Faronheit | A Chicago Centric Music Blog

The hottest music from Chicago & beyond

Tag: best of

The Top 50 Albums of 2024

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On 12/30/2024

In best albums 2024, BNM, listmas, listmas 2024, lists, music

The pain that comes with selecting your favorite albums of any given year is one most music lovers shouldn’t have to deal with. Of course a majority aren’t critics or writers or even care enough to bother with list-making, so you simply love what you love and keep it to yourself. Or maybe only share some key selections with close friends and family. Here at Faronheit HQ, sharing is caring. The understanding is that you probably don’t have the time or energy to spend listening to album after album, particularly if you have life responsibilities such as a demanding job or children. Hopefully a year-end music recap functions more as a saving grace – a quick reference point that gives you all the highlights in one swoop so you can play catch-up really easily. Of course all tastes are subjective, so what one person loves another may not.

There were a lot of great albums released in 2024. So much so, that my typical “Honorable Mention” section felt like it should be expanded to 15 instead of the standard 10, for a grand total of 65 records that make up the year’s best. And that’s with the knowledge I didn’t get to hear every single album released this year and probably missed some great ones as a result. But in a general sense, I’d like to think the records listed here encapsulate the “sound of 2024” quite well, and in a decade or two it’ll still hold up. Poptimism took a big step forward thanks to Sabrina Carpenter and Charli XCX. Kendrick Lamar, Vampire Weekend, and Father John Misty all made exceptional records following previous weaker entries in their catalogs. Then you’ve got some artists who feel like they’re on their way to superstardom, such as Doechii, Being Dead, Fievel Is Glauque, and Dummy. This list is so packed, I feel forced to apologize to Beyoncé and The Cure for placing them outside of the main list. Choices needed to be made!

If you haven’t heard all of these albums, and I generally assume you haven’t, please do yourself a favor and check some of them out. You’ll hopefully be pleasantly surprised, and might even discover a new favorite. And if you do love a record, please show some real love and support to the artists that made it. Spotify barely pays for streaming, so buy a vinyl or CD copy of the album because it’ll put more money into the pockets of the creatives. Go see some of this music performed live, too. Buying a concert ticket and/or merch is another great way to return the favor this music is giving to you. Then of course, share it with others so they can experience the magic of discovery too. Having said all that, please enjoy Faronheit’s Top 50 Albums of 2024 list below. Once you’ve taken it all in, let me know your thoughts! Reach out on social media to let me know what’s missing, because if I end up loving a record as much as you do, we’ll continue to build the fandom together.

This wraps up coverage for 2024. Cheers to a new year and more great music ahead!

Honorable Mention
Beyoncé – Cowboy Carter
Cassandra Jenkins – My Light, My Destroyer
The Cure – Songs of a Lost World
Dehd – Poetry
Ekko Astral – pink balloons
Erika de Casier – Still
Fine – Rocky Top Ballads
Godspeed You! Black Emperor – “NO TITLE AS OF 13 FEBRUARY 2024 28,340 DEAD”
Hovvdy – Hovvdy
Ka – The Thief Next to Jesus
Lip Critic – Hex Dealer
Merce Lemon – Watch Me Drive Them Dogs Wild
Rapsody – Please Don’t Cry
Shellac – To All Trains
Wishy – Triple Seven

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The Top 100 Songs of 2024

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On 12/30/2024

In best songs 2024, BNM, listmas, listmas 2024, lists, music

What can I say about this year in music? I would typically toss off some sentiment about how it’s been pretty good overall, maybe even better than expected. It comes from a place of honest belief, because there’s just so much music released in any given year you can always find something new to love. If you can’t, then you’re probably just not looking hard enough. I can probably count on one hand the number of times I’ve been disappointed with a majority of releases in a given year. Even when the bigger names or zeitgeisty artists fail to deliver, a smaller artist or band is right there to pick up the slack. So yes, 2024 was another strong one for music.

Singles in particular stood out to me this year more than albums as a whole, even though you’ll see plenty of crossover between the “Best Songs” and “Best Albums” lists. But think about it for a minute. Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” was an inspiration that flourished from his diss track battle with Drake and wasn’t on the album he’d release near the end of the year. Chappell Roan’s “Good Luck, Babe!” was a one-off single that wasn’t on her album from last year with all the other hits. Addison Rae finally gave us a song worth listening to more than once with “Diet Pepsi”, and Disclosure’s “She’s Gone, Dance On” also isn’t connected to an album, though both tracks will probably appear on as-yet-unannounced 2025 albums. There are plenty more examples, from SZA to Panda Bear to ANOHNI and the Johnsons who gave us some very worthwhile singles this year. They all appear on the Top 100 Songs of 2024 list, which you can find below.

