Staff Picks: 10 Best Country Songs of 2024

Strait and Stapleton have been tourmates for much of the past two years, and they team up on this sterling country outing. “Honky Tonk Hall of Fame” was written by Stapleton, Jameson Clark and Timothy James, and is included on Strait’s album Cowboys and Dreamers. Appropriately, the song is piled with guitars and piano as Strait and Stapleton sing of a guy whose greatest “fame” is sure to come from his greatest heartbroken misery. “I’m the best that’s ever been/ At drinkin’ doubles up on this stool,” they sing, later giving a glimpse at the loneliness that flows beneath the honkytonk’s neon glow and endless drinks. This is a stone-cold country outing, performed by two of the genre’s most towering vocalists. — JESSICA NICHOLSON

Wilson has ridden her way to stardom on midtempo ballads often with very heavy themes, so it was especially delightful to hear this utterly irresistible sunny rave-up as the first single from her current album, Whirlwind. The autobiographical romp details life on the road where it’s “two hundred days to a hundred towns bringing boots to a sawdust floor” as she fulfills her dream of playing music. But home is where the heart is, and even when she’s “two time zones away,” she can’t wait to get back home to her sweetie. The lyrics, as fun as they are, also perfectly capture the longing: “Just know they’re singing along to all them songs I wrote about you/ And I’ll be saving all my loving for you come Sunday afternoon,” she sings, with just the right amount of desire in her twang. — MELINDA NEWMAN

The tender ballad “Dirt Cheap,” a solo write from Josh Phillips, is a highlight on Johnson’s Leather project. In this top five Country Airplay hit, a subdivision developer’s money is no match for a lifetime worth of memories, as a homeowner declines an offer to sell the plot of land his home has been on for decades. It’s the place he proposed to his wife, where the couple raised their child, and the place where his loyal hunting dog is buried. This exquisitely penned song is an undeniable heart-tugger, one that was nominated for song of the year at November’s CMA Awards. – J.N.

Sometimes it seems like a heart is healing, but then one wrong move can break it all over again. For newcomer Mason, it’s when he walks into the bar and sees his ex and her red dress dancing with someone new. He can’t bear to watch as a new man falls for her, but he also can’t bring himself to look away. In this stripped-down, slow-burning shuffler, the 24-year-old’s weary vocals sound much older and disillusioned than they should, but we’re all the better for his heartache. — M.N.

On this solo write from Green, he unfurls a story of a military veteran, detailing the line of unexpected events and tragedies that ultimately resulted in the man standing by the side of the road with a cardboard sign: his mother dying of cancer when he was a young child, losing his own child, being drafted into the military and shipped off to war, and returning from service to find “my whole world didn’t love me anymore.” The story arc in “Jesus Saves” is a clear-eyed look at one person’s journey, weaving a story that evokes compassion and sympathy. That lyrical tale, paired with Green’s warm, slightly grainy vocal delivery, keeps the song from venturing into bromidic territory. — J.N.

Crowned Billboard’s 2024 Song of the Summer, this bouncy bop featuring two of the hottest artists in music today only grew more infectious with time. The upbeat tune, which also topped the Billboard Hot 100 and Country Airplay, features Posty and Wallen lamenting a break-up, but refusing to take all the blame: “It ain’t like I can make this kind of mess all by myself/ Don’t act like you ain’t help me pull that bottle off the shelf,” they sing. The lighthearted ditty — it’s hard not to smile by the time they sing “Teamwork makes the dream work” — was the first single from Post Malone’s chart-topping F-1 Trillion country duets set, and earned the pair two Grammy nominations.  – M.N.

As a songwriter, Ernest has swiftly become one of Nashville’s premier new musical architects, after serving as a co-writer on megahits like “I Had Some Help,” “More Than My Hometown” and “Son of a Sinner.” So, it stands to reason that as an artist, he also has a great ear for outside songs — in particular, this three-decade old composition from Dean Dillon and Skip Ewing. “Would If I Could,” bolstered by a lilting, easygoing melody, portrays someone who is tempted yet skeptical of an ex-lover’s attempts at rekindling their relationship, as the winding hook — “I would if I could, but I can’t so I won’t, but I want to” — summing up the tension between desire and hard-learned realities. It’s a retro sound, bound to a timeless lyric, and it’s engaging both in Ernest’s solo version and in collaboration with Lainey Wilson. — J.N.

Smith, who has already turned into a reliable hitmaker with such chart-toppers as “Whiskey on You” and “World On Fire” — which tied Morgan Wallen’s “You Proof” for the most consecutive weeks at No. 1 on Country Airplay at 10 weeks, looks back to the ‘90s with a driving, melodic mid-tempo rocker that recalls Nickelback. Thematically, he’s expressing his gratitude to the woman who saved him after the woman before him wrecked him. She didn’t have to do it, he sings over a cascading melody, but she did — and because of her tender care, she’s made him ready to love again. A win-win all around. – M.N.

A standout track from Musgraves’ 2024 album Deeper Well, “The Architect” finds Musgraves contemplating life’s complexities, ranging from the makeup of apples and deep canyons, to questioning whether there is a reason behind life’s twists and turns. “This life that we make/ Is it random or fate?/ Can I speak to the architect?,” she asks, as her softly hypnotic vocal (and the song’s understated instrumentation) draws the listener into the musing alongside the singer-songwriter. Written by Musgraves with Shane McAnally and Josh Osborne, “The Architect” reached No. 38 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart. — J.N.

Set the wayback machine for the 1970s, when songs with spoken word interludes like Johnny Cash’s “A Boy Named Sue” or David Allan Coe’s “You Never Even Called Me by My Name” soared up the charts. This time, it’s Langley and Green on this sly, sexy tune about a woman who knows what she wants — and it’s to take that strapping cowboy she sees at the bar home with her. Both the woman (looking back on her 22-year-old self) and the cowboy reflect on their memory of the evening in a way that is totally charming, original and like nothing else currently on the radio. In the 51^st week of the year, it became the first song by a woman to top Billboard’s Country Airplay chart in 2024. The laid-back appeal of the song and the natural chemistry between Langley and Green utterly captivated audiences, and only grew with repeated listenings, deservedly earning it the CMA Award for musical event of the year. More duets between these two, please. — M.N.