As ever, in 2024, thousands of tracks have been ploughed through and has been whittled down to a shortlist of 200 before going for this playlist of the essential 100 (or so) tracks to come out of Scotland that became the soundtrack for the year.
It incorporates the recognised, the little known to the downright obscure. The eclectic journey ploughs through through alternative rock, dance, hip-hop, trance, electronica, indie, choral, punk, post-grunge, nu-folk, the truly uncategorizable and much much more.
The 100-or-so are being published over four days with the final part dropping on New Year’s Day. Links are live after drops happen.
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2024 Part 1 (100-76)
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2024 Part 2 (75-51)
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2024 Part 4 (25-1)
Part 3- 50-26.
=50 Nü Cros – Falling
Guitarist Dylan Stewart of the band said: With songs like…Falling we take a lot of inspiration from emotions that come to us naturally and it expresses itself through our music. With the heavy guitars combined with Kev’s [Kevin O’Brien] lyricism it really makes a song feel heavy without necessarily being ‘heavy music’.”
=50 Xaia Chimera ft SK – Rend
Glasgow DJ and producer Xaia Chimera produces a mesmerising and ambitious 30 track album Infernal Rapture with this standout sonic alchemy of challenging noise and electronics from a parallel universe that deserves attention.
“On Rend with Salam Kitty, I really love their DJing and I was just like, ‘you’re getting in the studio with me and we’re gonna cook, honey! So we sat down and the first thing they said was that they liked bubbly, squeaky sounds. We went into Splice and searched for ‘bubbly’ and ‘squeaky’ and in the space of an hour we had pretty much finished the song.”
49 Lauren Mayberry – Mantra
The most sonically diverse and minimalistic track from the Chvrches front woman’s debut solo album Vicious Creature, that comes over as an introspective Depeche Mode-esque smoulder.
48 sweet philly – Bitemark
The earthquaking final track off the superb Strobelight Specimens, a five-track exploration of cutting-edge techno/rave influenced sounds from the exciting Dublin-born, Edinfburgh-based producer. It’s a sensory assault, moulding techno, rave, drum & bass and funk in a euphorically experimental release.
=47 Kathryn Joseph – long gone (Lomond Campbell remix)
Lomond Campbell, the multi-instrumentalist and producer has resculpted some of the bitterest and twistiest tales of the 2015 SAY Award winner’s 2022 album ‘for you who are the wronged’ to create a true alt-electro tour-de-force. This track from the ‘remix’ EP is hazy synth cracker and this just one standout track turns the stark, sparce original into a powerful melodic and melancholic gem.
=47 Mogwai – God Gets You Back
It will be the post-rock pioneers 30th anniversary next year and nothing about their latest output shows any sign that they have regressed as happens to so many bands. Robert Smith from The Cure may like their instrumental side, but the band have introduced actual singing even synth-pop moods without sounding twee. And this single is a perfect combination of old and new. The big chords, and slow build comes with added extras for 2024.
“[The song] needed some melody or vocals, but I couldn’t come up with the lyrics so I asked my seven-year-old daughter to make some up, and she did and I sang them,” says multi-instrumentalist Barry Burns.
46 Arab Strap – Allatonceness
I’m Totally Fine With It… I Don’t Give A F*** Anymore, the latest album from the delightfully dour indie-popsters that was written and performed exclusively by Malcolm Middleton & Aidan Moffat, and finessed with longtime collaborator Paul Savage, extended the band’s transformation from swooning, slow-core romantics to raging, alt-pop chroniclers. This opening track and second single hits home with a swaggering guitar riff – that becomes almost metal at the end – elevating Moffat’s deadpan delivery.
Allatonceness (as in ‘all-at-once-ness’) is a phrase borrowed from Marshall McLuhan’s 1967 tome The Medium Is The Massage.
“Lyrically it’s about being addicted to the endless stream of online lunacy and bullsh*t—constant bad news, disinformation and conspiracy theories, abuse and threats etc — when I know I should be out engaging with the world in a more physical, meaningful way,” says Moffat. “But I can’t stop scrolling, because I’ve been conditioned to constantly seek and consume information, which perpetuates the tide of misery and makes me part of the problem … The title came from Marshall McLuhan’s terrifyingly relevant 1967 book The Medium is the Massage; he also coined the phrase ‘global village,’ and that’s where the ‘village hall’s on fire all day’ line comes from. Long story short: I need to get out more.”
45 Soo Joo ft Hudson Mohwake – Running Water
This marks the the first collaboration between the American-Korean supermodel turned singer-songwriter and the Glasgow producer genius producer and is a captivatingly smooth and fizzy downtempo ode to the ephemeral nature of life.
