The 9 Best Songs of February 2024
The greatest tracks from the past month.
There are two, 100-per-cent certified hot takes I have about music:
- It’s good!
- There’s a lotttttt of it.
So it’s only natural that I’d want to highlight the first one and solve the second by creating this monthly music series, talking about the best songs of the past month.
You can check out all the songs I chat about today, as well as some additional picks in my expanded Spotify playlist here:
09 Burning Down The House
Paramore
Given the massive new wave influence on Paramore’s recent records, it would’ve been a massive oversight — and a human rights violation in certain communities — to not see Hayley Williams don the oversized silver suit.
Something far more fitting than said outfit is Paramore’s rendition of Burning Down The House for A24's Talking Heads tribute record.
It’s a faithful cover that doesn’t lack any of the bubbly charm that’s made either artist greatly adored: some would argue that with each new listen, it doesn’t stop making sense.
Best Bit: The final uttering of “fighting fire with fire” and its accompanying growl…does things to my brain.
08 Give Mama A Hug
Dev Lemons
Defying expectations as an internet funny person turned musician is a pretty successful formula. Hell, if the guy who made Hair Cake can have a song go double platinum then anything is possible.
It’s hard for me to say which hat Dev Lemons wore first but it’s far, far easier to say she rocks both. Much like the person behind it, Give Mama A Hug is a song of two halves: a delicate and detailed number with a defiant, obliterative kick to it.
Best Bit: Sure, a minute may be too long to be a “bit”, but nothing will stop me from going on about that glorious drop and pulverising outro.
07 Spring Is Coming With A Strawberry In Her Mouth
Caroline Polachek
The second cover to appear on this list couldn’t be more different from the other.
And no, not just because they’re not the same song.
While there are a lot of similarities to the original — written and performed by Irish synth-pop outfit Operating Theatre — Spring Is Coming With A Strawberry In Her Mouth a la Polachek has that kick that makes it her own.
A lot of the rough edges are buffed out and while that isn’t an objective improvement, it sounds so authentically Caroline to its core that I wouldn’t be surprised if many assumed it was an original.
Best Bit: Come to really dig those ad-libs, especially the references to her past work that turn me into that cursed reaction pic.
06 16 CARRIAGES
Beyoncé
Beyoncé might have claimed that her soul couldn’t be broken in 2022 but her latest single shows that this defiance didn’t come from a lack of anything trying.
The country direction she’s gone with has been confusingly controversial for “that” crowd but for anyone with ears, it makes too much sense.
A genre known for pouring out its soul is the perfect fit for Beyoncé’s bittersweet reminiscing. And when bolstered with that triumphant twang and part-punchy, part-witty lines (“I might cook, clean, but still won’t fold”), it’s easily the best song she’s put out in nearly a decade.
Best Bit: Oh boy, that bridge. Could go with those gang vocals but the moody synths make the hairs on my arms stand at attention like the BeyHive.
05 All Ur Luv (ft. Toro y Moi)
Wavedash & Madeon
I spend a lot of time — maybe even too much — racking my brain each month, trying to find the perfect point to make about every song on these lists.
So when I read that this supergroup collab of Wavedash, Madeon and Toro y Moi all came about after meeting at Porter Robinson’s Second Sky festival, I felt a weight come off my shoulders.
Because of course such a gorgeous, eclectic jam — primed for becoming the Sound of the Summer™ 2024 — would be conceived at the event of a musician synonymous with those descriptors.
FIFA 25 soundtrack: I’ve found your first submission.
Best Bit: Love Toro y Moi on this song but Madeon’s verse is so delightfully fun.
04 Fishbrain
Mount Kimbie
Ever make an observation that is so spot-on that it goes from a subjective opinion to just plain fact? It doesn’t happen to me much but it did for this entry: I jokingly jotted down in my notes how it felt very King Krule-coded.
Granted, Fishbrain isn’t one of those collabs but it’s definitely feeling the radiation-esque benefits from being in proximity to the slowcore, art-rock icon. A scuzzy, catastrophising wee gem.
Best Bit: The “Dumb Dumb, Give Me Gum Gum”-esque vocals on the chorus. Yes, you are seeing a Night In The Museum reference in 2024.
03Fool
Adrianne Lenker
It’s hard to recall an album with a more impressive run-up of singles in recent memory than Adrianne Lenker’s upcoming Bright Future.
Fittingly enough, it would probably have to be Lenker’s group Big Thief and their doozy of a double-LP Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You.
That fine run of form continues with Fool, home to some of Lenker’s most playful and mesmerising guitar work: high praise considering the competition for such an accolade.
That giddy guitar has to be a result of Lenker’s bubbling joy, the delivery of which helps to make it all the more concentrated. Another tasty cut from what is sure to be a milestone record.
Best Bit: Those backing vocals and the added oomph they give to Adrianne’s apparent happiness.
02 Something About Shirley
Fatboi Sharif & Roper Williams
More a saga than it is a song, Something About Shirley takes a bunch of twists and turns over its ten-minute run-time that will pique your curiosity just as much as it will make your toes curl.
If clipping have been producing the hip-hop equivalent to horror blockbusters, then Fatboi Sharif & Roper Williams have made the kind of unsettling short film you find at 3 am when you’re 100 feet deep into a YouTube rabbit hole.
It’s the kind of song that I’ll maybe return to once or twice in the coming months; and the kind of song where such an admission is all the more reason to check it out.
Best Bit: Spoiler, I guess? But the “don’t let me die” cry that subsequently falls through all nine circles of hell was certainly something.
01 A Dream Goes On Forever (feat. John Glacier)
Vegyn
While I’m used to my #1 picks being artists I’m familiar with, it’s always a pleasure when a complete outsider takes me off guard and wins me over.
Queue Vegyn: a name that seems to be from the CHVRCHES school of circumnavigating a Google search headache. What’s not something to laugh at is his production history, which includes credits on Frank Ocean’s Blonde and Endless.
It’s easy to see how busting his chops working on those colossal records has helped to refine his “happy melancholia” vibe into the full, bright form heard on A Dream Goes On Forever.
Throw in some optimistic bars from John Glacier — who fits the mood perfectly — and you’ve got the kind of pondering, reassuring trip-hop track your playlist is craving.
Best Bit: That twinkling main synth melody could be my alarm for the rest of the year and I still wouldn’t get sick of it.
Thank you for reading all the way through! If you want to stay up to date with my music thoughts then make sure to follow me on here and sign up for email alerts — have a great March!
P.S I will *try* to get the next entry out at the start of a month and not nearly halfway through it.
