CRITIC’S POLL: No Depression Writers, Editors, and Photographers’ Favorite Roots Albums of 2024
No Depression
Posted On December 16, 2024
The results of our Critics’ Poll are in! Collectively, ND writers, editors, and photographers put more than 100 albums on their lists of for Top 10 Roots Albums of 2024 10, covering a diverse array of albums, and reminding us just how much great music came out this year. In fact, this year, our music tastes ranged so far and wide that several slots on this list are tied two and even three ways.
Check the top 10 results below, with a few of our writers’ thoughts on what make the albums great. And don’t forget to vote in the No Depression Readers’ Poll; voting closes at 11:59p.m. EST on Wednesday, Dec. 18.
Also, you can find a list of the contributors who participated at the bottom of the post, and click the name of each album to find our review of it.
1. Sarah Jarosz — Polaroid Lovers
Polaroid Lovers, the seventh studio album from the prolific songwriter with a voice of gold, is Nashville through and through. It has the buoyancy and spirit of the best ’90s country confections, more a vibe than anything technical. Whether or not Jarosz meant to pay tribute to the Martinas, the Trishas, and the Pattys, Polaroid Lovers listens like a love letter to the sound they mastered. — Maeri Ferguson
2. Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings — Woodland
On Woodland, Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings maintain the same mix of contemplation, despair, and transcendence that listeners have loved for decades, in which the occasional mention of hashtags doesn’t change the sense that you’re moseying through a landscape as old as music or mortality. — Noah Berlatsky
With her latest, Tigers Blood, Waxahatchee (Katie Crutchfield) has her feet firmly planted in this sonic universe, and she doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. Crutchfield is utterly present on Tigers Blood, at ease even when she’s mining the prickly stuff of relationships, insecurities, and self-acceptance. — Maeri Ferguson
4. Hurray for the Riff Raff — The Past Is Still Alive
Under the Hurray for the Riff Raff moniker, Alynda Segarra’s latest album, The Past Is Still Alive, finds them looking inward, exploring their own life and processing loss and the passage of time. Segarra lays out their vulnerabilities and the experiences that have shaped who they are. Full of vivid lyrical imagery and taut, direct arrangements, the 11 tracks on The Past Is Still Alive make for a compelling and emotionally affecting listening experience. — Jim Shahen
5. Sierra Ferrell— Trail of Flowers
Though Sierra Ferrell is a long way from her days of roughing it, hitchhiking, and train-hopping, that scrappy drive to survive remains fully intact, ever-searching, always running toward something. Sometimes on her latest, Trail of Flowers, Ferrell is wistful about it, as with album opener “American Dreaming,” an anthem to soundtrack that unglamorous rise to the top. In other moments, it’s coded in something less heady, but more gritty and real. — Maeri Ferguson
6. Sturgill Simpson/Johnny Blue Skies — Passage Du Desir
Sturgill Simpson’s Johnny Blue Skies’ “debut” longplayer, Passage du Desir, is a harrowing account of terminal loneliness and romantic disaster. Should this rebranding raise fears of an unwelcome tangent — hold the synths, please! — don’t worry. The music is instantly recognizable as pure, brilliant Sturgill, a bracing blend of country, pop, and bluegrass that shows off his expressive voice to commanding effect. Nobody mixes anguish and determination better. — Jon Young
7. Willi Carlisle — Critterland
When the youth use the phrase “say it with my whole chest,” it means that they are speaking sincerely. For Willi Carlisle, this metaphor applies with all its meanings: Declaiming like a medieval bard on his evocative new album, Critterland, Carlisle finds the union between his past life as a poet and his current role as a troubadour. Carlisle populated his previous albums with strange characters and tales that highlighted the string of absurdities that form a person’s life. On Critterland, Carlisle steps into the spotlight, reflecting on his own peccadillos and victories, however small. — Rachel Cholst
8. TIE: Chuck Prophet and ¿Qiensave? — Wake The Dead; Kacey Musgraves — Deeper Well; Kelsey Waldon—There’s Always a Song
Chuck Prophet and ¿Qiensave? — Wake The Dead
