If one thing can be said with any certainty about this year, it's that – once again – rock did not die. Instead, it did what it always does. It flourished, it cropped up in unexpected places, and it kept us all thrilled, for 12 whole months. Here are albums that did much of the thrilling, the 50 best rock albums of 2024.
10. Gary Clark Jr - Jpeg Raw (Warners)
Eclecticism is the name of the game for Texan bluesman and multi-instrumentalist Gary Clark Jr on Jpeg Raw, with jazz, rock’n’roll, hip-hop, R&B, soul, African beats, funk and even a little Rat Pack crooning woven together to create a unique and exciting tapestry made from the threads of the last 50 years of American music. And with joyous guest appearances from titans such as Stevie Wonder and George Clinton, it finds Gary Clark Jr picking up the baton from the greats and running with it to take his place among them.
He’s got plenty to say on the state of the world as well, calling for revolution one moment and decrying our enslavement by mobile phones the next, although there’s plenty of time for more animalistic concerns on the slinky Funk Witch U. While Clark Jr’s previous records set him up as a prodigious talent, this one sees him truly fly. EJ
Killer track: Maktub
Buy on Amazon
9. Deep Purple - = 1 (Earmusic)
The album that many wondered if Deep Purple still had it in them to deliver, =1 captures a revitalised Purps rescaling the peak of their powers. We’re - astonishingly - back to a time when you attempt to pick out Purple members for individual praise, then realise they’re all playing out of their skin.
Gillan’s wrangling his rich, assured, significantly matured voice to excellent effect; shot-in-the-arm guitar newbie Simon McBride is on fire, tangling particularly compellingly with a decidedly in-form Don Airey on keyboards; then there’s Ian Paice casually deploying delicate percussive touches during triplelocked interplay with bassist Roger Glover; all concerned cresting in denial of time’s remorseless passage.
Bob Ezrin’s production allows Mark IX to sound exactly as Purple should, and their material – witty, hook-laden (including singles - Portable Door, Lazy Sod - that sound like singles) – is just as sharp as ever. Stunning. IF
Killer track: Show Me
Buy on Amazon
8. The Black Keys - Ohio Players (Easy Eye/Nonesuch)
Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney’s shift as the biggest band in the world is a memory, and those kinds of numbers will not happen again (it’s telling that the arena dates in support of Ohio Players were downsized to us-yet-unscheduled ‘intimate’ venues). But with a dip in commercial fortunes often comes artistic freedom, and this twelfth album fizzes with the joy of its creation, which saw the duo travel the world, indulging in what Carney called “fun shit” and roping in wish-list collaborators such as Beck and Noel Gallagher.
Inspired by their sideline in riotous DJ parties, the masterstroke was getting rid of any song they deemed “too mid-tempo or sad”, and the resulting album is a floor-filling blast, from the hairy funk of This Is Nowhere to the heart-racing soul of Beautiful People (Stay High). Screw the sales, let’s dance. HY
Killer track: Beautiful People (Stay High)
Buy on Amazon
7. Ian Hunter - Defiance Part 2: Fiction (Sun)
Ian Hunter continues to rock against the dying of the light. Now 85 and still wearing his rock’n’roll attitude like a battered badge of honour, the ex-Mott The Hoople frontman casts a weathered eye over the madness that surrounds him. ‘Am I the last man standing? Seriously…’ he barks on Everybody’s Crazy But Me, a pounding, Stones-ish rocker that provides the perfect framework for his eternally delinquent voice.
