First Floor's Favorite Releases of 2024
a.k.a. Wrapping up list season with the albums and EPs that made the biggest (positive) impression on me this year.
Is it just me, or does list season feel a bit less intense this year?
Maybe it’s because I’m not seeing as many Spotify Wrapped graphics, or maybe it’s because so many people—at least the ones in my social circle—have dialed back their engagement with social media, but with 2024 rapidly coming to a close, I have yet to feel like I’m being bombarded with “best of” lists and year-end round-ups.
(It’s also possible that there are just fewer music publications out there, and many of the ones that do exist simply don’t have the budget and resources to crank out a bunch of year-end content. Music journalism is still in trouble folks!)
Whatever is going on, I’ve continued to engage in my annual listmaking practices here in the newsletter. Just yesterday, I published my favorite tracks of 2024, and today I’ve followed that up with a breakdown of my favorite albums and EPs from the past 12 months. My selections haven’t been ranked—this list is subjective enough already—and they haven’t been separated into categories either. (I did consider reviving yesterday’s “For the Club” and “Not for the Club” rubric, but the line between those two spheres quickly becomes a lot fuzzier when albums are involved.)
Before we get started, a quick reminder: this week’s regular First Floor digest—which will most likely be the final edition of the newsletter this year—will be sent out tomorrow, so keep an eye out for that.
Otherwise, let’s go ahead and get into these releases.
Note: You can click the titles to hear each release individually, or you can also just head over to this convenient Buy Music Club list to find them all in one place.
Donato Dozzy - Magda (Spazio Disponibile)
2024 was not a bad year for techno, but it wasn’t a great year for techno’s reputation. It’s not that good records aren’t being released—back in July, I actually wrote an entire article specifically highlighting how much good stuff was coming out—but for those who aren’t diehards, it’s been difficult to separate the genre from the quasi-corporate blandness of the “business techno” circuit and the candy-colored stink of dance music’s post-pandemic excesses. Perhaps that will change now that sincerity is apparently back in fashion, but it’s unlikely that Italian techno veteran Donato Dozzy cares either way. Over the past two decades, he’s quietly done his thing, racking up accolades for his hypnotic techno excursions while also taking extended side trips into acid, ambient and more. It’s no exaggeration to call the man beloved, at least within a certain corner of the techno universe, and in 2024, he added to that legacy with Magda, a wonderfully lush album that’s as notable for its twinkling arpeggios and celestial swells as it is for its understated psychedelic thump.
MJ Guider - Youth and Beauty (modemain)
In late 2023 and early 2024, there was a period where seemingly any mention of the flute would prompt someone to talk about André 3000. I suppose that’s fine, but it’s a shame that more of that flute-centric conversation wasn’t devoted to MJ Guider’s Youth and Beauty instead. The New Orleans-based artist has been playing the instrument for most of her life, and she sneakily made it the centerpiece of this new record. Why do I say sneakily? Because the flute has been manipulated and processed to a point where it’s often practically unrecognizable, becoming just another humid texture in what’s ultimately a moody post-punk dirge. There’s an enticing lethargy to the music, one that will feel familiar to anyone who’s slogged through a summer of swampy heat, but Guider seems to thrive in these conditions, her buzzing, sweat-soaked incantations raising questions like, “What if the Mudd Club had been located in New Orleans instead of New York?” We’ll never know, but Youth and Beauty at least makes that alternate history sound like an intriguing proposition.
Jonny from Space - back then I didn’t but now I do (Incienso)
Miami dance music is cooler now than it’s been in decades, to a point where the tastemaker crowd—which previously spent years actively clowning on the city—has now made even the slightest of connections to South Florida into a marketable selling point. Jonny from Space, however, has been repping for Miami since long before the latest batch of hype arrived, and when the time came to deliver his debut album, he didn’t make the post-reggaeton, guaracha-referencing hybrid that everyone who’d hopped aboard the Latin club bandwagon was surely expecting. He swerved the dancefloor entirely, referencing vintage ambient, trip-hop and IDM in the zoned-out rhythms of back then I didn’t but now I do. The LP is better suited to relaxing at three in the afternoon than getting lit at three in morning—Jonny literally said it was “built to chill”—and while that may not have been a boon to his DJ calendar, there’s something to be said for artists who follow their heart and purposely take the timeless route.
