DJ Mag's Top Albums of 2024

British rapper and actor Ashley Thomas, better known as Bashy, serves his second studio album as a passionate, mind-altering plea to the youth of London. No stranger to bold, stand-out-from-the-crowd-style displays (adopting a lollipop as a visual prop in his *Chupa Chups* mixtape era of 2007, and uniting the grime scene on a collection of remixes for his black empowerment anthem “Black Boys,” a year later), Bashy verifies the views expressed on *Being Poor Is Expensive* with the wisdom of maturity and valuable lived experience. “I wrestled with my demons, insecurities, flaws, traumas, and memories long forgotten which revealed themselves during the writing process,” Bashy tells Apple Music. “It was a tough process during which I also realized that I had been a scared boy in the past—naive, often one choice away from death, jail, drama, or a successful future, on an almost daily basis.” As the title suggests, Bashy’s second album circles the hidden costs of poverty (also known as ghetto tax) that result in a self-limiting collection of habits, beliefs, and contradictions often unknown to sufferers themselves. “Some will break, some break through” he explains on cinematic opener, “The London Borough of Brent.” “Me and those guys went the same school.” To inspire and characterize the sound of *BPIE*, Bashy created a mood board of tracks for producers Toddla T, PRGRSHN, and Aaron Levy. Of the sparkling quartet of timeless Black British songs that he gave them, two surface on the album in sample form—Soul II Soul’s “Back to Life (However Do You Want Me)” (on “Earthstrong”) and Groove Chronicles’ remix of Myron’s “We Can Get Down” (on “On the Rise”). Additionally, the influence of Wookie and Lain’s garage anthem “Battle” and Roy Davis Jr.’s “Gabriel” shine through uplifting verses on tracks that rally against systems of oppression (“Lost in Dreams”), and herald soundsystem culture and family (“Made in Britain”). Fifteen years on from debut solo album, *Catch Me If You Can*, Bashy admirably centers personal struggle in front of later years of TV and film fame, hoping to redirect others in similar spots of street miseducation.

It’s no surprise that “PARTYGIRL” is the name Charli xcx adopted for the DJ nights she put on in support of *BRAT*. It’s kind of her brand anyway, but on her sixth studio album, the British pop star is reveling in the trashy, sugary glitz of the club. *BRAT* is a record that brings to life the pleasure of colorful, sticky dance floors and too-sweet alcopops lingering in the back of your mouth, fizzing with volatility, possibility, and strutting vanity (“I’ll always be the one,” she sneers deliciously on the A. G. Cook- and Cirkut-produced opening track “360”). Of course, Charli xcx—real name Charlotte Aitchison—has frequently taken pleasure in delivering both self-adoring bangers and poignant self-reflection. Take her 2022 pop-girl yet often personal concept album *CRASH*, which was preceded by the diaristic approach of her excellent lockdown album *how i’m feeling now*. But here, there’s something especially tantalizing in her directness over the intoxicating fumes of hedonism. Yes, she’s having a raucous time with her cool internet It-girl friends, but a night out also means the introspection that might come to you in the midst of a party, or the insurmountable dread of the morning after. On “So I,” for example, she misses her friend and fellow musician, the brilliant SOPHIE, and lyrically nods to the late artist’s 2017 track “It’s Okay to Cry.” Charli xcx has always been shaped and inspired by SOPHIE, and you can hear the influence of her pioneering sounds in many of the vocals and textures throughout *BRAT*. Elsewhere, she’s trying to figure out if she’s connecting with a new female friend through love or jealousy on the sharp, almost Uffie-esque “Girl, so confusing,” on which Aitchison boldly skewers the inanity of “girl’s girl” feminism. She worries she’s embarrassed herself at a party on “I might say something stupid,” wishes she wasn’t so concerned about image and fame on “Rewind,” and even wonders quite candidly about whether she wants kids on the sweet sparseness of “I think about it all the time.” In short, this is big, swaggering party music, but always with an undercurrent of honesty and heart. For too long, Charli xcx has been framed as some kind of fringe underground artist, in spite of being signed to a major label and delivering a consistent run of albums and singles in the years leading up to this record. In her *BRAT* era, whether she’s exuberant and self-obsessed or sad and introspective, Charli xcx reminds us that she’s in her own lane, thriving. Or, as she puts it on “Von dutch,” “Cult classic, but I still pop.”

It’s not easy being ahead of your time: You have to wait years for the world to catch up. Such was the case when an 18-year-old Chief Keef followed up his anthemic major-label debut (2012’s *Finally Rich*) with a pair of self-released 2013 mixtapes (August’s *Bang, Pt. 2* and October’s *Almighty So*) that sounded obscure in comparison, prompting many a claim that he’d fallen off as quickly as he’d gotten on. These days, you can hear echoes of both projects everywhere, in particular *Almighty So*, the better of the two. You might argue that the slurry, intuitive style which has dominated the past decade of rap began here. Eleven long years later, the project’s sequel arrives after a half decade of teasing. (Keef previewed *Almighty So 2*’s initial cover art way back in 2019.) Hip-hop’s reinvented itself a dozen times over in that time span, perhaps the only constant being Keef’s enduring influence. On *Almighty So 2*, the 28-year-old veteran sounds as if he’s well aware of just how tall his legacy looms. “I done been through so much smoke to where I couldn’t even see myself,” he raps in his oft-copied swing on “Treat Myself” before busting out a classic Sosa-ism: “Diamonds shining off my charm, I think I Christmas tree’d myself!” He spits fire and brimstone over sinister church choirs on “Jesus,” puffs out his chest on the soulful “Runner,” and offers up the most demented Scarface impression since Future circa 2011 on “Tony Montana Flow.” And on “Believe,” the former teenage phenom is now a man who’s done some soul-searching in his time off from shaping the sound of modern rap.

