The Greatest Music of 2024 So Far

Pitchfork’s editors are already serious about what albums have left the most important impressions and can land a coveted spot on our year-end record. So we’re spotlighting a few of 2024’s most excellent releases so far by rounding up albums which have earned excessive scores and Greatest New Music designations with a fast record of RIYLs (that’s Really helpful If You Like) and hyperlinks to our protection.

Not like our year-end lists, this one is organized in reverse chronological order. That will help you maintain monitor of the yr’s finest music, we’ll be updating it periodically all through the rest of 2024.

(All releases featured listed here are independently chosen by our editors. If you purchase one thing by means of our retail hyperlinks, nonetheless, Pitchfork might earn an affiliate fee.)

August

RIYL: Double entendres; wordplay; foreplay; Ghost City DJs’ “My Boo”; Jenny Lewis form of; himbos; relationship woes; “pure pop”; self-recrimination; the kooky emoji

Pay attention/Purchase: Amazon | Apple Music | Tough Commerce | Spotify | Tidal

RIYL: Quarter-life crises; virtuosic bars; psilocybin on the seashore; goals about drowning; miserable rhymes and twinkly pianos

Pay attention/Purchase: Amazon | Apple Music | Spotify | Tidal

RIYL: Ungoogleable names; MapQuest nostalgia; y2k-era clicks + cuts; midlife heel turns; the visceral pleasures of artificial sound; the visceral pleasures of artificial medication; outsider techno; the purity of guilelessness

Pay attention/Purchase: Amazon | Apple Music | Bandcamp | Spotify

July

RIYL: Electromagnetic radiation; the whirring of a pc booting up; deep listening; Fennesz; attuning to the sonic underworld of the metropolis; the soundtrack to Blade Runner 2049; wireframe glasses; immersing your self within the drama of on a regular basis sounds

Pay attention/Purchase: Amazon | Apple Music | Bandcamp | Spotify | Tidal

RIYL: Fretless bass; it’s price saying fretless bass twice; Jon Hassell; new age; journeying to the middle of your self; Naná Vasconcelos’ 1987 album Bush Dance; deep-sea submersibles; lapis lazuli; listening to a Balearic DJ whereas underwater

Pay attention/Purchase: Amazon | Apple Music | Bandcamp | Spotify | Tidal

RIYL: Soccer references; indie gang vocals; big-tent emo; Catholic guilt; having a social life that’s principally simply DSA conferences; the lore of the band Los Campesinos!