Florian T M Zeisig - Planet Inc (STROOM)
Angel R - Mossed Capable of Being Observant (enmossed)
Is it cheating to put two releases from the same artist on a list like this? Possibly, but looking at Florian T M Zeisig’s 2024 output, I could have easily added even more records to the list. (Some West Mineral Ltd. stan out there is surely furious that I didn’t include Bong Boat, which came from Zeisig’s NUG project with PVAS.) Planet Inc, however, is an obvious standout, a cosmically oriented, nostalgia-tinged endeavor on which the German ambient / experimental artist crafted gorgeous astral soundscapes while watching old episodes of a late-night German television show called Space Night. Devoted entirely to footage recorded in outer space, the program prompts viewers to look beyond their everyday surroundings, and Zeisig did just that, embracing grandeur while infusing his weightless compositions with warmth and an almost tangible sense of wonder. That grandeur gets reined a bit on Mossed Capable of Being Observant—the first full-length from the new Angel R alias he rolled out this year—but the album still defies gravity, its soupy, slow-brewing swirls flecked with static, whispered vocal fragments and scattered rhythmic shards. Both records invite listeners to get lost, and prove so enticing that few will be eager to find their way back to familiar ground again.
Ploy - They Don’t Love It Like We Do (Deaf Test)
The tech house redemption arc has been something to behold in recent years. It wasn’t that long ago that the entire genre had seemingly been surrendered to the Ibiza crowd, but somewhere along the way, the nerds and the diggers began to reassert their claim to the music, unearthing countless dollar-bin gems in the process. Ploy wasn’t necessarily a part of that crowd—the UK producer is best known for his rhythmically adventurous, bass-heavy outings on labels like Hessle Audio and Timedance—but the They Don’t Love It Like We Do EP marked his official coming out as a proper house enthusiast. It’s not a conventional record; the four-on-the-floor beat is the most “normal” thing about it, and the EP’s deliciously unpolished sonics exude a sort of crazed energy, even as they unfold over the same sort of rubbery grooves one might hear at a Mediterranean pool party. The word “bland” doesn’t seem to be a part of Ploy’s vocabulary, and if he keeps making records like They Don't Love It Like We Do, he just might take tech house back for the weirdos.
Xylitol - Anemones (Planet Mu)
Catherine Backhouse (a.k.a. Xylitol) is not a jungle lifer. According to Planet Mu, much of her musical activity is focused on “vintage central and eastern European pop and electronica,” and aside from hosting a radio show called Slav to the Rhythm, she’s “also co-writing a book on Yugoslav pop culture.” She is, however, based in the UK (a.k.a. the literal birthplace of jungle), and her Anemones album brings some welcome freshness to the genre, often by ignoring its traditional formulas altogether. Will that rub some purists the wrong way? Possibly, but the LP devotes plenty of time to rollicking Amen breaks; it’s just that Backhouse also explores scratchy ambient, perky 2-step and the most whimsical strains of IDM. Whimsy might actually be the record’s defining element, as even the hardest tunes on Anemones are frequently accompanied by gleaming, almost crystalline melodies that harken back to ’80s new age and any number of vintage computer games.
ESP - Promise (YEAR0001)
Clocking in at less than 20 minutes, ESP’s Promise goes by in a flash, but given its intensely zoomer-coded sound palette—think trance, glossy R&B, Miami Vice-style synth grandeur and a seemingly endless supply of arpeggios—the record’s “blink and you’ll miss it” brevity isn’t all that surprising. It’s also not a problem. Even with its abbreviated runtime, Promise is bursting with cinematic splendor, its shimmering swells and high-polish aesthetic coalescing into the musical embodiment of anyone who’s ever said “my life is a movie.” On paper, that may sound like some sort of dystopian nightmare, particularly to grumpy Gen Xers, but ESP have so effectively distilled their references into these potent little tunes—most of which barely crack the two-minute mark—that even the surliest of listeners are likely to be won over by the NYC duo’s capital-V vibes.
