Best of 2024 - Clay Geddert

For 2024, the Cups N Cakes Network is approaching our year-end lists a little differently: we’ve asked some of our volunteers to tell us a bit about their favourite releases this year. Today, Clay Geddert takes us through his top picks of the year.

Another year is behind us, and Canada's music scene continues to captivate with innovative, homegrown talent. 2024 was a year marked by conflict and strife, but there was plenty of music to meet the moment – whether it be through politically charged screeds or defiantly joyous earworms, Canadian music was there to carry us through it all. New stars emerged and old legends returned, it seems that Canada’s talent pool is deeper than ever.

Post-rock fans were certainly spoiled this year. Yoo Doo Right released another thunderous and engrossing long player, From the Heights of Our Pastureland. As loud as ever, it seems Yoo Doo Right can doo no wrong, so long as their amps are cranked. Always true to their anti-war philosophy, global conflict is typically followed by an LP from Godspeed You! Black Emperor. 2024 was no different with the release of NO TITLE AS OF 13 FEBRUARY 2024 28,340 DEAD - the title serving as a reference to the death toll in Gaza. In a surprising turn, NO TITLE turns out to be their brightest, most exuberant music yet. It serves as a beacon of hope rather than a harbinger of doom in a time we need it most.

I’d be remiss if I let country music slip through the cracks, because there were some stand-outs this year. Zachary Lucky is a weathered country crooner born from Canadian country royalty who reliably puts out great prairie tunes. His latest, The Wind, is a raw and easy-going country record in the style of the storytelling greats. But the highlight of the country/folk genre for me this year was definitely Wyatt C. Louis’ long-awaited release, Chandler. Louis teased us with their bouncy, tongue-in-cheek single “Dancing with Sue” four long years ago, but Chandler was worth the wait and then some. Louis filled their lungs with chinook winds and breathed out a collection of warm, pensive and vulnerable songs that teem with prairie life and discordant views of the place they call home.

<a href="https://wyattlouis.bandcamp.com/album/chandler">Chandler by Wyatt C. Louis</a>

Despite all these amazing albums, there was a definite stand-out: Cindy Lee’s Diamond Jubilee. It almost feels gauche to keep talking about it at this point, because it has ended up on so many year-end lists, but it really is that good; I suspect it will be in the conversation for best of the decade when the time comes. The behemoth, 2-hour long magnum opus is varied, strange, familiar, and visionary. It’s the indie sounds of the decades past filtered through a thick fuzz of AM static. The result is warm and familiar, but also makes it feel as though the music is just out of reach, like you're listening to it at the far end of the radio frequency’s range. Diamond Jubilee is absolutely entrancing from the first moment, it’s an undeniable instant-classic.

There were plenty of other stand-out albums that deserve a mention, despite my waning word-count: Another Day by Fucked Up, A Chaos Of Flowers by BIG|BRAVE, Think Of Mist by Dorothea Paas, ROLLERCOASTER by Cadence Weapon, Cîpayak Joy by Ghostkeeper, Up on Gravity Hill by Metz, SHAME by OMBIIGIZI, and RED FUTURE by Snotty Nose Rez Kids.