Sidelined from touring and most everything else after a 2022 cancer diagnosis and then treatment, San Francisco singer-songwriter Chuck Prophet had a lot of time to listen. Really listen. In interviews, Prophet has credited listening deeply to music with helping him through such a scary time, and the music that resonated most strongly was cumbia, a Latin dance genre with a long history of absorbing sounds as it spread. Prophet became not just a fan but an acolyte of the music, studying its history, hunting down recordings, and talking it up with friends. When he was back on his feet, he started jamming with cumbia brother group and fellow Californians ¿Qiensave?. Their informal collaboration coalesced into joint live performances and finally an album, Wake the Dead, a delightful pairing of Prophet’s laconic, lyrically rich style and a rhythmic blast of energy from ¿Qiensave?. — Stacy Chandler
Kacey Musgraves excels at producing cinematic albums that track the vagaries of human existence in kaleidoscopic colors. On Deeper Well, her fifth album and the follow-up to her 2021 chart topper star-crossed, Musgraves produces another stunning masterpiece that explores every chamber of the human heart. — Henry Carrigan
Kelsey Waldon — There’s Always A Song
Kelsey Waldon’s There’s Always A Song is brief — just eight songs. But into this remarkable set of covers, she packs a whole lot of musical history, both roots music collectively, and her own personal inspiration, collaborating with a powerhouse lineup of guests, including Margo Price, S.G. Goodman, and Amanda Shires. Waldon selected songs that shaped her own music writing, particularly highlighting women songwriters, with tracks including Jean Ritchie “Keep Your Garden Clean,” Hazel Dicken’s “Pretty Bird,” fellow Kentuckian Molly O’Day’s “Traveling the Highway Home,” and “I Only Exist,” popularized by Ralph Stanley, but actually written by his wife. — Meredith Lawrence
9. TIE: Karen Jonas — The Rise and Fall of American Kitsch; Jessica Pratt—Here in the Pitch
Karen Jonas — The Rise and Fall of American Kitsch
Inspired by the 2022 Elvis biopic, Karen Jonas started to think about the post-war excess of 1950s America and how that moment of unshackled growth lead to our current culture of hyper consumerism. What followed is The Rise and Fall of American Kitsch, a set of funky, funny, catchy tracks, part-Elvis character sketches, and part reflection on our relationship to disposable goods and Jonas’ own complicated love for buying stuff. — Meredith Lawrence
Jessica Pratt — Here in the Pitch
Jessica Pratt’s Here in the Pitch is the fourth studio album from the Americana artist, and her finest work of dreamy, raw folk music to date. Spacy and sparse, on Here in the Pitch Pratt is eloquently laid back, immersing the listener in her intimate yet expansive dream world of emotional exploration. — Meredith Lawrence
10. TIE: Kaitlin Butts — Roadrunner! ; Madi Diaz — Weird Faith
Kaitlin Butts’ new album, Roadrunner! reimagines the Broadway musical Oklahoma! through the lens of contemporary country music. With Roadrunner!, Butts takes a brush to all of it, reimagining the lead couple, Laurey and Curly, as lovers in metro Tulsa who probably met at a bar. By the end they’re driving off to Vegas, in a Cadillac, to elope. Though Butts’ previous album — 2022’s What Else Can She Do— was replete with sad songs about love and loss and addiction, she felt there was room for her to go in a different direction this time. Roadrunner! is an ambitious endeavor whose catchy choruses and authentic heart-tuggers rise to the task. — Kim Ruehl
Madi Diaz’ Weird Faith sinks into all the cracks of a person’s psyche as they navigate the uneven terrain of intimacy. It aims to find out what happens when the dust settles and you’re at the start of something again, pushing through the discomfort to give it another try. “This is your brain on love,” Diaz seems to be saying in these songs. She takes the adage of needing to suffer in the name of great art and flips it on its head a million times over, proving what often goes unsaid: Even a functional relationship is still muddled by anxiety and insecurity. — Maeri Ferguson
Thanks to the following ND contributors for participating in the 2024 Critics Poll: Henry Carrigan, Jon Young, Michael Elliott, Maeri Ferguson, Amos Perrine, John Amen, Peter Dervin, Rachel Cholst, Nancy Posey, Chris Giffy, Kim Reed, former Assistant Editor Stacy Chandler, Web Editor Meredith Lawrence, and Managing Editor Hilary Saunders.