Surrounded for the second time by a cast of legends, including the late Jeff Beck and Taylor Hawkins, Hunter vents his spleen with heroic disdain on tracks including Fiction, Kettle Of Fish and Weed – ‘Humans are stupid, expensive to breed, so let them smoke weed’. But then, accompanied by Lucinda Williams, he dives into What Would I Do Without You, a plain-spoken love song full of tender emotional riches. He’s still the ultimate dude – young or old. DS
Killer track: The 3rd Rail
Buy on Amazon
6. Pearl Jam - Dark Matter (Monkeywrench/Republic)
The last of the big grunge originals to continue unscathed by tragedy or burnout, Pearl Jam have enjoyed a revitalisation on their their twelfth studio album. The master stroke was getting producer Andrew Watt involved. Having previously encouraged the Rolling Stones to look back at their own legacy in order to move forwards, Watt has pulled the same trick here, asking Pearl Jam to revisit the crowdpleasing, stadium-stuffing drama of their earliest days and recreate that magic for 2024.
Frontman Eddie Vedder is in fine voice, that instantly recognisable, deep timbre as strong as ever – not least on opener Scared OF Fear with its clear-eyed look at the scene the band came from – while the titanic combination of Matt Cameron’s drumming and guitarists Mike McCready and Stone Gossard’s luminescent guitar playing conspire to light a fire under the whole thing.
The tougher material is balanced with more delicate numbers such as the Tom Petty-echoing Wreckage, and finds Pearl Jam sounding more assured of their own place in the world than they have in years. EJ
Killer track: Dark Matter
Buy on Amazon
5. Black Country Communion - V (J&R Adventures)
As far as supergroups go, it’s hardly a revelation that this transatlantic quartet of monster musicians share substantial alchemy. Much of Black Country Communion’s allure is born from absence – V is their first album since 2017, and they’ve performed live fewer than 10 times since 2011. But when Messrs Hughes, Bonamassa, Bonham and Sherinian align their schedules, the results are invariably tremendous.
So is V, and it sounds like all good BCC albums should: fat hard-rock riffs, bluesy bluster and sonic power that’s greater than the sum of its parts. Lead single Stay Free is an infectiously funky outlier, and Red Sun is one of the moodiest songs in the band’s history thanks to Bonamassa’s tempestuous central riff. He gets his guitar-god moment on The Open Road, where the album’s majestic closer builds to a stunning, guitar-soaked climax. Can we have album six a bit sooner, fellas? CL
Killer track: The Open Road
Buy on Amazon
4. Bruce Dickinson - The Mandrake Project (BMG)
While Iron Maiden continue their transformation into the prog band they always secretly wanted to be, Bruce Dickinson resurrected his solo career after a 19-year break with an album whose brilliance lies in its directness. Written with guitarist and trusty foil Roy Z and drawing on a range of esoteric influences from William Blake to Alan Moore, The Mandrake Project is a semi-concept album loosely tied to a comic book that takes in secret societies, the apocalypse and bringing dead souls back to life.
So far, so barking. But musically the album is more streamlined than much of what Maiden themselves have served up over the past two decades (even if one song, Eternity Has Failed, was ‘borrowed’ for 2015’s Book Of Souls album). Afterglow Of Ragnarök, Rain On The Graves and the terrific Mistress Of Mercy are Technicolor anthems that bridge the classic and the modern, while Sonata (Immortal Beloved) dials up the slow-burning, symphonic drama. All the grandeur of an Iron Maiden album, in half the time. DE
Killer Track: Resurrection Men
Buy on Amazon
3. David Gilmour - Luck And Strange (Sony)
David Gilmour’s first new album in nine years was certainly worth the wait for those hankering for Floydian fillips. Luck And Strange brims with self-reflection and poignant nods to his past, as well as featuring some of his finest, fiercest guitar playing. Boosted by working with young producer Charlie Andrew, the trademark rootsy blues prevails, but gauzier, otherworldly indie styles gained entrance.
