I spent the last 18 months in Singapore, where my wife is originally from, and where her parents and siblings live. Now that I think about it, in a meta way, my best thing of 2024 would have to be living in Singapore for the whole year. It was incredible (and I highly recommended) living in a different city / country for a while so you can look back at your usual life with fresh & broader perspectives. Of course, the food was amazing, and the traveling to other SE Asian countries was fantastic. Working remote on U.S. hours meant I was usually working from 9pm-4am (plus some other odd hours), which allowed me to have some more free time during the middle of the day while kids were still at school. I got in a great rhythm of picking up my youngest from her kindergarten class at noon each day by talking a long walk in the hot sun / tropical rain while I listened to podcasts, sat and read, or caught Phoenix Suns games. Anyways, I managed to consume / experience a lot of great stuff throughout the year, and I thought I'd share my favorites.
(This is not an official list of the best new releases in the calendar year, but mostly things that I enjoyed during the year.)
Best Music
- Fleet Foxes - I went on a big kick at some point early in the year after getting one of their old familiar song stuck in my head. Then the rabbit hole went deeper and deeper and I listened to all their stuff over and over, and also got inspired to do some guitar and singing of their songs, though I became painfully aware of how not high my voice is able to go. The album, 'Shore' (2020) is a masterpiece, and it has a great hour-long YouTube movie thing to go along with it. I enjoyed watching some of their live material on YouTube which also led me to their 'Live on Boston Harbor' (2024) performance and accompanying album. Transcendent stuff. I've really taken to live performances lately as there's something about the human achievement aspect that I love witnessing.
- Alan Sparhawk - 'White Roses, My God' (2024) - With the tragic passing of his wife and musical partner, Mimi, Alan Sparhawk was able to put out an excellent solo project. Very stylistic album with a lot of muffled, voice-filtered vocals
- Bob Dylan - 'Springtime in New York: The Bootleg Series' (1980-1985) - I discovered a clip on YouTube of Bob Dylan singing "Don't Fall Apart on Me Tonight" with Mark Knopfler on guitar ,and the veteran ease of their skillful jamming really drew me in. Then I checked out the Bootleg album and really dug it, listening on repeat for a while.
- The Smile - 'Cutouts' (2024) - Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood continue to put out incredible music, adding to their percussive and guitar complexity with each new project. The song, "Eyes & Mouth" is an amazing specimen of what modern, understated guitar solos can be. It makes me a little less grumpy about the disappearance of rock-out solos in today's music.
- Sufjan Stevens - 'Come on Feel the Illinoise!' (2005) - After not listening at all for maybe 15 years, I had an excellent experience putting on the headphones and enjoying the album from start to finish in one sitting. I hope to have the experience again in 15 more years.
- Taylor Swift - 'THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT' (2024) - It's super mainstream to like Taylor Swift, but I have to acknowledge the skill in her music. This album and her last one, 'Midnights', really appeal to me. Great beats, perfect sound-mixing, and her skillful songwriting and confident singing all combine to make quality music.
Best Tweet
Best Books
I'm proud to say that I supper upped my reading game in 2024. I'm surrounded by a bunch of readers in my family, so that helps. But also, as I mentioned earlier, I had time everyday to sit on the playground while my daughter played with her classmates. And I found physical books to be a great way to force myself to get away from my phone, and to give my eyes a chance to rest from the bright screen.
- Earthsea Series - Ursula Le Guin - Wow. I'm so glad my wife hipped me to this series. A different kind of wizards and dragons saga. I love the sacredness of language throughout the books. The characters have so much wisdom and courage. I hope to read the books again.
- Exhalation - Ted Chiang - Super cool sci-fi short stories. There was one fascinating story about a middle-aged father and his college graduate daughter and how the dad misremembers things that are so fundamental to their relationship that it had me feeling floored about how my own relationships might be skewed in my version of events. He spliced this story with a tribal story about people that don’t write words (don't even have a word for “word”) and allow their truth to shift based on what feels right.
- Dune Series (Books 2-4) - Frank Herbert - I decided to properly read Dune Messiah--I had previously only audiobooked it--and it opened up some new views on the book to me. Then I got to discussing the book with my cousin which I so thoroughly enjoyed that I decided to keep going in the series and to do a bit of a long-distance book club with my cousin. The series got me thinking about the difference between villains and heroes, the difficulty of knowing the past ("The only past which endures lies wordlessly within you."), and the different strengths of men vs. women. And I generally love a good hero's journey story.
- Underland - Robert Macfarlane - I had audibooked this before, but the allure and mythos of the world beneath our feet drew me back in. His writing is amazing and his accounts transport me out into the great outdoors.
Best TV
- Shogun - Episodes 1-6 or so were riveting and fresh. It started to drag a bit toward the end for Val and me, but it was overall a great show.
- 3-Body Problem - Good SciFi show.
- Better Call Saul - I rewatched this whole show. It's a masterpiece. It works for me like a great literary classic, like a Dostoevsky novel where I'm seeing the raging conflict in the characters and how the law is imposing its will.
- Lost - Now that the show has run its course I thought I'd try revisiting it. Season 1 especially, and 2 to a slightly lesser extent, are incredible TV. Emotional, philosophically fascinating, and revolutionary for the genre. Seasons 3 through 4 (where I am now) slow down a bit but there are some real gems in there too. I have the benefit of seeing which episodes are worth skipping. I'm interested to see if I can make sense of the finale when it comes to that.
Best Movies
- Dune - A lot of Dune in my lists, but this movie was awesome. The cliche term of "visual storytelling" is right on the nose for what Denis Villenuve is doing with this project. Coupling the reading of the books with the watching of these movies has been a thrill for me. I love the complicated hero arc we get with Paul Atreides.
- The Taste of Things - This was one of those rare experiences where I was really glad we watched a non-blockbuster movie in the theater. Val and I were transported as soon as there was a 20-minute or so wordless opening scene of a small cooking team preparing a decadent meal for a fancy 19th century feast.
- Furiosa - I saw this on the airplane. I loved the Dementis character. For having the appearance of a sand-dune gear-head movie about violence and fast cars, there was actually a lot of plot depth about being trapped into your harsh circumstances.
Best Games
- Crew - A card game that draws on principles of trick-taking games like bridge, but makes it collaborative and gives you 50 different missions that build up in difficulty, and adds other interesting curveballs like "broken communications". 4 of us tracked our score on completing all 50 missions over the course of a few months and had a great time doing it.
- Dune - My brother-in-law bought this 1960's game for us to play as a group of 6. It is INTENSE. You become one of 6 factions (Atreides, Bene Gesserit, Harkonnen, etc.) and you can form alliances and bargain while you try to get a majority of the 5 strongholds on the board while avoiding the great sandstorms and harvesting spice and on-worlding enough troops to engage in battles. We played twice and it took us like 5 or 6 hours each time.
- Tetris (Game Boy) - 2024 was a great year for me as my brother and I reached new heights of accomplishments, particularly in B-type play.