“This album is the sound of release, the story of a world tour condensed into one night out,” Ezra Collective bandleader Femi Koleoso tells Apple Music. “It moves from getting into the club to sussing the vibe, losing yourself to the music and feeling its euphoria. The dance floor is full of the highs and lows of life and that’s what we’re channeling.” After the London-based quintet became the first jazz act to win the Mercury Music Prize for their 2022 album *Where I’m Meant to Be*, their follow-up arrives with a dance-floor-focused bang. Featuring the band’s typical blend of jazz improvisation with West African rhythm, Afrobeat horns, and fizzing, upbeat energy, the 19 tracks of *Dance, No One’s Watching* inspire infectious movement. Written during a triumphant 2023 world tour, the record encompasses the fanfares of “The Herald,” gentle highlife rhythms on “Palm Wine,” hip-hop swing on “Streets Is Calling,” and emotive neo-soul on “Why I Smile.” “We’re questioning what ‘dance music’ actually means, since everything from klezmer to reggae and waltzes make you dance,” Koleoso says. “This album is an honest expression of all the things that move us.” Read on for Koleoso’s in-depth thoughts on a selection of songs from the album. **“The Herald”** “The word ‘herald’ means ‘bringer of joy’ and that’s what the dance floor brings to us. Ezra Collective has a mandate to bring joy when we play live and it’s what makes our shows feel so connected. We wanted to start the record deliberately with this battle cry. It’s a big shout, a manifesto of what you need to hear when you’re first getting on the dance floor. The right amount of joy will shatter your insecurities.” **“Palm Wine”** “West African highlife is a strong influence for us and this is the first time we’ve referenced it on a record. We were interested in exploring what kinds of music are allowed to be called ‘dance music’ and we think highlife is the perfect example of music for peaceful, elegant dance floors. Palm wine is a drink associated with things being relaxed and going well, and it’s the perfect title for this track that embodies when things are confident and sexy in the dance.” **“God Gave Me Feet for Dancing” (feat. Yazmin Lacey)** “This track carries on the bouncy, beautiful feel of highlife from ‘Palm Wine.’ I wrote the horn line in the shower but, once the track was done, I had a conversation with \[DJ, broadcaster, and author\] Annie Mac about joy and how it feels like God didn’t just make our feet for running and hunting, he made them for dancing, and I realized it needed a vocal too. Yazmin sings those lines perfectly, saying, ‘God gave me feet for dancing/And that’s exactly what I’ll do,’ because we can all access this joy in ourselves.” **“N29”** “I find Berlin beautifully fascinating because of their dance culture, where it’s like people are in deep meditation or being struck by the Holy Spirit on the dance floor. I wanted to recreate that depth of being in the dance on ‘N29.’ It’s named after the night bus that goes from Trafalgar Square to Enfield, through every part of North London, and it encapsulates how a huge part of the dance floor is getting there and getting back from it. This track is the middle of the record, since the middle of the night can see people arriving, already there, or leaving, and that’s what you find on the night bus with people having their different phases of the night on it. At one point, I strike my hi-hat bell like it’s pressing the button to stop the bus!” **“No One’s Watching Me” (feat. Olivia Dean)** “I’m a big fan of Olivia’s, and I was gripped when I watched her at Forwards Festival in 2023 since she was performing with such honesty. I knew I had to get her on the record, and we had such an honest session where we just started talking about life, and she said the best feeling you get when dancing is when it’s like no one’s watching you and you let the music take control. That was the song right there! Musically, it’s modeled on the marriage between Afrobeats and Afrobeat, where the horns are like Fela Kuti but the bassline and drums are like Tems and Wizkid, while Olivia soulfully drops in on top.” **“Hear My Cry”** “This is a reimagination of a church song, something I grew up listening to, since I wanted the record to take us to the church dance floor now. It’s all about how the dance floor can feel bigger than you, it can sweep you up and overcome your feelings of overwhelm. I wanted to do justice to how I hear the song in church with a marching energy but also adding a calypso/soca feel on top. I’m excited for this to come out because we’ve been playing it on tour and people go insane for it. They’ll finally know what it is now since it never had a name before!” **“Shaking Body”** “‘Shaking Body’ does exactly what it says! It’s inspired by how I fell in love with salsa music in lockdown and began writing songs in that vein, including ‘Victory Dance’ from our last album. Salsa is my favorite acoustic dance music, there’s no help from computers, just instruments tearing it to the floor and being full of aggression. We then wrote the bridge to the track separately to take some of that aggression out, like adding more mixer to a strong drink, and letting the listeners know they can still dance once it’s gone.” **“Streets Is Calling” (feat. M.anifest and Moonchild Sanelly)** “We wanted a hip-hop moment on the album as it has a rich heritage of dance in the music and it’s a big part of our palette. We wanted to bring hip-hop with an African accent, hence getting M.anifest and Moonchild involved, blending Afrobeats and amapiano with the Ezra horn lines. I’m really proud of this song, it’s worlds colliding that people wouldn’t expect from us.” **“Why I Smile”** “This is the sound of falling in love on the dance floor. It’s that moment in the night when you’re getting dramatic because the DJ played a couple of your tunes and so you’re having the best time of your life—everything feels right with the world. I’ve been down that hole in Shangri-La in Glastonbury, when the sun is rising and I feel like, ‘I could die today and I’d be good, all my friends are here!’ Musically, I wanted to keep broadening that idea of which music gives you permission to dance, since this has a laidback, neo-soul energy.” **“Everybody”** “‘Everybody’ is based on another church tune, the Nigerian Baptist song ‘Everybody Blow Your Trumpet.’ I love the word ‘everybody,’ since this album is for everybody, and this track is meant to evoke the end of a great night, when you’re not worried about how you’re going to get home, you’re just ascending. It’s a finishing feeling of euphoria, something we recorded in single takes with all our friends in the room, capturing a real feeling.”

