Each day of December this year, I’m highlighting one of my favourite albums of 2024. Counting down the list, we start with #31 on December 1st and go all the way down until we’ve reached #1 on December 31st. Today, #13 on my Album of the Year list: Van Houten – ‘The Tallest Room’.

Trends: they come and go. I myself am not quite up to date or interested in the latest and greatest online shenanigans that keeps society busy but I have noticed the world going through some revivals over the last couple of years. In chronological order I’ve seen people being influenced by the 80s, 90s, and I believe we’re currently back in the 00s. Music trends might have not quite clocked on to the 00s comeback yet (let’s keep it that way) but there certainly has been a revival or two this year.

The main standout for me was the surprising rise in popularity of shoegaze. The renowned 90s genre caught the attention of many adolescents this year and saw bands such as Slowdive regain a following while young and talented artists like Wisp shook the scene with great releases. In shoegaze’s slipstream followed dream pop, with Leeds band Van Houten capturing both those genres perfectly well in their impressive debut ‘The Tallest Room’.

I’m sure the people over at Clue Records were pleased to hear Van Houten finished their album this year, given that ‘The Tallest Room’ took seven (!) years to finish. I mean, think about all the things that happened over the last seven years! 2017: my final year as a student. A time where nobody had ever heard of COVID-19, and it would take another full year before the first Jam of Today saw the light. Madness! Either way, it seemed like Van Houten’s decision to take it nice and slow was very well thought out. ‘The Tallest Room’ is an intriguing melting pot of lo-fi 90s shoegaze, garage, and fuzzy psych rock and with the instrumentation consisting out of comforting acoustic guitar, mumbly vocals, and ride-heavy drums, the six-piece band encapsulates this familiar sound ever so greatly. Singer Louis Sadler touches upon topics such as polarisation (‘Black and White’), anxiety and alienation (‘Never Did Come Back’), and unhealthy relationships (‘Head Straight’) but those heavy topics get countered by the more lighthearted ‘Coming of Age’, and ‘Only Wanna Be With You’. ‘The Tallest Room’ is a rock solid album which sounds just as nostalgic as it is complete. All-round 8-minute album ender ‘I Let You’ makes it easy for me to pick a favourite off of this album. The melodic closing track highlights the vulnerable side of this genre and is probably the perfect sonic representation of this band. It might be risky taking seven years to release your debut album but in Van Houten’s case I’m very glad they did. It was absolutely worth the wait.