Iceboy Violet & Nueen - You Said You’d Hold My Hand Through the Fire (Hyperdub)
This should have been a much bigger record. Maybe my Barcelona bias is showing, but it’s moderately baffling to me that a collaborative album from Nueen (a 3XL affiliate whose smudgy beatmaking is very much in line with the dub / ambient / trip-hop brew that dominated much of 2024) and Iceboy Violet (a one-of-one UK vocalist who seamlessly slides between ferocious raps and forlorn introspection) seemed to come and go so quickly. Maybe the idea of a rap record turned off the ambient crowd, or maybe the music was too pensive for the Hyperdub bass fiends, but from where I’m sitting, the fact that You Said You’d Hold My Hand Through the Fire sits in a sort of hazy nether zone is absolutely key to its appeal. Lyrically, it’s driven by a breakup that Iceboy went through, and the Mancunian MC sounds genuinely pained throughout the LP, even when paired with the plushest of Nueen productions. There are elements of drill at play, most notably in the Spanish producer’s busted drum patterns and ominous bass tones, but this isn’t music for the streets; if anything, it’s for the bedroom, or wherever you feel most comfortable when stepping into the fog-strewn psyche of a tortured soul.
Harba - Despair EP (re:lax)
Hessle Audio, Timedance, Livity Sound … the top outposts of UK bass music are likely familiar to anyone with a passion for low-end dynamics, but if the re:lax imprint has another year like 2024, it might soon be regarded with the same sort of reverence. Headed up by re:ni and Laksa, the young label made an especially strong statement with Harba’s Despair EP, a hard-hitting record that skillfully straddles the bass-techno divide. With its abundance of shouty vocal bits and galloping rhythms, the EP is marked by a distinct sense of what re:lax calls “UK rudeness,” but what truly makes this Berlin-based artist so effective is his ability to combine that aesthetic with an industrial-strength wallop. “Sound design” was one of bass music’s buzziest terms in 2024, and it certainly comes into play here, but unlike many of his knob-twiddling peers, Harba doesn’t appear all that interested in masturbatory detours and unnecessary bells and whistles; listening to the Despair EP, it seems that he’d rather craft tracks that hit with the force of a sledgehammer to the face.
Low End Activist - Airdrop (Peak Oil)
Any bass music fan who lived through the mid-to-late 2010s most likely never wants to hear the word “deconstructed” again, but when I say that Low End Activist is making “deconstructed hardcore,” anyone who’s feeling skeptical about the terminology can rest assured that what he’s doing has nothing to do with layering samples of breaking glass atop a raft of wholly undanceable beats. Airdrop is one of two full-lengths the Berlin-based Brit released this year, and though his chosen sound palette is familiar (organ stabs, high-energy breakbeats, sirens, whooping vocal clips, etc.), he’s broken the standard hardcore formula down into its constituent parts—and then reassembled those parts into thrilling new combinations. Some of those combinations are bassbin-rattling slammers, while others are more pensive and avant-garde, but at no point does Airdrop feel like a “normal” hardcore record, or even an especially nostalgic one. Low End Activist may be mining the past for inspiration, but his inventive productions sound a lot more like the future.
claire rousay - sentiment (Thrill Jockey)
The electronic music realm is full of former emo kids, yet it’s somehow still in place where any admission of affinity for the famously sentimental genre is usually couched in embarrassment and self-deprecation. claire rousay surely heard many of her peers saying things like, “Oh yeah, that was just some dumb music I listened to when I was a kid,” but rather than playing along, she’s fully leaned into the cringe, embracing the term “emo ambient” and turning the earnestness up to 11 on this year’s sentiment. Light years away from the long-form experimental compositions the LA-based Texan has done previously for labels like Shelter Press and American Dreams, the album eschews abstraction, putting rousay (and her guitar) front and center as she tenderly spills her guts about love, lust and loneliness. Her extensive use of Vocoder does give the record a somewhat more “modern” sound, but rousay’s vulnerability shines through all the same—and does so in a way that any recovering Jade Tree fanatic can surely appreciate.
