{"id":32905,"date":"2025-01-02T03:09:27","date_gmt":"2025-01-02T01:09:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lauramccullagh.com\/blog\/?p=32905"},"modified":"2025-01-02T18:15:19","modified_gmt":"2025-01-02T16:15:19","slug":"2024-music-in-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lauramccullagh.com\/blog\/2025\/01\/2024-music-in-review\/","title":{"rendered":"2024 – Music in review"},"content":{"rendered":"
MUSIC<\/div>\n

It’s the start of a new year which means it’s time for my annual reflection on the music in my life.<\/p>\n

Today marks 18 years since I joined\u00a0last.fm,<\/a>\u00a0a truly sizeable chunk of time. It’s really true what they say – time moves faster as you get older. The year went by in a blur and unfortunately a lot of what I listened to became similarly blurred. I always enjoy the graphs and data that last.fm collects, it’s helpful and interesting, especially when I need a reminder of what I was really listening to.<\/p>\n

I knew before checking the graphs that I did not listen to a lot of music in the last year, but I did find a lot to enjoy; here is a look at some of my favourite music from 2023.<\/p>\n

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A L B U M S<\/strong><\/p>\n

I’ve been struggling for a while to get properly back into music. A whole bunch of factors have contributed to it, but it still makes me sad that I’m just not listening to as much music now as I A. historically have and B. would like to.<\/p>\n

Traditionally, January is a big listening month for me as I go through the internet’s best-of lists and check out all the albums I missed the year before. It usually gets me all invigorated and excited to keep listening throughout the year…sadly it can also be hard for me to maintain the momentum. That’s what happened in ’23 – my listening data forms a valley over the course of the year, steadily declining and only picking up as year-end panic started to set in.<\/p>\n

It’s interesting to me that my top albums all came from the later months of the year.<\/p>\n

Coming in first is\u00a0Romance<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0<\/strong>by\u00a0Fontaines D.C.\u00a0<\/strong>I loved\u00a0Skinty Fia<\/em> back in 2022 and think as a cohesive album I actually like\u00a0Romance\u00a0<\/em>more. From the first ominous tones of the opening\/title track all the way to the glittery pop singalong closer\u00a0Favourite<\/em> it was highly repeatable and my top pick of the year.<\/p>\n

Putting aside the whole cultural and meme movement surrounding it,\u00a0Charli<\/strong> XCX<\/strong>‘s\u00a0Brat\u00a0<\/strong><\/em>was a solid pop album. I enjoyed it as a whole but it was the standout tracks that really pushed it onto the top 3 for me.<\/p>\n

And in third place a super late addition as I only started listening to it in December:\u00a0Arab Strap<\/strong>‘s\u00a0I’m Totally Fine with it \ud83d\udc4d<\/a>\u00a0don’t give a fuck anymore\u00a0\ud83d\udc4d<\/a><\/strong><\/em>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>Much like with\u00a0As days get dark\u00a0<\/em>I really love the band’s current sound and had this album on repeat all of December.<\/p>\n

Favourite albums:<\/strong><\/p>\n