For its fifth album, *Reverie*, North London dance music duo Gorgon City had a specific vision in mind. Booked to headline Coachella’s iconic indoor club stage, the Yuma tent, for its 2024 edition, Kye Gibbon and Matt Robson-Scott set about crafting a special selection of tracks to play during their slot. “We decided to make a record with the intense vibe of that space in mind,” Gibbon tells Apple Music. “All the tracks had to be primed to deliver a massive, club-room sound.” Since the release of their debut EP, *The Crypt*, in 2012, Gibbon and Robson-Scott have crafted a globe-trotting, dance-floor-focused sound that blends thundering basslines with earworm vocal melodies. On *Reverie*, the duo delivers a darker, amplified version of this sonic signature, traversing everything from growling drum ’n’ bass synths to ’90s acid house and sun-filled soulful breaks—a combination guaranteed to make you move. “When we got to Coachella and played the first masters of the album, it blew the roof off,” Robson-Scott says. “This is instinctual music made to be played loud.” Read on for Gorgon City’s in-depth thoughts on the album, track by track. **“Are You Feeling It Too?”** Kye Gibbon: “Since we wanted to make *Reverie* a clubbier album, we decided to experiment more with sampling tracks, rather than our usual process of writing with songwriters and vocalists. On ‘Are You Feeling It Too?’ we sampled the hook of a song by \[LA singer-songwriter\] syd B \[also called ‘Are You Feeling It Too?’\], since it felt so euphoric and uplifting, and it perfectly fit our production to create a big club moment.” **“Breathe You In” (with NORTH)** Matt Robson-Scott: “We collaborated with the songwriter Paul Harris a lot on this album and he brought us a song by the singer NORTH that we were just blown away by. We decided to create a completely new track around their mesmerizing vocal and it was a challenge to honor such an amazing performance in the final edit. When we played it at an Elrow show in Dublin \[in March 2024\] it connected so well, we knew we had done it justice.” **“All That You Need” (with Caroline Byrne)** KG: “We wanted to throwback to the older Gorgon City sound on this track and the summery piano house music that was on the scene when we came up in 2012. We had to get back into our old mindset of making music when writing this, and then we added a modern twist with the hard edge of the unexpected drop that really catches audiences off guard. We also love how Caroline’s vocal sounds just like a processed sample.” **“One New Change”** KG: “This is one of the main tracks made with Coachella in mind. We were experimenting with analog synths like the Moog Sub 37 and trying to make a tune where everything fell into place, rather than overthinking or planning how it would sound. Sometimes, it’s important to not have a plan in the studio because it takes you away from your usual formulas. The song became a beautiful, atmospheric moment at Coachella that really got people going.” **“Biggest Regret” (with Bbyafricka)** MR-S: “We both grew up on drum ’n’ bass from the ’90s and love the growling synths on those tracks. We had a lot of fun incorporating that sound into this song and, when it came to recording with \[US rapper/singer/poet\] Bbyafricka in LA, since she hadn’t done much dance music before, her performance came out so interestingly. It helped make it another track where the drop takes people by surprise.” **“How Do You Love?” (with Mougleta)** KG: “We wrote ‘How Do You Love?’ just after ‘Biggest Regret,’ and we decided this would be a good point in the album to take a step back and add some lightness to make it a proper summer record, something we could play on our Ibiza residency. We loved the tone of Mougleta’s voice, and it was really enjoyable to write a song that counteracts some of the darkness on the rest of the album.” **“Make It Happen” (with DJ Pierre)** KG: “We’re massive fans of DJ Pierre as a pioneer of acid house and techno. We came across a remix of one of his tracks 10 years ago that really stuck with us. When it came to writing this song, we decided to sample the original and then give it a modern twist by making it more of a big-room sound, as well as adding in an acid feel. This is a huge one to play in the club and it’s an honor to have DJ Pierre’s seal of approval on the record.” **“Landslide” (with Poppy Baskcomb)** MR-S: “Poppy is an amazing artist we have wanted to work with for years. She came up with this super catchy melody that is emotional without being over the top and we just fell in love with it. It has similar production to our track ‘Voodoo’ from the last album, *Salvation*, and it was fun to revisit those sounds when we were writing, along with lots of vocal chopping. We’re really happy with the finished result.” **“Keep Your Head Up” (with Harry Romero)** MR-S: “The analog synth sound on this track reminded us of The Chemical Brothers and made me feel like I was in the middle of a field in Glastonbury! We built the track around that classic feel, along with a sample from a house record that Harry Romero released in the early 2000s \[‘Keep Your Head Up’ (as Harry Choo Choo Romero)\]. He rerecorded the original vocals for us to deliver a modern take.” **“You Know It”** KG: “We have worked a lot with the amazing singer and producer Poté in the past and ‘You Know It’ stemmed from a vocal idea he sent us five years ago. It’s been a staple of our DJ sets ever since and, when it came to making *Reverie*, we realized it would be a perfect fit for the album, so we redesigned it from scratch to make it another big clubby moment on the record.” **“Dreaming”** MR-S: “It can be a real challenge to keep a track deliberately simple and not overcomplicate things. With ‘Dreaming,’ we wanted to go back to our older sound, which is filled with disco drums and bright, clean instrumentals to match the vibe of the vocals. It comes full circle back to the sound of one of our earliest releases, ‘Real’ \[2013\], and this was the last track we finished on the album. It’s an ideal, uplifting moment to finish the record on.”

