Herb Sundays - MMXXIV
A global survey of Herb faves of 2024 + the year in Ghostly, and more.
Herb Sundays year in review: The songs that hit us hardest (Apple, Spotify).
Art by Michael Cina.
“The Year in Hate” opened relatively low stakes in middlebrow pop culture, all rap beef, comedian tiffs, and literary spats, but ended on a much worse note, portending what’s to come. It was the year when Pro Wrestling set the agenda much better than any news, a year of “kayfabe,” faces and heels, and apparently, we are in the mood for heels. Honestly, it was a depressing year, not for lack of exciting or good things happening personally, just a general malaise.
In contrast, I see Herb as a chance to fall in love every week with an individual artist's work, an idea, or another time and place, hopefully now. I realize that writing to understand, instead of the other way around, is therapeutic, trying to make sense of it all. All of this is a privileged talk, I’ve told myself, easily to opine about taste and aesthetics when your life is not at stake, but I’ve come around to thinking it is the patellar reflex test of our souls, or how easily we are moved to joy or tears. Art can be the shortest line to feeling, a litmus of our beliefs.
I put the word out to some folks below and was heartened by what I found, which you can find in this week’s playlist, an update on the midyear 2024 playlist (those songs are still included).
Contrary to some opinions, I don’t think the algorithm has robbed us; the slipstream of mass culture has always almost been a false flag as to what is best, apart from a few lucky moments here and there. The truth is somewhere else, and that’s ok. The real risk is that our ability to see/hear something and then feel something is at risk. Can you enjoy something without the chatter of others in your mind, without fear of being navel-gazing or basic, that’s the war at stake.
There is no “best of the year” list cause there is no best to be had now since no one has heard it all, and we all are panning for gold. It’s ok to declare “cultural bankruptcy” once in a while, to be disconnected from the group, to see it again with fresh eyes and renewed energy.
Musically and culturally, I’ve never been more proud of the Ghostly label team and what we’re building at All Flowers Group with Secretly Group, including the drink sum wtr label, which had an incredible rookie season with Aja Monet nominated at the Grammys this past Spring for Best Spoken Word Poetry Album and newcomers like JEMS! and Annahstasia. You cand find tunes from all in this week’s playlist.
For Ghostly’s 25th anniversary (we posted a recap here), we doubled down on debut albums but saved room for some original roster artists, too. We posted our team favorites to a playlist, and I posted my “Ghostly 25” playlist (Apple, Spotify), too, focusing on collaborations (Reznor, Sakamoto, ahoy!). All of which you can find here.
Thanks as always to
, my design partner-in-crime, who makes Herb so beautiful each week. And thank you for reading, commenting, listening, etc. Very much appreciated. - samThe prompt was: “What song hit you hard in 2024 (new or old)?”
In a fight against recency bias, the old blends with the new, but it is mostly new. I added a few of mine as well, you can read the mid-year picks in the post here too:
Alejandro Cohen (KCRW) - Melenas - "Bang (Peanut Butter Wolf Remix)"
“Such a fresh and catchy track, Stereolab but more post punk?”
Alessia Avallone (Language Of Sound) - Acopia - “Eyes Shut”
“I've been just obsessed with this song and Acopia (you should check them out!)”
Amber Schaefer (Director, SNL, etc) - Safe Mind - “6’ Pole”
Anthony Valadez - Benjamin Tod - “Using Again”
“I’m pretty straight edge but this song is fitting for 2024. It’s honest, genuine, beautiful and just fucking soul crushing.”
Ari Kuschnir (M ss ng p eces) - Jon Hopkins - “RITUAL (Evocation)”
"A pithy paean to matrimony I discovered (via, appropriately, Discover Weekly) roundabouts Valentine's Day, which introduced me to The Bug Club, a Welsh duo (now signed to Sub Pop) and their very catchy, sublimely silly songcraft; kinda like if Stephen Merritt didn't love Love so much and fancied himself a bit like James Bond instead. I haven't managed to get my wife invested in TBC yet, but there's always next year.”
(The Fox Is Black) - Nala Sinephro - “Continuum 2”“This is what I imagine the sound of the universe expanding would be like.”
Caleb Braaten (Sacred Bones) - Fairport Convention - "Tam Lin"
Cameron Parkins (All Our Dreams) - The Beach Boys - "Disney Girls (1957)"
“A beautiful tune that has got my daughter to fall in love with The Beach Boys. Bruce Johnston is a irl narc but musically under appreciated and he knocked this one out of the park.”