The “rules” of this list are simple. To qualify, a song must have been released at some point in the calendar year of 2024, so album advance singles released in fall 2023 are not eligible. Lastly, no lead artist may be included more than once, though featured guests do not count toward this total. The idea is to spread the love around and ideally introduce you to songs you might not have heard otherwise. It gives a leg up to those smaller names like Brennan Wedl, Still House Plants, Fake Fruit, Sea Lemon, and Night Tapes. Plus there’s plenty of local Chicago love with songs from Friko, Brigitte Calls Me Baby, Hannah Frances, Finom, Dehd, and Beach Bunny. You can hear this list of songs via the Spotify playlist at the bottom of this post. I’ll be posting a YouTube version of this playlist as well in the next few days. Of note, the song from Cindy Lee listed below is unavailable on Spotify at the moment, which is why that playlist isn’t complete. I’ll add it back should Cindy Lee allow Spotify to stream it again. Please enjoy, listen on shuffle if you’re so inclined, and share your personal favorite songs with me on social media!

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The Top 50 Albums of 2019

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On 12/31/2019

In best albums 2019, BNM, listmas, listmas 2019, music

Before we get into the nitty gritty of this Top 50 Albums list, let’s first talk about the honorable mentions. This is the space reserved for 2019 albums I also loved, just not quite enough to include as part of the main list. If this had been a worse year for music, they probably would have made the cut. It runs the gamut from two of the biggest pop stars in the world all the way down to some tiny names you’ve probably never heard before. These 10 albums are ordered alphabetically by artist.

Ariana Grande – thank u, next
Bedouine – Bird Songs of a Killjoy
Billie Eilish – When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?
Black Belt Eagle Scout – At the Party With My Brown Friends
Caroline Polachek – Pang
Floating Points – Crush
Fontaines D.C. – Dogrel
Peaer – A Healthy Earth
Sturgill Simpson – Sound & Fury
Wilco – Ode to Joy

As I was reflecting on the year in music and putting together draft after draft of this Top 50 Albums list, one of the main things I came to realize was that 2019 was a bit of a down year for hip hop. Familiar names like Drake, Jay-Z, and Kendrick Lamar took the year off for the most part, only dropping in with an occasional guest verse. Some of the established names that did put out records, such as Kanye West and Chance the Rapper, didn’t quite live up to their creative peaks. To a degree, that left room for others to step up and fill the voids left by these superstars. We were lucky enough to get some great introductions to names like DaBaby and Megan Thee Stallion in 2019, and it was refreshing to add their voices to the mix (though only one of those two is represented below). Other rappers managed to show significant growth and put out some of their best material to date. Shout out to Polo G, Rapsody, and Little Simz. Overall though, there are less rap albums in this year’s Top 50 than in previous years, and that’s a bit of a shame. I guess they can’t all be great, and given how much the hip hop scene has grown overall in the past decade we’re lucky to have reached this point. I’m excited to hear what the next 10 years will bring!

Beyond the scope of hip hop, there’s been plenty of music to love in 2019. It goes well beyond just songs too, because even though we continue to live in the era of the single, it takes a true talent to stretch beyond one or two great tracks and instead turn in an entire album’s worth. The 50 highlighted below each brought me considerable joy and comfort throughout the year, and they’re the ones I turned to over and over again to soundtrack everything from driving around running errands to cleaning my apartment on a rainy day to throwing a summer party to laying in bed feeling depressed after a long day. There’s a little something to satisfy just about any mood or particular taste. Chances are you haven’t heard all of these records, and I encourage you to check them all out! Even if they’re not to your liking, I applaud you for at least attempting to discover something new outside of your comfort zone. One last thing before we jump right into it: I haven’t included any direct links to places where you can find these albums, but Spotify, Apple Music, and Bandcamp are all your friends. Use their search functions and you’ll be fine. That said, here are my Top 50 Albums of 2019. Enjoy!

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The 50 Best Albums of 2017

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On 12/23/2017

In best albums 2017, BNM, listmas, listmas 2017, lists, music


Overall, 2017 was a pretty fascinating year for music. If last year was a massive dogpile of great artists releasing great albums (Chance, Beyonce, Solange, ATCQ, Radiohead, Bowie, etc.), this year was more about promising young upstarts working hard to prove their initial success wasn’t simply a fluke. In a very different way, 2017 also saw the return of the “elder statesmen” of indie, in which well-established names like Fleet Foxes, Grizzly Bear, and LCD Soundsystem returned with new albums after being absent for a few years. Exciting as it was to hear fresh material from the likes of The Shins and Broken Social Scene, many of these returns resulted in a slight decay in quality, which may very well have been a sign of the times. It’s difficult to say where Arcade Fire and The National fit into today’s musical landscape, other than the fact that as long-time favorites they’ve earned plenty of trust and leeway when it comes to these matters. Some of these artists have attempted to continue evolving after a decade of trying the same thing and were met with shrugs by fans, while others have been more content to remain in their own lane and hope that fans continue to follow along.

