Turn up the volume, readers, because we are counting it down again. For the 11th time, I am back with my annual “Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of the Year.” I have made sure to open up my musically-illiterate ears over the past 11.5 months so I could compile a list of the hottest tracks in 2024.

As I say every year, and as I have already alluded to above, I really suck at music. I can’t carry a tune, I never played an instrument, and I can read music about as well as I can read Swahili. But that won’t stop me from giving my ill-informed opinions about the best mainstream songs from the past year. So, yeah, take my list with a grain of salt.

Before I present the countdown, my overall assessment of music in 2024 was average. I thought last year punched above its weight class while 2021 and 2022 were lackluster. To better explain my positioning, I can say this: I had a pretty good idea of my top 3 songs but had to undergo some discernment on the other two. In an above average year, I know all five songs immediately and usually have an honorable mention. In bad years, I struggle to even identify my #1 song.

Alright, enough of my babbling. Here are my top five songs of 2024…

For the 11th year, I highlight my top 5 favorite songs from the past 12 months.

5. I Can Do It With A Broken Heart – Taylor Swift

I live in a Swiftie house where Taylor’s music is played on a daily basis so what did you expect? For the third year in a row, Taylor Swift is on this countdown. I have said multiple times that I like Swift songs that are serious, echoey, and mysterious. While “I Can Do It With A Broken Heart” doesn’t master this formula like “Is It Over Now” or “Blank Space,” it comes close enough. The intro is intriguing as I get “Baba O’Riley” vibes.

My favorite part of the song is when Swift sings All the pieces of me shattered as the crowd was chanting More (with that distinct emphasis on “more”). It just hits perfectly. More catchy lyrics follow with I was grinning like I’m winning, I was hitting my marks before concluding with the title of the song. Another superb track by Ms. Swift.

4. Put Some Miles On It – Marshmello and Kane Brown

Wait, this is just a song about a truck, right? I normally don’t choose a track that is such a shameless innuendo but when it energizes me like “Put Some Miles On It” I can make an exception.

In fact, a naïve and awkward blogger in his 30s can easily appreciate the song at surface level instead of entertaining the obvious double entendre. When I listen to it, I am totally following along with the story of a dude and his girlfriend breaking in a new vehicle. And because the lyrics at face value focus on a truck and the open road, it makes for the perfect driving song. Yep, cruising the mean streets of Spokane with this song made me feel like Superman as I listened to it mile after mile after mile.

3. Please Please Please – Sabrina Carpenter

Sandwiched between hits like “Espresso” and “Taste,” Sabrina Carpenter released a song that had me asking Alexa to please play. “Please Please Please” is a light, fun, and pleasant song that was kind of hard not to sing along to. With an almost dreamy-like melody, it is a song that releases stress and makes you happy. From the part where Sabrina sings I’m just kidding, but really…really…really to the big crescendo at the end, the song is just so dang catchy.

It is also really funny. Even after listening to “Please Please Please” a hundred times, I still find myself laughing out loud to different instances in the song, including when she calls her love interest a mother trucker (although Sid tells me that second word is a radio edit). Speaking of Sid, when Sabrina sings “the ceiling fan is so nice” it gives my wife ammunition to tell me how much we need to install our own ceiling fan. Thank you to “Please, Please, Please” for breaking up the serious and emotional tracks of satellite radio with something not so taxing—but really fun—on the mind/ears.

2. A Bar Song (Tipsy) – Shaboozey

Call it a multi-genre phenomenon. What happens when you cram country, pop, and hip-hop together? In the case of “A Bar Song” the answer is complete gold. Nothing sounded more unique in 2024 than Shaboozey’s smash hit. The guitar playing, the “oh lords,” and the theme of shenanigans at a bar just make this song memorable and a blast.

Speaking of memorable, songs that make my annual list are usually personally memorable. My family’s summer started in earnest during a mid-June weekend trip to Walla Walla and this song seemed to come on over and over on both legs of the drive. We were hooked! Now, whenever I hear that distinctive Shaboozey intro, I am immediately transported back to that hot weekend where we celebrated my aunt’s birthday, went to the water park, and drank milkshakes from the town’s popular drive-in.

1. I Had Some Help – Post Malone (featuring Morgan Wallen)

Irony. That probably best describes my love for this song. But before I address that, let me just say this: “I Had Some Help” SLAYS! What an engaging, rocking song. The collaboration between Malone/Wallen, the distinctive riffs, and its easy-to-sing-along nature led this track to the top of my list. I can’t begin to tell you how “I Had Some Help” increased my dish washing productivity as I played it on Alexa over and over as I did kitchen chores.

Okay, back to the irony. Although “I Had Some Help” is a song where the artists remind us that the significant other also shoulders blame for a bad relationship, I don’t necessarily listen to it that way. When I consume the song, I interpret the title phrase from a positive angle, because let’s face it—we all need some help to do great things. And although the cliché teamwork makes the dream work line is meant to convey that “it takes two to tango,” I view it in the optimistic sense that the phrase was originally coined. Maybe if the melody was slower I would take the lyrics at face value but the song is just so intoxicating I can’t appreciate it for anything else than a positive 3-minute musical ride.

One last thing: although I don’t usually let the music videos influence my decisions on this countdown, the fact that Post Malone and Morgan Wallen looked to be having so much fun when they filmed theirs definitely didn’t hurt “I Had Some Help.”

Incredibly, this is Post Malone’s third time earning top honors for my annual list. He earned the #1 spot last year for “Enough Is Enough” and he also topped this chart in 2019 with “Sunflower.” What an artist!

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What will happen with music in 2025? Will Taylor still rule the world? Will Sabrina Carpenter continue on her upward trajectory? Will Shaboozy release anything half as catchy as this year’s massive hit? We will just have to wait…and listen. Don’t Blink.

Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of 2023
Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of 2022
Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of 2021
Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of 2020
Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of 2019
Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of 2018
Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of 2017
Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of 2016
Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of 2015
Brent’s Top 5 Best Songs of 2012