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Pitchfork’s editors are already thinking about what albums have left the biggest impressions and will land a coveted spot on our year-end list. So we’re spotlighting some of 2024’s most outstanding releases to date by rounding up albums that have earned high scores and Best New Music designations with a quick list of RIYLs (that’s Recommended If You Like) and links to our coverage.
Unlike our year-end lists, this one is organized in reverse chronological order. To help you keep track of the year’s best music, we’ll be updating it periodically throughout the remainder of 2024.
(All releases featured here are independently selected by our editors. When you buy something through our retail links, however, Pitchfork may earn an affiliate commission.)
August
RIYL: Double entendres; wordplay; foreplay; Quad City DJs’ “My Boo”; Jenny Lewis sort of; himbos; dating woes; “pure pop”; self-recrimination; the kooky emoji
Listen/Buy: Amazon | Apple Music | Rough Trade | Spotify | Tidal
RIYL: Quarter-life crises; virtuosic bars; psilocybin on the beach; dreams about drowning; depressing rhymes and twinkly pianos
Listen/Buy: Amazon | Apple Music | Spotify | Tidal
RIYL: Ungoogleable names; MapQuest nostalgia; y2k-era clicks + cuts; midlife heel turns; the visceral pleasures of synthetic sound; the visceral pleasures of synthetic drugs; outsider techno; the purity of guilelessness
Listen/Buy: Amazon | Apple Music | Bandcamp | Spotify
July
RIYL: Electromagnetic radiation; the whirring of a computer booting up; deep listening; Fennesz; attuning to the sonic underworld of the metropolis; the soundtrack to Blade Runner 2049; wireframe glasses; immersing yourself in the drama of everyday sounds
Listen/Buy: Amazon | Apple Music | Bandcamp | Spotify | Tidal
RIYL: Fretless bass; it’s worth saying fretless bass twice; Jon Hassell; new age; journeying to the center of yourself; Naná Vasconcelos’ 1987 album Bush Dance; deep-sea submersibles; lapis lazuli; listening to a Balearic DJ while underwater
Listen/Buy: Amazon | Apple Music | Bandcamp | Spotify | Tidal
RIYL: Soccer references; indie gang vocals; big-tent emo; Catholic guilt; having a social life that’s mostly just DSA meetings; the lore of the band Los Campesinos!
