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The 20 best songs of 2024

Here are the year’s most outstanding tracks – from Fontaines DC to Beyoncé via Kendrick Lamar – as voted for by 26 Guardian music writers

But the muscular industrial roil and sharp, stabbing squeaks underpinning her suitcase inventory imply that she’s less bound for a luxury resort than some sort of bunk or heist, evoking the heroines of Play It as It Lays, Alice Doesn’t Live Here Any More, Thelma and Louise or, more darkly, A Woman Under the Influence. The kill shot was Not Like Us – not only did it have a DJ Mustard beat that made it the rare diss track you could dance to, Lamar’s framing of Drake as a cultural leech had real credence, while the allegations of involvement with young girls were what everyone wanted to believe: “Tryna strike a chord and it’s probably A minor” became the most quotable line in the whole debacle. Roan has the rough-hewn vocal ribaldry of Cyndi Lauper, the stentorian command of Hounds of Love-era Kate Bush, the high-goth drama of Shakespears Sister, a cabaret swoon so perfect you can picture the fake tear glued to the corner of her eye – but it’s also entirely her own creation, a towering layer cake of frustration, festivity and fury that rewards a million repeat plays.

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