“The main concept of Running Water was inspired from John Keats’ epitaph that said ‘Here lies one whose name was writ in water.’ I don’t know why, but I felt the impermanence of life with that one sentence,” says Soo Joo. “Writing in the sand for the wind to sweep away, or trying to leave a mark on running water…it’s about the ephemera of proclamations of feelings, the emotions, and beauty. And where does that trace of moment go after? Sometimes it all feels a bit here now, maybe gone forever.”
It has helped that is included in the soundrack to EA SPORTS FC 24
44 Lift ft Ian Maciak – You Are Safe Now
The experimental Scots sonic manipulator aka Dan Stevenson returned in 2024, three years after his debut album which featured on this list, with this masterfully fractured mash of industrial, jungle and obscure noise breaks about a momentary relief from depression and anxiety. He shows how an electronic primal scream can sound so beautiful.
“I wrote You Are Safe Now as a means to help explain the feeling of unrelenting depression and anxiety vanishing out of your life for a short moment,” he says. “I’m lucky enough to escape it for longer than I’m in it these days, but that’s new. I really tried to have the last section of this song feel like how I wish I could feel all the time. As if I’ve been extracted from Earth and I’m floating around space just existing without anything else hanging over me.”
43 Scorpio Leisure – Apology
The Edinburgh band, who released their debut album Audio Pleasure in 2024, are said to be a supergroup of sorts combining the talents of Russell Burn (Fire Engines/Win), Coco Whitson (Gin Goblins), Mungo Carswell and Hettie Noir.
This spellbinding standout, which also is the lead track of their first EP comes across like slowed down rockabilly, a narcotic collision of psychedelic indie, industrial electro and goth. The band are named after a sauna in the Leith area of Edinburgh that once ‘entertained’ clients opposite the Hibs football stadium.
42 HiFi Sean & David McAlmont – Sad Banger
The second album from the collaboration featuring the Soup Dragons songwriter and driving force, who grew up in Bellshill, twiddling the knobs and the soaring silky smooth voice of McAlmont is a marriage made in heaven and this standout single mixes old skool synth-onies with modern tech to a killer song that comes over like an update of a soulful rave torch song that Orbital had once pondered over,
“It is a euphoric but melancholy heart wrenching song that lifts you but at same time brings a soulful tear to your eye,” says Sean.
41 The Twistettes – Tory C**ts
It has the signature warped Cramps-esque sound, the to-the-point, in-yer-face R Rated message and the banshee screams. While Edinburgh duo, sisters Jo & Nicky D’arc may be pigeon holed as retro punk vs riot girrl they most definitely bring the noise, the fun and rock like an earthquake.
“The song was written on the evening of the 2019 election results.” said lead singer and bassist Jo D’arc. “Boris [Johnson] had just been re-elected and I was driving to practice with a sense of impending desolation churning in my gut. I kept hearing this chant pounding through my mind and by the time I arrived at the studio the lyrics were written. The music came together pretty spontaneously, primal screams and all. One of those songs that just rips its way out of you.
“Ultimately, it’s a release of frustration at the lack of reprieve from a government that didn’t even pretend to care about the majority of people in the country; excelling in the worst shade of selfish, greedy, corruption with no concept of compassion for those in a less fortunate situation than them.”
40 Taahliah – Boys
Gramarye, the startling debut album from the Glasgow black trans DJ, producer and groundbreaking hyperpopster who is a regular on this list blew apart all my high expectations and this first single is a breathless stomp, a face-meltingly dancefloor explosion that fuses electronic elements inspired by live music, and also pulls inspiration from her recent collaboration with the London Contemporary Orchestra where she performed a headline show at the Southbank Centre.
“It’s incredibly cheeky,” Taahliah says. “‘Boys’ was one of those songs you make in an hour then leave alone for three years. Since its conception, I knew it was going to be the introduction into this new world I’ve been creating over the past couple of years. It is the song everyone wants an ID on, it is the song everyone wants to know about.”
39 Hamish Hawk – Juliet as Epithet
The wordy Edinburgh-based ‘intelligent pop’ songwriter who has a keen following amongst his peers is at his very best on this non-single but opener from the A Firmer Hand album. It goes all tender exposing less of his more obvious indie leanings and more of real soul and poetry amidst the beautifully sparce synth and drum production. It all equals an unearthly amalgam of Neil Hannon, Morrissey and Jarvis Cocker.
