Top 10 Albums of 2024 – Gretchen Troop

2024 offered a great mix of new soul~funk music. Leon Bridges new release, “Leon”, I put at the top because of his beautiful matured songs that coat this album like honey. At the other end I added a vibing Khruangbin album “A La Sala”, which is more background and feel but a really solid album.

Some of the albums were from stalwarts in the soul~funk category like Meshell Ndgeocello’s intense masterpiece, “No More Water: The Gospel of James Baldwin”, Nikki Costa’s “Dirty Disco” feels like Prince and a party, Brazilian Neo-Soul artist Céu’s “Novela” who remains a consistently great artist, and LA’s Orgone’s “Chimera”.

Anderson .Paak came back with a divorce album in his partnership with NxWorries named, “Why Lawd?” after their first, “Yes Lawd!”, which is one of my favorite albums of all time.
Tems’ album “Born in the Wild” at first sounds like the overproduced R&B that I personally avoid, but has such amazing character, song-writing and originality that you should put that high on your listen list.

Judith Hill put out an album named, “Letters from a Black Widow” to straight on address her reputation as a “black widow”. That reputation comes from being Michael Jackson’s 2nd singer when he died and Prince’s girlfriend when he died. Do not sleep on this woman! Her talent live when I saw her in Denver was mind-bogglingly good.

Lastly an album that I just got which I am loving so far, Michael Kiwanuka’s, “Small Changes”. A soulful voice mixed with great song-writing and depth.

I’m sure that there are many more that I missed, so if you have some for me to check out and play on the show make sure to add a Post to “Dusty Grooves” Facebook page and I will listen!