These lists highlight the best in music, film, books, television, and games.
The 30 best pop albums of 2024 radiate with unstoppable playlist power, much-needed sweet escapism, self-reflection, self-criticism, and killer melodies.
The year’s best album re-issues include rock legends, essential R&B artists, classic pop, jazz, alternative rock, global beats and so much more.
PopMatters‘ 30 Best DVDs of 2024 hereby presents a glorious cavalcade, a prestigious panorama, a scintillating smorgasbord of classic films (and one newbie).
The genre rediscovery via TikTok during the first stages of the pandemic has been going on long enough that we might consider it a Shoegaze Revival Revival.
Artists worldwide have been exploring the visionary potential of electrical instruments in all manner of new and novel ways to create psychedelic music.
As always, rock was a guitar-led extravaganza in 2024 with artists drawing from an ever-widening musical well. These are the 25 best rock albums of the year.
This was another year of riches in the best jazz and creative music, with barriers between the tradition and the avant-garde melting away.
Thematically, much of this year’s best punk and hardcore music addressed mental health and working through the past while striving for a more peaceful present.
PopMatters’ 24 Best Video Games of 2024 highlight achievements in game design and the risks creators take to lure gamers into the magic circle.
Americana has never been better with the quality of music, diversity of styles, and the artists’ demographics in terms of race, gender, and wealth.
The year’s best folk albums transcend genre boundaries, yet each entry remains firmly grounded in the folk ethos of connection and storytelling.
In 2024’s best global music, celebrations of culture abound, with performers playing with sounds of home and family from the Caribbean to Tanzania and beyond.