“I’ve long believed that every album should start with a song that is a law unto itself, and I feel Juliet is unique on A Firmer Hand,” he says. “It is one of two truly tender and ultimately fleeting moments on the record, and the song I see myself most clearly in. It’s purely autobiographical, and very little of it actually took place.”
38 Queen of Harps – Where Will You Find Me
Anise Pearson may be the harp queen but if you ever came across the Scots-Malaysian hip-hopster’s material you wouldn’t know that that was the centre of her universe. This single is a collision of drum n beat percussion and trip hop swagger. In fact by the end I had thought it might have been a long lost Portishead track.
37 Susan Bear – Three Dimensional
Algorithmic Mood Music, the third album from Glasgow queer pop producer Susan Bear (FKA Good Dog), isn’t all ethereal. But this fascinating other-worldly synth-twisting opening track from the LP definitely is. Voiced using robotic text to speech to help introduce the album’s feeling of detachment in an increasingly digitally synthetic world, the track is said to be an uplifting note-to-self written to remind the artist “that I’m not one thing or the other, I’m loads of things layered on top of each other, and from moment to moment what I am and what I feel changes a bit. I think everyone’s the same. Infinitely complicated.”
=36 Barry Can’t Swim – Kimbara
The Lothian-born producer (real name Joshua Mannie) who spent his late teens studying at Edinburgh Napier University, working in jazz bars and fishmongers has an ear for vintage disco beats and sounds – and he has combined that with a tribal feel here.
The former intern at Glasgow’s SOMA Records has appeared on this list before because he can turn the depths of winter to summer as with this exhilarating anthem packed with vibrant horns, catchy vocal samples, and a fun vibe.
=36 sweet philly – Hypha
One of Scotland’s most exciting DJs and producers relies on playfulness in his captivating mix of techno, rave, drum & bass and funk. This fourth of five tracks from Strobelight Specimens, his second EP is as experimental as it is instantly gratifying.
35 The Joy Hotel – First Joy
A euphorically off-kilter third track from the mesmeric debut album from the playful Glasgow seven-piece rock combo who I’ve been mad about since their low key show at the Doune The Rabbit Hole festival in 2022. It’s as delightfully unpredictable a ride as you would expect. So predictable, then!
“First Joy started as many songs do, a noisy little voice note on our phones that was just a one or two minute looped vocal over a strummed electric guitar. By the time we brought it to the studio it had become a wailing, expansive, swooning epic,” say the band. “We tracked it three times only, going with the third take after little deliberation or disagreement. It was recorded the same day as I Decline and Forever Tender Blue, very late at night, and was one of those very special moments from the eleven days at Rockfield [Studio in Wales].
34 Primal Scream – Ready To Go Home (Terry Farley and Wade Teo Remix)
Some 34 years after Terry Farley created the seminal remixes of Loaded and Come Together for Bobby Gillespie and co, he sprinkles some gospel house magic once again to create an aural happy pill masterpiece. Only the more stripped back original appears on their new album Come Ahead, which is a shame.
Gillespie says he sang the lyrics of the song to his father, Robert Gillespie Senior, the night before he passed away. “It was just me and him in the hospital,” he says. “His body had given up. I think, when you get old and tired and your body just goes, ‘I’ve had enough. Time to go.’ I was trying to write about that feeling, I don’t know why – maybe I was feeling tired myself. Sometimes I do.”
33 Mokusla – the metal man
The Donegal-born but Glasgow-based singer and producer’s second single is a hauntingly intoxicating blend of dream-pop, trip hop, electronic and traditional folk that grabs hold like a lion’s jaws and won’t let go. In 2023 she was one of four artists awarded the Hen Hoose x PRS mentorship based in Scotland working with Tamara Schlesinger and Susan Bear of the artist/producer collective.
This track with its sublime ‘smiling forever’ hook is inspired by a rock marker known as Metal Man in the waters off Ards Friary in Donegal. She named it as her favourite spot in the world that feels like a retreat or perfect escape from the hustle and bustle. “It’s the most peaceful place in the world for me,” she says.
32 Lists – Crest
The mysterious Arran/Edinburgh/Glasgow singer-songwriter’s long long awaited debut album soars on this transcendent alt folk standout track that has a choral feel and tons of strings and woodwind.
31 Slam – Flicker
It would be so easy for the stalwart Glasgow techno producer duo consisting of Stuart McMillan and Orde Meikle (both now in their late 50s) to sail close to the clubland template and not change things enough for us home (or car) audiophiles. On this skyscraping title track from the new EP, the co-founders of Soma Quality Recordings switch up, and add some acid house vibes to their hyperfast wall of sound and create a hypnotic tour-de-force, like The Prodigy on steroids.
