Bandcamp Daily's Essential Releases of 2024

More than 20 years into his career, Dan Snaith continues to shape-shift as an artist. His sixth proper album as Caribou finds the 46-year-old electronic pop polymath diving headlong into big-room dance sounds, more so than ever before: French-touch-indebted synths, city-flattening wub-wub basslines, and the type of clipped-vocal UK garage melodies that pop artists like PinkPantheress have favored as of late. Snaith is taking clear inspiration from his acclaimed full-length under his dance-floor-focused Daphni moniker, 2022’s *Cherry*, as well as the recent stadium-pleasing gestures from left-of-center contemporaries Jamie xx and Four Tet’s Kieran Hebden. The result is the sound of an artist newly invigorated and truly having fun with the music they’re making. *Honey* isn’t the first time that Snaith has turned his attention towards body-moving music. 2010’s *Swim* fused techno’s intensity with his career-long penchant for all things psychedelic and heady, while *Our Love* from 2014 found Snaith rubbing elbows with the melodic bass music explosion that marked much of early-2010s electronic music, all the while applying his intimate and resolutely human songwriting point of view. If those albums felt like a combination of his established tendencies with dance music, then *Honey* feels like a complete breakthrough into pure pop territory. The warm synth waves of “Come Find Me” sound lovingly ripped from Daft Punk’s astral playbook, while Snaith’s soft-focus vocals on “Over Now” are centered in the midst of a spangly disco beat that wouldn’t sound out of place on a Dua Lipa record. Of course, this is a Caribou record, so he has plenty of dazzling and trippy tricks up his sleeve regardless; bear witness to the perpetually ascendant “Dear Life,” which chops up vocal samples in a flurry of glistening synth trickles, or the endless melodic ziggurats of “Climbing,” which recall Nordic space-disco greats like Todd Terje and Hans-Peter Lindstrøm. Every time Snaith seems like he might be touching terra firma, he seemingly blasts off thousands of miles into the stratosphere instead—a dazzling bait-and-switch that makes *Honey* endlessly replayable, as well as one of his most pure and potent works to date.

Few genres feel as inherently collaborative as jazz, and even fewer contemporary artists embody that spirit quite like Kamasi Washington. After bringing a whole new generation of listeners to jazz through his albums *The Epic* and *Heaven and Earth*, as well as his collaborations with Kendrick Lamar, the Los Angeles native and saxophonist amassed an impressively eclectic set of guests to join his forthcoming bandleader project *Fearless Movement*. Among the guests were Los Angeles rapper D Smoke and funk legend George Clinton, who joined him for “Get Lit.” “That was definitely a beautiful moment,” Washington tells Apple Music’s Zane Lowe. “The sessions were magical; it was like being in a studio with just geniuses.” Originally written by Washington’s longtime drummer Ronald Bruner Jr. (also known as the brother of bass virtuoso Thundercat), “Get Lit” sat around for a bit before the divine inspiration struck to invite Clinton and D Smoke to build upon it. After Washington attended the former’s art exhibition and the latter’s Hollywood Bowl concert in Los Angeles, it couldn’t have been clearer to him who the band needed to make the song shine. Washington compares Clinton’s involvement to magic, marveling in the studio at just how the Parliament-Funkadelic icon operates. “It\'s like we\'re listening to it and he\'s living in it,” he says, conveying how natural it felt having him participate. “When he decides to add something to some music, it\'s like water.” As for D Smoke, Washington was so impressed by the two-time Grammy nominee’s sense of musicality. “He plays keys, he understands harmony, and all that other stuff. He just knew exactly what to do.” As implied by “Get Lit,” the contributors on *Fearless Movement* come from varied backgrounds and scenes, from the modern R&B styles of singer BJ the Chicago Kid to the shape-shifting sounds of Washington’s *To Pimp a Butterfly* peer Terrace Martin. Still, the name that will stand out for many listeners is André 3000, who locked in with the band on the improvisational piece “Dream State.” The Outkast rapper turned critically acclaimed flautist arrived with a veritable arsenal of flutes, inspiring all the players present. “André has one of the most powerful creative spirits that I\'ve ever experienced,” Washington says. “We just created that whole song in the moment together without knowing where we was going.” Allowing himself to give in to the uncertainty and promise of that particular moment succinctly encapsulates the wider ethos behind all of *Fearless Movement*. “A lot of times, I feel like you can get stuck holding on to what you have because you\'re unwilling to let it go,” he says. “This album is really speaking on that idea of just being comfortable in what you are and where you want to go.”