Casey MQ - The Clark Sisters- “Center Of Thy Will”
“Listened on tour constantly 🙂”
Chad Pratt (Same Eyes) - Public Image Limited - “The Order of Death”
“Discovered this song from the HBO show Industry and I fell in love with the song and the song placement. I want that job!”
(Can’t Get Much Higher) - MJ Lenderman (Herb 46) - “She's Leaving You”
Chris Kaskie (Varyer / Slow Focus) - Bee Gees - “Morning of My Life”
“My kids are prob. tired of me telling them every morning to be patient with their life, as it's only morning and they're still to live the day.”
Ed Note: Chris wrote the most unhinged and awesome gift guide for his niece, , I’m still going through it.
claire rousay (HERB 09) - Brian McBride - “Girl Nap”
David Brandon Geeting - Alice in Chains - “Nutshell”
“This song really stands the test of time. It doesn't matter that it's by Alice in Chains -- it's an outlier in their discography and fits seamlessly in any era of songs that instantly get you in your feels with no context needed. You hear the first 3 chords and you have goosebumps. I had it on a playlist next to Joni Mitchell's "Amelia" and it worked perfectly. It also reminds me of ML Buch's 2023 emotional record-closer "Working it Out." I could see Alex G covering it and it not being weird at all. Nutshell forever <3”
Dave Sutton (All Flowers Group/Hype Machine) - Twen - “SeaStar”
‘I really fell for breakbeats/jangly guitar songs in 2024. This one from Nashville duo Twen sat at the top of my 'dreamy drum breaks' playlist all year. Refreshing sound with an equally fun, very '90s music video.”
Ed Note: Dave’s Ghostly 25 playlist of hooky tunes is ace.
Dina Litovsky (In The Flash) - JamieXX & The Avalanches - “All You Children”
“The jammiest of jams that makes it impossible to sit still. I will be ringing in the New Year with it.”
DJ Python - Acetone - “Esque”
Dua Saleh - Sade - “Young Lion”
“This song is an homage to her child who has publicly transitioned throughout the years. It’s wonderful to see your idols on the right side of history while supporting loved ones”
Ed. note: Dua’s debut on Ghostly is one of my fave we’ve released in 25 years, have a gander, artwork co-created by
too no less: (Minor Genius) - The Fall - “Eat Y’self Fitter” (The Angel) - urika’s bedroom - “*66”“Heart-wrenching, but more from the music than the lyrics. An ideal emo song for me.”
Ed Note: Check urika’s Herb Sundays from this year:
Gary Suarez (Cabbages) - Heems, Sid Vashi, & Cool Calm Pete - "BANSHEE"
“Queens rap is my favorite kind of rap, so hearing a revitalized Himanshu team up with the still mostly dormant Cool Calm Pete to rap about being from Queens meets the metaphorical definition of MY KINDA SHIT.”
Graham Jonson (quickly, quickly) - Jeanette - “Leo”
“The perfect forgotten 80s synth pop song. Fast and bursting with energy and charisma. Drive fast to this one dog!!!!!”
Ed Note: New quickly, quickly music in 2025 on Ghostly. His Nick Drake cover this year was lovely.
gum.mp3 (Gum Studio) - Theo Parrish - “ah”
“This is the peak of electronic music to me. Spiritual and psychosomatic in its stimulation. I workout to this song on loop, and let the modulations take me elsewhere.”
(Dinner Music, Horse Opera) - Geri Baird - “Backside of the Desert”“i tend to end up in marfa tx a few times a year and this year i played this song 20x or more on the drive there and back. there's almost nothing online (that i can find) about geri baird or song itself, which deepens the mystique of an already very mysterious song and makes me love it even more — it's late-seventies psych-folk at its very best.”
Jason Voltaire (Martyn Bootyspoon) - Loui$ - “Pink Footpath (Disco Mix)”
“Name me a better feeling than scratching that itch when you finally track down a rogue Italo gem that’s been lingering on the edge of your periphery for years and you haven't bookmarked. I'll wait!!!”
Ed note: Urgh he’s right, he always is, how the bass sort of falls out of time, the plaintive lead synth, the little ersatz guitars buried in the mix. Some days Italo is the only music that can heal me. This has been added to my Italo playlist now too:
Jeff Carvalho (Culture Club Show) - Arctic Monkeys - “From the Ritz to the Rubble”
“Not new, but nearly as strong today as then. A bloke's journey from an evening out with mates to something more urgent, like a good one off fist a cuff. When I discovered my young nine year old son knew every word and could carry every intonation of young UK lad talk, my heart bloomed with hope.”
