2024 Favourites
Merry Christmas Eve!!
From where I sit, it is a sunny Christmas Eve afternoon. The wind is blowing the snow around just enough for it to shimmer in the sun and make everything look a little bit nicer. I'm drinking a hot chocolate and trying not to think about all the gift wrapping I have to do later. In the spirit of the year winding down I decided to make a big list of all my favourite things from 2024. I love reading other people's end of year lists so if you've got one too please send it over to me either in the comments down below or at my email (click the contact page above). Time for me to rant and rave... grab a blanket and a preferred beverage of choice because this is so much longer than I thought it would be.
Books
Starting off with the best books I read this year!
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
At 700+ dense pages, this book took me almost the entire year to read, but I absolutely loved it. I haven’t dabbled much in great Russian literature, so this was a heavy but welcome introduction to some of the classics I had not yet experienced in my life. I adored reading this as the seasons changed from Fall to Winter, mirroring how dark and contemplative the book itself is. This is a true achievement of language and storytelling, and so visually immersive I felt like I was watching a movie. Tragic and comedic in a perfectly balanced way, I am now hooked on Dostoevsky and I already have The Idiot on my bookshelf, ready to go for 2025. I read the Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky translation (linked above), which I felt conveyed a sort of musical flow of the words. It didn't feel choppy, as some English translations of books can feel, and made it relatively easy to flow through hundreds of pages. Any Dostoevsky heads here who can read Russian? I'd like to know if you've got any thoughts on the many MANY English translators.
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I had never read Sebald before and I absolutely tore through this book early this Spring. It made me cry multiple times and was an excellent way to think about memory and the human relationship to places and moments. I love that Sebald includes photographs in his work, it's so completely immersive. Big thumbs up from me.
Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde
This is an essay collection by the late great Audre Lorde. 2024 was the year of filling blind spots for me amongst brilliant authors I had yet to read. Many of these essays are so short and yet so packed with ideas and revelations I found myself nodding along and taking notes on nearly every page. Reading "Notes From a Trip to Russia", I realized that I have rarely, if ever, read any 20th century reflections on international travel written by women (if you've got any suggestions here for me to read... send them over, please). Lorde's most famous essay, "The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle The Master's House" should be read by everyone ever.
Racism and homophobia are real conditions of all our lives in this place and time. I urge each one of us here to reach down into that deep place of knowledge inside herself and touch that terror and loathing of any difference that lives there. See whose face it wears. Then the personal as the political can begin to illuminate all our choices.
The Passion According to G.H. by Clarice Lispector
Lispector is my favourite author of all time and I love her so much that I'm learning Portuguese just so I can read all her books in their original language. I don't want to tell you anything about this book because I think it is best to go in blind and be pulled into this hyper emotional crisis of the self and reflection on BEING while feeling the claustrophobia of the white room that G.H. finds herself in. While I am partial to Benjamin Moser's translations of Lispector, I read Idra Novey's for this book and found it to be excellent as well.
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This book was on my reading list for 5 years and I FINALLY picked it up and read it while I was in NYC a few weeks ago. I didn't expect that a book this short could make me feel such heavy grief. I cried in public while reading this and thinking about all the ways that the universe puts us in the right place despite all the chaos. In English, Yoshimoto's writing feels so kind, like a good friend has just given you a hug and sat down with you to chat. A big-hearted and quirky little book.
Music
I use last.fm to track what I listen to because I don’t trust these Spotify and Apple music algorithm things. So Here’s what I listened to in 2024:
Top 10 Most Listened To Albums
slif slaf slof - Mermaid Chunky
DFA is one of my fave record labels and they got Mermaid Chunky signed to their label after James Murphy (DFA exec, LCD Soundsystem front man) heard them in a cafe somewhere in London. Weird, otherworldly, 2 awesome women making really cool music that can make you groove or make you cry.
Something For Thee Hotties - Megan Thee Stallion
I've been a fan of hers since 2017 and I still listen to her music everyday. She never misses.
Love What Survives - Mount Kimbie
So I listened to a LOT of Mount Kimbie this year because I spent a lot of time sleeping, driving and writing and I would often listen to their music on loop over and over again while doing those activities. Their summery electronic music elevates my mood but also makes me think of the future and gives me space to contemplate. Perfect music to think to. Not too complicated but just sonically interesting enough to get my creativity going.
The Lonesome Crowded West - Modest Mouse
This is on my list every year because it is one of my favourite albums of all time. Modest Mouse is excellent. Late 90s boys in a band talking about suburbia and life and believing in god and smoking a cig. If I go too long without listening to this album I start to get a bit evil so it's on regular rotation.
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I need to tell you about Sofia Kourtesis who is an electronic dj and producer who made this BEAUTIFUL latin house album called Madres, in honour of her mother. This album feels like being in the sun with everyone you’ve ever loved. Dance and listen or sit and listen and you will love it either way.
