), plus Cage the Elephant, Twenty One Pilots, Ben Platt, and The Decemberists all on the horizon, among others. If you’d like to see the full list of what I have flagged now, check out the Release Radar page. It will be updated further this week once the monthly post has gone out.

You can also listen along. I keep my annual playlists posted here, so you can just jump in and listen through any particular set you like — in order or on shuffle.

If you made it this far or even just opened the link and found yourself at the bottom, thank you. I love helping people find music they like, so thank you for reading my rants and opening yourself up to exactly that.

1. The main point for me is to rant and pretend people are paying attention to my rant.

2. Behind the scenes, I was secretly in fits trying to figure out if I had just become a snob or what… This isn’t Pitchfork, folks!