This perfectly suited tracks such as The Piper – a familiar backwards glance by Gilmour to his anguished late bandmate Syd Barrett – and standout Between Two Points, the entrancing dream-pop cover sung by Gilmour’s daughter Romany, who’s also on harp. The family affair continued with lyrics by his wife Polly Samson, and son Gabriel joining Romany on backing vocals. And the presence of the late Rick Wright on electric piano and Hammond – via reworked old jam recordings – next to Gilmour’s deep, rich vocal brought the whole work back home. JK
Killer track: Scattered
Buy on Amazon
2. Judas Priest - Invincible Shield (Columbia/Sony)
In March of 2024, just in time for a triumphant six-date arena tour of the UK accompanied by Saxon and Uriah Heep, Judas Priest unveiled what Classic Rock hailed as the group’s “third genuinely great album in a row”, continuing the groundwork lain previously by Redeemer Of Souls (2014) and Fire Power (2018).
This was no convenient hyperbole on our part. While many bands of Priest’s vintage – actually, make that just about all of their contemporaries – have withered on the vine in varying stages of gracefulness, Priest not only rebuffed the ravages of Father Time, but against all odds the group also actually flourished. Invincible Shield was easily the most important heavy metal release of 2024.
Which isn’t to say that Judas Priest enjoyed a cosy ride during the build-up the birth of their nineteenth studio album. That’s far from the case. In September 2021, Richie Faulkner, the band’s guitarist since 2011, came perilously close to losing his life when he suffered an acute aortic aneurysm on stage at the Louder Than Life Festival in the US. Incredibly, Richie finished the show.
“From what I’ve been told by my surgeon, people [affected by this] don’t usually make it to the hospital alive,” he commented later. During emergency open-heart surgery, parts of his chest were replaced by mechanical components. “I’m literally made of metal now,” Faulkner told Rolling Stone.
A little over a year later, with anticipation over Invincible Shield beginning to reach fever pitch thanks to a spectacular first YouTube track, Panic Attack, Priest were inducted to the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, where their current touring line-up performed a three-song medley along with Glenn Tipton, the band’s long-serving guitarist who had retired from the road in 2018 due to Parkinson’s disease, plus former members guitarist KK Downing and drummer Les Binks. Priest were inducted by Alice Cooper, who described them as “the definitive metal band”. When vocalist Rob Halford was reminded that he had previously expressed indifference towards the Hall Of Fame, he said with a chuckle: “Yeah, I was probably fibbing.”
Also that year, Priest joined a cast of fellow A-listers at the inaugural Power Trip Festival in California. During their set, Metallica fanboys James Hetfield and Kirk Hammett were filmed playing air guitar to Rapid Fire.
In March, Invincible Shield roared into the UK album chart at No.2 – the highest position of any of the band’s previous records. Classic Rock claimed that even at 72 years old Halford’s voice still packed more than enough power to set off car alarms three fields away when the band headlined at Bloodstock. “Every time Scott Travis hits the bass drum your teeth will judder,” the review continued, adding: “You won’t be able to resist singing along to Gates Of Hell or Crown Of Thorns.”
At Wembley Arena on their UK tour, to the roars of 12,500 leather-clad fanatics Priest thrust three songs from Invincible Shield into their 105-minute set (Panic Attack, the title track and Crown Of Horns); or four, if you include a specially recorded Invincible Shield Tour Anthem that welcomed them to the stage.
Soaking up the applause at the end of the show, Halford insisted: “The Priest will be back”. He repeated that sentiment to Classic Rock, adding: “This is the nineteenth album. I don’t like odd numbers. We’re already thinking about what we’re going to do next. That’s the joy of music, it never stops.” DL
Killer track: Panic Attack
Buy on Amazon
1. The Black Crowes - Happiness Bastards (Silver Arrow)
The Black Crowes’ reunion couldn’t have been more badly timed. Announcing the news in late 2019, the Robinson brothers, who hadn’t spoken to each other for six years before burying the hatchet, confirmed a continent-straddling 45-date tour of North America, scheduled to kick off the following June. Following the announcement, Chris and Rich Robinson talked to Classic Rock, and among other things we asked if there were plans for an album after the tour.
