Collage of 2024 Albums including: Sabrina Carpenter - "Short n' Sweet" Tyler, The Creator - "CHROMAKOPIA" Clairo -"Charm" The Marías - "Submarine" Future & Metro Boomin - "WE DONT TRUST YOU"
Collage of 2024 Albums including: Sabrina Carpenter – “Short n’ Sweet” Tyler, The Creator – “CHROMAKOPIA” Clairo -“Charm” The Marías – “Submarine” Future & Metro Boomin – “WE DONT TRUST YOU”
Jaden Sims

The Best Albums Of 2024

Rap beefs, record breaking tours, and most importantly amazing music.
Byline photo of Jaden Sims
Jaden Sims, Staff Editor
December 19, 2024
2024 in Music Overview

After (in my opinion) a weaker year in music in 2023, the music industry witnessed a huge shift. Many artists experimented with release dates, marketing methods, and sounds. While mediocre albums are a given any year in music, the best of the best this year were really strong and created a memorable year to reminisce on. Here are five of my favorite albums of 2024

5. SahBabii – “Saaheem”

Rapper SahBabii has been apart of Atlanta’s Underground Rap scene since the mid 2010s and he returns from a three year hiatus with his 18 track project  “Saheem”. 


While SahBabii may not be the most introspective lyricist, his vocal inflections, flows, and beat selection truly defines his sound. A project influenced by the likes of Young Thug, and Young Nudy, Sahbabii glides over the smooth trap production throughout the album. He truly understands how to use his voice as an instrument and he has plenty of funny/memorable lines throughout the project (“All these diamonds on me glitter” is one of my personal favorites on “Anaconda Livin”).  

 

SahBabii might be able to breakthrough into the mainstream industry of rap with this project, this is one of the best trap albums in recent memory

 

Favorite Songs: “Roll Wit Me”, “On Film”, “Mirror Picz”

4. Swapa & Waysett – “island”

Many may have never heard of the artist-producer duo consisting of New Jersey rapper and artist Swapa and Jamaican producer Waysett, but the pair created one of the best albums of 2024 and I expect to hear even bigger things from them in 2025. 

 

The title “island” perfectly describes this project as it has a very tropical sound while mixing in ambient trap production to create a very danceable but also euphoric and introspective album. The album touches on themes of love and relationships as Swapa raps and sings about finding himself and also his hardships with his relationships. The way Swapa delivers lines such as “Finding myself, can you wait for me?” on “all eye need” and “Refining, Realigning, Redefining, with Myself” on the outro track “visionary”, highlights the self-growth and self-love journey Swapa details himself going through on the 10 track LP. 

 

This is the project definition of late night music and Swapa & Waysett work really well together as a duo. I look forward to hearing more collaborations between the two in the future.


Favorite Songs: “sins”, “all eye need”, “commas”

Clario's album cover for "Charm"
3. Clairo – “Charm”

Clario has had a standout year in 2024.

 

Continuing her growth as an artist since her early success on YouTube as a bedroom pop artist, Clairo feels like she has fully mastered her sound on “Charm”, mixing elements of lo-fi pop with soft rock to create an album that would be perfect for a quiet night ride home. 

 

A critique could be made that a lot of the songs blend together, but personally, I think that adds to the album experience as the tracks flow so well together. This album fits perfectly into modern pop with its striped back and relaxed sound and collabing with producer Leon Michaels turned out to be the best decision she has made in her young career. 

 

The best way to describe the production on this album is simply rich. The warmth and groove throughout this project is something that not many artists can create but Clario creates her world perfectly, and Clario is emerging as one of the next stars within the music industry.


Favorite Songs: “Terrapin”, “Add Up My Love”, “Slow Dance”

Clario’s album cover for “Charm”
Leon Thomas's album cover for "MUTT"
2. Leon Thomas – “MUTT”

Known for his iconic portrayal of Andre Harris on the early 2010s Nickelodeon series Victorious, over the past decade, Leon Thomas has worked to prove that he is so much more than just another Nickelodeon child star. 

 

He became one of the music industry’s most prestigious songwriters, contributing to songs such as “Pipe Down” by Drake, and “nasty” by Ariana Grande. His biggest accomplishment would be winning a grammy for his work on SZA’s hit song “Snooze”. 

 

Thomas would recently take a bigger focus to his solo music with him releasing a LP in 2023 titled “Electric Dust” and this year he would release his much improved follow-up “Mutt”. In an era where it feels like Male R&B stars are dying out, Leon Thomas shows the potential for him to be the next star of the genre within this project. 

 

As always his songwriting is amazing and his spaced out vocals, full of reverb, shine throughout the project. Leon Thomas very comfortably fills the void that was left in the genre and I fully expect him to continue to build his legacy in the years to come.

Leon Thomas’s album cover for “MUTT”
Tyler, The Creator’s album cover for “CHROMAKOPIA”
2024 Album Of The Year: Tyler, The Creator – “CHROMAKOPIA”

Ever since his 2017 album Flower Boy, rapper Tyler, The Creator has seemed to push the boundaries of hip-hop with every album released. 

 

Flower Boy saw Tyler experiment with neo-soul and jazz-inspired sounds, while his 2019 follow-up IGOR told a love story which incorporated sounds such as R&B and synth-funk. In 2021, he would release CALL ME IF YOU GET LOST, where Tyler returned to his more braggadocious rap sound. This three-album run built up to his latest LP titled 

CHROMAKOPIA, which was released on October 28th of this year. The album turned out to be one of the most highly anticipated albums of the year, debuting at #1 on Billboard’s Top 200 albums and selling 299K copies in its first week, even without a full week of sales tracking due to the album releasing on a Monday. This is out of the ordinary for an artist as big as Tyler with most mainstream/commercial  artists releasing music on Fridays.

 

Despite the popularity and commercial success, this album is one of Tyler, The Creator’s most personal albums with him talking about topics such as growing older, his materialistic desires, and the concept of fatherhood. Arguably one of the most personal songs in his discography comes with the 12th track on the album “Like Him” which features Lola Young (as well as a singular ad-lib from Baby Keem). The song explores Tyler’s struggle with his identity as he is often compared to his father who was absent during his childhood. Another standout track on the project is “Take Your Mask Off” which features Daniel Caesar. The song features amazing soulful production and Tyler talks about people hiding their true selves and his last verse even dives into his own personal insecurities. In terms of the album’s sound, Tyler showcases many influences throughout the 15 track album. You can hear production inspired by artists/producers such as Pharrell, Kanye West, and Frank Ocean all sprinkled throughout the LP. Tyler, The Creator dove into many subjects that most artists, especially in the hip-hop community, would never touch on during CHROMAKOPIA and this album will push the rap genre forward as a whole.


Best Songs: “Like Him”, “Take Your Mask Off”, “Darling, I”