Most Wanted Albums for 2024: Part 1
12 possible releases from active artists
As the new year begins every year, I usually compile (in my head) a short list of artists that I would really love to hear new material from in the coming year.
Now that I have a platform, I may as well compile that list a little more officially.
So, in the process of completing my audit, I compiled two lists, both comprised of artists whose new albums I would be thrilled to welcome in the coming year. The first list was limited to artists who have released an album in the last 2-5 years (2019-2021); the second is reserved for the less-likely releases from artists who have been on hiatus or may be defunct, whose last releases occurred in 2018 or earlier.
This article, Part 1, will focus on that first list.
Since the new year is 2024, we’ll cover 24 total artists, the top twelve from each list. This first list contained 43 total artists by the time I was done with it, so the below will be sorted alphabetically, because making the top 25% on such a list feels like ranking enough.1
Finally, I'm not including any artists who have already announced release dates. Caligula's Horse, for example, would have been on this list, but they've got a release date set for THIS MONTH.
Much excite!
Anyhow, on to the list!
The List
Anneke van Giersbergen
Previous Appearance: The Darkest Skies Are the Brightest (2021); 12th
Van Giersbergen’s 2021 The Darkest Skies Are the Brightest is still very much a go-to for me. She is a phenomenal vocalist, both in her folk-rock solo material and in any of the various metal ventures she has participated in. However, she’ll be turning 51 this year, so she may not have many years left with her voice in its prime. The knowledge that any given record could be the last of her career has me anxious to get more – sooner, rather than later.
Auri
Previous Appearance: II – Those We Don’t Speak Of (2021); 15th
This project, led by Nightwish co-founder Tuomas Holopainen, is the foundational act for the Celestial Metal microgenre. Holopainen founded the group with Johanna Kurkela (a Finnish Folk vocalist and violinist who, incidentally, also happens to be his wife) and Troy Donockley (a multi-instrumentalist and fellow member of Nightwish). To date, they have released two albums (2018 & 2021) which were both incredibly good – good enough that Martijn Westerholt, the creative force behind Delain, founded Eyes of Melian, another project which fits into this same, weird space between Symphonic and Celtic Folk Metal. Auri remains the dominant force here, though, and a new album from them could help to further define this microgenre and potentially grow it enough to invite other projects into the space. And given the three-year gap between the first two albums, I’m keeping my fingers crossed.
Converge/Chelsea Wolfe, Bloodmoon: II
Previous Appearance: Bloodmoon: I (2021); 16th
This one might be a bit of a long shot for 2024, but it’s one of my most-anticipated albums because the combination, frankly, blew me away in 2021. And, let me be clear – the album I want is “Bloodmoon II”; Chelsea Wolfe has a new solo album set to release on February 9, 2024, but we currently have nothing solid on the future of her collaboration with Converge. All we know is that it is, eventually, coming. Given that it took five years for the project to produce its first album, I doubt that we’ll see it this year, but it remains at the top of my wishlist. I don’t even like harsh vocals!
Diablo Swing Orchestra
Previous Appearance: Swagger and Stroll Down the Rabbit Hole (2021); 30th
DSO is another act that I discovered recently. They’re in this incredible Avant-Garde Metal space, blending a Metal framework with stylings from Swing, Jazz, Bebop, and more. They’re, easily, one of the most unique acts out there, with an approach to composition that is as whimsical as it is refreshing. Oddly, though, their last album, 2021’s Swagger and Stroll Down the Rabbit Hole, was widely panned by fans on Reddit and elsewhere, citing the mixing, in particular; I felt that it was better than much of their older material, which I went back and sampled afterward. The album rated a Blue from me and ranked 30th on that year’s list; other critics, including AngryMetalGuy, also rated it highly. And, frankly, I crave more.
Lisa Miskovsky
Last Album: Bottenviken (2019)
Lisa Miskovsky is an artist I discovered through the end credits of 2008’s Mirror’s Edge, the first-person free-running platformer developed by DICE and published by EA. I didn’t play it for several years, but Miskovsky’s performance in “Still Alive” convinced me to look more into her music, and I’ve loved her since. Her brand of Folk Pop verging on Indie Rock brings a lot of popular elements together; but, most importantly, she does so convincingly and creates enjoyable, memorable easy-listening tracks. Frankly, she should be much better-known than she is.