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Every song on this album is a banger. Cate Le Bon is such a cool figure and her guitar playing is very stellar. Music for walking around and for tastefully dancing around your kitchen while cooking.
Renaissance - Beyonce
Did you think I only listen to obscure albums that aren’t available to stream that are exclusively pirated off of a bootleg cassette tape from a store in Lithuania? No. I listen to Beyonce too. Thanks Leon for showing me the Renaissance tour videos in my basement and altering the course of my life.
Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You - Big Thief
Big Thief’s 2022 album that I <3 so much. Good for everything. Big emotions. I don't even really know what to write about it because it just feels like it's a part of my heart. Thanks to Tessa for introducing me to Big Thief all those years ago!!!
The Sunset Violent - Mount Kimbie
I like this one even better than the other one that I wrote about above. Feels like a dream. Listen to it with really good headphones and feel like you're in another world where everything feels light and airy but there's also a dj there.
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I feel like everyone between the ages of 18-24 had brat on their list this year. I want to give my friend Paige her flowers here because Paige has been a ride or die Charli stan since forever and she is the reason I even had Charli on my radar before brat dropped and changed the course of music history. Just listen to it, everyone else already has. I’ve always loved that Charli has platformed creative electronic artists for years, especially A.G. Cook who shined on this record. It’s also not normal that an artist will drop a remix album just as good as the original but Charli did it flawlessly <3
songs i listened to that you should check out
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This lives in my head on repeat on repeat on repeat. If you ever look at me and I’m staring blankly ahead its because I’m thinking of this.
Here it Comes Again - Cate Le Bon
Cate Le Bon has a lush and gorgeous voice and this song reminds me of staring at the Atlantic ocean for hours and hours.
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Fun and poppy and dancing around!!! They're so weird, I love them.
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Alligator Bites Never Heal is a cool title for an album and Nissan Altima is a stand out on that album. Also on my walking fast playlist. I linked Doechii's tiny desk concert because it's awesome.
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If you’re going to listen to one song from Madres, let it be the titular one. Works best if you're sitting in the sun.
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Summery and I can listen to it 10000x on repeat without getting bored!
At Home He’s a Tourist - Gang of Four
My anthem having moved back to my hometown and getting to rediscover it throughout the year.
Movies
I watched many movies this year and some were awesome and some were not. Here are the best ones.
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I watched this last week so I’m still digesting it but it is absolutely my favourite movie of the year and if you have the stomach for gore and gross shrimp eating and total body obliteration you should absolutely see it. Watch it with company. I love that people give this either a 5 star review or a 1 star review. This movie is oddly personal. It is comforting and satisfying to me. I felt it deeply.
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This movie is a total fever dream. A Japanese ‘horror’ film and (I love this), the director was asked to make a movie like ‘Jaws’ so he made this. Bro did not even look at Jaws once. The colour? Stunning. The acting? Very awesome. Commentary on girlhood and adolescence?? Scary and excellent. Watch it near Halloween for maximum effect.
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Josh O’Connor was my actor of the year and while some of that is because of Challengers & the Crown, most of it is because of his role in this movie. I saw this at my local independent theatre this year, alone, with absolutely no idea what this was going to be. A folkish, ethereal story of love and grief and the literal strings that tie us together between worlds. Alice Rohrwacher I am paying attention to your films! I will watch anything you make!! How do I sign up for a career in Italian graverobbing?
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I can already hear all you film people going oh my goooood typical but this is a good movie. Feels like a theatre production and you are on the edge of your seat the entire time. A phenomenal courtroom drama. An accused criminal, an outsider, a story that challenges your morals and your sense of right and wrong.
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Watched this before watching the new one. The original is phenomenal. Patrick Swayze plays a philosophy grad named Dalton who can rip your throat out. I think this movie is soooo LGBT but many will disagree. See for yourself!!!
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Another movie I knew nothing about going in. A movie that only an old man could make. Wim Wenders is an iconic director and while I hope to see him keep working, this feels like the perfect bookend to a long and storied career. Quiet but relentless. Loved everything about this movie and I felt a shift in my own personal universe after seeing it.
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So I don’t follow wrestling and I had never heard the true story of the Von Erich brothers so I had no clue what this movie was about and oh my god this ripped my heart out. I don’t think I’ve ever cried so much in a theatre, not even when I saw Marcel the Shell with Shoes On. This movie had me SOBBING, also featured some of my fave actors this year (Harris Dickinson, Jeremy Allen White). Very good and I am mad this was snubbed at awards season. Zac Efron gives a career best performance. Generational trauma, bad haircuts, crazy wrestling, total tragedy.
In 2025...
I am setting ambitious 2025 resolutions to read 30 books and to actually watch every John C. Reilly and Philip Seymour Hoffman movie. Any recommendations for books, music or movies are always appreciated :)
Merry Christmas everyone!!!
Love n hugs,
Sam