Words by Sara Cederberg
Sara is a Michigan-based music nerd through and through, cutting her teeth as the music editor for her high school newspaper. By day, she’s an independent fundraising and marketing strategist for nonprofit organizations — and by night, she’s hopefully at a show, curled up with a good record, or watching The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City. Here’s her 2025 top 10 in descending order.
Laurie Torres – Après coup (Tonal Union)
Montreal’s Laurie Torres tracked Après coup during a brief break from touring, recording spontaneous piano, drums, and synth pieces at a Quebec studio overlooking water. The album features minimalist compositions where spare percussion meets cascading keys and electronic textures, creating lo-fi intimacy that shifts between bright and melancholic moods. Its French title means “afterwards,” reflecting music that lives in the space between what happened and what comes next — a meditation on memory and reflection that asks listeners to sit with stillness. Torres plays every note herself, and that solitary focus shows in the album’s warm, welcoming embrace.
The Convenience – Like Cartoon Vampires (Winspear)
Opener “I Got Exactly What I Wanted” is the best song Spoon didn’t write. New Orleans duo The Convenience (Nick Corson and Duncan Troast) completely reinvented themselves here, ditching the Prince-funk/yacht rock of their debut for jittery post-punk influenced by Krautrock and bratty Britpop. They’re in the same family as Parquet Courts — deadpan urgency, off-kilter rhythms, sardonic wit holding everything together. Tracks like “Rats” strip away drums almost entirely yet maintain a restless energy. Lyrically, Corson captures a dying empire through slippery wordplay and surrealist fragments. Even as they document collapse, The Convenience sound more energized on Like Cartoon Vampires than ever.
Armand Hammer, The Alchemist – Mercy (Backwoodz Studioz)
Where previous Armand Hammer records drowned in existential dread (not a bad thing!), Mercy introduces moments of genuine beauty and tenderness alongside the darkness. The duo’s dynamic remains captivating: ELUCID’s percussive, staccato flow contrasts with billy woods’ more verbose storytelling, their voices working in tandem like a rhythm section. When they trade verses on “Scandinavia,” they set each other up for thematic continuations with remarkable precision, structured yet unpredictable. The Alchemist’s production leans menacing — “Grabba” creaks with sweltering strings and “Peshawar” erupts with digital chaos, but it all leaves space for the duo’s complex meditations to breathe. It’s dense, rewarding work that reveals new layers with each listen.
Turnstile – NEVER ENOUGH (Roadrunner)
Turnstile is pushing hardcore into uncharted territory (and some of the bros hate it). Four years after GLOW ON made them stars, the Baltimore crew doubles down with NEVER ENOUGH, incorporating dream pop, funky ’80’s grooves, and house music into their hardcore foundation. The result is messy but liberating, like watching a band break free from genre constraints while keeping what made them essential. Dreamy opener “NEVER ENOUGH” crashes into the heavier “SOLE,” establishing the push-pull that defines the record. “SEEIN’ STARS” is a love letter to The Police’s “When the World Is Running Down (You Can’t Go Wrong),” and they own that influence proudly. Tracks like “SUNSHOWER” explode for 90 seconds before dissolving into blissful flute-driven codas. It’s summer music, pop music, and hardcore all at once.
Yves Jarvis – All Cylinders (In Real Life Music& Next Door Records)
Put Prince and Crosby, Stills, Nash in a blender, and you’ve got the sonic foundation of All Cylinders. Montreal’s Yves Jarvis delivers 11 tracks in just 26 minutes, playing every instrument himself and packing each song with enough genre-shifting ideas to fill a double album. Opener “With a Grain” bounces between time signatures and guitar tones, while “The Knife in Me” moves from funk to folk in under two minutes without breaking a sweat. The title track settles into a soul groove that’s both breezy and deeply felt, and ear nuggets like “Gold Filigree” reward repeated listens. It’s over too soon, but that just means you’ll immediately hit play again — and a recently-released deluxe version of the record delivers five additional and perfect tracks.
Geese – Getting Killed (Partisan)
Like everyone else, I’m finally on the Geese train. Cameron Winter has the most unique voice in music right now, and Getting Killed finds Geese unlocking their full potential. I couldn’t get into the band before this, but Winter’s gorgeous late-2024 solo record, Heavy Metal, piqued my interest, and Getting Killed feels like a fuller extension of that record’s vision. The album is entrancing and euphoric, chaotic yet controlled — ’70s rock and Krautrock filtered through dazzling psychedelia and beauty. Opener “Trinidad” shouldn’t work (Winter screaming “There’s a bomb in my car!” over what sounds like a Phish jam gone wrong), but it absolutely does. From there, Geese pivot between ’60s soul-rock warmth on “Cobra,” bluesy title track twists with Ukrainian choir samples, and the song-long crescendo of “Husbands.” I can’t wait to see what they do next.
Graham Hunt – Timeless World Forever (Run For Cover)
Opener “I Just Need Enough” drops you straight into ’90s Beck territory — big hooks and beat-driven in a way that feels like slacker power pop meets lo-fi Weezer. Wisconsin’s Graham Hunt recorded this album by cutting and pasting together clips of himself and friends playing real instruments, building songs like MIDI tracks but with organic warmth. “East Side Screamer” is one of my favorite songs of the year and “Frog in the Shower” has three sections good enough to be choruses on their own. Hunt’s slightly raspy voice and earnest lyricism, a la Emperor X, create an intimate, immediate feel. At just over 30 minutes, Timeless World Forever is packed with fun, nostalgia-inducing ear nuggets I couldn’t get enough of during a spectacularly bad year.
Bleary Eyed – Easy (Born Losers)
Shoegaze bubble grunge pop recorded in outer space — that’s the only way to describe Easy. Pennsylvania’s Bleary Eyed have crafted something wholly unique, where grungey riffs and punchy drums sit seamlessly with cathartic synth samples and sweetened vocals. The title track exemplifies this: Nathaniel Salfi’s wispy, spacey vocals intertwine with synths that mirror them, while crunchy-yet-soft guitars provide a sturdy foundation. When Margot Whipps joins for the chorus and the guitars drop notes, the song takes on a mesmerizing, deliberate pull. The album-ending “Honey” is anthemic and enveloping, a finale that justifies the entire journey. Comparisons to the Swirlies make sense, but Bleary Eyed definitely occupy their own sonic universe.
Wednesday – Bleeds (Dead Oceans)
Bleeds meets our current moment head-on, delivered by a band operating at peak power. Where 2023’s perfect Rat Saw God merged Wednesday’s alt-country leanings with grunge and shoegaze, Bleeds stretches in both directions simultaneously — rawer, dirtier, and fiercely earnest. Karly Hartzman’s visceral lyricism drives everything, from the opening tick-picking of “Reality TV Argument Bleeds” to the crushing “Wound Up Here (By Holding On).” She observes with careful attention to detail, never standing above the chaos but capturing it with stunning clarity. On Bleeds, Wednesday’s sound reaches new extremes while remaining sharply focused.
Nourished by Time – The Passionate Ones (XL)
While Nourished by Time’s Erotic Probiotic 2 earned universal praise, it never quite clicked for me — but The Passionate Ones did instantly. Baltimore’s Marcus Brown fuses ’80s dream pop, alternative R&B, electro-funk, deep house, club music, and hip-hop into something that defies categorization in the best way. His understated vocals carry both fragility and strength in every line. On “Max Potential,” he calls out complacency directly, while “9 2 5” honors the grind of working service jobs while chasing creative dreams. Brown’s message — that we must hold onto passion despite everything falling apart around us — lands with urgency right now.