Mastodon
Previous Appearance: Hushed and Grim (2021); 2nd
For years, I thought of Mastodon as a talented band that was good, but didn’t fully mesh with my tastes. They were the sludgiest Sludge Metal act out there and, for me, served mainly to fill out playlists for variety. Crack the Skye was solid, but it wasn’t anything foundational for me. But the band shifted with 2021’s Hushed and Grim, a 90-minute-long double album of epic proportions. When most of us think of a 90-minute-long record, we anticipate exactly what Pitchfork’s Chris O’Connell wrote in his disgusting outlier review of the album: “an inoffensive, occasionally alluring, but overwhelmingly dull 90-minute slog.”2 That review couldn’t be further from the critical truth:3 despite the album’s daunting length, each track feels fresh and unique, and the darkness which pervades the album on every level is so wonderfully inviting. It shifted away from Sludge a bit, but I am hoping that Mastodon can repeat the magic they pulled off in Hushed and Grim. Preferably soon. But I’m not going to complain if the band needs another year or so to ensure that whatever comes next can stand up to the quality that we all fully expect from them.
Opeth
Last Album: In Cauda Venenum (2019)
Technically, I was reviewing albums in 2019, but I only maybe did like 40, total, so I don’t really consider anything beyond my top three or four ranked albums from that year when looking back. Opeth was in my top ten, though, for certain.
And if you want to talk about aging acts…well, Opeth formed in 1990, and frontman Mikael Akerfeldt has been there from the start; he’ll be turning fifty in April. Opeth is one of the most varied – and storied – bands in Prog Metal today. In the 90s, they defined themselves with two wildly opposing sounds – you had this heavy, Death-forward Opeth, and then there was the lighter, ethereal sound of Prog Rock-leaning Opeth. They capitalized on this in the early 00s with Deliverance and Damnation, the former being their heaviest album, ever, and the latter filled with their lighter material. Since then, with Akerfeldt’s vocal cords aging, Opeth has leaned more and more toward their lighter side (which is fine with me). Watershed, Sorceress, and In Cauda Venenum have all been incredible listens. I’m ready for more; especially since we don’t know how much longer Akerfeldt will want to remain active.
Phantogram
Previous Appearance: Ceremony (2020); currently unranked
I’ve been working (slowly) to re-rate and rank my list of 2020 albums for a while now. At the height of the pandemic, I abandoned the task of ranking that year’s albums (my favorite part of the whole project) for my mental health. I want to have those rankings available, so it’s all being reconstructed in the background while also keeping up with current releases. I aim to have it done before 2025, if possible, so that I can start including 2020 in the stats. In the meantime, just know that I fully expect Phantogram’s 2020 album to rank in the top 40 there, just as I expect any future release to be a solid contender.
Phantogram is a duo who craft delicious electric Rock and Dream Pop melodies. Their songs are intricate and catchy, and if you like electronic music, in any form, you should give them a go. Ceremony was their fourth full-length album, and the gaps between those first four albums were 4/2/4. Four years to album five would make sense, so here’s hoping!
Run the Jewels
Previous Appearance: RTJ4 (2020); currently unranked
Another act that we saw last in 2020; RTJ4, without a doubt, was one of the ten best albums of 2020, and I believe that holds true for many critics. It holds up.
RTJ is my favorite Hip Hop act, hands down. Killer Mike and El-P are such an incredible duo, and their lyrics are satisfyingly aggressive and clever with flow and delivery to match. But they also pay attention to the melodies and instrumentations and how all of the various elements come together in their songs. You can’t beat RTJ.
The good news is that we may be in luck on this one – Killer Mike, in an interview in April of 2023, let on that RTJ5 (the presumed title) was basically done. Mike was in the middle of press for his new solo album at the time, and it’s likely that touring and such has dominated his life since, but it’s been eight months now. I can only assume that additional work is being done to prep the album and that it’ll be announced, officially, sometime in Q1. Fingers crossed until then.