Zero Key - False 01 (False Aralia)
Selfsame - False 02 (False Aralia)
Headed up by longtime kranky affiliate and behind-the-scenes independent music hero Brian Foote, who also runs the incredible Peak Oil imprint, False Aralia was launched less than two months ago, and has only two releases to date. It just so happens that both of those releases were brilliant, and have left anyone with a taste for vaporous dub eagerly awaiting the label’s next offering. There’s a good chance they won’t have to wait long, as False Aralia was specifically set up as a vehicle for experimental artist Izaak Schlossman to release music from his many, many projects. Zero Key and Selfsame are just two of those projects, and while even a trained musicologist would likely have a hard time distinguishing them, both False 01 and False 02 spellbindingly play with the idea of versioning. Long a staple of dub music, Schlossman slightly tweaks his compositions again and again, with each new iteration unlocking a new reverb-soaked groove to chew on or a trippy new rabbit hole to explore.
Carrier - In Spectra (Carrier)
One of the best things about the Carrier project is its virtual immunity to standard genre descriptors. Considering that the man behind said project, Guy Brewer, spent more than a decade making top-shelf techno under the name Shifted, there’s a temptation to tie his more recent output to that world, but records like In Spectra show little interest in the dancefloor. At the same time, they’re not really ambient either, and while the rhythms that are present are often disjointed, they’re far too structured to be described as “experimental.” So where does that leave us? In a musical space that’s largely undefined, but also viscerally thrilling, its foreboding drones and scratchy passages of static broken up by serpentine drum patterns and scuttling rhythmic outbursts. Relaxed it is not—there’s far too much tension in the air for that—but Brewer doesn’t seem like someone who’s all that keen to facilitate passive listening anyways.
J. Albert - I want to be good so bad (Self-released)
MAXAMBIENT - Special Needs (Self-released)
There are no rules in the J. Albert universe, and while that can occasionally leave journalists like me struggling to succinctly describe his work, there is no shortage of vibes in his extensive catalog. Understated but never undercooked, the NYC artist’s music glides between hazy avant-garde techno, distortion-licked ambient, alien bass experiments and much, much more, and though he might balk at the comparison, it’s no longer a stretch to describe him as America’s answer to Actress.
On I want to be good so bad, J. Albert dips into dimly lit minimalism, combining the cosmic drift of Basic Channel with the sort of persistent static one would expect to hear on a transmission from outer space. What results is still rather elegant, even as the nods to techno largely disappear on the record’s more abstract latter half, but those craving something more unhinged should definitely turn to Special Needs instead. Credited to the MAXAMBIENT alias he first unveiled in September, it’s not the most cohesive of releases, but it does have a colorful sort of “mad scientist” energy, playfully bouncing between wonky beat science, moody ambient and extended drum workouts as if it was the most natural thing in the world. When J. Albert is the one doing the bouncing, nothing is off limits—nor should it be.
Loidis - One Day (Incienso)
You like Huerco S. I like Huerco S. We all like Huerco S. With a catalog that includes both his 2016 ambient opus, For Those of You Who Have Never (and Also Those Who Have), and this year’s One Day from his “minimal emo tech” alias Loidis, the native Kansan born Brian Leeds has arguably become one of the past decade’s most consequential electronic music artists—and that’s without even taking into account all of the excellent off-kilter house records he made during the early 2010s. Plenty of artists in his position would soak up the critical acclaim and simply coast along, but One Day made clear that Leeds is still interested in exploring new ground. Well, not exactly “new,” but “new for him, as the LP is deeply indebted to classic dub techno and the nuanced grooves of 2000s minimal. Patient, hypnotic and downright cozy, One Day was a welcome antidote to much of the hyperactive nonsense that’s dominated dance music in recent years, and with the music press currently laying the groundwork for a full-scale revival of sincerity and restraint, Leeds’ profile might very well take another leap skyward in the months ahead. That’s not a bad place to be, and in a time when most other artists are busy chasing the latest trends, it seems that Huerco S. has now reached a point where the zeitgeist comes to him.