Expansive, cinematic, adventurous: These are the intentions saxophonist and composer Nubya Garcia decided to channel when it came to creating *Odyssey*. “I wanted to make a record that felt bigger, something that delivers unexpected emotions,” she tells Apple Music. Bursting onto the London jazz scene in 2017 with the release of her debut EP, *Nubya’s 5ive*, Garcia became a key proponent of a new group of young improvisers who were drawing on jazz traditions as much as their diaspora heritages in their music. Following 2020’s full-length debut *SOURCE*, Garcia now develops her Afrobeat- and dub-influenced sound further to encompass everything from the sweeping string arrangements of “Clarity” to the weighty soundsystem basslines of “Triumphance” and the ’90s R&B references of “Set It Free.” Largely written during extended trips to Brazil, away from her typically hectic touring schedule, *Odyssey* is Garcia soaking up new atmospheres to create an instinctual and intricately articulate music. “This is me growing through joy and practice,” she says. “It’s the fullest, freest vision of myself.” Read on for her in-depth thoughts on the album, track by track. **“Dawn” (feat. Esperanza Spalding)** “I wrote this track when I was in Brazil for six weeks at the end of 2022. I was staying right by the ocean and would wake up for the sunrise every day. It was such a beautiful, poignant way to start the day and this melody just came to me in that environment. I’ve always loved Esperanza’s work and she felt like the perfect addition to the song—I was so happy when she agreed to it. I only gave her the title and let her run free otherwise with these beautiful lyrics drawing on the Icarus myth.” **“Odyssey”** “‘Odyssey’ is the epic adventure of the record. I didn’t know the album would center on this composition but I had a feeling that it was going to be cinematic and journeying. Every section of this tune keeps building and turning in unexpected ways, from the keys to the string section producing a huge range of light to darkness. The melody wanders and feels like a beautiful marriage between my love of modal jazz and my love of classical textures. It all flowed really quickly since I had so many ideas for it, all sparking on from one another.” **“Solstice”** “This is one of the oldest tracks on the album. I wanted it to have a busy, erratic beat with a slower melody sauntering and winding over it. It’s about the fast and slow being in conversation. It’s called ‘Solstice’ because the first time I played it with the band was on the summer solstice in 2023. We’d all been away and not done a gig for a while but it just felt right and went down really well.” **“Set It Free” (feat. Richie)** “As soon as I began trying out ideas for this track, I knew I wanted it to have a chill but energetic backbeat, one you could walk down the street to. Richie’s vocals add a stunning sound and lyricism and establish the theme of the song being about promoting confidence in women who are so often raised in society to continually apologize for themselves. It also features a cheeky nine-bar loop, rather than the usual eight, which always surprises me when it comes around!” **“The Seer”** “‘The Seer’ is about wishing you could catch a glimpse of yourself in the future to know you’re on the right track and be confident about your choices. Sonically, it’s a nod to modal jazz with classic voicings and then shifts into my love of broken beats and energetic drums. That switch feels a bit like the ’90s R&B interludes where you hear a snippet of another section or song coming in.” **“Odyssey (Outerlude)”** “I wanted outerludes on the album to give the listener a reprieve and remind them of what they have just listened to before, as well as melting into a different energy for the rest of the record. This switches it from a very high-energy beginning to something much softer and quieter for the halfway point. I love it because it has an eerie vibe full of shimmering strings.” **“We Walk in Gold” (feat. Georgia Anne Muldrow)** “The melody for this composition feels like a lament but the intentions of the tune are joyous. It’s full of energies of hope, purpose, and direction, all informed by the color gold, which represents a light that releases darkness for me. I’ve always loved Georgia Anne Muldrow’s work and was elated when she agreed to feature on this track with me—she fully embodied the track’s uplifting intentions.” **“Water’s Path”** “This was the only tune on the album written in one go with no edits, which is something I haven’t done before. It’s one of my favorites because I’ve never written for strings before this album and I’m really proud of how this song embodies both happiness and sadness, as well as the qualities of water always finding its way through, which is reflected in the ostinato that just keeps ticking along. It’s super melodic and romantic.” **“Clarity”** “The vision for this song became clearer—no pun intended—as I wrote it and it became really enjoyable seeing it morph into the final version where the harmony is upward-reaching and always building. The intention behind the song is about the importance of clarity and transparency in relationships and how freeing that can be when we have it.” **“In Other Words, Living”** “Like ‘Clarity,’ this song always feels like it’s reaching upwards, pushing for peace and excitement in life. It’s a song about being intentionally present and living the balancing act between happiness and sadness that so often constitutes our existence as humans. That’s living as I know it, anyway.” **“Clarity (Outerlude)”** “I wanted one more reprise before we end, something to shift the listeners’ energy back to what’s been before and to show how far we’ve come over the course of the record. It’s a small offering to the journey we’ve traveled on together.” **“Triumphance”** “We’ve been playing this track for a few years to close the live shows and it always leaves people with such joy, since they can’t help but move when it drops. I wasn’t going to record it for the album but it ultimately felt like the only way we could end. I wanted a speech over the dub while the band cooked, something to sum up the triumphant themes of the record and to leave people feeling self-confident as they go out into the world. Except, the person I wanted to do the speech couldn’t and we were running out of time, so I ended up recording it myself, which was a first! I guess I had to find my own self-confidence here to say my piece.”