Sara Bareilles
Last Album: Amidst the Chaos (2019)
Sara Bareilles is an incredibly rare singer-songwriter talent. She is an S-Tier lyricist with a powerful, memorable voice. Any Swifties who do not also listen to Bareilles cannot be taken seriously.
And she hasn’t dropped an album since 2019. We’re officially into the second-longest hiatus of her career. Except, this time, she hasn’t written and starred in a musical during said hiatus.4 Instead, Bareilles seems to have had her hands in a number of things. Television appearances, commissioned compositions for Netflix and Disney, and even reprising her role in Waitress. But there’s no news thus far on a new album. And if she doesn’t drop one this year, she’ll be moving to the other list next year.
Come on, Sara! Give us more of your magic voice! Please?
Spiritbox
Previous Appearance: Eternal Blue (2021); 21st
Spiritbox was an eleventh-hour discovery in 2021; legitimately, I listened to this one after picking it up from a year-end list in December that year. I didn’t get much time with it, and it still jumped halfway up my list.
Spiritbox is a Canadian Prog/Metalcore band with incredible highs and lows as vocalist Courtney LaPlante shifts effortlessly between clean and harsh vox. Eternal Blue was their debut LP, and the band isn’t sleeping on the success they found with it. They released an EP in 2023 which found widespread acclaim,5 and then they turned around and backed it up by backing up Megan Thee Stallion on her rock remix of “Cobra”. And that might not mean much for fans of metal, but visibility and legitimacy are everything for entertainers of all stripes. And with the way the music is consumed these days, genric boundaries are paper-thin for both artists and consumers. I mean, there’s a reason I refuse to cater to any one genre on my platform.
A new Spiritbox LP is right at the tippety-top of my wishlist for 2024; they’re very active, and 2021-24 is a three-year gap between LPs, which is the sweetest of sweetspots. I need this one this year.
Vola
Previous Appearance: Witness (2021); 3rd
The final entry on this list is another Prog band I discovered in 2021. Vola’s Witness was mind-blowingly excellent, especially with their Shahmen feature on “These Black Claws”, which merged this dark Prog Metal with lofi hip-hop vibes and that one song has been one of my most-played tracks since. But every track on that album is stellar, and I’m still in the process of going through their back catalogue. This specific vein of Prog Metal scratches an itch that nothing else can touch, and I’ve always had a weak spot for music with darker tones (looking at you, Breaking Benjamin).
I’m very hopeful for new Vola this year. They dropped a single back in August, so hopefully that’s a sign of things to come.
If any of the above artists provide new albums this year, they’re almost certainly shoe-ins for the Top 40. Which really just means good things for our ears.
Who am I overlooking, though? Are there any artists I should have included instead?
Honorable mentions for this list include: Airbag, Brownout, Cellar Darling, Chance the Rapper, Damnation Angels, Eminem, Evanescence, Green Carnation, Janet Devlin, Jimmy Greene, Khemmis, Monica Heldal, Nada Surf, Nemesea, Protest the Hero, Thank You Scientist, and The Chicks
Yes, I’m just pulling the same quote that is cited on Wikipedia, but rest assured: this review is truly where my beef with Pitchfork begins. I was on my second full listen, still reeling from how incredible this album was, in spite of its length, when I read that travesty of an opinion.
Ooo! I should find an oxymoron competition to enter this one in.
Regardless, it is notable that the consensus across a dozen other outlets is nothing short of “acclaim”; Pitchfork’s dismal score lies so far outside of the scatter-plot grouping that one can only assume that the reviewer is either deeply biased or woefully incompetent. I don’t make a habit of trashing people’s opinions, but Chris O’Connell was clearly in a sour mood when trying to listen to that album.
I don’t count What’s Inside: Songs From Waitress as a standard album because it’s just packaged songs from a musical. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t listen to it if you haven’t heard it yet.
The EP is titled The Fear of Fear, and no, I haven’t heard it yet. But I’ve heard nothing but good things. EP tracks are frequently recycled for the LPs that follow them, so I ignore them for the same reason I ignore new singles until they’re shoved in my face — I prefer to walk into new albums entirely blind. Rest assured, though, I’ll be revisiting The Fear of Fear after Spiritbox’s next LP drops.