Jeff Owens (All Flowers Group / Felte) - Poorly Drawn House - “Oh Horn! Sing That Memory of Disappearing!”
“This song has every emotion known to exist within 7 minutes. It always stops me in my tracks. Think labradford, slocore and every great jazz record known.”
Jeffrey Silverstein - Gray/Smith - “Verrazano Tile”
Ed Note: Spoke with the very kind Jeffrey for The Creative Independent this year too.
Jubilee (Magic City) - Doechii - “Nissan Altima”
“I have been following Doechii for a while because FLORIDA stand up but nothing prepared me for "Alligator Bites Never Heal. It is a perfect project and in a time where mainstream releases just feel so...weird? I feel like we all needed it. It just reminds me of Nicki Minaj pre twitter meltdowns but also MF Doom and maybe some Tyler The Creator but also the internet aka a lot of things that I love. Nissan Altima was immediate my fav and when she did her Tiny Desk I fought back tears on the train because it was just the actual best.”
Jules Dressner (Louis/Dressner Selections) - Patty Johnson- “I'm In Love -Europe Version”
“Her name is DEF NOT Patty Johnson lol (it's Patrizia Bilardo, I just looked it up.)”
Kate Ebeling (All Flowers Group) - Nourished by Time - “Hell of a Ride”
Ed note: Kate’s G25 playlist is here too.
Kieran Press-Reynolds - starsaga, nosgov - "human" (prod. anarchy)
“I feel like a radioactive beam is setting my brain ablaze.”
ed note: I’ve liked how kpr has unvieled his year end list:
Kyle Raymond Fitzpatrick (The Trend Report™) - Boo - "Hyper Feminine"
“There were so many contenders for tracks that offered a pulse for the year — largely from persons like Nick Leon, Shygirl, Physical Therapy, and others — but Boo seemed to be one of the few people who captured the sublimity that can come from dance music. It's like "Halcyon and On and On" via Marie Davidson, which is the sort of combination you'd never put together but come to crave it. Very necessary in a year of, um, chaotics.”
Larry Fitzmaurice (Last Donut Of The Night) - Cash Cobain and Laila! - "Problem"
“Sexy drill's answer to Burial's "Archangel," the only eight-minute song this year that I put on loop repeatedly, the most truthful and irresistible hook of 2024.”
Ed. Note: I spoke with Larry earlier this year, really enjoy his interviews.
- Keanu Nelson - “Family”“When the Aboriginal Australian artist Keanu Nelson sings about family over Yuta Mastsumura's retrofuturist casiotone backbeat, you can hear 65,000 years of history culminating in a moment where the past, present and future exist at the same time.”
Matthew Dear (Matthew Dear) - Ween - “Ocean Man”
“I was big into Ween in high school and this later one slipped past me until recently. It’s such a catchy song that gets stuck in my head for a few days when I play it.”
Matthew Schnipper (
) - Cindy - “The Bell”Editor’s Note: Matthew’s year end playlist is a doozy.
Mea Liedl (Bitwig) - Tropic OF Cancer - “Be Brave”
“I was on my flight to LA from Berlin in January and found out Juan Mendez had passed away while in air. It felt surreal, suspended between here and there, as long distance flights are, and very sad. Juan had given me the CD when they played a Tropic of Cancer show at Berghain and I naturally gravitated towards this song to listen to on repeat.”
Ed Note: I love Tropic Of Cancer too, more on that in 2025.
Michael Cina (Cina Associates) - Eldana - “You & I”
“My most listened to song in 24” (Editor’s Note: on the mighty Drink Sum Wtr label)
More Eaze - Ween - "She's Your Baby"
In 2024, I experienced the third great Ween obsession of my life. This time White Pepper hit harder than ever and I became deeply obsessed with what is arguably the saddest Ween song of all time "She's Your Baby." My partner and I have become fascinated by the multiple readings that can come from the title line-is this the narrator's partner telling him that a child belongs to him as a reveal? Is it a much darker insinuation of abandonment and ownership (she's YOUR baby)? And what to make of the first verse where the title line takes on an entirely romantic tilt? There's an incredibly devastating and abstracted narrative that slowly reveals itself with multiple listens. Musically, it's one of the gentlest songs in the bands entire catalog and sounds like the best parts of Elliott Smith's ballads rolled into one small lilting moment. I couldn't stop mulling over the song's meaning and arrangement the entire year and ultimately just had to listen repeatedly in awe of its breezy wreckage.
