Originally Girl In Red's goofy, high-octane 'You Need Me Now?' was going to feature a moment of self-deprecation. The plan was to pretend she'd offered Ariana Grande a guest spot but had been turned down. That wouldn't be in keeping with the gleeful, giddy mayhem of DOING IT AGAIN BABY though. Enter Sabrina Carpenter for a smirking star turn in an already riotous indie-pop banger. A lot of collaborations feel very calculated, but I wanted something exciting and surprising, Marie told us earlier this year. It's just got this wonderful fuck you energy. And that's what makes You Need Me Now? so brilliant. ALI SHUTLER

Seven minutes is a bold choice for a debut single, but The Itch clearly didn't get the memo about dwindling, doom-scrolling attention spans. Their first release 'Ursula' takes inspiration from Ursula K. Le Guin's The Dispossessed and transforms it into a propulsive electronic odyssey that makes every second count. Each step adds weight to its central mission - making music that refuses to compromise while remaining ruthlessly engaging. The Itch have created something that pushes against current trends without disappearing up its own artistic ambitions. It's clever, it's challenging, and most importantly, it doesn't forget to absolutely bang. DAN HARRISON

Cast your minds back to February - when the colour green didn't directly correlate with Charli xcx, brat wasn't word of the year, and it certainly hadn't affixed summer and defined it - a crucial turning point in HRH xcx's career was upon us: 'Von dutch'. After previewing it at her now seminal Party Girl Boiler Room New York set, the excitement within her fanbase was palpable as ever, but the rumblings of something bigger were also felt. 'Von dutch' jump-started the BRAT album cycle, and in all its hedonistic, defiant glory, helped Charli switch gears. ABIGAIL FIRTH

Justifiably receiving acclaim, awards, and more five-star ratings than you can shake a stick at, Fontaines D.C.'s latest album Romance is so much more than the sum of its parts. Despite that, those parts are still some of the best songs we've heard all year. Case in point: slow-building semi-ballad 'In The Modern World'. Positioned midway through the album and being distinctly lower key than the mosh-pit friendly ‘Starburster’ or ‘Death Kink’, the song's haunting strings and slow, considered vocals give an oasis of calm in the middle of the storm. JAKE HAWKES

In a storm-battered Airbnb perched on Mulholland Drive, Dave Bayley stared into the void and found something beautiful. 'Creatures in Heaven' wasn't born from candlelit romance or dance floor euphoria — it emerged from complete isolation when Glass Animals' frontman found himself alone with nothing but existential dread and a 70s synthesizer for company. The result? Perhaps the most paradoxical love song of 2024. There's a delicious irony in crafting an intimate ode to human connection while being utterly removed from it. Its production mirrors this cosmic solitude — analogue synths pulse like distant stars while Bayley's vocals echo through the vacuum. FELICITY NEWTON

In a year when parasocial relationships have fuelled the entire internet economy, Porter Robinson has crafted an unsettling love letter to obsession. 'Cheerleader' arrives dressed in the shiniest clothes imaginable – all sparkly synths and soaring melodies that feel like pure sugar rush dopamine. But beneath that candy-coated exterior lurks a deeply uncomfortable exploration of digital stalking. Porter weaponises pure pop euphoria to explore the darkness. That blistering synth line? It's mimicking the rush of discovering a celebrity's personal details. Those uplifting chord progressions? They're scoring someone's descent into online fixation. Even the track's structure plays with this duality. FELICITY NEWTON

Kesha deserves a proper comeback, and not one shrouded in controversy around old label bosses like she got in 2017; a real celebration of the original messy party pop star she initially emerged as. 'JOYRIDE' is that comeback. It could be the full-blown, glitter-bombed, nostalgia-fuelled single reminiscent of her dollar sign days, or it could be the way it dropped in the middle of a summer defined by the exact kind of party-girl music she was the queen of in the 2010s. There's every indication that Kesha is monumentally back. ABIGAIL FIRTH

With 'Docket', Blondshell and Bully distil touring life's raw underbelly into a three-minute revelation. This team-up between Sabrina Teitelbaum and Alicia Bognanno emerges as a serendipitous meeting of kindred spirits, their vocal interplay carrying the intimate warmth of late-night confessions shared between friends. 'Docket' excavates those liminal spaces between performances — the quiet moments when bravado falls away and reflection becomes unavoidable. The track's brilliance lies in its ability to make even the acknowledgement of personal missteps feel triumphant. The result stands as more than mere collaboration — it's an invitation to find beauty in imperfection. FELICITY NEWTON

Sabrina Carpenter spent her last album campaign kicking down the A-list's door with 'Nonsense'. In 2024, she didn't just walk through - she took out every load-bearing wall with hit after hit. 'Please Please Please' landed as a legitimate chart-smasher - a glittering country-tinted triumph that proves exactly why she's a key part of the triumvirate of revolutionaries currently delivering pop's current main character moments. The soaring melodies channel vintage Dolly Parton while Jack Antonoff's production keeps things firmly in 2024's maximalist playground. But it's Carpenter's personality that makes this more than just another well-produced pop banger - she's mastered that perfect mix of slick and sassy that turns good songs into great ones. DAN HARRISON