Recent years have been full of change for I. JORDAN. The Doncaster-born producer has been on a meteoric rise, collaborating with the likes of SHERELLE and Fred again.. and taking their thundering, freewheeling DJ sets to packed clubs and festival stages across the globe. Closer to home, they have also been transitioning their gender. The result of this exhilarating, tumultuous, and life-affirming period now finds its expression on their debut album, *I AM JORDAN*. “It’s a collection of tracks that signify where I’m at as an artist and also serve as a snapshot of my life over the last few years,” they tell Apple Music. “It’s trans-led and full of trans artists, a celebration of my community.” Across 12 tracks, *I AM JORDAN* showcases each aspect of the producer’s ever-evolving artistry, veering from paying tribute to the hardstyle and donk music they grew up hearing on “The Countdown” to euphoric trance synths on “Close to You,” hammering techno on “Butterlick” and an immersion in “wobby” basslines on “Round n Round.” “It’s a record by trans people, allowing us to be ourselves, which feels more important than ever,” they say. Read on for their in-depth thoughts on the album, track by track. **“When Lights Flash”** “This track feels like the encapsulation of a whirlwind. I had just landed in Melbourne while on tour and was feeling disoriented and jet-lagged. I wanted to make something experimental, so I started playing with a plug-in synth that produced this really dramatic sound that was unlike the music I usually make. It felt like a turning point in my creation of the album and something I needed to start it with—a siren or a call to action.” **“Casino High”** “I made this track a week after ‘When Lights Flash’ while I was still in Melbourne. I was staying in this high-rise and it reflects how energized and uplifted I was feeling in the city. I feel like it has a classic ‘me’ sound, since it’s the only track on the record with a sample and so is a nod to my earliest productions where I would sample quite a bit.” **“Real Hot n Naughty” (feat. Felix Mufti)** “I first met Felix when he was dancing for me at Homobloc festival a few years ago, and we became friends. I later found out he did rap and spoken word and knew I had to get him on some demos. As soon as I sent him this one, he fired back this hook right away, and it all happened really quickly. We wanted it to be a northern working-class queer anthem, which is tongue-in-cheek and punctuated by Felix’s Liverpool accent.” **“The Countdown” (feat. TAAHLIAH)** “I’ve been mates with TAAHLIAH for a while and, since we both grew up with donk and hardstyle and other northern working-class dance floor sounds, we decided to make ‘The Countdown’ as a celebration of that shared heritage and of our friendship. It always goes down really well when I play it live and is basically just a tribute to the fun we have together.” **“Butterlick” (feat. Sister Zo)** “I first met Sister Zo in a production workshop, and she sent me the drum loop you hear on this intro. It came at a time when I was making loads of tunes in preparation to play at Glastonbury 2022 and so those drums soon developed into this tune, which used to be called ‘For Glasto,’ since it ended up playing out really well there. It’s also a nod to my growing love of techno, which is really technically challenging to make well, so I’m very proud of it.” **“Reification and Pathetic Fallacy”** “I wrote this track on the train home after spending a week at a residency in Newcastle for trans artists. I was really inspired after being around all these different creatives and, while it was looking gloomy outside on the way back, this track just emerged. It’s me trying to put the overwhelming emotions I was feeling into sound, as well as connecting with the mood of the weather.” **“People Want Nice Things”** “Once I started taking testosterone, it led to changes in my voice that I wanted to document, so I began recording myself saying the phrase ‘People want nice things’ every month to track how my voice was dropping. Those recordings are part of this track, like an archive of the changes I’ve gone through to honor my transness, all set to a nice house tune!” **“Round n Round”** “I will always love ‘wobby’ sounds and basslines—those bass frequencies that anchor the sort of music I grew up listening to in clubs in Doncaster and Sheffield. ‘Round n Round’ is a tribute to that sound, as well as the music I have released before like ‘Hey Baby’ and ‘WARPER.’ I initially made it for a set I was playing at AVA festival in Belfast, where it really went off.” **“The Woodpecker”** “This is the oldest track on the record, which I started in 2020. I wasn’t going to include it on the album since it felt too heavy but my A&R convinced me otherwise! It’s got this intense hardstyle kick and wood-chopping sound, which made it the perfect tribute to my favorite bird, the woodpecker. Those who follow me online will know I’m a keen birdwatcher, so this is also a nod to that part of my life.” **“7 Degrees of Despondent”** “If you’re going to make a record that is a documentation of your life, you need to include the lows as well as the highs. This was written during a difficult period in 2021 when I was isolating with COVID and feeling pretty miserable. It was seven degrees outside, and I was feeling despondent—it’s not really a track for the club but rather something that speaks to the sadness we can sometimes all feel.” **“Close to You”** “After the mood of ‘7 Degrees of Despondent,’ this track switches it up by launching into a euphoric trance feeling. It came really quickly and was another one I made just before Glastonbury, encapsulating the feeling of hope and happiness for the summer to come. It felt like the perfect note for the record to draw to a close on.” **“Rapt Finis”** “I came up with ‘Rapt Finis’ after becoming really absorbed by playing this melody and the dramatic mood it creates, which isn’t really one for the club. In the same way that ‘When Lights Flash’ is something more experimental from me, setting the tone for the record to come, I wanted this closing number to bring people gently back down to earth as it ends.”