Fergus Jones - Ephemera (Numbers)
The more music I hear from Fergus Jones, the more I think, “Is there anything this guy can’t do?” Long before he dropped his debut album Ephemera, he’d established himself as one of electronic music’s sharpest ears via the brilliant curation of his FELT label, and while the records he’d released previously under the name Perko had frequently trended toward ethereal escapism, his occasional forays into dancefloor-oriented production (and his long-running affiliation with the Numbers label) hinted at a deep-seated love for techno, garage and soundsystem culture. As it turned out, those things were only the tip of the iceberg. Jones has since revealed himself as a lover of everything from experimental composition to lo-fi indie-pop, and when the guest-heavy Ephemera arrived this past October, it included spacey detours into trip-hop (voiced by James K and Laila Sakini), fuzzy ambient excursions (with Lia T and Koreless) and even a soulful hip-hop cut (with Birthmark, ELDON and Withdrawn). Add in a couple of Huerco S. collabs and some free-floating dives into gaseous dub, and Jones had himself a hell of a debut full-length. What will he do next? Jungle? Happy hardcore? Free jazz? Anything is possible, and I can’t wait to hear it.
Hekt - Lens (Numbers)
In a year when the dance music narrative quietly shifted back toward nuance and restraint, Lens may have been a bit too extra to find a big audience, but the debut EP from Danish artist Hekt—who was formerly one half of the duo Code Walk—was a rubbery delight. Building upon the technicolor legacy of SOPHIE and PC Music, the record makes no effort to obscure its pop flirtations, and does so while battering listeners with a boisterous drum attack and springy rhythms that sound like something out of an old Looney Tunes cartoon. Goofy without being stupid, the EP definitely has a manic vibe, but Lens never slides into total disarray—the production is far too detailed for that, and even those who can’t fully hang with Hekt’s penchant for bedlam will likely be awed by his obvious talents.
Verraco - Breathe... Godspeed (Timedance)
Verraco has a lot of weight to carry. While many of his contemporaries in Europe and North America can just be artists and do their thing, the TraTraTrax co-founder has been thrust into the spotlight as the face of Latin club—a dubious genre name that few people in Latin America are even all that comfortable with. And whether he’s releasing a record, DJing at a festival or even just posting on social media, he’s expected to represent not just himself, but an entire culture, one that’s not only been historically marginalized, but is also far more complex than most people realize. How does an artist continue to do good work in that scenario, and do so while also being vigilant enough to ward off efforts to tokenize their identity?
There’s no handbook for navigating this sort of thing, but if Verraco is feeling the pressure, it’s only hardened his resolve, as 2024 felt like the year that the Colombian artist solidified his standing as one of dance music’s most electrifying talents. His Breathe... Godspeed EP had a lot to do with that, as its four tracks filtered stadium-ready sonics through the lens of the hardcore continuum, resulting in a collection of jaw-dropping, rhythm-switching bangers that often sounded like something beamed down from another planet. The club might be Verraco’s primary theater of operation, but if he keeps displaying this sort of production wizardry, it won’t be long before he gets recruited to score a James Cameron flick.
