A year ago, I made a post expressing my disappointment with one of the worst years ever for my kind of music: indie rock, and all the adjacent styles like shoegaze, post-punk, goth, synth-pop, and others.
Only artificial-intelligence radios like Apple Music’s Discovery Station managed to save 2024, by making me discover music from the past.
Well.
This year is much better. I would even say it feels like a rebirth.
So yes, as usual, the Top 100 or Top 50 best-of-the-year lists from websites or magazines we all used to love are still very disappointing. These rankings acknowledge everything but – everything but – the music. It’s all about TikTok virality, the “right” political views, the “right” political fights, the “right” attitude, visuals, costumes, videos, dances, provocations, looks, and the perceived feelings of the new generation. In the end, very little is left of the music itself.
But once again, this year is not a total disaster. From my side, I count 14 records this year that may last, albums that could endure in rock history, or at least stay in my playlists for a long time, or even earn a place as vinyl in my collection.
Some of them even made it into the mainstream (and often terrible) Top 100 or Top 50 lists – how can you rank music anyway? You can’t. Every album deserves to be cherished, they are so different. Anyway, good news is that these Top 100 or Top 50 lists often include artists like Wet Leg, Wednesday, and even Momma.
But let’s be frank: once again, indie rock is no longer seen as a trend worth pushing to the masses. As a result, most of these albums remained under the radar, if not completely ignored.
In short, we saw:
- The brilliant return of veterans like Prolapse and Idlewild
- A brand-new sound from Wednesday, is it country, grunge, or indie rock?
- A full-on hold-up by Wet Leg (who didn’t hear about them this year?)
- Superb returns and career-best albums from relatively new bands like They Are Gutting a Body of Water, Just Mustard, Prewn, Sword II, and Hatchie
- Obscure albums from obscure bands like Nyxy Nyx, with great potential for future cult status
- Good old shoegaze at its best, like Keep
- Brand-new, traditional indie rock from Rocket
- Indie-rock-adjacent projects, like the dub-goth album The Bug & Ghosts Dubs
Overall, a great year.
Looking forward to 2026.
Best of Indie-Rock Albums 2025, A to Z sorted:
- The Bug & Ghost Dubs “Implosion”
- Hatchie “Liquorice”
- Idlewild “Idlewild”
- Just Mustard “We Were Just Here”
- Keep “Almost Static”
- Momma “Welcome To My Blue Sky”
- Nyxy Nyx “Cult Classics Vol. 1”
- Prewn “System”
- Rocket “R Is For Rocket”
- Sword II “Electric Hour”
- They Are Gutting A Body Of Water “Lotto”
- Wednesday “Bleeds”
- Wet Leg “Moisturizer”