When KAYTRANADA left the 2021 Grammys with two awards (Best Dance/Electronic Album for 2019’s *BUBBA* and Best Dance Recording for “10%”), he made history as the first Black and first openly gay artist to win the former category. The industry recognition was long overdue for the producer, who had been building a devout following for nearly a decade. “In my mind I was finally a true artist,” he tells Apple Music’s Zane Lowe. After relocating to Los Angeles, he channeled that confidence into making his third solo album, *TIMELESS*: “It felt more serious—more legit. I was still having fun making *TIMELESS*, but making *BUBBA* was another type of fun where I didn’t really take it seriously.” Like its predecessor, *TIMELESS* is a collection of club grooves for catching a vibe. It’s packed with guests who effortlessly acclimate to KAYTRANADA’s singular sound while imprinting their own touch. PinkPantheress’ saccharine voice is richer on the squiggly house beat of “Snap My Finger,” Ravyn Lenae offers breathy seductions on the hard-edged R&B of “Video,” and Thundercat delivers comical disses in soothing falsetto on the jazzy hip-hop of “Wasted Words.” Back-to-back tracks “Do 2 Me” (featuring Anderson .Paak and SiR) and “Witchy” (featuring Childish Gambino) hit an energy peak, their tales of late-night infatuation framed by sultry, body-enveloping production. If *BUBBA* was about finding KAYTRANADA’s sound, *TIMELESS* expands it. The producer is in what he calls his “experimental bag,” and Channel Tres joins him in it on the incendiary “Drip Sweat.” Channel’s trademark baritone drifts in and out of disembodied Auto-Tune, dropping bars over punchy drums and breaks sampled from Lyn Collins’ “Think (About It).” “We were just making the funkiest thing, like how it would sound if we did new jack swing today,” KAYTRANADA says. “What is that Bobby Brown energy? We were trying to give it that.” He tries out AI sampling on the breezy instrumental “Seemingly.” He also sings on a track for the first time on the Weeknd-inspired “Stepped On,” creating his version of ’80s New Wave with strobing synths and a dark disposition. With a new skill unlocked, *TIMELESS* makes room for another KAYTRANADA evolution.

Kelly Lee Owens’ musical journey has been a fascinating one. After spending time as the bassist of the noisy British indie-pop outfit The History of Apple Pie, she took an abrupt left turn into electronic territory with 2017’s self-titled debut album, which melded brainy production with melodic pop gewgaws delivered straight from the Welsh singer-songwriter’s pipes. 2020’s *Inner Song* and the 2022 follow-up *LP.8* ventured further into strange territory, the former featuring a cover of Radiohead’s “Arpeggi” and a feature from art-pop luminary John Cale—but nothing she’s done previously can prepare you for the total rush of her fourth album *Dreamstate*. Owens’ music has always been body-moving even at its most abstract, but on her inaugural bow for the 1975 production impresario George Daniel’s dh2 imprint, she heads full-on into big-room territory—think miles of pulsing synths, dewy rhythmic stretches lovingly ripped from trance’s fabric, and a distinct psychedelic flavor. *Dreamstate* is, in its essence, a capital-B big-sounding record, with guest turns from the type of folks—The Chemical Brothers, Bicep, and Daniel himself all pitch in on programming and production—who know how to play to massive crowds looking to feel something. But the sound of this record retains the trademark wispy intimacy that Owens has proven so good at, launching her to the forefront of electronic pop alongside fellow sneaky-smart dance-pop alchemists like Jamie xx, Caribou, Floating Points, and HAAi. The lush, soaring build of “Higher” dissolves into the type of pulsing synth line that you can practically feel in your bloodstream, while “Air” packs a four-to-the-floor punch as her vocals aerate the neon house-music surroundings. Owens’ pop sensibilities, which she’s cloaked in mysterious left-field sonic shapes in the past, are more present than ever before: Witness the arpeggiated ascent of “Rise,” which features a lovely vocal sigh reminiscent of Kate Bush’s “This Woman’s Work,” or the bell-clear sincerity of “Ballad (In the End),” the most straightforwardly vocal pop cut of the bunch.

On 2021 breakout single “Elevate,” Manchester’s Nemzzz laid out flows over a sample flip of PARTYNEXTDOOR’s “PERSIAN RUGS,” a self-assured, melodic display that created a brief viral moment for the newcomer. Three years on, the short freestyle track is perhaps best remembered for also introducing his alter ego: MR DND. The do not disturb phone mode for peace and quiet has now become a way of life for Nemzzz—a firm reminder that he’s in control. “I’ve always been that way as a person: distant and introverted,” Nemzzz tells Apple Music. “I just like my own space and I like to be by myself, or very selective on who I have around me. And that’s just how everyone knows me. They started calling me that even before ‘Elevate,’ and I’ve embraced it.” *DO NOT DISTURB* takes the teenage MC’s personal mantra for limiting distraction, staying focused, and curating his personal space, and blows it out across 11 tracks (all produced by Zel). After a writing camp in 2023, Nemzzz decided to set future sessions away from open call-outs for producers, going for a more structured, one-on-one approach for his debut mixtape. “It was at that camp in July that I met Zel, who was one of the participants,” he explains. “That was when we made the outro (‘MONEY AND VIBES’), just bouncing ideas off each other, and we’ve kept it going since. Now, we’re both coming up together and it feels good. What I liked was that we could agree to disagree with each other on almost everything.” The result creates a cohesive and familiar feel to *DO NOT DISTURB*, as jumpy, drill-leaning patterns sit under Nemzzz’s punchy lines on self-improvement (“ETA”) and intimacy (“NEED YOU”), and observations of his rapidly declining social battery (“PTSD”). Here, Nemzzz guides you across *DO NOT DISTURB*, track by track. **“REFLECTION”** “This is a trip down memory lane. At my \[young\] age, I’ve already been through a lot. For anyone that doesn’t already know me, this track gives you all you need to know.” **“ETA” (feat. Luciano)** “I can sum this track up easily: ‘I will not be on time.’ Honestly, ask anyone around me and they’ll tell you I’m always late for things. It’s never really on purpose, either—but it *always* happens. This goes all the way back to school, I was almost kicked out. I was the guy that woke up early, went back to sleep again, and the next thing, I’m late.” **“PTSD”** “This track samples one of my favorite Sade songs \[1992 track\], ‘Like a Tattoo.’ I’ve been listening to the song for years now, I got into her music over lockdown in 2020, so it’s pretty cool to use that here. I’m still reflecting here, but there’s a bit more acceptance this time.” **“L’s”** “This is a shout-out to my favorite clothing brand: Louis Vuitton. I just couldn’t help myself! I say, ‘All my L’s, they come with a V,’ which is really about turning negative \[situations\] into a positive. All my losses, I’ve learned from them, and I’ve grown up, so I’m able to maneuver situations better now.” **“DOOM”** “Here, I’m trying to switch it up and show that I can do different vibes as well. Think of this as a teaser of what’s still to come.” **“STAR SIGN”** “I was having fun, feeling good, and riding the wave on this one, nothing too serious. I’m an Aries, and to me, we’re the best—but all I keep hearing from people is how we’re meant to be crazy!” **“NEED YOU”** “This is a song about a particular someone. They’ll definitely know who they are when they hear this. Everything from the lyrics to some of the places I mention makes it quite precise.” **“REASSURANCE”** “This is another one that’s very specific to someone. I’m not always on DND, you can actually keep some contacts on favorite to make sure they can reach you. This track is about that special person.” **“VENICE” (feat. JayG)** “This track’s called ‘Venice’ because of the beat, really. That was the vibe I got when I heard it! And \[Hackney rapper\] JayG, that’s my guy. I’m really rooting for him when it comes to music, and I’ve got really high hopes. This is me giving him that cosign, letting people know this guy’s up there. You should trust me.” **“DND”** “This track explains who and what I am. The line, ‘My bad, didn’t see your call I’m on DND/I wanted to see you win, but it’s clear you envy me’ sums up this tape. I’m a realist. I look at things exactly how they are, and I don’t really dwell on certain things. It definitely did affect me at one point. But when you look at the bigger picture though, it’s like, ‘Why am I worried? What’s there to be sad about?’ The way I see it, a polar bear isn’t freezing in Antarctica, because that comes with the territory—and they know how to stay warm.” **“MONEY AND VIBES”** “This was a quick turnover ting with my producer, Zel. I heard the track \[a cover version of Justin Timberlake’s 2003 single ‘Rock Your Body’\] and asked him to make a beat around it. This track is a statement: ‘No, I’m not in the mood for toxic things anymore, man. I just need money, and I just want vibes!’”

“It’s quite a strange album,” Nia Archives tells Apple Music about her debut, *Silence Is Loud*. The award-winning artist, producer, and DJ—credited with spearheading a mainstream revival of jungle music—is the first to acknowledge that the sonic landscape of the album is an eclectic departure from her early sound. While elements of the production will be familiar to fans of Archives—including jungle pioneer Goldie and global superstar Beyoncé—*Silence Is Loud* rings with Britpop, Motown, and alternative rock influences, resulting in a wholly original listening experience that exposes the unconventional edge to her artistry. Co-produced with rising talent Ethan P. Flynn, whose credits include FKA twigs and slowthai, the record is beholden to the late-’90s/early-2000s era of organic, experimental pop dominated by William Orbit—albeit charged with the frenetic energy of drum patterns still firmly rooted in jungle. While tracks like “Cards on the Table,” “Crowded Roomz,” and “F.A.M.I.L.Y” see Archives explore recurring themes of loneliness, self-acceptance, parental estrangement, and love—both unconditional and unrequited—with her characteristic lyrical candor, *Silence Is Loud* leaves fewer places for the intensity of her words to hide behind. This reality is most clearly evidenced on the reprise of the title track, which strips away her typical percussive camouflage. “Jungle is so chaotic and intense that nobody really pays attention to the lyrics that much,” says Archives. “The drums take up a lot of space in the music—they’re like the heart, and when you take that away, it’s like the brain. Which is a bit much sometimes.” For all the risk Archives has taken in releasing a body of work that resists the urge to chase trends in favor of presenting a true reflection of her own journey, *Silence Is Loud* succeeds in alchemizing its disparate parts into audio gold. “I played in a pub in London the other day and the people were singing along so loudly it made me think this isn’t just a viral-TikTok-moment album. It’s an album that people have to listen to, and then listen to again to take it in…\[because\] it’s something weird and new,” she says. “But I think I’ve got good taste in music, so that gives me a little bit of confidence in myself.” Read on to find out more about each track in Archives’ own words. **“Silence Is Loud”** “I wrote this song about my little brother, who is my little baby. He’s getting older and our relationship has changed so much. He’s changed so much, I’ve changed so much. I wanted to write about how I love him no matter what, and that is what unconditional love is to me. There’s no ifs or buts, it’s just pure love. I wrote it in bed and then I took it to Ethan. It’s the first song we made together. One of my favorite albums is *Aha Shake Heartbreak* by Kings of Leon, I’m so inspired by the lo-fi \[sound\] in their music. I really wanted a Kings of Leon-meets-Radiohead moment because *In Rainbows* is also one of my favorite albums.” **“Cards on the Table”** “I wanted to make a really hardcore Britpop jungle tune. It’s quite stripped-back breaks. I was hugely inspired by Blur, Pulp, Oasis, all that kind of vibe. I love Damon Albarn. If there’s anyone I would love to listen to the album, it would probably be him. Again, I wrote this in bed—I had a bit of a situationship with an Irish boy I met after a show in Dublin last year, so it’s a real story and my first time writing a song like this. I don’t really write love songs, but I was trying to have a bit of a Natasha Bedingfield moment. I’ve really tried to think of all the best songwriters to come out of the UK and focused on studying a lot of people. This was the first time I wrote a song and I felt like it was a ‘proper’ song.” **“Unfinished Business”** “This is the only song I’m worried about having to sing live because I’d just come back from a festival and I’d lost my voice, which is why it sounds so hoarse and rock ’n’ roll—I don’t know if I can re-sing it like that. I wrote it about realizing that everybody else has their own life before they’ve met you. Before you even say hello, they’ve already had so many experiences that have shaped them as a person. That’s actually quite positive. The production is quite four-four because I’ve been making loads of four-four music recently. And I also really wanted to make a Foo Fighters-inspired jungle tune because I loved the Foo Fighters when I was 14.” **“Crowded Roomz”** “We made this in the studio and it was a bit overwhelming. I was talking about loneliness—chronic loneliness. I feel like a lot of people my age experience loneliness. For me, with what I do—where it’s really high or low—it’s so heightened and you experience that a little bit more. And it was like, ‘Oh my god, this is actually a bit much, I can’t listen,’ because we listen to the same song on loop for four hours and it’s an intense one to listen to over and over again. The next day, we were like, ‘Oh, this is actually really good.’ I’ve been playing this one out and everyone screams the words, so I’m hoping that will be the vibe across the album. More of my sets have turned from hardcore jungle to a pop concert, which is cool.” **“Forbidden Feelingz”** “I feel like there’ll be a lot of people discovering me \[through this new sound\] and I really want them to hear where I’ve come from and how I got to this point. This is a nice moment for a switch-up, to be like, ‘I do this as well and, if you want, you can go back and discover all that stuff.’ I can never recreate this song, it’s one of my favorite songs I’ve ever made, so I didn’t want it to not be a part of an album that will hopefully shape the next few years of my life.” **“Blind Devotion”** “This is the longest project I’ve made in my life. I’m usually a 20-minute person, max. Towards the end I was like, ‘Oh my god, for an album to be an album it has to be 35 minutes, I need three \[more\] minutes to complete this thing, let’s make one more song.’ It’s one of the only new songs with the ‘old me’ sound, where it’s really clubby. We were going for that Massive Attack kind of vibe. We made this one at my studio and mine’s not got a lot of equipment. I try not to spend money on too much stuff. I’ve got 10 plug-ins, which is really weird as a producer, but I’d rather be the master of what I’ve got than have everything and not know how to use any of it. As a creative, you want a challenge and to feel like, ‘I’ve only got this, how do I make it sound interesting?’” **“Tell Me What It’s Like?”** “I said to Ethan that I wanted to make a song a bit like The Cranberries. The middle section, which is so happy, comes from another beat—the only song that didn’t make it on to the album. The rest of the song is quite dark and it was Ethan’s idea to put the two together. It’s about unrequited love, but not necessarily in a relationship sense, more related to my own life, but I guess people will take it however they want to take it. When I wrote it, I was inspired by Natalie Imbruglia’s kind of vibe. I sampled this voice note that Goldie sent me, because he sends me voice notes every week. He’s been a great listening ear and a real supporter. He’s someone I’m so inspired by and look up to—not just as a musician but as a person. He was quite gassed about it when I sent it to him.” **“Nightmares”** “I had my heart broken in Tokyo, which is hilarious and random. It’s like something out of a film. I came back from Asia and I was really sad, and the only way I can process my emotions is by making music. I wrote this song at home and then Ethan’s label let us use their spare studio, and he brought his guitar. I’d been listening to loads of Fleetwood Mac to get over my upset and I wanted to make something with that vibe. I thought ‘Nightmares don’t just happen when you’re sleeping’ was quite a funny play on words because what was happening felt like a real-life nightmare, which is so dramatic. This is the only song I kind of regret. I’ve never been really mean on a song in my life and the person I wrote about hasn’t heard it. I hope they don’t hate me because we’re kind of friends again now. But it’s a good song, so what can you do?” **“F.A.M.I.L.Y”** “I wrote this about my personal experience and my relationship with my family. This song is the end of that era, for me. I’m 25 this year, I feel like there’s only so many times you can be so caught up in things that cause you stress or upset you, so I really just wanted to say my piece and that’s it. There’s a little bit of acceptance within the song, understanding this is just the way things are and that’s OK, I guess. It was quite therapeutic. We recorded it in Ethan’s flat with me screaming and Ethan’s friend Felix \[Stephens\] playing the viola. My main inspiration was Estelle, ‘1980.’ There’s just a feeling I get when I listen to that song…I don’t know how to explain it. Even the video, where she’s sat on the stairs. It’s just a whole vibe I really wanted to capture with this song. It’s quite theatrical and I feel like the production reflects the drama.” **“Out of Options”** “I’d just been to the Motown Museum in Detroit for the first time and it was amazing. I love Motown. All the productions they made, just with what they had in those times, is actually crazy. It was such a booming Black industry that I’ve always been so inspired by. And I love The Ronettes, one of my favorite girl groups of all time. So I was really intensely listening to that kind of music and wanted to explore that sound. It was the only song I wrote on the spot and didn’t really have much that I wanted to say, but it was really fun recording how they would have recorded—standing in different spots in the room to create that big sound.” **“Silence Is Loud (Reprise)”** “Ethan suggested we do a reprise and I was kind of like, ‘Oh, I don’t know about that. Feels a little bit weird.’ But I trusted his gut. This was the only song we didn’t make in the UK. I was in L.A. on tour, and I hate making music in L.A., but we were at Sound Factory and we had all kinds of equipment and he was really having fun with the sound design. Throughout this album, I wanted to have loads of voice notes and anecdotes from people who mean something to me. So the voice talking at the start is my brother. In the middle, it’s loads of different voice notes from my friends, my friends’ parents who have become a really big part of my life, and my manager Tom, who’s my best friend. At the end is a sample of a video of all my friends from my birthday dinner. It’s quite emotional actually.” **“Killjoy !”** “I had a really nasty interaction with somebody who was quite close to me and this was me expressing that. It was the first time I was trying to think about how to make the words interesting and I love the way I wrote it. I made it at home and took it to Ethan, and what he brought to it was so cool—Massive Attack vibes with a bit of old-school IDM and jungle.” **“So Tell Me…”** “Another moment from a previous project. If I didn’t make \[2023 EP\] *Sunrise Bang Ur Head Against Tha Wall*, this song would have been on the album anyway—it felt like a good end.”

