It’s been yet another massive challenge to narrow yet another massive year of new music down to just ten releases, but we intrepid music scribes must shoulder the responsibility.
First up, here are my very honourable mentions, who I would have loved to have squeezed into my top list, but unfortunately fifteen to twenty does not go into ten. They are as follows: Mammal, Distant (who were perilously close to the top ten), Gravemind, Darko US, Four Stroke Baron, Nightwish, Opeth, Entheos, The Omnific.
TOP 10 RELEASES OF 2024
10. Diamond Construct – Angel Killer Zero
9. Klone – The Unseen
8. Hippotraktor – Stasis
7. Alpha Wolf – Half Living Things
6. sleepmakeswaves – It’s Here, But I Have no Names for it
5. Reliqa – Secrets of the Future
4. Make Them Suffer – Make Them Suffer
3. Disembodied Tyrant/Synestia – The Tower: Part One/The Poetic Edda
2. Caligula’s Horse – Charcoal Grace
1. Devin Townsend – PowerNerd
TOP 10 SONGS OF 2024?
10. Klone – ‘Interlaced ‘
9. sleepmakeswaves – ‘Black Paradise’
8. Darko US – ‘Bunny Suit’
7. Hippotraktor – ‘Descent’
6. Caligula’s Horse – ‘The World Breathes With Me’
5. Alpha Wolf Featuring Ice T – ‘Sucks 2 Suck’
4. Make Them Suffer – ‘Tether’
3. Reliqa – ‘Keep Yourself Awake’
2. Disembodied Tyrant/Synestia – ‘Winter’
1. Devin Townsend – ‘Ubelia‘
BEST GIG YOU CAUGHT THIS YEAR
Aussie Band
Karnivool / Sleep Talk at Northcote Theatre, Melbourne/Naarm (Review & Gallery here)
The ‘Vool are one of my favourite bands on the planet, but more than a decade out from their last album, they grow more aloof and enigmatic by the year. So to catch them on a rare live foray across the nation is always going to be number one for the year. And, enigmatic or not, they always deliver.
International Band
Tesseract / Future Static at The Croxton, Melbourne/Naarm (Review & Gallery here)
Tesseract put out my number one album of last year, and they are utterly sublime in a live setting, simply flawless, so it had to be them (probably just edging out their djenty compatriots Periphery.) The fact that Melbourne’s mighty Future Static supported was just a massive bonus.
Special mention to: normally, I wouldn’t be interested in a cover/tribute band in the slightest, but this year I’ll make an exception. California’s Mood Lifters, one of the best Rush tribute bands on the planet, came out this year and blew everyone’s minds with their ridiculously accurate and authentic three-hour take on one of the all-time more difficult rock acts to replicate. That one was a night to remember.
FAVOURITE CONTRIBUTION PRODUCED
I am an unashamed, unabashed Hevy Devy fanatic, and have been since he sang on a Steve Vai album back in 1993. I get an all-too-fleeting twenty minutes with the guy every two to three years, and I got that chance in 2024. So my interview with the amazing Devin Townsend was always going to be it. Read it here!
FAVOURITE NEW BAND/MUSICIAN DISCOVERED IN 2024
They’ve been around for a little while (they formed in 2020), but they exploded into my consciousness this year and became pretty much my favourite deathcore band on the planet. Their name is Disembodied Tyrant, and their utterly seamless juxtaposition of extreme technical heavy music and classical/symphonic bombast will blow your mind, if you let it.
NEXT BIG AUSSIE ACT TO WATCH IN 2025
Australian prog rock ‘supergroup’ Lune Asea released their superb debut single, Outlier, in 2023, and will be following that up with a second single entitled ‘Fathoms‘ next year.
WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING FORWARD TO MOST IN 2025?
Yes, I have a one-track mind sometimes – Hevy Devy is releasing his all-time magnum opus, a musical/rock opera entitled The Moth, in 2025. The great man states that this is the work he has been building up to for most of his life. So monumental is this release, he is doing a special one-off live show to signify its release in late March – Devin will take the stage at De Oosterpoort, a major cultural and musical centre in Groningen, The Netherlands, with no fewer than seventy musicians from the Noord Nederlands Orkest, a sixty-member choir, and his own band comprising of Mike Keneally, Joseph Stephenson, Darby Todd and James Leach.
There are two shows, and they will not be staged or repeated anywhere else in the world.
Personally, the video game I’m writing the narrative and novelisation for, Brides of BloodBane, should have a public, playable demo out on the interwebs next year (please wishlist https://rb.gy/a00wwt)
Written by Rod Whitfield @rod_whitfield
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