On the other side of the coin, it often felt like fewer new artists managed to make a major impact this past year. Standouts like Priests and Charly Bliss aside, the ability to discover and cultivate fresh talent failed to impact as potently in 2017 as it has in other recent years. That left things largely up to the in-betweeners. Julien Baker, Jay Som, Big Thief, Torres, and others are known but not yet popular enough to earn things like regular radio airplay, yet their records remain deeply impactful and wholly original. Turns out that’s the sweet spot for this year. It remains exciting to hear a collection of artists figure themselves out, and connect with listeners in an interesting and genuine fashion.

Below you’ll find my Top 50 Albums of 2017. While many near the top of the list fall in line with a generally established consensus from plenty of other publications, there are still quite a few personal touches that hopefully help this list stand apart from the rest. I strongly encourage you to seek out any of the records listed if you haven’t heard them yet. All of them are worth your time and effort, though some are more challenging and impenetrable than others. So while you might not fully “get” some of these on a first, second, or third listen, the effort you put into many of them is worth the deeper rewards contained within their folds.

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The Ten Best Concerts of 2017

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On 12/20/2017

In best concerts 2017, chicago, listmas, listmas 2017, lists, live music, music, music festivals, photos, pitchfork music festival 2017, show review


Just like an album or a song, a truly great live show can change your life. Unlike an album or song, live shows are a communal experience that only exist for a brief moment in time before they become a distant memory. That’s why it’s so important to be as present as possible when you’re at a venue or music festival, to keep that memory locked inside your brain instead of locked inside your phone. Of course I’m as guilty as the next person for taking photos during a show (see all the examples below), but I do my best to only take a few and then put the device away.

Having said that, 2017 marked my busiest and most exciting concertgoing year to date. According to calculations, I attended shows on 71 days this year, and that’s not including the insanity of multi-day festivals such as the Pitchfork Music Festival, Lollapalooza, and Riot Fest. When all is said and done, my best guesstimation is that I saw 167 performances total, which takes opening acts and festival sets into account. So yeah, a lot of live music. It’s not nearly as much as the 500+ shows NPR’s Bob Boilen has pulled off in recent years, but I’d like to think it’s a solid amount for somebody that also has to maintain an active work and social life (not saying Bob Boilen doesn’t have either of those, but he arguably has more…flexibility).

Needless to say, it was tough choosing only ten performances from 2017 to highlight. Then again, this list could easily have been the ten best live shows I attended at the Empty Bottle this year, since they hosted an incredible array of big name bands and artists vastly underplaying at their tiny venue in celebration of their 25th anniversary. Instead, things are just a little more diverse than that, focusing on the moments that really stood out to me for one reason or another. Some were emotionally moving. Others were genuinely surprising or fun. The thrill of discovering something new, and the pleasure of hearing a set list comprised of many of your favorite songs. There was so much to love, and it’s my sincerest hope that you are inspired by this list to check out more live music no matter where you live. After all, science says that regularly attending concerts makes you happier.

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The Ten Best EPs of 2017

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On 12/19/2017

In best eps 2017, BNM, EP, listmas, listmas 2017, lists, music


The Extended Play is a tricky beast. For many artists, it serves as an introduction – a means of dipping one’s toes into the water with a small parcel of songs and seeing what the initial reaction is. It stands to reason that if you amass lots of positive attention from fans and critics, that you’re on the right path and can safely wade into the deeper waters of a full length album. For more established artists, EPs can function as a bit of a dumping ground. Sometimes when recording an album, there are some good songs that simply don’t fit the aesthetic you were trying to cultivate, so those odds and sods wind up collected in an EP. It’s also a good stopgap measure, to keep fans engaged during the wait between full length efforts. And finally, it’s important to remember that creativity can be finite. You may head down a particular path with certain songs and themes before reaching to the conclusion after completing five or six songs that there’s nothing more you want to say or explore on the matter.

The ten artists featured on this Top EPs of 2017 list come from a variety of backgrounds and places in their careers. Most are new artists on the verge of breaking out, but there are a couple of established names in the mix too, who thankfully chose to approach their short releases with the same care as their long players. The great news is that there’s plenty to discover. Unless you’re neck deep in the hunt for quality new music, chances are you’ll see a name or two (or three) that you’ve never heard of before. Therefore, I strongly encourage you to hit play on some of the embedded tracks/videos tied to each EP on this list and get a taste of something great you might have otherwise missed. So without further ado, here are my choices for the Ten Best EPs of 2017!

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