Perhaps the biggest compliment one could pay Rema is that he has always had clarity of vision regarding his artistry. Since dubbing himself “the future” right out of the gate in 2019, Rema (born Divine Ikubor) has operated with the assured air of a generational talent. His otherworldly melodies, energetic stage performances, and eerie imagery have inspired a new generation of emerging artists—and made him a beacon for Afropop’s global expansion. A lot has happened in the two years since he released his debut album, *Rave & Roses*—including standout single “Calm Down,” and its Selena Gomez-assisted remix, launching the singer to the top end of the charts across Europe and in the US. *HEIS*, the follow-up to *Rave & Roses*, arrives with hardly any warning and is packed with more of the freewheeling experimentation that Rema has built his reputation on. The album—11 songs in under 30 minutes—sees Rema step into a new era as he reckons with the thrills of global stardom and the pressures of being at the forefront of Afropop. He’s keen to be respected for his contributions to the culture, defiantly placing himself at the top of Afropop’s taxonomy on the punk-adjacent “HEHEHE.” Over a riotous instrumental on the title track, he makes a case for cross-continental pollination by infusing Swahili into the song proclaiming his musical greatness. Both of Nigeria’s 2023 breakout stars join Rema’s metaverse here: Fellow Benin native Shallipopi dials in for a love letter to their hometown on “BENIN BOYS,” while Abuja rapper ODUMODUBLVCK delivers a thumping verse on “WAR MACHINE.” Still, the narrative of *HEIS* is solely Rema’s as he declares that he’s primed for more success on “MARCH AM” and reels off his accomplishments on the P.Priime-produced “YAYO.” It all feels like the work of a candid creator reminding his listeners that he’s still operating at the cutting edge of Afropop and laying the building blocks for the genre’s future.

In January 2021, news broke that the pioneering pop producer SOPHIE had died, aged only 34, after a tragic fall when she was attempting to glimpse the moon. The outpouring of grief was instantaneous and the tributes heartfelt, as artists including Rihanna, Flying Lotus, Sam Smith, Christine and the Queens, Rina Sawayama, and Nile Rodgers honored a visionary talent who had touched—and forever changed—pop with her restlessly inventive and, eventually, mainstream-conquering sound. As Jack Antonoff put it on social media at the time, “she’s been at the forefront for a long time and we see her influence in every corner of music…an artist who truly had the ideas first and the guts to put it out there.” Almost four years later arrives *SOPHIE*, the follow-up to SOPHIE’s 2017 debut *Oil of Every Pearl’s Un-Insides* and the album the artist had been working on—and almost finished—before her death. Promised as her only posthumous album, it was completed by SOPHIE’s brother and studio engineer Ben Long, who’d been working closely with her on the record, and who intimately understood her vision for it. Despite the artist’s undeniable impact on radio-friendly pop, this being SOPHIE, the record isn’t always an accessible, straightforward listen. *SOPHIE* is split into four sections of four songs, each exploring different moods, and each one arriving like a thrillingly abrupt left turn. The record almost feels like a voyaging DJ set through her musical world. There’s ambient music (“Intro (The Full Horror)”), frenetic, crunchy production and late-night club sounds to raise anxiety levels (there’s a song called “Berlin Nightmare”). But then there’s also ebullient and expertly crafted pop moments that will make you want to turn the volume right up, from the summer-ready “Reason Why” with Kim Petras and BC Kingdom to “Why Lies,” also with BC Kingdom and LIZ. Later come softer, often yearning tracks, the kind of songs that showcase what always made SOPHIE’s music—and the hyperpop sound she helped pioneer—so special: its heart. See “Always and Forever,” which features PC Music talent Hannah Diamond’s wispy vocals against softer, yet still bouncing, production and lyrics about transcending time and moving towards the light. Indeed, unlike on *Oil of Every Pearl’s Un-Insides*, there are guests on every song on *SOPHIE*, including Petras and Diamond, as well as Cecile Believe, Jozzy, Bibi Bourelly, and artist, writer, and DJ Juliana Huxtable. And that roster feels poignant for SOPHIE’s final album: This is an artist who has always been synonymous with community, collaboration, and friendship. Her chosen guests here deliver spoken word (on the racing yet strangely addictive “Plunging Asymptote” and the spacey “The Dome’s Protection”), pitched-up vocals (“Live in My Truth”), and lonely, heartbreak-fueled lyricism, as on the gorgeous, ’80s-referencing “My Forever” with Cecile Believe, one of the album’s standout moments. “I want to go back to forever,” she sings. “You’ll always be my forever.” Listening to *SOPHIE* is often an exhilarating experience, but it’s also a bittersweet one, a reminder of the producer’s extraordinary ambition and boundless experimentation—and of how much she still had to give.