“I don’t know,” Chris told us. “Yeah. Maybe. I definitely think Rich and I will write songs together in our future. I don’t know how, when and where. But if Rich has songs, I’m down to hear them and do what I do. But I don’t think we can do that until we see how this goes.”
We all know what happened next. Pandemic. Shutdown. No live music. Disaster.
The tour was shelved and, given the often fractious and historically fragile nature of the siblings’ relationship, fans could be forgiven for wondering if the band might ever resurface. But, in late July 2021, The Black Crowes finally got the Shake Your Money Maker tour under way. Over the course of the next two years they played more than 100 shows. It did go well. And they did record that album.
“Happiness Bastards is our love letter to rock’n’roll,” said Chris, announcing the news in January this year. “This album is a continuation of our story as a band,” Rich added.
It sounds like both. The Black Crowes’ first album of new material since 2009’s Before The Frost… Until The Freeze is an absolute peach. It’s lean, an album of real purpose. Bands usually stretch out and relax as they age, but this collection of songs is fierce. Songs get to the point quickly; no messing around. And they rock. Opener Bedside Manners rattles along like the Faces playing Saturday night at the rowdiest of roadside honky-tonks. Rats And Clowns winds into gear quickly before propelling itself along like an out-take from Highway To Hell. Cross Your Fingers begins with deftly picked acoustic guitar, but by the 40-second mark it’s transformed into a taut rocker, wrapped around the kind of riff that might result if you put Jimmy Page and Joe Perry in a room and told them not to come out until they’d come up with something truly worthwhile.
The ghost of Malcolm Young appears again on Wanting And Waiting’s glam-shuffle verses, before the chorus arrives and takes it to the church. Dirty Cold Sun struts and swaggers. Bleed It Dry is hauled along by the filthiest of overdriven slide guitar riffs, a blues teetering on the edge of chaos and collapse. Flesh Wound is genuine power-pop, as if The Replacements have hooked up with Andrew W.K. to cover Cheap Trick. In a bar. During a riot. Follow The Moon swoops and swaggers, powered by the slinkiest of riffs, enlightened by a slide guitar worthy of Gregg Allman and lifted towards the heavens by the most celestial of choruses.
Honestly, it’s a miracle. Just when you think you’ve picked your favourite track, along comes another. Only on the lovely Wilted Rose – featuring vocals from country star Lainey Wilson – and poignant closer Kindred Spirit do the band do their more relaxed, ‘side two of Sticky Fingers’ thing.
You’ve heard all this before. The Stones. Zeppelin. Free. Aerosmith. The Allman Brothers. Etc. But throw in the handclaps, the gospel backing vocals, the Hammond organ, Chris Robinson’s gift for a vocal delivery that’s both ragged and righteous, and an extraordinary amount of enthusiasm, and you’re left with an album that doesn’t land too far short of their first two. It crackles with an electricity that belies the age of those involved (the band formed 40 years ago, do the math), and is a genuine return to form, in an age when many releases described as such are nothing of the sort.
Happiness Bastards is the sound of men getting stuff out of their systems, and having a ball as they do so. And for all the plaudits afforded the Robinsons’ post-split, pre-reunion bands, Rich’s The Magpie Salute and the Chris Robinson Brotherhood always felt like stopgaps, however sincere the ambition of those involved. The reunion is proof, if it were needed, that some things are truly more than the sum of their parts.
Another pair of warring brothers kissed and made up this year. Oasis will trot around the globe in 2025, filling stadiums and their own coffers, and ticket holders will experience a diminished version of a thing they loved when they were younger. If the Gallaghers make an album, it’ll be a poor facsimile of their two great records. They know it, and their fans – if they’re being honest – know it too.
And therein lies the miracle of Happiness Bastards. After all those battles, all that rancour, all that violence, all that arguing over “horrible, stupid shit”, all those years lost to acrimony and bitterness, The Black Crowes sound completely undiminished. And everybody should know it. FL
Killer track: Wanting And Waiting
Buy on Amazon
