2024's Most Unconventional & Brilliant Albums
Mint Hyderabad|December 28, 2024
From moody indie-rock to industrial noise, these albums are a snapshot of the expansive geography of pop music
Bhanuj Kappal

It's never easy to distill a year's worth of music listening into a neat list of 10 (or even 50) albums. But putting together this year's best albums list has been particularly hard. 2024 was a year of left-field surprises, with brash upstarts and underground favourites regularly stealing the spotlight from some of the industry's most bankable names. We had a new generation of wildly inventive pop starlets stake their claims to the crown, a brutal power struggle in hip-hop that enraptured rap fans, a long-overdue reckoning with country music's racial politics, and a steady stream of genre-blurring, envelope-pushing albums from the unlikeliest of scenes and places.

The 10 albums that made the final cut range from moody indie-rock and industrial noise to rambunctious rap and spectral dance music, offering a snapshot of the expansive geography of pop music in 2024. In no particular order, here are my favourite records of the year.

This story is from the December 28, 2024 edition of Mint Hyderabad.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.

This story is from the December 28, 2024 edition of Mint Hyderabad.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.

MORE STORIES FROM MINT HYDERABADView All
Mint Hyderabad

Address India's worsening urban groundwater crisis

We require innovative solutions that use technology to prevent its depletion and contamination

time-read
3 mins  |
January 23, 2025
Mint Hyderabad

NSE's investor registrations breach 110 mn mark

In the last five months, daily new registrations have ranged 47,000 to 73,000, adding a massive 10 million investors

time-read
1 min  |
January 23, 2025
Mint Hyderabad

US sanctions won't see oil price surge, shipping to be hit

Oil price is not projected to rise, may stay at $70-75 a barrel, and the situation will ease in a few months: BPCL CMD

time-read
2 mins  |
January 23, 2025
Mint Hyderabad

India Uses AI to Stop Stampedes at World's Biggest Gathering

Keen to improve India's abysmal crowd management record at large-scale religious events, organisers of the world's largest human gathering are using artificial intelligence to try to prevent stampedes.

time-read
1 min  |
January 23, 2025
Mint Hyderabad

A Liveable Planet Must Remain on the Agenda

People of over 340 districts are highly vulnerable to the health effects of climate change

time-read
3 mins  |
January 23, 2025
Mint Hyderabad

Strategies to achieve ₹1 cr with a current portfolio of ₹47.4 lakh

I'm 28 years with a ₹47.4 lakh portfolio (₹36.5 lakh in equities, rest in mutual funds). I invest ₹25,000 via monthly SIPs, increasing 10% annually. With no liabilities, I plan to invest ₹10 lakh more. How can I grow my portfolio to ₹1 crore in two years, or by 30 years?

time-read
1 min  |
January 23, 2025
Mint Hyderabad

HDFC Bank NPAs rise amid Q3 agriculture loan defaults

The lender's profit growth was weighed down by asset quality issues and slow loan growth

time-read
2 mins  |
January 23, 2025
Mint Hyderabad

Netflix surges past 300 mn subscribers

Netflix on Tuesday said it added nearly 19 million subscribers during the holiday season to finish out last year with more than 300 million subscribers.

time-read
1 min  |
January 23, 2025
Mint Hyderabad

Travel unicorn OYO eyes religious hubs

Travel tech unicorn OYO on Wednesday said it is planning to add 500 hotels in religious hubs, including Ayodhya, Varanasi, Prayagraj, Puri, Haridwar, Mathura, Vrindavan, Amritsar, Ujjain, Ajmer, Nasik and Tirupati, this year.

time-read
1 min  |
January 23, 2025
Mint Hyderabad

Blue Energy Motors to invest ₹3,500 cr

NG-powered truck maker Blue Energy Motors on Wednesday said it plans to invest ₹3,500 crore for setting up an electric trucks production plant in Maharashtra to fuel the state's green energy transition.

time-read
1 min  |
January 23, 2025