šŸŽ¶ I find a lot of ambient (ish?) stuff pretty tedious, but Ghost Elegies from Death Librarian is something special.

šŸŽ¶ I was really hoping the saxophonist on ESAā€™s ā€œSaturnaliaā€ was Christoph Clƶser (from Bohren & Der Club of Gore and a guest appearance on Kardashevā€™s ā€œBeyond the Passage of Embersā€) but itā€™s Matt ā€œchopsā€ Thompson.

Either way, I missed my calling playing sax for jazz, metal, and industrial.

šŸŽ¶ good beats about cryptids. Whatā€™s not to like?

šŸŽ¶ Looks like Daveed Diggs and clipping. will continue to lean into the industrial rap angle. Looking forward to this release: Dead Channel Sky.

šŸŽ¶ I was reminded of ā€œInstafestā€ when looking at my archives. Please enjoy my music festival courtesy of my 2024 listening.

A graphic poster for "Instafest" features a lineup of musical artists across three event dates with a cityscape and palm tree background.

2024 Reviews Collection

  • šŸŽ¶ Music
  • šŸ“š Books
  • šŸŽ²šŸƒšŸ•¹ļøā™Ÿļø Games (forthcoming)
  • Meta-blogging (forthcoming)
  • By the Numbers (a personal update) (forthcoming)
  • TV/Film (forthcoming)
  • Podcasts/Periodicals (forthcoming)

šŸŽ¶ 2024 Music Review

other 2024 reviews here


2024 was the year that I found out that iTunes Match and Apple Music were ā€œeatingā€ my music by dropping files, replacing with different editions/formats, or failing to sync some material. I already knew that Google did terrible things when going from Google Play Music to Youtube music, but Apple was a surprise to me. I resolved to not let such things happen any more.

I set out to rebuild my library by:

  • re-downloading lossless versions of my Bandcamp purchases
  • getting the best format download from other places Iā€™d bought digital music
  • re-ripping our CDs in lossless format
  • backing it all up
  • normalizing metadata with MusicBrainz Picard
  • running Plex Media Server to share the music
  • running Tailscale to make the server available without putting it directly on the web
  • running PlexAmp clients for an awesome listening experience
  • scrobbling my listening with last.fm

Iā€™m not finished with the project, but I have over 200 artists, 600 albums, and 6000 tracks re-deployed, with much more to come. Because Iā€™m not complete, the listening may not have as much variety as it could have.

Artists: Clubroot, Juno Reactor, NIN, Circle of Dust, Front Line Assembly; Albums: HolyName, Excursionsā€¦, Imaginationā€¦, Celldweller, A Homeland Denied; Tracks: The Straight and Narrow, Hammer & Gavel, Low Pressure Zone, HATEFUL, Listen!

Artists:

  • Clubroot is my go-to for evening chillout music
  • Juno Reactor is a constant fave
  • 3-5 are prolific industrial-ish artists that use various project pseudonyms, and I listen to a lot of each

Albums:

  • HolyNameā€™s self-titled is sorta doomcore taize and is a great Sunday listen
  • Excursions is a collection of early Front Line Assembly side-project work
  • Imagineā€¦ is a re-release of Juno Reactorā€™s first 5 albums as a compilation
  • Celldweller is another project from Circle of Dust (Klayton/Scott) which has probably eclipsed CoD
  • A Homeland Denied was a hardcore compilation as benefit for Palestinians
  • Trans-Siberian Orchestra broke in for me this year, mostly because of their Christmas music

Tracks:

  • 1 and 3 are a couple of those excellent Clubroot grooves
  • Hammer & Gavel is a prophetic anthem from a 2-person wall of sound I discovered this year (American Arson)
  • HATEFUL is a single from HEALTH and my favorite thing from them so far
  • Listen! was one of my ā€œlisten on repeat tracksā€ this year from Oak Pantheonā€™s excellent 2023 album ā€œThe Absenceā€
  • Kindred Void (and some other Koan Sound) tracks get honorable mentions

Chart showing Industrial, Electronic, Metalcore, Rock, and Metal genre ebbs and flows

As usual, Industrial, Electronic, Metalcore, Rock, and Metal dominate my listening (with many varied subgenres therein).

Chart showing I rate higher on consistency and variance than other listeners, but lower on replay rate, discovery rate, and concentration Chart showing Iā€™m 42% mainstream

We are not surprised my listening is not ā€œnormalā€. I also expect this chart is not my normal either due to the project I mentioned at the start of this post. Iā€™m not sure how useful these are, especially with no definitions. Iā€™m sharing them anyway.


Stay tuned to get a copy of my ā€œfavesā€ playlist, courtesy of Album Whale.


What was your favorite this year? Anything you discovered?

šŸŽ¶ Todayā€™s ā€œchill the hell outā€ radio station

Plexampā€™s Artist Mix Builder showing Submotion Orchestra, KOAN Sound, and Clubroot

šŸŽ¶ yet more nonsense from Igorrr and Iā€™m here for it.

šŸŽ¶ the Shpongle guys made a chill piano & flute album