30 Kusht – Garden Radio
The always inventive but criminally overlooked Scottish-born downtempo electro producer is a list regular and this latest single released as part of a celebration of Brazilian label Tropical Twista’s 100th release, is an unpreditable, mesmeric trip that almost creates a new genre on its own, cleverly moulding tribal rhythms, psychedelic synth grooves, skittering dancefloor beats and neatly selected samples and loops. And that’s just the underbelly.
29 ONR & The Listening Planet – Breathe
My first encounter with Robert Shields was as the former frontman of the massively underrated Dumfriesshire indie combo Finding Albert and he remains one of the country’s best tunesmiths, albeit he is not a household name. For Imperfect Cadence, the debut album under the ONR moniker, he waves field recordings from The Listening Planet (Martyn Stewart) to his soulful indie-pop songs, which are twisted to have a more cinematic/orchestra feel.
This tune is a standout from the eight songs that provide a sensory journey through Scotland’s wild and untamed beauty and aim to plead the case for the conservation of Scotland (and the world’s) natural integrity, flora, and fauna. Breathe is an all too brief three minute hypnotic hymn which begins beautifully with the found sounds from Loch Garry in Perth & Kinross and a simple piano, before Shields’ spine-tingling falsetto pleads.
“I don’t believe that anyone involved in this project is naive enough to believe that changing attitudes, influencing governmental policy or progressing any kind of environmental evolution is a simple undertaking,” said ONR. “What I do know for absolute certain, is that if anything can, then music can. Music’s influence remains at the very fundamentals of what it is to be human; not just human, in fact, but to be alive and sentient and communicative.
“This project has taught me that. Songs are ever-present. Be those the songs of the capercaillies of the Cairngorms, the curlews of the Solway Firth… or the eight songs that make up this body of work.”
=28 Guests – Arrangements, As In Making Them
Avant garde and experimental can often be alienating and unlistenable. But ‘i wish i was special’, the fascinating debut album from the Glasgow-based surreal-pop combo of Jessica Higgins and Matthew Walkerdine formerly of the bands Mordwaffe and Vital Idles, is definitely not that.
This album single is the most accessible entry point and is an engagingly hypnotic mantra that creates a ghostly atmosphere with abstract keyboards, percussion, found sounds and other ticks and tweaks with the deliciously twee rhythmical chat-rap of Higgins to the fore.
“This one’s a touchstone,” she says. “Matt’s spooky intro/outro is often in contention but I think it’s a perfect seam. To stick with a theme, basically mostly what I’m into is talking about talking or the process of trying to talk about something, anything.
“The lyrics on the recording were improvised around a melodic hook that seemed to fit with the music, so are a bit hard to learn to play live. I think with this song we’re starting to get used to our instruments and how to make music from the bottom up. We’re not trained, per se, I did some piano lessons as a kid, but before making this record we played as a drummer and vocalist in a post-punk four-piece, so we could thrash and make it up alongside the guitarists who were more adept at building melodic frames.”
=28 Isobel Campbell – 4316
Isobel Campbell who left Belle and Sebastian in 2002 has done very well thank you very much with her solo career and has re-announced herself with Bow to Love, the follow up to her last solo album 2020. This standout track is a vivacious slice of psychedelic synth-folk that could be a Madchester twist on Spacemen 3. It’s not typical at all of the album which is more stripped down. She has also released a French version called 4319 for those who desire a more romantic language.
27 Lylo – We Move Again
Glasgow five-piece sophisti-pop Lylo emerged from a six year writing and recording hiatus with a third album Thoughts of Never and a vibe that almost mashes Blue Nile and Talk Talk with George Michael and Sade (yes Sade). The danger with the lush production is that it is too easy to smoothen out the rough edges and become bland. too retro and quite frankly boring. But this neo soul album standout and single is a cinemascopic, shiny and gorgeous earworm, like a modern day Love and Money.
They label it “a glimmer of hope in the midst of an ethereal, city soundscape”, adding: “The song was written as a cathartic experience to tackle metropolitan melancholy whilst finding comfort in its often vast, lonely spaces and those you wish you could reach.”
26 Wrest – Amber
The jangling guitar riffs that haunt this single have more than few echoes of Coldplay’s Yellow (and perhaps the title recognises this) but the Edinburgh indie-folk rockers formed in 2017 find their own way on what is an undeniably gripping anthem built for big arenas from their keenly crafted Everything’s Nothing Forever Again album.
The final part drops tomorrow, New Year’s Day.
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2024 Part 1 (100-76)
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2024 Part 2 (75-51)
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2024 Part 4 (25-1)