Tristwych Y Fenywod - Tristwych Y Fenywod (Night School)
As a general rule, it’s not a good thing when a band immediately conjures thoughts of Game of Thrones, but UK trio Tristwych Y Fenywod isn’t the average group. Magic and mysticism is in their DNA—they literally describe themselves as a “power coven”—and with all of their lyrics being delivered in Welsh, it’s not hard to imagine their zither-driven songs doubling as ritual incantations, albeit ones that also bear a passing resemblance to the gothy power ballads that groups like Siouxsie and the Banshees and Tears for Fears once made their calling card. Plenty of artists have engaged in witchy cosplay over the years—hell, that aesthetic was arguably the backbone of the 4AD label during the ’80s—but Tristwych Y Fenywod have fully committed to the bit, with some truly fantastic results.
Moin - You Never End (AD 93)
You Never End could have been a disaster, for one simple reason: it switched up the formula. On their first two albums, Moin avoided vocalists entirely, relying instead on random, internet-sourced vocal clips to add an extra touch of humanity to the group’s angsty strain of ’90s-indebted post-hardcore. It was an unorthodox technique, but given the litany of accolades that greeted those LPs, it also clearly worked, so when the time came to make another record, the UK trio could have easily stuck to the script and offered up more of the same. Instead, they decided to up the difficulty level and operate more like a traditional band, inviting artists like james K, Coby Sey and Olan Monk to step into the studio and add their vocals to the mix. Doing that undoubtedly required founding members (and core producers) Tom Halstead and Joe Andrews to surrender at least a bit of creative control, but listening to You Never End, the new blood only seems to have invigorated the group. (Oddly enough, two of the most appealing songs are voiced by Qatari-American artist and filmmaker Sophia Al-Maria, the only non-musician who appears on the record.) In comparison to the previous LPs, You Never End is a somewhat moodier and more introspective effort—think of it as more Slint than Fugazi—but regardless of who is on the mic, Moin ultimately still sounds like Moin, and new music from Moin is always something to be excited about.
HONORABLE MENTION
Wait, there’s more?
Yesterday I said that making these year-end lists is a kind of sickness, and I really meant it. A lot of time and effort goes into putting these things together, and while the releases listed above were my absolute favorites from 2024, there were an additional 24 albums and EPs that just barely missed the cut. I sadly don’t have the time or the bandwidth to give them all proper write-ups, but in hopes of giving them a little boost, I wanted to at least give them a small acknowledgement here in the newsletter. You’ll find them all below, and though they haven’t been ranked, I promise that they’re all very much worth your time.
Note: You can click the titles to hear each release individually, or you can also just head over to this convenient Buy Music Club list to find them all in one place.
Not Waving & Romance - Infinite Light (Ecstatic)
Panoram - Great Times (Balmat)
Persher - Sleep Well (Thrill Jockey)
Carré - Soft Fascination (Fast at Work)
Skee Mask - ISS010 (Ilian Tape)
Bianca Scout - Pattern Damage (Sferic)
taupe set xl - swamp prayer (enmossed)
Theef - Sun & Smoke (A Strangely Isolated Place)
Priori - This but More (naff)
Ali Berger - Shout (Trackland)
Ali Berger - Serious (Scissor & Thread)
Civilistjävel! - Brödföda (FELT)
Perila and Ulla - Jazz Plates (Paralaxe Editions)*
Oliver Coates - Throb, shiver, arrow of time (RVNG Intl.)
Man Rei - Thread (Somewhere Press)
doris dana - reveries (Somewhere Press)
mu tate - wanting less (Warm Winters Ltd.)
AshTreJinkins - Vapor Codes (Self-released)
Zaumne - Only Good Dreams for Me (Warm Winters Ltd.)
SHXCXCHCXSH - ......t (Northern Electronics)
ana reme - key (blush)
Ulla & Ultradog - It Means a Lot (Motion Ward)
naemi - Dust Devil (Self-released)
james devane - Searching (Umeboshi)
*Full disclosure: My wife Dania runs the Paralaxe Editions label.
Shawn Reynaldo is a freelance writer, editor, presenter and project manager. Find him on LinkedIn and Instagram—and make sure to follow First Floor on Instagram as well—or you can just drop Shawn an email to get in touch about projects, collaborations or potential work opportunities.