Nick Barat (Fool’s Gold) (ed note: Nick’s great substack continues to gain steam) - Eyedress ft Bb trickz & Elvia - "Skater Dater"
“Casio-preset new wave courtesy the most #relevant guitarist besides Mk.gee, backed by my fav from this year’s class of kawaii rappers. Eyedress’ other hip-hop collab also stayed in heavy rotation (the Depeche Mode drive-by “Make It Out The Hood” with Top Rank Gang) but “Skater Dater” is what makes him such a sly prodigy: emotional mallrat music, fizzy like a food-court Dr Pepper and romantic as a perfectly aimless afternoon.”
Nicola Kuperas (ADULT.) - Psychic Graveyard - “Sword Through My Neck”
“This song is a total EARWORM! Actually whole album gets jammed in your head! Top album of 2024!”
Nigil Mack (drink sum wtr) - Kendrick Lamar - “reincarnated”
“Sent chills on how amazing and talented Kendrick is. Light years ahead of his peers.’
Phil Bator (Lunch Reads) - Brian Eno - “An Ending (Ascent)”
“It's always excellent, but hits a little harder-in-a-softer-way as we collectively look toward the new year.”
rafael anton irisarri (Black Knoll) - The Cure - “Alone”
“The loss and disillusionment of 2024 couldn’t be more fittingly summed up—this track hits like a ton of bricks.”
- Jabu - "Oceanside Spider House"“In a year where seemingly everyone went gaga for dream pop, and Cocteau Twins were somehow more influential than ever before, this Jabu song shined particularly bright in what was ultimately an extremely crowded field.”
Stephan Kunze (Zen Sounds) - Able Noise – “Violence”
It hit me first on a crowded train, feeling slightly drained and sick, trying to drown out the traffic noise by turning up the music in my headphones.
As a pre-single for Able Noise’s debut album High Tide, “Violence” seems like an odd choice. Still, I could listen to it on repeat forever. I actually did.
This is five and a half minutes of layered detuned guitar, overdubbed with violins (hence the title) and loose, free-form drums. It’s not “about” anything, it doesn’t “mean” anything. In Alan Watts’ words, it’s just about its very “suchness” – the essence of sound itself.
“There isn't that much, if any, of an interesting back story to it”, the Dutch-Greek experimental rock duo confirms over email when I reach out to them. “No concept, no meaning, just music.”
Pressed on how the tune was conceived, they go into a bit more detail: “Initially it was just the guitar and drums, played as such live a few times at the end of our set, until we decided to try and convert it in to something for the album, for which we thought it would benefit from an extra melodic layer. We had the sense we wanted violins for it, so we contacted our pals Magdalena McLean and Oliver Hamilton who both play in the London band caroline, made a date for recording, and then wrote their lines by humming the melody into our recorder. They recommended we stick to the hummed version instead of adding violins, which we wisely decided against. The recorded violin tracks were pitched down and then subjected to increasing levels of distortion and chorus as the piece developed, resulting in that John Cale/Tony Conrad, Oliver Coates-like bowed string sound, that we were both very obsessed with.”
Todd L. Burns (Crambe Repetita) - Prefab Sprout - “Bonny (Acoustic)”
Teen Daze (Enjoy Music) - mk.gee - “I want”
“There was an evening a few months ago where I literally listened to this song on repeat, like four times in a row, like I was 13 years old or something.”
Travis Holcombe (KCRW / FREAKS ONLY) - Mermaid Chunky - "Céilí"
“I love the journey this track takes you on across its 8+ minute runtime - from "wtf?" to "HOLY FUCK!"“
ULYSSA (EOD & JLW) - "ALL YOU BLEED IS BLOOD" - LUCY (Cooper B. Handy) & SURF GANG
It’s a strange courage
you give me ancient star:
Shine alone in the sunrise
toward which you lend no part!" - William Carlos Williams
Yasmin Leung (All Flowers Group) - Bullion - “Blue Pedro”
“2024 gave us new Bullion music with ‘Affection’, but also prompted a dive back through his catalogue & (for me) a return to looped plays of this nautical masterpiece from 2017.”
Ed Note: Have been trying to work with Bullion for over a decade, his 2024 album is a masterpiece to me: