Every year, but moreso 2025 than recently, I feel like I’m not going to be able to find identify my favorite or truly great albums. This is an ongoing neurosis, I guess, because it wasn’t hard to find a selection of really outstanding 2025 alternative albums.
That isn’t the same as saying 2025 was a great music year. For the first time in awhile, I thought, “this was a pretty off year.” Normally I’m the You’re Just Not Listening Enough guy. Generally I think rock and roll gets better with time. But it’s not a straight line and 2025 was definitely a strange year for alternative music.
These 25 records, and a dozen or so honorable mentions, were the exception. So let’s have a listen!
How does anyone chose literally the BEST alternative songs in 2025?
Only a professional rock music writer, record store employee or avowed masochist should actually rank the literal best songs in a year. I mean what does that even mean, “Best Song?” There are approximately fourteen billion songs written in year and I’ve only listened to half of them (joke). So I don’t attempt the hubris of canonizing the best songs in a year. These are some of my favorites. I hope you like them enough that you buy from the artists and find something new to love.
Assembling a list of alternative songs in 2025
I pick my favorite songs for this list from albums that I specifically DO NOT expect to be on my favorite records list for 2025. This is a completely arbitrary and irrational way to assemble two dozen plus of the coolest songs for you to hear, but stick with me for a second. My top albums list features a couple of songs from each of those records already. If I didn’t choose from a different pool of songs, you’d be missing out on a ton of great music. So here they are.
The Beths Salt Lake City show warmed a pre-holiday crowd with a mix of power pop favorites. The Beths, featuring Liz Stokes, are touring on their hit August album Straight Line Was a Lie. Stokes and company are touring the U.S., Japan and Australia through next summer. And after four albums, The Beths shared an easy rapport with the packed house at Salt Lake City’s Metro Music Hall.
I had two or three 2024 alternative albums in mind all year and I was SURE one of them was going to be my #1. But no! I ultimately surprised myself with my top choice this year. Still, I’ve never been more persuaded in my favorite record of 2024.
Every year it seems I can inevitably conjure just one or two records that I think will be worth writing about. Then I spend two weeks in rapturous review — oh that was so good! and wow that one was amazing! Canonizing my favorite 2024 alternative albums is really more for me than for you.
These 24 remarkable alternative songs from 2024 are a kind of a soundtrack of the year.
The songs range from post punk to dream pop to alternative country. I’ve been adding to this list of tunes all year from hundreds of album and song downloads. A few of the songs may be a teeny bit obscure. But all of them were written with infectious hooks. They are immediate and super easy to fall in love with.
A quick preface that these aren’t the biggest alternative singles of the year.
In fact, most come from records that WON’T make my Top 20 Albums list for 2024. So Pom Poko’s “Champion” isn’t on this list and none of the one billion songs on Cindy Lee’sDiamond Jubilee are here. Those bands released records that are almost certain to be among my favorite albums. So I’m cherry picking songs that both easy to love but NOT on my favorite albums list. Although the albums list is still an undefined mental catalogue. STOP WITH ALL THE QUESTIONS.
Best alternative songs from 2024: The most insanely catchy
Let’s start with the catchiest alternative songs from 2024. Ready?
I’ve been missing for a few…but I’m motivated tonight to tell you about 6 alternative songs in 2023 you need to jump on ASAP! Some of these from spring and summer will make my year-end list of favorite alternative songs in 2023. A few are just in my head and deserve a broader audience.
How to listen to the best alternative songs in 2023
Hifi Sean and David McAlmont connect Bollywood and 1989 Manchester on their brilliant, trippy album Happy Ending.
Sean Dickson and David McAlmont have a history
“Hifi” Sean Dickson comes directly from the Madchester era, a founder of 90’s fan favorite The Soup Dragons. If Scottish, Hifi Sean brings Manchester’s baggy sensibility to the songwriting, which he delicately marries to McAlmont’s textured, smoky vocals.
Hifi Sean may look more like an angry logger than musician! Just call it smoldering intensity — he’s an in-demand DJ and producer with a catalogue of his own solo material. He originally collaborated with McAlmont on Dickson’s 2016 solo debut Ft. McAlmont sang on “Like Josephine Baker.”
The Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup promises a blowout before Sunday night’s lineup featuring Pavement. I’ve scouted out every Saturday band from renowned to obscure. You can hear samples of most of every band below.
HEY HEY STOP! Are you looking for the **2024** LINEUP?!! Click here for band reviews!
Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup: Topline takeaways!
Here are some quick expectations for the Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup:
Saturday will have higher highs than Kilby’s Friday night lineup. If The Strokes’ Casablancas throws himself into it — and that’s an open question — the jog from Weyes Blood at 6:25p to RTJ at 7:35p and The Strokes at 8:45p could be a hoot.
Get to the venue early on Saturday! I’m excited to see Salt Lake City’s Kipper Snack for the first time. They play shortly after 12p noon. If you’re not there by noon, DO NOT miss Tamino at 1:20p and Grace Ives at 1:35p.
Couple of Saturday conflicts, starting with dual start times for Alex G and Wallice at 3:25p. Those two will probably split the audience by age. Also, Osees and Run the Jewels both play at 7:35. I’d really like to see both. However, Osees will play a late DJ set at the Urban Lounge Saturday night.
Here is my recommended Saturday plan. Listen for all these bands below. As always, IMMV.
Saturday
12:15 Kipper Snack 12:45 This looks like Break #1 for me 1:20 Tamino 1:55 Grace Ives 2:30 Tanukichan 3:25 Alex G (May cross over to see Wallice) 4:15 Break #2 5:15 Indigo De Souza 6:25 Weyes Blood 7:35 Run the Jewels 8:45 The Strokes
Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup: The headliners
The wild gamut from Alex G to Weyes Blood to Run the Jewels is going to blow some minds. Let’s have a look at (my) headliners in order of appearance. We’ll start with Alex G’s afternoon performance.
Alex G
It’s actually not the easiest thing in the world to find an image of Alex Giannascoli.
I think part of that is the Elliot Smith mythos, a mystery partially burst with recent network TV appearances. Alex G has become an increasingly influential part of the indie folk/lo fi rock scene for the larger part of a decade, particularly since Beach House (2015) and Rocket (2017).
The Pennsylvania native once again charmed critics with 2022’s God Save the Animals. I didn’t immediately buy it after listening last year, but I think I am basically alone on planet Earth on that take. Here is “Miracles,” which includes the touching lyrics:
“‘I have fears that I have not addressed,’ she says Some things from my past make me feel powerless, well Baby, I pray for the children and the sinners and the animals too And I, I pray for you
Weyes Blood
Natalie Mering had been releasing music for nearly ten years before sinking the music industry on her iceberg with 2019’s Titanic Rising. She returned all the stronger in 2022 with And In the Darkness, Hearts Aglow. It’s a delicate throwback to pastoral soft 70’s – but punctuated with Weyes Bloods’ powerful emotion and earnestness. In her promotional material, she actually describes her heart as a glow stick.
A friend of mine in NYC, not easily impressed, was blown away by Weyes Bloods’ performance at Brooklyn Steel this spring. He noted particularly the lighting and set, with some in the audience “moved to tears” at the show’s end. I’m ready to have my cynical cold heart warmed in Mering’s ambience. And, joking aside, this is woman who knows how to write pure melody.
This is the opening track from her current album, “It’s Not Just Me, It’s Everybody.”
Run the Jewels
I previously speculated we could get RTJ5 just in time for the Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup takes the stage. Bad news: That’s a No. Good news: Killer Mike is putting out his first solo release in a long time, Michael, on June 16. That’s pretty awesome!
Michael Render will be touring major metros with the Midnight Revival Choir starting in July. I have to believe we’ll be treated to Run the Jewel classics and previews of Michael when RTJ plays Saturday night.
Have you heard “Don’t Let the Devil?!” El-P guests along with thankugoodsir and it’s super good.
The Strokes
I feel it’s important to manage expectations with The Strokes.
I’ll go back and experiment with 2020’s The New Abnormal. Most of us, though, will be hoping for competent performances of Is This It and Room On Fire.
Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup: Supporting Acts
Part of the joy of this year’s KBP is not just the big name acts but the introduction we get to dozens of strong independent performers, many of whom I am hearing for the first time. If you’re similarly looking for an introduction, then read on.
Tamino
I am absolutely wrecked hearing Tamino tonight for the first time.
When someone is out there creating music like this and it doesn’t cross my radar, I simply feel inadequate. He hasn’t exactly labored in obscurity – Tamino played several shows at SXSW in 2019. Although in my defense, the Belgian-Egyptian music scene is not super strong.
Tamino’s hypnotic vocals are unearthly. Cairo’s Nile FM (this is an actual radio station, at the evenly numbered MHz 104.2 FM) identifies him as the grandson of Egypt’s “legendary Muharram Fouad.” Last year he released the album Sahar but I want you to hear the song I just sampled, 2017’s “Habibi.”
You cannot NOT hear Jeff Buckley singing. I am dead.
I will absolutely be at the Utah Fairgrounds at 1:20pm to hear Tamino early in the Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup.
Osees
John Dwyer’s long time project Osees, aka Thee Oh Sees, have lived a dozen or more musical lives. From freakout to psych rock, I actually like his current thread which is closer to pure punk.
A Foul Form came out last August although I didn’t catch it then. This is pretty good! It’s on the tolerant side of the hardcore spectrum, which is about the sweet spot for a 50-something white guy like me.
Songs like the freaky surf of “Perm Act” and punk blasts of “Funeral Solution” and “Scum Show” could be a wild part of the Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup.
Indigo De Souza
North Carolina’s Indigo De Souza is all rough edges and blunt, confessional lyrics. De Souza has a great sense of dreary melody, a bit like Dana Margolin of Porridge Radio. De Souza just released All of This Will End two weeks ago and I enjoyed the several tracks I’ve downloaded.
The artist profile on Bandcamp quotes De Souza saying, “I was finally able to trust myself fully.” I don’t really know what that means but it sounds good!
On “You Can Be Mean” she disses on a Luva like Taylor Swift would, but with 100x more venom.
Caroline Polachek
I actually kind of liked parts of the song and video for Caroline Polachek’s “Welcome to my Island,” at least the images of her running through a construction site. (Hey that’s what Weyes Blood serving her coffee!) But its hard for me to take the former Chairlift singer too seriously, and I’m definitely not the target demographic.
Here’s “Welcome to My Island,” which I realize while listening and not watching, loses some interest without the construction video and throwing up blood or coffee.
Dreamer Isioma
Dreamer Isioma continues the suave Freak&B of 2021 debut Goodnight Dreamer on April’s Princess Forever.
Early single “Love & Rage” shows how Isioma deftly combines funk, Afrobeats and a rhythmic indie palette. Princess Forever is also a deep concept album – rarely a necessity – that envisions Isioma transcending an apocalyptic something-or-the-other in an alternate universe.
Best to focus on the Chicago native’s beats, as here on “Touch Your Soul.”
Wallice
Behold the sardonic, self-deprecating indie pop of Wallice!
Just a single EP under her belt, last year’s cutting 90’s American Superstar, Wallice grimly mocks her career trajectory on “Rich Wallice.” The LA artist absolutely shreds on “John Wayne” (actually I don’t know if that’s her on guitar!?) and on the imagined end of her career arc on the EP’s narrative closer “Funeral.”
After a couple of pandemic hits, Wallice Hana Watanabe spent part of the year opening for The 1975 and I can totally hear it. For Rolling Stone AU, Wallice describes hours of added music and dance rehearsals to prepare for her big break.
I dig the way she shifts from 2nd to 5th gear about 1 minute into the EP’s opening cut, “Little League.”
Grace Ives
Synth pop marvel Grace Ives is the author of last year’s Janky Star. Endlessly entertaining, Ives specializes in 2 minute pop gems that show off her breathy vibrato. Sometimes working in a dream pop space, other times breaking into a Cars twee power pop, Ives delivery always matches the material perfectly.
She soars on “Butterfly” from her 2019 debut 2nd.
Tanuchikan
You can hear the Cranberries influence on Tanukichan’s 2023 sophomore release GIZMO. I don’t know that the reference is good or bad, it’s just there. Particularly on songs like “Been Here Before” and “Take Care,” Hannah van Loon sounds like the late Dolores O’Riordan, minus the yodeling.
I appreciate Tanukichan’s crunchier dream pop to the poppier dream pop. Album opener “Escape” is more of a Lush soundscape.
Kipper Snack (Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup local feature)
Loving everything I’ve heard from Salt Lake City’s Kipper Snack, whose Insta says the band is half finished with “a real rock and roll album.” Last year Kipper released Pretty as a Flower, whose seven tracks look like an EP or mini album. Tracks fall somewhere between indie folk and high desert alt country.
Check out this impressive number, “Stick It With Me.”
Other standouts include “No Surprise” and “Mama.” Kipper is getting some well-deserved attention this year. Besides their opening slot for the Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup, they’ve played Soundwell, The Depot and Kilby Court. Kipper is a band to watch.
I’m also going to include a video. Readers of this site know I focus on audio. But I was so struck by the tenderness of this video shot during the pandemic. I hope whatever rock and roll Kipper releases soon includes this purity of spirit.
Also include the pedal steel, I want this young man to show off more pedal steel.
Kipper Snack at Studebaker Studios in Provo
Anais Chantal (Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup local feature)
Anais Chantal released Where Do I Go?? just a couple of months ago. Salt Lake’s Chantal drops between soul and torchlit piano ballads. This is difficult territory to stand out! Chantal has the voice to pull it off, although not all of the melodies here cut through for me.
The opener “CLASSIC” captures Chantal’s presence and range perfectly.
Hippo Campus
Bright indie pop not wildly removed from The Killers, the Minneapolis veterans have been around since 2013. Hippo Campus last month released the Wasteland EP, from which the fan favorite seems to be “Yippie Ki Yay.”
Kilby Block Party Saturday lineup: Other bands playing
I could have and maybe should have broken out The Moss and Josh Doss separately. Links provided for all.
Let’s continue this weekend’s exploration of Nordic indie pop with the February album Sata syytä aloittaa by Helsinki’s Teini-Pää. The band Teini-Pää play divine 2 minute guitar pop gems just as catchy as 2022 darlings Alvvays. Now BEFORE YOU STOP READING because the vocals aren’t sung in American, take 2:18 to see if the song “Ydintyttö” persuades you that you need to know more.
That’s one extraordinary blast of power pop right?! Whatever tongue you speak…Finnish, Swedish, Spanish…we all understand the International Language of rock. Before getting into any background, I want to be sure you’re fully on board. If not, begone!
The guitars get a little scuzzier on Teini-Pää‘s “4567.” This isn’t your mother’s Finnish bubblegum pop. Just a 3 minute blast of guitars and harmonies from an alternate indie pop universe called Northern Europe.
Band Teini-Pää hits its stride with 2nd album Sata syytä aloittaa
Like me, you probably didn’t know about this remarkable Helsinki indie pop band that is one EP and two albums into its career. Teini-Pää (“Teenage Head”) has been releasing music for about four years. Here is early single, “Lähtisitkö.” (“Would You Go”)
The quintet seems to tour between Helsinki and Turku, in far SW Finland across the Baltic from Stockholm. They have a website with fun facts about each member, including what appears to be a mutual fondness for vissy (sparkling water?), The Go-Go’s and yoga. I’ve conveniently linked an English translation of the band’s website for you here.
If you haven’t heard Denmark’s Appleseeds! what are you even doing?!
February’s Sata syytä aloittaa (“100 Hundred Reasons to Start”), published by Finland’s Soit Se Silti is a blast from start to finish. Google translates Teini-Pää’s own description of their band from its website as “puff pop.” It may just be a bad translation? The 90 seconds of “Aamulla” sounds like power pop to me!
I made a deliberate decision to jump start 2023 by listening to the first great alternative songs new to January.
That’s what you’re going to hear below. While the first couple weeks of the year always seem to be catchup mode on Best Of lists for the year before, you will 100% fall in love with the new music already dropping in 2023.
Let’s have a listen!
Alternative songs new for your January playlist
Each of these songs shot out of the cannon in the first four weeks of the new year.
I haven’t finished listening to all the indie songs new to January, but these are the ones that caught my immediate attention. Each tune comes with a link to buy the song or album and support the artist. Make that a new year’s resolution in 2023! Support independent musicians by paying them for their art!
1. “Dark Moon” – GRMLN (Dark Moon)
We were just four days into the new year when Yoodoo Park of Kyoto, Japan, released Dark Moon and its tasty title track. Park’s GRMLN has been at this for a decade and doesn’t find these dream pop guitar lines by accident. I didn’t hear an entire album of these hooks on Dark Moon but the title track is one of the promising alternative songs new to January 2023.
2. “Mile Marker 29” – The Bad Ends (The Power and the Glory)
You know who you don’t hear a lot about in the year 2023? REM drummer Billy Berry.
Bill’s been taking it easy – the royalty checks probably still clear. After a health scare in the 90’s, Berry has been hay farming outside Athens the last 25 years. A chance meeting with Mike Mantionelead to new band The Bad Ends and Berry’s return to music. Have a listen to “Mile Marker 29.”
The Rills have a super dancy Franz Ferdinand thing happening.
It was especially clear on “Landslide,” which The Rills released last fall. Two weeks ago, they dropped “Falling Apart.” The Rills’ second EP, depending on where you get your info, will be available in February.
4. fine. – “New Skin/Good Life” (Love, Death, Dreams and the Sleep Between)
What I really dig about Boston’s fine. is this grade school choir sound they’ve perfected.
Bubblegum pop songs by Alice Kat and Liam James Marsh will wake you from your winter doldrums and get you dancing again. Although I’m including fine. in my January list of tunes…Love, Death, Dreams came out three days before Christmas, so sue me. Hit play and fall in love!
The Murder Capital don’t care if search to find the melodies in Gigi’s Recovery. But the Dubliners are also so good at what they do, they can’t keep the hooks from bursting through the dissonance.
You’ll hear TMC winking at James Murphy’s masterpiece “All My Friends” in their drooping cacophony, “Ethel.” It’s a slow build, so don’t give up on this one.
Let me tell you what I know about The Spooky Boys, which is close to nothing. They’re billed as “Portland’s premier indie/surf rock group featuring jangly dripping wet guitars, relentless driving rhythm, and insatiable catchy melodies.” Admittedly I didn’t know “jangly wet guitars” was a thing, nor that The Spooky Boys were Portland’s exemplar.
I DO KNOW superior power pop when I hear it. So check out one of the best indie songs new to 2023, “Past Tense.”
If Priestgate look miserable, their single “White Shirt” is a delirious balance of pop sugar and darker 80’s Cure vibes. I’m looking forward to hearing Priestgate’s second EP due on March 3. I have to say I love the rhythm and vocal desperation of “White Shirt.”
I get it, a band with a name and sound like Toronto’s FU is not going to appeal to everyone reading this post, and that’s a shame.
The arrangements and (honestly) melodies underneath Damian Abraham’s vocals are second to none. It is remarkable hardcore guitar rock. Hang with it for two minutes and think about what songs like “Huge New Her” would sound like with actual singing.
My FU collection goes back, if not to their origin, to their remarkable David Comes to Life. Abraham sang a bit more on David than on One Day. So, for context, a bonus track: “The Other Shoe” from 2011’s landmark David Comes to Life.
On no planet was I going to suggest a batch of my favorite alternative songs new to January without some of the best Spanish-language indie pop (*makes note to subscribe to Rosetta Stone). “Cuchillos” is the fourth single from LISASINSON’s pending full length. I’ve already started following Elefant Records to make sure I don’t miss the album by the Valencia, Spain art students.
10. “Skeleton Boy” – Strange Neighbors (Party of None EP)
Let’s stick with the power pop sound. I bet Strange Neighbors are a fun show. Just look at them, having fun with a camera like good self-entertaining kids. The Party of None EP came out two weeks ago, and I recommend you download and inject one of the indie songs new to January that will get your party started.
This month Chicago singer-songwriter Maria Jacobson released her second album, Leaving. It’s sweeping acoustic folk with song titles like “Winter” and “God.” Those feel like difficult motifs to live up to. Much of this rests on Fran’s voice and lyrics, like Weyes Blood striped bare of the chamber orchestra.
Kelley Deal, Kim’s twin and most famous sister, delivers on R. Ring with partner Mike Montgomery.
Deal is involved in a ton of stuff in addition to R. Ring, including Breeders reboots and Protomartyr. I love Kelley’s comeback story, the Breeders’ icy cool baked into R. Ring and her indie rock confidence. Check out the payoff halfway through War Poems’ lead, “Still Life.”
I confess, another 2022 song but – come onnnn! — Denmark’s appleseeds! dropped this song on December 31. You were probably already asleep, so it’s officially one of the alternative songs new to January in my book. Too Good to be True Records indicates appleseeds! will release æblefrø on February 3.
Check out “Hungry Mouth” and get set for what promises to be an album of jangle pop perfection!.
Sabrina Teitelbaum is LA’s Blondshell, who writes about her toxic relationships with a candor that couldn’t care less. Dark indie rock echoing influences like PJ Harvey and Courtney Love. Some of it is sexualized, some of it is just dysfunctional emotion like “Sepsis.”
15. “Anglepoise” – The Happy Somethings (A Gathering of Sorts)
Let’s finish this list with 90 seconds of fist-pumping guitar rock. England’s The Happy Somethings roll the rhythm from Bow Wow Wow’s “I Love Candy” under bubblegum guitar fuzz and twee Bangles vocals.
You’ll be singing “Anglepoise” all day, and you’re welcome.
