This was another noteworthy year for the best rock music. Some artists followed a debut with a stunning second LP and mainstays showed a return to form or evolved.
Hélène Barbier writes songs that are couched in traditional post-punk, power-pop frameworks, but there always seems to be something off-kilter in the presentation.
Tiberius’ influences serve the songwriting and performances beautifully. Their various sounds always include an undercurrent of folky Americana.
The Kyle Sowashes’ Start Making Sense stacks up so many satisfying classic rock moves that the concept of being out of options grows more ironic.
For his current timeline-centric release, the R&B/pop polymath Cautious Clay navigates from dawn to dusk with sly ease, discussing his creative process.
Deadbeat is Tame Impala’s electronic dance and house record, and it wants listeners to consider the multi-talented Grammy winner a loser.
Melding late 1960s and early 2000s pop/rock, Twen slide under the wire with one of 2025’s finest rock records, Fate Euphoric.
Derived from a dream, the Mountain Goats’ new musical tells the intimate and vivid tale of the lone survivors from a shipwrecked crew.
SPRINTS remain emotive but more polished and reflective, questioning rather than acting—though often admitting defeat as the songs grow louder.
Whitney’s new album, Small Talk, is less about drifting through melancholy and more about staying still long enough to understand it.
Pavement’s new best-of compilation offers a more concise and moderately updated, although non-essential, retrospective of the beloved band.
Tortoise’s Touch is a cinematic record that is profoundly human and entirely spectral. It’s a world unto itself, filled with beautiful landmarks and perplexing questions.
